alanabit,

Where those seven words make all the difference - is that they afford Saddam more than ample scope to play the same game he has played with UN weapons inspectors for the last 12 years.

The swift change in events in Iraq, may also explain the non-use of chemical or biological weapons to date. US and UK forces were in place so there was no delay, whatever Saddam has was hidden - he ain't had time or the freedom of movement to deploy it.

Armen T - I thought the alternative candidate to de Gaulle was Admiral Darlan - not Petain. In 1940 the French and British were defeated by tactics, not by a vastly superior force. Where the Germans were vastly superior was in their command and control of the forces at their disposal. In numbers the British and French were superior in armour, both Britain and France had tanks that German anti-tank guns could not touch - unfortunately the Allied General Staff of the time did not know how to fight a mechanised war. The only occasion British armour was used correctly (Arras) it gave one particular German commander (Erwin Rommel) the biggest fright of his life. During the British armoured counter-attack in utter desperation Rommel ordered his anti-aircraft batteries to engage - that was when Rommel found that in his 88mm anti-aircraft gun he had one of the best tank killers of the war.