by Bob Woodward
The Custodian of Mecca and Medina continued with the history, the sort of speech that normally would have been expected at the beginning of the meeting. “Twenty-two years ago, where you sit was formed a desert. I was the minister of education. We had no more than 33,000 students, five high schools. Now, in a short time, we have seven universities and 37 junior colleges. [We] have gone from 33,000 to 2.7 million students. . . . Who would have believed? From nothing to 2,200 factories.”
Why such success, the king asked. Because, he answered, they always went into joint ventures with people and countries who knew what they were doing. “We’re not afraid to learn from people who are better than we are. The Saudi people have no complexes. We want to cooperate with other people.” He offered to send Cheney some videos describing this transformation and he also encouraged Cheney to return and see for himself.
Fahd said he laughed at reports that most of the Saudi oil income went to the royal family. “Read in one place that I have an income of $40 billion a year. The whole income of the country is only $40 billion. Many preposterous things are said, but I don’t care what’s said outside. What I care about is the welfare and well-being of the Saudi people.”
In a direct shot at King Hussein of Jordan, who traced his own ancestry directly to the Prophet Mohammed, Fahd said, “We do not claim that our ancestors are holy. We’re just one family of the Saudi people.
“We believe strongly in our God. We believe he knows the truth and that he will guide us.
“In closing, I want to thank the President, the Vice President, his administration, both houses of Congress, you personally. You’ve come here with one objective, which is to help Saudi Arabia. [I] hope that these problems in our part of the world can subside and I still owe you a visit to the United States and I am holding to it.”
Cheney said that President Bush was eager for the king to visit. “This has been a truly historic meeting,” Cheney added.
“No doubt it is,” Fahd replied.
The Secretary said he would be going back to Washington right away to brief the President on this conversation. “General Schwarzkopf will work with your officials to work out the details. We will leave a team behind.”
“It’s good to leave a team. The quicker the work gets done, the better. The less we give to the media, the better.”
“I will give word to the President,” Cheney said. “He will start moving forces right away.”
Back in his room, Cheney told his aides, “They’ve invited us in.” He phoned the President, who took the call in the Oval Office where he was meeting again with Prime Minister Thatcher.
King Fahd has approved the deployment, Cheney said.
Bush sounded quite happy.
Cheney said he was formally asking the President’s approval to begin moving the forces.
“You got it. Go,” Bush said.
• • •
Cheney called Powell to tell him that they were authorized to start the deployment.
Powell was surprised to hear the Saudis had agreed.
General Kelly and his operations staff had spent much of the weekend in the building—first working to prepare for a deployment, and then waiting. Kelly had been told that there was movement at the political level but it hadn’t quite been settled. About 4 p.m., the mission came. They were ordered “to defend against an Iraqi attack on Saudi Arabia and be prepared to conduct other operations as directed.” The immediate order was to execute Operations Plan 90–1002.
The first unit sent would be 48 advanced F-15 jets from the 1st Tactical Fighter Wing at Langley Air Force Base, Virginia. The Division Ready Brigade of 2,300 men from the 82nd Airborne Division—the troops in the highest state of readiness—would be next.
The initial planes and troops could not arrive until the morning after next, Wednesday, August 8.
Powell was concerned. The Division Ready Brigade was an extremely light force. In the eyes of some military experts, it was little more than a massive airport security detail. The brigade, the 48 jet fighters, the naval airpower in the region and the small Saudi Army were no match for Saddam’s six divisions. It was naked vulnerability, prime time for Saddam to strike.
• • •
Cheney was aware that Powell believed Saddam did not want to go to war with the United States, that way down deep, Saddam would be frightened, that he had a healthy respect for U.S. military capability and would conclude that a war would be suicidal. But Cheney disagreed. Perhaps, he thought, Saddam had a very different concept of what could constitute victory. Just standing up to the United States or inflicting a bloody nose on Uncle Sam might be a significant political gain for Saddam. Perhaps even worth the price that would be paid in a war.
Saddam was not suicidal, Cheney thought, but some degree of conflict with the United States might not necessarily be a bad thing for him. He thought Saddam’s position might resemble Egyptian President Sadat’s in the 1973 war, which had begun when Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on Israel. Sadat didn’t have to beat Israel to “win” that war—all he had to do was get across the Suez Canal and demonstrate he was willing to try to take the Sinai Peninsula back from Israel. Though it was a military defeat for Egypt, Sadat proclaimed victory; he’d made his point and the episode had won him status as an Arab leader. Cheney was sure that fighting was at least a real possibility in the Gulf.
Before leaving Saudi Arabia the next morning, Cheney met with Bandar and his father, Saudi Defense Minister Prince Sultan, to review the bidding. Bandar already had information from his network. “My friends Kissinger and Crowe are predicting failure,” he said, adding that the Saudis had been up all night discussing the matter.
“Look,” Bandar continued, “there’s no backing away from the decision. It’s a done deal, not just because the king said it.” He suggested they try to conceal it, proposing the two countries “just say it is a joint exercise. Saddam is not crazy. He is foxy and evil. But let’s employ some of his tactics and not advertise what we are doing.” Bandar said he was deeply worried about the first arrivals; they would be so few in number that they could not provide any kind of defense. Could they not hide what they were doing until there were enough troops to defend the kingdom?
Cheney responded that he did not know how this could be done. The President could not mislead the American people, Bandar knew that. This was a big decision for the President and his best opportunity was to lay it out straight. If he did not, the news would leak and he would be demolished. You know the American system, Cheney reminded Bandar. It wouldn’t work.
Bandar said it was just a tactic. “Let’s play dead like a desert animal and then rise up,” he said.
After more discussion, both sides agreed to delay any announcement of a troop deployment until the first troops were actually on the ground in Saudi Arabia—Wednesday morning in the United States, Wednesday afternoon and evening in Saudi Arabia. As Cheney prepared to leave, he was thinking that the agreement might be soft. With Bandar, with the Saudis, you never knew what you had. His worry was compounded when Schwarzkopf contacted the senior general in the Saudi defense ministry to begin coordination of the deployment. The Saudi general wanted to reopen discussions and talk about whether the United States was going to send troops at all.
Schwarzkopf, concerned that the invitation was off, told the general he understood it had been decided and that they were supposed to start deploying immediately. Skeptical, the Saudi said he would check. He did so and came back to Schwarzkopf very surprised. Schwarzkopf was right about the deployment.
Cheney finally departed Saudi Arabia for Cairo, where he was taken by small plane to see President Mubarak in Alexandria. He informed the Egyptian president about the coming U.S. deployment to Saudi Arabia. Would Mubarak please grant permission for the nuclear aircraft carrier U.S.S. Eisenhower to go through the Suez Canal? Mubarak said fine, but when? Tonight, Cheney said. Mubarak agreed. The Egyptian president didn’t agree to send troops, but did later when he
spoke to President Bush.
Cheney left Egypt to return to the United States. When he was over Italy, he received a call directly from the President, who was still dialing the world seeking more support and troops.
“Dick,” Bush said, “I just got off the phone with King Hassan of Morocco. I’d like you to stop in and see him.”
Landing charts for Morocco were immediately faxed up to Cheney’s plane.
Since his year as CIA director, Bush had been close to Hassan, who now had ruled Morocco for 29 years. The king owed his longevity on the throne in part to the CIA, which had long provided friendly-head-of-state security assistance and training that helped him stay in power. In return, Hassan allowed U.S. intelligence agencies free run of his strategically located country at the western entrance to the Mediterranean Sea.
At the palace, Cheney saw Hassan first in a group meeting, then privately. Between the two discussions, the king took a call from Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi. All the regional heads of state were talking to each other. When Cheney and the king were alone, Hassan did not reveal what the Libyan leader had said. Cheney told Hassan that the Saudis had agreed to accept a significant number of U.S. troops. The President would welcome Hassan’s support. Hassan said that he was ready to contribute Moroccan troops immediately.
Afterwards, Cheney and Gates went to the U.S. Embassy in Rabat and called Scowcroft on the secure phone to discuss the speech the President was planning to give announcing the decision. Scowcroft was attempting to define precisely the action and the reasoning.
Cheney said King Fahd had asked that President Bush make it clear in any public statements that the Saudis had requested the U.S. presence.
Scowcroft assured him that that point would be included in the speech.
Cheney finally landed in Washington at 6 a.m. on Wednesday, three hours before the President’s speech. A draft had been faxed to him and he had reviewed it. The speech drew on some World War II analogies: Iraq had “stormed in blitzkrieg fashion through Kuwait,” and “Appeasement does not work. As was the case in the 1930s.” The deployment was cast in terms of a principled moral crusade, and the speech explicitly said that the mission was defensive.
• • •
At 9 a.m. on August 8 Bush appeared on national television from the Oval Office, looking tired and drawn.
“In the life of a nation,” he began, “we’re called upon to define who we are and what we believe. Sometimes these choices are not easy. But today as President, I ask for your support in a decision I’ve made to stand up for what’s right and condemn what’s wrong, all in the cause of peace.”
His voice was a bit scratchy and his rhythm off. His facial expression did not seem to match his words of high purpose. Holding to his “this-will-not-stand” position, the President said, “We seek the immediate, unconditional and complete withdrawal of all Iraqi forces from Kuwait.”
But he explained that the military would not be used offensively for this purpose. “The mission of our troops is wholly defensive. Hopefully, they will not be needed long. They will not initiate hostilities, but they will defend themselves, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and other friends in the Persian Gulf.”
A nervous smile flashed at several inappropriate moments. Bush stuck his fist in the air when he spoke of “unity of purpose.”
At a noon press conference, the President repeated the point that the military mission was not to drive the Iraqis out of Kuwait.
At 1 p.m. Cheney and Powell appeared at a Pentagon press conference.
“I would, at the outset though,” Cheney said in a subdued manner, “emphasize for all of you—especially those of you who remember the Panama operation in December—that this situation is different.” Because it was an ongoing operation, he said he couldn’t answer many questions about what units were going, when they were going and their strength. He outlined his trip to Saudi Arabia in six paragraphs, then turned the conference over to Powell.
Powell made an unusually direct appeal to the media. “I also would ask for some restraint on your part as you find out information,” the Chairman said, “if you would always measure it against the need for operational security to protect our troops. That should be uppermost, I think, in all our minds.”
To a question concerning the vulnerability of the initial troops, Powell stretched the point. “I think they are pretty secure,” he said. He mentioned the airpower from the Independence and Eisenhower battle groups, and the Saudi armed forces with AWACS aircraft and their “top-of-the-line fighters.” The Chairman added, “So I’m reasonably sure that we can get in in good order without presenting any vulnerabilities.”
But privately, Powell was still concerned about the vulnerability of his initial forces. Many in the world, apparently including Saddam, thought somehow that the United States could deploy tens or hundreds of thousands of troops instantaneously. Of course it wasn’t true. Powell didn’t even have the Division Ready Brigade of 2,300 in Saudi Arabia yet. In the first three or four weeks, his troops would be naked and excruciatingly vulnerable. It was a secret that needed to be guarded at almost any cost. Lives depended on it.
• • •
DIA officer Pat Lang was sent out to brief Prince Bandar at his elegant, sprawling residence in Virginia. The former British commandos who acted as Bandar’s personal security guards escorted him into an ornately decorated room where he put up a map of the region. For an hour, Lang went over in detail what had happened during the Kuwait invasion and how Saddam was massing the same elite force of eight divisions on the Saudi border.
He crisply described how nearly 800 T-72 tanks were on the battle line and could move unimpeded into eastern Saudi Arabia and duplicate the Kuwait success. “We are powerless to stop them,” Lang said.
“Oh, God,” Bandar said, “Oh, God. Do they know this?” Does Saddam realize he can overrun Saudi Arabia this easily?
“I think they suspect it,” Lang replied, “but they don’t know it.” He added that reading Saddam’s mind had become the question of the day, and that so far everyone had flunked the test.
• • •
Pete Williams, who had the top security clearances and was as trusted a Cheney aide as any, did not know exactly how many troops were scheduled for deployment. He was hearing from other senior Pentagon civilians and military officers that 100,000 or 150,000 might be the final number, but not the accurate figure of 250,000. Whenever he asked Powell, the Chairman was vague. Powell seemed almost paranoid about the numbers and the locations of the troops.
From the White House, Sununu put out the figure 50,000, which was published Thursday, August 9, and attributed to an unnamed senior administration official.
• • •
When General Vuono saw the low ball figure, he was distressed. The operation, now dubbed Desert Shield, could sour on the question of expectations and credibility. With the White House and political leadership concealing facts and risks, creating false hopes for a small, short-lived operation, he heard echoes of Vietnam. The Army chief recognized that Operations Plan 90–1002 put the military in for the long haul—months and months, if not longer. No one knew how long the deployment might last. If the media and therefore the public didn’t feel they were getting the facts, there was no chance of maintaining public support. Such a massive deployment could not be concealed; orders were going to units in dozens of states. “The big question is the political will question,” Vuono told his staff. A Vuono aide soon leaked the real number of up to 250,000 to the Associated Press, which ran a story.
Vuono also detected an initial complacency in the Army operations staff. He went to see them, reminding the staff that once the Army had a heavy tank division on the ground in Saudi Arabia, they might become involved in high-intensity, central-front warfare—the stuff they had trained for and worried about in Europe for decades.
The Army is going to be tested, he said, adding sternly, “Anticipate, coordinate and verify.”
• • •
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On that Thursday, retired Air Force Chief Larry Welch and his wife Eunice were scheduled for a 15-minute farewell courtesy call with Bush, a thank you to Welch for 37 years of service. When they arrived, they were asked if they could stay for lunch with the Bushes. Brent Scowcroft joined the two couples in the residence for lunch.
Barbara Bush and the President both talked at some length about their children and family. Welch noticed that Bush seemed entirely relaxed. He had watched Bush enough to realize that when the President was on the verge of making a decision, he became intense, outspoken, often launched a frenzy of public statements. Once the decision had been made, Bush would pull back and loosen up.
Welch had written part of the initial contingency plan for the Gulf deployment in the early 1980s. He was well aware that the desert would be extremely taxing and that the Saudis would be very restrictive. It would be a Gatorade, not a Budweiser deployment. Welch felt that the risks of failing to defend Saudi Arabia far outweighed the risks of sending the force. But an attempt to push the Iraqis out of Kuwait would be another thing entirely, he felt. It would reduce Kuwait City to the ruins of Beirut. Any effort to restore the status quo would likely fail because the status quo was gone forever.
“You’re doing the right thing, Mr. President,” General Welch said.
Bush didn’t dwell on the Gulf. He preferred to talk about his family. He, Welch and Scowcroft all said they were glad to have an officer as strong as the new Air Force chief, General Michael Dugan, Welch’s successor.
