Hmmm. When was the last
Hmmm. When was the last time a sitting American Vice-President engaged in shuttle diplomacy among Arab nations? That would have been Al Gore, in April-May of 1998. He visited Israel for its 50th Anniversary celebrations, then swung by Saudi Arabia and Egypt, essentially just saying hello.
Over the course of 1999, former Secretary of State Albright visited Egypt (three times), Saudi Arabia (twice), Jordan, and Syria (twice). Former Secretary of Defense William Cohen visited Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Kuwait, Jordan, and Oman, also in 1999. In 2000, Albright visited Syria and Egypt. In 2001, Colin Powell visited Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Kuwait.
Vice President Cheney, on the other hand, visited Kuwait, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, Oman and Yemen, one after the other...and swung through Israel on his way out. One visit by the second-most powerful man in the United States to nine Arab nations, plus Turkey. The only Arab nations he didn't visit? Iran, Iraq, and Syria. Syria wasn't named in the "axis of evil," but might as well have been.
It's just a hunch, but something tells me that there was more to those visits than, "Guys, we're really, really serious about this Palestinian thing." Cheney has delivered the message to those Arab countries that we give a damn about, and to those non-Arab countries that are strategically important to the efort: we are going to take action against Iraq.
Add a boatload of 1,000 Kurdish refugees appearing from nowhere to dock in Sicily, with attendant airtime on tonight's national evening news, and you've got the first bits of media mortar slapped onto the foundation stones of our eventual invasion of Iraq. 300 of the refugees, Our Man Peter Jennings tells us, are children. Seven or more are pregnant, one has already been airlifted off and given birth.
Remember the Kurds? Sadaam Hussein killed lots of them, using nerve gas and other nasty things.
Let's see...Vice-President of the United States...nine Arab states...Kurdish refugees on the evening news...gosh.
We'll be bombing Iraq within six months.
