It now appears that an Israeli strike into Syria back on September 6th was a mission to take out a site perceived to have been a fledging nuclear program— supplied by the North Koreans. As you can imagine, this strike (and the (lack of) response that has followed it) has several implications:
1. If, in fact, the North Koreans are supplying nuclear technology, in the face of recent negotiations, all we can say is, “Kim Jung be Illin’.”
(Editor’s note—although, we must confess, much as when we first heard Run-DMC utter those words, we are not exactly sure what they mean)
2. Could this have been a trial run for an attack on Iran? If so, the lack of vehement response from the Arab world could have been the green light.
Israel has been down this road before, as chronicled in Rodger Claire’s excellent book Raid on the Sun: Inside Israel's Secret Campaign that Denied Saddam the Bomb. Whatever you think of Israel’s policy, it was hard not to come away from that one without some grudging respect for their military men… and the recognition that the strike did, in fact, waylay Saddam’s nuclear ambitions. Unfortunately, it also seems to have encouraged the Bushies. To a(n extreme) fault, the Bush administration has shown that it is perfectly willing to sit back and let Israel do its dirty work, even when, as last summer’s debacle into Lebanon showed, widespread killing of the innocent civilians is involved.
What are we saying? Well, that a strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities has just become a more-likely likelihood. Especially if Cheney has anything to say about it.
