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Bush the authority to use force, or making him wait for such authority, would undermine U.S. credibility and render the threat in UN Security Council Resolution 678 (and subsequent UN resolutions) hollow.
    Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-CT), an articulate supporter of Bush’s request, emphasized practical issues: the effect of any delay on the coalition against Saddam, on the uneasy allies in the Gulf, and on U.S. and other troops deployed in the area. Lieberman also raised the prospect that waiting might give Saddam time to perfect weapons of mass destruction.
    The debate considered whether Bush had exhausted all options and whether congressional authorization would encourage him to turn to war. It considered whether protecting the Gulf was a vital U.S. interest or merely an important one, and why countries that were more dependent on Gulf oil were not playing a much larger role in its protection. It was a searching debate, resolved by a narrow, largely Republican majority in the Senate (52 to 47) in favor of granting the authorization Bush wanted. The House approved the joint resolution by a wider margin (250 to 183).
    In the time it took to debate these issues in the administration, in Congress, and among the allies, great harm had been done to the people and the country of Kuwait, and Israel and Saudi Arabia had been subjected to great danger. Yet the result was that no reasonable charge of precipitous, ill-considered, or unauthorized action could be made against the Bush administration. The legitimacy of his action had been firmly established, and this had unquestionable value for the U.S. polity, evenas it raised doubts that aggression could be quickly and effectively countered through the laborious processes of the UN Security Council (and Congress).
    Building Support Among the American Public
    Bush needed support not only in the UN, in the Gulf, and in Congress, but from the public as well. Vice President Dan Quayle made numerous speeches explaining the nature of the adversary and emphasizing Saddam’s desire to be the leader of a new Arab superpower. Quayle said:
    To that end, he spent some fifty billion dollars on arms imports during the 1980s alone. He has launched two wars of aggression during this period…at a cost of some one million lives thus far. He has built the sixth largest military force in the world. He has acquired a sizable stockpile of both chemical and biological weapons…and he has launched a massive program to acquire nuclear weapons. 45
    Former president Richard Nixon entered the discussion with his own evaluation of the U.S. stake in the Gulf and of why the United States should act: “[because] Saddam Hussein has unlimited ambitions to dominate one of the most important strategic areas in the world…. Because he has oil, he has the means to acquire the weapons he needs for aggression against his neighbors, eventually including nuclear weapons.” 46
    Like Bush, Nixon characterized the world’s response to this aggression as a precedent:
    We cannot be sure…that we are entering into a new, post–cold war era where armed aggression will no longer be an instrument of national policy. But we can be sure that if Saddam Hussein profits from aggression, other potential aggressors in the world will be tempted to wage war against their neighbors.
    If we succeed in getting Mr. Hussein out of Kuwait in accordance with the UN resolution…we will have the credibility to deter aggression elsewhere without sending American forces. The world will take seriously U.S. warnings against aggression. 47
    Saddam’s Threats
    The Gulf War reflected not only one man’s ambitions, but also that man’s misunderstanding of his relative power position. In spite of the sustained efforts of Bush, Mitterrand, and UN secretary-general Javier Perez de Cuellar to make Saddam understand the strength and determination of the forces assembled against him, the Iraqi leader continued to