Hussein Hopes to Survive First Strike, Stir Oil Chaos

Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, convinced that American forces will attack within a month, believes he can ride out a first strike and then plunge the world economy into chaos by disabling Saudi Arabia’s oil fields with chemical weapons or missiles, according to U.S. government analysts.

Many civilian strategists have tended to dismiss as mere bluster the repeated public assertions by Iraqi officials that they can win a military conflict with U.S. and allied forces. But Administration experts on Iraq believe that those statements are sincere reflections of Hussein’s thinking.

And the conclusion that Hussein believes he can survive a U.S. strike has potentially profound consequences for the United States. Even if Hussein is wrong, his belief would sharply reduce his incentive to withdraw peacefully from Kuwait.

Hussein’s thinking is that an American attack “could wipe out my air force, but you still have to come at me on the ground,” said one government analyst. The Iraqi leader accepts estimates that Iraqi casualties in a war would vastly outnumber U.S. losses but calculates that his country “can stand 10,000 casualties, but we (the United States) can’t handle 1,000,” the analyst said.

Based on the full array of information available to U.S. officials, government analysts have concluded that Iraq’s strategy calls for dispersing its air force and missile batteries--”hiding them in the date palms,” as one put it. That, Baghdad calculates, will enable enough Iraqi weapons to survive a massive U.S. first strike to mount a deadly attack against the Saudi oil fields.

In addition, analysts say, Iraqi air and missile units have expanded their training for night operations, expecting that any American air strike would come under cover of darkness.

On the ground, meantime, Hussein is thought to believe that Iraq’s deeply entrenched troops, tanks and artillery could inflict horrendous casualties on attacking American units--even if eventually forced to give ground.

The key to Hussein’s strategic planning, U.S. analysts say, is the belief that Washington cannot sustain a war against Iraq if the American public must absorb heavy casualties and other nations--including those now arrayed against Iraq--see their economies disrupted by skyrocketing oil prices.

To add to the pressure, Administration analysts say, Hussein would be likely to unleash terrorist attacks against American targets.

Hussein is convinced that under such conditions Bush would face enormous pressure at home and abroad to cease hostilities and negotiate with Iraq, Administration analysts say.

At the same time, there appear to be few signs, if any, that the economic sanctions against Iraq have begun to undermine Hussein’s internal position seriously. Food rationing appears to be going smoothly, U.S. officials believe, and the country probably has food supplies for at least another three months.

There are no indications yet of major leaks in the sanctions, U.S. analysts say, but Administration officials are keeping watch on several potential holes, the largest of which would be Iran--if the Iranians decide to help their longtime enemy.

In recent diplomatic discussions between Tehran and Baghdad, the two countries have discussed the possibility of Iran taking Iraqi oil and exporting it around the international blockade, Administration officials say, although there are no signs yet that the talks have led to action.

Sanctions could be evaded by sending tankers from Iraq directly to Iran--sailing through territorial waters of both countries where the international blockade force would have difficulty stopping them.

Another possibility for Tehran and Baghdad would be to build a short pipeline connecting the major pipeline networks of the two nations. Such a pipeline could be built in about 30 days.

For now, Hussein appears to be hunkering down for a long siege. The Iraqi army, with more than 200,000 troops in Kuwait and another 150,000 in neighboring regions of Iraq, is dug in at heavily fortified positions designed to withstand a lengthy ground assault. The fortifications are similar to those used during the eight-year Iran-Iraq War: concentric rings of mine fields and anti-tank ditches backed by massed artillery and armor, officials say.

In addition to inflicting heavy casualties on American forces, the Iraqis “have made it quite clear that in case of war, the first thing to go would be the Saudi oil fields,” the analyst said.

Both government and non-governmental experts agree that the Saudi oil installations are highly vulnerable. Many of the largest fields in eastern Saudi Arabia are well within range of Iraqi missiles, which have been test-fired carrying chemical warheads. Even the threat of chemical attack could well drive off the foreign workers who keep the oil flowing, effectively shutting the fields down.

In addition, war would halt the tanker traffic through the Persian Gulf that brings most Middle Eastern oil to Western refineries, causing huge disruptions in an oil market already facing a shortfall of roughly 1 million barrels a day.

Iraq’s leaders appear to hope that such disruption would put the United States under “immediate pressure to stop” a war. If negotiations then began, Hussein could well hope to emerge with at least some of the Kuwaiti territory he has seized, analysts believe.

So far as protecting the oil fields is concerned, the Saudis for several years have been working on an extensive system of anti-aircraft and anti-missile defenses for their oil fields and industrial installations, but have not yet completed that work, U.S. military officials say.

Since Bush ordered American troops to Saudi Arabia, the United States has deployed its own advanced Patriot ground-to-air anti-missile system around the Saudi fields, the military officials add. But although the Patriot system is believed to be effective against Iraqi missiles, it cannot totally protect the large area of the oil fields against such an attack, officials concede.

The question of how Iraq views its chances in a war parallels a debate among military officials in the United States and allied nations about the staying power of the Iraqi army.

One view--that Iraq’s army would crumble quickly, despite its tenacity in the long war with Iran--is strongly held by some Air Force officials. The same position is taken--at least publicly--by officials of Arab governments who have been urging a quick U.S. military strike against Hussein in hopes of eliminating a dangerous adversary.

In the event of war, “they’re going to experience something few armies have ever experienced. We’re not 13-year-old Iranians,” said one high-ranking U.S. military strategist.

Iraq’s forces are “an army that relied heavily on mass power, firepower--and had the whole world behind them” in the war against Iran, said one senior Arab diplomat.

“Whatever that army needed, they got” from allies determined to see Iran lose, the diplomat added. “For every bullet they fired, you and France and Britain and the Soviet Union and Kuwait would send them three bullets. If a tank went out, they got two tanks. . . . If they wanted Pepsi-Cola, (they got it) all the way from Georgia.”

Now, isolated and facing an adversary with overwhelming air superiority, the Iraqi army would crumble much the way the supposedly “battle-hardened” Egyptian army crumbled against Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War, the diplomat predicted.

Former Air Force Chief of Staff Michael J. Dugan advanced a similar argument, telling reporters from The Times and the Washington Post in an interview last week that the Iraqi air force would collapse in “minutes . . . not hours” if war came.

In firing Dugan, Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney chastised him for publicly “underestimating” the capability of the Iraqis. Other military officials share Cheney’s more pessimistic view.

“I think we will prevail ultimately, but I think it will be costly,” retired Adm. William J. Crowe, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in a televised interview this week.

“I think our air will take a tremendous toll on them. I really believe that. But I don’t think that that alone would do it,” Crowe said. “We will have to seize ground. We will pay a price.”

Much depends on the morale of Iraqi forces, a factor about which experts differ. During the war with Iran, Iraqi forces showed great tenacity while defending their home soil but much less initiative when defending conquered ground. How theywould perform in defending conquests in Kuwait--an area many Iraqis have long considered rightfully a part of their country--cannot yet be known.

Staff writers John M. Broder and Robin Wright contributed to this report.