Apparently, Syria gave the OK

The London Times has the most detailed write up of the raid into Syria that netted us Abu Ghadiya, a write up that includes this little nugget:

According to one source, the special forces operation had taken place with the full cooperation of the Syrian intelligence services.

“Immediately after 9/11, Syrian intelligence cooperation was remarkable,” said the Washington source. “Then ties were broken off, but they have resumed recently.”

Abu Ghadiya was feared by the Syrians as an agent of Islamic fundamentalism who was hostile to the secular regime in Damascus. It would be expedient for Syria if America would eliminate him.

As they say, read the whole thing. I think this piece confirms my original argument that the raid itself wasn’t the issue; if it had been done under the radar with plausible deniability, everything would have been fine. It wasn’t, which sent the Syrians scrambling for cover and gave critics of the Bush administration more ammo. But really, if this is all true, what else could the Bush administration have done?