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The United States sees a diminishing prospect of another major war with Iraq and is focusing more attention on North Korea, according to a report in the electronic intelligence newsletter Geostrategy-Direct.
U.S. officials said the reduced military capabilities of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein have appeared to rule out another major war with Baghdad. They said Iraq does not have the weaponry and infrastructure to wage anything other than a brief conflict.
The new assessment has led the Defense Department to revise U.S. military needs. The Bush administration is ready to drop the military requirement that Washington must be ready to fight two simultaneous regional wars. The United States currently has 1.4 million troops.
The requirement was set a decade ago and envisioned the prospect of a U.S. war in the Middle East and East Asia. This required sufficient U.S. troops and weapons for such deployment.
Officials now want the United States to be capable of fighting a full-fledged war on one front while being able to deter an attack in another region. They said Iraq can be deterred from launching an all-out war while North Korea might have to be fought.
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said he has not formally recommended a change in the Pentagon’s assessment to President George Bush as part of the nation’s military strategy review.
“So what we’re suggesting and what we’re testing now is the idea of winning decisively on our terms anywhere in the world, being capable of defeating swiftly in another part of the world and simultaneously being able to conduct a series of smaller-scale contingencies,” Rumsfeld said.
“That reduces the requirements substantially and gets you much closer to the force levels we have.”
Earlier this month, Belarus, under pressure from Kuwait, denied allegations of weapons sales to Iraq.
Belarus officials have told their Kuwaiti counterparts that Minsk has been complying with the United Nations sanctions and rejected reports that the former Soviet republic is upgrading Iraqi anti-aircraft systems and fighter-jets.
Kuwaiti officials raised the issue with a visiting Belarus delegation last month. The delegation held meetings to discuss military cooperation between the sheikdom and Minsk.
Officials also raised reports that Belarus has supplied radar and communications systems to Baghdad.
But Belarus has denied the reports. Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko met with Kuwait’s ambassador in Riga and stressed that trade between Belarus and Iraq is limited to civilian systems.
“We don’t want to create problems for ourselves, because the U.N. permits trade under the oil-for-food program,” Lukashenko said. “We don’t want to lose these good contacts.”
Belarus has launched a drive to market weapons and defense systems to Kuwait and other Gulf Cooperation Council members.
