The truth is out there.

• Author: Ehrenreich, Barbara
• Position: Flip Side

Conspiracy theories have been proliferating worldwide almost as fast as nuclear weapons. The Indonesians are seriously entertaining the idea that the United States bombed those dance bars in Bali as part of a P.R. effort for the war on terrorism. The French have been snapping up a book arguing that the Pentagon blew itself up on 9/11 and that the other plane-bombs were flying under remote control. Many Muslims and Arabs blame the Jews--a.k.a., the well-known Zionist conspiracy--for everything up to and including the weather.

I've been crafting my own conspiracy theory about the upcoming war with Iraq and it goes like this: Al Qaeda is behind the whole thing.

Sounds far-fetched, I know, but ask yourself the venerable question, Qui bono? Who stands to gain from this war? It won't be you or me living in one of Saddam's palaces after the anthrax has been swept out and the torture equipment relocated. Nor are we even likely to benefit at the gas pump, since Exxon Mobil will swallow the difference between the pre- and post-invasion price of Iraqi oil. Few ordinary Americans will get anything out of war, aside from the chance to see their children, should they be servicemen or women, buried with a modicum of pomp.

No, the only clear-cut beneficiary is Al Qaeda. First, because the war on Iraq will distract the United States from the already difficult-to-detect global war on terrorism. Second, because it will contribute mightily to the worldwide Qaeda recruitment effort: Note the recent Pakistani provincial elections, in which the once solidly secular urban elite reacted to U.S. threats of war against Iraq by voting for whacked-out fundamentalist parties. Third, because there's little that Al Qaeda hates more than the secular leaders of largely Muslim states, Saddam included, unless it's Ariel Sharon.

But is Al Qaeda actually directing the war effort? Have they, in other words, infiltrated the White House itself? Any conspiracy theory worth its salt asserts that the enemy is already within: The John Birch Society labeled Eisenhower a Communist agent; our homegrown Nazis identify Washington as the site of the Z.O.G.--Zionist Occupation Government.

I was struggling to work out the Bush-bin Laden connection when--POW!--news came of yet another probable international conspiracy at work: Thanks to Pakistan--which is supposedly our friend and ally in the war on terrorism--the wild-haired dictator of North Korea has, or is about to have, nuclear bombs. We...