The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

MR. MacNeil: Good evening. Leading the news this Wednesday, President Bush told Congress the latest U.S. military buildup in the Gulf did not mean war was eminent. House and Senate leaders said a special session on the crisis was not needed at this time. We'll have details in our News Summary in a moment. Judy Woodruff is in Washington tonight. Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: On the NewsHour tonight, the debate in Washington over the President's Gulf policy is our lead focus. Five members of Congress debate that institution's role in the current crisis. They are Senators David Boren, John Warner, and Nancy Kassebaum, and Congressman Henry Hyde and George Miller. Then another in our series of conversations with Americans on what they think about sending U.S. troops into combat. Tonight Middle East scholar Robin Wright. And finally a report on what researchers hope will be a tough new weapon in the war on cancer. NEWS SUMMARY

MR. MacNeil: President Bush today assured Congress that war with Iraq was not imminent. He met with leaders of both parties at the White House this morning. Afterwards House Speaker Tom Foley and Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell told reporters there was no need for an emergency session of Congress at this time, but they said they told the President the Constitution required him to seek Congressional authorization for an offensive strike.

SEN. MITCHELL: The President made clear that the recent deployment is not in and of itself a decision to use force, but rather it's intended to create the credible option of the use of force should that become necessary and appropriate.

REPORTER: Mr. Speaker, are you satisfied with the Congressional role in this process?

SPEAKER FOLEY: Up to this point, the President has consulted with selected leaders of the Congress in both parties and both Houses. For the purposes of the present policy I think that has been carried out well. If the policy should change in the future, circumstances for the Congress's role could also change. But for the present, those circumstances haven't arisen.

MR. MacNeil: President Bush today authorized extending the call-up of prime time reserve troops. It means that the 36,000 reservists who are now activated for 90 days will be extended for an additional 90 days. Also today Defense Sec. Dick Cheney authorized the call-up of as many as 72,500 additional reserve troops. Sec. of State James Baker briefed reporters at the White House today on developments in the Gulf. He said the current policy of UN-sponsored sanctions was producing results.

SEC. BAKER: Sanctions are working but the real question is, are they working to achieve the goal so that we could be assured that they would achieve the goals of the UN resolutions. And I don't think we can say that today with certainty. We know they are beginning to bite, particularly in certain areas. We know that we've cut off the exports of oil. We know we've cut off financial transactions by Iraq around the world. We know that the income stream is basically blocked, that for the most part imports as well have been, if not cut off, substantially reduced. But that does not mean that he is ready to withdraw unconditionally from Kuwait, which is what the sanctions were applied in order to achieve.

MR. MacNeil: Britain's defense secretary said today time is running out for the Iraqis to leave Kuwait. Tom King spent the day with British troops in Saudi Arabia. He called the next few weeks critical. He said we're not going to keep our troops hanging around forever doing nothing. And he added, "It would be a very foolish man who thought we were bluffing." Britain has 15,000 troops in the area. Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: Iraq today condemned plans for the U.S. Marines to hold their first amphibious assault exercise in Saudi Arabia. The Pentagon announced the plans yesterday. Iraq's ambassador to the UN, Emir Alambari, called it a clear act of provocation, but he told the NewsHour Iraq would not take action because it does not want to give the U.S. pretext for an attack. Prospects for an Arab summit on the crisis became dimmer today. Saudi Arabia's foreign minister said such a summit would be useless unless Iraq first agrees to leave Kuwait. Egypt's President, Hosne Mubarak, was in Syria to talk about the summit proposal with that country's President, Hafas Al Assad. Morocco's King Assan proposed the summit on Sunday, calling it the last hope for peace. Vice President Quayle criticized Japan today for its response to the Gulf crisis. Quayle was in Tokyo for the enthronement of the new emperor, Akihito. He told Prime Minister Kaifu that Japan's pledge of $4 billion to help pay for the Gulf operation is adequate, but he said he hoped for more. He called for a Japanese presence in the Gulf, although he did not specify what form it should take. Japan's parliament recently killed a proposal to send Japanese troops to the region.

MR. MacNeil: Israel today put a curfew on Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip to prevent demonstrations over the second anniversary of the PLO's Declaration of Independence, which is tomorrow. We have a report narrated by Tom Browne of Worldwide Television News.

MR. BROWNE: Motorists were among the first to feel the effects of the new security measures. In the West Bank Town of Ramanah, the familiar scenes of the uprising were repeated under the watchful gaze of the security forces. Scores of Palestinians were rounded up for not having the proper work permits. The government plans to cut the Arab work force by half. On the Gaza strip, street remained unnervingly quiet as people waited for the full effect of the new measures. The Palestinians were determined not to forget the second anniversary of Palestine's declaration of independence. Children defied the crackdown and took to the streets for an early celebration of the anniversary.

MS. WOODRUFF: Margaret Thatcher today received the most serious challenge to her leadership since she became Britain's prime minister 11 years ago. Her former defense secretary, Michael Heseltine, said he would run against her next week to become leader of the Conservative Party. Heseltine said he wants to replace Thatcher because she is not supportive enough of European unity. He also promised to review a controversial tax which Thatcher pushed through parliament.

MR. MacNeil: Mikhail Gorbachev lost a battle over the Soviet economy today. He issued a decree that would have lifted price controls on luxury goods, but the Russian republic, the Soviet Union's largest, voted to ignore it. Gorbachev's had a long running dispute with the Russian Republic's President, Boris Yeltsin, who wants to weaken the power of the central government. Poland and Germany signed a historic treaty today, settling one of their last disputes left over from World War II. The treaty makes their current border along the Oder and Naisse Rivers official. It was signed in Warsaw by the countries' foreign ministers. About a third of Poland's territory used to belong to Germany but was given to Poland after World War II. By signing the treaty, Germany officially gave up any claim to that land.

MS. WOODRUFF: Philippines President Corazon Aquino declared nearly half the country a disaster area today because of yesterday's typhoon. The typhoon's winds reached 150 miles per hour. It left more than 100 people dead and more than 300,000 homeless, and it caused major damage to one of the country's most important industrial centers.

MR. MacNeil: The U.S. Department of Energy detonated an underground nuclear weapon in the Nevada Desert today, but the blast was delayed when four protesters breached security and walked into the test area. The protesters were arrested just minutes before the explosion was scheduled to take place. Supporters of the protest demonstrated outside the Department of Energy Office in Las Vegas. The demonstration was sponsored by the anti-nuclear group

MR. SESNO: The President himself spelled out when announcing the augmentation of forces. That is the issue that Senator Mitchell was addressing and that is what I am addressing?

SEC. BAKER: That is hypothetical and therefore I will not address that issue because it is hypothetical. I have said we want to lay the foundation that would out us in a position to have a credible option of using force. But that is far different from saying the President has taken a move in that direction.

MS. WOODRUFF: But not everyone on Capitol Hill was reassured. Senator Ted Kennedy talked to reporters late this afternoon.

SEN. KENNEDY: I am increasingly concerned the President Bush is preparing to take this country unilaterally in to war in the Persian Gulf with out the approval of Congress and with out the support of the American people. In this situation Congress must not remain silent. The decision of war or peace in the Persian Gulf will have profound consequences not just for the lives of hundreds of thousands of troops in the desert of Saudi Arabia but for the future of the Middle East and for the future of our Country. It is our responsibility in Congress to debate these issues now while there is still time to stop this needless war before it starts.

MS. WOODRUFF: We get five more Congressional views now. Three of our guests attended today's meeting at the White House. Senator David Boren Democrat from Oklahoma is Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. Senator John Warner of Virginia is Senior Republican on the Armed Services Committee. And Congressman Henry Hyde of Illinois is the Senior Republican on the House Intelligence Committee and a Member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Also Senator nancy Kassebaum Republican of Kansas a Member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. She and Senator Boren join us from the Senate. Congressman George Miller of California is among a group of 32 Democrats who are preparing to file a suite in Federal Court that would prevent President Bush from taking offensive military action with out a vote from Congress. Congressman Hyde let me begin with you and with the others who were in this meeting today. Before this meeting today it was out impression that the Republican leaders of the Congress at least several of them were calling for the President to go along with a special session. Now they have appeared to back off,. What happened at today's meeting to change that?

REP. HYDE: Well there was no sentiment for a special session. The Leadership of the Democrats and the Republicans, the Senate and the House were there plus the senior Committee Chairman and ranking members and every one agreed that a special session was inappropriate right now. We would be debating hypothetical circumstances. The reason or a special session is to involve Congress and we think that has been done by the agreement to have frequent consultations from the Senators and House members as to what is going on.

MS. WOODRUFF: But that is not what Senator Dole and Senator Lugar were saying yesterday is it Senator Warner.

SEN. WARNER: Senator Lugar is a very valued member of the United States Senate and has a long history in foreign affairs and he felt very strongly that we should have such a meeting and Senator Dole to some extent did join as did I but I laid down very carefully the conditions under which I felt would be important to have a special session. First let the President complete his trip to the Gulf and come back and report to the American people and to the Congress and Secondly let the Secretary of State continue his work for the United Nations particularly in seeking. That is exploring the possibility of another resolution specifically addressing the United Nations of using or not using force. And thirdly then make the assessment whether or not it was necessary.

MS. WOODRUFF: So was there new information today Congressman Hyde?

REP. HYDE: I don't think there was no new information. There was clarifying done. It was a two way exchange between the members of Congress and the President and Secretary Cheney and Secretary Baker. IT was cordial. Every one was supportive of what the President was doing. Different views with some nuances were expressed but I think we all come out unified and supportive.

MS. WOODRUFF: Senator Boren did you hear something new. You were in the meeting as well. Did you hear something different today that would have changed your mind about a special session or not?

SEN. BOREN: No I really didn't. I think most of the people had already decided in advance of the meeting that we shouldn't have a special session. You know it is one thing to call a special session of the President has a proposal to lay before us. If he is seeking language giving him authority to take some action but until we reach that situation really all Congress would do then is meet with out an agenda, we would be a debating society, we would display to the World that there are 535 members of Congress each with a different idea on how we should approach this problem and I think that what we need least right now is a display of disunity around the World. That certainly does not protect our young men and women in uniform in the Gulf. That adds danger to them because Saddam Hussein will simply try to say that we are in disarray.

MS. WOODRUFF: Did the President make that point at this meeting?

SEN. BOREN: The President certainly made that point in some ways that displays of division are not helpful right now. We know that Saddam Hussein and his news agency have exploited these differences of opinion. That doesn't mean that Congress shouldn't be consulted. It should. It doesn't mean that Congress and members of Congress should not give their views. They gave some specific suggestions to the President today in great candor and it was really a remarkable two way conversations in which people were heard on both sides of the table. But that is the appropriate form not out in front of the rest of the World where we give an image of disunity.

MS. WOODRUFF: So when Speaker Foley and Senate Leader Mitchell are saying that any action that is taken is going to need Congressional approval. Then what I hear you saying is the Democrats are satisfied that no military action is anticipated in the near future?

SEN. BOREN: No I haven't said that at all. I don't think that the President foreclosed any option today in the conversation. He made it clear that there has been no decision to embark up on a military offensive action but he certainly said all the options are open. I think that you want to leave that impression with Saddam Hussein right now that nothing is ruled out and that he better move toward a diplomatic solution and withdraw from Kuwait and release of the hostages. So I don't think that any decision at all was conveyed by the President today?

MS. WOODRUFF: Congressman Miller what do you hope to accomplish, you and the other members of Congress. I think that there are 32 signed on to the law suite by filing this?

REP. MILLER: Well we hope to clarify the issue as to whether or not the constitution is going to be upheld in the situation in respect to the Middle East. And that is should the President decide to commit thousands of American men and women to offensive action it is our belief that requires a declaration of War. As you just heard Secretary Baker say, as you just heard members of Congress say the White House has not committed themselves to that position with in the Constitution. They have suggested that they would continue to consult. The founding fathers did not require that. They required a declaration of War and that is our concern. With all the consulting I think the record will show that the Leadership was informed simultaneous with this last action of the build up. This wasn't discussed before hand they were told of a decision that has been made.

MS. WOODRUFF: So specifically what would you achieve with a law suite. I mean there are those who are saying this is just a dramatic gesture on the part of Democrats it is not going to go anywhere?

REP. MILLER: I think the history of these law suits suggests that the court takes them very seriously and in fact has ruled in these matters. We would hope that the court would tell the president that he could not take offensive actions with out a declaration of war. We would also hope that the Court would declare that in fact the constitution does require a declaration of War. That those are two things that are friendly to the Federal District Court in these matters.

MS. WOODRUFF: Senator Kassebaum when you hear this explanation for a need for a law suit to clarify. What are your thoughts?

SEN. KASSEBAUM: I don't see the point myself. I guess, while I have not been a fan of the war powers act it is the law of the land and it clearly states that when we have our forces in position where there is imminent hostilities then the President has responsibility to notify Congress and we have a responsibility to act. And I think that we do. I agree with those who say that a special session, I don't believe serves a useful purpose now. But I think what Senator Lugar was stating and Senator Dole really to on how important it is to be informed. That it is important for us to be engaged in this in a way that we can clearly keep our own constituents informed as well.

MS. WOODRUFF: And are you now satisfied that is now happening?

SEN. KASSEBAUM: Well I think that it is beginning to there are many nuances to this. It is an extremely difficult situation and I think that there is some growing frustration. But I also believe that it has been easy for some of my colleagues to be very critical with out being responsible and there haven't been any votes taken.

MS. WOODRUFF: Do you want to name any names?

SEN. KASSEBAUM: No.

MS. WOODRUFF: Are you referring to the members, the Democrats who are filing this law suit.

SEN. KASSEBAUM: There is no point in naming names.

SEN. WARNER: Could I say something?

MS. WOODRUFF: Alright Senator Warner.

SEN. WARNER: Today the President had before him copies of newspaper clippings from Iraq. And he read to use their interpretation which they do very carefully and selectively. As a matter of fact this program will get chopped up and I dare say segments used to their own advantage in Iraq.

MS. WOODRUFF: For what purpose?

SEN. WARNER: To tell their people their interpretation of what is going on as we exercise our democratic process of debate. That debate is important. Members should express themselves. But let's do it in a way that when we fully understand when we do it it is likely to be taken by Saddam Hussein and used for his purposes.

MS. WOODRUFF: Congressman Miller have you considered that?

REP. MILLER: Well that should not be used to stifle debate in the United States Congress. We have a constitutional obligation and I think what Senator Kassebaum says defies history because each and every President has said that they will not comply with the war powers act. They have provided notification and they say they believe it is not in line with the war powers act because they believe it be unconstitutional. The War Powers Act was an effort to get around a Constitutional impediment which is a declaration of war and every President in Vietnam, Korea, Grenada have all tried not to get in to a declaration of war. They is what they have historically tried to do. And now the suggestion that we shouldn't discuss this because Saddam Hussein is outrageous. It is outrageous to suggest that the Congress will be stifled because a mad man like Saddam Hussein is in control of this debate is outrageous.

SEN. WARNER: This is not a case of first impression that you are going to bring. It was brought several times before the Federal Courts since Marberry versus Madison the historic Supreme Court case has said that these are political questions and they have to be resolved in that branch of Government.

REP. MILLER: Senator with all due respect you missed the point here. The court will not say this is a political question. This is an exact question that the court has entertained under the War Powers Act and to avoid the problems that they have had under the War Powers Act we brought it under the Constitution of the United States directly. So that's not the case.

MS. WOODRUFF: Senator Kassebaum.

SEN. KASSEBAUM: Let me just say --

MS. WOODRUFF: Since you started all of this.

SEN. KASSEBAUM: -- to Congressman Hyde and Congressman Miller, I have no objection to a declaration of war either. I don't think this is the time and I hate to see our energies and our focus drained away from looking at some of the diplomatic options that are out there and that the administration is exploring with arguing over whether we should be declaring war.

REP. MILLER: We're in agreement. The question is whether or not the President will recognize his Constitutional obligation. We're not saying there should or should not be or that it should be now or later. We're saying the question when you commit hundreds of thousands of young people's lives to that decision, that requires the intervention of Congress to approve or disapprove under a declaration of war.

MS. WOODRUFF: Congressman Hyde.

REP. HYDE: Judy, no hostilities can take place without the assent and support of Congress. You cannot pay for the weapons or for the logistics, nor for the support of troops without Congress appropriating money. They can terminate that appropriation any time they want, but a declaration of war is anachronistic. It involves censorship, treason, it involves trading with the enemy. The President has the constitutional power to make war, but Congress has the constitutional power to declare war.

SEN. BOREN: Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: Sen. Boren, I want to bring you backinto this but just one second. Congressman Miller was disputing what Congressman Hyde was saying.

REP. MILLER: Well, let's not decide that we're not going to comply with the Constitution because it's old fashioned. The question here --

REP. HYDE: Nobody said that.

REP. MILLER: Don't sit here, Henry, and tell me that the Congress in all of its wisdom after the President sends 100,000 people across the border that we're going to cut off the funds if we disagree, because no one would do that to an American soldier. So don't pretend like we'd be in control after the fact. You know that's not the case and every President since World War II has bet on the fact that Congress wouldn't have the courage or the conviction to cut off funding or to challenge him, and that's why we spent all those years in Vietnam killing people in a worthless cause.

REP. HYDE: Well, I was present in Washington when we did cut of the funds on April 25, 1975.

REP. MILLER: And a whole generation went before you. We were here together, Henry.

REP. HYDE: 1975 and we abandoned a lot of people over there with your prediction of --

REP. MILLER: And we killed a lot of people before.

REP. HYDE: -- no blood bath, and that's just what we got.

MS. WOODRUFF: Let's go to Sen. Boren now.

SEN. BOREN: Judy, I think what we've just been hearing is a good example of why we should not have a special session of Congress. We well know what circumstance might develop there. What if hostages started being killed and what if the President had to act immediately? There is no way that we could have a debate in Congress before he acted. Obviously, if there was some kind of attack upon our forces --

MS. WOODRUFF: Why not? I don't understand --

SEN. BOREN: Well, how could you? If you were going to going to save lives, for example, you might have to act within 30 minutes. What if you have missiles loaded, or missiles fired, at our forces that we know have chemical agents, for example? There is every kind of hypothetical situation imaginable that might develop. Maybe there are circumstances where the President might have a lot of advanced planning and seek authority in advance for an offensive action. That might justify a debate and a declaration of war. But there could be many, many other circumstances which don't, so I think you can't have -- yes, Congress declares war -- has the power to declare war, but the President of the Constitution is also the commander in chief. What we need to help him with right now, we need to give him advice and counsel about the very, very difficult life and death decisions that he has to make. All of them --

REP. HYDE: He's listening. He's listening.

SEN. BOREN: -- are very, very difficult to make.

REP. MILLER: Could I pick up on that point? All of the situations that Sen. Boren outlines are not the situation. Nobody suggested a declaration of war in Libya; nobody suggested a declaration of war in Grenada. And the President knows that he has the right and the support of the Congress and the American people to defend Americans' lives, be they hostages or an attack on our troops there. We all understand that, but we watch the Sec. of State travel around the world consulting, briefing, informing people what he's about to do, and we watch a massive buildup of troops. This massive buildup we are told by the President last week is taking place for a purpose, to conceivably move to an offensive force. Now he's backtracked on that in this meeting, and I'm delighted with that. But the fact is that's not the situation. None of this --

MS. WOODRUFF: But Sen. Warner, the President did say last week that we were moving to an offensive capability.

SEN. WARNER: I was there this morning and again this afternoon. What he has done -- listen carefully -- is to lay the foundation, both politically in the United Nations and with the consortium of countries that have joined us, some 25, and militarily by augmenting our forces, he's laid a foundation for the possible exercise, underline possible, exercise of the future option to use force. He needs that option to bring to Saddam Hussein's attention that we mean business together with our allies. Now one last point. This President has established a new precedent in our history. He has conferred more with the Congress and listened carefully to our leadership and others than any other President in the history of the United States.

MS. WOODRUFF: Sen. Kassebaum, one of the questions I hear being raised is if the sanctions are working, which Sec. Baker suggested they are, he said they're working, but maybe not as -- we don't know how well they're working but we think they're working well - - and he went on to say that we think we have the allies on board. I believe it was the Secretary who said that today -- why then is it necessary to send 200,000 additional troops? Are you clear on the reason for that?

SEN. KASSEBAUM: Well, I think Sen. Warner just laid it out very well, that it was the President's belief that he needed to do this to send an additional strong message that we were prepared for an offensive action if other options were going to fail. I still believe and strongly believe that the administration is working on other options, and I think many believe this is very important. We are at a different crossroads than we were a week ago. But I think that was pretty clearly laid out by Sen. Warner.

MS. WOODRUFF: Congressman Miller, how much of this is reflective of what any of you are hearing from your constituents at home?

REP. MILLER: Oh, I think it's very reflective. We had a meeting yesterday with the Speaker, with Democratic members from across the country, and everybody indicated that after the President notified the country that these troops were being sent there and he suggested they were being sent there for offensive purposes, which he clearly did, the phone started ringing off the hook.

MS. WOODRUFF: Congressman Hyde.

REP. MILLER: And that's what's going on, at least as members reported from Kentucky and Texas, and everywhere else.

MS. WOODRUFF: What are Republican members --

REP. HYDE: I think there is concern out beyond the beltway about what this means, the incremental increase, the ratcheting up, but I think the President has explained, and I think it's up to us to explain who understand that it is not a preparatory to using force but it is providing that option to protect our troops and our personnel and our hostages by giving credibility to our presence over there and sending the strong signal to Saddam Hussein that we're deadly serious.

MS. WOODRUFF: So --

REP. MILLER: There's really no disagreement on that. This is not inconsistent with that.

SEN. WARNER: You know, we wouldn't want to leave the impression here, those of who had the privilege to work with the President today, that he has deviated in course. He is staying on his course of trying to negotiate, trying to let time pass to make the sanctions work, and the sanctions are working, Judy, they are, in terms of stopping all the export of oil, freezing the cash that this nation, Iraq, needs for its other affairs, and secondly, the problemis we don't know exactly how long they can exist due to food shortages and how much shortage of spare parts in the military machine will affect their decisions.

MS. WOODRUFF: So they're working but not totally working?

SEN. WARNER: Well, they're working, but we don't know how to carefully assess the impact of the shortage of spare parts, food, medicine, and so forth.

MS. WOODRUFF: Unfortunately, we're going to have to leave it at that. I'm sorry, Sen. Bore, thank you, Sen. Kassebaum, Congresslqn Miller, Congressman Hyde, Sen. Warner, we thank you all for being with us. CONVERSATION - I WANT YOU

MR. MacNeil: We continue now with our series of special conversations designed to explore attitudes toward war in the Gulf. Our guest tonight is Robin Wright, the National Security Correspondent for the Los Angeles Times, and the author of several books about the Middle East. Ms. Wright has traveled extensively in the region since 1973, and she's currently enjoying a grant from the McArthur Foundation. Ms. Wright, thank you for joining us.

MS. WRIGHT: It's nice to be with you.

MR. MacNeil: Many people have said today after talking to the President that the recent buildup which would almost double the U.S. forces there is not a decision to use force but to create a credible option. What do you feel about that?

MS. WRIGHT: Well, it may add to the psychological pressure against President Saddam Hussein of Iraq, but at the same time I don't think we're playing by the same rules as he is. I think that there is very little that is going to squeeze him short-term in the time frame we need to move or to get a resolution of this crisis, to get him back down to withdraw completely from Kuwait.

MR. MacNeil: Let's discuss kinds or purposes of using military force and what you feel about each of them. Would you consider support, the option of using offensive force if Saddam does not leave Kuwait?

MS. WRIGHT: I think we probably would pay an enormous cost. We might win a war militarily, but I think we'd lose long-term politically in the region in terms of the fall out within the various countries not only in the Gulf but throughout the Middle East, and in terms of the kind of legacy. This war or this potential war has been portrayed as a kind of war to end all wars as if this is going to create a new world order, and I don't think it will. I think it will have set only the precedent, a very dangerous precedent, of using military force as a means of forcing, trying to get people to do what we want them to do, and I think that the lesson of the post cold war era or the cold war era has in Korea and Vietnam and Beirut, has been that using military force does not work long-term in squeezing or forcing the hand of regimes bent against standing up to us.

MR. MacNeil: Does that, would that apply if it were force sanctioned by a prior UN resolution?

MS. WRIGHT: Well, I suspect that all the United States or the multi-national force participants could hope for at the UN is a pretty watered down version and it might even specify the need for a catalyst, and I think Saddam Hussein has played unfortunately a very shrewd game. It's not going to provide that catalyst, hasn't so far. It is unlikely to in the future.

MR. MacNeil: You mean a provocation, like attack on --

MS. WRIGHT: That's right.

MR. MacNeil: -- U.S. forces or the killing of a hostage or something?

MS. WRIGHT: That's right. And I think that we would be in a very dangerous position if we tried to create a catalyst such as the Gulf of Tonkin during the Vietnam War, that we would be seen by our, even by some of our allies today and certainly by history as doing something or creating conditions for something we wanted to do anyway.

MR. MacNeil: So you think that if Sec. Baker does succeed in getting a resolution through the Security Council, it would have a catch to it, it would say, we would sanction the use of force, but only if Saddam Hussein gives some additional provocation?

MS. WRIGHT: That's right. I think that we're not going to get a blank check from the United Nations. There are too many members who are questioning our real intent. A lot of people, and not only in the Arab world or in the Islamic world, but in the third world in general, look at this confrontation not in terms of a benevolent intention to help a poor little government take its rightful place back in Kuwait City, but as motivated very largely by a desperate need for cheap oil. After all, many will -- have asked, and I've talked to various people around the world, would the United States have moved so quickly, for example, if Iraq had moved West against Syria, a relatively poor country, rather than South against oil rich Kuwait.

MR. MacNeil: What do you think about the use of force, as some people have hypothecated, to rescue the hostages?

MS. WRIGHT: Well, if you're talking about a Delta force type operation or a Navy Seal type operation, that's certainly one possibility, but I don't think it'd work. They're simply too scattered. That's not a realistic option. Unfortunately, I'm not convinced that there is any easy way militarily or diplomatically to get the hostages. If we don't go to war, they're going to sit there. If we do go to war, some of them may die. I think that, in fact, making them an issue is a very dangerous precedent, because one of the goals of the deployment in the Gulf was to tell Saddam Hussein, including the buildup in the Gulf, was to say to Saddam Hussein, we can't be intimidated by hostages. I'm afraid if we end up acting, it will show the world that actually taking hostages is a very cost efficient way of shaping the foreign policy of an adversary.

MR. MacNeil: What about using force to overthrow Saddam Hussein or destroy it or to weaken his military resources?

MS. WRIGHT: Well, of course it's an appealing option because we have made him the Adolf Hitler of the Arab world and the danger is though that in this obsessive discussion of war or no war that we're losing sight long-term of the issues in the region. What is the future going to look like, in Iraq specifically, but also in other parts of the region. What does removing Saddam Hussein do to Iraq, one of the most populous, one of the most important geostrategic properties in the entire Middle East? Do we leave behind an alternative? There is no opposition group strong enough or effective enough to take his place. The alternatives to Saddam Hussein, himself, within the military or the Revolutionary Command Council or the ruling Bath Party are only going to perpetuate his legend, and the third alternative is, in effect, the Lebanization of Iraq, a breakdown along very deep, divisive lines of sectarian and communal differences, and we can't afford to have a giant Lebanon in the Persian Gulf with such vital oil assets. We'd see the price of oil gyrating just as high after this whole ordeal as it is now.

MR. MacNeil: Sec. Baker yesterday said the real bottom line interest there is American jobs. He said, to put it in a word, "It is jobs." How would you feel about the use of force to protect American jobs?

MS. WRIGHT: That breaks my heart actually to think that it's just American jobs. After all, we initially deployed what President called "a new world order". And for us to act with such single- mindedness, lack of consideration for the rest of the world does not bode well for this alleged new world order.

MR. MacNeil: So as somebody who knows the region well, would you think there was no sort of politically viable moral justification for going to war against Iraq unless Iraq does something more than just invade Kuwait, unless it -- and take hostages -- unless it lashes out further?

MS. WRIGHT: Absolutely. And unfortunately, I think that while there probably is growing sentiment in that direction within this country that we've pained ourselves into a corner and even the various debates suggested on the Hill in academe, in other parts of this country, are not really going to lead to any significant questioning or reversal of our deployment in the Persian Gulf. There's no alternative. We really have to do something by the spring. We can't sit there for a year. We can't let sanctions take hold. I lived in Africa during the Rhodesian sanctions period. It was 13 years it took before sanctions took hold. We can't afford literally or figuratively to last, to hold out that long.

MR. MacNeil: How has this country painted itself into a corner?

MS. WRIGHT: Well, I think the Bush administration --

MR. MacNeil: I mean, Mr. Bush -- you just head the arguments again now -- it's the two options and one reinforces the other and here you heard it.

MS. WRIGHT: Well, yeah. I frankly don't think Saddam Hussein is going to back down. I'd love to believe there will be a diplomatic miracle. I'd love to be wrong. But in the absence of something before the spring, we really have no choice but to do something. Again, the alternatives are to sit there indefinitely. And we can't afford it. I mean, it's not just the financial cost of it. What's happening to the new democracies in Poland and Peru? In Poland, for example, it's not just the oil they need from the Gulf, particularly Iraq, but the trade they did with Iraq. It's a country going through shock therapy. The rippling effects of the Persian Gulf crisis around the world are taking a devastating toll, and the world literally can't afford this to hang on through next fall.

MR. MacNeil: Well, if you say you don't see a moral justification for using force to get rid of Saddam or get him out of Kuwait, and yet, you think that the United States can't wait, then how do you resolve that paradox or dilemma in your own mind, as a citizen how would you resolve it?

MS. WRIGHT: It's not easy. I mean, I think we are paying now a price for a very poor policy over the past 10 years. We allowed Iraq and so did the Saudis to become the bogeyman of the region, to build a million men army, to build one of the deadliest arsenals. We not only restored relations in 1984, but we assisted Iraq during the Gulf war. We allowed them to become the evil it is today.

MR. MacNeil: Well, do I understand you correctly, Ms. Wright, that you're really saying war is inevitable, whether it's desirable or will create worse problems down the line, it's inevitable now, is that what you're saying?

MS. WRIGHT: I think so.

MR. MacNeil: Well, with what consequence? If you think it's inevitable, what do you think the consequences are going to be?

MS. WRIGHT: I think they're very serious. First of all, are we going to end up undermining the very regimes we hope to strengthen, particularly those in the Gulf, by our presence there? Are we going to lead to a back lash notonly in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Sheikdoms, but in places like Jordan, which has been a very important ally of the United States for more than four decades, what kind of rupture is there going to be between the moderate Arab regimes? We've already seen a very serious split between Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia's cut off Jordan's oil. That kind of coalition even among the moderates, for it to fall apart, would be devastating if we genuinely hope to address the Arab-Israeli conflict in this century. I think the fallout could play out in so many different ways that it would end up costing us so much more we're really in a "no win" position.

MR. MacNeil: Well, Robin Wright, thank you for joining us.

MS. WRIGHT: Thank you. FOCUS - GENE THERAPY

MS. WOODRUFF: Finally, a radical new strategy to fight cancer. Over the next several weeks, doctors at the National Cancer Institute will begin an experimental program using gene therapy to treat cancer patients. The Food & Drug Administration gave NCI researchers a green light for the study yesterday. If the patients respond to the treatment, it could march a major advance for many types of diseases that up till now have been incurable. Fred De Sam Lazaro of public station KTCA in Minneapolis-St. Paul has a report on this new therapy.

MR. LAZARO: Barely a decade ago, a sterile bubble was the best medicine had to offer to children with ADA deficiency, a rare genetic disease. The immune system disease was made famous in the '70s by David, the "Bubble Boy". He had to spend all his 12 years in an artificial germ free environment. An essential enzyme, called ADA, was missing and his body was unable to fight off even routine infections.

DOCTOR: [Talking to Patient] What grade are you in now?

CYNTHIA: Fourth.

DOCTOR: How's Fourth Grade?

CYNTHIA: Fine.

DOCTOR: Good.

MR. LAZARO: By David's standards, a normal fourth grade existence is a miracle for Cynthia Cutshall. The nine year old Ohio native is one of fewer than 20 children worldwide known to have ADA deficiency.

DOCTOR: [Talking to Patient] Real big deep breath and cough.

MR. LAZARO: Doctors at Cleveland's Rainbow Hospital put Cynthia on a new drug that has allowed her a near normal lifestyle. Called Peg ADA, it substitutes for the missing enzyme.

DOCTOR: Find some wood to knock on, it's done very well as far as protecting her against all the threats to the immune system one encounters in K through 4 so far.

MR. LAZARO: But Dr. Melvyn Berger says Peg ADA provides only limited immune function for Cynthia. She still runs a high risk of succumbing to an infection.

DR. BERGER: The question is how long will that band-aid work.

MR. LAZARO: The answer soon may not matter. That's because Cynthia Cutshall is coming close to a second miracle, not just a treatment, but an actual clear. ADA deficiency is the first disease ever to be treated by gene therapy. Even though it's one of medicine's biggest breakthroughs, the concept and actual procedure for the first human gene transplants appear fairly simple. First, these T lymphocytes, the body's natural disease fighting cells, are extracted from the patient. In the laboratory, the missing ADA gene is injected into them. It is carried into the cells by a rectal virus, a virus that's been modified so that it cannot cause disease. It's simply a courier for the transplanted gene. The treated T cells are then reproduced several thousandfold in the laboratory. They are reinjected into the patient and it's hoped the newly transplanted gene will trigger the body to produceADA. Dr. Michael Blaese at the National Institutes of Health has begun treating the first of 10 children with the new therapy.

DR. BLAESE: We really don't anticipate seeing much in the way of effects for the first six months or so. The child is doing very well. Her parents tell us that she's happier than usual, so it's been very successful.

DR. STEVEN ROSENBERG, National Cancer Institute: The procedure is a disarmingly simple one.

MR. LAZARO: Dr. Steven Rosenberg will soon apply the same procedure as colleague Blase to patients with melanoma, an advanced skin cancer. To their cells, Rosenberg will insert a gene that increases their production of tumor fighting substances.

DR. ROSENBERG: It's very upsetting to try to treat disease by altering the patient's own genetic makeup by taking advantage of their own biologic resources to fight the disease.

DR. ANDERSON: If our first patients are successfully treated, then I think there will be an opening of the flood gates.

MR. LAZARO: Dr. French Anderson heads the NIH team of genetic engineers. He predicts that after ADA deficiency, gene therapy will be applied to various other diseases. In genetic diseases, the basic approach is to inject healthy genes to correct or to replace defective or missing genes. In cancer treatments, on the other hand, additional genes help soup up the body's own disease fighting mechanisms. In the future, Anderson says, gene therapy will become routine and widely used.

DR. ANDERSON: Insulin is an example. Rather than taking daily injections or weekly injections, it simply makes more sense to genetically engineer some of the patient's own cells and let the patient's own cells constantly secrete whatever that product is.

MR. LAZARO: Although seemingly simple, there are numerous hurdles to get to that stage of gene therapy. Anderson says scientists need a more accurate and controllable method of inserting genes. With the current technique, doctors have little control over where in the vast human genetic structure the transplanted gene will settle, whether it will disrupt other healthy genes, possibly knock out a cancer suppressing gene, for example. There's also no guarantee it will respond like a normal gene.

DR. ANDERSON: I certainly think that within say 20 years, all three of those hurdles should be at least partially overcome. And if that is the case, then we move into a major inexpensive, safe mass treatment. Then you move into another world of problems, and these are the problems Jeremy Rifkin has talked so much about.

MR. LAZARO: Author and social activist Jeremy Rifkin is a longtime foe of genetic engineering.

DR. RIFKIN: I think that the National Institutes of Health and the French Anderson team has jumped the gun. Other scientists in the last week who are in the field said that ambition and NIH priorities took precedence over the children's welfare.

MR. LAZARO: Rifkin is particularly critical of the ADA deficiency trials which he says highlight the need for more regulation of the new science.

DR. RIFKIN: The retrovirus could trigger oncogenes, tumor, cancer. It could trigger antibiotic resistance. So you're putting a potentially dangerous animal retrovirus into the genetic code of children who already have compromised immune systems and children who already are getting a treatment that's working.

DR. BLAESE: We don't intend to treat patients that are doing very well.

MR. LAZARO: NIH doctors vigorously deny they are placing patients in increased danger. They acknowledge there is some cancer risk from gene transplants, but Blase says years of scrutiny by NIH panels have deemed it an acceptable risk, and that similar trials on animals have proven safe.

DR. MICHAEL BLAESE, National Cancer Institute: We believe that that risk must be very, very low and certainly much lower than the risk the children are going to develop cancer because of their principal immune deficiency disease.

DR. FRENCH ANDERSON, National Institutes of Health: This protocol is safe, has been established to be safe by a broad range of regulatory committees with a substantial number of scientists, commissions, lawyers, ethicists, and so on on it, but the rapidity of our progress is frightening for some people.

DR. RIFKIN: The technology is rushing way ahead of social policy.

MR. LAZARO: Rifkin is concerned that genetic engineering today has left too much to the scientists to oversee. He wants to see a broader public review of what he calls a new tool for prejudice, a science fraught with potential abuse.

DR. RIFKIN: It is possible within this decade to imagine the following experiment, to place a growth hormone gene from another species directly into the genetic blueprint of a child. Well, this could raise serious eugenics implications. In our society, we know that people who are taller on all the surveys make more money in their lifetime than those who are smaller. There is a prejudice -- it's assuming, if you will -- but there is a prejudice against small people in this society. Parents might be pressured to want to have their child take that genetic surgery so that their blueprint can be changed and they would grow taller than they normally would.

DR. ANDERSON: Jeremy has the reputation and deservedly so of being an alarmist, of challenging with lawsuits, et cetera, but Jeremy's basic point I am in total agreement with.

MR. LAZARO: In fact, Anderson has joined Rifkin in supporting new federal legislation that guarantees an individual's right to genetic privacy.

DR. ANDERSON: This really should be something very, very beneficial for the health of the world. but if we are not able to control the abusive side, then we'll have another nuclear power kind of situation.

MR. LAZARO: For his part, Rifkin, despite his opposition, did not sue to stop the ADA deficiency experiments. Rifkin is not opposed to genetic engineering, but says he wants to see this emerging science debated before its application.

DR. JEREMY RIFKIN, Activist: You know, in my lifetime I've experienced the results of petrochemical technologies and nuclear technologies. Our parents' generation did not ask the hard questions up front when most technologies were in their incipient form. They were so enamored with the benefits and so overwhelmed with the possibilities, no one bothered to ask what would be the environmental, social, and ethical impacts of these technologies. As a result, our world is worse off because we didn't have that debate.

DOCTOR: There's no way to give percentages or chances per thousand or anything else.

MR. LAZARO: The debate over gene therapy has already played out in the Cutshall family. Susan Cutshall says the potential cancer risk concerned her.

MS. CUTSHALL: We have the feelings of should I do this, shouldn't I do this. She's doing well. She's doing fairly well, maybe we should just hold off, maybe we should wait. The gene therapy, itself, we understood wouldn't even be feasibly possible I think for what, ten, fifteen years, so that was three years ago we heard about it, so this was amazing to us that it started so soon.

MR. LAZARO: The Cutshalls decided to proceed with evaluations which would make Cynthia a gene therapy candidate, urged on by Dr. Berger, a molecular biologist and himself surprised at the pace of progress.

DR. MELVYN BERGER, Rainbow Hospital: At this point every step is taking half as long as we would have thought at the previous step.

MR. LAZARO: The immediate next step is to await results from the early gene therapy trials. Several research labs are now studying genetic diseases that could be treatable with gene therapy, like cystic fibrosis, hemophilia, and sickle cell anemia. Besides expanding their ADA deficiency and cancer trials, Anderson's team hopes next year to move on to an experimental gene therapy to treat AIDS. RECAP

MR. MacNeil: Once again, Wednesday's top stories, President Bush told members of Congress the U.S. military buildup in the Persian Gulf did not mean war with Iraq was imminent, House and Senate leaders said a special session on the crisis was not needed at this time. Good night, Judy.

MS. WOODRUFF: Good night, Robin. That's our NewsHour for tonight. We'll be back tomorrow night with Congressional hearings on the Keating Five and an interview with Mikhail Gorbachev's Middle East trouble shooter. I'm Judy Woodruff. Thank you and good night.