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War-on-Iraq-allies embarrassed by Iraq’s swift response to return of inspectors
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LONDON,
September 18 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) – U.K. newspapers
reported Wednesday, September 18, that Iraqi diplomacy in accepting to
readmit the weapon inspectors has put the U.S. and the U.K. in an
awkward situation.
While
the initial response from the White House was that they had expected
this all along, there was a period of strange silence that followed,
not just from President Bush but from opposition politicians, reported
the Guardian.
“In
truth, everyone was trying to digest the implications,” the paper
said.
“If
Mr. Bush really had anticipated this, he would have handled things a
little differently. For four and a half days, since his masterful
speech last Thursday, he has dominated the global diplomatic agenda in
a manner he has not managed since this time last year, in the days
after the September 11 attacks,” it added.
“I
believe they did expect an offer from Saddam over the inspectors, but
not this fast, and not this pure,” said Judith Kipper of the Centre
for Strategic and International Studies, the Guardian quoted her
saying. “There are so many questions now. It has become a very, very
fluid situation.”
In
an optimistic note, the paper also said that Bush’s decision top go
via the security council means that it is the U.N. and not the
administration that must now decide the pace of events.
Meanwhile
the Telegraph also reported on Wednesday, September 18, that
Saddam’s offer could hardly have come at a worse time for U.K. Prime
Minister Tony Blair.
“Just
as the Prime
Minister appeared to be winning round a skeptical public to the
prospect of American-led military action, Baghdad regained the
diplomatic initiative with its apparent cave-in to demands to allow
the unconditional return of the U.N. inspectors,” said the
newspaper.
The
paper added that a public opinion poll said on Tuesday, September 17,
that the British public’s opposition to military action had fallen
sharply over the last three weeks as a result of Britain and
America’s willingness to seek U.N. backing for their action and a
concerted campaign to highlight Saddam’s attempts to develop nuclear
weapons.
Senior
Labor MPs predicted Saddam’s offer would make it more difficult for
Blair to hold together the international coalition against Iraq as
well as raising fresh doubts at home about the prospect of going to
war, said the Telegraph adding that there was a clear sense of relief
among many Labor MPs yesterday that intense diplomatic pressure on
Saddam had brought the first signs that military action might be
averted.
The
Times said that Iraq’s offer to readmit the inspectors complicates
Bush’s desire to get swift support backing the ousting of President
Saddam Hussein both in the international community and on Capitol
Hill.
The
Times also said in a separate article that the move led Gerhard Schröder,
the German Chancellor, who has been resisting a war against Saddam, to
hail the Iraqi move as a triumph for the United Nations, but he could
not disguise that he had been wrong-footed and may have lost his key
election-winning theme.
Edmund
Stoiber, the conservative rival for the chancellery, made political
capital out of Herr Schröder’s embarrassment. “He has been
trying to make this election into a choice between war and peace,”
Herr Stoiber said. “But I hope that people today can see how Schröder
has isolated us from the United Nations and, indeed, from the world.
Schröder has contributed nothing to this solution. I think voters
will now see through him.”
