From today's Washington Post story on Syria's latest shenanigans:
Syria has cleared away all traces of a large building that experts say was bombed by Israeli jets last month because it was suspected of housing a partially finished nuclear reactor, according to a new satellite image that shows only freshly groomed dirt at the site. The tall, box-like building visible in aerial photographs before the Sept. 6 bombing raid has been dismantled down to the last brick, the image taken Wednesday by a commercial satellite service shows. Nuclear weapons experts who studied the photo sequence said the starkly different images indicate that Syria must have moved quickly to hide what remained after the site was bombed. 'They are clearly trying to hide the evidence,' said David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security, a nonprofit nuclear research group that was the first to publicly identify the facility as the apparent target of the Israeli raid. 'It is a trick that has been tried in the past, and it hasn't worked.'
The story goes on to report that State Department officials continue to downplay suspicions that North Korea was somehow involved in the construction of the buildings the Syrians are tearing down while saying they were never there in the first place. People always talk about how one of the Republican candidates will have to "break from Bush" in order to help his chances in next year's general election. Typically, the people saying this imply the candidate should "break with Bush" by disavowing the Iraq war - a foolish thing to do. And yet here's an issue that is ripe for one of the candidates to take. I suspect one of the reasons the administration downplays North Korea's suspected involvement in the Syrian affair is that to admit that Kim's regime was somehow involved would embarrass those in the White House and State Department who advocate a conciliatory approach to North Korea. A presidential candidate who wants to prove his or her hawkish credentials could call the administration's bluff and argue that the world is a dangerous place where strength, not wishful thinking, is necessary to maintain global order and American security. Here's hoping.