Global Policy Forum

By George Gedda

Suppose Saddam Hussein wants to import trailers to transport heavy loads of wheat. Is there any certainty he won't use them to cart tanks around?

That is the kind of question diplomats will be sorting out over the next month in deciding what type of dual use items Iraq should be permitted to import under the new smart sanctions regime being discussed in the U.N. Security Council.

A council resolution approved Friday is aimed at tightening controls over Iraq's exports of oil and imports of arms and other strategic materials while ensuring there are no restrictions on imports of strictly civilian goods.

There are expected to be arguments over dual use items, with some countries, notably Russia, wanting to give Saddam the benefit of the doubt and the United States taking a more hard-nosed stance.

The State Department saw the approval of the resolution as a breakthrough.

It really represents a substantial coming together of the international community and the council on the right policy, spokesman Richard Boucher said.

But the commitment of many countries is suspect, especially Russia. Russia wants to be the best friend Iraq has and wants to get the sanctions lifted, says Richard Murphy of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Among other reasons, he says Russia wants to be positioned for contracts when the oil industry opens up again in Iraq. But Russia is not the Bush administration's only headache. There also is what Lee Feinstein, a former State Department policy planning director, calls the elite versus the street problem in many Arab countries.

Some Arab governments are hostile to Saddam, he says, but cannot ignore the view of many ordinary Arabs that the sanctions are hurting the Iraqi people and therefore must be removed. Feinstein says no matter what Secretary of State Colin Powell does to make sanctions more palatable, they never will win the support of Arab public opinion.

Mark Ginsberg, a former ambassador to Morocco and Democratic foreign policy consultant, agrees. He also says the collapse of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process has heightened anti-Americanism in the region and complicates Powell's quest for support for his Iraq policy.

When Powell took office, he had visions of rebuilding the anti-Saddam coalition that drove Iraqi forces out of Kuwait a decade ago. That goal seems far-fetched nowadays.

And even if disputes over dual use items are sorted out, there are questions about both enforcement and effectiveness. Of particular interest to the United States is a provision to require much tighter controls of illegal smuggling operations from which the Iraqi regime has profited handsomely in recent years.

Perhaps because of this provision, Iraq has reacted angrily to the U.S.-backed proposal. It has responded by suspending the more than 2 million barrels a day it is authorized to sell under the U.N.-approved oil-for-food program. This could result in increased pressures on world oil prices.

Compared with a decade ago, Saddam is looking strong. He has been able to avoid U.N. weapons inspectors since late 1998. Powell suspects Saddam is at work on forbidden weapons.

Saddam has been more of a problem for the administration than some of its top officials felt he would be before they took office. At various points, these advisers had suggested that the United States counter Saddam by seizing some Iraqi territory or by recognizing a provisional government of Iraq headed by the Iraqi National Congress, a coalition of anti-Saddam groups.

There is no suggestion that the administration has either of these options in mind. Powell said a few weeks ago that the administration was trying to determine whether there are any Iraqi resistance organizations capable of mounting a serious effort against Saddam.

The statement implied that the INC had not met that threshold, even though many members of Congress see it as potentially the best hope for eventually bringing Saddam down.