As tens of thousands of people march the streets of Britain Europe & America, Osama Bin Laden must be laughing all over his cave. Why wait for a Muslim uprising when the bloody Christians are going to self destruct and hand over their countries to us without a fight.
Naive & Stupid
All the peace protesters on the street would probably also let all the Afghani combatants out of the Cuban Camp Delta prison and let them roam the streets of Europe bombing at will.
Defence of the Realm
Blair may have lost the support of the people, but hopefully he has the moral conviction to carry this through. If we were now being led by the majority wishes of the Labour party we would not be facing up to Iraq at all. Without the US there would be no confrontation. Without the US there would be no UN inspectors in Iraq. Without the US there would be no problem . We would just be innocently watching TV as the fanatics infiltrated and neutralised our cities.
As France & Germany rabidly destroy the United Nations, Nato and the European Defence Force just for the sake of a bit of domestic political pouting, the future of the European Union itself is changing. With Chirac & Schroder trying to keep the power to themselves by carving up insider deals the other new nations of the EEC have spoken and given "old Europe" a bit of a shock. I don't think the French ever envisaged Europe as a real Democracy. Chirac continues to hold Blair by the neck at the UN for daring to out manoeuvre him. Obviously the French have learned nothing from the last world war.
History will remember their treachery and show Blair as a man of consummate courage.
Oil for Europe
Nobody will come clean about the fight for oil because it is an immoral cause. The facts probably are that the Arab fanatics have a masterplan involving grabbing the oilfields and holding Europe to ransom. Saudi Arabia is particularly vulnerable. Maybe our leaders are being totally immoral in protecting our oil interests but do we really want to see Europe's industrial might brought to its knees and our economies destroyed.
No one in authority would want to spell it out to the minions in the street for fear of frightening them and the money markets. It's a balancing act, how to convince the populace without terrifying them.
Think back to the days after 9/11 and remember how close the western economies came to total free-fall.
In the Middle East there are millions of dissatisfied Arabs blaming the US and the west (including Europe) for their plight. Maybe someone should have explained to us that if Al Qaeda can raise and train 10,000 Muslim fanatics to fight a war then the future of Europe looks less than healthy.
While the dictators in the Middle East continue to deprive their people of basic human rights, a healthy economy and a strong ideology, the world will always be unstable and affluent western nations will continue to be the targets. Every dictatorship has a fledgling population of dissatisfied youth who are likely to become potential fanatical terrorists. How many would we be willing to fight in ten years time if the situation didn't change?
Between the Lines
It has never been said, but a logical analysis of the Arab and Middle East situation points toward a solution in which the US attempts to democratise the area. This could be done by setting up one country in the area as a model, which other countries would find hard not to follow.
At the beginning of the war against terror there was talk of it being a ten-year war. This is a war that has not started yet. The fanatics are regrouping and the intelligence services in many countries are continuing the battle with moderate success. The failure beneath this success lies in the fact that public opinion has become complacent and secure.
One tragedy would change all of that, but then it would be too late.