Good morning, Mr. Kerry. I hope you slept well. By the way, sir, have you seen the “Washington Times” this morning?

“RUSSIA TIED TO IRAQ MISSING ARMS”

John Kerry’s Presidential campaign died today. It expired as a result of the extraordinary desperation and hubris of its candidate who, in what could only be termed a “hail mary” pass attempt to finally overtake the incumbent, ended up with the quarterback flat on his ass and seeing stars.

Kerry gambled that the “missing” weapons stocks in Iraq would be his ticket to the White House. He has now lost that gamble with the shocking revelations contained in the WA Times article.

It seems that our friends in Moscow assisted the Butcher of Baghdad in spiriting out of Iraq huge stockpiles of weapons and explosives to Syria,. Lebanon, and even Iran. The weapons transfer occurred in March, 2003 before the war.

Evidently, the Russkies were more interested in destroying the paper trail of violations of the the arms embargo imposed on Iraq after the Gulf War than in the weapons themselves. While probably no WMD was part of this transfer, chemical precursors were involved.

The reports are too detailed, too precise to be figments of the Administration’s imagination.

“John A. Shaw, the deputy undersecretary of defense for international technology security, said in an interview that he believes the Russian troops, working with Iraqi intelligence, “almost certainly” removed the high-explosive material that went missing from the Al-Qaqaa facility, south of Baghdad”

“The Russians brought in, just before the war got started, a whole series of military units,” Mr. Shaw said. “Their main job was to shred all evidence of any of the contractual arrangements they had with the Iraqis. The others were transportation units.”

“Most of Saddam’s most powerful arms were systematically separated from other arms like mortars, bombs and rockets, and sent to Syria and Lebanon, and possibly to Iran, he said.”

Shaw said that he confirmed this information with two separate European intelligence services who were familiar with the Russo-Iraqi arms transfers.

“Besides their own weapons, the Russians were supplying Saddam with arms made in Ukraine, Belarus, Bulgaria and other Eastern European nations, he said.”

“Whatever was not buried was put on lorries and sent to the Syrian border,” the defense official said.

This is unbelievable. This cuts the heart, the soul and the testicles out of Kerry’s Iraq critique. The Russians were violating the UN arms embargo with impunity. Does anyone wanna guess if the French had a similar “arrangement” with Saddam? How about the Chinese?

Read the whole article. It’s a bombshell!

One question the Democrats will be asking tomorrow is if Bush was aware of this, why not tell everyone about it?

First, we’ve got to work with the Russians in the war on terror. No sense in antagonizing them unnecessarily. My guess is that Rove & Co. didn’t like what they were seeing over the last 48 hours of polling and figured it was time to go public to save Bush’s Presidency…which is fine with me, although the damage done to our relationship with Putin may be extensive.

Second, why let Syria know that we know, that they know where those missing weapons are? Here, the Bush administration is on shakier ground as far as releasing information that could compromise some future plans we might have for Syria. Given the alternative, let’s worry about picking up the pieces AFTER the election.


UPDATE: OH THOSE CRAZY RUSSIANS

Bill at INDC has some startling information with regards to our erstwhile “allies” in Moscow.

March 24, 2003

“Tensions increase between the United States and Russia. The United States charged the Russians of supposed deliveries of Russian weapons in Iraq. The spokesman of the American President, Ari Fleischer, rejected denials of Moscow and assured that Washington has “evidence” of these deliveries, which could give the Iraqis invaluable assets against the Anglo-American forces. Devices listed are binoculars for night vision, GPS units, and anti-tank missiles.

Bill speculates we knew the Russians were up to something both before and during the war. To that end, there was an apparent attempt to interfere with the Russian operations by ambushing a Russian convoy headed towards Syria:

“The coalition special operations HQ were sure that the embassy column would contain secret devices taken from military equipment captured by Iraqis. In this connection one cannot shut out the possibility of “revenge”from the coalition command.”

Read the entire post…especially the very interesting links to sources of information I wasn’t aware of…

The other big issue raised by the Gertz article was the apparent violations of Russia (and probably others) of the UN arms embargo imposed on Iraq after the first Gulf War. In fact, Gertz has written a book detailing French duplicity in this regard. What makes these revelations so serious is the impunity with which the international community routinely violated the sanctions against Iraq. “Grown-up nations” as Kofi Annan called France and Russia were not only up to their armpits in the ever-unfolding Oil For Food scandal, but actually sold banned materials to Saddam as if the UN didn’t even exist. (Note: The next time you hear that santimonious son of a bitch Chirac dissing the US for acting unilaterally, throw your popcorn at the TV like I plan to. That kind of hypocrisy deserves to be answered with a glove to the face and pistols, at dawn, at 20 paces).

In the cold light of dawn here, what’s becoming depressingly clear is that the UN is worse than a hollow shell, it is in fact an obstacle to peace in any form, of any kind. How can the United States in good conscience follow the dictates of an organization, so corrupt, so filled with cynicism, graft, and outright thievery that it won’t enforce it’s most fundamental dictums and instead, turns a blind eye to these kinds of outrageous violations of its OWN rules?

Is it time to marginalize the United Nations? Certainly the UN does a decent job of pooling international resources when it comes to humanitarian efforts. The World Health Organization has virtually eliminated smallpox and malaria which combined to kill millions in the past. And the various UN agencies that assist when refugee crisis arise are, despite the horrible conditions of most of these camps, doing a job that would be done piecemeal and ineffectively if left to the international community (read the United States) to resolve.

But when it comes to the BIG issue of war and peace, the UN is an impediment to either preventing war or keeping the peace. Perhaps it’s time to stop pretending that the UN can make a difference in these matters and turn the UN into a supranational relief organization. It might upset some of the fat cat envoys and bureaucrats who make their living trying to outdo one another in their anti-American rhetoric…but it might just be the biggest contribution to world peace since the US Army rolled into Baghdad.


EXPLANATION: SO THAT’S WHAT A TRACKBACK IS FOR

Jeff at Backcountry Conservative did a post on blogging etiquette that surprised and embarrassed me. I had always thought a trackback was for directing readers to related posts on the same story or subject. Imagine my horror when I discover that it’s customary to LINK BACK to the post you’re tracking back!

While ignorance is no excuse (I’ve only been blogging since late Sept.), I want to apologize for any violations of this etiquette and I assure one and all I will endeavor to do better in the future.


ALERT!: COMRADES! MAN THE BARRICADES!

TO ARMS! TO ARMS!

Comrade Commissar has been kidnapped and taken hostage…by himself!

“The Commissar, who is holding himself hostage, was seized last week while at his New York office. The Commissar, 50, was born in America and has lived and worked in America for 30 years and is married to an American. He holds American citizenship.”

Our beloved apparatchik is in mortal danger…he has threatened to behead himself unless his demands that the US remain in Iraq and all female prisoners in Iraq be executed are met.

Comrade Commissar needs your unwavering support and obedience at this terrible time. All good little socialists will IMMEDIATELY go here and receive marching orders.

LONG LIVE THE REVOLUTION! LONG LIVE SOCIALIST FRATERNAL FEELINGS! LONG LIVE OUR BELOVED COMMISSAR!

Any citizen not showing sufficient sympathy and support for our Commissar shall be immediately executed.


UPDATE: IS THERE A PRAYER FOR SOLDIERS GOING OFF TO WAR?

Kevin at Boots on the Ground is going back to Iraq. He found this out on his birthday.

“The bad thing is, it’s my birthday today, and my family don’t even know about it yet. They don’t even know how I’m now stopped loss and wont be able leave the Army the actual date my enlist ends, which is in March. I don’t know if telling my family on my birthday that I have going back to Iraq soon is such a good idea.”

Read the whole post. Anyone who knows a prayer for soldiers going off to war…say one for Kevin and all of our protectors that they come back to their loved ones.

Reading Kevin’s post reminded me (and I think we all need reminding) that this war we’re advocating is taking our best and bravest away from their families…some for a while, some forever. The right we take for granted to be cheerleaders and armchair generals is WHAT THEY FIGHT AND DIE FOR. It’s impossible to overstate the feeling of humility that these strong young men and women give me to be blessed to live in a country which produces such loyalty and devotion.

Stephen Ambrose, in his book “Citizen Soldiers” talks about the gamble Hitler took in WW II. Hitler believed that young men who grew up in his totalitarian, regimented society would be able to outfight the young men who grew up in the freedom and, what he considered, the “decadence” of America. Guess who won.

The Greatest Generation? The American Generation.