It may appear so Carol - but you can't fault the man's planning:

If you take the point about Iraq not honouring the terms of the cease-fire agreement - then hypothetically the UN could declare the cease-fire over at any moment and hostilities could resume - you are perfectly correct in saying that it would have to be the UN that did that - not one of the "Desert Storm" coalition partners.

If the UN did go down that line - the President would then have to go to Congress for the authority that would enable the US to rejoin that coalition and intervene.

What George W. Bush has done is to short-cut that process so that should the UN opt for military intervention the US would be at immediate readiness. Good planning.

It falls in line with what the US has done right from the start in this matter (Iraq) - irrespective of rhetoric, not once have they acted "unilaterally", they have always operated throughout in accordance with UN protocol.