Please don't bomb Iraq

[Rakesh Bhandari]

If after this bombardment for no evident reason at all, Israel doesn't live
up to the Wye Accords, the US will be facing the mother of all clash of
civilizations. It does not seem to me possible that the US would have
commenced this attack unless it was confident that with this rather
perverse assurance of regional security at the expense of a devastated and
totally defeated nation Israel would or could be forced to commence
withdrawals--though the WSJ reports that this bombing may interfere with
the honoring of the Wye Accord.  The legitimacy Saddam will derive and the
spark anti western sentiment will receive if Israel does not withdraw after
this unjustifiable attack probably cannot be underestimated. This of course
is not to say that the Wye Accord is anything but cosmetic--again see the
Nicholas Guyatt book.  But I think the more important question than the
effect of this bombing on the American impeachment process  is the
consequence on the so called peace process and the meaning of its success
or failure, in light of this bombardment, for the 'mood' of Arabs
throughout the region and the stability of pro Western Arab govts, already
rocked by IMF conditionalities, plummeting commodity prices, ever more
adverse terms of trade,  widespread hunger and poverty.

 Yours, Rakesh