Bush had this planned this month. A friend of mine who works with a close frind of Tommy Franks told him back in November that St. Patty's day was D-day. well, it's tomorrow, so I can't be held accountable for sharing state secrets.
However Scott, your line:
>"The war itself's outcome is a foregone conclusion" is just a guess, and a poor one at that.

A top war planner with general Schwarzkopf had this to say (and it could very well GO this way)"
"Within hours of our attack, Saddam launches Scuds on Israel. Israel's government launches a full-scale attack on Iraq, creating a holy war. Saddam, threatened with his own survival, uses chemical and biological weapons and human shields. He torches his own oil fields, thousands of his own people are killed. Photos of US soldiers amid landscapes of Iraqi civilian bodies blanket the world press which aligns unanimously against the US."

He then envisaged the US left to administer a post-Saddam Iraq with minimal international co-operation and open to terror attacks from al- Qa'ida. North Korea could take advantage and start exporting nuclear weapons.

Now don't tell me this ccan't happen, because it could. There is always the war with "unintended consequences". THIS is why so many people have been protesting worldwide. They don't wnat to take the chance of this war escalating.

For the whole article
<go here.>

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=387234