Where I Stand — Mike O’Callaghan: Powell’s balancing act

Friday, Feb. 28, 2003 | 9:07 a.m.

Mike O'Callaghan is the Las Vegas Sun executive editor.

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH is using every diplomatic skill available to get the support of the Security Council for moving on Saddam Hussein. Probably his most effective weapon has been Secretary of State Colin Powell, who has been juggling political and diplomatic balls from Seoul to Baghdad and back. The former general has international credibility that the president and his other advisers have sacrificed during the past two years. France and Germany have been able to paint our president as a cowboy with advisers who are nothing more than gunslingers. They have failed dismally to paint Powell in that corner.

Turkey has agreed to allow U.S. troops on its soil to enter Iraq from the north. The Kurds in Iraq have to be wondering what was added to our pot of money that finally won the Turks' approval. Some of the Kurds have asked if they have been sold down the river. When all is said and done, the Kurds don't want the Turks in that part of Iraq any more than they want Saddam.

The Kurds have been whipsawed between existing powers since 1849 when the Ottoman Sultan killed thousands of them. Since then they have tried to create a government of their own in Turkey, Iraq and Iran. All of these efforts have been crushed. They again saw their hopes arise following the defeat of Iraq's army during Desert Storm in 1991.

In 1992 I joined some observers of the first Kurdish election in northern Iraq. There were some lingering doubts about what had happened following Desert Storm. From Dahok, Iraq, I wrote about my observations during the week of elections:

"The Kurds, and the whole world, know that the Bush administration encouraged them to revolt against Saddam Hussein following Desert Storm. They did, and we watched as the Bastard of Baghdad butchered them with the helicopters and other weapons we failed to destroy when stopping the war about two days before it should have been terminated.

"Because of the pictures of suffering refugees coming out of the mountains of Iraq, the conscience of the world was bothered. Great Britain's Prime Minister, John Major, was the first to call for enforcement of a safe haven for the Kurds. 'I love John Major. He saved our lives with the safe haven concept,' Hussain Sinjari told me. President Bush followed this lead and U.S. military fighter planes covered the area, and food and supplies were dropped to the cold and starving refugees."

So what besides dollars has encouraged the cooperation of Turkey? A week ago, when still bartering with the U.S., the leader of Turkey's ruling party made it clear that it was about much more than dollars and the toppling of Saddam. His country is concerned about the creation of a sovereign Kurdish state in Iraq. The New York Times writer Dexter Filkins reported:

"To make sure it does not happen, the Turks are planning to send thousands of their own troops into northern Iraq behind an advancing American army. The reason offered in public is to control the flow of Kurdish refugees, thousands of whom poured into Turkey following the Persian Gulf War in 1991."

The Kurds and Turks are but one small problem our diplomats have been confronting. A big question may be that even if Saddam runs down Baghdad streets naked pointing out where his weapons are hidden, is it too late to stop an invasion? The gathering of awesome U.S. military might on his doorsteps has demonstrated the president's determination to dethrone him.

In recent days, although he is still a threat, the Iraqi leader has been winning the public relations contest. If our president doesn't carry out his threat it will be, in the Arab minds of the Middle East, a sign of weakness. Just ask the Israelis who withdrew from Lebanon only to have the Hezbollah guerrillas follow them back to Israel and send their rockets deeper into that country.

This week Prime Minister John Howard of Australia wrote in The Wall Street Journal that "doing nothing about Iraq, potentially, is much more costly then using force, if necessary, to ensure the disarmament" of that country.

During the coming weeks and days it will be interesting to watch Powell gather as much support for our government as possible. No matter what he accomplishes there is little chance that our troops won't be in combat.