mother, may I?

Yes, you may, says Turkey, in this update from the Washington Post. The Turkish accession to support any U.S.-led coalition against Saddam is conditional on UN Security Council "authorization" of any war. Which may, or may not, happen, depending on the vagaries of how much pressure we are able to bring to bear on Saddam's best friends on the Council, France and Russia.

What makes this a less-than-"hooray for our side" occasion is the fact that we once again are selling the Kurds short. While we must, repeat, must, keep Turkey from sliding into becoming just another Islamist craphole of a state, we must not lose our souls in the process. You'd think that 50 years of being a close military ally in the fight against the Soviets, including literally fighting shoulder to shoulder in Korea, would count for something, and that the Turks would willingly shoulder almost any burden for the United States.

You'd think; you'd be wrong, but let's not write off our friends the Turks just yet. They may come around to the sight of virtue, unhindered by caring about a phony UN "mother may I". We're going to clean Iraq's clock of the toad-like face of Saddam., whether or not the UN says its a go, if we know that it is in our national security interest to do so.