(Washington Post) - Michael Dobbs Saddam Hussein is following a well-thought-out strategy for extracting a political and propaganda victory from almost certain military defeat, according to U.S. and Iraqi analysts. After five days of warfare, Saddam's government has not collapsed and no major Iraqi cities have fallen. "Every day he succeeds in juxtaposing images of American cruise missiles blowing up Baghdad with pictures of Iraqi farmers shooting down Apache helicopters, he wins the battle for the hearts and minds of 250 million Arabs," said Joseph Wilson, a former U.S. charge d'affaires in Baghdad. Saddam "believes that our tolerance for casualties is so low that he does not need to inflict that many" in order to force a U.S. retreat, said Kenneth M. Pollack, a former CIA expert on Iraq now with the Brookings Institution. Pollack argues that the American media have been playing into Hussein's hands by paying too much attention to the issue of U.S. casualties, which are still relatively minor, compared with other major conflicts.
2003-03-25 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive