Debka.com's take on this, but take with a grain of salt: http://www.debka.com/article.php?aid=905 Washington in Undercover Talks with Assad DEBKAfile Special Analysis September 19, 2004, 9:33 PM (GMT+02:00) Mubarak`s Syrian protege turned patron Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak’s unscheduled visit to Damascus Wednesday, September 18, was made to offer the youthful, inexperienced Syrian president Bashar Assad some wise, fatherly advice, out of respect for his late father Hafez Assad. That is not at all how the Syrian president saw it. Rather the shoe was on the other foot. The patronizing was all on Assad’s side. When a deeply concerned Mubarak hurried over to Damascus, he sought to make sure Assad fully appreciated the grave implications of UN Security Council resolution 1559 passed on September 2, which called on all foreign forces to quit Lebanon. Secretary general Kofi Annan was instructed to confirm implementation within 30 days. The nine Security Council members who endorsed the resolution (Angola, Benin, Chile, France, Germany, Rumania, Spain, Britain and the US) acted on the premise that the only foreign armies in Lebanon are that of Syria and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. Mubarak asked Assad how he intended handling the UN demand and when he meant to remove his 20,000 troops. He also drew his host’s attention to Para 3 that calls for the disbanding and disarmament of all Lebanese and non-Lebanese militias. The reference was to the most powerful, the Hizballah terrorist group, plus the various Christian and Druze private armies and the non-Lebanese Palestinian groups and al Qaeda, which occupy strategic parts of South Lebanon. The Egyptian president pointed out that the Arab foreign ministers who met in Cairo on September 14 implicitly supported the Security Council declaration upholding Lebanon’s sovereignty. A day earlier, on September 13, the US congress issued a strongly-worded statement which condemned Syria’s human rights abuses and repression, alleged that hundreds of Lebanese had disappeared in the hands of Syrian security services and urged the US government to take action. Mubarak tried to caution Assad against taking on the Security Council, Arab rulers and the United States all at once with his provocative behavior. He was running the risk of sanctions – military as well as economic, said the Egyptian ruler, which could range from denial of oil sales by UN members to a naval blockade of Syrian ports, like the one that prevented the delivery of any but the most essential supplies approved by the Security Council to Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. But Mubarak seriously misjudged Assad’s self-perception. The Syrian president does not comport himself as the still raw son of a great Arab statesman. According to DEBKAfile’s Middle East sources, he was not impressed by the sage veteran ruler of the greatest Arab nation who came to guide his faltering steps. His welcome was brusque and chilly. He expanded somewhat on only one point: “You say the Syrian army and Iranian Revolutionary Guards are the only foreign armies on Lebanese soil? But you are wrong. Israeli military forces hold captured portions of Lebanon and Syria, and as long as they do, there is no reason why the Syrian army, which was legally invited into the country by the Beirut government, should not remain there as a deterrent against Israel.” This was an indirect reply to a proposal known to both that was laid before him on September 3 by the former US ambassador to Israel, Martin Indyk, in the form of a hypothetical question: “What if Israel withdraws from the Shabaa Farms and Mt. Dov and pulls back from the Golan Heights up to the line of military positions? Would you then guarantee that Hizballah would halt its attacks on Israel and its involvement in Palestinian combat, and move back its missile and rocket batteries from southern to central Lebanon, so putting Haifa out of range? Assad’s only response at the time was a dismissive: You come here as an expert not a negotiator. At a grand dinner party Indyk attended a few hours later in Damascus, he talked about his disappointing encounter to Walid Mualem, Syria’s assistant foreign minister who has long acquaintance and negotiating experience with Israeli officials. The Syrian advised Indyk to drop the issue which was a non-starter. According to DEBKAfile’s Middle East experts, Assad’s nonchalance in the face of pressure and threats coming at him from the world body, fellow-Arab governments and Capitol Hill derives from the fact that the Bush administration is running a secret negotiating track with his regime. US undersecretary of state William Burns arrived in Damascus on September 11 with a “strong and detailed” message aimed at developing a basis for military collaboration to stem the flow of Arab fighters, al Qaeda combatants, weapons, explosives and cash from Syria into Iraq. Under discussion is the creation o