IS Waging Another War on Iraq Justified?

Bad Day for Blustering Bad Boy Bush -- we will invade Iraq -- ``with or without`` SC approval --

so France and Russia wrote it out in Jumbo letters -- for the half-wit near-sighted Junior - the four letter Expletive -- called VETO

they will brand the Texas Bull with a searing red hot VETO on his cowboy rump -- ``with r without`` -- his 9 votes majority --

if he forces the hands of a civilized Security Council to allow him to vandalize Antique Iraq -- and to go on a death and destruction spree -- as the American versin of Buddha Basher Taliban.

Now our Kofi Annan has spelled it out for the little Juvenile Delinquent as well --

he has WARNED the ADHD kid -- NOT without the Security Council permission, boy -- you don’t

he almost said -- if the Infantile Emperor with no Diaper -- invades Iraq -

- he will be committing the same UGLY CRIME of Aggression -- against Iraq -- that Saddam Hussein committed when he invaded Kuwait. Period

-- and like Saddam Hussein -- he will also be hearing from the War Crimes Tribunal at Hague -- one day.

in other words Kofi scolds the Hyper Kid -- play by the RULES boy -- if the SC says -- NO -- it`s a NO NO --

and no tantrums -- de u hear

The West has been liberating the Middle East for Centuries Will we never learn?



By Robert Fisk; UK Independent; March 07, 2003



ON 8 MARCH 1917, Lieutenant- General Stanley Maude issued a ``Proclamation to the People of the Wilayat of Baghdad``. Maude`s Anglo-Indian Army of the Tigris had just invaded and occupied Iraq - after storming up the country from Basra - to ``free`` its people from their dictators. ``Our armies do not come into your cities and lands as conquerors or enemies, but as liberators,`` the British announced.



``People of Baghdad, remember for 26 generations you have suffered under strange tyrants who have ever endeavoured to set one Arab house against another in order that they might profit by your dissensions. This policy is abhorrent to Great Britain and her Allies for there can be neither peace nor prosperity where there is enmity or misgovernment.``



General Maude, of course, was the General Tommy Franks of his day, and his proclamation - so rich in irony now that President George Bush is uttering equally mendacious sentiments - was intended to persuade Iraqis that they should accept foreign occupation while Britain secured the country`s oil. General Maude`s chief political officer, Sir Percy Cox, called on Iraq`s Arab leaders, who were not identified, to participate in the government in collaboration with the British authorities and spoke of liberation, freedom, past glories, future greatness and - here the ironies come in spades - it expressed the hope that the people of Iraq would find unity.



The British commander cabled to London that ``local conditions do not permit of employing in responsible positions any but British officers competent... to deal with people of the country. Before any truly Arab facade sic can be applied to edifice, it seems essential that foundation of law and order should be well and truly laid.``



As David Fromkin noted in his magisterial A Peace to End all Peace - essential reading for America`s future army of occupation - the antipathy of the Sunni minority and the Shia majority of Iraq, the rivalries of tribes and clans ``made it difficult to achieve a single unified government that was at the same time representative, effective and widely supported``. Whitehall failed, as Fromkin caustically notes, ``to think through in practical detail how to fulfil the promises gratuitously made to a section of the local inhabitants``. There was even a problem with the Kurds, since the British could not make up their mind as to whether they should be absorbed into the new state of Iraq or allowed to form an independent Kurdistan. The French were originally to have been awarded Mosul in northern Iraq but gave up their claim in return for - again, wait for the ironies - a major share in the new Turkish Petroleum Company, newly confiscated by the British and recreated as the Iraq Petroleum Company.



How many times has the West marched into the Middle East in so brazen a fashion? General Sir Edward Allenby ``liberated`` Palestine only a few months after General Maude ``liberated`` Iraq. The French turned up to ``liberate`` Lebanon and Syria a couple of years later, slaughtering the Syrian forces loyal to King Feisel who dared to suggest that French occupation was not the kind of future they wanted.



What is it, I sometimes wonder, about our constant failure to learn the lessons of history, to repeat - almost word for word in the case of General Maude`s proclamation - the same gratuitous promises and lies? A copy of General Maude`s original proclamation goes under the hammer at a British auction at Swindon this week but I`ll wager more than the pounds 100 it is expected to make that America`s forthcoming proclamation to the ``liberated`` people of Iraq reads almost exactly the same.



Take a look at Article 22 of the Covenant of the League of Nations - on which Mr Bush claims to be such an expert - that allowed the British and French to divide those territories they had just ``liberated`` from Ottoman dictators. ``To those colonies and territories which as a consequence of the late war have ceased to be under the sovereignty of the States which formerly governed them, and which are inhabited by peoples not yet able to stand by themselves... there should be applied the principle that the well-being and development of such peoples form a sacred trust of civilisation... the best method is that the tutelage of such peoples should be entrusted to advanced nations who, by reason of their resources, their experience or their geographical position, can best undertake this responsibility...``



What is it about ``liberation`` in the Middle East? What is this sacred trust - a ghost of the same ``trusteeship`` the US Secretary of State, Colin Powell, now promotes for Iraq`s oil - that the West constantly wishes to visit upon the Middle East? Why do we so frequently want to govern these peoples, these ``tribes with flags`` as Sir Steven Runciman, that great historian of the 11th- and 12th-century Crusades, once called them? Indeed, Pope Urban`s call for the first Crusade in 1095, reported at the time by at least three chroniclers, would find a resonance even among the Christian fundamentalists who, along with Israel`s supporters, are now so keen for the United States to invade Iraq.



Urban told his listeners the Turks were maltreating the inhabitants of Christian lands - an echo here of the human rights abuses which supposedly upset Mr Bush - and described the suffering of pilgrims, urging the Christian West`s formerly fratricidal antagonists to fight a ``righteous`` war. His conflict, of course, was intended to ``liberate`` Christians rather than Muslims who, along with the Jews, the Crusaders contentedly slaughtered as soon as they arrived in the Middle East.



This notion of ``liberation`` in the Middle East has almost always been accompanied by another theme: the necessity of overthrowing tyrants.



The Crusaders were as meticulous about their Middle East invasions as the US Central Command at Tampa, Florida, is today. Marino Sanudo, born in Venice around 1260, describes how the Western armies chose to put their forces ashore in Egypt with a first disembarkation of 15,000 infantrymen along with 300 cavalry (the latter being the Crusader version of an armoured unit). In Beirut, I even have copies of the West`s 13th-century invasion maps. Napoleon produced a few of his own in 1798 when he invaded Egypt after 20 years of allegedly irresponsible and tyrannical rule by Murad Bey and Ibrahim Bey. Claude Etienne Savary, the French equivalent of all those Washington pundits who groan today over the suffering of the Iraqi people under President Saddam, - wrote in 1775 that in Cairo under Murad Bey ``death may prove the consequence of the slightest indiscretion``. Under the Beys, the city ``groans under their yoke``. Which is pretty much how we now picture Baghdad and Basra under President Saddam.



In fact, President Saddam`s promises to destroy America`s invasion force have a remarkable echo in the exclamation of one of the 18th-century Mameluke princes in Egypt, who, told of an imminent French invasion, responded with eerily familiar words: ``Let the Franks come. We shall crush them beneath our horses` hooves.``



Napoleon, of course, did all the crushing, and his first proclamation (he, too, was coming to ``liberate`` the people of Egypt from their oppressors) included an appeal to Egyptian notables to help him run the government. ``O shayks, `qadis`, imams, and officers of the town, tell your nation that the French are friends of true Muslims... Blessed are those Egyptians who agree with us.`` Napoleon went on to set up an ``administrative council`` in Egypt, very like the one which the Bush Administration says it intends to operate under US occupation. And in due course the ``shayks`` and ``qadis`` and imams rose up against French occupation in Cairo in 1798.



If Napoleon entered upon his rule in Egypt as a French revolutionary, General Allenby, when he entered Jerusalem in December, 1917, had provided David Lloyd George with the city he wanted as a Christmas present. Its liberation, the British Prime Minister later noted with almost Crusader zeal, meant that Christendom had been able ``to regain possession of its sacred shrines``. He talked about ``the calling of the Turkish bluff`` as ``the beginning of the crack-up of that military impostorship which the incompetence of our war direction had permitted to intimidate us for years``, shades, here, of the American regret that it never took the 1991 Gulf War to Baghdad; Lloyd George was ``finishing the job`` of overcoming Ottoman power just as George Bush Junior now intends to ``finish the job`` started by his father in 1991.



And always, without exception, there were those tyrants and dictators to overthrow in the Middle East. In the Second World War, we ``liberated`` Iraq a second time from its pro-Nazi administration. The British ``liberated`` Lebanon from Vichy rule with a promise of independence from France, a promise which Charles de Gaulle tried to renege on until the British almost went to war with the Free French in Syria.



Lebanon has suffered an awful lot of ``liberations``. The Israelis - for Arabs, an American, ``Western`` implantation in the Middle East - claimed twice to be anxious to ``liberate`` Lebanon from PLO ``terrorism`` by invading in 1978 and 1982, and leaving in humiliation only two years ago. America`s own military intervention in Beirut in 1982 was blown apart by a truck- bomb at the US Marine headquarters the following year. And what did President Ronald Reagan tell the world? ``Lebanon is central to our credibility on a global scale. We cannot pick and choose where we will support freedom... If Lebanon ends up under the tyranny of forces hostile to the West, not only will our strategic position in the eastern Mediterranean be threatened, but also the stability of the entire Middle East, including the vast resources of the Arabian Peninsula.``



Once more, we, the West, were going to protect the Middle East from tyranny. Anthony Eden took the same view of Egypt, anxious to topple the ``dictator`` Gamal Abdul Nasser, just as Napoleon had been desperate to rescue the Egyptians from the tyranny of the Beys, just as General Maude wanted to rescue Iraq from the tyranny of the Turks, just as George Bush Junior now wants to rescue the Iraqis from the tyranny of President Saddam.



And always, these Western invasions were accompanied by declarations that the Americans or the French or just the West in general had nothing against the Arabs, only against the beast-figure who was chosen as the target of our military action. ``Our quarrel is not with Egypt, still less with the Arab world,`` Anthony Eden announced in August of 1956. ``It is with Colonel Nasser.``



So what happened to all these fine words? The Crusades were a catastrophe in the history of Christian-Muslim relations. Napoleon left Egypt in humiliation. Britain dropped gas on the recalcitrant Kurds of Iraq before discovering that Iraq was ungovernable. Arabs, then Jews drove the British army from Palestine and Lloyd George`s beloved Jerusalem. The French fought years of insurrection in Syria. In Lebanon, the Americans scuttled away in humiliation in 1984, along with the French.



And in Iraq in the coming months? What will be the price of our folly this time, of our failure to learn the lessons of history? Only after the United States has completed its occupation we shall find out. It is when the Iraqis demand an end to that occupation, when popular resistance to the American presence by the Shias and the Kurds and even the Sunnis begins to destroy the military ``success`` which President Bush will no doubt proclaim when the first US troops enter Baghdad. It is then our real ``story`` as journalists will begin.



It is then that all the empty words of colonial history, the need to topple tyrants and dictators, to assuage the suffering of the people of the Middle East, to claim that we and we only are the best friends of the Arabs, that we and we only must help them, will unravel.



Here I will make a guess: that in the months and years that follow America`s invasion of Iraq, the United States, in its arrogant assumption that it can create ``democracy`` in the ashes of a Middle East dictatorship as well as take its oil, will suffer the same as the British in Palestine. Of this tragedy, Winston Churchill wrote, and his words are likely to apply to the US in Iraq: ``At first, the steps were wide and shallow, covered with a carpet, but in the end the very stones crumbled under their feet.``

In this column -- Maureen Dowd of New York Times -- explains why the Junior George repetitiously LIES like crazy -- without even batting his eyes -- because the man with altered ``reality`` -- really believes in his own LIES --

is this because the born-again Junior is mentally damaged -- has turned paranoid-schizophrenic -- facing the ``consequences`` -- of his past indulgence in coke and alcohol use -- and addiction to -- mind altering -- panic control -- pills?.

The Xanax Cowboy
By MAUREEN DOWD


WASHINGTON — You might sum up the president`s call to war Thursday night as ``Message: I scare.``

As he rolls up to America`s first pre-emptive invasion, bouncing from motive to motive, Mr. Bush is trying to sound rational, not rash. Determined not to be petulant, he seemed tranquilized.

But the Xanax cowboy made it clear that Saddam is going to pay for 9/11.

Even if the fiendish Iraqi dictator was not involved with Al Qaeda, he has supported ``Al Qaeda-type organizations,`` as the president fudged, or ``Al Qaeda types`` or ``a terrorist network like Al Qaeda.``

We are scared of the world now, and the world is scared of us. (It`s really scary to think we are even scaring Russia and China.)

Bush officials believe that making the world more scared of us is the best way to make us safer and less scared.

So they want a spectacular show of American invincibility to make the wicked and the wayward think twice before crossing us.

Of course, our plan to sack Saddam has not cowed the North Koreans and Iranians, who are scrambling to get nukes to cow us.

It still confuses many Americans that, in a world full of vicious slimeballs,

we`re about to bomb one that didn`t attack us on 9/11 (like Osama);

that isn`t intercepting our planes (like North Korea);

that isn`t financing Al Qaeda (like Saudi Arabia);

that isn`t home to Osama and his lieutenants (like Pakistan);

that isn`t a host body for terrorists (like Iran, Lebanon and Syria).

I think the president is genuinely obsessed with protecting Americans and believes that smoking Saddam will reduce the chances of Islamic terrorists` snatching catastrophic weapons.

That is why no cost — shattering the U.N., NATO, the European alliance, Tony Blair`s career and the U.S. budget — is too high for him.
_____________________________________________________
Even straining for serenity, Mr. Bush sounded rattled at moments:

``My job is to protect America, and that is exactly what I`m going to do. . . . I swore to protect and defend the Constitution; that`s what I swore to do. I put my hand on the Bible and took that oath, and that`s exactly what I am going to do.``

But citing 9/11 eight times in his news conference was exploitative, given that the administration concedes there is no evidence tying Iraq to the 9/11 plot.

By stressing that totem, Mr. Bush tried to alchemize American anger at Al Qaeda into support for smashing Saddam.

William Greider writes in The Nation, ``As a bogus rallying cry, `Remember 9/11` ranks with `Remember the Maine` of 1898 for war with Spain or the Gulf of Tonkin resolution of 1964. . . .``

A culture more besotted with inane ``reality`` TV than scary reality is easily misled.

Mr. Greider pointed out that in a Times/CBS News survey, 42 percent believe Saddam was personally responsible for the attack on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, and in an ABC News poll, 55 percent believe he gives direct support to Al Qaeda.(NYT)
_______________________________

thanks Maureen for the horrifying insight...... ...and this man has his finger on the nuclear BUTTON ......God, WHERE R U

tahmed @ # 24:

My only concern is that due to media and Far Right collusion, no free debate and freedom of expression will be possible when needed. If Bush & Company decides to take on even a 100% democracy, media will immediately join it and start a propganada war to such an extent that an average American will flow with it. Please note that the Democrats are only conspicuous by their absence on opposing Bush & Company.

And boss, I have traveled to Iran a number of times. Iranians are generally quite happy with their Government and especially with Khatami. There seems to be no resentment even among the younger folks as the western media makes us believe. Surprising to note for me was that a number of western women are married to Iranians and are living very happily. I have a Pakistani friend, who has married into an Iranian family and I have found out through this family and their Iranian connections that there is lot of propaganda against the rift between Government and general folks.

An indication comes from a recent event. Since the western plot of breaking down relationship between modernist lead by Khatami and the conservatives did not work out, the US Government decided to abort the mission of supporting Khatami last year.

This could be attributed to the fact that theocracy in Iran is in perfect harmony with Shiaism, unlike that in Sunni world where religion and dictatorships are competing with each other.

Another point to note, although this depart from our matter of discussion, was the respect for Pakistanis in Iran despite ``our excesses`` against Shia population.

Your concern is that a US attack on Iraq will set a precedence for the US to attack any country at will. I dont share this concern, for a number of reasons. History shows democracies generally do not initiate aggressive wars. This is done by dictatorships, kingships etc. in their persuit of glory and retention of their personal rule. In a democracy like the US, there are too many countervailing forces, as indeed the intense debate on the subject within the US demonstrates. And this is despite the fact that there is a very strong case for the US to attack Iraq and to take out Saddam Hussein.
And even if the US were to attack an undemocratic regime like Iran, I personally would shed no tears: the inhabitants of such countries are effectively dienfranchised, and their basic human rights to hold and express their opinions are already curbed, so at worst (which, realistically speaking, wont happen anyway) they will simply exchange rulers and at best (which is much more likely) they will be on the road to democracy and freedom. Look at how the US occupation of Japan freed that country from the dictatorship of the Japanese militarists and a god-like emperor into a modern, peace-loving and progressive nation. No Japanese seriously wishes to start worshipping their political rulers again.

those -- who say that the 30 million people who protested against the War on Iraq -- ALL OVER THE WORLD -- protested to protect the monstrosity called Saddam are

were born only yesterday -- or

are participating knowingly in a Goebbelsian White Lie -- manufactured by the Professional Liars in the White House -- led by a halfwit Lunatic Liar President --

who just said in his weekly radio `war sermon` today --

that his government is doing `everything` to `prevent` war on Iraq! --

Incredible!!

is this MORON real?

another gem from this dyslexic White Hous stupido in his press conference:

North Korea with nuclear weapons -- and with its recently discovered 8000 miles range -- ICBMs capable of hitting Washington DC -- is a ``regional issue`` !!!!--

while Iraq with its -- 93 miles rockets -- now being destroyed -- is a ``direct threat`` to the Security of the United States!

bravo -- applause -- more applause!!

ah -- ``the Security of the United States`` -- NOW it`s becoming clearer -- who is the gratest threat to the Security of the United States.

oh God -- how did we end up with such a Dumbo in the White House of such a Smart Country --

God please deliver us from this man in 2004 -- will YOU?-- pleeeeze

and I promise I will render five times Namaz throughout my remaining years of life.

tahmed at # 2:

I believe too that Iraqis will be better off without Saddam. But I believe that there would be no stopping for the USA after Iraq. With American media fully supporting them, Bush and Company could and would invade any other country that they feel is resisting them after branding them as terrorists, anti-Americans, pseudo-democrats, etc.

For example, even though Lebanon is a democracy, US can invade it after painting it as a pseudo-democracy that is in league with the terrorist groups like Hamas

Or it can make a pre-emptive strike in Indonesia, claiming that the Indonesian Government, although democratically elected, is not doing enough against terrorism.

Or take the example of Pakistan - after painting Pakistan as a dictatorship on the basis of EU`s stance on our elections, it can decide to attack it and take out on our strategic assets.

And of course they have the support of Turkish army to get rid of a democratically elected Government in Turkey if the latter does not come in line with US` policy in the region.

However, once again, I think that the current strategy of allowing UN to work in Iraq under a threat of US invasion is the best course of action. Saddam must go.

Re: ``IS Waging Another War on Iraq Justified?``


America isn`t waging a war against Iraq. It is mere providing ``moral and diplomatic support`` to the Iraqi people in removing a tyrant Saddam in accordance with UN resolutions.

Satire

Another uninspiring and inchoate speech from our dear Mr. President...

ahmedzai #10 I agree with Rozaiba #4 on the human lives that would be lost if the US invades Iraq, and that is certainly a valid argument to consider. I dont think the argument that Bush may then attach Iran next that you provide is quite right though. I think we should separate democratically elected governments from undemocratic ones. Iranians can pick their choice of mullah, but cannot go outside this theocratic form of govenment that has been imposed by mullahs. If I had my way, I would not permit any undemocratic government to send its representatives to the UN and pretend they represent people when in fact they represent no one but the regime in power.
So, getting rid of Saddam is certainly no attack on the Iraq people. On whether this attack will result in civilian casualties that will be greater than if there were no attack: I dont know, and I dont think anyone else knows either. My feeling is that in the long run Iraqis will be better off if Saddam is removed, but that`s just me. I dont have to make such decisions, thank God.

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Sherdil --

don`t minimize the power of Public Opinion -- remember as the saying goes -- hur Firaune raa Moosa -- for every Phaoroh there is a Moses --

thanks to the stupid braggadocio of this stupid American Pharaoh -- an alliance of world countries like France, Russia, China -- three permanent members of Security Council -- plus the Economic giant Germany -- is on the making -- to oppose American hegemony

The Juggernaut of Public REVULSION -- against the boorish, moronic Bush and his crude bullying tactics -- against foes and friends as well -- while exhibiting an idiotic confidence of a Village Idiot in his press conference --- is on the MOVE -- ALL OVER THE WORLD --

I don`t think that Sharon, Blair and Bush -- are politically immortal or permanent enough to change the shape of the entire region -- or will have a staying power to sculpt the area to their own specifications.

Only a year before 2004 -- Bush is being considered to be -- the greatest threat to World Peace -- at home (48%) and abroad by 75% of the people --

So right now Bush`s Titanic may look formidable -- but it is the Titanic -- it WILL sink.

Here is something from the latest New York Times:

Losses, Before Bullets Fly -- ie (Is Bush A ``Bastard``?)
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

Last week a member of the Canadian Parliament for the ruling party, Carolyn Parrish, was caught on television declaring: ``Damn Americans. I hate those bastards.``

Then the Toronto Globe and Mail newspaper conducted a (hopelessly unscientific) poll on its Web site, asking Canadians whether they agreed that ``Americans are behaving like `bastards.` `` The returns aren`t good: as of yesterday, 51 percent were saying yes.

When even the Canadians, normally drearily polite, get colorfully steamed at us, we know the rest of the world is apopleptic.

After all, the latest invective comes on top of the prime minister`s spokesman calling George Bush a ``moron`` last fall.

Canada`s incivility is a reminder that the U.S. and its allies are slugging one another to death while Iraq watches from the sidelines. If, as Mr. Bush suggested in a press conference last night, the U.S. may lose a vote in the U.N. and then promptly go to war anyway, the internecine warfare within the West will grow far worse.

The U.S. debate on the antipathy toward us has been misleading, I think, in its focus on France. (There`s now an American bumper sticker: ``Iraq Now, France Next.``)

It`s not just the prickly Gauls who are taking potshots at us — it`s even our buddies, like the Canadians and the Irish.

In a survey, The Sunday Independent newspaper of Ireland polled Dublin residents about whom they feared most, Saddam Hussein or George Bush.

The result: 39 percent picked Saddam; 60 percent, Mr. Bush.

Even in Britain, a poll by The Sunday Times of London found that equal numbers called Saddam and Mr. Bush the ``greatest threat to world peace.``

So let`s take stock of how our invasion of Iraq is going.

The Western alliance is ferociously strained, NATO is paralyzed, America is resented by millions, the United Nations is in crisis, U.S. pals like Tony Blair are being skewered at home, North Korea has exploited our distraction to crank up plutonium production, oil prices have surged, and the world financial markets have sagged.

And the war hasn`t even begun yet. (NYT)
__________________________________
so today for EVEN our docile laid back peaceful neighbor Canada -- our `Bastard` Bush` is -- THE greatest threat to World Peace --

now that is called the ultimate success of our American Foreign Policy

Bless u Texas

We are asking the wrong questions.
Nothing short of the reshaping of the Middle East governments is in the works and Iraq is the first step. I was convinced of the certainty of war when Ariel Sharon openly castigated the US a year ago and advocated a new middle east order. Benjamin Netanyahu has repeated this several times as well.
This war is going to take place because it is Israel that is threatened - not the US and it seems to be Israeli sympathisers that are driving US policy. Saddam threatens Israel and supports the Palestinians. This is reason enough for his removal and he will go because ultimately he has always been a nasty piece of work and has no friends. Oil is a second reason but in itself it would not have been reason enough for the war in this case. Instead of a Marshall Plan for Iraq, there will be a Martial Plan. In place of a Marshall Plan, Iraq will fund the war upon itself by itself because Iraqi oil (the spoils of war) will pay for it in the end, provide subsidised and cheap oil to the US and Britain (helping the economy presently in trouble) and finance further geo-political alignments in the region. Those realignments are coming.
Reading the following statements (from the Guardian UK) made by the US State department gives a pretty clear indication of the plans for the MidEast:

``American officials often told us in private that an intervention in Iraq would be a prelude to political and geographic upheavals in the region.``

An analyst said Washington was playing a ``carrot and stick`` game with its main Arab allies, pressing them to align themselves fully in the war on terrorism and the campaign against Iraq, or face be prepared to face dire consequences.

``The Americans have ... made it known to countries like Saudi Arabia and Egypt that they must modernize their forms of government and engage themselves clearly in the war against terrorism and Islamic extremism,`` he said.
``It is understood that from now on only pro-American dictators, that ally themselves totally with the West and clamp down Islamist currents, will be tolerated,`` the analyst said.

The answer to ``Why Now?`` is that the right wing (some would describe them as extremist) governments of both Bush and Sharon have little more time in office before the uncertainty of elections. They have a golden opportunity in which they have both power and control and they have to move now while they are in office following the agenda laid out in the article advocating the political reshaping of the Middle East by Richard Perle and others in the Institute for Strategic Studies.
Saddam`s departure and a US/Israel-compliant Iraq is step 1. Sharon has also dictated step 2 and 3. He stated the day after his election that once Saddam is removed, Iran needs to be taken care of next and then Syria. No surprise here, given that Iran has also long supported Hamas etc. The dissatisfaction of the young generation of Iranians with the mullahs combined with the coming targeting of Iran as the next ``regime change`` has the present Iranian government nervous, and they are making economic and political overtures to other countries. Economic ties to countries have been known to stave off war.
What is fast shaping up re: the Middle East has ramifications for Pakistan as well. The US has set up Israel as the Middle East regional superpower. With a surging China, I think India would be the choice of the US for a South Asian regional superpower.

President Musharraf has saved Pakistan from being the third target for ``realignment`` - some of us have yet to appreciate the risks he has taken, or the compromises for the survival of Pakistan. I`ve been thinking on the future path for Pakistan with the above scenario in mind - writeup to follow shortly. I`m interested in all your thoughts ...

It looks like the war between the US and Iraq will surely come to pass. I had earlier thought that it was going top be sabre rattling and no more. But now Bush is on a path of no return. Its almost as if he feels it is his destiny. But this irrational act will initiate the start of yet another crusade between the West and the Arabs, as it did nearly a 1000 years ago. The question now is: Who will serve the role of the modern-day Saladeen?

I dread to think that Saddam or even Usama BL are the likely candidates.

stuka:

read this poem in college as a part of british lit course that focused on colonialism. another book that is along similar lines is forsters` passage to india. the book unlike the movie provides amazing insights into life in india before partition. have you read it?

``consequences`` galore

The dimwit WAR Peddler Bush says:

there will be ``consequences`` for evry country that opposes his bloody ugly WAR on Iraq

-- there will be ``consequences`` -- for France

-- there will be ``consequences`` for -- Russia

-- there will be ``consequences`` for -- China

-- there will be ``consequences`` for -- Germany

-- there will be ``consequences`` for -- Belgium

-- there will be ``consequences`` for -- Turkey

BUT --

there will be -- absolutely -- NO ``Consequences`` -- for Bush`s United States -- no ``consequences`` for US economy -- no ``consequences`` at the gas pump --

no ``consequences`` for Christian Morality --

no ``consquences`` for American mothers, fathers, husbands, sons, daughters, brothers and sisters of -- American kids -- dying in that desolate deserts of Middle East for a very Questionable Cause.

-- what an arrogant imbecile dyslexic -- Village Idiot -- we have ended up with -- as our President -- hell bent on a new HOLOCAUST in the Midlle East -- without ``consequences` for the US

this juvenile delinquent -- has ``consequences`` for everybody -- EXCEPT -- for himself.

looks like even -- the Boy`s lapdog -- Blair -- is NOW having second thoughts following its -- INSANE Master.