Defense Poll: Iraq Response Won't Avert War

By Ruth Pitchford and Joanne Russell

LONDON (Reuters) - Iraq's massive arms dossier is unlikely to dissuade the United States from invading to depose President Saddam Hussein  within the next three months, according to a Reuters poll of defense experts.

Ten of the 18 experts in the global survey said war was still likely or very likely and six gave a 50-50 chance that U.S. troops would go into Iraq, probably in January or February.

"It's inevitable," said Magnus Ranstorp at the University of St. Andrew's in Scotland. "The volume of the evidence handed over is a very clever stalling tactic... but there will be military conflict after this."

Most analysts thought conflict would last between two weeks and three months, but the United States would keep troops in Iraq long after this.

"The actual fighting is likely to be less than a month but that is only the beginning," said U.S. Middle East specialist Judith Kipper, who puts the chances of war at 50-50.

Analysts in the United States, Europe, the Middle East and Asia contributed to the survey, carried out Dec. 9 and 10. Only two said war was unlikely.

However most analysts saw a fairly limited risk of long-term disruption to the oil market -- the major economic threat from any conflict in the oil-rich region.

AL QAEDA

"We're going to see an oil price spike that will diminish comparatively quickly and no extended interruption to oil supplies," said Toby Dodge of the University of Warwick, who sees war as very likely.

"The United States clearly have a big strategic reserve, the Saudis will up their pumping and even if the Iraqis fire all their own oil wells, that's not going to interrupt supply."

Most analysts thought the risks of war had been left broadly unchanged by Iraq's 12,000-page response to the United Nations demand to declare any weapons of mass destruction.

"It will be difficult to find a 'trigger' if Iraq does not overreact, but the Bush administration seems determined and the military build-up proceeds apace," said one U.S. expert who asked not to be named. "The scenario moves forward more or less as planned."

There was no consensus on whether recent attacks attributed to al Qaeda, such as the Bali and Mombasa bombings, would spur or deter a U.S. invasion of Iraq, loosely linked by Washington to global terrorism.

Dodge at Warwick University thought such attacks made war less likely. "If al Qaeda managed to land (another) blow on continental America... this would highlight the fact that Iraq isn't the main enemy, that Bush's war is mistargeted," he said.

"Al Qaeda are clearly a transnational, non-geographically- based result of globalization. Iraq is a hangover from before globalization, a rogue state fighting for its autonomy."

WHAT COULD DISSUADE U.S.

Others thought such attacks were having little impact on policy. "If anything the war on Iraq has made terrorism more likely because intelligence assets are being shifted into finding evidence against Iraq, away from looking for terrorists," said Jeremy Binnie at Jane's Sentinel in London.

Asked what could dissuade the United States from invading Iraq, some analysts said concerted opposition from other major powers could undermine U.S. public support for the conflict and make Washington more concerned about the aftermath of invasion.

"Short of a clear-cut veto by a superpower at the (UN) Security Council... I don't think anything would dissuade the United States," said Riad Kahwaji at Defense News in Dubai.

Kipper, who is associated with the Washington-based. Council on Foreign Relations and the Center for Strategic and International Studies, cited other possible deterrents to war.

"A new al Qaeda attack in the United States or a big one against U.S. interests abroad, a major outbreak of instability in the Middle East someplace, or crisis elsewhere like Korea or China/Taiwan or India/Pakistan" could all force Washington to rethink, she said.

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