3-12-08, 9:41 am

After nearly a half century of service Admiral William J. Fallon resigned Tuesday from his post as top U.S. military commander for the Middle East because of growing publicity of his differences of opinion over Bush Administration policy on Iran. Bush's beef with Fallon: 'He doesn't react like Pavlov's dog to inflammatory rhetoric from inflammatory little men.'

A Mar. 11 article in 'Esquire' speculated on the longevity of Fallon's career, asking 'How does Fallon get away with so brazenly challenging his commander in chief?

The answer is that he might not get away with it for much longer. President Bush is not accustomed to a subordinate who speaks his mind as freely as Fallon does, and the president may have had enough.'

How very 'Nostradamus' of them.

However, their next prediction proved the absence of total omnipotence, suggesting that Fallon might last until this summer when Bush would replace him with a more deferential commander who would chase whatever stick the neocons threw into Iran.

One can only hope that 'Esquire's' third prediction proves them to be charlatans and false prophets: 'If that were to happen, it may well mean that the president and vice-president intend to take military action against Iran before the end of this year and don't want a commander standing in their way.'

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has tried to downplay the existence of any disagreement, going so far as to declare, 'I don't think there were any differences at all.'

Wanna know just how much 'difference' there is between Fallon and the Bush Admin's policy?

You may recall the very under-reported story about a B-52 bomber carrying six live nuclear warheads across the country to Louisiana. It was scheduled to continue to the Middle East after refueling. Fallon and a few other sane Intel and Air Force officials found out and stopped it before it could take off.

To put it politely, Fallon was royally perturbed.

When the incident was leaked to the press by high-level officials, distinguished patriots all, concerned about the possibility of being dragged into another aggressive, unprovoked war-- this time a nuclear one-- the inconceivable explanation offered by the morons in charge was:

It was an accident.

The 'Bent Spear' B-52 incident of August 30 was no accident. Live nuclear warheads stored in impenetrable underground bunkers, at heavily guarded sites do not 'accidentally' attach themselves to cruise missiles, drive themselves out on a fork truck, and jump into place on a bomber that has for several years been prohibited from carrying nukes because the B-52 has been deemed too unsafe for that purpose.

The timeline tells the tale here. One week after the 'accident', on Sept. 5, the story was leaked to the Military Times. The next day, Sept. 6, Israel bombed a compound in Syria that was rumored to be a 'suspected nuclear facility' where the Syrians were cooperating with North Korea on a secret project that was partially funded by Iran.

How convenient that those three nations turned out to be the exact ones in Bush's 'Axis of Evil.'

Asked about the incident, Bush refused to speak one word on the subject. To this day, nobody in the administration has offered any substantive information on the bombing of Syria.

Just before Fallon stopped the nuclear-armed bomber from delivering its cargo, Robert Gates had matter-of-factly announced that the new National Intelligence Estimate on Iran would not be released publicly. After Fallon realized exactly how maniacal the Bush regime was, he and other military and intel officers forced the release of the NIE, which said Iran had not had a nuclear weapons program since 2003, and was unlikely to resume it. It contradicted everything the White House had been selling.

How did they force Bush's compliance? They threatened to tell the whole story to every reporter in Washington – that Bush was trying to sneak nukes to the Middle East with the intent of bombing Iran's nuclear energy plants at the same time Israel bombed Syria.

British intel sources say the Israeli attack on Syria was originally intended to coincide with a U.S. attack on Iran. After the mutiny over sending nuclear-armed missiles to the Middle East, Israel proceeded with its attack on Syria.

Remember how passively Bush and Cheney took the disclosure of the NIE? Normally, they would have shouted and wailed, aggressively attacking such a repudiation of all the rhetoric they had been spouting for years. What caused their uncharacteristic calm and deference when the NIE was first released?

They were scared. If the public discovered the extent and scope of their plans, they might finally insist that Speaker Nancy Pelosi to return the nourishing meal of impeachment to the table from which she swiped it, thereby depriving the children of Democracy of the sustenance provided by the Constitution. More than that, Bush and Cheney were afraid of going to prison for their highly illegal trespasses. Fallon had their cajones in his fists, and had convinced them that he would not hesitate to twist them off if they continued to do everything possible to get us into a third idiotic war.

Remember just days after that NIE was made public, when Bush suggested that other countries better fall in line if they were 'interested in avoiding World War III'?

That is exactly what Admiral Fallon helped to prevent.

Hopefully, his retirement will allow him the freedom to expose the reckless insanity of the worst administration in the history of America.