Survival Plan Seen in Iraqi Moves : Mideast: Reported purge, and obstruction of U.N. inspectors, may be part of Hussein’s strategy to cripple opposition.

Bush Administration officials and Middle East experts said Tuesday that a recently reported purge in the Iraqi military and new Iraqi obstruction of U.N. inspectors are part of an elaborate survival strategy by Saddam Hussein to cripple internal opposition while probing for weaknesses in the external forces arrayed against him.

Aware that the Bush Administration and its European and Arab allies are striving to nurture a military coup against him, Hussein over the last year has been removing or executing scores of officers in units considered potentially disloyal, the officials said.

The latest purge, which involved more than 130 officers, has been linked in various press reports to a coup attempt--a claim widely disputed within the Administration.

Although Defense Secretary Dick Cheney said Tuesday at a Pentagon press conference that “my personal guess would be that there was some kind of an attempt to topple Saddam’s government,” he added that this was based only on speculation and “bits and pieces of reporting.”

Others monitoring Iraqi developments, including senior Pentagon analysts, were more skeptical. “These purges go on routinely,” said one official.

Several U.S. and Arab Middle East experts also contended that Hussein is unlikely to be overthrown soon. “Most of our people agree that this is not a turning point,” a senior Administration official said.

While maneuvering to blunt efforts against him--by the United States and its Persian Gulf War allies, as well as domestic opponents--the Iraqi leader appears to be growing more emboldened, officials said. This week, the Baghdad regime has felt sufficiently strong to block a U.N. inspection team once again from access to government installations linked to weapons of mass destruction.

Iraqi officials refused Tuesday to heed a Security Council demand to allow U.N. inspectors, led by U.S. Army Maj. Karen Jansen, into the Agriculture Ministry. The inspectors have maintained a round-the-clock vigil outside the ministry since Sunday.

The ministry is suspected of housing information on ballistic missiles and possibly other weaponry. A U.N. spokesman said Tuesday that the 16-member team of Americans, Russians, French and British chemical weapons experts will continue their rotating stakeout until they are admitted to the ministry. They will also continue to monitor any attempts to remove materials.

According to reports reaching U.N. headquarters in New York, demonstrators in Baghdad pelted the cars of the inspectors Tuesday with eggs, fruit and vegetables, an act that prompted Iraqi officials to urge the inspectors to leave the ministry for their own safety. But U.N. Special Commission spokesman Tim Trevan said that the inspectors will not leave.

Trevan said that Rolf Ekeus, the Swedish diplomat who heads the U.N. inspection teams, will go back to the Security Council to demand some threat of punitive action if the defiance continues. The impasse surprised U.N. officials because the Iraqis have cooperated with most inspections in the last few months.

Angered U.S. officials charged that Hussein is testing the strength and cohesion of the U.S.-led coalition. “This is part of his probing to test the waters,” said a military analyst.

Iraqi opposition leaders in exile said Tuesday that Hussein may even have staged reports of a coup to cover the executions.

Administration officials have not yet agreed on an explanation for reports of fighting outside Baghdad in late June. But Administration sources concur that Hussein’s support is diminishing, as is his control over significant sections of Iraq.

Since May elections in northern Iraq, the Kurds are gradually gaining control over a region with more than 15% of Iraq’s population.

In the Shiite Muslim-dominated south, tensions between Sunni and Shiite Muslims have not been so serious since the uprising last year shortly after the end of Operation Desert Storm, the analyst added.

And in the Sunni Muslim heartland that has been Hussein’s power base, the middle class is being hurt by the U.N. economic embargo.

The level of opposition, however, “doesn’t translate into a coup. It will have to get worse, maybe much worse, before something happens,” the senior analyst said.