If the question were asked to name the most childish international diplomatic ploy ever made a good instant response might be the pre-Iraq War tragic scenario where France was blamed for alleged wimp-like behavior for not immediately following the White House neoconservative rush to war.

This childish behavior was implemented by the symbolic act of the previously named French toast, which has endured for years, and changing it to freedom toast when served on Air Force One, the plane that transports George W. Bush.

Such a gesture befit the occasion of a robust nation flexing its muscles and launching a war in the best tradition of Rambo.

Who was France's leader during that period?  Who was the force urging that the launching of the first wave of shock and awe be withheld until it could be determined by a UN weapons inspection team headed by Hans Blix of Sweden that the alleged weapons actually existed?  

What did Saddam Hussein's swift execution following his conviction for mass murder have in common with Francis Ford Coppola's Godfather I and Godfather II cinema epics?

The comparison became evident after analyzing the history of U.S. involvement in Iraq alongside two films underscoring the importance of the Mafia's code of silence, omerta.  

Omerta's application relates to individuals not revealing information concerning how The Family does business.  It also tenaciously enforces a rule of silencing individuals perceived as occupying positions to do the organization harm.

From the moment of Saddam Hussein's capture it became evident that the prevailing powers, meaning the Cheney-Bush Administration along with the international consortium to which it is inextricably linked, such as Skull and Bones, the Carlyle Group, along with vital corporate operations such as Halliburton and Bechtel, were not about to let the situation get out of hand.

From Egypt to Afghanistan, when terrorists and gangsters need a place to meet, to relax, maybe to invest, they head to Dubai...

[Dubai] serves as the region's criminal crossroads, a hub for smuggling, money laundering, and underground banking. There are Russian and Indian mobsters, Iranian arms traffickers, and Arab jihadists. Funds for the 9/11 hijackers and African embassy bombers were transferred through the city. It was the heart of Pakistani scientist A. Q. Khan's black market in nuclear technology and other proliferation cases. Half of all applications to buy U.S. military equipment from Dubai are from bogus front companies, officials say. "Iran," adds one U.S. official, "is building a bomb through Dubai." Last year, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents thwarted the shipment of 3,000 U.S. military night-vision goggles by an Iranian pair based in Dubai. Moving goods undetected is not hard.

 -- U.S. News & World Report (Dec 5, 2005)

President Bush has made it clear that he hadn't a clue about the events unfolding within his Administration surrounding the management takeover of 6 U.S. Ports by the United Arab Emirates.

We've also learned that very few others in the administration seemed to know anything about the transaction prior to the media blow-up -- certainly those who should have known about it were unaware. By their own admission, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Treasury Secretary John Snow, and Homeland Security Czar, Michael Chertoff were left completely in the dark.

Normally, that would be no big deal, but here we're talking about a post-911 world (as the administration feels constantly compelled to remind us) coupled with arguably the nation's most vulnerable points of entry.