Whither Iraq?

The tragic, montrous death of Nick Berg has created empathy from certain Iraqis. CNN interviewed Iraqis about the footage of Berg's beheading, and they said described their shame in the same way Americans described their reaction to the photos from Abu Ghraib. They said things like "The badness of a few will overshadow the goodness of many" and "This will reflect poorly on our country."

Blame for the horrific slaughter of Berg is being placed on Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Zarqawi has been blamed for over 700 deaths in Iraq over the past months. And here's the shocking, disheartening thing: the administration could've pulled the trigger on Zarqawi on not one, not two, but on three occasions.

NBC News has learned that long before the war the Bush administration had several chances to wipe out his terrorist operation and perhaps kill Zarqawi himself — but never pulled the trigger.

In June 2002, U.S. officials say intelligence had revealed that Zarqawi and members of al-Qaida had set up a weapons lab at Kirma, in northern Iraq, producing deadly ricin and cyanide.

The Pentagon quickly drafted plans to attack the camp with cruise missiles and airstrikes and sent it to the White House, where, according to U.S. government sources, the plan was debated to death in the National Security Council.

“Here we had targets, we had opportunities, we had a country willing to support casualties, or risk casualties after 9/11 and we still didn’t do it,” said Michael O’Hanlon, military analyst with the Brookings Institution.

Four months later, intelligence showed Zarqawi was planning to use ricin in terrorist attacks in Europe.

The Pentagon drew up a second strike plan, and the White House again killed it. By then the administration had set its course for war with Iraq.

“People were more obsessed with developing the coalition to overthrow Saddam than to execute the president’s policy of preemption against terrorists,” according to terrorism expert and former National Security Council member Roger Cressey.

In January 2003, the threat turned real. Police in London arrested six terror suspects and discovered a ricin lab connected to the camp in Iraq.

The Pentagon drew up still another attack plan, and for the third time, the National Security Council killed it.

Military officials insist their case for attacking Zarqawi’s operation was airtight, but the administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq could undercut its case for war against Saddam.

As someone who protested the Iraq war as a distraction from the war on terror, it sickens me to read something like this. I keep remembering former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill description of Bush as "a blind man in a room full of deaf people." That weird description seems to fit as more and more awful predictions come true.

David Brooks, a fervent war supporter and Bush sympathizer, had a good op-ed yesterday reflecting on the goals of the war.

We went into Iraq with what, in retrospect, seems like a childish fantasy. We were going to topple Saddam, establish democracy and hand the country back to grateful Iraqis. We expected to be universally admired when it was all over.

We didn't understand the tragic irony that our power is also our weakness. As long as we seemed so mighty, others, even those we were aiming to assist, were bound to revolt. They would do so for their own self-respect. In taking out Saddam, we robbed the Iraqis of the honor of liberating themselves.

Ok. This message is basically a cut and paste job. I find it hard to say anything coherent about this whole mess. Everything is a mixture of sadness, regret, and a slim hope that the shame those good Iraqis are feeling now, which is matched only by Americans' shame at the pictures from Abu Ghraib, might translate into empathy for the cause of a better, more just, and more democratic Iraq. Anyways. More fun links later.