Conrad, we have been here. We have been trying to get the US to engage Iraq in a non-violent way for decades. Back when Iraq was our ally, we gave the the poison gas used on the Kurds. Instead of censure, the US supported him. But that was because the Iraqis were at war with the "evil" Iran.

Then, we complained about the crippling US sanctions against Iraq which did nothing to weaken Saddam's power, but caused Iraqi citizens to die by the thousands each month. After 10 years of it, Saddam is still in power and the people who would have liked to see him ousted see him as a hero for standing up to the US.

The US foreign policy supporting and arming one petty dictator until he becomes politically inconvenient, and then supporting and arming their enemies instead has brought us round and round at war in Latin American and the Middle East. Who's next? The Turks? We've supported their internal ethnic cleansing. What about the Sauds? If Pakistan and India go to war, who are we goingto support -- the Pakistani military dictator that was out enemy but has so recently become our ally, or the Indian government that we've had peaceful relations with for years, but really hasn't done anything for us lately?

I'm afraid I don't see any noble intentions. We've never stopped bombing Iraq in the first place; we have not been offering peace.

I take to for granted the US will never take responsibility for helping to create some of the world's most brutal and repressive governments. We so conveniently forget yesterday's recipients of military arms and training. But what we must do, is to STOP DOING IT. Stop supporting internal rebels who seek to overthrow legitimate governments. Stop being the world's largest arms dealer, willing to sell anything to anyone, becuase any of those customers could be fronts for terrorist groups or future terrorists.

I am not suggesting we disengage from these governments, but by using the threat of war as our first response, we de-legitimize anything we have to say about peace.