To: Sully- who wrote (25758 ) 1/23/2004 1:40:05 AM From: Nadine Carroll Read Replies (2) | Respond to The US probably feels that it has the Iraqi problem in hand. It may also want to maintain the operational tempo in its wider campaign against the Middle Eastern dictatorships. An American deployment to the Bekaa would at the minimum open a new low-intensity warfare front which would resemble a cross between the campaign in Afghanistan and the recent anti-Saddam counterinsurgency in Iraq, which in the light of recent experience, the Pentagon feels it can safely assume. It has become a familiar operation of war with a known cost. But to the Syrians, it will be a mortal threat, to which they must respond. If they cannot bloody America and force a withdrawal, the spring of 2005 will see the Bekaa transformed from a Syrian stronghold to a dagger in the heart of Damascus they need not care how many Lebanese civilians they kill; they know perfectly well that only the US and Israel will be blamed for all casualties.
