In all seriousness, if Saddam were to do something really stupid, like use nukes or chemical weapons on Israel... it would pose a huge risk to the entire region. Assume for one minute that he may have acquired some "weapons of mass destruction".Precisamente.. and no one No One! can more than guesstimate how to calculate the India/Pakistan, Iraq/???, Israel/almost anyone Not-Israel >> *nuclear* possibilities.
Almost any trumped-up 'justification' can lead to [gawd.. remember the Domino Theory as justification for the rape of Vietnam - followed by the phony Tonkin Gulf 'Resolution'?] Unfortunately too - for those who indeed see the situation as not unlike Windoze Stability illustrated [One More Time]
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_*_ = a fly about to land
one can justify the dissembling, the patently false semantic tricks du jour - just because the situation is so fragile!
One major atrocity in Kashmir + a single nuke response - opens the Pandora's Box of 'spasm war'; that phrase from Hermann Kahn & Co, a group I know you are familiar with: weren't they the originators of the think tank label? (our first Nuke Wonks, diagramming the Unthinkable but Doable)
That this combination should occur while the insouciant US non-voting electorate submits to a coup d'etat by a handicapped mediocrity: is both too cosmically humorous for words and / tragic. Especially since W's sights are set so low: his own and his pals' bizness success post-reign + various pater/son 'issues' no one can guess.
Your closing note,
One more trait that I failed to mention above about Mr. Hussein, is his unwillingness to play by international law or treaty or UN or any recognized non-military authority... How do we negotiate with him? Seriously.pretty well sums up (for me too) the greased cone balanced on its tip.
Tough times to be raising kids, no?
Ashton