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http://www.msnbc.com/news/842500.asp?0cm=c21&cp1=1

The United States declared Monday that the diplomatic window “has closed” for a peaceful resolution to the Iraq showdown and that President Bush will address the nation later on Monday. At the United Nations, the United States and its allies withdrew a resolution that would have paved the way for U.N. authorization for war... White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said, “The diplomatic window has closed as a result of the U.N.’s failure to enforce it’s own resolutions for Saddam to disarm.” He declined to say whether Saddam would be given a deadline in President Bush’s speech, set for 8 p.m. ET... Bush said at a news conference. “Tomorrow is a moment of truth for the world.”

...Germany announced it was closing its embassy in Baghdad and that its chargé d’affairs was heading for Jordan. The embassies of China and the Czech Republic were also ordered evacuated. Britain advised all of its citizens except diplomatic staff to leave Kuwait...The United States ordered all government dependents and nonessential staff out of Kuwait, Syria, Israel and the West Bank and Gaza.

...Foreign journalists also began clearing out of Iraq. NBC News confirmed [this, and]... two ABC News journalists were reportedly leaving the Iraq capital. China’s official Xinhua news agency said six Chinese reporters were leaving... A week ago, there were 450 foreign journalists in Baghdad. On Monday, the number was down to 300, the Information Ministry said.

Early Monday, Mohammed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, announced that the United States had advised his team to leave Baghdad... U.N. officials told Reuters that the inspectors will recommend that the monitors be pulled out in the next 24 hours. Most of the teams’ helicopters already have left Iraq because their insurance was canceled, chief U.N. inspector Hans Blix said.

...Finland said on Monday it would expel three Iraqi diplomats working at the Iraqi embassy in Helsinki... following a request from the United States.

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this article includes a photo of a british soldier practicing his bayonet skills. it's a ruthless killer's life-- in the army!

http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,6138463%255E401,00.html

Planes and armoured units will tear across Iraq in a 48-hour blitzkrieg. Cruise missiles will be launched from ships and submarines, British Tornado fighters will fire bunker-buster missiles, and electronic bombs will disrupt communications [and hospital equiptment and of course individual pacemakers and hearing aids --mrs. h].

...Harlan Ullman, a former US Navy pilot... added: "The idea is to replicate the shock and awe created by a nuclear bomb, but using conventional weapons." ...At the disposal of the supreme allied commander, General Tommy Franks, are the most sophisticated planes and most lethal payloads in existence [mrs. henry doesn't understand the use of the word 'conventional' then].

The B2 stealth bomber carries JDAM (joint direct attack munition) precision-guided bombs. The F-117A Nighthawk stealth fighter can drop GBU-28 bunker-busters; B-52s carry air-launched cruise missiles and JDAMs. F-15Es launching new joint air-to-surface stand-off missiles (JASSM) and RAF Tornados unleashing Storm Shadow missiles will swarm into Iraqi airspace... [to] maximise destruction of Saddam Hussein's machine [??!]... Just ahead of the US and British strike bombers will be up to 250 cruise missiles fired from US and British ships in the Gulf and Mediterranean. Dozens of fighter-bombers will swoop on air defence sites to ensure total domination of the skies. Others will hunt for Iraq's remaining 300 aircraft.

US Delta Force teams are likely to be dropped into Baghdad... they will work to capture key military and political figures. Blackout bombs will pitch large areas into darkness... and E-bombs dropped on military centres will fuse every computer [and respirator and heart monitor and pacemaker and hearing aid, and so on --mrs. h] within a 300m area.

...Airborne units will be flown by helicopter deep inside Iraq... By dawn, Iraq's military and political infrastructure is likely to have been shattered, say analysts. Leaders will have disappeared, entire military units will have been obliterated [that means killed-- possibly using baynets! oh boy!] At dawn hundreds of helicopters will appear as entire brigades are dropped deep into Iraq, the first mass ground operations, to take the oilfields.

...The political imperative to minimise civilian casualties will have to be put aside for street to street fighting.

[mrs. henry thinks we should think about that: "The political imperative to minimise civilian casualties will have to be put aside." ]

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http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=387906

Hans Blix, the chief United Nations weapons inspector, said yesterday that he was still planning to produce a list of disarmament targets for Saddam Hussein to meet in the coming months... In the past two weeks, Mr Blix has told reporters he has received "quite a lot of paper from the Iraqis" on weapons issues. "They are very pro-active, and this, of course, is one requirement of the resolution, that they should be active," he said.

...Mr Blix said he had no plans to evacuate between 140 and 150 UN weapons inspectors now in Iraq.

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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-613382,00.html

A highly secretive military build-up is also under way on President Saddam Hussein’s western flank. Special forces from the United States and Britain have begun to conduct long-range reconnaissance missions from their bases along the 113-mile border between Iraq and Jordan, military sources have told The Times. Remarkably, Israeli forces are also said to be involved... One Western military expert said yesterday: “It is a very discreet operation, but the special forces are certainly there. You may not see any tanks dashing across the border from Jordan when the war begins, but there will be significant special forces activity."

...At least 5,000 US troops are already in Jordan, according to an official source in Amman. One Western diplomat in the capital said, however, that the true figure was nearer 7,000. Thousands more are expected to arrive soon... Scattered among the Americans are an estimated 100 British special forces troops... Members of Sayeret Matkal, Israel’s commando force, are also said by Western military experts to have carried out covert reconnaissance operations inside the Western Iraqi desert.

...Washington has promised Jordan an economic aid package worth hundreds of millions of dollars or more, according to one official source in Amman.

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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-613555,00.html

AMERICAN troops were told yesterday to prepare for “suicide PoWs..." US Marines, likely to be among the first troops to enter Iraqi terroritory, fear that some prisoners of war will use the suicide tactics of Hamas bombers to cause as many casualties as possible.

...US Marines have been practising crowd control at their camps in Kuwait in preparation for prisoners. Staff Sergeant Howard Bradford told assembled Marines at Camp Grizzly to tie prisoners’ hands behind their backs using plastic “flexi-cuffs” and then twist them. This will give a short stab of intense pain, he said, that would “let them know who’s in control”... The 1991 effort to round up prisoners did not go smoothly. “We had a lot of people going through the prisoners’ wallets because they wanted souvenirs,” Staff Sergeant Bradford said. He has told his Marines not to repeat such behaviour.

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http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=273178&contrassID=2&subContrassID=1&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y

All mention of an "independent" Palestinian state has been eliminated in Israel's response to the "road map" prepared by... the United States, the European Union, the United Nations and Russia. An "independent" Palestinian state, which would be initially established along temporary borders, is replaced with "certain attributes of sovereignty."

...Israel also rejects the demand of immediate removal of all illegal outposts set up in the territories during the government of Ariel Sharon. According to the Israeli version, the government will "enforce the law in relation to the outposts."

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http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=19855

British Prime Minister Tony Blair is facing the embarrassing prospect of being prosecuted for 'war crimes' over the Iraq crisis by his wife's human rights law firm. The interesting row has intensified on whether Britain's plan to bomb Iraq is legal... Anti-war campaigners plan to use the firm to force Blair to answer for his actions to the International Criminal Court.

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http://www.cjonline.com/stories/031603/kan_cronkite.shtml

A U.S. invasion of Iraq would destroy the United Nations, former CBS anchorman Walter Cronkite said... Cronkite said a U.S. invasion would plunge this country into financial chaos. He agreed that Saddam Hussein is dangerous, but said American diplomacy has been poor. "We have shown arrogance, almost an egotism, in our conduct of foreign policy so that we have alienated most of our former allies in the world," Cronkite said. "I think (it) is going to get us in very serious trouble."

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events in oregon

http://www.dailytidings.com/2003/news0311/031103n1.shtml

The recent arrest of videographer Wes Brain is just one of the many controversies now bubbling up from the March 5 protest event in Ashland. Brain, who works for Southern Oregon University as an environmental health and safety technologist, was arrested by Ashland Police at his workplace, two days after the protest. Brain, who is also a union shop steward, said he attended the rally to shoot footage for Rogue Valley Community Television. He was charged with two counts of disorderly conduct, and one count of impeding police. He was then jailed and released on $10,000 bail.

...Even though at least 6OO people were breaking laws in the un-permitted march - mainly obstructing traffic - only one man was arrested at the time. That arrest was an act of conscious civil disobedience... Since then, two others have been charged for alleged criminal action during the march. A 20-year-old transient Jeremy Dahl was cited for obstructing traffic and causing a public alarm, and Brain's arrest.

According to Ashland Police Lt. Rich Walsh - who was the incident commander during the march - police were more than justified to single out Brain and Dahl because they "terrorized" a woman attempting to drive through the Plaza area... Brain said he had approached a vehicle after it had nearly run down two protesters. "I said to her, lady, slow down, these are our kids. But I didn't yell at her," Brain said.

Children and young adults from Ashland Middle School, Ashland High School, and Southern Oregon University gathered for the march [and]... In a written statement, Brain detailed what he did the day of the protest. "That day I shot one hour and 41 minutes of raw footage which shows the colorful march and rally with 500 or 600 (some say more) students demonstrating that money for war should instead be spent on education (books not bombs)," Brain wrote.

"This footage shows some of the things not reported by the local mainstream media like the SWAT team that was called in from a neighboring county to square off against our peacefully protesting students. This footage looks like it is taken from another planet, I mean can you imagine riot cops squaring off against young kids?… My footage also shows the tail-end of a scuffle in the street which shows the Ashland police throwing people to the ground. I did not capture the beginning of this incident but do have an interview of someone who says she saw it from the start and that the police instigated the scuffle."

...John Fricker, a sound engineer living in Ashland... who said he attended the demonstration as "a peacekeeper," said he saw officers Teresa Selby, Phil Gray, and School Resource Officer Mike Vanderlip approach the demonstrators from behind, asking them to move out of the left lane. "My immediate response was to follow them as the mass of people was very large and my initial thought was that their task was impossible," Fricker said. The scuffle began, according to Fricker, when officers approached a couple and spoke to them. "At first the couple did not respond and then it appeared one officer placed their hand on the shoulder of one of the pair. One protester turned, and the other appeared to trip and fall. It appeared that the couple and one officer then fell to the ground," Fricker said.

At that point according to multiple eyewitnesses, a female demonstrator was thrown to the ground. Another protester was then thrown against a parked car by Gray. At that point a group of protesters - roughly 20 - surrounded the officers and called for calm. "The officers were together at all times, and I did not see any protester grab, block, or attack an officer," Fricker said.

Brain said he was about 80 feet away from the incident, and filmed the latter part of the events. He has not yet released a copy of his video to The Tidings, pending advice from his attorney. A family of demonstrators who arrived at the courthouse today to support Brain said they also witnessed the fracas. Edgar Morton, 33, said he saw two officers wrestling two individuals to the ground, and that they were approached by a third person, who was "sent headfirst into a parked car by Officer Vanderlip." At that point Morton, his wife and roughly 18 other demonstrators surrounded the three officers. Morton's two children, aged 4 and 10, also witnessed the scene. "At this point the officers were no longer physically dominating the kids because they were aware of their surroundings," Morton said. Morton said he saw Brain approach the officers with his video camera. "He told the policemen they should be ashamed of themselves for traumatizing little children," Morton said.

Margaret Morton, Edgar's wife, said she found the whole scene intimidating. "All the kids were screaming and crying," she said. Paul Morton,10, concurred with his mother's view. "When I saw the cops start throwing people down, it made me angry, and then I got scared," he said.

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http://abclocal.go.com/ktrk/news/31403_local_rodeofight.html

Talk of war with Iraq... may be to blame for a brawl that broke out at the rodeo Thursday night. With some 15,000 to 20,000 folks at the rodeo drinking beer and having fun, things can get a little out of hand at times. It happened when a tape of Lee Greenwood's song Proud To Be An American was playing. Some rodeo fans were standing and others were sitting down. Felix Fanaselle and his buddies chose to remain seated.

"This guy behind us starts yelling at us (because) we're not standing up," said Fanaselle. "He starts cussing at us, telling us to go back to Iraq." The 16-year-old said the man seated behind him started spitting at him and spilling his beer on him and his friends. "By the end of the song, he pulled my ear. I got up. He pushed me. I pushed him," said Felix. "He punched me in my face. I got him off me." When the dust settled, Fanaselle had been handcuffed and released. He and John McCambridge were cited for "mutual combat" and fighting in public. That's a $200 fine.

Fanaselle's lawyer says you don't have to stand for a country and western song... The Fanaselle family will give McCambridge a chance to make this right without going to court. The family says the biggest insult was McCambridge telling Fanaselle to go back to Iraq. Fanaselle is half Hispanic and half Italian. "He was born in this country and who is this clown to tell him to go back where he came from? He came from Houston, Texas, so he is where he came from," said Rawlings.

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http://reuters.com/financeNewsArticle.jhtml?type=governmentFilingsNews&storyID=2370392

U.S. consumers would not benefit from knowing which grocery stores, restaurants and butchers stocked meat products potentially contaminated with deadly bacteria, the top U.S. Agriculture Department food safety official said on Wednesday.

...When the USDA announces a food recall, consumers are told where and when the meat was produced, what states they were distributed to and specific identification numbers on all affected products. The names of any restaurants, grocery stores and butcher shops that may carry these products are not given... Despite the information given out by USDA, most consumers do not know if their meat was subject to a recall since the product was most likely repackaged and carries a different identification number than the one released by the USDA, said Caroline Smith DeWaal, food safety director for the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/from_our_own_correspondent/2850485.stm

My wife and I do not believe in God. In our last posting, in Brussels among the nominally catholic Belgians, unbelief was not a problem. Before that in London it was not remotely an issue. With the sole exception of one friend who is an evangelical Christian, I don't recall a single conversation with anyone about religious matters in the years I lived and worked in the capital. Our house in London was right next to a church. We talked to the tiny congregation about the weather, about the need to prune the rose bushes and mend the fence. But we never talked about God.

How different it is on this side of the Atlantic... The right to trumpet your religious affiliations - loud and clear - has been part of the warp and weft of American life... I am talking about Mr and Mrs Average in Normaltown, USA.

86% of Americans, we are told by the pollsters, believe in heaven... 76% or three out of four people you meet on any American street believe in hell and the existence of Satan. They believe that the devil is out to get you. That evil is a force in the world - a force to be engaged in battle. Much of that battle takes place in the form of prayer.

Americans will talk of praying as if it were the most normal, rational thing to do. And nobody spends more time on his knees... than George W Bush. He is famously born again - at the age of 40 it was goodbye Jack Daniels and hello Jesus. He has never looked back. So while there are plenty of rational people giving rational advice about policy matters in the Bush White House there is also a channel, an input, from on high.

The Bush administration hums to the sound of prayer. Prayer meetings take place day and night. It's not uncommon to see White House functionaries hurrying down corridors carrying bibles. A friend who works in the press office of 10 Downing Street tells me that - even in these difficult times - such a sight would be highly unusual.

Doubtless the president and his people have been praying earnestly that Saddam Hussein might fall under a bus. But if no bus comes they feel justified in what they have decided to do. Having made the decision to fight the good fight - and have no doubt about it President Bush has made that decision - the nagging doubts, the rational fears, the worldly misgivings - all those things felt so strongly by post-religious Europeans - can be set aside.