Anger Builds and Seethes as Arabs Await American Invader

But on the edge of the crowd, Hassan Hossam reflected on a deeper fear in this part of the world that if the United States attacks Iraq, it would go on to impose long-term military control.

"This is totally rejected because Arabs are the only people who should rule their country," Mr. Hossam, a 32-year-old sales clerk, said. "President Bush is trying to take us backward, to many years ago," he said. "If America occupies an Arab country, it would mean the whole Arab world on fire."
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Tinker, Banker, NeoCon, Spy
Ahmed Chalabi's long and winding road from (and to?) Baghdad

If T.E. Lawrence ("of Arabia") had been a 21st-century neoconservative operative instead of a British imperial spy, he'd be Ahmed Chalabi's best friend. Chalabi, the London-based leader of the Iraqi National Congress (INC), is front man for the latest incarnation of a long-time neoconservative strategy to redraw the map of the oil-rich Middle East, put American troops -- and American oil companies -- in full control of the Persian Gulf's reserves and use the Gulf as a fulcrum for enhancing America's global strategic hegemony. Just as Lawrence's escapades in World War I-era Arabia helped Britain remake the disintegrating Ottoman Empire, the U.S. sponsors of Chalabi's INC hope to do their own nation building.
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Deeper Into the Big Muddy

On the campaign trail this fall, George W. Bush has been selling his hard-line foreign policy as a strategy for protecting Americans. But the opposite now appears to be true: Bush’s tough-guy rhetoric in the face of complex world problems is adding to the dangers confronting Americans.

The latest episode of Bush’s unintended consequences is North Korea’s admission that it is pressing ahead to build nuclear weapons.
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Nuclear Enabler

Pakistan's role as a clandestine supplier shatters the Bush administration's efforts to paint that country as a flawed but well-meaning member of the coalition against terror. Pakistan today is the most dangerous place on Earth, in large part because the administration does not understand the forces it is dealing with there and has no policy to contain them.
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