Former Reagan Secretary of State Shultz has an interesting piece, Sustaining Our Resolve, in the latest Policy Review. Some highlights:

On December 29, 2000, the Security Council strongly condemned “the continuing use of the areas of Afghanistan under the control of the Afghan faction known as Taliban . . . for the sheltering and training of terrorists and planning of terrorist acts. . . .” (Res. 1333) By the end of the 1990s, we had begun to glimpse the reality. And we were just beginning to understand that the threat was to far more than the Middle East. Looking back at all those terrorist attacks of the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, we could see that our enemy targeted every aspect of the international system: tourism, commerce, air travel, world finance, the United Nations, embassies, the commitment to the principle of diplomatic immunity, and the sovereign and territorial integrity of states. This was Islamism — a radical, aberrational deviation from Islam — with an ideology that set itself violently against every element of the international state system, the centuries-old basis for a cooperative world order.

Nevertheless, in the first phase of this war, the terrorists had a completely free rein with no real effort made to carry the fight to them, let alone defend ourselves aggressively.

What can we learn from this experience? First, passivity does not lead to a cessation of attacks. On the contrary, passivity only encourages our adversaries to believe that they can do as they choose without consequences to themselves. The terrorists were getting a free ride from us even as their attacks grew greater in frequency and devastating power….

Iran, as does North Korea, now poses a great threat as it seeks to gain nuclear weapons capability. With U.S. help, the European Union and the International Atomic Energy Agency are actively engaged in the effort to turn Iran back from this course. All five UN Security Council permanent members voted in the IAEA to refer the Iran problem to the Security Council. Now the permanent five plus Germany have initiated inducements for change in Iran’s nuclear program with at least implied sanctions should Iran remain defiant. What further action will be taken is uncertain as of this writing. Just as France declares without qualification that Iran seeks a nuclear weapon and the IAEA reports on multiple Iranian deceptions, China is negotiating a further deal for Iranian oil.

Iran seems convinced that its actions, as in restarting its enrichment facilities, will have no adverse consequences. It sees no strength behind the diplomacy. We must be ready to summon the will — and persuade others to join us — to use economic and political strength — and ultimately force — to deal with this situation if multilateral diplomacy and collective security are to be credible….

Meanwhile, we now know from the huge number of captured documents produced by Saddam Hussein’s regime that in Iraq there were in existence three training centers for terrorists with apparently some 8,000 or so trainees. We must identify who the trainees are, learn the methods they have been trained to use and their connections to other countries, and, to the extent that these terrorists are operating in Iraq today, do everything possible to get them out of circulation before they go elsewhere….

… [W]e must not let up on the reality that we are at war and will continue to be so for a long time to come. Some commentators have noted that the length of time from 9/11 to today is longer than World War II. This is the wrong analogy; what we face is more akin to the decades-long struggle of the Cold War.

And being at war, we must retain the option and the will to use force — even as we pair that option with intensive diplomacy. Given the ongoing military task we face in Iraq and the political pressure against President Bush, it is being assumed by many around the world, friends and enemies alike, that the United States cannot undertake another major military operation, let alone see the effort in Iraq through to success. This is a dangerous perception, one that will only heighten the likelihood of further warfare unless it is dispelled.

At the end of President Bush’s first term it could be said, correctly, that now the United States could begin to make the transition from the first-term emphasis on strength to a second-term focus on diplomacy. In very large part we are doing that. But the option for military action on even a large scale, such as a sustained air campaign to cripple Iran’s nuclear weapons program, must remain alive as a last resort. The more alive it is in the minds of our adversaries, the more likely it is that we never will have to use that military option.

The American eagle on the Great Seal must continue to look toward the olive branch but, just as important, must keep a powerful cluster of arrows in its grasp.

(Fox guarding the hen house? From AP: U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Friday that Syria has pledged to step up border patrols and work with the Lebanese army to stop the flow of weapons to Hezbollah….According to Annan, Assad said at a meeting in Damascus that Syria will boost the number of its guards along the Lebanon-Syria border and establish joint patrols with the Lebanese army "where possible.")

It now appears that Damascus wasn't just the middleman in arming Hezbollah. Today’s Los Angeles Times reports that Syria directly armed the group:

New postwar intelligence indicates that the militant group Hezbollah had broader access to sophisticated weaponry than was publicly known — including large numbers of medium-range rockets made in Syria, said U.S. and Israeli government officials and military analysts.

The size of the Hezbollah arsenal and the direct role of Syria in supplying it will complicate the daunting task of keeping Hezbollah from rearming, the officials said….

The new weapons data indicating a broader Syrian role were gathered by Israel largely by examining debris left by shells that hit the country during the conflict. The examination uncovered the serial numbers and other defining characteristics of the weapons. Israel's postwar forensics have shown some of the rockets were manufactured by the Syrian munitions industry, military sources said….

Israel, backed by the Bush administration, would like to see international peacekeepers deployed along the Syria-Lebanon border — a step it says is needed to prevent arms shipments to Hezbollah. Lebanon, backed by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, has resisted that idea, as have the Syrians….

Experts said Hezbollah retained significant weaponry even after the monthlong Israeli bombardment. Israeli intelligence officials think they destroyed a large number of Hezbollah's longer-range missiles, but do not know how many remain. The number of medium-range rockets in Hezbollah's possession also is unclear.

In addition to the 3,700 to 3,800 rockets fired by Hezbollah, the Israeli military said it destroyed about 1,600. Together, that would account for fewer than half of the rockets that Israeli and U.S. intelligence officials think Hezbollah had at the start of the conflict.

Will Syria pay a price for all this? I doubt it. Consider this: Syria arms a group that’s supposed to be “disarmed” under UN Resolution 1559 (for that matter, Res. 1189, passed in the aftermath of the 1998 embassy bombings, states: “every Member State has the duty to refrain from organizing, instigating, assisting or participating in terrorist acts in another State or acquiescing in organized activities within its territory directed towards the commission of such acts….”), and the UN Secretary General sides with Assad on keeping troops away from the border used to arm Hezbollah in the first place. That ought to tell you something about the will of the UN to hold Damascus accountable for its actions.

The Jerusalem Post reports:

IDF troops discovered an underground tunnel earlier this week that had been dug by terror operatives on the outskirts of the Shajaiyeh neighborhood in Gaza City.

The opening of the 13-meter-deep, 150-meter-long tunnel was found inside a building at least one kilometer away from the Gaza security fence. It was believed that the target of the attack was the nearby Karni Crossing.

It was as yet unclear whether the tunnel - similar to the one used by Palestinians in June's attack on the IDF outpost at Kerem Shalom in which Cpl. Gilad Shalit was abducted - was intended as a means of infiltrating Israeli territory, or whether it was meant to be rigged with explosives.

Here’s the tunnel:

So Hezbollah lobs missiles over Israel's border, and Palestinian terrorists tunnel under it.

Despite objections from Britain, the Netherlands and a few other nations, the Bush administration is pushing to give China more voting weight at the International Monetary Fund to reflect its growing economic power and encourage Beijing to become a “stakeholder” in the international system. According to the New York Times:

In an effort to gain Chinese cooperation on international economic issues, the Bush administration is pushing for China and other developing nations to get more power in the global institution that has played a central role in easing myriad financial crises since the end of World War II….

“I would argue that by re-engineering the I.M.F. and giving China a bigger voice,” Mr. Adams [under secretary of the Treasury for international affairs] said, “China will have a greater sense of responsibility for the institution’s mission.”

China is a particular focus of American interests because of the Bush administration’s uneasy relationship with the Beijing government and its desire for China to become a “stakeholder” in the international system, as American officials put it.

A similar “stakeholder” argument was advanced during congressional debate on granting China permanent most-favored-nation trade status. Since that time, Beijing has been less than helpful on numerous fronts: Darfur, North Korea and Iran top the list. It may make perfect economic sense for a greater Chinese role at the IMF but shouldn’t the Bush administration request “a greater sense of responsibility” from the Chinese as a member of that other international institution, the UN Security Council, before falling over backwards for them at the IMF?

Last month, the Security Council offered Iran “incentives” to come clean on its nuclear program. It also gave Tehran a deadline of August 31 to stop enriching uranium. But it’s doubtful the regime will take the Security Council seriously until China and Russia stop coddling it. From today's Washington Post:

Iranian nuclear specialists have begun enriching a new batch of uranium in an apparent act of defiance just days ahead of a U.N. Security Council deadline for Tehran to stop such work or face the prospect of economic sanctions, officials in Washington and European capitals who have been monitoring Iran's efforts said yesterday.

Today, Secretary Rumsfeld resurrected a theme from Jeane Kirkpatrick’s famous 1984 "San Francisco Democrats" speech in which she took on the "blame America first” crowd. She said:

The American people know that it's dangerous to blame ourselves for terrible problems that we did not cause.

They understand just as the distinguished French writer, Jean Francois Revel, understands the dangers of endless self- criticism and self-denigration.

He wrote: "Clearly, a civilization that feels guilty for everything it is and does will lack the energy and conviction to defend itself."

In his speech to the American Legion in Salt Lake City, Secretary Rumsfeld asked:

Can we really afford to return to the destructive view that America — not the enemy, but America — is the source of the world’s troubles?

The Lamont victory indicates that the road to the Democratic presidential nomination runs straight through the party’s anti-war base. John Kerry and John Edwards long ago abandoned their hawkish positions on Iraq. Others, like Hillary, hedged. But since Lieberman’s defeat, the New York senator has embraced Lamont probably much more than she wanted to. And yesterday, former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner came out of his shell on Iraq a little bit more than he has in the past. He’s inched closer to the standard Democratic talking points on the war:

My sense is we've got to make clear that we're getting out of Iraq. We've got to start a redeployment of our troops.

When should they get out? He doesn’t say. Where should our troops redeploy? He doesn’t say. How will the combination of both achieve victory in Iraq or, at least, stave off defeat? He doesn’t say. As to what led to the current conditions in Iraq, Warner does offer an answer:

Again, we're seeing the price of the Bush administration's arrogance that they can remake Iraq in America's image without engaging Iraq's neighbors.

But Warner won’t answer how he’d have voted on the Iraq War resolution had he’d been in Congress at the time. Is he too arrogant to give voters an explanation? Also, I don’t remember Warner voicing opposition each time millions of Iraqis went to the polls. And what nations should we have engaged? Syria? Iran? What goodies should we have offered to these dictatorships? Perhaps the governor will fill us all in the next time he’s in Iowa or New Hampshire.

The Washington Post's Dana Milbank reviews a forum, sponsored by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), held yesterday at the National Press Club. As Milbank observes, the featured speakers, John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Harvard’s Stephen Walt, made a point to single out the Jews in the administration.

Walt singled out two Jews who worked at the Pentagon for their pro-Israel views. "People like Paul Wolfowitz or Doug Feith . . . advocate policies they think are good for Israel and the United States alike," he said. "We don't think there's anything wrong with that, but we also don't think there's anything wrong for others to point out that these individuals do have attachments that shape how they think about the Middle East."

"Attachments" sounds much better than "dual loyalties." But why single out Wolfowitz and Feith and not their non-Jewish boss, Donald Rumsfeld? …Picking up on the "attachments" lingo, Mearsheimer did mention Bolton but cited two Jews, Elliott Abrams and David Wurmser, as "the two most influential advisers on Middle East affairs in the White House. Both, he said, are " fervent supporters of Israel." Never mind that others in the White House, such as national security adviser Stephen Hadley, Vice President Cheney and President Bush, have been just as fervent despite the lack of "attachments."

For more on the “scholarship” of Mearsheimer and Walt see here, here and here.

Once Clinton was in office, the first President Bush had enough class to travel the world without trashing the sitting Democratic president – and during Clinton’s presidency the elder Bush could have said a lot. I wish I could say the same for this failed one-term president who regularly attacks the Bush administration while overseas. And now Jimmy Carter is busy attacking a strong ally of the U.S as well. Pathetic.

Reuters reports:

Saudi Arabia has released over 700 suspected militants after clerics "corrected" their thinking in a special program aimed at stemming a three-year-old campaign of violence by al Qaeda, officials said.

"They are sympathizers. There are many of this kind of people, who are subject to the process of an advisory committee. Hundreds of them have gone through this and been released," Interior Ministry spokesman Mansour al-Turki said….

Turki said the men had believed in 'takfiri' ideology, which permits branding Muslim governments or ordinary Muslims as infidels because of policies, behavior or beliefs….

Sheikh Mohammed al-Fifi, a member of the committee leading the dialogue with suspects, said this week that those released, accounted for over 90 percent of all detainees whose thinking clerics had tried to "correct." He put the number of those freed at around 700.

"First we would deal with them in groups, then individually as they related their thoughts," he told the al-Madina newspaper in an interview published this week.

"They became like this through provocative religious edicts on the Internet or in books, or via preachers who stir up young people's passions in sermons and lectures," he added.

Fifi said he did not blame Saudi Arabia's controversial educational curriculum which foreign rights groups and Western governments have said promote extremism.

Here are just a few examples of “controversial” publications funded by the Saudi government.

Just after Lamont's primary victory, I noted that Hillary Clinton has

tried to keep some distance from the party’s noisy anti-war wing. Appearing with Lamont may endear [her] to the party’s base, but it would also tie [her] to a candidate, who, in the words of Joe Lieberman, holds views that are “dangerous for our troops, disastrous for the Middle East and really make America vulnerable to another terrorist attack like 9/11.” So can Hillary afford to stay away from the race? I doubt it. The liberal blogoshere will demand that all the ’08 candidates kiss the ring of Lamont, and given the muscle they’ve flexed in outing Joe, the Hillary folks will likely decide they have no choice but to submit.

Well, Hillary has jumped on the Lamont bandwagon, as today’s New York Post editorial explains:

It's nice finally to know where Hillary Clinton stands on something.

On Friday, Clinton hosted Connecticut Democratic Senate nominee Ned Lamont in her Chappaqua home. Also on hand was the senator's senior aide - and state Democratic Party spokesman - Howard Wolfson.

After the meeting, the left-wing Daily Kos site - one of Lamont's biggest online boosters - promptly announced that a Clinton campaign source promised that Sen. Clinton would do a fund-raiser for the Lamont campaign.

Plus, Wolfson has been tasked to serve in an "advisory role" for the Lamont campaign.

Sen. Clinton is, of course, entitled to do as she wishes in support of Democratic candidates.

Lamont is the official nominee of Connecticut Democrats after his defeat of incumbent Sen. Joe Lieberman - who campaigns on as an independent.

But no one should mistake what's going on here as anything other than opportunistic politicking of the crassest kind.

Lamont won his nomination based on a single issue - full-throated opposition to the war in Iraq (and, by reasonable extension, the War on Terror itself) - and fueled by activist Web sites.

In contrast - until now - Clinton walked a very fine line on the central policy issue of the moment: She voted for the war and - despite some rhetorical wriggling here and there - has generally stood by her vote.

Until now.

For there can be no denying what she did in overtly embracing the Lamont campaign.

The nation is at war. And Hillary Clinton is giving aid and comfort to the anti-warriors.

Given the dynamics of New York state, this decision is unlikely to cause Clinton any political damage in her re-election campaign.

But this is a vivid reminder that the Democratic establishment can't be trusted on national security - and, now, neither can Hillary Clinton.

It's an old story. The Sudanese regime continues its brutal campaign in Darfur and tells the UN to take a hike. Actually, Khartoum tells those nations who care about stopping the killing to get lost. The regime pays no price for its defiance. Why? No, it’s not because George Bush invaded Iraq. For years, Moscow and Beijing have refused to support UN Security Council-imposed sanctions on Khartoum. They are heavy investors in Sudan’s energy industry, and the Chinese are also busy selling weapons to the butchers of Darfur. From Reuters:

Sudan snubbed an invitation to send high-level officials to a U.N. Security Council meeting in New York on Monday to discuss a U.S. and British sponsored draft resolution to deploy around 20,000 troops and police to Darfur….

"Eyewitnesses in el-Fasher in North Darfur are telling us that Sudanese government military flights are flying in troops and arms on a daily basis," said Kate Gilmore, Amnesty International's executive deputy secretary general….

Khartoum submitted a plan to the Security Council which would send 10,500 more government troops to Darfur to stop the violence instead of a U.N. force.

"Displaced people in Darfur are absolutely terrified that the same soldiers that expelled them from their homes and villages may now be sent supposedly to protect them," Gilmore said….

Around 7,000 African Union troops are struggling to monitor a shaky truce in Darfur, but short of cash and capabilities they have been unable to stem the violence which has only increased since an AU-brokered peace deal signed by the government and one rebel faction in May….

In an ominous development Sudanese Islamist leaders have said they will take up arms to expel any U.N. forces in Darfur and even turn against the government if it accepts international troops.

Those statements echo comments by Osama bin Laden, hosted by Sudan in the 1990s, who has said al Qaeda would fight in Darfur if U.N. troops were deployed….

And we’re expecting the Russians and the Chinese to get tough with Iran at some point. Don’t hold your breath.

Four percent of the world's trade passes through the Panama Canal, making it a tempting terror target.

Lt. Col. Stephen Coonen has an interesting piece in the US Army War College journal Parameters on the widening military capabilities gap between American and European forces. He argues:

The improbability of many European states committing more of their treasuries toward defense suggests that capabilities will continue to diverge. While this is certainly not a desirable condition, it is far from being the apocalyptic end of the alliance. The capabilities gap, while growing, has not led to a dysfunctional alliance. Rather, Europe’s and America’s leaders continue to acknowledge the enormous value and importance of the transatlantic partnership in advancing their shared values and facing their common threats. Despite recent strains in European-American relations, NATO continues to serve as a valuable organization that binds the allies together, providing the vehicle for continued cooperation. In this light, the military capabilities gap between the United States and Europe, as it exists today, is not as significant as many observers state or imply.

Still, NATO is a military alliance that has been engaged in the Balkans and is now much more active in Afghanistan. There’s a remote possibility it could be operating in Darfur in the coming months. And other crises may erupt at any moment (think southern Lebanon) where a robust NATO/European force may be needed –- which is why it’s hard to imagine that NATO will remain a healthy alliance in the long run with European governments devoting so little to their defense capabilities.

From today's New York Times:

The consensus of the intelligence agencies is that Iran is still years away from building a nuclear weapon. Such an assessment angers some in Washington, who say that it ignores the prospect that Iran could be aided by current nuclear powers like North Korea. “When the intelligence community says Iran is 5 to 10 years away from a nuclear weapon, I ask: ‘If North Korea were to ship them a nuke tomorrow, how close would they be then?” said Newt Gingrich, the former Republican speaker of the House of Representatives.

Let’s hope our intelligence agencies have a better grip on Iran’s nuclear program than they did on Saddam’s before the first Gulf War. From the Washington Post, August 11, 1991:

International inspectors...unearthed one of the most important—and disturbing—finds of the post-Cold War era: a huge assembly line for the covert manufacture of equipment to make an Iraqi bomb.

The location of the sophisticated, secret factory for manufacturing hundreds of uranium gas centrifuges was unknown to any foreign intelligence agency despite intense scrutiny and untouched by five weeks of severe aerial bombardment during the Gulf War that supposedly eviscerated the Iraqi nuclear project. As such, it is a monument to the world’s ignorance about what a determined bomb-builder such as Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein can do.

The factory was a key component in Iraq’s elaborate highly redundant and largely secret network of physics, chemistry and metallurgical laboratories, industrial mines, metalworking factories, electrical power generators, nuclear research reactors and radioactive waste processing sites—all aimed at swiftly putting a nuclear weapon in the hands of one of the world’s most ruthless leaders.

The Post also reported:

Despite repeated warnings and Saddam’s own public statements, Western experts consistently underestimated Iraq’s scientific and technical capabilities. Inspection officials now believe Iraq was only 12 to 18 months from producing its first bomb, not five to 10 years as previously thought.

I'm not sure what to make of this, though Jerusalem must be enjoying it. Speaking of Damascus, what’s the status of the UN investigation into the role Syria may have played in the assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister? Has it been swept under the rug as part of the recent cease-fire agreement or as part of a broader effort by some to engage the dictatorship?

Tony Blankley of the Washington Times looks at what the world would look like if the president adopted the policies of his critics for the remainder of his term. You can add to Blankley's list the huge shot in the arm all this would give to al Qaeda. And a few months back, Gerard Baker speculated on “the consequences of what might have happened” had Saddam not been deposed.

Today's USA Today/Gallup poll shows an up tick in the president’s approval rating. It’s now 42 percent, “suggesting that more positive evaluations of Bush could be tied to his handling of terrorism.” Other polls also show a GOP advantage on security-related issues. An AP poll conducted well before the news of the latest terror bomb plot found:

One bright spot for the GOP is that Republicans hold an advantage over Democrats on issues such as foreign policy and fighting terrorism _ 43 percent to 33 percent _ and a smaller edge on handling Iraq _ 36 percent to 32 percent.

The AP-Ipsos poll was conducted after the divisive Democratic debate in the Senate over setting a timetable for withdrawing U.S. forces from Iraq. Potential voters were paying attention to the GOP complaint that Democrats want to "cut and run."

"It seems like the Democrats want to pull out or start to pull out, and I don't think that's the correct thing to do," said Eric Bean, 24, a college minister in Fort Worth, Texas. "I'd much rather see a Congress that would support our president. I think George Bush is doing the best he can. I think Republicans will support him."

As I have noted before, if Democrats were hitting Republicans from the right on national security, the GOP would be in far deeper trouble. But naturally they’re not, which gives Republicans an opening to schedule as many security-related votes (with lots of debate) as possible before November 7. Also, Ned Lamont will likely say a lot of things before election day that will help make the GOP's case against the Democrats. Republicans should nationalize his comments as much as possible and note all the major Democrats who are actively campaigning for Lamont against the hawkish Lieberman. Americans aren't going to buy the Frank Rich line (see Sunday's New York Times) that the Lamont Democrats really are tough as nails on the terror front.

(The latest poll has Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega leading the presidential race by 10 points. Venezuela's Chavez, who's been lobbying for a seat on the UN Security Council, has been just as busy trying to put Ortega in office. A Chavez win on both counts would obviously not be good news for the U.S.)

Posted on July 23, 2006:

Once again, Venezuela's Hugo Chavez has become an issue in a presidential campaign. This time in Nicaragua, where Chavez has been showering gifts upon Sandinista party leader Daniel Ortega. Today’s Washington Post reports:

Ortega, 60, whose armed revolution made him the Reagan administration's chief antagonist in the hemisphere during the 1980s, is also getting a boost this time from Washington's current bête noir in Latin America: Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez.

Among other shows of support, Chávez recently bypassed Nicaraguan President Enrique Bolaños and negotiated a deal directly with Ortega to sell oil to Nicaragua under a long-term credit scheme intended to free more government funds for social spending…. In addition to the oil deal, Chávez has arranged to distribute fertilizer at cut-rate prices to Nicaraguan farmers through an association allied with the Sandinistas….

But there are signs that Chávez's assistance could backfire. In a recent poll commissioned by the Nicaraguan weekly Confidencial, 49 percent of Nicaraguans said they thought Venezuela was interfering. And there are rumors that Chávez is directly financing Ortega's campaign -- fueled by the abundance of enormous posters of Ortega's smiling face across not merely the capital but also in the countryside.

Aside from delivering a political black eye to the U.S., Chavez may have other things in mind with his oil charity and in pushing for an Ortega victory. He may hope that a President Ortega returns the favor by derailing Managua’s current plan to allow for more extensive oil exploration off its coast. The prospect of tapping these potentially large oil deposits is something that I’m sure doesn’t sit well with the oil-rich Chavez. Stay tuned ...

Saddam's second trial begins today. This time for genocide (see here for info. on Camp Slayer), as the New York Times reports:

Mr. Hussein sat stone-faced in a courtroom in the fortified Green Zone of Baghdad, listening as prosecutors gave a detailed account of how Mr. Hussein and six co-defendants embarked on an eight-stage military campaign in 1988 to eliminate the Kurds from swaths of their mountainous homeland in northern Iraq. Prosecutors said the campaign, called Anfal, killed at least 50,000 Kurds and resulted in the destruction of 2,000 villages.

Recently, Time magazine published an interview with a senior leader in charge of the forces that doused Halabja and other villages with chemicals in 1988 during the Anfal campaign. Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri also claims that he and other Saddam loyalists are behind much of the insurgency. During the first Gulf War, he warned Kurds to stay out of the fight or face another chemical attack: "If you have forgotten Halabja, we are ready to repeat the operation." Saddam and his senior Baathist leadership targeted Kurdish villages with a mixture of mustard gas and nerve agent. Here’s a reminder of the result:

(source: http://www.ccc.nps.navy.mil)

And here’s what the Iraq Survey Group concluded on Saddam’s wmd production capability:

[T]here is an extensive, yet fragmentary and circumstantial body of evidence suggesting that Saddam pursued a strategy to maintain a capability to return to WMD production after sanctions were lifted by preserving assets and expertise. In addition to preserved capability, we have clear evidence of his intent to resume WMD production as soon as sanctions were lifted.

The ISG continued:

Based on an investigation of facilities, materials, and production outputs, ISG also judges that Iraq had a break-out capability to produce large quantities of sulfur mustard CW agent, but not nerve agents....

Iraq retained the necessary basic chemicals to produce sulfur mustard on a large-scale, but probably did not have key precursors for nerve agent production. With the importation of key phosphorus based precursors, Iraq could have produced limited quantities of nerve agent as well. Mustard production could have started within days if the necessary precursor chemicals were co-located in a suitable production facility; otherwise production could have started within weeks. Nerve agent production would have taken much longer.

After losing power, I'm sure al-Douri would like to "repeat the operation" in Halabja if given the opportunity.

Call me a skeptic. From this weekend's Wall Street Journal:

A senior State Department official contends that 'Hezbollah has been boxed in militarily.’

Today’s Journal editorial explains that given the facts on the ground in Lebanon it may be the U.S. that has been “boxed in."

Resolution 1701 also calls for an arms embargo on Hezbollah, although it specifies no penalties for those who break it. Anyone who has visited the remote, unguarded and unmarked hinterland between Syria and Lebanon must know that such an embargo will be very hard to enforce.

All of this explains Israel's increasing frustration with the cease-fire. Prime Minister Ehud Olmert bought into the agreement based on what now appear to have been insincere pledges that European troops would dominate the U.N. force. Meanwhile, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan is displaying his trademark even-handedness by denouncing Israel for trying to enforce the arms embargo while staying silent on the failure of everyone else to enforce it.

Israel can and will defend itself. The person who should really be furious here is Secretary of State Rice. She midwifed this cease-fire in the name of Lebanese democracy and as a way to use diplomacy, and the U.N., to tame Hezbollah and frustrate its patrons. She also believed French promises, so it'd be good to know if she now feels she was lied to. If this U.N. exercise turns out to be as feckless as it increasingly appears, U.S. credibility will also be a loser.

Likud member Yuval Steinitz has an interesting piece in Haaretz. He argues:

In recent years, a concept of ''victory from the air'' developed, negating the need for ground maneuvers or improved firepower on ground or in sea. In the case of Lebanon, a specific concept of repelling Katyusha rockets and missile fire in the air was developed -- hence, the belief that it was possible to conduct a broad confrontation with Hezbollah with no action on the ground.

As a result, infantry, tank, and artillery forces were neglected. One factor that made neglect in the military power structure more severe was the self-persuasion of senior security force members who believed that conventional warfare had seen its final days. A total of 23 years without frontal conflict between the I.D.F. and Arab armies allowed ministers of defense, chiefs of staff and other experts to develop a military version of the ''end of history'' theory.

It was expressed in the belief that the conventional military threat to Israel had been permanently replaced by the threat of unconventional weapons, on one hand, and terror, on the other. This concept remained intact even though we witnessed a conventional clash between the United States and Iraq, a clash which included broad ground maneuvers alongside the battle in the air.

(This reaction to the cease-fire is not good news, and now Iran's Ahmadinejad is calling for the US to "disarmed.")

Posted on August 7, 2006:

This report out of Damascus is why Hezbollah must be routed in southern Lebanon. Key quotes:

In the last few weeks alone [Damascus shop owner] Ali says he has sold thousands of posters ranging from close-ups of a serene-looking Nasrallah to Hizbollah fighters stepping over skulls of Israeli soldiers.

"My customers are from every sect and religion. Nasrallah is the only Arab leader alive who has actually achieved something. He liberated south Lebanon from Israel," Ali said.

"You see pictures of Arab leaders in Cairo, Amman and elsewhere, but what have they done? Here in Syria we are still living off our achievements in the 1973 war with Israel and that wasn't even a victory," he said.

Back in 2000, Hezbollah claimed victory following the Israeli withdrawal. The subsequent failure of the Security Council to enforce its own disarmament resolutions and to hold Syria and Iran accountable for arming Hezbollah allowed the group to consolidate its power in the south. This time, when the current fighting ends, there should be little doubt that Hezbollah’s policy of creating a terror state within a state to attack Israel has failed.

Two Iraq War veterans, Wade Zirkle and Connecticut native Josh Clark, make the case for Joe Lieberman in today’s Wall Street Journal. They write:

Joseph Lieberman's primary loss might be a satisfying victory for the partisan extremes, but it is a sharp blow to bipartisan efforts to prevail in a global war that may span generations.

The political gamesmanship is heard by the troops on the front lines. Many in the media tend to portray our warriors as mindless pawns who are unaffected by debates on the home front. This misperception is largely a result of troops unwilling to openly talk politics with the press. But as American servicemen who together served three tours in Iraq, we can attest to the discouragement those in battle endure in the face of a domestic politics that has a seemingly singular focus on controversy and negativism.

Our troops are witness to the 24-hour news cycles, as American television is beamed into the "chow halls." Military base Internet portals also provide access to sound-bites from Washington in real time -- a phenomenon that did not exist in earlier wars. Our troops are watching and they need tempered, constructive leadership on how we will proceed. Ultimately, the wartime politics of partisan destruction is corrosive to troop morale.

Sen. Lieberman made it clear that a nation cannot effectively fight a war by looking in the rearview mirror. Too often it appears we are fighting a war among ourselves instead of against the enemy.

This is all the more reason why Joe Lieberman is needed now as an independent voice to represent America's troops and their interests abroad in the war on terror. This is not to suggest that our troops do not welcome healthy debate about the direction of the war, or serious accountability of our leaders. But supporting our troops, understanding the stakes of the mission, and still constructively questioning military and civilian leadership is a difficult balance to strike -- and one on which Joe Lieberman has repeatedly risen to the occasion. This should be the model. Our national security agenda must never be borne out of divisive domestic campaigns that champion partisan vindictiveness. Semper Fi.

Click here for more information.

In his book Fiasco and in this interview with Hugh Hewitt, Tom Ricks points to the 1998 Desert Fox campaign against suspected wmd sites in Iraq as evidence that containment worked. But Clinton himself had no idea how much wmd was destroyed in that campaign. He told Larry King on July 27, 2003: “When I left office, there was a substantial amount of biological and chemical material unaccounted for. That is, at the end of the first Gulf War, we knew what he had. We knew what was destroyed in all the inspection processes and that was a lot. And then we bombed with the British for four days in 1998. We might have gotten it all; we might have gotten half of it; we might have gotten none of it. But we didn't know.” Even after the invasion, in April 2003, his defense secretary, William Cohen, still believed we'd find wmd. What's more, the inspection process was not about running around the country searching for stuff. Iraq was obligated to provide "verifiable evidence" that it had, in fact, destroyed its wmd stocks and wmd-related material. As Cohen explained in 1998: "[Inspectors] have to find documents, computer disks, production points, ammunition areas in an area that size [California]. Hussein has said, 'we have no program now.' We're saying, 'prove it.' He says he has destroyed all his nerve agent. [W]e're asking 'where, when and how?'"

By mid-March 2003, regardless one's postion on the inspection process, UN inspection reports still showed that Saddam had not complied with numerous disarmament resolutions. Post-invasion, Charles Duelfer noted that inspectors had discovered “clear evidence of his intent to resume WMD production as soon as sanctions were lifted." And UNMOVIC's May 30, 2003 report detailed Iraq's attempt "to conceal the extent of its import activities and to preserve its importing networks. "

Iraq was required to declare the import of dual-use items and supply UNMOVIC with details as to their origin. However, Iraq’s recent semi-annual monitoring declarations, starting with the “backlog” of declarations since 1998 supplied to UNMOVIC in October 2002, showed a trend of withholding pertinent information....The biological imports were of a slightly more significant kind, and included the import of a dozen autoclaves, half a dozen centrifuges and a number of laminar flow cabinets.

Missile imports, however, were more substantial and could have contributed significantly to any missile development programme. One example was the importation of 380 Volga engines that Iraq planned to use in the production of the Al Samoud 2 missile, a missile system UNMOVIC later determined to be prohibited since its range exceeded 150 km. In its declaration of 7 December 2002, Iraq declared that it had imported 131 such engines but failed to supply any information about their origin (suppliers, exporting countries) until inspectors observed 231 such engines at an Al Samoud production facility.

A trend that was especially pronounced in the missile area (but to a lesser extent also present in the biological and chemical fields) was the use of the term “local market” to classify the import of some very sophisticated pieces of equipment....UNMOVIC came to understand that Iraq used the term “local market” when an Iraqi import company imported a commodity and then sold or transferred it to a government facility, which suggested that Iraq was trying to conceal the extent of its import activities and to preserve its importing networks.”

On a separate note, the current bomb plot reminded me of two photos (scroll down to figures 1 and 2) in the Duelfer report on alleged unsuccessful attempts by Saddam’s intelligence service (IIS) to weaponized perfume bottles.

It failed. From the Duelfer report (p. 43):

A former IIS officer claimed that M16 directorate had a plan to produce and weaponized nitrogen mustard in rifle grenades, and a plan to bottle Sarin and sulfur mustard in perfume sprayers and medicine sprayers which they would ship to the United States and Europe. The source claimed that they could not implement the plan because chemicals to produce the CW agents were unavailable.

Former Clinton administration official Richard Holbrooke and Newt Gingrich pen dueling op-eds, here and here. This is not the first time Holbrooke has got in a tussle of over foreign policy with a Republican. Last October, in a New Yorker piece on Brent Scowcroft and the so-called "realist" camp, Holbrooke argued that Democratic foreign policy should "marry idealism and realism, effective American leadership and, if necessary, the use of force." He also told the New Yorker’s Jeffrey Goldberg: "Support for American values is part of our national-security interests, and it is realistic to support humanitarian and human-rights interventions."

Sen. Joe Lieberman today (via Hotline on Call):

If we just pick up like Ned Lamont wants us to do, get out [of Iraq] by a date certain, it will be taken as a tremendous victory by the same people who wanted to blow up these planes in this plot hatched in England…. It will strengthen them and they will strike again….

“I’m worried that too many people, both in politics and out, don’t appreciate the seriousness of the threat to American security and the evil of the enemy that faces us — more evil, or as evil, as Nazism and probably more dangerous than the Soviet Communists we fought during the long Cold War

[T]hese terrorists certainly don’t distinguish based on our party affiliation? They want to kill any and all of us.

I’m sure Harry Reid and all the rest who have heartily endorsed “Bring Them Home” Lamont won’t be happy with Lieberman. Good for Joe.

From the Senate minority leader:

I commend British authorities for defusing this terror plot and apprehending the suspects. Their actions protected the lives of innocent civilians, including many American citizens. Today’s events are an important reminder that we need to renew our focus on the war on terror and to continue to work with our allies to protect Americans from terrorism.

Terrorism remains the greatest threat to our security. As the five year anniversary of the September 11th attacks approaches, we should take this opportunity not just to remember, but to take stock of what progress has been made to protect Americans and what steps remain unfulfilled. As a result of mismanagement and the wrong funding priorities, we are not as safe as we should be and we still have not implemented the bipartisan 9-11 Commission’s recommendations to secure our ports, airports, and chemical plants. The Iraq war has diverted our focus and more than $300 billion in resources from the war on terrorism and has created a rallying cry for international terrorists. This latest plot demonstrates the need for the Bush administration and the Congress to change course in Iraq and ensure that we are taking all the steps necessary to protect Americans at home and across the world.

So Democrats like Harry Reid vote for the Iraq War resolution (which passed 77-23) and now want to cut and run, handing a victory to al Qaeda. Remember al-Zawahiri’s first priority in Iraq? It’s to “expel the Americans.” Bin Ladin used the American withdrawal from Somalia and other events to rally jihadists. America was “a weak horse,” he told his followers in the '90s. Al Qaeda, he said, was the "the strong horse. " It worked -- see here. Evidently, Reid’s unaware of all this. Are we supposed to believe that al Qaeda will react differently to the Lamont-Kerry-Pelosi-Murtha withdrawal plan? Joe Lieberman certainly doesn't believe so.

As to the lesson of the latest terror plot, Reid should listen to Sen. McConnell:

This is yet another reminder, if anyone needed one, that the war on terror is not over. And it is a reminder that our military, law enforcement and intelligence forces are working around the clock and around the world to prevent attacks here at home.

That's why we need more tools, not less, to fight terrorists. It is clear to anyone paying attention that our law enforcement and intelligence forces need every legal means at their disposal to be able connect the dots and prevent and disrupt al Qaeda’s attacks. Tools such as the terrorist surveillance program and others allow us to prevent the attacks before they happen, not just to respond when it’s too late. We must continue to arm our forces, so that they can disarm terrorists.

A short time ago, the British government released two reports -- here and here -- on the July 7, 2005 terrorist bombings in London, which killed 52 and injured over 800. The reports suggest that more interrogations and more wiretaps may have thwarted the attack, as Gary Schmitt explained in the Weekly Standard:

If there is any smoking gun when it comes to the failure of British intelligence and the July 2005 bombings, it's the fact that there appears to have been knowledge of [subway bomber Mohammad Sidique] Khan's role as a possible al Qaeda fellow traveler among the post-9/11 detainees in both Pakistan and Guantanamo. What is known for sure is that Khan had traveled to Pakistan in 2003 and late 2004. And while he was only one of several hundred thousand U.K. residents who visited Pakistan for a month or longer in 2004, at least one detainee, and perhaps a second, subsequently recognized Khan and knew about his efforts to reach out to Muslim extremists while there.

In addition, the government's report takes note of the fact that in the run-up to the bombings themselves, the terrorists appeared to be in relatively constant phone contact with an individual or individuals in Pakistan. Although "it is not known who this was or the content of the contacts," according to the report, "the methods used, designed to make it difficult to identify the individual, make the contacts look suspicious."

Of course, it is impossible to know whether, if these "leads" had been followed up, the bombings would have been prevented. Nevertheless, the irony here is what would have been required to crack the case--information gained from detainee interrogations and from listening in on calls made to terrorist suspects abroad. Both are practices pushed by the Bush White House and roundly reviled by London's elite.

Based on the reports’ findings, it’s a good bet the British used more aggressive intelligence gathering techniques to help unravel the current bomb plot. And the British (and the U.S. for that matter) need all the help they can get if this report is accurate.

Securitywatchtower.com has a good roundup of news (with multiple links) on the terrorist bomb plot here (scroll up a bit). At the Counterterrorism blog, Evan Kohlman comments:

Though for some, news of a reported Al-Qaida plot to down multiple commercial airliners with liquid explosives may sound exotic and unusual, in fact, U.S. authorities have been aware of such a threat from Al-Qaida affiliates for over a decade.

In 1995, when U.S. and Philippine security services uncovered a plot by 1993 World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef and his uncle 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to bomb over a dozen U.S. airliners simultaneously over the Pacific Ocean, they quickly moved in and arrested their co-conspirators. One of the detained men, trained commercial pilot Abdel Hakim Murad, described Ramzi Yousef's plans in detail -- including his intention to travel to "France, Egypt, and Algeria after the activities here in the Philippines. The purpose was to train those Muslim brothers thereat, on using a Casio watch as a timing device, chemical mixtures to compound bombs, and to share his expertise in eluding detection on an airport's x-ray machine, and eventually smuggling [onboard] this liquid chemical bombs. Furthermore, France has a lot of Algerians staying and that these Egyptians and Algerians ha[ve] no experience on making these bombs and [do] not know the basics of smuggling liquid bombs through the airport."

Eleven years later, we once again return to the same threat to commercial aviation posed by liquid explosives. Only now, it would appear that the fabrication of such high-tech terrorist weapons by Al-Qaida operatives inside Western Europe is no longer an insurmountable challenge.

Senate reaction to the plot:

BOWLING GREEN, KY— U.S. Senate Majority Whip Mitch McConnell made the following statement Thursday regarding the disruption of a major terrorist plot centered in the United Kingdom, and the need for continued anti-terror efforts in the United States:

“This is yet another reminder, if anyone needed one, that the war on terror is not over. And it is a reminder that our military, law enforcement and intelligence forces are working around the clock and around the world to prevent attacks here at home.

“That's why we need more tools, not less, to fight terrorists. It is clear to anyone paying attention that our law enforcement and intelligence forces need every legal means at their disposal to be able connect the dots and prevent and disrupt al Qaeda’s attacks. Tools such as the terrorist surveillance program and others allow us to prevent the attacks before they happen, not just to respond when it’s too late. We must continue to arm our forces, so that they can disarm terrorists.”

This fall the UN will vote to replace the current non-permanent members of the Security Council with new nations. Though little reported in the media, for many weeks Hugo Chavez has been traveling the globe trolling for enough votes from regimes opposed to the U.S. to get on the Council. He’s been offering cut-rate oil deals and has signed agreements to buy weapons. His latest campaign swing brought him to Tehran, where he lavished praise on the regime for standing up to the Americans. Now, he’s taken up the cause of Hezbollah and has accused Israel of perpetrating a “new Holocaust” in Lebanon. On Monday, Israel withdrew its ambassador to Venezuela. Earlier, Chavez recalled Venezuela’s charge d’affaires to Israel. In a recent televised speech, the BBC reports, Chavez said that he had

no interest in maintaining diplomatic relations, or offices, or businesses, or anything with a state like Israel….

Israel has gone mad. It's attacking, doing the same thing to the Palestinian and Lebanese people that they have criticised - and with reason - the Holocaust. But this is a new Holocaust.

At least one very senior Republican I know of believes the Bush administration must make denying Chavez a seat on the Council a top priority. Specifically, all U.S. ambassadors should let their host country know that the U.S. government would view a vote for Chavez as an unfriendly act. The administration should also encourage a friendlier nation in Latin America to seek a Security Council seat.

One thing is for sure: If Chavez succeeds, it would be very bad news for the U.S.

Now that Ned Lamont has won, some Democratic presidential candidates will be in a bind. Do they actively campaign for Lamont? Do they appear with him at campaign rallies with the crowd chanting, “Bring Them Home, Bring Them Home” as they did last night during his victory speech?

It’s no accident that John Edwards made sure he was the first to congratulate Lamont on his primary win. He knows this race will get national attention, and he has already repudiated his past support for the war. You can bet that Edwards, Kerry and the other anti-war candidates will want to shine in the national spotlight by actively campaigning for Lamont. But what about Mark Warner, Evan Bayh and Hillary Clinton?

In varying degrees, they have all tried to keep some distance from the party’s noisy anti-war wing. Appearing with Lamont may endear them to the party’s base, but it would also tie them to a candidate, who, in the words of Joe Lieberman, holds views that are “dangerous for our troops, disastrous for the Middle East and really make America vulnerable to another terrorist attack like 9/11.” So can Hillary afford to stay away from the race? I doubt it. The liberal blogoshere will demand that all the ’08 candidates kiss the ring of Lamont, and given the muscle they’ve flexed in outing Joe, the Hillary folks will likely decide they have no choice but to submit.

Here's what Sen. Lieberman had to say this morning on the Today show about his opponent – the same one all the ’08 Democratic presidential candidates are cutting checks for and offering congratulations:

My opponent says let's get all our troops out by a deadline. I saw that will be dangerous for our troops, disastrous for the Middle East and really make America vulnerable to another terrorist attack like 9/11.

AFP reports:

MIRANSHAH, Pakistan -- Pro-Taliban militants beheaded a pro-government tribal elder in Pakistan's restive tribal region bordering Afghanistan, officials said. The body of Loi Khan was found dumped on a road in Garhiyoum, some 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan region, a local official said on Monday.

The man was abducted last week from adjoining South Waziristan, the official said, requesting anonymity.

A note found on the body said the man had been killed as punishment for working as an "informer."

"Anyone found indulging in espionage will meet the same fate," the note said.

Several tribal elders have been shot dead or beheaded this year…

First, Fidel goes missing and now another dictator hasn’t been seen publicly for some time.

From Israel to Lebanon to Iraq, the Islamic Republic of Iran has been fomenting war (see here for more on this) in a bid to intimidate the US and other nations against taking a tougher line on its nuclear enrichment activities:

TIKRIT, Iraq -- The U.S. ambassador to Iraq accused Iran on Tuesday of having forces in Iraq and said Tehran could use the war between Hizbollah militants and Israel in Lebanon to try and further destabilize the country.

"The region is very much interconnected. What happened in Lebanon affects things here," Zalmay Khalilzad told reporters.

"Iran ... has some forces here. There is the possibility that they might encourage those forces to create increased instability here."

Imagine how the regime will act if it acquires nuclear weapons. Speaking of, on August 22, Tehran is supposed to give its answer to the latest nuclear deal on the table. Look for the regime to play for more time by offering some sort of conditional acceptance of the deal. It will be just enough for Russia and China to argue that the consideration of sanctions at this juncture would be counterproductive.

(With BP replacing Prudhoe Bay's feeder pipelines, I dusted off a post from a few months back on the construction of the Trans-Alaska pipeline. Back then, overseas events forced Congress’s hand by a razor-thin margin.)

Posted on April 25, 2006:

Last night, PBS' American Experience chronicled the building of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, which traverses some 800 miles from Prudhoe Bay to the port of Valdez. Planning for the pipeline began in 1968, but a mountain of legal challenges put off construction until 1975. Two years later oil began flowing south. What kick-started actual construction was the October 1973 Yom Kippur War and the subsequent OPEC oil embargo against the U.S. Relying so heavily on foreign energy sources, Congress figured out, wasn't such a good idea. From American Experience:

July 17: With a vote of 50 to 49, the Senate narrowly passes the Gravel Amendment which declares that the Department of the Interior has fulfilled all the requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act, allowing Alyeska to move forward. Vice President Spiro Agnew casts the deciding vote.

October 6: On the Jewish holy day of Yom Kippur, Egyptian forces attack Israel, while at the same time Syrian troops assault the Golan Heights in a surprise offensive. With help from the United States, Israel succeeds in reversing the Arab gains. The clash will have repercussions for the U.S. oil supply.

Pumps closed due to the gasoline shortage October 17: The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) strikes back against the United States and the Netherlands for their support of Israel in the war. OPEC imposes an oil embargo. Overnight, the price of a barrel of oil rises from $3 to over $5. Gas at the pumps will soon rise from 30 cents per gallon to $1.20, and drivers will wait in long lines to fill up their tanks.

November 16: In direct response to the oil crisis, President Nixon signs the Trans Alaska Pipeline Authorization Act into law. Nixon introduces "Project Independence" in a televised speech: "Throughout history, America has made great sacrifices of blood and also treasure to achieve and maintain its independence. In the last third of this century, our independence will depend on maintaining and achieving self-sufficiency in energy."

Some things never change on the independence front.

Fidel Castro hasn't been seen publicly since July 31, not even a photo of him propped in his hospital bed reading Che’s Motorcycle Diaries. There’s some speculation at the State Department that if Castro has indeed died, the government may using this time to build up the reputation of his brother, Defense Minister Raul Castro, in the Cuban press before he replaces Fidel as the island’s dictator. We’ll soon find out the truth, I assume.

This report out of Damascus is why Hezbollah must be routed in southern Lebanon. Key quotes:

In the last few weeks alone [Damascus shop owner] Ali says he has sold thousands of posters ranging from close-ups of a serene-looking Nasrallah to Hizbollah fighters stepping over skulls of Israeli soldiers.

"My customers are from every sect and religion. Nasrallah is the only Arab leader alive who has actually achieved something. He liberated south Lebanon from Israel," Ali said.

"You see pictures of Arab leaders in Cairo, Amman and elsewhere, but what have they done? Here in Syria we are still living off our achievements in the 1973 war with Israel and that wasn't even a victory," he said.

Back in 2000, Hezbollah claimed victory following the Israeli withdrawal. The subsequent failure of the Security Council to enforce its own disarmament resolutions and to hold Syria and Iran accountable for arming Hezbollah allowed the group to consolidate its power in the south. This time, when the current fighting ends, there should be little doubt that Hezbollah’s policy of creating a terror state within a state to attack Israel has failed.

The war didn't start on September 11. The simultaneous bombing of our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, on August 7, 1998, was just the latest attack in a war al Qaeda had been waging against us since the early 1990s. But we didn’t treat it as a war until hijacked jets slammed into the World Trade Centers and the Pentagon. Steve Coll details the many policy failures that led to September 11 in “Ghost Wars.” It’s a book I highly recommend.

The Center for Naval Analyses has just released a report on "Managing Civil Strife and Avoiding Civil War in Iraq." A senior military analyst emails his take after reviewing the report:

There are two interesting things about this report, in my view. First, although the panelists identified the power vacuum [see here for more on the roots of this vacuum) as the greatest factor contributing to the rise of militias on both sides, they assume, apparently without much discussion, that the US can do nothing to fill this vacuum. Second, they focus almost entirely on recommending solutions that rely on improvements in things we have the least control and leverage over. It would be great to “professionalize” the Iraqi Police and turn the Ministry of the Interior around, to make sure that Army and Police units are not identified according to sect, that talented people are promoted at all levels, etc. But these are not the sort of things you can order to be done anyway, and they rely entirely on the sovereign Iraqi government to do them. It hasn't done them so far because a) it can't, and b) it doesn't want to.

The discussion about what to do in Iraq is spinning off into never-never land as people focus ever more on irrelevant theories and propose solutions that can't be implemented. We need to help restore the discussion to reality, and that starts by identifying the things we can effect and the things we can't. One of the reasons I'm always pushing for troops to establish security is because that's something we can do directly. It does not require transformations in Iraqi government and society that will come only slowly, if at all. This problem affects the way many people think about the GWOT [Global War on Terror], too. We focus heavily on basic, fundamental social, economic, and sociological problems that we really can't hope to fix in any reasonable time frame or possibly at all, and ignore solutions that rely on our capabilities for action. What I propose is called looking for nails--but it really is true that, from the standpoint of making any sort of short-term progress in a disastrously collapsing situation, we really do only have a small collection of hammers.

This piece by Dexter Filkins in today's New York Times seems to confirm much of the above.

On August 2, Jeffrey Gedmin, director of the Aspen Institute Berlin, penned an excellent piece for Die Welt (Germany) on Hezbollah’s barbarism and use of “its own people as human shields.” He writes:

Nabih Berri, speaker of the Lebanon’s parliament, says that “the Zionist Dracula’s thirst has yet to bequenched.” He said this in reference to Israel’s air strike at Qana, where some 60 innocent civilians, many of them children, were killed. There is brutal irony in Berri’s comment. In the first Lebanon war Israelis found hospitals where Hezbollah fighters had actually drained the blood of patients to supply their holy warriors. Hezbollah’s barbarism is legendary. Gen. Effe Eytam, an Israeli veteran of that first Lebanon war, tells of how--after Israel had helped bring Doctors without Borders into a village in the 1980s to treat children--local villagers lined up 50 kids the next day to show Eytam the price they pay for cooperating with the West. Each of the children had had their pinky finger cut off.

(Robert Kagan has a must-read piece in Sunday's Washington Post on Lieberman and his critics.)

Yes, they're out there. Thursday's Los Angeles Times poll found that a majority of Democrats prefer neutrality to alignment with Israel. But 39 percent disagree. They believe the US shouldn’t remain neutral as Israel defends itself against groups and nations that would like to drive it into the Mediterranean Sea. All of this brings me to the Connecticut senator.

Should Al Gore's running mate go down next Tuesday to the candidate of moveon.org, Republicans should be ready to speak to those pro-Lieberman Democrats who have grown increasingly uncomfortable with their party’s leftward drift on national security. The media will portray a Lieberman primary defeat as a rebuke to Bush’s Iraq policy. But it will say a lot more about a political party that has purged its strongest voice on security matters and signaled retreat in the war on terror (Someone at the RNC may want to monitor the reaction of unfriendly foreign media/web sites to a Lieberman defeat). And, as the LA Times poll suggests, there may be many Lieberman Democrats across the country willing to part company with their party – which is why, as William Kristol explains in this editorial, “a Lieberman victory as an independent candidate in November would be so important.”

The other day Tony Blair stated:

[I]t is almost incredible to me that so much of Western opinion appears to buy the idea that the emergence of this global terrorism is somehow our fault. For a start, it is indeed global. No-one who ever half bothers to look at the spread and range of activity related to this terrorism can fail to see its presence in virtually every major nation in the world.

Here’s a sample of what Blair is talking about from just the last few days:

From AFP:

Seven dead in Philippine offensive against Muslim extremists

ZAMBOANGA, Philippines - Seven members of the Abu Sayyaf were killed in the fourth day of a major Philippine offensive against Al-Qaeda-linked Muslim militants, including two suspected Bali bombers, military statements said.

The Philippine military launched a major land, air and sea operation on known Abu Sayyaf positions on the southern island of Jolo on Tuesday in a bid to destroy the group.

From the BBC:

Teacher shot in southern Thailand

A teacher has been shot and killed in front of a classroom of children in southern Thailand, according to police. Gunmen disguised themselves as students to shoot the Buddhist teacher at the primary school in Narathiwat district.

The attack is the latest in a string of violent incidents in the Thai south, where more than 1,300 people have been killed since January 2004.

Officials blames Muslim insurgents for much of the unrest, although criminal motives are also thought to be at work. The southern provinces are predominantly Muslim, with a separate language and culture to much of the rest of Thailand.

Police blamed militants for the killing of Prasarn Martchu, 46. "He has taught at this school for 20 years and has no fight with anyone," police Colonel Bunleu Chawet said. "This is the work of insurgents."

…At least 30 teachers have been killed since the beginning of the insurgency. Militants target schools and teachers because they see them as symbols of the Buddhist Thai authorities.

In many areas of the south, the government now provides teachers with armed escorts to and from their classes to prevent them from being harmed. In June, five security officers escorting teachers to school were killed by a roadside bomb in neighbouring Yala province.

From Reuters:

Schools in Afghanistan under growing attack: UNICEF

Schools are increasingly being attacked across Afghanistan and an estimated 100,000 children in the south are shut out of the classroom due to closures, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) said on Friday.

There were nearly 100 attacks on Afghan schools in the first half of the year, a sixfold rise from the same period in 2005, according to the agency which blamed "unknown insurgents."

The attacks, which included 11 explosions and 50 school burnings, have led to the deaths of six children, it said in a statement….

Millions of Afghan children returned to school since the Taliban overthrow, including 1.5 million girls who had been discriminated against under their strict rule, UNICEF said.

"Today schools are closing, students are staying home and the hard-won progress is at risk. In four southern provinces it is estimated that more than 100,000 children are shut out of school because of school closures," it said.

From AFP:

Indonesia studies suicide bomber claim

JAKARTA - Indonesian police said they would look into a radical group's claim that hundreds of Southeast Asian suicide bombers had been sent to attack Jewish interests in countries that support
Israel.

The claim was made by Suaib Didu, the head of the hardline Asian Muslim Youth Movement (AMYM), The Australian newspaper reported.

From The Sunday Times:

Bali terror chief’s new mission

THE venerable preacher named as a terrorist leader by the United States had a twinkle in his eye as he talked of his new mission to convert Indonesia, the world’s biggest Muslim nation, into what he calls an “Allahcracy”.

Abu Bakar Bashir is a free man after serving just over two years in jail for participating in the conspiracy to bomb two nightclubs in Bali in 2002. The suicide attacks killed 202 people, including 88 Australians, 38 Indonesians and 26 British citizens.

From the Washington Post:

Israel Suffers Highest Toll Yet

AVIVIM, Israel, Aug. 3 -- A new wave of Hezbollah rockets killed eight Israeli civilians Thursday, and four soldiers died in ground combat in southern Lebanon, Israel's highest daily death toll in the three-week-old war. Israeli jets blasted targets in Beirut for the first time in almost a week.

From Reuters:

More Somali officials quit as talks planned

Four more top officials deserted Somalia's interim administration on Thursday, as a government delegation made plans to travel to Khartoum for talks with their Islamist rivals who control a large part of the country.

The latest resignations bring to 38 the number of senior officials who have quit Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi's government in the past week, a development that may allow the Islamists to take ministerial posts.

Although the Islamists, who control Mogadishu and much of southern Somalia, have not shown an interest in a power-sharing deal, they have welcomed the departures and urged lawmakers to join them….

Hardline Islamist leader Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys has said his group will not negotiate unless the government's strongest regional ally, Ethiopia, withdraws its troops from Somali soil.

With Ethiopia deploying soldiers across the border, according to witnesses, and Eritrea said to be arming the Islamists, diplomats fear the standoff between the two sides may trigger a regional conflict.

From The Sunday Times:

Hezbollah: we’ve planned this for 6 years

Until now Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militant group, has refused to reveal much about its response to Israel’s assault.

Hezbollah’s stockpiling of arms and preparation of numerous bunkers and tunnels over the past six years have been key to its resistance. “If it was not for these preparations Lebanon would have been defeated within hours,” [Sheikh Naim Qassem, Hezbollah’s second in command] said.

Hezbollah is believed to be in possession of four types of advanced missile: Fajr missiles with a range of 100 kilometres; Iran 130 missiles with a range of 110km; and Shahin missiles and 355mm rockets with ranges of 150km. He said that Hezbollah will use its weapons to strike deep into Israel should the attacks in Lebanon continue.

Coddling dictatorships around the globe is their specialty. From AFP:

China urged non-interference in the affairs of Cuba, following comments by US President George W. Bush offering US support for "democratic change" in the Caribbean nation.

"China has all along stood for mutual respect between nations and mutual non-interference in the affairs of other nations," the foreign ministry said when asked to comment on Bush's statement.

I should have noted this earlier, but late Monday French Foreign Minister Douse de Blazy went to meet the Iranian ambassador in Beirut at the Iranian embassy. Isn’t it usually the other way around with the ambassador going to the embassy of the foreign minister – in this case the French embassy? Of course, the minister may have made the trip to talk with the Iranian ambassador and a special guest there – Hezbollah’s Nazrallah. Has anyone asked the minister?

Last night, in an interview with Fox's Bill O'Reilly, Rudy Giuliani again put himself squarely in the president’s camp on immigration reform. The mayor is for tough border security, but he has also made the case in recent speeches that real reform must include a guest worker program and a “path to citizenship.” On Fox, Giuliani argued that comprehensive reform is not only practical but also aides in fighting crime and thwarting terrorists. Some highlights:

GIULIANI: Yes, yes. National Guard short-term solution makes a lot of sense. Increasing the border patrol.

O'REILLY: In the long term.

GIULIANI: Long-term over a period of time would be the permanent way to do that.

But you've got to seal the border. And you've got to do it with personnel. And you've got to do it with technology. You've got to have both.

And we have to know who's in the United States. We need to have information about who's in this country. And then you have to have a way in which people can regularize themselves as well. I mean, you need to get people out from under the table.

O'REILLY: So you would give them a pathway to citizenship?

GIULIANI: I would say -- this is a classic thing where you've got to do both, carrot and stick.

O'REILLY: Yes, but you got to do -- I think the stick first.

GIULIANI: You've got to do both.

O'REILLY: You know, you stop it and then back.

When you were the mayor in New York, illegal immigration rose in this city tremendously. I mean, you can't get a cab now with an American in there.

GIULIANI: But crime declined immensely….

GIULIANI: The Immigration and Naturalization Service would only deport 1,500 to 2,000 a year. So I said to myself I have 398,00 illegal immigrants because the federal government is not going to do anything about this. It can't. So I had to figure out how do I deal with it so that I regularize them, so that I.

O'REILLY: So how did you do that?

GIULIANI: They don't commit crimes. They don't - well, we made sure that their children were allowed to go to school for which we were criticized. But if I didn't do that, I would end up with children on the streets. If I had just said well, illegal immigrants can't have their children in school. And we tried to make their lives reasonable.

O'REILLY: How about city services?

GIULIANI: It would have been.

O'REILLY: Did you give them city money?

GIULIANI: Sure, we did. If they were necessary services. We allowed them, for example, to report crimes.

O'REILLY: Without being -- asked what their status was.

GIULIANI: Because we wanted the criminals who were committing the crimes.

O'REILLY: Right.

GIULIANI: A criminal can beat up an illegal immigrant today. He can beat you up tomorrow. So we need the.

O'REILLY: So you took the practical approach to it?

GIULIANI: But you've got to take a practical approach to it. There are 12 million illegals in this country. We got to stop illegals from coming in. And a tremendous amount of money should be put into the physical security that's needed to do that.

People and technology. At the same time, you've got this tremendous number of people who are below the table. As long as you don't know who they are, as long as you can't get them to come forward, you can't identify them, you can't photograph them, you have to figure out who they are, then you have a dangerous situation.

O'REILLY: It's interesting.

GIULIANI: Now terrorists can hide in that group.

O'REILLY: Oh, absolutely.

GIULIANI: And criminals can hide.

Democratic leaders may support a strong alliance with Israel, but a majority of Democratic voters don’t agree. A Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll released today found that nearly 60 percent of Americans support Israel in the current conflict. But underneath that number, there is a significant partisan divide.

The poll results suggested that the Middle East conflict could have domestic political consequences in the 2006 midterm elections and beyond, due in part to a growing partisan divide over Israel and its relationship with the United States. Republicans generally expressed stronger support for Israel, while Democrats tended to believe the United States should play a more neutral role in the region.

Overall, 50% of the survey's respondents said the United States should continue to align with Israel, compared with 44% who backed a more neutral posture. But the partisan gap was clear: Democrats supported neutrality over alignment, 54% to 39%, while Republicans supported alignment with the Jewish state 64% to 29%.

You can bet this will some get attention when Secretary Rumsfeld goes before the Senate Armed Services Committee this morning. If the BBC has the full text of the leaked memo, why not provide readers with the entire document (redacting where appropriate)? And if the BBC report is accurate, the former British ambassador to Iraq is arguing precisely against the policy advocated by the Democratic leadership in the U.S.

[The] memo cautioned against making any swift repatriation of troops, stressing that talk of pulling out of Iraq would weaken the position of coalition soldiers who remain.

The Jerusalem Post reports that Israeli forces are close to “recreating the 'security zone' that Israel maintained in south Lebanon from 1982 until the army withdrew in 2000.” Israeli commanders have also left open the possibility of “advancing north of the Litani River.” Israeli jets, the Post further reports, have “dropped flyers in villages north of the river calling on residents to flee north in anticipation of IDF operations in the area.” C.S. Scott has an overview of yesterday’s operations at Security Watchtower.

Also, Steve Schippert at Threatswatch believes Hezbollah is on the ropes, while over at The New Republic, Michael Oren, author of "Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East," warns:

Israel, the Middle East, and the international community cannot afford such a calamitous outcome to the crisis. But to avert it, Israel will have to shift its tactics away from aerial strikes against infrastructure to a massive ground campaign to gain control of southern Lebanon up to the Litani River. By clearing the terrorists from the area adjacent to its northern border and by eliminating Hezbollah's most strategic strongholds, Israel will have won a concrete achievement. And though long-range rockets will continue to be launched at Israel from central Lebanon, Israel can address that threat by surgical aerial attacks while ensuring that the more plentiful short-range katyushas will be removed.

Judging from today’s operations, Oren’s view may have won the day in Jerusalem.

The Worldwide Standard has learned that five members of the Congressional Black Caucus, who had previously agreed to campaign with Sen. Lieberman this Sunday in African-American churches, have apparently backed out of their commitments. I’m told that anti-war groups put heavy pressure on the members to cancel their appearances in Connecticut. The Left’s intimidation of Democrats who’d like to support Sen. Lieberman seems to be working in the final days of the primary campaign. And, as I noted in an earlier post, the Left is gearing up against an Independent Joe in November.

Yesterday, Prime Minister Tony Blair spoke to the Los Angeles World Affairs Council. It was remarkable speech. It was also noteworthy because on the same day the leader of the Labour Party delivered it, the Washington Post ran a front-page headline, “Hill Democrats Unite to Urge Bush to Begin Iraq Pullout.” You’d be hard pressed to come up with many national Democrats who’d deliver the speech Blair gave to the Council. Some highlights:

We rather inclined to the view that where there was terrorism, perhaps it was partly the fault of the governments of the countries concerned. We were in error….

Still now, I am amazed at how many people will say, in effect, there is increased terrorism today because we invaded Afghanistan and Iraq. They seem to forget entirely that September 11th predated either. The West didn't attack this movement. We were attacked. Until then we had largely ignored it….

[I]t is almost incredible to me that so much of Western opinion appears to buy the idea that the emergence of this global terrorism is somehow our fault. For a start, it is indeed global. No-one who ever half bothers to look at the spread and range of activity related to this terrorism can fail to see its presence in virtually every major nation in the world. It is directed at the United States and its allies, of course. But it is also directed at nations who could not conceivably be said to be allies of the West. It is also rubbish to suggest that it is the product of poverty. It is true it will use the cause of poverty. But its fanatics are hardly the champions of economic development. It is based on religious extremism. That is the fact….

What it is doing in Iraq and Afghanistan is not about those countries' liberation from US occupation. It is actually the only reason for the continuing presence of our troops. And it is they not us who are doing the slaughter of the innocent and doing it deliberately. Its purpose is explicitly to prevent those countries becoming democracies and not 'Western style' democracies, any sort of democracy. It is to prevent Palestine living side by side with Israel; not to fight for the coming into being of a Palestinian State, but for the going out of being, of an Israeli State. It is not wanting Muslim countries to modernise but to retreat into governance by a semi-feudal religious oligarchy. Yet despite all of this, which I consider virtually obvious, we look at the bloodshed in Iraq and say that's a reason for leaving; we listen to the propaganda that tells us its all because of our suppression of Muslims and have parts of our opinion seriously believing that if we only got out of Iraq and Afghanistan, it would all stop….

And most contemporaneously, and in some ways most perniciously, a very large and, I fear, growing part of our opinion looks at Israel, and thinks we pay too great a price for supporting it and sympathises with Muslim opinion that condemns it. Absent from so much of the coverage, is any understanding of the Israeli predicament. I, and any halfway sentient human being, regards the loss of civilian life in Lebanon as unacceptable, grieves for that nation, is sickened by its plight and wants the war to stop now. But just for a moment, put yourself in Israel's place. It has a crisis in Gaza, sparked by the kidnap of a solider by Hamas. Suddenly, without warning, Hizbollah who have been continuing to operate in Southern Lebanon for two years in defiance of UN Resolution 1559, cross the UN blue line, kill eight Israeli soldiers and kidnap two more. They then fire rockets indiscriminately at the civilian population in Northern Israel. Hizbollah gets their weapons from Iran. Iran are now also financing militant elements in Hamas. Iran's President has called for Israel to be 'wiped off the map'. And he's trying to acquire a nuclear weapon. Just to complete the picture, Israel's main neighbour along its eastern flank is Syria who support Hizbollah and house the hardline leaders of Hamas. It's not exactly a situation conducive to a feeling of security is it….

Somehow this doesn't surprise me. Today's New York Times reports that if Sen. Lieberman loses his primary next Tuesday many Senate Democrats will not campaign for Lamont. A few will even actively support Lieberman’s independent run. Then there’s John Kerry, who apparently has no problem stepping on the back of a defeated Lieberman to suck-up to the anti-war left as part of his ’08 presidential quest.

As Senator Joseph I. Lieberman battles to retain his seat in Connecticut, some factions within the national Democratic Party are quietly preparing to campaign against the three-term senator if he loses the primary on Tuesday and runs as an independent in the general election in November, numerous Democrats said yesterday….

Furthermore, some forces within the party, including Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, will be willing to campaign actively for Mr. Lamont if he is pitted against Mr. Lieberman in the general election, many Democratic officials said. Some Democratic officials also say the Democratic National Committee will probably support Mr. Lamont if he wins the primary, though Howard Dean, the party’s chairman, has been neutral leading up to the primary.

…[S]ome Democrats in Washington said yesterday that a Lamont primary victory could provide an opportunity to shift the party in a more progressive direction — away from supporting the war in Iraq and toward policies that favor withdrawing troops.

For figures like Mr. Kerry, who was the party’s presidential nominee in 2004 and is considering running again in 2008, the race could also offer a platform to broadcast opposition to the war.

If you're in to the deliberate mass killing of innocents and the brutal subjugation of those you disagree with, this channel is for you. From AKI (Italy):

Rome, 28 July - The next evolution in al-Qaeda's propaganda war is a television channel visible only via the Internet, which has already begun operating on an experimental basis. The 'channel' has evolved out of the experience of jihadi internet forums - in particular of the al-Firdaws site - and al-Qaeda's own experiments in 'news bulletins' and talk shows produced by the Islamic Media Front. The new channel - called al-Firdaws TV - aims to publish the most important video and audio documents in the recent history of the terror network. The documents include speeches by Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri and the late Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, as well as documentaries on mujahadeen.

The broadcasts start at 8pm Mecca time and run till midnight.

Like most traditional Islamic television channels, the broadcasts open with a reading from the Koran, followed by a film on al-Zarqawi and various videso that have already been published on the Internet such as that of the London bombs. The end of transmission is marked by Jihadi songs, calling for Islamic martyrdom….

Radical Islamist internet forums publish the planned programmes daily and the channel organisers are seeking feedback from al-Qaeda sympathisers, on what they think of the new channel.

In 2000, Israel withdrew from southern Lebanon. Later, the UN Security Council called for the disarmament of Hezbollah. All the while, Hezbollah, armed by Iran and Syria, prepared for war. When war finally erupted, the soldiers of C Company of the Golani Brigade would pay the price. From the London Sunday Telegraph:

Early Wednesday morning, Dahan and 14 comrades from C Company of the Golani Brigade's 51st battalion roused themselves from the Bint Jbail house where they had dug in for an hour or two of sleep.

Slinging packs laden with ammunition over uniforms already heavy with body armour, they headed into the deserted streets.

It was expected to be a routine mission - spread out and establish control in a town decimated by artillery and air strikes.

As they moved in from the northeast, the patrol passed the empty silhouettes of two and three-storey buildings and mosques, interspersed with scrubland and olive groves. It was deadly quiet.

"The resistance had been very light from the moment we entered Lebanon,'' said 22-year-old squad leader Yoni Roth. But the enemy, which had melted away in the face of Israeli tanks in the open country, had assembled to fight a street-to-street battle on its own terms.

When the men of C Company entered a 50-metre-square olive grove, surrounded on all sides by three-storey apartment blocks, they had walked into a killing zone. "Everything was very quiet,'' Dahan said.

"But the Hezbollah were in buildings all around.'' They were also behind a wall which ran around the grove, from where the attack began.

"Grenades started coming over the wall,'' Dahan said. "One rolled right up to me and the guys next to me but I kicked it away at the last second.''

As another grenade came over the wall, the wounded soldiers say that deputy battalion commander Major Roi Klein fell on the explosive to protect his men, inscribing himself in the lore of the Golani Brigade as he lost both his legs and died.

With explosions all around, the men of C Company returned fire, but could not locate their enemies. Then small arms fire erupted from every direction, as the fighters of the "Party of God'' fired from the upper floors of surrounding buildings.

Next to Dahan, his friend, 20-year-old Yaniv Imani, fell to the ground, blinded by a piece of shrapnel.

A short way behind, a platoon from the 51st battalion's A Company were shocked to hear the gunfire. "First our officers went forward to see what was happening, but when they realized how many casualties there were, we all went in,'' said 21-year-old Staff-Sgt. Avraham Dajan. "Almost all of the first platoon had been hit, all 15.''

Some were dead. More would die in the long hours of battle before they could be evacuated. "I made a mistake,'' said Dajan. "I focused on the wounded and on trying to help them. I should have concentrated on fighting.''

Within seconds that mistake proved costly as a grenade exploded nearby, its shrapnel injuring his arm and soaking his uniform with blood. "I couldn't control my rifle any more,'' he said. Platoon medics set up an emergency field hospital on the fringe of the grove and Dajan managed to cross the 50 metrtes to get treatment.

Blinded by his wound, Imani could only listen as the battle raged. Soon his friend Dahan was felled by a bullet in his back.

Other nearby Israeli units had arrived, bringing to 60 the number of crack troops against what they estimated to be an equivalent Hezbollah force.

As the battle intensified a fierce debate raged at headquarters, with commanders loath to send attack helicopters to provide air support, for fear of flying into a second, missile-borne, trap. Eventually, however, the situation was so desperate that Cobra and Apache helicopters were sent in, tipping the battle in Israel's favour and allowing the injured to be evacuated.

Eight soldiers were killed and 22 wounded.

The Weekly Standard's Duncan Currie wrote on life after Fidel a few months back – see here.

Daniel Hannan, an Iraq War opponent, pulls no punches on the issue of Iran's quest for nuclear weapons. From the Telegraph:

It won't be a "durable" ceasefire, Condi, and it won't be "sustainable"; not while the ayatollahs are in power in Iran. This war isn't about border security, or prisoner exchanges, or the status of the Shebaa Farms.

This is the poisonous ideology that we are fighting. Our chief purpose in defeating it should not be to restore the comity of nations, nor to bolster Muslim moderates, nor even to bring freedom to the long-suffering Iranian people - though all these would be happy side-effects. Our main object, rather, must be to forestall a nuclear attack.