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Blair
faces a tough job of selling striking Iraq to his own cabinet
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LONDON,
September 14 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - British Defense
Secretary Geoff Hoon, returned from Kuwait Saturday, September 14,
2002, with full details of what America wants Britain to provide
towards the forces lined up against Iraq. Prime Minister Tony Blair,
however, faced deepening Labor disquiet over Iraq despite President
George W Bush's promise to seek United Nations support for action to
force Saddam Hussein to give up his weapons of mass destruction.
The
renewed criticism overshadowed a long-awaited declaration of support
for Blair's plans by Gordon Brown, the Chancellor of the Exchequer,
according to British daily The Telegraph.
Bush
said Friday that he was "highly doubtful" that Iraq would
comply with UN resolutions and made clear that war was all but
inevitable.
Tariq
Aziz, the Iraqi deputy Prime Minister, raised the tension when he
rejected the demand for unconditional access for UN weapons
inspectors.
As
military preparations reached a new pitch, it emerged that a team of
British planners has begun to identify targets in Iraq for an
escalation of attacks by U.S. and British aircraft.
Reports
from the United States suggested that U.S. and British special forces
were already in Western Iraq to prevent deploying Scud missile
launchers for an attack on Israel.
At
the same time, around 6,000 British troops were preparing to move
stores and equipment to Marchwood, near Southampton, for a major
logistics exercise.
Although
officials continue to insist that no decision has been made on whether
to go ahead, they admit that contingency plans are in place.
The
Ministry of Defense has set up a Target Planning Group to select
targets for attacks by U.S. and British aircraft on the no-fly zones
in Iraq.
Senior
defense sources confirmed that Tornado GR4s patrolling the zones would
be equipped with precision-guided Storm Shadow missiles to provide
"more punch", the paper said.
General
Tommy Franks, the U.S. commander in the region, is known to want an
extremely strong force of about 250,000 - including a British armored
division - to attack Iraq on three fronts.
Donald
Rumsfeld, the U.S. Defense Secretary, insists that all possible
options must be examined and that Franks should think "out of the
box" to come up with plans, but a full-scale invasion is seen as
the only realistic choice.
That
would require three thrusts, one by U.S. airborne troops, probably
accompanied by elements of the Colchester-based 16 Air Assault
Brigade, to occupy Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq.
British
and U.S. special forces are already on the ground in the region and
U.S. air force engineers have already re-laid three large air bases.
The
second thrust would be an amphibious assault on the south via Bubiyan
island by a U.S. Marine Corps expeditionary force, possibly including
the Royal Marines 3 Commando Brigade.
This
would be bound to involve the British Navy, since the area is heavily
mined and America has no specialist mine-seeking ships. It is also
expected to involve the aircraft carrier Ark Royal and the amphibious
assault carrier Ocean.
Ark
Royal is on its way to the Mediterranean, where it will be joined by
the destroyers Southampton and Edinburgh prior to carrying out
amphibious landing exercises with other NATO forces.
The
third and final phase will be a classic armored advance from Kuwait
into southern Iraq by five armored divisions, one of them the Army's
main armored force, 1 Armored Division, based at Herford in Germany.
However,
the growing prospect of British troops being involved in an
American-led action against Iraq provoked renewed discontent among
Labor's rank and file.
Chris
Smith, British former Culture Secretary, said that an attack on Iraq
could result in a "disintegration of the international coalition
on terrorism", with potentially disastrous consequences for
stability in the Middle East.
In
an interview for GMTV's Sunday Program, to be broadcast Sunday, Smith
said: "My sense is that the Labor Party overwhelmingly is
extremely anxious about what is happening here. People don't think we
should be going gung-ho into a military conflict," according to
Telegraph.
Smith
urged the Cabinet to restrain the Prime Minister over any attack.
Gerald
Kaufman, a veteran backbencher, said he would support military action
if it was authorized by a UN resolution on the basis of Iraq refusing
to comply with demands to disarm.
But
Blair should say "no" to Bush "if the UN doesn't pass a
resolution authorizing action and America decides to take action
anyhow", Kaufman told BBC News 24's One to One program.
A
member of Labor's national executive committee, Ann Black, said party
members were considering resigning their membership because they were
"alarmed and disturbed" by Blair's stance on Iraq. But she
said many in the party would accept an explicit UN authorization of
the use of force.
On
Friday, September 13, Margaret Beckett became the highest-profile
member of the Cabinet to express doubts openly about launching a
military attack against Iraq.
The
British Environment Secretary highlighted the effect a bombing
campaign or invasion would have on the economic prospects of the Iraqi
people.
Her
comments were measured, and well within what Downing Street would
regard to be the bounds of acceptable ministerial comment on the
subject, according to Telegraph.
However,
when asked about Iraq in an interview, she made a point of expressing
reservations which she could easily have kept to herself.
When
Beckett was asked on the BBC's Breakfast whether she was opposed to
the idea of Britain joining America in an invasion of Iraq, she
started by saying that the prospect was "theoretical". But
then she went on to stress the disadvantages.
"If
there is a proposal, then we shall all have to consider it in our own
sphere and in our own ways," she said.
"I
also share the view of those who say both that conflict in the world
does contribute to poverty and also that poverty and environmental
degradation go very much hand in hand." Menzies Campbell, the
Liberal Democrats' Foreign Affairs spokesman, said her
"carefully-chosen words" were significant.
"The
Prime Minister will have a real job on his hands trying to take his
Cabinet with him on military action against Iraq.
"Beckett's
reservations demonstrate that the Prime Minister has not yet satisfied
his most senior colleagues," Campbell said. In March, Miss Short
twice made clear she would resign from the Government if Britain
supported an attack on Iraq.
