WASHINGTON, July 11 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – If U.S. President George W. Bush fails to attack Iraq at the beginning of next year, he may have missed his chance, Times Online reported Thursday, July 11.

The paper said that the Pentagon is unlikely to consider sending thousands of U.S. troops across the desert in the following summer months, when temperatures rarely fall below 100F.

There is an opportunity to strike in the autumn of next year, officials say, but waiting until then risks the fighting spilling over into 2004, leaving Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s fate unresolved at the start of a presidential election year, something that Republican political strategists are loath to contemplate, Times Online reported.

Despite Bush’s early rhetoric against Saddam, his room for maneuver has always been limited by the calendar. Reports of an invasion being launched this autumn were always likely to be wide of the mark, it said, adding that Americans go to the polls in early November for the critical mid-term elections and Republican strategists do not want their quest to regain control of the Senate wrecked by the unpredictability of war.

Although Bush enjoys the tacit support of many leading Democrats for taking on Saddam, that could change in the ruthlessly partisan atmosphere likely to prevail in 2004.

Times Online also said that mistakes and reverses in a war that left thousands of Americans dead could hurt Bush in a presidential campaign, especially if exploited by a canny Democrat who presented criticism as patriotism.

There are early signs, however, that Bush will not enjoy a free political ride.

Joe Biden, the Democrat chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said Wednesday, July 10, that he wanted to question administration officials in public this autumn about their proposals for Iraq.

Bush has public opinion with him in targeting Iraq, but there are signs that it is weakening.

A recent Gallup poll found that support for sending troops into Iraq has fallen from 74% in November 2001 to 59%. White House officials want to use support while it is there.

A Fox News poll found that 75% of Americans would support Bush authorizing the CIA to use deadly force to overthrow Saddam, a step that he has not taken. Fifty-five per cent think that Washington should try to assassinate Saddam.

According to the article, Bush set a clock ticking in his State of the Union address in January, when he labeled Iraq as part of an axis of evil, along with Iran and North Korea.

Bush said that the trio posed a “grave and growing danger”. He said that time was not on America’s side and added: “I will not wait on events while dangers gather. I will not stand by as peril draws closer and closer.”

By the time that Bush stands before Congress next January, he will need to demonstrate that he is living up to his own rhetoric, and acting. Yet the U.S. administration remains deeply divided about what precisely the mission should be, let alone how to accomplish it.

Personality clashes have also frustrated the war planning. While Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld strongly believes that the mission should be focused entirely on Saddam, Secretary of State Colin Powell wants a broader brief, to include the transition to a democratic successor regime, the kind of nation-building that Bush derided in his 2000 presidential election campaign, it said.

“The success in Afghanistan has emboldened some in the Administration, who say that it shows that intervention will be welcomed if it is swift and decisive. Officials talk increasingly about the search for an “Iraqi Karzai”, referring to the new President of Afghanistan,” the paper reported.

In the past the U.S. President’s National Security Advisers have thrown their weight around in debates between the Pentagon and State Department. The role assumed by Condoleezza Rice is different. She takes a back seat in debates, acting as a private summarizer for the President.

The arrangement pitches Rumsfeld against Powell, a fault line that is likely to grow as planning intensifies.

Bush confirmed this week that he was playing a central role. “I’m involved in the military planning,” he told a press conference.