Even while US forces prosecute the Iraqi invasion smoothly and on schedule, an anxious person might think there are ominous signs the world may match US arrogant impetuousness in unforseen and cataclysmic ways.
‘Three missiles fired by U.S. jets taking part in attacks in Iraq landed over the border in southwestern Iran, Iran’s official IRNA news agency said on Saturday.
Quoting an unnamed military commander, IRNA also said that U.S. and British military jets violated the Islamic Republic’s airspace several times on Friday and Saturday during operations against targets in southern Iraq.
“In two cases, rockets from American planes hit (southwestern Iran),” the commander said. The rockets fell in the area of Maniuhi, close to the border with Iraq. The commander gave no further details and there were no reports of casualties or damage.
Another rocket hit an oil refinery depot on Friday evening in the city of Abadan, about 30 miles east of the southern Iraqi city of Basra, government officials and witnesses told Reuters. Two guards at the depot were injured in the blast.’ NY Times
If these were US/UK missiles, I can understand the first two landing just over the border but someone who knows more about how these things operate would have to dispel my suspicions that hitting an oil refinery depot 30 miles off-course could not have been accidental. Perhaps some commander got the brilliant idea, after the first two missiles strayed over the line, of making a gratuitous hit on Iran look inadvertent. Iraq, Iran, they sound alike, look alike, they’re both evil® in the commander-in-chief’s assessment, and they stand in our way in the same way in the global War for Peace. To be fair, however, given that US planes strayed over the border, these could have been Iraqi anti-aircraft missiles firing on them, the Times article suggests.
On the other side of Iraq, everyone is watching Turkish troop movements into Iraqi Kurdistan. Could Turkish designs on this region and fears of Kurdish nationalism emboldened by a US defeat of Iraq (more than Turkey’s stated aim of controlling an influx of refugees from the fighting into Turkey) have motivated Turkey all along in preventing US deployment on a northern front? In its arrogance, US strategic planners never counted on Turkey daring to flout our demand for cooperation. This miscalculation could broaden the war immeasurably in a manner we never bargained for, even if we’ve taken Baghdad within the next 48 hours. “Germany’s Foreign Minister Joschka Fisher has warned its crews on NATO planes protecting Turkey will be withdrawn if it becomes involved in the war; and a top Russian official has warned the war could spread if Turkey gets involved.” ABC News [via truthout]
And while we’re on the topic of the threshold,
‘North Korea says the situation on the Korean Peninsula was deteriorating to the “brink of a nuclear war” because of US-South Korean war games.
And in its first official response to the war on Baghdad, North Korea called the military action in Iraq “a grave encroachment upon sovereignty”.
It also accused the US of planning to attack North Korea after Iraq. ‘ Sydney Herald Sun [via truthout]
