Da Suh-Mokin Gun

This could of course be one of those breaking news stories that just vapourises. They are talking WMD on BBC R4 at the moment and they are not even mentioning this report.

However I'll quote from Arundati Roy's piece from last week

"In the fog of war - one thing's for sure - if Saddam 's regime indeed has weapons of mass destruction, it is showing an astonishing degree of responsibility and restraint in the teeth of extreme provocation. Under similar circumstances, (say if Iraqi troops were bombing New York and laying siege to Washington DC) could we expect the same of the Bush regime? Would it keep its thousands of nuclear warheads in their wrapping paper? What about its chemical and biological weapons? Its stocks of anthrax, smallpox and nerve gas? Would it?

Excuse me while I laugh.

In the fog of war we're forced to speculate: Either Saddam is an extremely responsible tyrant. Or - he simply does not possess weapons of mass destruction. Either way, regardless of what happens next, Iraq comes out of the argument smelling sweeter than the US government."

Some people pay good money for that at home, of course.

Anyway, cue everyone who is going to insist this is all a plant by the Secret Shadowy Forces and 12 Ft. Lizards in order to justify the US, etc. etc. Roy's got a good point on the first front but I think her conclusion turned back vis-a-vis Iraq is a jump-the-gun approach as well, but it will be the approach almost certainly used by most still protesting the war in future. Problem is that if (if) the states of current affairs holds, the coalition is going to turn around and implicitly say, regardless of what has or hasn't been found, "Look, no quagmire getting to Baghdad. Problems getting aid in, yes, we're fixing them. A horrible regime has been ousted. Sit and spin." But even more, Roy saying that Iraq comes out smelling sweeter than the US on the point of chemical weapons ignores a third possibility (and there might be more) -- Hussein had the potential intent to use such weapons in this kind of crunch situation but lacked the opportunity or ability to deliver a command to act. Roy's grasp of military possibilities is too binary.

My eventual judgement on the war will depend of the way the peace. The peace will have to be just and driven by iraqis, not the INC or any of the other external opposition, but by the iraqi people. Americas number one choice for a future PM is Amhad Chalabi, a man convicted in absentia of fraud in Jordan, such a figure would not inspire confidence in me.

The press loooooove Rummy (he treats em like dirt - 'whatta tuffguy!')

Considering what vehicles Iraq currently has for the use of chemical weapons (wildly inaccurate missles and shells), they might also not be getting the opportunity to use them. You can't just fire a shell full of VK and expect to take out a thousand troops. That's completely unrealistic. For shelling to be effective, they'd have to fire hundreds or thousands of shells, and simply put, we take out their artillery before they'd get a chance to do so. Plus, there's the whole "the officers may be refusing" thing.

I'm a liar.

(I think I'm starting to lurv you. :D)

Never can hurt. :-)

James Blount's position is essentially mine down the line. Great that this is wrapping more quickly than expected, sucks that it happened at all. A major risk was run and is being run, flat out.

I think that once UNMOVIC and the IAEA are allowed back in and are given a chance to really explore Iraq without the regime running interference, we'll get the real story, and from a source the int'l community is more likely to trust.

It's like getting Al Capone on tax evasion. Actually, it's as if Elliot Ness just machine-gunned every Capone hideout ever, yelling "I just KNOW you didn't file that 1040, Al!" Even gangland cops had more to go on! It wouldn't surprise me though if the Prez, via CIA, took a page from the LAPD cheat-book and just planted a bunch of white-hot missiles somewhere for Gen. Freakley to find. Our word against theirs. Who could believe them? It's for the greater good, right?

If you want to start a fun conspiracy theory: the PFC Jessica Lynch episode was all a set-up.