War with Iraq will come. The only question is when. The Anglo-Americans show no signs of backing down as they continue their tremendous force buildup in the Middle East. Rumsfeld and Central Command General Tommy Franks (the guy directly in charge of Iraq/Afghanistan operations) promised maximum effort to avoid civilian casualties. Rummy said directly that only a coup d'etat in Iraq can prevent the war now. Franks added that we're going to use nonlethal weapons to mess up Iraqi communications, and that we can deploy the troops who were to have gone to Turkey within the interior of Iraq (seems like that'd have to be in the Kurdish-controlled region). There is talk of 3000 smart bombs within the first 48 hours. That ought to end the war right there; ground troops can then mop up. Powell said that we have intelligence reports that Saddam is moving some of his WMDs to isolated places near the Syrian froniter and that others are hidden inside trucks parked in Baghdad suburbs. How many more smoking guns does anybody need? France, Germany, and Russia seem to want to see a few more; the French and Russians are threatening a veto, again, if the Alliance introduces another Security Council resolution against Saddam. Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schröder are going to be remembered as a couple of Keystone Kops Blum and Daladier types, just as we know Anglo-Saxon King Ethelred (who spent most of his reign getting booted around by the Danes) as "The Unready" after a thousand years.

Lessee. In history we've got Ivan the Terrible, Vlad the Impaler, Pedro the Cruel, Bloody Mary, Juana the Mad, and Carlos the Bewitched. How about we call these guys Gerhard the Thick-Headed, Jacques the Crooked, and Vladimir the Spy? Gorbachev is already "Mikhail the Useless" and I vote that Ceaucescu be dubbed "Nicolae the Depraved". Who's got one for Saddam?