The Commanders

by Bob Woodward

  • • •

  The next day, November 29, the United Nations Security Council met to vote on an authorization to use force to expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait. If it passed, the resolution would be the broadest authority for war it had granted since Korea in 1950.

  Baker had touched down in various world capitals to bring key heads of state on board and iron out the language of the resolution. He had spent ten weeks traveling 100,000 miles and had held more than 200 meetings with foreign ministers and heads of state.

  His strategy had been to obtain ironclad assurances of support from the key U.N. countries before publicly acknowledging that the administration was even seeking a resolution on the use of force. He had hedged, saying repeatedly that he was taking soundings and that such a resolution was merely under consideration.

  Any one of the five permanent members of the Security Council—the United States, China, Great Britain, France or the Soviet Union—could veto the resolution. The Chinese turned out not to be much of a problem; early on, they agreed not to veto. Britain’s Prime Minister Thatcher was ready and willing to use force. The French were a problem and required a major effort, but Bush and Baker had succeeded in bringing them on board.

  The Soviets were the big question mark. From the beginning of the crisis, Gorbachev had opposed the possibility of military force, but he had finally come around. Bush administration lawyers had said it would be best for the resolution language to be a model of clarity, spelling out directly the authority for use of force.

  In a series of conversations and meetings in the weeks and days leading up to the U.N. vote, Baker and Soviet Foreign Minister Shevardnadze had hashed it out.

  Baker presented Shevardnadze with a draft that included the phrase “use of force.”

  “Can you live with this?” Baker asked.

  “After our Afghanistan experience, that won’t fly with the Soviet people,” Shevardnadze said. There had to be some other way, an indirect way of saying it, a euphemism. The Soviets could support the idea of force but the resolution itself had to be vague.

  Baker said that would be hard. Force was force, after all, and they could not run the risk of not saying exactly what they meant. Scribbling on a piece of paper, Baker tried out some ideas—lawyerly phrases to substitute for “use of force.” He tried five different formulations.

  In one of their conversations, Shevardnadze said he wanted some language that would allow force but also encompass all other possible measures—diplomacy, sanctions, anything that might work. The broader the better.

  How about “all necessary means,” Baker proposed. In Russian, the same word could be used for “means” and “measures.”

  They went back and forth. Soon Shevardnadze was favoring “all necessary means.” It was the broadest phrase they had found.

  Now Baker backed off his own phrase. It was too indefinite.

  “The United States knows what ’all necessary means’ is,” Shevardnadze said. “Don’t embarrass us. Don’t push us. Don’t be extreme.” Shevardnadze said for the Soviets it wasn’t a moral problem, it was a practical problem. The Soviet Union could not go to the United Nations and be seen voting for war. At home, war still meant Afghanistan.

  Baker said the United States wanted to avoid ambiguity. The Gulf policy was too volatile at home, and the Bush administration did not want a domestic debate on the meaning of a U.N. resolution.

  Shevardnadze was immovable. Finally Baker gave in and they settled on “all necessary means.” The coalition would be authorized to use “all necessary means” to eject Saddam’s forces from Kuwait if he had not pulled them out by the resolution’s deadline, January 15, 1991.

  Baker said that since he would be the temporary president of the Security Council during the vote, he would speak afterwards and characterize the resolution as an unambiguous authority to use “force.” That would be a permanent part of the record, and if no one objected, it would stand as the interpretation of “all necessary means.”

  Fine, Shevardnadze said.

  The Soviet foreign minister had another problem. He wanted the resolution to include language devised by President Gorbachev stating that the six weeks before the January 15 deadline was “a pause of goodwill.” Gorbachev was proud of that language. He wanted the 45-day delay to be a real opportunity for diplomacy to work. The Soviet leader intended to exploit the Soviet-Iraqi bilateral relationship and seek a peaceful solution. He considered the phrase nonnegotiable, a diplomatic sine qua non. Without it, the Soviets could not support the resolution.

  Baker agreed.

  Before the vote, Shevardnadze said to Baker, “Mr. Secretary, you know you can’t back off once you start down the road. You will have to implement the resolution” if January 15 passes without an Iraqi withdrawal.

  “I’m afraid you’re right,” Baker said.

  The resolution passed 12 to 2. Yemen and Cuba were the two countries voting against it. China abstained.

  In his address to the Security Council, Baker said: “Today’s resolution is very clear. The words authorize the use of force, but the purpose, I believe, and again as many have already said, is to bring about a peaceful resolution of this problem.”

  • • •

  Prince Bandar, delighted by the U.N. resolution, received word that night that the Iraqi ambassador to the United Nations wanted to see him. It was an emergency. At last, Bandar thought, Saddam was scared. The resolution was already having an impact. Bandar agreed to set up a meeting for the next day.

  At 10:30 the following morning Bandar received a call at home from the White House, saying that President Bush wanted to arrange a phone call with King Fahd for noon.

  About what? Bandar inquired.

  Nothing special, just to check in with His Majesty.

  Bandar soon received word that President Bush was going to be on television at 11 a.m. He sat down in front of a television.

  Bush appeared and went through a 20-paragraph statement about his Gulf policy, listing all the steps he had taken. “However, to go the extra mile for peace,” he said, he would receive Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz in Washington. “In addition, I’m asking Secretary Jim Baker to go to Baghdad to see Saddam Hussein . . . at a mutually convenient time between December 15th and January 15th of next year.”

  Bandar nearly shot out of his chair in disbelief and surprise. How stupid, he thought. Americans would never understand Arabs. A peace offering 24 hours after the United States and the coalition had scored the United Nations victory would send precisely the wrong message to Saddam: a message of weakness. Bandar complained to the White House.

  Why did you not consult with us? he asked Scowcroft. The timing could not have been worse. The offer to meet right up to the deadline of January 15 would be an invitation for Saddam to stall. Bandar predicted that Saddam would offer to receive Baker on January 14. To you, Bandar said, sending Baker is goodwill; to Saddam, it suggests you’re chicken.

  Scowcroft replied that he was not crazy about the timing, not enough thought had been given to it. It had been a last-minute decision—but a needed step to prove to Congress and the American public that the President was willing to exhaust all diplomatic alternatives before war. Baker’s offer to visit Baghdad demonstrated that the “pause of goodwill” was being taken seriously.

  Maybe it was the right domestic message, Bandar conceded, but it was the wrong telegram to Saddam. King Fahd was extremely displeased at the failure to consult with him. What is going to happen if there is a war? Bandar asked. Are we going to get a call saying, “Oh by the way, we just started”?

  Bandar also spoke with the Iraqi mission at the United Nations, inquiring about the emergency meeting Saddam’s ambassador had requested the night before. The staff said the Iraqi ambassador just wanted to chat, he hadn’t seen Bandar for a long time. There was no reason in particular to meet, and certainly there was no emergency.

  Bandar concluded that Bush and Baker had given Saddam great comfort at
what should have been the Iraqi leader’s moment of greatest distress.

  • • •

  Baker had recommended the Baghdad mission to Bush. He had been thinking of it for weeks. He had never been to Iraq and never met Saddam. By every account available to Baker, Saddam was pathological. He literally shot people who brought him bad news. And he was totally isolated. The Soviets had told Baker that the only way to get a message to this guy was to sit before him and state it.

  The domestic political considerations were as important to Baker as the diplomatic possibilities. Public support for the administration policy was dropping, Sam Nunn was challenging Bush, former Joint Chiefs chairmen were testifying against the policy. Now that the United Nations had authorized force, people were scared. The President had to stop the political bleeding, Baker had argued.

  Cheney thought there was no harm in trying the Baker mission. He dismissed suggestions by some of his staff that Baker would make a deal at any cost and get taken to the cleaners by Saddam. Cheney knew the President’s mind and he knew that Baker knew the President’s mind.

  When The Washington Post published a poll showing that 90 percent of Americans approved of the Baker-to-Baghdad offer, Bandar received three separate calls directing his attention to the wide support. The calls were from Scowcroft, Baker and Cheney.

  • • •

  Later on November 30 Bush met with the congressional leadership in the Cabinet Room. The announcement of the Baker mission had nearly all the two dozen men in a jocular, even boisterous mood. The atmosphere was like a men’s clubhouse, with much backslapping and joking. It only calmed down when Bush took his seat. Quayle, Baker, Scowcroft, Cheney and Sununu also sat down.

  “The Secretary of State has been engaged in a marathon to get the United Nations on board,” Bush said. “He knows of the difficulty concerning the issue of force. It’s a combination of [our increased] deployment and the United Nations resolution which gives us the best chance to get a peaceful resolution of the issue.” The President added, “I know there are differences around the table, and with former chiefs. But I want to show you I have no second thoughts at all.” The Iraqi nuclear weapons potential is a real danger, he said. “And I’m going to err on the side of caution.”

  Bush mentioned his concern about oil and the effects of increased energy costs worldwide.

  “There is brutality in Kuwait,” he said. “We really ought to care.” He became very emotional. “If the United States can’t care about this, then I don’t know. I’m not sure that up to yesterday, maybe even today, that Saddam Hussein thinks that the United States is serious.”

  Baker is going to Baghdad and Aziz is coming to Washington, Bush continued. He said these would not be sessions to find common ground, to let Saddam save face. “He doesn’t deserve it.”

  The President said he hoped Saddam got the message, that the purpose was not to find a compromise. A compromise would guarantee that the coalition would vanish.

  “If the Congress wants to come back and endorse the U.N. resolution, let’s go. But let’s not have a hung jury. If you can’t support, frankly, I’d be wary. So I’d welcome your support.”

  Then Bush turned the meeting over to Baker. “In this 45-day period, let us use the threat of force to solve this peacefully,” the Secretary of State urged. “It’s the only hope we have, unless you want us to buy off on a compromise. The threat of force is not the same as the use of force.” In a beseeching tone, he added, “You’ve got to give us the threat as a diplomatic tool.”

  Speaker Tom Foley praised the administration for being open and forthcoming. He said that Bush should consult the new Congress in January, adding that he thought the allies would support economic sanctions for a year.

  Bush shook his head at this.

  “If after January 15th you decide to go to war, you’ll have to come to Congress,” Foley added.

  Senator Mitchell was emphatic on the same point: a vote was necessary and constitutionally required. As the Senate Majority Leader spoke, Bush stared coldly in the other direction.

  Bush said: “Don’t underestimate the strength of the signal it would send if Congress would endorse the U.N. resolution. It would be the most powerful guarantee of getting his [Saddam’s] attention. . . . There’s an enormous price to pay if we try to help him save face.”

  Sam Nunn said there was common ground. “Iraq has to get out of Kuwait. The question is: with or without war? There’s a difference between the U.N. voting and our people going to die. Secondly, time is on our side. . . . The strategy’s working. It’s working. We’re winning.”

  Baker, looking for consensus, asked whether Congress might approve offensive operations limited to the use of superior allied airpower. “If we are unified on the use of air, could you give us that?”

  “No,” Mitchell said.

  Senator Cohen cited Mark Twain’s observation that a man would fight to defend his home, but that he might have a different view toward a boardinghouse. “Right now, the American people are not persuaded that Kuwait is in fact our home, or Saudi Arabia’s our home, but rather the equivalent of the boardinghouse. . . . Why are we willing to die for the Kuwaitis at this moment?”

  Cohen told Bush that he had to answer that satisfactorily. “The second question is, what kind of a war is it going to be? The notion that we’re somehow going to use our land forces to go in and dig the Iraqis out of Kuwait only generates images of young men and women being stacked up like cordwood.”

  Senator Alan Simpson of Wyoming, the Republican Whip, interjected that the U.N. resolution was for peace, not war. A hung jury would be a disaster. Cohen and some of the others were dropping a bag on old George Bush, talking about bodies as cordwood.

  “I’ve never said anything publicly,” Cohen replied. “I’m telling you what’s in their minds.”

  Senator Lugar told the group that he had counted seven times in the meeting when the President had appealed for the support of the Congress, yet the congressional leaders were saying they weren’t going to give it. “It just seems inconceivable that we are going to leave it at this,” Lugar said. There is no more important issue facing the country, he said, and the Congress has to stand up to its responsibility. “It’s imperative to find a way out of this dilemma that we face.”

  Cheney pointed out that it was a massive undertaking to move the 200,000 additional troops to the Gulf. Some 600 trains were being used just to transport the forces out of Europe.

  “We don’t need another Vietnam War,” Bush said. The logistics would be different. “World unity is there. No hands are going to be tied behind backs. This is not a Vietnam. . . . I know whose backside’s at stake and rightfully so. It will not be a long, drawn-out mess. As Mubarak says, we trained the Iraqi pilots. They stink.”

  The room filled with laughter again.

  * * *

  I. As described in the Prologue, pp. 35–39.

  * * *

  23

  * * *

  ON SATURDAY, DECEMBER 1, the chiefs went to Camp David to meet with the President. They had done some private grousing about not having seen the President in the middle of the largest military deployment since Vietnam.

  Admiral Kelso and General Gray gave straightforward descriptions of the forces from their services that were in the theater or on their way.

  General Vuono said that the size and power of the U.S. force would convince Saddam that he could only lose. “Is this son-of-a-bitch really dumb enough to fight us?” the Army chief asked.

  General McPeak, the newest chief, expanded his presentation into a forecast. If the offense is launched, he said, the air operation ought to last about 30 days before a ground operation begins. Mr. President, you will lose about four to five airplanes a day or about a total of 150 airplanes down over the 30 days.

  Bush did not show any emotion.

  About half the pilots would be rescued, McPeak estimated. A quarter would be killed. The other quarter would be made prisoners o
f war and paraded on television through downtown Baghdad. There would be accidents, mistakes, he said. The precision missiles and bombs would not all perform perfectly. Damage to military targets would spill over to civilian areas. McPeak estimated that the bombing would kill 2,000 Iraqi civilians—people the President was not angry at. McPeak said he thought that overall the 30-day bombing campaign would destroy 50 percent of the main Iraqi military equipment on the ground—tanks, artillery and armored personnel carriers.

  Privately, McPeak thought it would be greater than 50 percent, but he knew that over the years airpower advocates had discredited themselves with wild predictions.

  • • •

  Cheney thought the United Nations resolution on the use of force was a watershed for the President. Bush now had many of his international friends, most of the major heads of state—Gorbachev, Thatcher, Mubarak and Fahd—in an unusual coalition. If Saddam did not withdraw during this 45-day pause, Cheney did not doubt that Bush would use the military to drive Iraq out.

  The Secretary had been asked to be the first witness to testify at Nunn’s committee hearings on the Gulf operation, but he had declined. The White House, less confident it would have its way in Congress than in the United Nations, did not want anyone from the administration testifying while the U.N. resolution was being debated. Instead, Crowe and several others critical of Bush’s push for an offensive option had opened the hearings.

  Cheney agreed to appear in the second week of the hearings. He and Powell would testify together.

  Make the opening statement long, Cheney had instructed his staff, make it very long. Not only did he want to lay out all his reasoning; he wanted the senators to be exhausted by the question period so he would have an easier time.

  At the December 3 hearing, Cheney read aloud a lengthy statement reviewing the entire history of the Gulf operation. He said that since Saddam would probably be able to ride out sanctions, force was the only way to guarantee that Iraq got out of Kuwait.