SEEKING A PROMOTION:

Rumsfeld Warns Syria on Iraq Equipment (MATT KELLEY, 3/28/03, Associated Press)

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld warned Syria on Friday to stop sending military equipment to Iraqi forces, a charge that Mideast nation called "absolutely unfounded."

Rumsfeld said he had "information that shipments of military supplies have been crossing the border from Syria into Iraq, including night vision goggles."

"We consider such trafficking as hostile acts and will hold the Syrian government accountable for such shipments," he told a Pentagon press conference. He didn't say what the other equipment was, and several senior Defense Department officials said they didn't know.

Syrian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Bouthaine Shaban rejected Rumsfeld's statement as "unfounded and irresponsible."

"He only brings problems for his country and humanity at large," she told Britain's Channel 4 television in a telephone interview from Damascus. "It is an absolutely unfounded, irresponsible statement, just like his statements that brought his country and the allied countries into a terrible war, unnecessary war on Iraq."

Syrian President Bashar Assad has described the military action against Iraq as "clear occupation and a flagrant aggression against a United Nations member state."

Aware of an imminent opening on the Axis of Evil, Syria is making its bid to be added.

N.B.--Hey, Mr. Murtaugh, note how we're already doing the spadework for a future Tonkin-like episode with Syria?

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 28, 2003 5:36 PM