Warning Shots on Iraq

Brent Scowcroft is a cautious, deliberate man accustomed to sharing his foreign policy views with Republican presidents in private, as he did as national security adviser to Gerald Ford and George H.W. Bush. That Scowcroft would publicly question the current President on a matter as sensitive as Iraq is an extraordinary challenge to the Bush administration as it weighs whether to go to war to oust Saddam Hussein from power. Scowcroft's concerns about attacking Iraq, aired Thursday in an op-ed article in the Wall Street Journal, were the equivalent of a cannon shot across the White House lawn. The piece should erase any doubt about the need for a national debate on Iraq.

Scowcroft is the third prominent Republican in recent days to question the wisdom of a campaign against Iraq. Dick Armey, the House Republican leader, said last week that using force without clearer provocation was unjustified, and Senator Chuck Hagel noted that President Bush had failed so far to make the case for military action. But it was Scowcroft who caught everyone's attention, not only because of his strong words but because of his long and loyal service to Bush's father. Scowcroft said in the Journal that military action to remove Hussein would "seriously jeopardize, if not destroy, the global counterterrorist campaign we have undertaken".

Washington was abuzz with speculation Thursday whether Scowcroft's comments reflected the views of the elder Bush. That may be wishful thinking for those who oppose a war with Iraq. The importance of Scowcroft's article was less in such unknowables than in its thoughtful rebuttal of some of the basic assumptions of the case for a war presented thus far by the Bush team, especially its argument that Saddam is allied with terrorist groups like Al Qaeda. Scowcroft punctured that assertion by saying "there is scant evidence to tie Saddam to terrorist organizations, and even less to the Sept. 11 attacks".

The point is not that Saddam Hussein poses no threat to the United States and its interests in the Middle East. He unquestionably does. The issue is how best to balance that threat against other priorities. Scowcroft and others are making abundantly clear that dealing with Iraq is a highly complicated matter that carries great potential to produce unintended and injurious consequences if handled rashly by Bush.

The Bush administration has generally responded to cautionary comments by saying that the President is still weighing options and has not started to make the case for going to war because he has not decided to proceed with one. But Bush should not wait until a final decision before conducting a conversation with Congress and the nation about Iraq. It's not sufficient simply to say repeatedly that Saddam Hussein is an evil man, a line used again Thursday in an interview by the BBC with Condoleezza Rice, the national security adviser.

Since Sept. 11 President Bush has demonstrated strong leadership in his role as Commander-in-Chief. He must now resist the temptation to see Scowcroft's comments and other questioning as carping from the sidelines. Bush and his aides may yet be able to make a solid case for military action in one of the most volatile parts of the world. But Americans have learned the hard way that presidents can stumble if, from the very beginning, they do not take the country into their confidence.