Last year the Iraqi dissident Kanan Makiya spoke of a democratic Iraq in the aftermath of a U.S. invasion and famously said, "If there's a sliver of a chance of it happening, a 5 to 10 percent chance, you have a moral obligation, I say, to do it."

OK. But as opponents of the war have said for months, an invasion also increases the likelihood -- probably by far more than 5 to 10 percent -- of quite a few horrors as well. U.S. News & World Report now lists the calamities most likely to result from this war:

Six Deadly Fears

1. Iraqi forces unleash their chemical or biological weapons arsenal.

2. Saddam Hussein makes a bloody last stand in Baghdad.

3. Iraq's oil wells are turned into fields of fire.

4. Saddam puts civilians in harm's way.

5. Terrorists acquire Saddam's weapons of mass destruction.

6. Once Saddam is ousted, Iraq descends into chaos.

The article has details. Panglossian pro-war naïfs would do well to read it.