"My concluding arguement is that the Cold War ended in a fart, not a bang. No silos were used just waved about as possible tokens of extreme. We are helping to vaporize USSR WMDs as a favor. This is an example of waiting. We should wait..." PFD, The weakness in your arguement is that you assume a rational bi-polar world. First nuclear weapons can now be used in a regional context which never existed in the Cold War. India and Pakistan and China all have their own dynamics and self interest between themselves that do not have the U.S. as a major part in that equation. Second, you can not assume rationality. It was not rational what OBL did to the World Trade Center. If he had a nuke he would have used it. Don't use the old rules to play in the new game. We will only get hurt.

"Second, you can not assume rationality. It was not rational what OBL did to the World Trade Center." Why? It was a prime target. It represents american style capitalism. It is just not conventional warfare but it surely is rational. It's like helping to put a dictator on the throne a sport that both superpowers enjoyed playing in the cold war. From the viewpoint of a terrorist this is rational, he poses no real target for retaliation while for a nation state this would be suicide. Terrorists should not be compared to nation states not because they are driven by different motivations but because they have different target areas. While both may hate the US (or the west at large) they will still be using different methods of expressing their hatred because of that difference. Moffmaster

Good point Moff, However if the host country (Afghanistan) did not approve I don't think that Al Qauda would have done the mission. There is nothing so disheartening to be told to leave post haste. Ask Arafat in Jordan or Lebanon for that matter. So it comes down to the host country projecting it's hatred in subtle ways that don't have an easy fingerprint on it. This way excuseniks can explain away inconvenient facts like the meetings Atta had with Iraq. Was the attack on the WTC rational? Yeah from their standpoint it was. I don't think that their rationality is the same as ours and we will have to impose our rationality on them. Pure and simple power politics in this case. Lets use our might to smash things that make a state function rather than swinging into the empty air because we gutted our human intelligence.

Jeff, I agree about the French, about whom I need to engage in an exercise of will not to refer to by the Jonah Goldberg/National Review appellation, "Cheese eating surrender monkeys". However, I do feel that we underestimate the magnitude of the problem by laying it entirely at the door of the French political, bureaucratic, academic and media classes. I think it's much more widely distributed in much of Europe and is growing, not shrinking. It's become a basic stance of the European Left, and by "Left", I mean the mainstream as well as the extreme fringe. It's become a widely accepted POV within academe in Europe, as well as a fair bit of the European media. And, there ARE, in fact, a few countries in which the politics is even more hostile than in French. Greece springs readily to mind, where most of the rest of the West seems to believe that a substantial part of the Greek political establishment on the left not only supports, but actively protects an ongoing terrorist movement which kills Americans (and Brits) in Greece to this day. There IS still a large reservoir of goodwill towards America in much of Europe, plus some places where America is seen as the natural ally rather than any old EU member. Poland is one such place, for instance. Nevertheless, I think we're in real danger, over time, that what began as what we tended to see an amusing, even comical antiamerican pov will become a basic position of a major part of European politics. There are several reasons for this, but the one I implied is the one which most bothers me; the structural bias. It's just too easy for some malignant aspiring party to slip into the antiamerican role as a way to gain control of the nascent European state. The role is virtually built into the system, especially with the absence of another *clearly* threatening outside power. In this sense, the worse Al Qaeda becomes, the better off the North Atlantic Alliance will be. If things begin to look like a real, hot Western-Islamic war, hot or cold, then we'll be REAL popular, again. If not, I strongly believe we've seen only the opening salvos in what will become some really nasty European antiAmericanism. In connection to this, you might take note that Margaret Thatcher seems set on trying to bust Britain out of what the EU is becoming, and to realign it back with America (and Canada, and perhaps, Australia.)

pfd, "Sounds good but I don't remember a declaration of war vs Iraq." That's a legitmate point, but don't put too much reliance on a Declaration of War for ANY purpose. For one thing, although the law is murky on this, it appears that the weight of law is that there is no need for a formal declaration of war in order to HAVE a war. Congressional approval can come in other forms. It might even come by the absence of formal reproach of Presidential conduct. And, in this, specific case, also keep in mind that during the Clinton years, what prevented a LOT more hot metal on Iraqi targets was NEVER Congress. It was Bill Clinton. A clear majority of Congress supported a lot more hostilities from our end. A majority, even, of Congressional democrats. Getting enough Congressional support to end Saddam Hussein's corporeal presence is not, IMO, an especially high bar. If the Bush people lay a little groundwork, they'll have support of the majority of BOTH parties, in BOTH chambers. What could get them into trouble, from this side of a war, would be to act too highhandedly, leaving too many Congressmen feeling that they have been ignored, entirely. "The core of my arguement is that great states can scare each other silly to no effect but small states get slapped down." There's something to this. It's related to the Golden Rule; i.e. Whomever has the gold makes the rules. We are far less willing to take on China than we are to take on Somalia because the practical results of fighting China are so much greater. This has ALWAYS been true in the world. People who complain about it tend to be seen as somewhat lacking in connection to reality. OTOH, there is ALSO an absolute element in these calculations. In this case, it's related to what is seen as the REAL potential, indeed, real likelihood of damage which will be inflicted on America. And, in this sense, there is a Rubicon, here, which has already been crossed. IOW, we seem to have concluded that we ARE in a war, and, given the WMD aspect, it's a war to the death. We aren't going to be put off nearly as much as we would have been a year ago by the threat of high casualties, or regional fallout (pun intended), or the law of unintended consequences. You might want to check out the latest free article at Stratfor, which bears, somewhat, on these general matters. I recommend it. Most important, I think you should take careful note that whatever is happening and will happen, it is being driven NOT by the media, but by the calculations and conclusions the Bush Administration has made and drawn about what's going on. And, supporting this, I strongly recommend you try to determine just how much is going on around the world, especially in Europe, Canada, and Australia, by other governments whose actions strongly imply that they have made some of the same conclusions, whether or not they have or will adopt the same policies America has to address the challenge. bsl

The issues at hand seem to be coming to a type of consensus but there seems to still be a divide. As an aside please for give my constant spelling errors. -back on track- OBL gave us a cause for reaction in that he declared war on the US first. Granted, he inched into it (albeit loudly) and certainly never quite had the nerve to admit it but the evidence is overwhelmingly against him. His current host state refused to give him up and is now engaged. This is a case of demonstrated open support. While evidence exists for some Iraqui support no tangible facts have come to light. Some could dispute this by assuming proffesionalism by the Iraqui agencies that do this sort of thing. something tells me we may never know or if anyone does they certainly aren't talking. My gut feeling is that they were simply touching bases. As facts about many of these groups (usually defunct) come to light, you see this as a standard practice. The small stateless covert band sends reps around to states or other groups that they feel are like minded or at least give lip service to the current great cause in hopes of some kind of handout. Usually it is a token or gesture just to keep them from getting their house wrapped in toilet paper. Who knows. The Iraqui connection may have been quite a profound one. On the other hand, maybe OBL's boys leaked some plans to them and the Iraqui report was 'these guys are nuts-drop them like a bad habit'. Irrespective of all of this, I still feel that the first use of WMD -or any use for that matter is crazy. Sure we don't live in a bi-polar world. When we did, we had a lot to fear in terms of response. It kept everyone honest. Since massive response is not as probable, should we stop being honest? To leak a possibility to the press ( I hope) may have been similar to Kissinger's telling the Vietnamese that Nixon wa a little unstable and may go on a bombing frenzy. It gives folks pause while not having to actually do the dirty deed. It doesn't cheer up our allies but it isn't as embarrasing as explaining to them our reasons for actually doing such a horrible deed. Gawd that was dull.....

lost the paragraphs again-no matter what I do. I should stop posting -cheers across the board-

Pfd, I had the same problem. Just type your writing into MS Word and then cut and paste into the body block of the post. Keeps your paragraph format very nicely. Also I would have to recommend downloading PopUp Killer to get rid of all those annoying ads. Cheers!

Thank you.