Adelman says there is cause to attack Iraq
Ken Adelman takes a different tack than I on the subject of military action against Iraq. Adelman discounts reports that 9/11 chief hijacker M. Atta did not meet Iraqi intelligence operatives in Prague (with some reasons he states) and then insists, "Other reasons exist for us to attack Iraq — and soon — besides any direct involvement of theirs in Sept. 11."

I grant everything that Adelman says. In my post of May 22, my main point was not that no reasons exist to bring down Saddam, because there are reasons. I said then and still say now that the Bush administration has not made the case. Adelman is making it, but he's not in federal service. It's Bush, not Adelman, who needs to persuade us.

What I see happening, though, is a variation on the "trial balloon" method of making policy that goes on all the time in Washington. I am convinced there are no near-term plans in the administration to attack Iraq. But there is time to put a finger in the wind now to see how to lead America toward greater willingness to confront Saddam. For the nonce, Bush is content for journalists and other private-sector writers or analysts to compile the bill of particulars for a casus belli. Eventually, the cases they make will become well accepted in media and public opinion. They will be pretty much self-justifying, no longer challenged by the chatterati. Then the administration will adopt the cases as its own, with a minimum of debate and fuss.

We'll see.