Yesterday, the NY Times wrote that the Bush administration is reportedly considering incursions into Syria in an effort to put a brake on the flow of arms and terrorists (the NYT calls them "fighters") for the Iraqi insurgency.

One official told the Times the United States has taken the struggle right up to the border but not beyond. Other officials said U.S. forces have entered Syria both by accident and design.

Sources said the administration held a high-level discussion Oct. 1 on Syria and on putting pressure on President Bashar Assad. They told the Times President Bush has not selected a specific strategy yet.

The administration has reportedly offered Syria a deal similar to that with Libya -- with friendship and foreign aid exchanged for a number of concessions.

Syrian President Bashar Assad is no friend to the U.S. or a democratic Iraq. Syria openly criticizes U.S. policy in Iraq and has a history of secretly supporting terrorism there. On October 10 Assad told CNN that the U.S. has achieved nothing in Iraq:

The United States should re-examine its Iraq policy because of the negative consequences of the war, Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad told CNN on Wednesday. "We should re-evaluate what's going on in Iraq," Al-Assad said. "What did we achieve, what did they achieve from that war in Iraq. It's a very simple question. What did they achieve economically, politically, fighting terrorism?

The answer to Assad's questions should begin with confronting him about his complicity in undermining the U.S. effort in Iraq, and then call his attention to what's happening today in Irag and that in spite of his efforts, it is he that has accomplished little and the Iraqi people that have accomlished much. It is Assad that has accomplished little in stalling the inevitible - a democratic Iraq.

Chris Suellentrop had it right in his April 2003 piece at Slate entitled, "The evil moron who's running Syria."

(...) In the real world, most evil men aren't geniuses. Instead, the real danger, more often than not, comes from evil morons.

(...) Take Bashar Assad. Has there been a more disastrous geopolitical move in recent years than the 38-year-old Syrian president's decision to cast his lot with Saddam just prior to Iraq's stunning military defeat? Before the war, Syria had actually done quite a bit to improve its standing in the eyes of the United States. It cooperated in the war against al-Qaida, sharing the intelligence it gained from interrogations of Muhammad Haydar Zammar, the man suspected of recruiting Mohamed Atta to carry out the 9/11 attacks. In addition, Syria supported the Saudi plan for peace with Israel. And it may not sound like much, but Assad denounced the 9/11 attacks, while Saddam (less smartly) praised them.

(...) Now it appears that Assad may have gambled all of that away. By foolishly providing moral and material support to Iraq during the war--and, the administration says, now by harboring high-ranking Iraqi officials--he's created an environment that makes it possible for a Democratic presidential candidate (Florida Sen. Bob Graham) to openly support war with Syria. Already some hawks are pointing to the tantalizing parallels between Saddam's Iraq and Assad's Syria. Weapons of mass destruction? Check. Support for terrorism? Check. Repressive domestic intelligence services? Check. The comparisons go further: Both countries were ruled by tyrannical men who are not members of the ethnic majority. (Saddam was a Sunni who ruled over a largely Shiite country, and Assad is an Alawite who rules over a Sunni majority.) To top things off, Syria even has a Baath Party and a Republican Guard. No one expects war anytime soon, but Assad's stupidity has put the subject on the table.

That was in 2003, Syrian troops shot and wounded U.S. forces in 2004, and Syria has been aiding and facilitating terrorism in Iraq that has resulted in the deaths of not only thousands of Iraqis but also Coalition forces ever since then. So the subject is definately on the table, as it should be. I don't expect the subject to be "tabled"(postpone consideration) this time, unless Assad can dig up enough sense to look at the outcome of decisions by two men - Muammar al-Qaddafi of Libyia, and Saddam Hussein of Iraq. If he isn't as much a moron as Suellentrop believes him to be, he will accept the Libyan solution to the problem of having the U.S. war machine marching through his front door or a cruise missle sailing through his car window.

And Assad has yet another problem - he's ticked off Israel.

Other coverage - Steel Deal

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