The Iraq equation: How to subtract Hussein

President Kennedy had his Bay of Pigs. Now concern that a misstep in Iraq could leave President Bush with something similar – like a "Bay of Basra" – is influencing deliberations over how to carry out the president's order to depose Saddam Hussein.

Mr. Kennedy's 1961 plan to free Cuba from the Marxist Fidel Castro using anti-Castro Cubans ended in disaster – and only bolstered a regime that survives today. Mr. Bush has approved stepping up cooperation with the Iraqi opposition, largely through the CIA and State Department, with the goal of bringing down Hussein's regime.

But many in the administration continue to doubt that acoup from within will work – at least not soon enough to stop the Iraqi leader from using the weapons of mass destruction the US contends he possesses or is developing. The Joint Chiefs of Staff is also jittery that even an attack following the Afghan model – US airpower and special forces working with armed Iraqi opposition – could not guarantee success, sources say.

So without having made any decisions yet on exactly how or when to move definitively for "regime change" in Iraq, the Bush administration is working toward several options. And still alive is the idea that a full-scale US invasion – supported by "willing" allies but much smaller than the half-million soldiers assembled for the Gulf War – may yet be necessary.

"The Pentagon is not ready, so what the president is doing is keeping all the options open and advancing them all," says Richard Murphy, a former assistant secretary of state for Near eastern affairs. "The idea is to keep everybody busy, and maybe one [option] will work before he has to send in our troops."

Central to the debate is the question of just how strong the Iraqi leader is.

Some civilian officials at the Pentagon and close outside advisers contend Hussein is much weaker today than a decade ago and that US air weaponry is more powerful and precise. Some Iraq watchers say Hussein's support from Iraqis – truly tired of life under a ruthless dictator – would wilt with the clear prospect of his fall. Kenneth Adelman, former Reagan arms control adviser, said earlier this year that taking out Hussein would be "a cakewalk."

But others reject such assurances because no one can say with certainty how Hussein's forces will respond to a coup attempt or invasion, and when either failure or success is likely to cause profound regional repercussions. "It's particularly reckless and very, very dangerous to start saying this is something that's going to be easy," says Anthony Cordesman, a specialist in Iraq at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. "You're not dealing with an unsophisticated force, and it's a complex and unpredictable situation, completely different from Afghanistan."

The complexities Mr. Cordesman cites include the level of armed-forces loyalty to Hussein, the impact of international sanctions and nationalism on public sentiments, the response of Kurdish and other minorities to an attack, and the impact of a decade of limited access to the world arms market. "Iraq remains the most effective military power in the Gulf," he says, so the many uncertainties "can still favor either side."

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