(Iraqi tank graveyard in the desert near Al Jahrah, Kuwait. In 1991, during the first Gulf War, a million depleted uranium shells were fired at Iraqi forces, spreading radioactive dust for miles around. Such dust is known to  cause various forms of cancer and other serious illnesses among humans. Or so they say. Photo USAF.)

I tossed and turned all night, thinking about the taxes. I missed a 1099 that did not appreciable change my previous submission, but was clearly going to cause problems downstream when the big IRS computer starts crunching what has been reported by the snitches at the banks.

Crap. I will have to file an amended return, and that will shoot more time this weekend. I want to get all this tax stuff done and filed, and think I might be able to submit the package for the parents this week. I am hoping there is no huge tab due back to the IRS- until some other things click, I don’t have the money to pay them.

I flicked through that and read a note from a learned colleague. His key judgment, after dissecting the Romney non-juggernaut of the Super Tuesday Republican Primaries yesterday, caught me up short:

“The rumor (from Israel Radio 2 quoting an unnamed US government official) is that the debate that accompanied Prime Minister Netanyahu’s visit to Washington wasn’t about whether Israel will wage preventive war on Iran (they will), nor was it about whether the US will be informed in advance (we won’t).  Rather, the discussion centered on consequences (“the day after”).”

Crap, I thought. As if things were not confused enough as they were. Another old shipmate applied some conventional and accurate context from our mission planning days. He chipped in that we ought to be looking at the coming nights of the New Moon, when conditions for a strike are most conducive.

That would be the 22nd of this month, the 21st of April, and the 20th of May. I hope I am not disclosing military secrets- I once had the Operations Officer of the Joint Staff earnestly ask me if we should classify the basic laws of thermodynamics. The Iraqi Republican Guard tanks absorbed heat nicely all day in the heat of the Kuwaiti desert, and thus were easy targets for infra-red seekers just after sunset, when they stood out like beacons in the night.

I did not bother to say that just because basic physics made them stand out, the IR signature could not tell us if they were still working, or just hot steel that had been pummeled the day before, and maybe the day before that, too.

I hate days after. I really do.

Copyright 2012 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com