Breaking

In the biggest attack since Operation Desert Fox four years ago, 100 American and British jets attacked Iraqi air defense intallations in western Iraq.

What this story leaves unmentioned is, the western desert is where Saddam keeps his Scud missiles (possibly armed with biological or chemical weapons) so that they are in range of Israel.

There might have been something more to this attack than simple war preparations.

UPDATE: So far, there is still only that Telegraph story to link to.

But while I’m here, working on tomorrow’s posts and this week’s Friday Recipe (Coq au Vin for Two!), let me go into a bit more detail.

“War preparations” above means three things. 1) Taking out radars and missiles to make the skies safer for Allied warplanes. 2) Keeping Saddam blind on the Jordanian front. 3) Getting Saddam to play more of his hand.

The “something more” could mean we saw Saddam moving or preparing to use what few ballistic missiles he has left. Better to take them out on their launch trucks than relying on Israeli Arrow 2 or US Patriot anti-missile missiles.

As always, fresh material just after midnight, Mountain time.