October 18, 2002	Friday	Sha'aban 11, 1423

LONDON, Oct 17: The United States will need to follow up any war against Baghdad with both nation-building in Iraq and “region-building” in the Middle East, an influential defence think-tank said here on Thursday.

The International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), in its annual Military Balance report, also said that a US-led war on Iraq was now a probability within the next six months.

“After any war against Iraq, the US and any of its allies would not only have to engage in nation-building, they would also have to do ‘region-building’ in the Middle East,” the London-based IISS said.

It said the key component would be a “vigorous return” to the Middle East peace process, preferably through a major international conference.

Washington expects a successful military campaign in Iraq would “isolate opponents of an Israeli-Palestinian peace process, press Egypt and Saudi Arabia to support Palestinian reform, and reinforce (Palestinian leader Yasser) Arafat’s sense that he has nowhere left to turn,” it said.

The IISS said a “very strong new (UN Security Council) resolution” on Iraqi disarmament could still “avoid conflict in the short term.

“But any sign of non-compliance would lead to the US choosing to deal with the issue through the use of force,” either unilaterally or with the support of allies, it said.

“On present form it remains more probable than not that a war will be waged within the next six months,” the IISS said.

On regime change in Baghdad, the think-tank said Washington would have to play the lead role in a post-Saddam Iraq despite any political fallout from the US occupation of an Arab country.

“A US-led transitional authority in Iraq may be presentationally the worst option, but in fact is operationally probably the best and the only one,” the IISS said.

“It would be next to impossible to develop a government in exile that could safely be imported. Negotiations between Iraqis on a future government would inevitably take place in Iraq after the war.”

The report said the United States’ plans to oust Iraqi President Saddam Hussein by force could put its global “counter-terrorism efforts” at risk in the longer term by pushing away potential allies, the International Institute for Strategic Studies said on Thursday.

Moreover, the US will find it harder to prosecute a successful war on Iraq than it was for its military to fight the Al Qaeda network and their Taliban hosts in Afghanistan, the London-based military think-tank said in its annual report.—AFP