GROUND ZERO, New York City, Mar. 2--Imagine It!  Crushing four Al Samoud 2 missiles with bulldozers in a beat-up arms junkyard in a desolate sand hill in Iraq might be the straw that breaks the camel's back--or, put another way, the missiles that break America's "go-to-war" back.
     Saddam Hussein may have just pulled another ace out of his Butcher of Baghdad sleeve by playing his "pretend-to-crush-the-missiles" trump card.  
     In a last ditch effort to keep the U.N. Security Council appeased he is “bending to its will,” Saddam rolled out four battered, off-line Al Samoud 2 missiles into a chunk of empty sand and played destruction derby with them yesterday.   Bulldozers s-l-o-w-l-y smashed them, taking their time as the war clock ticked.

       His “efforts to disarm” were expertly timed.  They were just enough for Turkey's Parliament to vote down a U.S. proposal to use the Middle East democratic nation as a launch pad for a Northern assault on Iraq.   Shocking Turkey's leaders, and devastating American diplomats who have pressed Turkey for the right to use its bases in a war against Iraq, the Middle East's first democracy shouted NO WAR FOR OIL! to the U.S.
Months of negotiations had ended with the U.S. offering billions of dollars in aid to cash-strapped Turkey in return for using its bases and airspace.   Up to 60,000 U.S. troops were slated to attack Iraq from this strategic vista.
     With egg on its face, the U.S. is now scrambling to find alternatives to launch a swift and decisive attack on Iraq, should war become inevitable.
      And what does Saddam Hussein think?  Well, you can bet he is gleefully picking his teeth with miniature Al Samoud 2 missile toothpicks, happy that his choice to destroy them was just enough disarmament bluff to cause the Turkey vote to swing against the U.S.

      The blow Turkey delivered  may devastate American efforts to convince other wavering nations that war is the only solution unless Saddam Hussein steps down or a revolt within his ranks topples his regime.
       In effect, the Beast of Terror has won another major but important battle in proving how nations will embrace (ignore?) Terrorism until it spills the blood of their children.
       Turkey has now joined France, Germany and Russia in a major stand-off against the U.S. and Britain, the two major nations calling for immediate action against Saddam Hussein. Each in its own way is thumbing its nose at the U.S. "Iraq war policy," while Saddam Hussein dances in the palaces in Baghdad.
        To the casual observer, if any can exist in this turmoil of nations at war with the egos of other nations, the idea of Saddam gaining a reprieve for bulldozing a few missiles seems as idiotic as his pledge never to torture another citizen.
        To Hussein, what's a couple of old missiles?
        Of the estimated 100-200 Al Samoud 2 missiles in his country (new sources seem to waffle on the exact number, some saying 100, others quoting 150, still others hedging with 100-200) smashing four seems a small sacrifice.  Odds are the four chosen were the oldest, most beat up and probably non-functioning of all.
         Imagine you were Saddam.  Would you rush to destroy all your missiles?  Like a football coach eating up the play clock, you'd take your time and grind up the inefficient, most crippled of them as slowly as possible.  Your delay in acting would evoke the Chinese Water Torture, where a single drop of water pounding over and over eventually eats a giant hole in the rock below.    You’d know that if you kept the carrot on the stick that you were moving toward disarmament, that eventually the U.S. allies would drop like flies.  And they are.  One by one, the nations the U.S. has historically counted on to back its decisions are turning coats.  Some are lifting their leg.  Others are planning to exclude the U.S. and to take over Iraq on non-U.S. terms.

        Saddam has a lot more cards up his sleeve than just taking his time to crush a few missiles.   In addition to the Al Samoud 2’s, there's the 385 SA-2 rocket engines that power the missiles.   Most of the engines have been illegally imported into Iraq after the 1991 Gulf War.  They are also slated for disposal.   But, there’s a nagging question raised by the number of engines—why 385 if there are only 100 or 200 missiles?   At the most conservative basis, that’s one engine for every four missiles, and at the top of the line, a two-to-one ratio.
          Could Saddam either have more than 200 missiles, maybe some buried in the deep sand? 
         Maybe Saddam owes his good fortune to escape sanctioned war against him not to Turkey, France, Germany or Russia, but mostly to the U.S. political and diplomatic corps that has been bungling negotiations and public relations to win support for unseating Saddam.

         World news suggests that U.S. diplomacy has been similar to television character Andy Sipowicz (played by Dennis Franz) interrogating a suspect on N.Y.P.D. Blue--less than tactful.  
         Critics of U.S. diplomacy say America is shoving its power and might down the throats of former allies who don't leap up to the table and buy-in on American "war-against-Saddam-at-all-costs" policy.    CNN reports one Turkish official stating the “U.S. negotiations were disgusting,”  The Turkish Parliament's vote against allowing U.S. troops to use its country as a launch pad was, CNN said, largely a reaction to being "bullied."  So much for Andy Sipowicz smashing telephone books against the back of suspect's heads.
         But what does all this mean to my grandsons, Matt, age 6; Angus age 8 months, or my granddaughter, Sarah, 4?
         That's the core issue.  And it should be for every parent in America, France, Germany, Russia, Turkey and the other 185 nations of the world.
         Will U.S. fumbling of foreign policy and its arrogance to unseat Saddam backfire and leave the Beast of Terror to roam the sands of Iraq with impunity?  Will that impunity seep through the sifting sands of Iraq upon my grandchildren, or any other’s children or grandchildren?

        Judging the world’s reaction to American Anti-Terrorist policy of hunting down and eliminating threats that present clear and present dangers to the present and future of the children, one would think that only America sees Terrorism for what it is--a cancer that needs to be cut out before it spreads.   But the rest of the world isn't looking at surgery.  Instead, it seems bent on chemotherapy--destroy a few missiles here, let a few more inspectors in, allow a couple of private interviews.
         It seems the world has turned the blind eye toward Saddam Hussein’s flagrant acts of deception regarding an open book look at his weapons of mass destruction.   Personal honesty is one of the key cogs in the disarmament wheel everyone is ignoring.
       So far, Iraq has refused the 28 private interviews requested by U.N. inspectors with scientists working in the biochemical weapons of mass destruction field.
      It makes me wonder why the U.S. didn't demand that Iraq allow the scientists to be privately interviewed rather than seeking to destroy limited range missiles (they exceed U.N. restrictions by having a range of only a few miles over the maximum allowed) and have no guidance systems.  The missiles enjoy the accuracy of a rock being hurled into the air.  One might think the missiles are only a headline diversion, swerving world opinion away from the nitty gritty and that no one really wants to put Saddam Hussein's feet to the fire.

       Twenty-eight refusals to interview scientists?    If one has something to hide, you cut off his tongue.  In effect, Saddam has let the world know none of his scientists will be allowed to talk, and, rumor has it if any do, their families will be killed.  That's pretty good tongue cutting in my book.
        Missiles or tongues?
        Show or go?
        I get dizzy thinking "Why do nations bury their heads and turn on each other when the enemy of them all stands guilty and ready to act against all who oppose him??
        Every bone in my Vigilant body wants to insure my grandchildren's safety, and the safety of their grandchildren, and their grandchildren's safety.  
        Then I look at the world.  Instead of seeing a unified front against the Beast of Terror, I see a pie carved into many pieces and those around the table fighting for their piece.
       I see one Beast of Terror dancing around his maypole, happy as a clam that he is slowly castrating the U.S. power position.   Part of his success due to "suck-up" politics, where one nation makes a deal with another to turn against another, all once allies, now conspiring to divide themselves up so no one is stronger than the other.   They become the enemy.  They forget that if you  swim with the sharks and think you can't be bitten to death by the ducks surrounding the shark pool, you are sorely mistaken.  Saddam is gnawing on them.

        Virtual effeminate nations such as France, with literally no geopolitical clout except long-winded rhetoric, are crippling the U.S. when it least expected it.   Nations such as Turkey the U.S. tried to buy off with billions of dollars of blackmail financial aid have turned at the last minute and tossed back the dollars as though the bills were washed with the blood of the innocent and America was some "hit man" trying to assassinate "good" so "evil" could reign..
       Then there is Germany, the nation America conquered and set free.  It stands out like a sore thumb against war--one of the most aggressive of all nations in Europe--refusing to lend a hand in favor of U.S. policy.
       And Russia.  Well, no one expects Russia to rush to any side.   But it leans toward Europe and casts it lot with France and Germany, and now Turkey.
       Can these nations be called Vigilant?
       Do they really believe that Saddam Hussein's bulldozing tactics suggest any concert toward disarmament?
       Obviously, they aren't that naive.
       So, they must be plotting to unseat America's power base in Europe and the Middle East.   They must want to emasculate America's might, to shame it before the world, to cast it adrift on the turbulent seas of Imperialism where all its former friends will offer it drinks of salt water and shout, "The King is Dead, Long Live the King!"
      But who is the new King?

      It's got to be the Beast of Terror.  He's won another battle, because he's turned the heads of the Vigilant away from himself, and successfully made the Sheriff of Vigilance the "bad guy."
      It's America who is being protested globally as the warmonger, not Saddam Hussein, or Kim Jong Il, or Osama bin Laden.   Odd?  Peculiar?  Frustrating.
       Is the way of the world to turn against the Terror Hunter?  It would seem so. 
       I want to tell my grand kids what's happening in the world, that the bad guys have made the good guys the bad guys, and that the former good guys of the good guys have turned into bad guys because they don't like the good guy anymore and want him to go away, and now the former good guys are bad guys, but not as bad as the original bad guy who is being presented as a good guy for crushing his missiles, but is not good enough of a guy to let anyone interview his scientists who might tell the world the bad guy really isn't a good guy disguised as a bad guy, but really a bad, bad, bad guy who might be disguised as a bad guy but really is the Beast of Terror. Whew!
        No.
        Even that confuses me.
        Then I would have to explain why France, once a good guy turned into a bad guy but the world thinks it now the leader of the good guys, and then do the same with Germany, and ultimately try to explain about Turkey.
        Along each step of the way, Matt, the six-year-old, would pound me with the eternal Vigilant question: "Why would they do that, G-Pa?"
        And, while I might have some answers, I don't know if I'd have the strength to conjure them all.
        But I do know that Terrorism isn't just about Saddam Hussein.
        Terrorism is all about selfishness.
        It's about when nations and leaders are more concerned with themselves than they are future generations of all the children.

        I know the U.S. is much at fault in this area.  Had it professed the purpose of disarming Iraq for the benefit of the Children's Children's Children and stuck to that single-minded message, and cleared the table of all other issues but that as the bulls eye of diplomacy, then Turkey would have voted in our behalf.
       What Turkish Parliament saw was a bunch of U.S. politicians strong-arming them, trying to drive them to buy their will.   The negotiators used bully tactics, not Generational Safety Tactics, and that cost America credibility.
        There was no vision to the future in the negotiations, for had there been, our diplomats would be talking constantly about the safety of the Children's Children's Children, and how Saddam was endangering the future of the Turkish Children, the French Children, The German Children, and the Russian Children.
       We should have sent Fred Rogers of Mr. Rogers Neighborhood to negotiate, for he would have inspired rather than alienated the public to stand up for what is right, rather than to concede to Fear, Intimidation and Complacency, the tools of Terrorism.
       Fred Rogers would have said:  "Every child has the right to be special.   Saddam Hussein restricts the right of the child to be special.  For that reason, he is a Terrorist.  For that reason, he must be deposed."
       Who could argue with Mr. Rogers?
       No parent would.
       But when George Bush wags his finger into people's faces, and growls, the kids watching him don't see a Sentinel of Vigilance wanting to make their neighborhood's safe, they see a "monster" challenging them.

       Theoretically, nations should see through personalities to the intent they represent. But people don't.  People take threats and muscle as Bullyism, and bullies can't live comfortably in Mr. Rogers Neighborhood, but friends can.
        So, I ended up telling my grandson that one day the world will be like Mr. Rogers Neighborhood.  It will be free of people who threaten and bully other people, because everyone will be more concerned with the Children's Children's Children than themselves.
        Then he looked at me and said, "When will that be, G-Pa?"
        And I replied: "When everyone becomes a Parent of Vigilance!"

Mar 1.--Why The Children Of America Want To Go To War

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