The Clinton administration is on their way to single-handedly dismantling the Gulf War coalition formed over six years ago to combat Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi military.

Through selfishness, indecision, and a lack of objectives, the coalition that the Bush administration worked so hard to organize is rapidly crumbling.

Though there is widespread support in this country for punishing Iraq for their transgressions against the Kurds, the same cannot be said for our allies. Great Britain was the only supporter of last week’s raids, and Saudi Arabia and Turkey would not allow further raids to be launched from their soil.

Last week Iraq fired missiles at U.S. aircraft patrolling the no-fly zones. Instead of consulting with our allies before deciding on a response, the Pentagon announced that they were sending more aircraft, an additional aircraft carrier and 5,000 troops to Kuwait.

Someone forgot to ask the Kuwaiti government first. They had not even approved our request to place troops there when this was announced last week. Only 3,000 troops are now approved to go, no doubt a reduction caused by our faux pas.

Not only does this make the U.S. look foolish, but it also demonstrates the inability of Bill Clinton to deal with complex foreign policy decisions.

Most in the U.S. agree that Hussein must be dealt with harshly, but certain steps have to be taken to make these raids easier to accomplish.

One way to make these sound decisions is to have clear objectives when such operations take place. A play-it-by-ear attitude does not work, and it places American servicemen and servicewomen in greater danger.

If we make it clear to the other countries in the gulf that we want to deal with Saddam harshly and will protect those countries that support us, we would achieve greater success than we have previously.

We should start these operations with the objective of finishing the job we started in 1991; that is, complete destruction of the Iraqi military and persuasion of the citizens to overthrow Hussein.

Another method to reduce antipathy among the other coalition nations is to be cognizant of their possible hesitations. In 1990, Secretary of State James Baker performed the impossible task of arraying Arab nations against one another. He accomplished this by convincing them that Iraq was wrong in their actions.

We have not cast Saddam Hussein as the aggressor in this instance. The nations of the Gulf are strongly aligned, and a move by Kuwait to appease the U.S. could cast them as an outsider.

Even these motives may not convince the nations of the Coalition to act in concert with us. In that case, we must use other assets to accomplish our objectives. We have massive ships in the Gulf and Red Sea armed with cruise missiles and various types of aircraft.

Though these platforms are now on station, they are not being used. Last week, a spokesman for the Pentagon said that retaliation for Iraq targeting American aircraft and rebuilding anti-aircraft sites would occur but wouldn’t say when.

Well, it’s been a week. Where are these raids? Has Saddam’s pledge to back down halted the preparations for American raids? Probably.

This situation is similar to the Serbian occupation of U.N. “safe havens” last summer.

Instead of punishing the Serbs for their display of ethnic cleansing, the Clinton administration believed that they would back down. They didn’t bend, and the belated NATO air strikes amounted to nothing more than a slap on the wrist.

So here we are again; a despotic ruler of a third world nation brazenly defying international mandates and then retreating to avoid retaliation.

How many times is this going to happen before Clinton finally gets the picture? Since he received his foreign policy experience while draft-dodging and protesting the Vietnam War at Oxford, he probably won’t get the picture.

If we are going to have an effective foreign policy, then we need to have some minds in Washington who understand the situation.

Clinton clearly doesn’t have a handle on the problem, nor does his cabinet. Secretary of State Warren Christopher, Secretary of Defense William Perry and National Security Advisor Anthony Lake have shown themselves inadequate to deal with the situation in Iraq, or any other areas for that matter.

If Clinton does get reelected (perish the thought!) he will need to replace these three men with some diplomatically-advantaged people if he wants to achieve some sort of international success.

He hasn’t mentioned removing them nor has he mentioned a strong, objective-based policy concerning Iraq. This is just another reason for Americans not to reelect him.

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Robert Zeis is a senior in finance from Des Moines.