Destiny And Power - Destiny and Power Part 70
Library

Destiny and Power Part 70

A REPORT THAT INCLUDED Author interview with Richard Haass. It was, Haass recalled, "a roundup of reaction and suggested talking points. What I showed him were different comments in the Arab world-there was a kind of pattern of passivity there." As to what Bush said next, Haass recalled: "My gut is that it was an accumulated frustration. All of his frustration bubbled over on that Sunday." The key point that Bush had come to: "Better to defend Saudi Arabia than to liberate it," Haass recalled. "One way or another we weren't going to allow Saddam to have Saudi Arabia." (Ibid.)

Bush also had a set of typewritten talking points in hand.

-I have had a busy weekend needless to say.

-I have spoken over the phone with Chancellor Kohl, PM Thatcher, PM Mulroney of Canada, PM Kaifu, President Mitterrand, King Fahd, and President Ozal of Turkey. I also had a chance to speak to the Amir of Kuwait.

-I am glad to say that in every instance I encountered strong support for our basic objectives: to bring about the immediate, complete and unconditional withdrawal of all Iraqi forces from Kuwait and the restoration of the legitimate government there.

-I have also met with my National Security Council, and I will be convening the NSC again this afternoon at 5 to review developments and to continue to consider the options.

-Let me just add that tomorrow I plan to meet here with Mrs. Thatcher and also with NATO Secretary General Manfred Woerner. I also expect to be in touch with other leaders in order to continue to build support for the strongest possible international response to Iraqi aggression.

On the folded paper, Bush wrote: "File: Press remarks upon arrival 3 PM helicopter." Then he added: "Not read in entirety." (GHWB, annotated talking points, Sunday, August 5, 1990, DF.) SADDAM HUSSEIN HAD CHALLENGED BUSH'S UNIVERSE Naftali, GHWB, 1056; Engel, "A Better World...but Don't Get Carried Away," Diplomatic History, especially 3435. Of a postCold War world, Engel wrote: "Bush believed it was a president's job to shepherd this new world through its period of change, to contain the violence and instability he could not control, and to impose structure and order whenever possible. Defeating Iraq and liberating Kuwait, removing Noriega, and pushing a humanitarian solution in Somalia were more than geopolitical necessities to his mind. These were opportunities to show the world at this critical juncture in history that order itself would prevail, that the international system would indeed function to promote stability and to protect sovereignty absent the Cold War's structural impositions....'Appeasement does not work,' Bush said in response to Saddam Hussein's assault on Kuwait." (Ibid., 3435.) HE DESCRIBED, IN GENERAL TERMS "Remarks and an Exchange with Reporters on the Iraqi Invasion of Kuwait," August 5, 1990, Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George Bush, 1990, 11002.

I'M NOT GOING TO DISCUSS Ibid., 1102.

"I'VE GOT TO GO" Ibid.

THIRTY-EIGHT: No Blood for Oil I CAN'T SEE HOW GHWB diary, August 22, 1990.

"HOW'D I DO?" Dan Quayle interview, George H. W. Bush Oral History Project, Miller Center.

"WHERE'D YOU GET THAT" Ibid.

"IT WAS A VERY" Ibid.

"I JUST GOT A NEW MISSION" Author interview with Colin Powell. See also Powell with Persico, My American Journey, 46667.

"DICK, YOU ARE AUTHORIZED" "Cheney to POTUS," August 6, 1990, box 288, James A. Baker III Papers, Princeton. See also GHWB diary, August 6, 1990. Margaret Thatcher, who was still in the United States, was in the office when Bush spoke with Cheney. Bush briefed her but asked for confidentiality. (GHWB diary, August 6, 1990.) "I FEEL GREAT PRESSURE" GHWB diary, August 6, 1990.

SADDAM'S FIRST DIRECT WORDS AWT, 337.

"CONVEY TO PRESIDENT BUSH" Ibid.

"IT WAS YOUR LEADERSHIP" GHWB, "Telephone Call from Prime Minister Thatcher of the United Kingdom," August 9, 1990, Presidential Telcon Files, Presidential Correspondence Files, BSC.

BRIAN MULRONEY OF CANADA CAME DOWN GHWB diary, August 7, 1990.

"I PAY THE PRICE" Ibid.

AROUND A QUARTER TILL THREE Ibid.

MANFRED WRNER...HAD WARNED BUSH Ibid.

"WE WILL BE THERE" Ibid.

"MITTERRAND SURPRISES ME" Ibid.

NEXT WAS A CALL TO MUBARAK Ibid.

"HE THOUGHT KING HUSSEIN" Ibid.

BUSH'S DIPLOMATIC CALLS WERE DONE Ibid.

"I'M SAYING TO MYSELF" Ibid.

"THE TROOPS ARE UNDER WAY" Ibid.

TO CHECK HIS NERVES Ibid., August 8, 1990.

"APPEASEMENT DOES NOT WORK" "Address to the Nation Announcing the Deployment of United States Armed Forces to Saudi Arabia," August 8, 1990, Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George Bush, 1990, 11079.

THIRTY-FIVE COUNTRIES WOULD JOIN Wilentz, Age of Reagan, 298.

RESISTING ADVICE THAT HE REMAIN GHWB diary, August 11, 1990.

"THE PRESS ARE SNIPING" Ibid.

WITH A LARGE Greene, Presidency of George Bush, 109.

WORRIES THAT HE MIGHT AWT, 307; Friedman, Desert Victory, 6162; Atkinson, Crusade, 296.

"I LIKE WRESTLING" GHWB diary, August 11, 1990.

THE BUSIEST OF DAYS Ibid., August 16, 1990.

LATER THAT MORNING KING HUSSEIN OF JORDAN Ibid.

THE KING PRESSED Ibid.

"THERE ISN'T ANY" Ibid.

"HUSSEIN REFUSES TO ADMIT" Ibid.

"THIS IS NOT JUST" Handwritten notes of meeting between GHWB and King Hussein of Jordan, August 16, 1990, Iraq-August 2, 1990-December 1990 (2), Working Files, Richard Haass Files, NSC (CF01478-024).

THE JORDANIAN KING LEFT ABOUT TWO THIRTY GHWB diary, August 16, 1990.

TO BE FOLLOWED BY PRINCE SAUD Handwritten notes of meeting between GHWB and Prince Saud, August 16, 1990, Iraq-August 2, 1990-December 1990 (2), Working Files, Richard Haass Files, NSC (CF01478-024).

"GOD KNOWS IT MAY" GHWB diary, August 17, 1990.

THE TAKING OF AMERICAN HOSTAGES Ibid., August 16, 1990.

THEN, AT A QUARTER TO TEN Ibid., August 17, 1990; AWT, 34950; Naftali, GHWB, 107.

"BLATANT HOSTAGE HOLDING" GHWB Diary, August 17, 1990.

SOON BUSH HAD TO MAKE AWT, 35152; Naftali, GHWB, 1089.

THE PRESIDENT, SCOWCROFT, CHENEY, AND BOB GATES Ibid.

IT FELL TO BUSH AWT, 352.

"WELL, ALL RIGHT, GEORGE" Ibid.

"A MARVELOUS EXPRESSION" GHWB diary, August 27, 1990.

THE UN SECURITY COUNCIL QUICKLY PASSED AWT, 352.

("IN THE MEANTIME") Naftali, GHWB, 109.

"THE MORE I THINK OF THIS" GHWB diary, August 22, 1990.

BUSH CALLED THE SITUATION ROOM Ibid., August 27, 1990; September 5, 1990.

NEVERTHELESS, THERE WERE STORIES Ibid., August 19, 1990.

ON A FISHING EXCURSION AWT, 353. See also Naftali, GHWB, 110.

"I ASKED IMPATIENTLY" AWT, 353.

THE BROADER CONVERSATION Naftali, GHWB, 10910; Engel, "A Better World...But Don't Get Carried Away," Diplomatic History, January 2010, 2546. (I am also grateful to Professor Engel for his consultation on these points.) HAD FRANKLIN ROOSEVELT'S OLD VISION Naftali, GHWB, 10910.

PERHAPS A "NEW WORLD ORDER" WAS AT HAND Sparrow, Strategist, 47987, discusses the "new world order" phrase and the overall conduct of Bush foreign policy.

THE GENTLE ATLANTIC AWT, 353.

RONALD REAGAN, WHO WAS ABOUT TO GHWB diary, September 5, 1990.

"HE'S LOOKING FORWARD" Ibid.

BUSH HIMSELF WAS REFRESHED Ibid., August 27, 1990.

"WHEN I WAS YOUNGER" Ibid.

WOKE TO NEWS Ibid., August 29, 1990.

"THE MORE I THINK OF IT" Ibid.

"IT HAS BEEN PERSONALIZED" Ibid., September 4, 1990.

IN SEPTEMBER, BUSH TRAVELED TO HELSINKI AWT, 36162.

"I THINK IT'S IMPORTANT TO GORBY" GHWB diary, September 9, 1990; GHWB, Helsinki, Finland, "Meeting with President Mikhail Gorbachev of the Soviet Union," Helsinki, Finland, September 9, 1990, Presidential Memcons, Presidential Correspondence, Files, BSC.

"ALL COUNTRIES IN THE WEST" GHWB diary, September 9, 1990.

"THE HARD-HATS CHARGE" Ibid., September 19, 1990.

"YOU KNOW HOW I FEEL" Ibid., September 11, 1990.

"CRITICISM OF U.S. POLICY" NYT, September 20, 1990.

ANTIWAR SENTIMENT GREW APACE See, for instance, Stephan Chapman, "In the Persian Gulf a Great Risk for an Unworthy Cause," Chicago Tribune, August 23, 1990; Ford Risley, "America's Mood," Ibid., September 2, 1990; David Gonzalez, "Talk of Ground War Intensifies Mood at Antiwar Demonstration," NYT, February 18, 1991; Elsa Walsh, "14 Arrested in Clash Outside White House," WP, January 17, 1991; "More Than 400 Are Arrested in California Antiwar Protest," WP, January 16, 1991.

"JIM BAKER IS WORRIED" GHWB diary, August 16, 1990.

AFTER A MEETING ON IRAQ AT CAMP DAVID Quayle, Standing Firm, 208.

THESE DOUBTS AND CONCERNS WERE COMING GHWB diary, September 22, 1990.

HE WAS CLEAR IN HIS OWN MIND Ibid.

THE PRESIDENT HAD ADDRESSED CONGRESS "Address Before a Joint Session of the Congress on the Persian Gulf Crisis and the Federal Budget Deficit," September 11, 1990, Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George Bush, 1990, 121822.

"IT IS SAID OF ME" GHWB diary, September 11, 1990.

IN THE MIDST Naftali, GHWB, 11011.

THIRTY-NINE: Read My Hips I CAN'T DO THIS Author interview with Newt Gingrich. See also Newt Gingrich interview in "Conversations with Bill Kristol," November 21, 2014. http://conversationswithbillkristol.org/transcript/newt-gingrich-transcript/.

THEY CAN PONTIFICATE GHWB diary, October 4, 1990.

BUSH HAD CONVENED Darman, Who's in Control?, 26972; GHWB diary, September 7, 1990; Naftali, GHWB, 111.

"I JUST HOPE" GHWB, diary, September 7, 1990.

HIS MAJOR CONCERNS LSY, 429, 435; Naftali, GHWB, 100111, 140.

A RECESSION See, for instance, "More Economists Predict U.S. Recession This Year," WP, August 25, 1990; "Greenspan Gives Even Odds That Recession Is Near," Chicago Tribune, September 20, 1990. Wicker, GHWB, 16769, is a useful account of the economic realities of the day.

ALL WEAKENING THE UNITED STATES AT AN HOUR Author interview with GWB. The forty-third president made the same point his book 41: "He felt that he could not afford a budget crisis at home while he was managing a national security crisis abroad." (GWB, 41, 218.) "LORD, I'VE GOT TWO YEARS" GHWB diary, August 6, 1990.

"I WANT TO" "Address Before a Joint Session of the Congress on the Persian Gulf Crisis and the Federal Budget Deficit," September 11, 1990, Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George Bush, 1990, 121822.

ON SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30 NYT, October 1, 1990; GHWB diary, October 2, 1990. Darman, Who's in Control?, 27172; Naftali, GHWB, 115.

THE AGREEMENT WOULD HAVE CUT Greene, Presidency of George Bush, 86.