Now that several thousand troops are in Kuwait to protect the oil interests and President Clinton's re-election campaign, let's figure out some true costs Amerika will suffer come payback time.

The present number of ground troops cannot protect airplanes bombing Iraq on behalf of Kurds fighting their own civil war. The concept of "no fly zones" over a sovereign foreign power is an act of war masquerading as "peacekeeping."

Those countries which are NOT busily making nuclear or biological weapons are understood to be natural targets for a cowardly bully of a superpower and politicians eager to show the Amerikan electorate how tough they are in fighting countries which cannot effectively retaliate. Scratch non-proliferation as sane foreign policy for third-world regimes.

Far better than nuclear weapons for despots are cheap, low-level biological weapons used against enemy troops. The Amerikan Pentagon will activate a series of PR fall-back lines, telling Amerika that it was 400, no 5,000, next tens of thousands of former GIs and their wives and children who are suffering from 'chemical' weapons attacks. Don't want to dampen recruitment for Bob or Bill's next excellent foreign adventure.

Let's go out and play a game of chicken against those smaller and weaker than us. Let's show some bully courage by not whining when them chickens come home to roost.

223 words, not counting title.

Martin Lindstedt
Granby, Missouri .

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