Secretary of State James A. Baker III bluntly told a Senate panel Wednesday that the Bush administration opposes a larger say for Congress in determining whether American forces go to war against Iraq.
Pressed by senators expressing fears that war will break out while Congress is in recess over the next two months, Baker said President Bush will continue to consult with legislative leaders as the Persian Gulf crisis unfolds.
But he rebuffed congressional calls for a formal consulting mechanism between the White House and key lawmakers while Congress is out of session for elections and the holidays.
Baker also refused to promise lawmakers that the administration would ask Congress for a formal declaration of war before launching hostilities, saying such a pledge could put American troops` lives at risk and eliminate the element of surprise in combat operations.
”If we were under an obligation to come back here and have hearings that might . . . drag out for a while while we debate, (we) really ought not to do that,” Baker told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. ”We do have a different view, I suppose, on the constitutional question of the authority to commit forces.”
For more than two hours, Bush`s top diplomat faced the sharpest questioning yet of any senior administration official in the gulf crisis, as senator after senator expressed fears the administration is leading the U.S. into a shooting war without congressional authorization or sufficient public support.
Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), usually an administration ally in foreign policy matters, touched on a widespread concern on Capitol Hill when he told Baker that lawmakers fear the administration might take advantage of the period between Congress` adjournment and its scheduled return to Washington in January to move against Iraq.
”It`s a personal gut reaction that sometime between the time that we recess and adjourn in the next week or so and the time the new Congress is sworn in there is likely to be military activity in that area,” Lugar said.
”And that is an ominous prospect.”
Bush`s decision to send forces to Saudi Arabia, the largest deployment of U.S. troops since the Vietnam War, was made in August with little congressional consultation. Most legislators were out of Washington on summer recess.
The White House has not invoked the War Powers Act, a Vietnam War-era law that requires the president to notify Congress within 48 hours when troops are dispatched overseas where ”imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated.” Under the act, troops must be withdrawn within 90 days unless Congress approves their continued deployment.
Both liberal Sen. Claiborne Pell (D-R.I.), chairman of the committee, and arch-conservative Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), committee vice chairman, sharply criticized the administration for its conciliatory policy toward Iraq and its leader, Saddam Hussein, before Iraq invaded Kuwait Aug. 2.
”Up to the day before the Kuwait invasion, the State Department was still trying to support this madman,” Helms said. ”Only the State Department could not see that he is a murderer, a torturer, an assassin. . . .”
Helms also challenged the administration`s decisions to make an ally of Syrian President Hafez Assad in the lineup against Iraq and to pressure Israel to cooperate with a United Nations team investigating the killings of 20 Palestinians in Jerusalem last week.
Helms accused Baker of making U.S. foreign policy ”anti-Christian and anti-Jewish in one week” after Syria`s successful offensive Saturday against a Maronite Christian faction in Lebanon.
”Now we have another Saddam Hussein in the Middle East, only his name is Hafez Assad,” Helms said. ” He, too, is an international gangster, a drug producer, a supporter of terrorists. . . .
Baker, asked what happens if Hussein complies with UN sanctions and withdraws from Kuwait, leaving intact Iraq`s large conventional and chemical- weapons arsenal, said the U.S. would push for a continued international arms embargo against Iraq.
He said the U.S. is talking to regional allies about a possible new
”security structure” in the Persian Gulf after the crisis passes, but he stressed that Bush is ”not seeking a (military) presence on the ground in the Middle East.”
”We cannot allow this violent way to become the wave of the future in the Middle East,” Baker told the panel. ”Saddam Hussein, Mr. Chairman, must fail if peace is to succeed. The prospects for a just and lasting peace between Israel and its Arab neighbors will be shattered if he prevails.”
Baker said the U.S. is determined to maintain its international alliance against Iraq and may yet go to the UN to seek formal authority to use military force.
But Baker acknowledged that Bush opposes placing American troops under UN command.
He also noted that at least one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council may well veto any resolution granting formal authority for military action.
