"My friend, I saw a third dream and this was altogether frightful. The heavens roared and the earth roared again, daylight failed and darkness fell, lightings flashed, fires blazed out, the clouds lowered, they rained down death. Then brightness departed, the fire went out, and all was turned to ashes fallen about us." (Gilgamesh to Enkidu)

What a fateful dream! A dream, millenniums later, is to befall on his sullen descendents!!

Saddam Hussein of Iraq is not an unknown man. A misanthrope as he is, he has maimed and killed and gassed Iraq's innocent. Abetted by none other than his today's nemesis, he waged a regional war, later only to be rebuffed as he stepped on the sore toes of his benefactor. This is a slithering story of slippery oil, and oil only. Neither Mr. Hussein nor his enemies harbour any compunction for the people, or for the matter of fact, for "peace". Snooty warmongers, with a rather haughty mood for the nonce, can never care less for Arabs (precisely from the ancient land of Mesopotamia).

With the absence of WMD-in-sight, they are crying, with certain justification, for a new justification in unearthing of the mass graves! I view the whole thing as an "exercise-in-futility": -- a not so futile exercise for humanity after all. Iraq, in fact, is liberated from the heavy yoke of a totalitarian regime. Liberated, yet occupied! From a cosy couch in my family room, the amazing flurry of dancing JDAMs was entertaining. But my heart was with the fallen hearts at the receiving end. Aerial softening of the enemy line, to my heart was nothing but a firing line to kill those frightened "toys" of Saddam. I was sad. Like a pelted windshield of a speeding vehicle, my heart was broken into myriad smithereens. But at the same instance I was hopeful to the brim that at the end some sort of democratic phoenix shall rise from the ashes, that the ruins shall morph into a reign of the wise: - may be another modern day Gilgamesh!

Now that the war is over, that the kibosh-laden theories of WMD are coming home to roost, and that the newfound voice of the millions of Iraqis are in yodel; - it is not the time to ponder over the bygone. Let the sloganeering and/or electioneering politicians do their petty fight. "Wide is the range of words on one side or the other (Homer)". For the thoughtful, it is time to look beyond and to make a little sense of what lurks in yonder!

Being confronted with an overwhelming western superiority, both technological and intellectual, the Arabs have the dreamy luxury of falling back to a comfortable cocoon of "Historical Grandiosity". They also dream of a world wide web of "Umma Solidarity" shattered repeatedly by wars and conflicts. Not only Iraq but also the entire Arab world is stranded precariously on the steepest of the precipices. Autocracy in some cases runs amok. Minus democracy (and even the semblance of benevolent autocracy), the whole World-of-the-Arabs is immersed in a terrible morass. Things are in the bottom and can go no further down. To be precise, not only the Arab World, but also the Whole Muslim World is in the same predicament. A rapid melt down of Saddam Hussein's mighty (?) regime came as another rude awakening for the dreamy!

I have an enormous faith in the ability of any people, especially those who once achieved a dizzying height of success, to shape their own destiny. If they keep on wearing the uneasy stiletto heels, they will lag behind. Eventually, however, they surely shall shed their lagging attributes if the desire to climb up is strong enough. A smidgen of benevolent external hand may smoothen the rock, although at the end; it is the particular people who have to do the climbing.

Legitimate misgivings are there as to the intentions of the only superpower. Unlike the Britons, the Spaniards and the French of imperial yesteryears, America, hegemonic though, is not a declared imperial power.

History is not there to domicile in. History is more like a lighthouse to warn a weary mariner of the dangers that litters the water. Only an astute Odysseus shall reach his cherished Ithaca.