Voila

Last week, the "Voila Moment" was inserted into America’s war vernacular. A Pentagon source quoted in the Times used it to describe that moment when an Iraqi soldier, ducking bombs, has a catharsis about the bomb’s intended recipient—Saddam—and, in anger, rises up to overthrow the cruel dictator. Naomi Klein wonders if it will work. "I'm sceptical. There was, after all, a Voila Moment during the last Gulf war, when many Iraqis living near the Kuwaiti border believed US promises that they would be supported if they rose up against Saddam. It was followed shortly afterwards by a Screw You Moment, when the rebels watched US forces abandon them to be massacred." She writes that this is exactly the sort of thing we need in the antiwar movement—a moment when the light clicks on and we refuse to stand for war :

the civil disobedience the US military is hoping to provoke in Iraq is exactly the sort of thing the anti-war movement needs to inspire in our countries if we are really going to stop, or at least curtail, the pending devastation in Iraq. What would it take for large numbers of people in the US, the UK, Italy, Canada - and any other country assisting the war effort - truly to break with our leaders and refuse to comply? Can we create thousands of Voila Moments back home?

Could this be the start: a veteran U.S. diplomat resigned because he felt he couldn't in good conscience represent a government that declares unilateral preemptive war. "...until this Administration it had been possible to believe that by upholding the policies of my president I was also upholding the interests of the American people and the world," wrote John Brady Kiesling in his resignation letter to Colin Powell. "I believe it no longer." He continues:

We should ask ourselves why we have failed to persuade more of the world that a war with Iraq is necessary. We have over the past two years done too much to assert to our world partners that narrow and mercenary U.S. interests override the cherished values of our partners. Even where our aims were not in question, our consistency is at issue. The model of Afghanistan is little comfort to allies wondering on what basis we plan to rebuild the Middle East, and in whose image and interests. Have we indeed become blind, as Russia is blind in Chechnya, as Israel is blind in the Occupied Territories, to our own advice, that overwhelming military power is not the answer to terrorism?

Will more good people within the administration jump ship, as a matter of conscience?