Fight to the Finish : Don’t End the War Until Hussein Is Out of Commission, People Say

Jerry Cottone does not mince words. For much of the past 33 years, he has been the proprietor of the Larchmont Barber Shop, an old-fashioned place where for $14 a man can get a haircut, a shoulder massage and good conversation. From behind his barber’s chair, Cottone holds forth on a variety of topics--old cars, the rising price of water, his days as a newspaper delivery boy.

On Friday, the topic was war and peace.

“He has got to be done away with. No ifs, ands or buts,” Cottone insisted as he carefully drew his razor around a customer’s ear. The barber left no doubt that the man he was talking about is Saddam Hussein: “If you let him go, in another four or five years, he’s going to have another whole army that we’ll have to deal with.”

Across the city, the words were much the same. From the USC campus to the VFW post in Maywood to the eclectic lunch crowd at a hamburger stand near downtown, few people, it seemed, were ready to let the Persian Gulf War end on Hussein’s terms.

“I think we should take every precaution to make sure that he surrenders unconditionally,” said Geraldine Bowick, on her way to see “Dances with Wolves” at the Beverly Center. “It has to be unconditional, and on our terms.”

Friday was a day when the news seemed to change by the minute. An eight-point peace plan drafted by the Soviet Union gave way to another plan, this one with six points. President Bush rejected them both, setting 9 a.m. today Pacific Standard Time as the deadline for an Iraqi pullout from Kuwait. Without the withdrawal, the President said, Iraq would risk a massive ground war.

But as world events fluctuated, public opinion in Los Angeles appeared, by and large, to remain steadfast.

To be certain, peace activists encouraged acceptance of the Soviet plan. “It’s not a fly-by-night proposal,” said Jerry Rubin, director of the Los Angeles Alliance for Survival, as he and a dozen others conducted a sit-in at Rep. Mel Levine’s office. “It sounded like it was worth accepting, certainly worth more than losing thousands and thousands of lives.”

But others interviewed at random disagreed. They displayed a kind of collective resolve, a feeling that what the United States has begun, it now must bring to a finish. Even some who have misgivings about the war said they think it is too late to turn back now.

At the tony Jose Eber hair salon on La Cienega Boulevard, stylist Frankie Lozovina--decked out in a mock-Bavarian outfit with a red vest and a gray wool hat from London--fretted over the loss of life both sides have suffered.

“It’s sad,” he said as fellow hairdressers snipped, curled and moussed their clients’ locks. “We’re all people and we’re all in this world together. There’s innocent people dying and it’s terrible.”

Nonetheless, Lozovina said, he supports President Bush: “I’m against war, but at the same time, I think we’re doing the right thing.”

At Tommy’s Original World Famous Hamburgers on Beverly Boulevard, manager Bill Jolas proclaimed himself against any peace plan conceived by the Soviet Union. The Greek immigrant, who came to the United States in 1961, said he has not forgotten the communist insurrection in his native land:

“You can’t trust the communists,” he said as his cooks flipped burgers. “If you let the Russians make peace with the guy, maybe after five or six years, it would be worse.”

At VFW Post 2830 in Maywood, Dean Larson spent Friday installing a new kitchen counter as reruns of “I Love Lucy” blared on a television screen above the wood-paneled bar. On the wall was a picture of Hussein’s face--with a bull’s-eye drawn over it.

The 61-year-old Larson, an Air Force veteran who serves as post quartermaster, said he was pleased to hear that President Bush had set a deadline for the Iraqi withdrawal. “Forget about this playing footsie with him,” Larson said. “Bush said either by (today) or else. That’s the only way to go.”

At USC, men who are 40 years Larson’s junior--draft age, all of them--expressed similar feelings as they relaxed on the concrete steps of a classroom building. “If Hussein is going to pull out on U.S. terms, then we can go for peace,” said student Peter Kim, 20. “Otherwise, I say kick his ass. I’m not for war or anything, but this has gone far enough.”

As for Hussein himself, the college junior had a clear plan for the Iraqi president’s future: “He has to be killed, basically. Even if he is eliminated from power he could still come back with rebel forces to overtake the government.”

Others agreed. Leaving Hussein in power would be far too dangerous, several people said, and stripping him of his office would not be enough. Larry Baldwin, who spent Friday volunteering with a graffiti paint-out crew near MacArthur Park, put it this way:

“Off with Saddam’s head and then we’ll go home.”