Mark quotes Bush's simplistic nonsense:

>  And we will pursue nations that provide aid or safe haven to terrorism.
>  Every nation in every region now has a decision to make: Either you are
with
>  us or you are with the terrorists."

And Mark writes:

>  The Russians have faced several ghastly terrorist incidents in the past
>  week.  This is not a US problem, it is a world-wide problem.

The terrorist incidents this last week in Russia are primarily of Russia's
own making, in very much the same way that the Israel's Palenstinian problem is
of Israel's own making. The Russian army has conducted a brutal war of
suppression in Chechnya, covered over by a blanket of silence due to Putin's near
stranglehold on the Russian and foreign press, a war that will now continue to
escalate to an even more deadly status, unless someone begins to negotiate in
good faith.

The Moscow theater incident of a year ago, where 129 hostages were killed,
was conducted almost wholly by Chechnian women, widows who had lost their
husbands to Russian firefights, summary executions and indiscriminate bombings.
Although they nominally committed their act of "terror" in the name of Islam,
there was very little evidence that they were even all that familiar with Islam.
Rather, they did it out of revenge and a deep sense of rage, and because they
no longer had anything to live for.

Now it's the citizens of Ossetia turn to be outraged. In the Greek Orthodox
Christian tradition, it is customary to mourn the dead for 40 days. After that,
attempts at revenge will be almost unstoppable, even though Putin warned
against such retaliation today, saying that they too will be treated as acts of
terror.

Wirt Atmar

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