U.S. Will Double Force in Gulf : Buildup: Bush orders the deployment of up to 240,000 more troops. The move will provide the firepower for an attack.

President Bush ordered a massive buildup of U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf on Thursday, dispatching as many as 240,000 additional troops from Europe and the United States to provide the firepower for a potential attack on Iraq and occupied Kuwait.

The new deployment, which will include heavy armor and three more aircraft carrier groups, could double the number of U.S. military personnel deployed in the region to nearly 500,000--approaching the maximum deployment in Vietnam two decades ago.

“We’re talking about substantial numbers,” Bush acknowledged.

The President’s decision appears to push back the timetable for possible U.S. military action by several months, allowing additional time to move the troops and equipment and to shift from defensive to offensive positions.

The new deployment also gives diplomacy, economic sanctions and sheer intimidation more time to work before the United States would initiate a military collision in an effort to drive Iraq out of Kuwait.

Asked if the new units would be in place by the end of the year, Defense Secretary Dick Cheney said: “I would think it would be after that.”

Pressed on whether the escalation from a defensive deployment to an offensive force capable of launching a full-scale attack means that the United States is going to war, Bush responded: “I would love to see a peaceful resolution to this question.”

But, he said, “I have not ruled out the use of force at all, and I think that’s evident by what we’re doing here today.”

While Bush, Cheney and other officials refused to make public the number of additional troops that will be sent to the Persian Gulf for Operation Desert Shield, the potential total of 240,000 was calculated from a detailed force list disclosed by the Pentagon.

Among those called into the Middle East crisis from the Orange County area will be troops from the 5th Marine Expeditionary Brigade, based at Camp Pendleton, officials said.

As a task force that can be restructured by assignment, the brigade’s size can range from 4,000 to 18,000 troops, including air personnel from the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station, said El Toro spokeswoman Capt. Betsy Sweatt. The brigade is designed to respond to a variety of military situations--by land, air or sea, she said.

“They can do basically anything. They train for all different kinds of missions and it will depend on their assignment,” Sweatt said. She would not discuss the timetable for the brigade’s deployment or any other details.

No other military units in Orange County are known to be involved in the deployment.

The deployment will include half of all U.S. troops in Europe, a full mechanized division from the United States, the equivalent of a division from the National Guard and Marine expeditionary brigades totaling roughly 60,000 men.

“There clearly will be a need to call up further reserve units, and we also will be calling up for the first time combat units of the Army National Guard,” Cheney said.

The beefed-up naval force will include three additional aircraft carriers and their destroyer and frigate escorts. Those ships will join the three carrier battle groups already on station in the Arabian Sea, the Red Sea and the Mediterranean Sea. In addition, a second battleship, the Missouri, will join the Wisconsin in the region.

Looking grim and avoiding the bellicose language that marked his statements about the Persian Gulf crisis as he campaigned last week for Republican candidates, Bush said the troops deployed in the region are now sufficient to defend against an Iraqi attack on Saudi Arabia.

The additional forces, he said at a White House news conference, are clearly intended for possible offensive action.

“After consultation with King Fahd (of Saudi Arabia) and our other allies, I have today directed the secretary of defense to increase the size of U.S. forces committed to Desert Shield to ensure that the coalition has an adequate offensive military option should that be necessary,” the President said.

“I think it sends a very strong signal, another strong signal, to (Iraqi President) Saddam Hussein that we are very, very serious,” he added.

“I find it hard to believe that today, Nov. 8, he does not understand that he’s up against a determined, unprecedented alliance. I hope that he is rethinking his position of unyielding opposition to the will of the rest of the world,” the President continued. “I would think that when he surveys the force that’s there, this force that’s going, what other countries are doing in this regard, he will recognize that he is up against a foe that he can’t possibly manage militarily.”

The announcement came amid fresh signs of cooperation between the United States and the Soviet Union.

Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard A. Shevardnadze said in Moscow, with Secretary of State James A. Baker III at his side, that the Soviet Union agrees with the United States that the use of military force in the gulf cannot be ruled out. But he made it clear that the Soviet Union is still willing to give the economic sanctions and other forms of pressure on Hussein time to work before opting for combat.

After speaking with Baker, Bush said that he and Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev “are on the same wavelength.”

Similarly, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was quoted in the New York Times as saying that two or three more months should be allowed before a decision is made to move against Hussein. Bush, when asked if he is willing to wait that long, said: “We are in total sync with him.”

Asked why, given the looting and destruction already reported in Kuwait after the Iraqi invasion on Aug. 2 and the subsequent occupation, the President said: “I would like to feel that Saddam Hussein would come to his senses.”

Iraq, which has 430,000 troops stationed in Kuwait and southern Iraq, issued a dire warning Thursday of the possible consequences of a military confrontation. “The mother of all battles is nearer today. If the fire of aggression is unleashed against Iraq, . . flames will . . . burn everything in every direction,” the Iraqi government newspaper Al Jumhuriya said, according to Reuters news agency.

Bush said that while the United States has not polled the other 14 members of the U.N. Security Council to determine whether they would support a resolution authorizing the use of force, he believes that he is free to initiate an attack without explicit U.N. approval.

“We have the authority,” he said.

Bush’s use of the word “offensive” to describe the new capabilities, said Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.), a member of the House Armed Services Committee, is ominous.

“The whole attitude seems to be changing from defense to offense,” Skelton said.

Rep. Lee H. Hamilton (D-Ind.), chairman of the Middle East subcommittee of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said he thinks Bush is concerned that recent visits to Iraq by European politicians have shifted attention away from the military threat.

Bush “wants to . . . let the Iraqis know that we’re deadly serious about this,” Hamilton said.

The President said that if Hussein had any doubts about the seriousness of the coalition lined up against him--including Arab states, Western nations, the Soviet Union and Japan--”I think that those doubts are rapidly being dispelled.”

“When he moved into Kuwait, I think he felt he was going to have just an easy time of it and that the world would not rise up in arms against the aggression. I think he miscalculated there,” Bush said. “I believe he thought he could just take over Kuwait and there’d be a lot of talk and discussion and he would be able to turn Kuwait . . . into Province 19.”

Hussein has said that Kuwait no longer exists as a nation and is instead the 19th province of Iraq.

The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait was met by an initial deployment of 10,000 U.S. troops to the region. That figure rapidly grew, and the dispatch of allied units brought the total force currently lined up against Hussein to more than 300,000.

The President, who for several weeks has encountered demonstrations--sometimes by a few people, sometimes by a few dozen--protesting the U.S. deployment in the Persian Gulf, took issue with the frequently heard chant of “no war for oil.”

He said that protection of crucial Persian Gulf oil supplies is “a part of” his reason for sending troops to the gulf “but it is not . . . a main reason.”

“My argument with some of the protests is that they seem to focus, to suggest that oil is the sole reason that we are involved in this enormous commitment, and that is simply not correct,” Bush said.

“The restoration of the security and stability in the Persian Gulf region clearly relates to the world’s economic interests,” he said. “I’m not denying that, and I’m not backing away from the fact that all the Western world has, you know, a real interest in that.”

But, he added, “It is the aggression against Kuwait that has caused this coalition to come together as it has.”

Saying that Hussein must be prevented “from establishing a chokehold on the world’s economic lifeline,” Bush said: “We are seeing global economic stability and growth already at risk as each day countries around the world pay dearly for Saddam Hussein’s aggression.”

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