Last Chance To Talk

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At the same time, Washington knows it must not appear overeager to fire the first round; hence the latest offer of talks. Originally, President Bush proposed that Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz meet with him in Washington, after which U.S. Secretary of State Baker would confer with Saddam in Baghdad. But Saddam cleverly offered to receive Baker on Jan. 12, just three days before the deadline the U.N. has established for Iraq to leave Kuwait or face eviction by force. Bush replied that Saddam was trying to stretch out the grace period and insisted on an appointment on or before Jan. 3. Baghdad complained in response that protocol demanded that Saddam choose the meeting time, since he is senior to Baker.

Once Jan. 3 came and went, both parties could be accused of rejecting what Bush called "the final step for peace" because of a trifling squabble over dates. Anxious not to be seen as the side that blinked, the Bush Administration offered what was supposed to look like a totally new idea: a Baker-Aziz meeting in Europe.

That plan, however, had its own handicap. Washington's rationale for the originally proposed Baker-Saddam meeting was that the Iraqi leader, counseled only by sycophants who were reluctant to bring him bad tidings, was not getting the message that the U.S. was dead serious about taking him on. The tough-talking Baker was to deliver that news. But now the Secretary is to meet only with one of the "sycophants." "You're talking to the monkey, you're not talking to the organ-grinder himself," lamented Les Aspin, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. The encounter with Saddam might yet come off. Bush last week ruled out such a meeting. But should the Iraqis, after a smooth Baker-Aziz get-together, invite Baker to Baghdad, Washington would find it difficult to decline.

If Baker and Aziz stick to their publicly stated agendas, it is difficult to imagine how their meeting will achieve anything. Aziz said last week he would use the talks to press the cause of the Palestinians, a subject Washington refuses to link formally to the gulf crisis. Washington meanwhile continued to insist that Baker would offer Aziz nothing more than an ultimatum: Leave Kuwait, or lose it in war. "There will be nothing in our message indicating that we are ready to float any kind of deal," said a senior Bush Administration official. If that is the case, said an Iraqi official, "the meeting will last only five minutes."

Diplomatic probes were also coming from the Europeans. At an emergency * session in Luxembourg late last week, the E.C. foreign ministers signaled their own interest in talking with Iraq. That meeting had been proposed by Germany and seconded by France, both of which are particularly worried that options for peace have been neglected in the effort to gird for battle. "War in the gulf," said German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher, "is by no means unavoidable."