IS SYRIA NEXT?

I don't know. Could be--it largely depends on the choices Bashar Assad makes in the next few days. He could choose wisely and be spared. He could choose poorly, and find any one of three US divisions barreling toward Damascus. Whether he finds himself facing the battle-tested 3rd Infantry Division, the battle-tested Marine 1st Expeditionary or the fresh and very high-tech 4th Infantry Division--or a some combination of those units, all of which are in theatre--his defeat would only be a matter of time. And not much time at that.

Choosing wisely in this context would constitute handing over any Iraqis who've fled to Syria, and handing over any WMDs the Iraqis had shipped his way at any time before or during the war. What will he do? History suggests he won't choose wisely.

Former UN Chief Weapons Inspector Richard Butler says Syria probably helped Saddam hide his illicit stashes throughout the 90s.

Mr Butler said he had seen intelligence during his time as chief UN weapons inspector in Iraq from 1997 until 1999 which seemed to indicate Syria had helped keep Iraq's weapons of mass destruction hidden.

"I was shown some intelligence information, from overhead imagery and so on, that the Iraqis had moved some containers of stuff across the border into Syria," he told ABC Radio.

"We had reason to believe that those were containers of chemical weapons and perhaps some other weapons.

"I don't believe the Iraqis wanted to give them to Syria, but I think they just wanted to get them out of the territory, out of the range of our inspections.

That fits the Iraqi MO, too. Just prior to Gulf War I, Saddam ordered most of his jets to fly to Iran for safe-keeping. His plan was to save them during the war, and bring them back afterward. The Iranians had other ideas, and got themselves a new air force, free of charge. It's possible Assad has done the same thing with Saddam's WMDs.

UPDATE: Michael Ledeen says Syria has chosen poorly, and has embarked with Iran on a terrorist campaign to turn Iraq into a "second Lebanon." If he's right, Assad is toast.

UPDATE: Choosing poorly. Anyone doubt that the UN serves as a fig-leaf for tyrants at the expense of democracies? Get a load of the Syrian envoy's actual response to US charges:

He was speaking a day after senior U.S. officials threatened sanctions over charges that Damascus supported terrorism, was harboring Iraqi leaders and developing chemical weapons.

"It's an insult to my country, an insult to a country that is a member of the U.N. Security Council and an insult to a peaceful country that is struggling and working for a lasting peace in the Middle East," the ambassador, Mohsen Bilal, told Spain's Cadena Ser radio.

Serving on the UNSC is, for the 10 non-permanent members, purely luck of the draw (and for France, an accident of history). It has nothing to do with any government's legitimacy or its international standing, but does serve as a convenient diplo-speak shield for bad eggs. We should replace the UN with an international body composed entirely of democracies.