According to this report, Saddam has developed missiles that have a range of 180km when he is limited by UN resolutions to a range of 150km. This isn’t important in itself, but it could be critical in the way that things play out from now on. Despite the noise Blair and Howard are already making, the breach won’t be sufficient to justify immediate war in the eyes of anyone who isn’t already committed to it. On the other hand, it is a clear breach.

The obvious next step is a UN resolution demanding that Saddam destroy the missiles. I expect this will be passed because it gives a lot of UN members a potential escape from their dilemmas. If there is a resolution and Saddam doesn’t destroy the missiles, all those who have been on the fence will be able to support a war. On the other hand, if he does destroy the missiles, the position of the doves will be greatly strengthened. So the French have a strong incentive to support a resolution of this kind – they clearly
(a) are not fundamentally opposed to war
(b) do not want to be seen to bow to the US

A clear-cut demand will suit them very well in resolving the difficult position they are now in.

Blair needs a UN vote and this provides an obvious basis. And I suspect, given the difficulty of his current position, he would not be terribly upset if Saddam did destroy the missiles and put war off the agenda for a while . He could reasonably claim victory, in that British and US pressure was producing the desired outcomes (all this applies for Howard too, of course).

The people who will be unenthusiastic about this are those who want either war at any price or peace at any price. In principle, both parties should be confident that Saddam will jump the way they want, but he is too unpredictable for this.

The two Kevins (Drum and Batcho) have some related thoughts.