Sunday, October 28, 2007

Now You See It , Now You - Don't

The mysterious emplacement that never was. But likely was. And no longer is. Evaporated. A figment of someone's anxious imagination. On the other hand, what most certainly was there at one time at an enticing stage aspiring to become something entirely other might have been there, might it not?

Are pictures worth a thousand words? At least that number of words and more have been expended on breathlessly theorizing and interpreting and hazarding educated guesses. All in the realm of possibility. Probability? Likelihood?

Brought, many would say, to reality by the background and the action - in the air, on the ground. Now, is there conceivably any room left for doubt? Those thousand-and-more words have taken back seat to satellite photographs purporting to illustrate that which was not, had never been, and simply did not exist.

These are the "before" and then the "after" photographs. Mysterious, to be sure, but explicatory at the very least by events precedented but unanticipated by those who cling to the "never-existed" claim. What most certainly looks like a nuclear site close to the Euphrates River, complete with pumping station for the reactor in photo one. Photo two, tractors, bulldozers excavating buried pipelines. Now gone, vanished.

There is now nothing left for the International Atomic Energy Agency to pick away at. They saw, they flew, they conquered. Not the IAEA, most certainly, but those others whose very existence is dependent upon a nuclear-free zone where they make their abode. With rare exceptions, to say the least.

Syria, rather put out at the disruption of her plans to succeed where their close friends already have, practised the expeditious art of removing all traces of her misdemeanor on the world stage. Allowing that yes there was a building under construction, but its purpose was entirely other than that claimed. And they're downright pissed at the illegal incursion.

"Dismantling and removing the building at such a rapid pace dramatically complicates any (IAEA) inspection of the facilities and suggests Syria may be trying to hide what was there", according to the highly intelligent report by the Institute for Science and International Security.

After inspecting the aerial photographs of the 'suspected' reactor building well visible prior to Israel's September 6 air raid over Syria. Leaving both that country and Iran to fume over the failure of their (Russian-built-and-failed) aerial detection system.

Israel too is remaining uncharacteristically tight-lipped about the purpose of her mission over Syria. A friendly visit it most certainly was not. A warning to Iran, perhaps, at the very least. Buying time.

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