WASHINGTON/BAGHDAD, 8 February 2003 — The United States built up its war force yesterday, putting two more aircraft carriers on notice to leave for the Gulf and launching new warnings at Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
But the US move to garner support for a military strike failed to convince the world with Russia, Germany France and China opposing a new UN resolution to sanction war.
The USS Nimitz and USS Kitty Hawk and their battle groups are being readied to leave for the Gulf, a US Navy official said.
Four other carriers are either in the Gulf or eastern Mediterranean or are on the way and two others are ready to leave from the United States. The Nimitz is based in California and the Kitty Hawk in Japan.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld rallied US troops during a visit to Italy yesterday. Any war with Iraq would last “six days, maybe six weeks” but certainly less than six months, Rumsfeld told troops during a visit to the US Air Force’s 31st Fighter Wing at Aviano in northern Italy.
Rumsfeld said that international diplomatic efforts to get Iraq to disarm had failed.“Not only have the diplomatic efforts failed to get Saddam Hussein to cooperate and disarm himself of his weapons of mass destruction, but so too have economic sanctions and the so-called oil for food program have failed to get him to disarm.”
The United States is massing tens of thousands of troops in the Gulf, with 150,000 expected to be in place by the end of next week.
Parallel to the military buildup, the US administration is stepping up diplomatic pressure in the showdown with Iraq. President George W. Bush warned the Iraqi leader on Thursday that “the game is over” as he again urged the United Nations to make a stand against Iraq. To follow up Bush’s comments, the White House warned yesterday that the United States “will not put up with any last-minute games of deception” from Saddam. “No more cheat and retreat, no more deny and deceive,” White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters. Washington also announced that it is closing the US interests section at the Polish Embassy in Baghdad, severing its final diplomatic link with Iraq in a move that normally precedes armed conflict.
Meanwhile, world opposition to war increased yesterday.
French President Jacques Chirac insisted yesterday there was still an alternative to war in Iraq while a senior official hinted Paris might use its veto to block any UN resolution authorizing a military intervention there.
Russia said it will oppose a second UN resolution authorizing the use of force against Baghdad should Iraq fail to disarm.
“Today, we see no basis for adopting a UN Security Council resolution that would open the way for the use of force against Iraq,” Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said. “It is very possible to solve the problem of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq through political means,” said Ivanov as he called for UN weapons inspections to continue. Germany also said yesterday that a second UN resolution on Iraq was “not necessary for the moment” and that UN weapons inspectors must be allowed to continue their work in the country.
In Beijing, Chinese state TV reported yesterday that Chinese President Jiang Zemin and his French counterpart Jacques Chirac agreed that weapons inspectors should be allowed to continue their work in Iraq.
In Vienna, chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix said that Iraq appeared to be “making an effort” to cooperate with his disarmament mission.
The comment came after UN experts held their first private interview with an Iraqi scientist ahead of a key visit to Baghdad beginning today by Blix and the head of the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Mohamed El-Baradei.
Meanwhile, Arab countries are preparing for emergency meetings in the Egyptian capital to try to stop war. Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia “think war is very, very close,” Danish Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller said Thursday after talks on the telephone with his counterparts from the three Arab countries.
Iraqi ambassador to Moscow said Iraq will not blow up its oil fields in the event of US military operations. Iraq "will not blow up the oil fields in the event of strikes on its territory," the envoy, Abbas Khalaf, was quoted by Itar-Tass news agency as telling journalists (Agencies)
