I heard the French ambassador say at the UN today that France doesn't believe that a second resolution is necessary. On that, they apparently agree with the US-led coalition (though Tony Blair would still like one to provide him a little political cover at home).

Of course, they disagree with our (correct) position that the present one, 1441, allows us to go in and remove Saddam and his weapons by force. They have made it abundantly clear that they never meant for that resolution to be taken seriously--that it was simply a means of buying time last fall until they could come up with another means of buying time. In so doing, they continue to render the UN increasingly irrelevant, because it's also abundantly clear that Saddam is so far beyond being in material breach at this point that he can't even see it from where he is, sans a gravitational lens.

It would be nice, for Blair's sake, if they can get a resolution passed, or at least get a majority for one, with a French veto. The latter would probably finally get the British public firmly on the PM's side. But either way, it's hard to believe that we won't be actively sanitizing the once-Fertile Crescent of dictators and WMD within a couple weeks.

Ops in Iraq should start on the next new moon so we can have the cover of darkness. If we wait again we will have to wait for the following new moon on March 31st. That puts us one month closer to the summer heat. By the time summer comes we need to be firmly covering the entirety of Iraq with forces, ours and whoever else will be willing to go. By years end we need to be well along in turning Iraq into a country with a democratically elected govermnent.

Perhaps we can set about starting, and I use a phrase much heard in my youth, a Domino Effect, of Democracy in the Middle East!! Surely democracies and free markets will prevail in an area rich in oil and silica sand.

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I wouldn't count on free markets blossoming without help. The usual trend for countries possessing oil is to socialize the pumps, and have the government use the oil revenue to pay for free services. They Iraqis are going to be mighty tempted to do just that.

I'm not at all certain that we'll begin under cover of darkness this time -- just because that's expected, if for no other reason.

This war won't look like any of the previous ones; remember, we've already taken out much/most of Saddam's antiaircraft defenses, and the covert ground operations have been going on for a long time. EMP bombs would be most impressive in the daytime -- more magic for the visually-insignificant daytime detonation. And then there are all the things which haven't really ben discussed yet...

I think Rand's right: a couple of weeks.

Operations would probably begin on some side of the new moon rather than right on it for the simple reason that most night vision scopes require some background light to work, and although starlight suffices for some of them, many need more. Thus, IIRC, the U.S. favors launching assaults on either the nights immediately before or just after the new moon.