IT'S difficult to play defence and offence the same time. But when the geo-political ground is shifting beneath someone's feet and damaging leaks are spurting out of the White House and Downing Street is plumbing it's more difficult than usual. That's the notion one frames after watching the alacrity of late of far-right and neo-conservative personalities who found themselves trying, on the one hand, to persued their compatriots to prepare to take on new enemies in what they call 'World War IV' (Third World War, the cold war -- the longest in history -- has since been fought and won by the Americans) while, on the other, mounting rear guard actions against faint hearted allies who want to be out of Iraq and the Democrats who are after the blood of Karl Rove, known to be the 'brain' of George Bush.

Judging by their editorials, columns and television appearances these days most of them are

focussed on defending Rove from the charges that he may have compromised national security by relieving a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officer as an immediate priority. Through the week the cabal was on the map -- almost literally -- for most of the past couple of days, the neocons were dispensing a never ending stream of geo-strategic advice for all and sundry. Some of them were entirely

familiar, especially with respect to Iran and Syria, highly preferred neo-conservative targets for the next phase of the global war on terror.

Even if the regimes of Rafsanjani and Khatami raised hope for a liberal transformation of politics in Iran these hopes were shattered by last month's surprise victory of hardliner Mahmood Ahmadinejad in Iran's presidential election. The first non-Ayatollah president of Iran, Ahmadinejad however enjoys personal blessings of Ali Khameni, the supreme

leader. There are thus reasons for disappointments in Washington. The responses also are ominous when Jeffrey Gedmin, director of Aspen Institute, declared in 'Weekly Standard' that "the regime has to go". He went on arguing that what with the constitutional process stalemated and the impending political demise of Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Shroeder, Bush should be able to line up the

European Union behind support for the "democracy movement in Iran."

And if that strategy should fail, noted Michael Rubin of the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), "Bush may decide that pinpoint military strikes are the only mechanism by which to undercut the Ayatollah's nuclear ambition. AEI's Michael Ledeen took much of the same line in several articles in National Review Online, arguing that new and 'abundant' evidence has surfaced over Iranian ties to Al-Qaeda and to the continuing insurgency in Iraq.

"I do not know if the Iranians were involved in London bombings, but it hardly matters, for Iran is the most potent force in the terror network from which the killers in London must have drawn inspiration We cannot possibly have decent security in Iraq unless we end the murderous gangs in Tehran and Damascus," wrote Ledeen, a staunch neo-conservative while these were all quite familiar the

war-hawks tried to take advantage recently of congressional concern over an attempted Chinese takeover of the US' oilgiant Unocal and current visit of Indian Prime Minister Manmohon Singh to mount a broader strategic vision of allies and enemies.

This was encapsulated in a brief talk by the neo-conservative Foundation for the Defence of Democracies director Clifford May to the "US-India League" in which he called on the US to "forge new alliances appropriate to a new era" that would include Eastern

Europe, Australia, Israel, Japan and most emphatically India, the world's largest democracy.

Clifford May, who would later in the week devote his considerable polemical talent to defending Rove duly joined by Keneth Timmerman, the author of "Coming Nuclear Showdown with Iran," far right activist Paul Weyrich and AEI's Thomas Donnelly -- all of whom argued that Delhi should play a

key role note in countering China's strategic ambition. And so should Japan, Washington Times editor Rich Lowry quickly added in a column titled, 'Unleash Japan' in which he made almost a common argument that Tokyo should tear up its post-war constitution and become a reliable partner of the US in checking Beijing.

As for China which never lettered a word against the US' preemptive aggressive policy is in no way spared by the neoconservative who appeared before a Congressional commit-

tee to argue that Washington should prevent the sale of Unocal most of whose assets are found on China's doorstep in Asia to the China National Offshore Oil Company because oil is a national security issue rather than a simple commodity that should be subject to the free market. According to James Woolsey, a farmer CIA director, China is pursuing a national strategy of domination of the energy market and strategic dominance of western Pacific. Woolsey, a prominent neoconservative who popularised the 'World War IV', slogan but who untill now had confined its use to the war on 'Islamic fascism' in which China is supposedly on Washington's side.

Notwithstanding such paradoxes while propagating their hawkish geo-strategic worldview the same activists and their comrades are also forced to play defence for damage inflicted on White House by the growing scandal over Rove. In the meantime the war clouds are hovering over West to Central Asia to Western Pacific. Whether the armageddon, now being prepared by the arrant warmongers will snowball into World War IV is contingent upon the efficacy of diplomacy, still prevalent good sense among the nations of the world and most importantly the role of American people.

Brig ( retd) Hafiz is former DG of BIISS.