it is not about the military. The military is ready, willing, and able.
it is not about the UN. Bush knows the diplomatic route is garbage, but we do need to maintain alliances for the larger "war on terror," so he couldn't come out and call the French cheese-eating-surrender-monkeys.
So what IS it about? One of two things. If you saw the post by Mansoor Ijaz on NRO Monday, ("Brain Drain") he had a very important paragraph, where he said that the arrest of KSM and the info we were getting likely pre-empted some pretty big attacks that were supposed to happen with the onset of the war. So first, this delay has been about making sure that the "retaliatory" attacks by AQ did not occur.
Second, you have NOT heard anything about this, but I am convinced that Tom Ridge has been one of the keys, closely tied to the issue above. Perhaps Ridge knows of some expected attacks and the CIVILIAN response in the U.S. wasn't yet ready to deal with it. Obviously I don't know what specifically that might be, but I'm convinced that Homeland Security has been one of the major factors in delaying this war. As you (and STRATFOR) show, from a purely military point of view, waiting is silly.
No. Stratfor forgets that all martial impulses must be subordinated to political aims.
Certain political actions had to be taken so that our best, closest ally, Tony Blair, could go to those Mad Hatters in the Labour Back Benches and say that we gave it the Old College Try.
That's all this was about. The Iraqis, and us, are going to be amazed at the speed and intensity of this campaign. Some of the talking bulletheads have been speaking of "Gulf War, Squared".
Be Seeing You,
Chris