It Isn’t the Ideal Cabal, but We’re Committed to It : Iraq: We encouraged the people to topple Saddam Hussein; now we have a moral obligation to see the insurgency through.

By design, America’s victory in the Persian Gulf war was less than total. But now the Bush Administration must face the human consequences of the turmoil in Iraq unleashed by the war: It must accept the moral duty of aiding the people who were encouraged to challenge Saddam Hussein and are now being brutally punished.

The United States agreed to a cease-fire on Feb. 27 for two basic reasons: Air and ground forces had devastated Iraq’s military potential, and it was clear that pressing on to Baghdad would exact an unacceptable price. In part, that price was denominated in terms of America’s becoming responsible for the future of Iraqi politics--and perhaps being sucked into the desert equivalent of a quagmire.

One month later, it is obvious that halting the war at the Euphrates River did not let the United States escape the consequences of successful conflict against Iraq’s armed forces. Now Iraq’s political fabric and the state’s integrity are under attack.

The former, of course, has been one of the United States’ key aims: to end the reign of Saddam Hussein. That became clear when President Bush called for war-crimes trials for Iraq’s leaders and when he urged the Iraqi people to overthrow Hussein. Bringing about a change of regime is also the objective of U.S. postwar economic policy toward Iraq: the renewed emphasis on sanctions, which will be kept in place so long as Hussein remains in power.

But pursuing the goal of deposing Saddam Hussein raises troubling problems. So far, the preferred U.S. scenario has not played out: No cabal of disgruntled generals has come forward to topple Hussein and impose a benevolent rule. Instead, thousands of people have taken to the streets. Yet their ambitions are not the same as those of the United States: a peaceful transition to a stable regime that can preserve Iraq’s integrity.

Not unnaturally, millions of Kurds who have long been oppressed--as well as gassed--by Iraq’s Sunni Arab leaders in Baghdad want at least autonomy and at most a separate state. And in the south, Shiite Arabs, who constitute about 60% of Iraq’s total population, want at least fair representation if not also self-rule.

The aspirations of both groups thus conflict with the declared U.S. objective of keeping Iraq whole and sovereign, in part to dampen the ambitions of Iraq’s neighbors and in part to avoid a cascading series of border changes in the region.

The Kurdish and Shiite revolts are thus seen in Washington as inconvenient. Some anonymous Administration spokesmen have even blamed the insurgents for delaying the departure of Saddam Hussein, by giving the putative “good” generals no choice but to support him against efforts to pull the country apart.

Politically, this is difficult enough for U.S. policy, although, in time, the internal struggle will be resolved, probably with Baghdad in control of the entire country. Morally, however, the United States cannot just rely on time (and Hussein’s helicopter gunships) to relieve it of responsibility. By calling for the people of Iraq to revolt, the United States saddled itself with the consequences, which every day are becoming more terrible.

In 1956, Americans watched as Soviet tanks crushed Hungarian freedom-fighters, who had been encouraged by Radio Free Europe. Then, there was some ambiguity about U.S. intentions; there can be no doubt now, in the case of Iraq.

The Bush Administration has warned Baghdad about using chemical weapons and fixed-wing aircraft against the insurgents. But that does not answer the basic dilemma: whether to give positive support and risk being dragged further into Iraq’s political future; or to stand by and accept the moral debt of letting Saddam Hussein go about his grisly business.

It is too late to stand aloof; as the United States did for a lesser moral purpose in Afghanistan, it must begin providing tangible help to the Iraqi insurgents who took its call seriously.