--The Option of Diplomacy-- |
| Reports that U.N.
Secretary-General Kofi Annan would travel to Iraq to try to defuse the crisis are being
discounted here and at the United Nations. Whatever diplomacy is going on is limited,
officials said. Cohen, speaking at a Pentagon photo session with Singapore’s defense minister, Tony Tan, said he has decided to hasten the movement of the USS Enterprise aircraft carrier and a group of Marine warships into the region in case the United States chooses the military option. Asked what airstrikes against Iraq might achieve, Cohen said the goal would be to make sure Saddam, in the absence of U.N. inspections, is not reconstituting his weapons of mass destruction. “We’d consider the possibility of degrading his capability of manufacturing the weapons of mass destruction, or the means of delivering them, of posing a threat to the region. ... It would be a significant degradation of his capacity,” Cohen said, adding that he hoped it would not be necessary to take such steps. Cohen said that despite an accident on the USS Enterprise that claimed the lives of several crew members, he’d ordered the carrier and its battle group to cut several days from its planned transit to the region. That would put it in the Persian Gulf by Nov. 23, Cohen said. He’d also ordered a Marine task force led by the USS Belleau Wood to do the same, he said. The Enterprise was due to swap out of the region with the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, now in the Gulf. The Belleau Wood, which is normally based in Okinawa, Japan, is slated to arrive by Nov. 26, and replace the Marines there now, led by the USS Essex. Clinton, at a weekend meeting, had asked for more diplomatic and military options. White House press secretary Joe Lockhart said today’s meeting was “part of the military options process.” Lockhart said the meeting should send Saddam the message that “the world community is determined that he reverse course and allow full cooperation with (U.N.) inspectors. And that all options remain on the table should he decide on his current course.” He said no decisions were expected from the meeting. |