Endgame : Solving the Iraq Problem -- Once and For All

by Scott Ritter

The resignation of Scott Ritter as chief weapons inspector for UNSCOM in August 1998 made front-page news around the world. Now Scott Ritter draws on his seven years' experience hunting Saddam's weapons of mass destruction to take readers inside Iraq and show that country as it has never been seen by outsiders before. In Endgame, he dissects the failure of U.S. policy in Iraq and reveals a bold new approach to ending the ongoing Iraq crisis. Ritter describes Saddam Hussein's rise to power, painting a damning portrait of a dictator who ruthlessly eliminated rivals as he fought his way to the top. Ritter explains how Saddam cleverly drew on tribal and family connections to consolidate power and then outmaneuver and often execute opponents. Once he had become the uncontested strongman in Iraq, Saddam began planning the domination of the Persian Gulf region, fighting a war with Iran, threatening Israel, and finally invading Kuwait, the action that provoked the Gulf War. Along the way Saddam repeatedly purged Iraq's military, putting his own key allies and relatives in charge. He also discovered the value of chemical weapons and ballistic missiles, which he used to turn the tide in the war against Iran. When the U.N. Security Council authorized inspections of Iraq's chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons facilities following the conclusion of the Gulf War, Saddam put in place a concealment program designed to preserve his weapons capabilities. It was this concealment mechanism that UNSCOM spent seven years trying to penetrate in its search for Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Ritter takes us with him inside some of Iraq's most carefully guarded sites as he describes what it was like to conduct these inspections. He tells stories of dramatic face-offs by unarmed inspectors with hostile Iraqi guards and officials. Endgame criticizes current U.S. policy toward Iraq, pointing out that we have squandered an international consensus and now find ourselves virtually isolated over our Iraq policy. Scott Ritter offers a way out of the Iraqi morass, proposing a bold and innovative solution to the current crisis. He argues that the U.S. should again take a leadership position on Iraq if we are to avoid facing a re-armed and emboldened Saddam on another battlefield in the future.

240 pages, Hardcover

First published April 1, 1999

Reviews

[Dylan Loughheed · Rating 4 out of 5]

Picked up on a whim from the Peace Corps library. Entertaining non-fiction about something I didn’t know a lot about. While the book focuses on the UN Security Council disarmament and investigation process post Kuwait invasion by Iraq, it also spends a lot of time explaining the rise to power of Sadam Hussein; the way he ran his government through a blend of tribalism, Ba’athist political ideals, and nepotism; the methods of “no-knock” weapons inspections; the intelligence work involved from both sides of the issue; etc. Cool to hear about how a country can break things down (missile launchers, biological weapon grow labs, wmd research facilities, chemical agent filled missile heads) and hide them in sedans, under orchards, in scrap piles, and as melted ingots.

[Joseph Stieb · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting account of one of the top UN weapons inspectors in the 1990's. Gives some excellent insights into how the inspections worked and why they fell apart. Ritter comes across as an odd character: very exacting and intense, an ex-Marine who took his job as an inspector extremely seriously. Maybe even a little too seriously: he would accept any political influence in the inspections, even if the Clinton administration really needed some slight tactical adjustments. Ritter ends this book with a compelling argument that the US strategy lacked an endgame. In other words, the US had committed itself to containing Saddam indefinitely, but the international coalition was collapsing and the US had no plan for diplomacy or an invasion. Ritter makes an solid case for an alternative strategy based on deterrence and diplomatic engagement with Saddam, although he overlooks the survival guarantee that would have been needed to get SH to trust the US even a little bit. This diplomatic approach would not have worked, but the fact that it was never tried shows how narrow a spectrum the American policy debate on Iraq took place within. Recommended for people interested in the Iraq War, but not really for anyone else.

[David Vanness · Rating 4 out of 5]

When the ink was still wet on this work, I just followed the reviews, critiques, and Sunday morning Television reviews. It has always been on my list of 'to read'. I should have not postponed reading of the behind the scenes politics, personalities, and on-the-ground workings and events. Ritter's criticisms of the US's handling I found historically solid. Not current, but a worthwhile investment of my time.

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good overview of Saddam's history. Speaks of the difficulties of a military occupation of Iraq.