While the drumbeat of military attacks continues at a steady pace and the US stares down the barrel of the March 31 deadline for the US to sustain its commitments without drastic action on enlistment, other, bigger blocks are shifting.
In the last two days we've had
The Sunday Herald suggest that there is a deal for the Kurds to keep quiet about their role in capturing Saddam in exchange for the autonomy they demand, seriously pissing off their neighbours, the Turkmen (who have also demanded that the Kurds be disarmed) and provoking the US to raid political offices and confiscate weapons. Talk about playing both sides of the game.
Then the news via War In Context that the Sunnis are getting their political and religious act together to resist their exclusion and oppression by their former victims, not to mention the US.
Riots today in Basra, mostly unemployed Army wanting back pay, how long will it take for them to decide that it ain't coming, and go dig up their weapons again?
And still that deadline looms, stop-loss orders are in the works and if the resistance can keep up its sufficient deadliness for another 90 days, the US military starts to break. Meanwhile nothing has changed on the international front; no new troops or money from the UN conference, only rising fear for airline security, orange alert all the time.
The pawns keep moving and Bushco has no effective reply, pretty soon the bishops will be in play, then the knights. The question is, will Bush be in check by November, and will the US electorate be able, or allowed to see it?