cross compiling a linux application for zlinux using debian

[<moshief_daniel@emc.com>]

I am new to linux and am attempting to rebuild an existing linux i386
application to run on zlinux by making small modifications to the build
by having it cross compile on a vmware debian linux image.  When an ar
command is run in the build, I am getting an error:

 emulation options: 
  No emulation specific options
ar: supported targets: elf32-i386 a.out-i386-linux efi-app-ia32
elf32-little elf32-big elf64-alpha ecoff-littlealpha elf64-little
elf64-big elf32-littlearm elf32-bigarm elf32-hppa-linux elf32-hppa
elf64-x86-64 elf64-ia64-little elf64-ia64-big efi-app-ia64 elf32-m68k
a.out-m68k-linux coff-m68k versados ieee a.out-zero-big
elf32-tradbigmips elf32-tradlittlemips ecoff-bigmips ecoff-littlemips
elf32-ntradbigmips elf64-tradbigmips elf32-ntradlittlemips
elf64-tradlittlemips elf32-powerpc aixcoff-rs6000 elf32-powerpcle
ppcboot elf64-powerpc elf64-powerpcle aixcoff64-rs6000 elf32-s390
elf64-s390 elf32-shbig-linux elf32-sh-linux elf32-sh64-linux
elf32-sh64big-linux elf64-sh64-linux elf64-sh64big-linux elf32-sparc
a.out-sparc-linux elf64-sparc a.out-sunos-big efi-app-x86_64
elf32-m32r-linux elf32-m32rle-linux elf32-spu srec symbolsrec tekhex
binary ihex trad-core

What does ar want as syntax for emulation options?

ar elf32-s390 -r ......   does not work

I am executing the "ar" that is part of the s390-linux-gnu/bin so I
assume it knows that it is in cross compilation mode..... but I suppose
ar needs to know whether it is 32 or 64 bit mode...

thank you, 

Daniel Moshief
EMC Corp.