This vitally important article in the US Congressional Quarterly is a very important revelation of how close the world came to a major US nuclear war with China . This almost happened because Taiwanese politicians were encouraged by US Defence Department highly-placed necons to declare independence from China. This was clandestinely encouraged by top neocon members of the Bush regime, such as Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Feith, Cambora and right wing Republicans in particular. We can thank Colin Powell, and the US State department at that time, for correcting this impression with independence-minded Taiwanese politicians, saying the US may not defend Taiwan if it declares independence.

Defense Officials Tried to Reverse China Policy, Says Powell Aide

The same top Bush administration neoconservatives who leap-frogged Washington's foreign policy establishment to topple Saddam Hussein nearly pulled off a similar coup in U.S.-China relations—creating the potential of a nuclear war over Taiwan, a top aide to former Secretary of State Colin Powell says.

Dr Leupp provides an excellent analysis of the geopolitical situation and the likelihood that the US will attack Iran in 2007.
However like many other US commentators he doesn't mention Bush's probable use of nuclear weapons, or how Bush may use a 'False Flag' type of attack on the US then blame it on Iran , to justify a war on Iran . An attack would frighten, confuse and probably enflame the US public with increased hatred of Iran , thus gaining their support for the planned war in much the same way as their support was gained for the phoney war on Iraq.

The reaction to the Iraq Study Group (ISG) report suggests that a showdown is shaping up within the U.S. power elite between two different sets of cowboys.
On the one hand, there are the George W. Bush cowboys who want to expand their conquests from Afghanistan and Iraq into Syria and Iran. It's a natural extension of the Manifest Destiny doctrine that underpinned the conquest of the"Wild West," the annexation of almost half of Mexico's territory in the 1840s, the "opening of Japan" resulting from gunboat diplomacy in 1854, the Marines' overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy in 1893, and the establishment of a colonial empire from the Pacific to the Caribbean following the Spanish-American War.

...In the opinion of many, the U.S. is governed by a criminal conspiracy that has also become an administration  of war criminals, using lies to con their people and congress into supporting an illegal and unjustifiable war on Iraq. Having killed, tortured or imprisoned up to 250,000 Iraqis for no justifiable reason, the Bush Administration has established that it is capable of committing any crime.

An inability to protect its citizens. The belief that it is above the law. A lack of democracy. Three defining characteristics of the 'failed state'. And that, says Noam Chomsky, is exactly what the US is becoming. In an exclusive extract from his devastating new book, America's leading thinker explains how his country lost its way

On Tuesday April 18, Chinese President Hu Jintao landed in the United States and, after a tour of a Boeing plant, made his official way, with all due pomp and ceremony, to the expectable "state banquet" in Washington… no, not at the White House but at the Washington State home of Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates. In fact, the Chinese leader came to Seattle, Washington, ready to toss money at Microsoft goodies and Boeing jets in an atmosphere as celebratory as money can make things.

Slowly but surely, the grand strategy of the Bush administration is being revealed. It is not aimed primarily at the defeat of global terrorism, the incapacitation of rogue states, or the spread of democracy in the Middle East. These may dominate the rhetorical arena and be the focus of immediate concern, but they do not govern key decisions regarding the allocation of long-term military resources.

Prof. Klare shows how Bush has gone against 35 years of US policy supporting the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, by selling India nuclear technology. This is allegedly only to help India's nuclear energy program. But it will allow India to double it's production of nuclear weapons. That effectively scraps a cornerstone of US policy - the NPT.

....For thirty-five years nuclear nonproliferation was a major priority of U.S. foreign policy. But now, in a throwback to early cold war power politics, President Bush has agreed to supply nuclear technology to India in blatant violation of the NPT.

This 2003 paper gives a historical record of the development of nuclear war as a tool to achieve US military objectives.
No longer were nuclear weapons to be regarded as a deterrent "last resort" type of doomsday device. There was a new doctrine to use nuclear weapons first or "pre-emptively" - supposedly before the claimed enemy had a chance to use what the Pentagon calls "weapons of mass destruction" against the US.
The Pentagon will supply the so-called "intelligence" to justify it. This would likely be a phoney doctored intelligence, similar to what they supplied to justify the war on Iraq with a litany of accusations later found to be false.
Based on what they knew to be lies, Bush for the US and Blair for the UK , nevertheless warned they might use nuclear weapons against Iraq if Iraq resisted the US-UK invasion with WMD.
The alleged WMD could be anything the Bush Administration chose to define as WMD.

It Keeps Getting Scarier and Scarier
...The prospect of the U.S. using nuclear weapons against Iraq adds a new, even more horrifying dimension to the threat of war in the Persian Gulf. LaRouche has already called on President Bush to renounce this madness.
The leak of the Jan. 10, 2003 document did not come in a vacuum. For the past year, the Bush Administration has been moving, step by step, to overturn a fifty year policy of keeping nuclear weapons on the shelf, as part of America's strategic deterrent. Here is a short chronology:
In January 2002, the Bush Administration issued its Nuclear Posture Review, a Congressionally mandated report on the U.S. nuclear weapons program.
For the first time, the 2002 report openly discussed the possible use of nuclear weapons, naming seven countries that could be targets of the American nuclear arsenal: Russia, China, Iraq, Iran, North Korea, Libya and Syria.

Cautious welcome by Bush for road map deal · Aid and US promise not to invade seals agreement
North Korea has agreed in principle to end its nuclear weapons programme and rejoin the international non-proliferation treaty, marking the biggest breakthrough in its three-year stand-off with the US.   The Guardian

North Korea has promised to give up its nuclear weapons programme and rejoin international arms treaties in exchange for energy assistance from neighbouring countries and sovereign guarantees from the United States.
The agreement, which ends a three-year crisis, came in a dramatic turn to six-nation negotiations that have been held since 2003. The head of the UN nuclear watchdog said he hopes the deal will lead to an early return of UN inspectors to the country.

North Korea pledged to drop its nuclear weapons development and rejoin international arms treaties in a unanimous agreement Monday with other countries at six-party arms talks. The joint statement was the first ever after more than two years of negotiations.
The North "promised to drop all nuclear weapons and current nuclear programs and to get back to the (Nuclear) Nonproliferation Treaty as soon as possible and to accept inspections" by the International Atomic Energy Agency, according to the agreement by the six countries at the talks.

As the Nobel winners point out, nuclear extinction could happen in an hour - by accident. And this state of instant readiness has been going on for years. As many experts have said, a global holocaust has almost happened several times due to faults in the system, human error, miscalculation and misinterpretations of incoming data.

32 Nobel Laureates and 237 organizations and parliamentarians from around the world have signed a Statement of Endorsement that calls for removing all strategic nuclear weapons from "hair-trigger alert and "Launch on Warning" status. In addition the Statement has been endorsed by the European Parliament and by the Australian Senate.