Don’t expect a quick end to the stalemate between the United Nations and Saddam Hussein over weapons inspections.
Hans Blix, the head of the U.N.’s inspection unit, told Time magazine that it will take a full year – assuming cooperation by the less-than-compliant Iraqi leader – just to get an accounting of Saddam’s inventory of chemical, biological and nuclear weaponry.
That length of time causes U.S. and British officials to worry that the U.N.’s commitment to disarming Iraq will again dissipate.
“The inspections route is the wrong route” to disarming Iraq, said Ken Pollack, who was a National Security Council staffer during the Clinton administration.