The Iraqis were later proved to have produced close to four thousand liters of VX long ago—after claiming far lower estimates. “But of course,” they told UNSCOM, “we’ve destroyed all that we made during the years they had actually made the stuff.”

The UN resolution demanded UNSCOM verification, but the Iraqis always blocked UNSCOM from verifying anything significant.

Naturally, UNSCOM successes did not sit well with the Iraqis.

On August 5, the battle entered its final phase, when the Iraqis officially suspended UNSCOM’s disarmament work. Though Kofi Annan and others shuttled to all the usual capitals in an effort to attain another “diplomatic solution,” by October 31 no one serious doubted that the work of UNSCOM was finished. No one knew how the end would come—whether the Iraqis would throw the inspectors out, or the inspectors would give up and walk out—but one way or another it was certain that the UNSCOM operation in Iraq was untenable.

When that happened, the heavy air strike would inevitably follow.

As that moment approached, Secretary of Defense Cohen, communicating through General Hugh Shelton, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, directed Zinni to prepare two attack plans—a heavy option, and a lighter one. The heavy option would attack many targets over several days. The lighter option would be shorter, and hit fewer targets.

Though he could have lived with either option, Zinni preferred the heavier. “If you’re going to hit him, hit him,” he told the Joint Chiefs.

ON THE SEVENTH of November, he flew up to Washington to brief the plan.

If he thought the briefings would be easy, and followed by an automatic approval of his plan, he was wrong.

A briefing with the Joint Chiefs was held in the small Pentagon conference room called “the Tank.” When Zinni had finished, the chairman called for a vote on the options.

To say that the vote surprised Zinni was an understatement; the vote itself made no sense. Not only was there no serious discussion beforehand, nor to his knowledge had there been earlier sessions to discuss the options, but, most important, the Joint Chiefs were not in Zinni’s chain of command (which went directly through the Secretary of Defense to the President). The CINCs are operationally independent of the Joint Chiefs, whose primary job, in their Service Chief role, was to provide the CINCs with the personnel and equipment they needed to do their job. In other words, to Zinni the vote was meaningless (though no CINC casually ignores the recommendations that the JCS gives on employment of U.S. forces). He was even more shocked when the JCS voted 4 to 2 for the lighter option, after he had recommended the heavier one. Since there had been little discussion before the vote, the reasons for their choice were unclear. Whatever the reason, Zinni could sense their nervousness: Going against the CINC’s recommendation made them all uneasy. None of them liked to second-guess a field commander.