DANGER!! PEACEKEEPER TRAP!!: If this report is correct, Old Europe has figured out a last-ditch method of indefinitely delaying action against Iraq:

"Germany announced a new Franco-German initiative to try to avert military conflict after a magazine reported it involved sending thousands of U.N. peace-keeping troops to Iraq and trebling the number of arms inspectors."

Now, at first glance, this sounds like the "coercive inspections" idea that Jessica Tuchman Matthews and others devised back in September 2002. Which I thought was a good idea, then.

But Franco/German behavior over the past two weeks has been so... so... [reluctant to acknowledge reality?--ed. Thanks!!], that I think they have an ulterior motive. They want to use peacekeepers in Iraq the same way they wound up being used in Bosnia -- as an excuse to do nothing. Because British and French peacekeepers were on the ground, there was stiff European resistance to take any coercive action against Bosnian Serb forces. This (plus U.S. vacillation, to be sure) led to three years of dithering, before any constructive action was taken.

Another question: just which nationalities would comprise the proposed peacekeeping force?

Developing....