House opens debate on war powers

WASHINGTON -- In a somber, nonpartisan mood, the House of Representatives opened debate Tuesday on a congressional resolution authorizing President Bush to use the full weight of the U.S. military against the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein.

The same resolution hit a snag in the Senate, even as Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., declared he was "inclined to support it" and praised Bush for trying to gain U.N. support for any military action.

As many House members compared Hussein to Hitler and warned appeasement of the Iraqi leader could recreate conditions that led to World War II and the Holocaust, Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., said he would use parliamentary maneuvers to delay a Senate vote on the resolution.

Before the final vote on the resolution, the House is scheduled to vote on an amendment by Rep. John Spratt, D-S.C., that would require a second vote in Congress before the president can order the use of U.S. troops.

The Spratt amendment and a similar one sponsored in the Senate by Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., call on the administration to work toward Security Council backing of military force if Iraq continues to resist demands for unfettered weapons inspection.

House and Senate leaders predicted that their chambers would reject the Spratt and Levin amendments before giving Bush the near-total authority he requests.

"None of us is enthused about going to war," said Rep. David Dreier, R-Calif. "But we face one of the most difficult issues we possibly can. That is, are we going to provide the president of the United States the support that he wants and deserves to proceed in defending the United States of America and our interests?"

While Daschle said he hopes for a vote on the resolution late next week, Senate aides said Byrd, a strong opponent, could delay the vote beyond that.

Byrd called the resolution a "blank check that cedes to the president the power that the Constitution gives to the Congress to declare war."

House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., opened debate in the GOP-led House by comparing Hussein to Hitler and Mussolini, the German and Italian rulers who in the 1930s built armies and seized territory, drawing only weak reaction from the League of Nations.

Congressional leaders urged a subdued and calm debate that would make clear that the United States is determined to force Hussein to submit to unfettered weapons inspections or face military action.

"We will be watched by the world," said Rep. Donald Payne, D-N.J., floor leader of a group of 75 to 100 members who have indicated they will vote against the war resolution unless it is amended.

Declaring there is "no evidence that the United States is in danger of imminent attacks on our soil," Payne said unilateral U.S. strikes could incite worldwide pre-emptive strikes.

Payne said India and Pakistan, Russia and the former Soviet republic of Georgia, and China and Taiwan could interpret a U.S. assault on Iraq as an invitation to their own unilateral actions.

Meanwhile Tuesday, Pentagon officials said that Iraq is hiding its weapons of mass destruction in anticipation of renewed U.N. inspections and has begun fielding decoys and taking other deceptive measures in preparation for a possible U.S. invasion.

John Yurechko, a Defense Intelligence Agency official, briefed reporters on Hussein's efforts to hide his nuclear, biological and chemical warfare programs.

"We think they are fairly accomplished masters" at denial and deception, said Yurechko, adding that Hussein's younger son, Qusay, supervises Iraq's denial and deception program.

World reacts to Bush speech

PARIS -- Whether President Bush intended it or not, much of the world praised his speech on Iraq on Monday not for its toughness but for its suppleness, lighting upon the idea that he might not be fixated on going to war after all.

A number of foreign officials and commentators chose to ignore the spy satellite photos said to show how an Iraqi nuclear plant had been rebuilt, the new charge that Iraq's unmanned aerial vehicles were intended to pinpoint U.S. cities with biological and chemical weapons, and the comparison of the threat from Iraq with the Cuban missile crisis of 1962.

Instead, they focused on one line of Bush's half-hour speech: that the pending congressional resolution giving him the right to use force if necessary "does not mean that military action is imminent or unavoidable."

The front-page headline in today's issue of Le Monde read, "Iraq: Bush's War Is No Longer Inevitable."

The foreign ministers of Jordan and Egypt seized on the same statement by Bush. "We still believe that a military operation isn't imminent and that there's a chance for diplomatic moves to try to avert the dangers of such a war," Foreign Minister Marwan Muasher of Jordan told reporters in Amman.

After a meeting in Cairo between President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and Foreign Secretary Jack Straw of Britain, Egypt's foreign minister, Ahmed Maher, was asked about Bush's remark that war was not inevitable. "These are important words," Maher said.

Although it is not clear whether there was a connection to Bush's speech, Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said his country would support a French approach for a resolution that would not call for the automatic use of force but was "aimed at enhancing the performance of international inspectors in Iraq."

Ivanov added that it was too early to discuss a specific resolution and that it was important that weapons inspectors be allowed to return after their four-year absence.

In Baghdad, senior members of the Iraqi Parliament reacted angrily to Bush. "You are just like a beast which wants to eat small countries, and while you should help them you want to destroy them," said Abdul Aziz Kailani of Parliament's religious affairs committee.

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