The aerial bombardment of Iraq began on January 15, 1991. Ari wasn’t surprised at the uncompromising stand taken by the U.S. President and his coalition partners in their pursuit of Kuwait’s liberation. He was surprised, however, at the overwhelming superiority of American technology, resulting in such astonishingly few allied losses. The allegedly invincible Republican Guard was pinned down and pulverized. Allied air power was making certain that the ground war, once it began, would produce a swift and stunning victory.

Ari was running out of hot issues to write about. Then along came Saddam Hussein’s brutal takeover of Kuwait in August 1990, and Ari’s job as a political columnist became exciting for him once again. The Post had connections high up in the Mossad, which gave Ari access to certain intelligence data that would not expose agent sources and was periodically earmarked for publication in his columns.