My servers have been down and out for the count and since I never got a copy back from the listserv, I'm assuming that my reply to this thread never made it to PEN-L. If it has, forgive the repeated posting. Having written what I did before Blair met the senior Bush weenie in Texas, I think I sound at least pseudo-prophetic here.
CJ > Hmm, one could say instead that Sharon has precluded the possibility > of Bush attackng Saddaam by his invasion of the PA. > You want more informed speculation, trey Luttwak here. > http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101020408-221163,00.html > Michael Pugliese I haven't read the Time Magazine piece (try to avoid the publication if at all possible). Why does Luttwak strike me as a total wacko most of the time? Hasn't Sharon agreed to 'expedite' his military campaign against the PLO? Hussein probably doesn't even have any Scuds to launch at Israel this time around, so it would seem that Israel has become the key ally in the campaign to take Hussein out. Perhaps the Bush regime really thinks it can accomplish the removal of Hussein with Israel, some Kurds out of N. Iraq, and the Southern Shia Arabs. As outrageous as it might sound, what makes you think the current regime wouldn't think just about anything is possible now? It's no less outrageous than other things they've uttered out loud already. Incidentally, it's been my theory that one way the 9-11 perps got into the US so easily was that for some their cover was that they were being trained as part of the anti-Hussein coalition. The Senate made this a priority from 1998, and it was given new emphasis once the Bush regime took power--like one of the first things they did in foreign policy and military planning in early spring 2001 . So the CIA and the Mossad might well have been responsible for Atta and company getting to the US with so little scrutiny. Al Qaeda types also infiltrated the Kurds. Charles Jannuzi
