WAR WATCH : Bush’s Hard Line Will Stick
When Secretary of State James Baker meets with his Iraqi counterpart, Tariq Aziz, on Wednesday, our man will be there as a messenger, not a negotiator. And the message will be brief: Evacuate Kuwait forthwith or else. Aziz will try to seduce Baker to go to Baghdad, but it won’t happen. George Bush will see to that. The “talks” will begin and end in Geneva.
Though there are those in Congress who oppose this hard-line ultimatum, they don’t have the votes to stop it. And if it does come to a vote in Congress on authorizing war, I agree with House Speaker Thomas Foley that the President would win and win big.
How will Hussein take the news from Baker? Will he act as the fox or the martyr? We should have a better idea at the end of the week. But my money is still very narrowly on self-preservation (Hussein’s) and that war won’t be necessary.
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