Kurt Vonnegut on Jesus and the Bush admin.

Cold Turkey

By Kurt Vonnegut

Many years ago, I was so innocent I still considered it possible that we could become the humane and reasonable America so many members of my generation used to dream of. We dreamed of such an America during the Great Depression, when there were no jobs. And then we fought and often died for that dream during the Second World War, when there was no peace.

But I know now that there is not a chance in hell of America's becoming humane and reasonable. Because power corrupts us, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Human beings are chimpanzees who get crazy drunk on power. By saying that our leaders are power-drunk chimpanzees, am I in danger of wrecking the morale of our soldiers fighting and dying in the Middle East? Their morale, like so many bodies, is already shot to pieces. They are being treated, as I never was, like toys a rich kid got for Christmas.

-------------

When you get to my age, if you get to my age, which is 81, and if you have reproduced, you will find yourself asking your own children, who are themselves middle-aged, what life is all about. I have seven kids, four of them adopted.

Many of you reading this are probably the same age as my grandchildren. They, like you, are being royally shafted and lied to by our Baby Boomer corporations and government.

I put my big question about life to my biological son Mark. Mark is a pediatrician, and author of a memoir, The Eden Express. It is about his crackup, straightjacket and padded cell stuff, from which he recovered sufficiently to graduate from Harvard Medical School.

Dr. Vonnegut said this to his doddering old dad: "Father, we are here to help each other get through this thing, whatever it is." So I pass that on to you. Write it down, and put it in your computer, so you can forget it.

I have to say that's a pretty good sound bite, almost as good as, "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." A lot of people think Jesus said that, because it is so much the sort of thing Jesus liked to say. But it was actually said by Confucius, a Chinese philosopher, 500 years before there was that greatest and most humane of human beings, named Jesus Christ.

The Chinese also gave us, via Marco Polo, pasta and the formula for gunpowder. The Chinese were so dumb they only used gunpowder for fireworks. And everybody was so dumb back then that nobody in either hemisphere even knew that there was another one.

But back to people, like Confucius and Jesus and my son the doctor, Mark, who've said how we could behave more humanely, and maybe make the world a less painful place. One of my favorites is Eugene Debs, from Terre Haute in my native state of Indiana. Get a load of this:

Eugene Debs, who died back in 1926, when I was only 4, ran 5 times as the Socialist Party candidate for president, winning 900,000 votes, 6 percent of the popular vote, in 1912, if you can imagine such a ballot. He had this to say while campaigning:

As long as there is a lower class, I am in it.
As long as there is a criminal element, I'm of it.
As long as there is a soul in prison, I am not free.

Doesn't anything socialistic make you want to throw up? Like great public schools or health insurance for all?

How about Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes?

Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the Earth.

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God. .

And so on.

Not exactly planks in a Republican platform. Not exactly Donald Rumsfeld or Dick Cheney stuff.

For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But, often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that's Moses, not Jesus. I haven't heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere.

"Blessed are the merciful" in a courtroom? "Blessed are the peacemakers" in the Pentagon? Give me a break!

-------------

There is a tragic flaw in our precious Constitution, and I don't know what can be done to fix it. This is it: Only nut cases want to be president.

But, when you stop to think about it, only a nut case would want to be a human being, if he or she had a choice. Such treacherous, untrustworthy, lying and greedy animals we are!

I was born a human being in 1922 A.D. What does "A.D." signify? That commemorates an inmate of this lunatic asylum we call Earth who was nailed to a wooden cross by a bunch of other inmates. With him still conscious, they hammered spikes through his wrists and insteps, and into the wood. Then they set the cross upright, so he dangled up there where even the shortest person in the crowd could see him writhing this way and that.

Can you imagine people doing such a thing to a person?

No problem. That's entertainment. Ask the devout Roman Catholic Mel Gibson, who, as an act of piety, has just made a fortune with a movie about how Jesus was tortured. Never mind what Jesus said.

During the reign of King Henry the Eighth, founder of the Church of England, he had a counterfeiter boiled alive in public. Show biz again.

Mel Gibson's next movie should be The Counterfeiter. Box office records will again be broken.

One of the few good things about modern times: If you die horribly on television, you will not have died in vain. You will have entertained us.

-------------

And what did the great British historian Edward Gibbon, 1737-1794 A.D., have to say about the human record so far? He said, "History is indeed little more than the register of the crimes, follies and misfortunes of mankind."

The same can be said about this morning's edition of the New York Times.

The French-Algerian writer Albert Camus, who won a Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957, wrote, "There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide."

So there's another barrel of laughs from literature. Camus died in an automobile accident. His dates? 1913-1960 A.D.

Listen. All great literature is about what a bummer it is to be a human being: Moby Dick, Huckleberry Finn, The Red Badge of Courage, the Iliad and the Odyssey, Crime and Punishment, the Bible and The Charge of the Light Brigade.

But I have to say this in defense of humankind: No matter in what era in history, including the Garden of Eden, everybody just got there. And, except for the Garden of Eden, there were already all these crazy games going on, which could make you act crazy, even if you weren't crazy to begin with. Some of the games that were already going on when you got here were love and hate, liberalism and conservatism, automobiles and credit cards, golf and girls' basketball.

Even crazier than golf, though, is modern American politics, where, thanks to TV and for the convenience of TV, you can only be one of two kinds of human beings, either a liberal or a conservative.

Actually, this same sort of thing happened to the people of England generations ago, and Sir William Gilbert, of the radical team of Gilbert and Sullivan, wrote these words for a song about it back then:

I often think it's comical
How nature always does contrive
That every boy and every gal
That's born into the world alive
Is either a little Liberal
Or else a little Conservative.

Which one are you in this country? It's practically a law of life that you have to be one or the other? If you aren't one or the other, you might as well be a doughnut.

If some of you still haven't decided, I'll make it easy for you.

If you want to take my guns away from me, and you're all for murdering fetuses, and love it when homosexuals marry each other, and want to give them kitchen appliances at their showers, and you're for the poor, you're a liberal.

If you are against those perversions and for the rich, you're a conservative.

What could be simpler?

-------------

My government's got a war on drugs. But get this: The two most widely abused and addictive and destructive of all substances are both perfectly legal.

One, of course, is ethyl alcohol. And President George W. Bush, no less, and by his own admission, was smashed or tiddley-poo or four sheets to the wind a good deal of the time from when he was 16 until he was 41. When he was 41, he says, Jesus appeared to him and made him knock off the sauce, stop gargling nose paint.

Other drunks have seen pink elephants.

And do you know why I think he is so pissed off at Arabs? They invented algebra. Arabs also invented the numbers we use, including a symbol for nothing, which nobody else had ever had before. You think Arabs are dumb? Try doing long division with Roman numerals.

We're spreading democracy, are we? Same way European explorers brought Christianity to the Indians, what we now call "Native Americans."

How ungrateful they were! How ungrateful are the people of Baghdad today.

So let's give another big tax cut to the super-rich. That'll teach bin Laden a lesson he won't soon forget. Hail to the Chief.

That chief and his cohorts have as little to do with Democracy as the Europeans had to do with Christianity. We the people have absolutely no say in whatever they choose to do next. In case you haven't noticed, they've already cleaned out the treasury, passing it out to pals in the war and national security rackets, leaving your generation and the next one with a perfectly enormous debt that you'll be asked to repay.

Nobody let out a peep when they did that to you, because they have disconnected every burglar alarm in the Constitution: The House, the Senate, the Supreme Court, the FBI, the free press (which, having been embedded, has forsaken the First Amendment) and We the People.

About my own history of foreign substance abuse. I've been a coward about heroin and cocaine and LSD and so on, afraid they might put me over the edge. I did smoke a joint of marijuana one time with Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead, just to be sociable. It didn't seem to do anything to me, one way or the other, so I never did it again. And by the grace of God, or whatever, I am not an alcoholic, largely a matter of genes. I take a couple of drinks now and then, and will do it again tonight. But two is my limit. No problem.

I am of course notoriously hooked on cigarettes. I keep hoping the things will kill me. A fire at one end and a fool at the other.

But I'll tell you one thing: I once had a high that not even crack cocaine could match. That was when I got my first driver's license! Look out, world, here comes Kurt Vonnegut.

And my car back then, a Studebaker, as I recall, was powered, as are almost all means of transportation and other machinery today, and electric power plants and furnaces, by the most abused and addictive and destructive drugs of all: fossil fuels.

When you got here, even when I got here, the industrialized world was already hopelessly hooked on fossil fuels, and very soon now there won't be any more of those. Cold turkey.

Can I tell you the truth? I mean this isn't like TV news, is it?

Here's what I think the truth is: We are all addicts of fossil fuels in a state of denial, about to face cold turkey.

And like so many addicts about to face cold turkey, our leaders are now committing violent crimes to get what little is left of what we're hooked on.

Kurt Vonnegut is a legendary author, WWII veteran, humanist, artist, smoker and In These Times senior editor. His classic works include Slaughterhouse-Five, Breakfast of Champions, Cat's Cradle, among many others. His most recent book, A Man Without a Country, collects many of the articles written for this magazine.

VHeadline.com - Iran's euro-denominated oil bourse to open in March; US$ crash imminent!

VHeadline.com - Iran's euro-denominated oil bourse to open in March; US$ crash imminent!

Published: Saturday, January 28, 2006
Bylined to: William R. Clark

Iran's euro-denominated oil bourse to open in March; US$ crash imminent!

"A successful Iranian bourse will solidify the petroeuro as an alternative oil transaction currency, and thereby end the petrodollar's hegemonic status as the monopoly oil currency. Therefore, a graduated approach is needed to avoid precipitous U.S. economic dislocations."

"This notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculous... Having said that, all options are on the table."
-- George W. Bush, February 2005

William R. Clark writes: Contemporary warfare has traditionally involved underlying conflicts regarding economics and resources. Today these intertwined conflicts also involve international currencies, and thus increased complexity.

Current geopolitical tensions between the United States and Iran extend beyond the publicly stated concerns regarding Iran's nuclear intentions, and likely include a proposed Iranian "petroeuro" system for oil trade.

Similar to the Iraq war, military operations against Iran relate to the macroeconomics of 'petrodollar recycling' and the unpublicized but real challenge to US$ supremacy from the euro as an alternative oil transaction currency.

It is now obvious the invasion of Iraq had less to do with any threat from Saddam's long-gone WMD program and certainly less to do to do with fighting International terrorism than it has to do with gaining strategic control over Iraq's hydrocarbon reserves and in doing so maintain the US$ as the monopoly currency for the critical international oil market.

Throughout 2004, information provided by former administration insiders revealed the Bush/Cheney administration entered into office with the intention of toppling Saddam.[1][2] Candidly stated, 'Operation Iraqi Freedom' was a war designed to install a pro-US government in Iraq, establish multiple US military bases before the onset of global 'Peak Oil,' and to reconvert Iraq back to petrodollars while hoping to thwart further OPEC momentum towards the euro as an alternative oil transaction currency ( i.e. "petroeuro").[3] However, subsequent geopolitical events have exposed neoconservative strategy as fundamentally flawed, with Iran moving towards a petroeuro system for international oil trades, while Russia evaluates this option with the European Union.

In 2003, the global community witnessed a combination of petrodollar warfare and oil depletion warfare. The majority of the world's governments -- especially the EU, Russia and China -- were not amused -- and neither are the U.S. soldiers who are currently stationed inside a hostile Iraq.

In 2002, I wrote an award-winning online essay that asserted Saddam Hussein sealed his fate when he announced on September 2000 that Iraq was no longer going to accept dollars for oil being sold under the UN's Oil-for-Food program, and decided to switch to the euro as Iraq's oil export currency.[4]

Indeed, my original pre-war hypothesis was validated in a Financial Times article dated June 5, 2003, which confirmed Iraqi oil sales returning to the international markets were once again denominated in US$ ... not euros.

• The tender, for which bids are due by June 10, switches the transaction back to dollars -- the international currency of oil sales -- despite the greenback's recent fall in value.

Saddam Hussein in 2000 insisted Iraq's oil be sold for euros, a political move, but one that improved Iraq's recent earnings thanks to the rise in the value of the euro against the dollar. [5]

The Bush administration implemented this currency transition despite the adverse impact on profits from Iraqi's export oil sales.[6] (In mid-2003 the euro was valued approx. 13% higher than the dollar, and thus significantly impacted the ability of future oil proceeds to rebuild Iraq's infrastructure). Not surprisingly, this detail has never been mentioned in the five US major media conglomerates who control 90% of information flow in the US, but confirmation of this vital fact provides insight into one of the crucial -- yet overlooked -- rationales for 2003 the Iraq war.

Concerning Iran, recent articles have revealed active Pentagon planning for operations against its suspected nuclear facilities. While the publicly stated reasons for any such overt action will be premised as a consequence of Iran's nuclear ambitions, there are again unspoken macroeconomic drivers underlying the second stage of petrodollar warfare – Iran's upcoming oil bourse. (The word bourse refers to a stock exchange for securities trading, and is derived from the French stock exchange in Paris, the Federation Internationale des Bourses de Valeurs.)

In essence, Iran is about to commit a far greater "offense" than Saddam Hussein's conversion to the euro for Iraq's oil exports in the fall of 2000.

Beginning in March 2006, the Tehran government has plans to begin competing with New York's NYMEX and London's IPE with respect to international oil trades – using a euro-based international oil-trading mechanism.[7] The proposed Iranian oil bourse signifies that without some sort of US intervention, the euro is going to establish a firm foothold in the international oil trade. Given US debt levels and the stated neoconservative project of US global domination, Tehran's objective constitutes an obvious encroachment on dollar supremacy in the crucial international oil market.

From the autumn of 2004 through August 2005, numerous leaks by concerned Pentagon employees have revealed that the neoconservatives in Washington are quietly -- but actively -- planning for a possible attack against Iran.

In September 2004 Newsweek reported:

Deep in the Pentagon, admirals and generals are updating plans for possible US. military action in Syria and Iran. The Defense Department unit responsible for military planning for the two troublesome countries is "busier than ever," an administration official says. Some Bush advisers characterize the work as merely an effort to revise routine plans the Pentagon maintains for all contingencies in light of the Iraq war. More skittish bureaucrats say the updates are accompanied by a revived campaign by administration conservatives and neocons for more hard-line US policies toward the countries…'

…administration hawks are pinning their hopes on regime change in Tehran – by covert means, preferably, but by force of arms if necessary. Papers on the idea have circulated inside the administration, mostly labeled "draft" or "working draft" to evade congressional subpoena powers and the Freedom of Information Act. Informed sources say the memos echo the administration's abortive Iraq strategy: oust the existing regime, swiftly install a pro-US government in its place (extracting the new regime's promise to renounce any nuclear ambitions) and get out. This daredevil scheme horrifies U.S. military leaders, and there's no evidence that it has won any backers at the cabinet level. [8]

Indeed, there are good reasons for US military commanders to be 'horrified' at the prospects of attacking Iran. In the December 2004 issue of the Atlantic Monthly, James Fallows reported that numerous high-level war-gaming sessions had recently been completed by Sam Gardiner, a retired Air Force colonel who has run war games at the National War College for the past two decades.[9] Col. Gardiner summarized the outcome of these war games with this statement, "After all this effort, I am left with two simple sentences for policymakers: You have no military solution for the issues of Iran. And you have to make diplomacy work."

Despite Col. Gardiner's warnings, yet another story appeared in early 2005 that reiterated this administration's intentions towards Iran. Investigative reporter Seymour Hersh's article in The New Yorker included interviews with various high-level US intelligence sources.

Hersh wrote: In my interviews [with former high-level intelligence officials], I was repeatedly told that the next strategic target was Iran. Everyone is saying, 'You can't be serious about targeting Iran. Look at Iraq,' the former [CIA] intelligence official told me. But the [Bush administration officials] say, 'We've got some lessons learned -- not militarily, but how we did it politically. We're not going to rely on agency pissants.' No loose ends, and that's why the CIA is out of there. [10]

The most recent, and by far the most troubling, was an article in The American Conservative by intelligence analyst Philip Giraldi. His article, "In Case of Emergency, Nuke Iran," suggested the resurrection of active US military planning against Iran -- but with the shocking disclosure that in the event of another 9/11-type terrorist attack on US soil, Vice President Dick Cheney's office wants the Pentagon to be prepared to launch a potential tactical nuclear attack on Iran -- even if the Iranian government was not involved with any such terrorist attack against the US:

The Pentagon, acting under instructions from Vice President Dick Cheney's office, has tasked the United States Strategic Command (STRATCOM) with drawing up a contingency plan to be employed in response to another 9/11-type terrorist attack on the United States. The plan includes a large-scale air assault on Iran employing both conventional and tactical nuclear weapons. Within Iran there are more than 450 major strategic targets, including numerous suspected nuclear-weapons-program development sites. Many of the targets are hardened or are deep underground and could not be taken out by conventional weapons, hence the nuclear option. As in the case of Iraq, the response is not conditional on Iran actually being involved in the act of terrorism directed against the United States. Several senior Air Force officers involved in the planning are reportedly appalled at the implications of what they are doing -- that Iran is being set up for an unprovoked nuclear attack -- but no one is prepared to damage his career by posing any objections. [11]

Why would the Vice President instruct the US military to prepare plans for what could likely be an unprovoked nuclear attack against Iran?

Setting aside the grave moral implications for a moment, it is remarkable to note that during the same week this "nuke Iran" article appeared, the Washington Post reported that the most recent National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) of Iran's nuclear program revealed that, "Iran is about a decade away from manufacturing the key ingredient for a nuclear weapon, roughly doubling the previous estimate of five years."[12] This article carefully noted this assessment was a "consensus among US intelligence agencies, [and in] contrast with forceful public statements by the White House."

The question remains: Why would the Vice President advocate a possible tactical nuclear attack against Iran in the event of another major terrorist attack against the US ... even if Tehran was innocent of involvement?

Perhaps one of the answers relates to the same obfuscated reasons why the US launched an unprovoked invasion to topple the Iraq government ... macroeconomics and the desperate desire to maintain US economic supremacy.

In essence, petrodollar hegemony is eroding, which will ultimately force the US to significantly change its current tax, debt, trade, and energy policies, all of which are severely unbalanced. World oil production is reportedly "flat out," and yet the neoconservatives are apparently willing to undertake huge strategic and tactical risks in the Persian Gulf. Why? Quite simply ... their stated goal is US global domination ... at any cost.

To date, one of the more difficult technical obstacles concerning a euro-based oil transaction trading system is the lack of a euro-denominated oil pricing standard, or oil 'marker' as it is referred to in the industry. The three current oil markers are US dollar denominated, which include the West Texas Intermediate crude (WTI), Norway Brent crude, and the UAE Dubai crude. However, since the summer of 2003, Iran has required payments in the euro currency for its European and Asian/ACU exports ... although the oil pricing these trades was still denominated in the dollar.[13]

Therefore a potentially significant news story was reported in June 2004 announcing Iran's intentions to create of an Iranian oil bourse. This announcement portended competition would arise between the Iranian oil bourse and London's International Petroleum Exchange (IPE), as well as the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX). [Both the IPE and NYMEX are owned by US consortium, and operated by an Atlanta-based corporation, IntercontinentalExchange, Inc.]

The macroeconomic implications of a successful Iranian bourse are noteworthy. Considering that in mid-2003 Iran switched its oil payments from EU and ACU customers to the euro, and thus it is logical to assume the proposed Iranian bourse will usher in a fourth crude oil marker -- denominated in the euro currency. This event would remove the main technical obstacle for a broad-based petroeuro system for international oil trades. From a purely economic and monetary perspective, a petroeuro system is a logical development given that the European Union imports more oil from OPEC producers than does the US, and the EU accounted for 45% of exports sold to the Middle East. (Following the May 2004 enlargement, this percentage likely increased).

Despite the complete absence of coverage from the five US corporate media conglomerates, these foreign news stories suggest one of the Federal Reserve's nightmares may begin to unfold in the spring of 2006, when it appears that international buyers will have a choice of buying a barrel of oil for US$60 on the NYMEX and IPE ... or purchase a barrel of oil for €45-€50 euros via the Iranian Bourse. This assumes the euro maintains its current 20-25% appreciated value relative to the dollar ... and assumes that some sort of US "intervention" is not launched against Iran. The upcoming bourse will introduce petrodollar versus petroeuro currency hedging, and fundamentally new dynamics to the biggest market in the world -- global oil and gas trades. In essence, the US will no longer be able to effortlessly expand credit via US Treasury bills, and the US$'s demand/liquidity value will fall.

It is unclear at the time of writing if this project will be successful, or could it prompt overt or covert US interventions ... thereby signaling the second phase of petrodollar warfare in the Middle East.

Regardless of the potential US response to an Iranian petroeuro system, the emergence of an oil exchange market in the Middle East is not entirely surprising given the domestic peaking and decline of oil exports in the US and UK, in comparison to the remaining oil reserves in Iran, Iraq and Saudi Arabia. What we are witnessing is a battle for oil currency supremacy.

If Iran's oil bourse becomes a successful alternative for international oil trades, it would challenge the hegemony currently enjoyed by the financial centers in both London (IPE) and New York (NYMEX), a factor not overlooked in the following (UK) Guardian article:

Iran is to launch an oil trading market for Middle East and Opec producers that could threaten the supremacy of London's International Petroleum Exchange.

…Some industry experts have warned the Iranians and other OPEC producers that western exchanges are controlled by big financial and oil corporations, which have a vested interest in market volatility.

The IPE, bought in 2001 by a consortium that includes BP, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, was unwilling to discuss the Iranian move yesterday. "We would not have any comment to make on it at this stage," said an IPE spokeswoman. [14]

During an important speech in April 2002, Mr. Javad Yarjani, an OPEC executive, described three pivotal events that would facilitate an OPEC transition to euros.[15] He stated this would be based on

(1) if and when Norway's Brent crude is re-dominated in euros,

(2) if and when the U.K. adopts the euro, and

(3) whether or not the euro gains parity valuation relative to the dollar, and the EU's proposed expansion plans were successful.

Notably, both of the later two criteria have transpired: the euro's valuation has been above the dollar since late 2002, and the euro-based EU enlarged in May 2004 from 12 to 22 countries. Despite recent "no" votes by French and Dutch voters regarding a common EU Constitution, from a macroeconomic perspective, these domestic disagreements do no reduce the euro currency's trajectory in the global financial markets ... and from Russia and OPEC's perspective ... do not adversely impact momentum towards a petroeuro.

• In the meantime, the UK remains uncomfortably juxtaposed between the financial interests of the US banking nexus (New York/Washington) and the EU financial centers (Paris/Frankfurt).

The most recent news reports indicate the oil bourse will start trading on March 20, 2006, coinciding with the Iranian New Year.[16] The implementation of the proposed Iranian oil Bourse – if successful in utilizing the euro as its oil transaction currency standard -- essentially negates the previous two criteria as described by Mr. Yarjani regarding the solidification of a petroeuro system for international oil trades.

It should also be noted that, throughout 2003-2004, both Russia and China significantly increased their central bank holdings of the euro, which appears to be a coordinated move to facilitate the anticipated ascendance of the euro as a second World Reserve Currency. [17] [18] China's announcement in July 2005 that is was re-valuing the yuan/RNB was not nearly as important as its decision to divorce itself form a U.S. dollar peg by moving towards a "basket of currencies" -- likely to include the yen, euro, and dollar.[19] Additionally, the Chinese re-valuation immediately lowered their monthly imported "oil bill" by 2%, given that oil trades are still priced in dollars, but it is unclear how much longer this monopoly arrangement will last.

Furthermore, the geopolitical stakes for the Bush administration were raised dramatically on October 28, 2004, when Iran and China signed a huge oil and gas trade agreement (valued between $70-$100 billion dollars.) [20]

It should also be noted that China currently receives 13% of its oil imports from Iran. In the aftermath of the Iraq invasion, the US-administered Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) nullified previous oil lease contracts from 1997-2002 that France, Russia, China and other nations had established under the Saddam regime. The nullification of these contracts worth a reported $1.1 trillion created political tensions between the US and the European Union, Russia and China. The Chinese government may fear the same fate awaits their oil investments in Iran if the US were able to attack and topple the Tehran government. Despite US desires to enforce petrodollar hegemony, the geopolitical risks of an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities would surely create a serious crisis between Washington and Beijing.

It is increasingly clear that a confrontation and possible war with Iran may transpire during the second Bush term.

Clearly, there are numerous tactical risks regarding neoconservative strategy towards Iran. First, unlike Iraq, Iran has a robust military capability. Secondly, a repeat of any "Shock and Awe" tactics is not advisable given that Iran has installed sophisticated anti-ship missiles on the Island of Abu Musa, and therefore controls the critical Strait of Hormuz – where all of the Persian Gulf bound oil tankers must pass.[22]

The immediate question for Americans?

Will the neoconservatives attempt to intervene covertly and/or overtly in Iran during 2005 or 2006 in a desperate effort to prevent the initiation of euro-denominated international crude oil sales?

Commentators in India are quite correct in their assessment that a US intervention in Iran is likely to prove disastrous for the United States, making matters much worse regarding international terrorism, not to the mention potential effects on the US economy.

…If it [ US] intervenes again, it is absolutely certain it will not be able to improve the situation…There is a better way, as the constructive engagement of Libya's Colonel Muammar Gaddafi has shown...Iran is obviously a more complex case than Libya, because power resides in the clergy, and Iran has not been entirely transparent about its nuclear program, but the sensible way is to take it gently, and nudge it to moderation. Regime change will only worsen global Islamist terror, and in any case, Saudi Arabia is a fitter case for democratic intervention, if at all. [21]

A successful Iranian bourse will solidify the petroeuro as an alternative oil transaction currency, and thereby end the petrodollar's hegemonic status as the monopoly oil currency. Therefore, a graduated approach is needed to avoid precipitous US economic dislocations.

Multilateral compromise with the EU and OPEC regarding oil currency is certainly preferable to an 'Operation Iranian Freedom,' or perhaps another CIA-backed coup such as operation "Ajax" from 1953.

Despite the impressive power of the US military, and the ability of our intelligence agencies to facilitate 'interventions,' it would be perilous and possibly ruinous for the US to intervene in Iran given the dire situation in Iraq. The Monterey Institute of International Studies warned of the possible consequences of a preemptive attack on Iran's nuclear facilities:

An attack on Iranian nuclear facilities … could have various adverse effects on US interests in the Middle East and the world. Most important, in the absence of evidence of an Iranian illegal nuclear program, an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities by the US or Israel would be likely to strengthen Iran's international stature and reduce the threat of international sanctions against Iran. [23]

Synopsis:

It is not yet clear if a US military expedition will occur in a desperate attempt to maintain petrodollar supremacy. Regardless of the recent National Intelligence Estimate that down-played Iran's potential nuclear weapons program, it appears increasingly likely the Bush administration may use the specter of nuclear weapon proliferation as a pretext for an intervention, similar to the fears invoked in the previous WMD campaign regarding Iraq.

If recent stories are correct regarding Cheney's plan to possibly use a another 9/11 terrorist attack as the pretext or casus belli for a US aerial attack against Iran, this would confirm the Bush administration is prepared to undertake a desperate military strategy to thwart Iran's nuclear ambitions, while simultaneously attempting to prevent the Iranian oil Bourse from initiating a euro-based system for oil trades.

• However, as members of the UN Security Council; China, Russia and EU nations such as France and Germany would likely veto any US-sponsored UN Security Resolution calling the use of force without solid proof of Iranian culpability in a major terrorist attack.

A unilateral US military strike on Iran would isolate the US government in the eyes of the world community, and it is conceivable that such an overt action could provoke other industrialized nations to strategically abandon the dollar en masse.

Indeed, such an event would create pressure for OPEC or Russia to move towards a petroeuro system in an effort to cripple the US economy and its global military presence.

I refer to this in my book as the "rogue nation hypothesis."

While central bankers throughout the world community would be extremely reluctant to 'dump the dollar,' the reasons for any such drastic reaction are likely straightforward from their perspective -- the global community is dependent on the oil and gas energy supplies found in the Persian Gulf.

Hence, industrialized nations would likely move in tandem on the currency exchange markets in an effort to thwart the neoconservatives from pursuing their desperate strategy of dominating the world's largest hydrocarbon energy supply. Any such efforts that resulted in a dollar currency crisis would be undertaken -- not to cripple the US$ and economy as punishment towards the American people per se -- but rather to thwart further unilateral warfare and its potentially destructive effects on the critical oil production and shipping infrastructure in the Persian Gulf.

Barring a US attack, it appears imminent that Iran's euro-denominated oil bourse will open in March 2006.

Logically, the most appropriate US strategy is compromise with the EU and OPEC towards a dual-currency system for international oil trades.

Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes...known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few … No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare. -- James Madison, Political Observations, 1795

Footnotes:

• [1]. Ron Suskind, The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House, and the Education of Paul O' Neill, Simon & Schuster publishers (2004)
• [2]. Richard A. Clarke, Against All Enemies: Inside America's War on Terror, Free Press (2004)
• [3]. William Clark, "Revisited - The Real Reasons for the Upcoming War with Iraq: A Macroeconomic and Geostrategic Analysis of the Unspoken Truth," January 2003 (updated January 2004)
• [4]. Peter Philips, Censored 2004, The Top 25 Censored News Stories, Seven Stories Press, (2003) Story #19: U.S. Dollar vs. the Euro: Another Reason for the Invasion of Iraq
• [5]. Carol Hoyos and Kevin Morrison, "Iraq returns to the international oil market," Financial Times, June 5, 2003
• [6]. Faisal Islam, "Iraq nets handsome profit by dumping dollar for euro," [UK] Guardian, February 16, 2003
• [7]. "Oil bourse closer to reality," IranMania.com, December 28, 2004. Also see: "Iran oil bourse wins authorization," Tehran Times, July 26, 2005
• [8]. "War-Gaming the Mullahs: The U.S. weighs the price of a pre-emptive strike," Newsweek, September 27 issue, 2004.
• [9]. James Fallows, 'Will Iran be Next?,' Atlantic Monthly, December 2004, pgs. 97 – 110
• [10]. Seymour Hersh, "The Coming Wars," The New Yorker, January 24th – 31st issue, 2005, pgs. 40-47
• [11]. Philip Giraldi, "In Case of Emergency, Nuke Iran," American Conservative, August 1, 2005
• [12]. Dafina Linzer, "Iran Is Judged 10 Years From Nuclear Bomb U.S. Intelligence Review Contrasts With Administration Statements," Washington Post, August 2, 2005; Page A01
• [13]. C. Shivkumar, "Iran offers oil to Asian union on easier terms," The Hindu Business Line (June 16, ` 2003)
• [14]. Terry Macalister, "Iran takes on west's control of oil trading," The [UK] Guardian, June 16, 2004
• [15]. "The Choice of Currency for the Denomination of the Oil Bill," Speech given by Javad Yarjani, Head of OPEC's Petroleum Market Analysis Dept, on The International Role of the Euro (Invited by the Spanish Minister of Economic Affairs during Spain's Presidency of the EU) (April 14, 2002, Oviedo, Spain)
• [16]. "Iran's oil bourse expects to start by early 2006," Reuters, October 5, 2004
• [17]. "Russia shifts to euro as foreign currency reserves soar," AFP, June 9, 2003
• [18]. "China to diversify foreign exchange reserves," China Business Weekly, May 8, 2004
• [19]. Richard S. Appel, "The Repercussions from the Yuan's Revaluation," kitco.com, July 27, 2005
• [20]. China, Iran sign biggest oil & gas deal,' China Daily, October 31, 2004.
• [21]. "Terror & regime change: Any US invasion of Iran will have terrible consequences," News Insight: Public Affairs Magazine, June 11, 2004
• [22]. Analysis of Abu Musa Island
• [23]. Sammy Salama and Karen Ruster, "A Preemptive Attack on Iran's Nuclear Facilities: Possible Consequences," Monterry Institute of International Studies, August 12, 2004 (updated September 9, 2004)

Petrodollar Warfare: Dollars, Euros and the Upcoming Iranian Oil Bourse

Today's danger: Undocumented fruit pickers

original



Today's danger: Undocumented fruit pickers

by Christy J., April 21, 2006

Re Mexicans and my liberty...

I want to thank you, H&HH, for taking the stand against this hysterical "war on Mexicans." It's really depressing to me, to see the extent to which Republican propaganda has been internalized by good people, even many self-identified "left-wing" partisans who know better on most other issues.

When we let Republican hate-mongers define what the issues are, we are always, always, always told to be afraid. Be afraid of the terrorists, be afraid of the homosexuals, be afraid of the war on Christianity, and now be afraid of fruit pickers.

Look, it's a rock-solid rule of American politics: Republicans lie. They lie about everything. If you sit down and think about it, you can come up with a hundred Republican lies from the Bush era, everything from Iraq to 9/11 to tax cuts to the Bush-made Social Security "crisis." A good indicator that you're being lied to is when a Republican says anything. Never fails.

I ain't saying Democrats are all virtuous, but when most Democrats speak you have to at least listen before deciding whether it's hogwash. Republicans haven't said anything that wasn't hogwash since Dwight D Eisenhower. They just lie and lie and lie and lie and lie and yet some people are willing to believe the Republicans are telling the truth about today's horrible danger: undocumented fruit pickers.

Don’t let them poison your heart with anger and worry and hate. Ask yourself: Who's hurting you more, Mexicans or Republicans? Who's hurting you at all? Most of the people most worried about Mexicans don't even know any Mexicans, let alone being hurt by them.

Anyone who believes the immigration panic, you're just swallowing the rightwing liars' bait.

Christy J.

Al-Qaeda to 'move fight' to Saudi Arabia | | The Australian

**.....right.....sure, must be great to create your own boogeyman that can be wherever you need him to be **

original

Al-Qaeda to 'move fight' to Saudi Arabia
From correspondents in Paris
April 22, 2006

A SUSPECTED senior Al-Qaeda operative who escaped from a US airbase in Afghanistan last July called on members overnight in a video statement to move to fight in Saudi Arabia, predicting they would soon overcome US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"You must have a precise programme in mind: we will soon conquer America (the United States) in Afghanistan and Iraq. We must then head directly towards the peninsula of Mahomet (Saudi Arabia)," Saudi Mohammad al-Qahtani, said in the video statement released on the internet.

"We will have acquired great military experience...We call on our brothers who are fighting at the moment in the peninsula of Mahomet to continue their fight. We will soon be there," he said.

Al-Qahtani was one of four Al-Qaeda members who escaped from the US Bagram airbase last July.

The escape of the four men, described by the US army as "dangerous combatants", is a source of embarrassment at the main US base in Afghanistan.

Zimbabwe 'asks farmers to return'

original

Zimbabwe's white farmers say they have been invited to apply for land - in an apparent U-turn by the government which has seized their land.

All but 300 of the 4,000 white farmers have been forced off their land since President Robert Mugabe started his "fast-track" land reform in 2000.

A farmers' leader says some 200 applications have already been made and more are coming in.

Critics say the reforms have devastated the economy and led to massive hunger.

Foreign currency

Much of the formerly white-owned land is no longer being productively used - either because the beneficiaries have no experience of farming or they lack finance and tools.

Many farms were wrecked when they were invaded by government supporters.

The government has admitted that the exercise has been beset by corruption.

But Mr Mugabe blames Zimbabwe's economic problems on a plot by Western countries to topple him.

"There is an understanding that our members want to play a significant role in agriculture production, food security and generation of foreign currency for the country," Trevor Gifford, Commercial Farmers' Union vice-president told Reuters news agency.

"It is within this context that we were invited to submit the applications and I do know that instructions have been given to provincial land committees to process the applications and we are now awaiting responses," he said.

'No going back'

Didymus Mutasa, the minister in charge of land reform, could not be reached for comment.

But on Wednesday he said: "There is definitely no going back on our policy on land."

He also said that 99-year leases for commercial farms would be distributed by June, which he hoped would lead to higher agricultural output.

Earlier this year, Agriculture Minister Joseph Made told the BBC News website that any Zimbabwean was free to apply for land, whether white or black, as long as they used it.

Under colonial rule, the best agricultural land was reserved for whites - a policy which Mr Mugabe says he is trying to reverse.

But many white-owned farms were highly mechanised, productive businesses which formed the backbone of the economy.

The opposition says Mr Mugabe is using the land to buy votes.

Halliburton income soars 33%

original


DALLAS: Oilfield services conglomerate Halliburton said that first-quarter net income rose 33 per cent, a boost driven largely by increased sales and robust rig activity in North America.

The Houston-based company reported net income of $488 million, or 91 cents a share, compared to $365m, or 72 cents a share in the same quarter last year.

Stripping out 1 cent for discontinued operations, the results were three cents a share better than the 87 cent per share profit among analysts polled by Thomson Financial.

Revenue rose to $5.2 billion from $4.8bn in the same period of 2005, short of Wall Street's estimate of $5.62bn.

"These are solid looking gains year-over-year," said Jeff Tillery, an analyst with Pickering Energy in Houston.

Halliburton was led from 1995 to 2000 by Vice-President Dick Cheney, and it has been criticised since the beginning of the Iraq war for its large government contracts, some of them awarded without a bidding process.

The Nation | No Longer Sitting Pretty

original

No Longer Sitting Pretty
The Nation | Editorial

08 May 2006 Issue

Two years and nine months to go. How much more can George W. Bush take? More important, how much more can we?

Bush's approval rating is bottoming out. Retired generals have launched a media coup against his Secretary of Defense. Republican strategists have actually started to consider the unthinkable: Their party could lose control of the House. (That does not yet seem likely, but the consequences are frightening for GOPers: Congressional investigations and subpoenas.) Bush's best pals in the "coalition of the willing" are not faring well: Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was defeated in Italy, and British Prime Minister Tony Blair is once again on the ropes. The war in Iraq continues to get uglier - perhaps morphing into intractable sectarian conflict - and progress on the political front there seems elusive. And let's not forget, no WMDs have been found.

Worse (for Bush), it seems that every few days there's another news story - some related to the prosecution of accused liar Scooter Libby - that reminds the public that Bush's primary case for the now unpopular war was based on bunk and that he overstated that bunk. A coming-to-an-end (or a chickens-coming-home?) feeling has enveloped the Bush White House that no staff shuffle can puncture. (Will the American people cry, "Hooray! There's a new press secretary and Karl Rove has a different job title"?)

Bush's approval ratings in recent polls have dropped into the mid-30s - twenty to thirty points lower than Bill Clinton's ratings during his tawdry Monica scandal. Bush may say he doesn't care about the polls, but other Republicans do, fearing that Bush has become a pair of concrete shoes for Congressional candidates running in November - some of whom are running away from joint appearances with Bush. Accompanying Bush's decline is a drop in Republicans' overall numbers. A recent Washington Post/ABC News poll found that registered voters favor a House Democratic candidate over a Republican by 55 to 40 percent - the biggest Democratic edge since the mid-1980s. Given the gerrymandering of House districts and the GOP's ability to raise a tremendous amount of money and to demagogue Democrats on national security issues, Republicans don't need to panic yet. But any party would rather be swimming with the current than staring at an incoming wave. The only good news for Bush, poll-wise, is that he's ahead of Dick Cheney.

The retired generals' revolt has raised questions about the Commander in Chief, such as: How come he's the last person in the room to know the war is going poorly and that the guy he picked to run it has screwed up royally? The White House had Bush speak out in defense of Rumsfeld, but did they really believe the public would take the word of a onetime MIA National Guardsman over that of the generals - especially when Bush's credibility, because of those missing weapons of mass destruction, is shot? Bush and his White House tacticians don't seem to get it: It doesn't matter what he says anymore. He's delivered a series of we're-making-progress speeches to rally support for the war, but there has been no discernible impact on the public's attitude. He's busted in the rhetoric department. Reality, for the moment, has trumped his spin.

There's still plenty of time for him to make things worse (see Iran). But the Rumsfeld imbroglio is a pointed reminder that this is a man stuck too much within himself and his world of distortion. And relying on false or disingenuous assertions is not working for him the way it once did. So finally - years too late - he is paying a price. Alas, so is the rest of the world.

UN Tells US to Charge or Release Thousands of Iraqi Detainees

original

Editor's Note: In the last reconstruction appropriation for Iraq, the State Department sought $100 million for the building of prisons in the next fiscal year. This was the only specified allocation in the budget.
-- ad/TO

UN Damns 'Illegal' Iraq Detention
BBC News

Friday 21 April 2006

The UN's human rights official in Iraq has said the Iraqi authorities are illegally holding thousands of people.

Gianni Magazzeni said that of the 15,000 people held under Iraqi control, little more than half were under the jurisdiction of the justice ministry.

This is the only body with the right to detain suspects for more than 72 hours.

But he said thousands were also being detained by the interior ministry and hundreds by the defence ministry, in clear breach of Iraqi law.

More than 14,000 people are also being held by US-led coalition forces in Iraq.

Mr Magazzeni said the UN believed that number was far too high and he urged the US military authorities to either charge or release them.

"We think that the 15,000 being held for 'urgent security reasons' are far too many and we are working very closely [with the coalition] to reduce that number considerably," Mr Magazzeni said.

'Torture and Execution'

He said the UN still did not have access to prisoners being held in unidentified coalition prisons, and called for them to be released or handed over to Iraqi authorities to be charged.

"We want them to speed up this process," Mr Magazzeni said. He added that the UN was "very concerned about ongoing violations" of human rights in Iraq.

"Torture and summary executions happen every day," Mr Magazzeni said.

There have been widespread and recurring reports of death squads, allegedly linked to Shia political factions, targeting Sunni Iraqis.

Mr Magazzeni said the so-called death squads had become more active in Iraq since the bombing of the revered Shia shrine at Samarra in February.

"We've seen an increase in the instances of allegations of actions by such militias or death squads that sometimes are linked with police forces or forces within state entities in Iraq," he said.

-------

Larry C. Johnson | The Firing of Mary McCarthy

original

The Firing of Mary McCarthy
By Larry Johnson
TPM Cafe

Saturday 22 April 2006

The case against the CIA Intelligence Officer, Mary McCarthy, fired for her alleged role in leaking information about secret prisons to the Washington Post's Dana Priest smells a little fishy. Let me state at the outset that the officer in question, Mary McCarthy, is an old acquaintance. I hasten to add that I do not consider her a friend. She was my immediate boss in 1988-89 and was instrumental in my decision to leave the CIA and take a job at the State Department's Office of Counter Terrorism. Mary, in my experience, was a terrible manager. I left the CIA in 1989 despite having received two exceptional performance awards during my last eight months on the job because I could not stand working under her.

That said, I take no delight in the news that she was fired. In fact, there are some things about the case that puzzle me. For starters, Mary never worked on the Operations side of the house. In other words, she never worked a job where she would have had first hand operational knowledge about secret prisons. She worked the analytical side of the CIA and served with the National Intelligence Council. According to press reports, she subsequently worked at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) from 2001 thru 2005. That is a type of academic/policy wonk position and, again, would not put her in a position to know anything first hand about secret prisons.

Sometime within the last year she returned to CIA on a terminal assignment. I've heard through the grapevine that she was attending the seminar for officers who are retiring while working with the Inspector General (IG). Now things get interesting. She could find out about secret prisons if Intelligence Officers involved with that program had filed a complaint with the IG or if there was some incident that compelled senior CIA officials to determine an investigation was warranted. In other words, this program did not come to Mary's attention (if the allegations are true) because she worked on it as an ops officer. Instead, it appears an investigation of the practice had been proposed or was underway. That's another story reporters probably ought to be tracking down.

I am struck by the irony that Mary McCarthy may have been fired for blowing the whistle and ensuring that the truth about an abuse was told to the American people. There is something potentially honorable in that action; particularly when you consider that George Bush authorized Scooter Libby to leak misleading information for the purpose of deceiving the American people about the grounds for going to war in Iraq. While I'm neither a fan nor friend of Mary's, she may have done a service for her country. She was a lousy manager in my experience, but she is not a traitor and has not betrayed the identity of an undercover intelligence officer. That dirty work was done by the minions of George Bush and Dick Cheney. It is important to keep that fact in the forefront as the judgment on Mary McCarthy's acts is rendered.


Larry C. Johnson is CEO and co-founder of BERG Associates, LLC, an international business-consulting firm that helps corporations and governments manage threats posed by terrorism and money laundering. Mr. Johnson, who worked previously with the Central Intelligence Agency and US State Department's Office of Counter Terrorism (as a Deputy Director), is a recognized expert in the fields of terrorism, aviation security, crisis and risk management. Mr. Johnson has analyzed terrorist incidents for a variety of media including the Jim Lehrer News Hour, National Public Radio, ABC's Nightline, NBC's Today Show, the New York Times, CNN, Fox News, and the BBC. Mr. Johnson has authored several articles for publications, including Security Management Magazine, the New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times. He has lectured on terrorism and aviation security around the world.

-------

Berlusconi Refuses to Concede Defeat

original

Berlusconi Refuses to Concede Defeat
By IAN FISHER

ROME, April 21 — Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi kept up his struggle against the election he lost, saying today that he would demand more scrutiny of the results despite a high court decision awarding victory to his center-left challenger, Romano Prodi.

"I have not and will not make any telephone call because why should I give them good wishes," Mr. Berlusconi said in a visit to the northeastern city of Trieste. "That would be against the country's interests."

One call that was made, though, came from the White House, when President Bush phoned to congratulate Prime Minister-elect Prodi, who expressed his appreciation.

Mr. Bush said he looked forward to working with him on "a number of common priorities that we have" and to seeing him again soon. Italy is a valued ally and a good partner, the president said.

Italy, too, exhausted by its national elections and its razor-thin verdict, seemed to be moving beyond Mr. Berlusconi's continuing refusal to concede defeat. Attention instead began to turn to what may be a new — and possibly serious — crisis: the fight among Mr. Prodi's fractious allies over the highest positions in a new government.

One Italian newspaper called the spat an "emblematic mess" in that it underscores the fundamental weakness of a new Prodi government: his need to appease the nine different parties in his coalition, at a time when he will hold the slimmest possible majority in Parliament.

The biggest fight concerns who snags the prestigious post of head of the lower house of Parliament, the Chamber of Deputies. Two of Mr. Prodi's most important allies — Massimo D'Alema of the largest coalition party, Democrats of the Left, and Fausto Bertinotti, of the Refounded Communists — both want the title.

In an early sign of difficulties for Mr. Prodi, Mr. Bertinotti was quoted by the La Stampa newspaper as saying that he might withdraw from the coalition if he does not get the post — a move that would doom the new government before it even began.

In comments to reporters today, Mr. Prodi played down the significance of the fight, saying that he would resolve the issue by Monday.

"I will serenely make a decision," he said, according to the ANSA news agency. "Everyone will be obliged to accept it. It will not be a difficult decision, even if it obviously might be painful, like all decisions in these cases."

Meantime, Mr. Berlusconi, who has served as prime minister for the last five years, today continued working to define his political role in the way he knows best — pugnaciously.

In an interview with the Piccolo newspaper in Trieste, Mr. Berlusconi broke two days of silence since Italy's highest court on Wednesday confirmed preliminary election results showing Mr. Prodi had won.

He is under pressure even from some allies to acknowledge Mr. Prodi's victory, in the name of national unity and endorsing the nation's democracy. But, rather, Mr. Berlusconi said he should be acknowledged for a feat that awarded him a "political" victory if not an actual one: that he won some 220,000 more absolute votes than Mr. Prodi's coalition and that his party, Forza Italia, polled better than any other.

"Who wants to be recognized as a winner for having kept the majority of the seats," Mr. Berlusconi said, "must then necessarily recognize that the political victory in terms of consensus goes to the House of Liberty and Forza Italia, with its 24 percent, the first party in the country."

The House of Liberty is the name of the center-right coalition led by Mr. Berlusconi. In one of the ironies of this election, Mr. Prodi's coalition won despite an electoral law that Mr. Berlusconi pushed through Parliament in order to help him and his allies. Many experts say that without that law, Mr. Berlusconi would have won the election.

Meantime, though, several members of his coalition acknowledged defeat, key among them Pier Fernando Casini, head of the United Christian Democrats, which represents many devout Roman Catholics.

"The U.D.C. is called to assume the role of national opposition," Mr. Casini said, using the party's initials in Italian. He added, however, that he would not compromise on moral issues important to his party.

Unlike many other Western countries, Italy has not had a strong tradition of losers in elections actually conceding, athough the issue has grown in recent years since Italy moved more toward a system of two defined political groupings.

Today, Mr. Prodi said that a telephone call from Mr. Berlusconi would be a sign of "good institutional manners" but was no longer necessary to legitimize his victory.

"If he does it, he does it," he told reporters. "If he doesn't, the institutions have their own strength, and democracy goes forward all the same.

"Certainly, it's a shame," Mr. Prodi added. "These rites, these customs, reinforce the democratic system. They aren't indispensable, but they give an indication of style."

* Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Olmert accuses Syria and Iran of involvement in Tel Aviv suicide bombing - Haaretz - Israel News

original
**how convenient **
Olmert accuses Syria and Iran of involvement in Tel Aviv suicide bombing
By The Associated Press

Prime Minister-designate Ehud Olmert on Friday accused the Syrian and Iranian governments of involvement in the Tel Aviv suicide bombing that took place Monday.

"The order for the Tel Aviv suicide bombing came from Damascus and when the operation was complete the report went back to Damascus," Olmert told a visiting group of U.S. senators, according to his office.

Olmert also said Iran, which provides funding to Islamic Jihad, and the new Hamas-led government bear responsibility for the attack.

"There is a channel of communication between Iran, Syria and the Palestinian Authority," he said.

The Islamic Jihad militant group claimed responsibility for Monday's suicide bombing, which killed nine people. The group is headquartered in Damascus.

Shame on the Post's Editorial Page

original



By Robert Parry
April 20, 2006

If a full and truthful history of the disastrous Iraq War is ever written, there should be a chapter devoted to the pivotal role played by the Washington Post’s hawkish editorial page and the many like-minded thinkers who are published in the newspaper’s Op-Ed section.

As arguably the most influential newspaper in the nation’s capital, the Post might have been expected to encourage a healthy pre-war debate that reflected diverse opinions from experts in the fields of government, diplomacy, academia, the military and the broader American public. War, after all, is not a trivial matter.

Instead, the Post’s editorial section served as a kind of pro-war bulletin board, posting neoconservative manifestos attesting to the wisdom of invading Iraq and tacking up harsh indictments of Americans who dissented from George W. Bush’s war plans.

Yet what is perhaps most amazing is that even now – after all that’s been learned about Bush’s Iraq War deceptions – the Post’s editorial page continues to act as the administration’s hall monitor for the war, trying to keep the American people and especially Washington insiders in line.

This month, the Post published two more editorials disparaging critics of the Iraq War. One resumed the near-three-year-old campaign to tear down former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson for challenging “twisted” pre-war intelligence on Iraq; a second scolded retired generals for speaking out against Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

‘Good Leak’

In an April 9 editorial, “A Good Leak,” the Post’s editors praised President Bush’s decision in June-July 2003 to declassify parts of a National Intelligence Estimate that were then leaked to favored reporters to undermine Wilson’s criticism of intelligence used to scare the American public about Iraq’s supposed nuclear weapons program.

The Post editorial bought into virtually all the administration’s spin points, accepting at face value that Bush intended simply “to make clear why he had believed that Saddam Hussein was seeking nuclear weapons.” The editorial even attacked Wilson as “the one guilty of twisting the truth.”

Yet, the Post leaves out a number of key facts, including that Bush selectively declassified parts of the NIE – sections on Iraq’s alleged pursuit of enriched uranium in Africa – though his top aides knew that those points were hotly disputed by many U.S. intelligence experts when the NIE was written and had since been disproved.

The available evidence indicates that Bush’s goal was not to educate the public with “a good leak,” but to avoid getting caught in a deception that had misled the nation to war.

Ironically, that was the conclusion of a front-page news article in the Post on the same day as the editorial, April 9. The news article cited the fact that Vice President Dick Cheney and his chief of staff, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, chose to leak information they knew to be false.

“The evidence Cheney and Libby selected to share with reporters had been disproved months before,” the Post’s news article said. “United Nations inspectors had exposed the main evidence for the uranium charge as crude forgeries in March 2003, but the Bush administration and British Prime Minister Tony Blair maintained they had additional, secret evidence that they could not disclose.

“In June [2003], a British parliamentary inquiry concluded otherwise, delivering a scathing critique of Blair’s role in promoting the story. With no ally left, the White House debated whether to abandon the uranium claim and became embroiled in bitter finger-pointing about whom to fault for the error. …

“It was at that moment that Libby, allegedly at Cheney’s direction, sought out at least three reporters to bolster the discredited uranium allegation. Libby made careful selections of language from the 2002 estimate, quoting a passage that said Iraq was ‘vigorously trying to procure uranium’ in Africa.”

In other words, what the Post’s editorial-page editors judged to be “a good leak” was part of a continued disinformation campaign aimed at discrediting Wilson’s accurate assessment about “twisted” intelligence – and keeping the American public confused.

Watchdog Press?

For a U.S. editorial board of a major newspaper to embrace, uncritically, a government’s deception of the American people turns the concept of a watchdog press upside down – and it is an especially grave offense on a life-and-death issue like war.

But the Post’s editorial board went even further, echoing long-standing Republican attacks on Wilson, who has said he traveled to Niger in 2002 at the CIA’s request and concluded from his trip that suspicions of an Iraqi uranium purchase were almost surely untrue.

The Post’s editorial, however, challenges Wilson’s honesty, claiming that “several subsequent investigations” have demonstrated that “in fact, (Wilson’s) report supported the conclusion that Iraq had sought uranium.”

But the Post’s claim is, at best, misleading and, more likely, dishonest.

According to all available evidence, Wilson told the truth, that based on his interviews with former Niger government officials, he concluded that the alleged uranium purchase almost certainly did not occur and was not even feasible given the tight international controls on Niger’s enriched uranium, called yellowcake.

Wilson did report to the CIA that he was told by former Nigerien Prime Minister Ibrahim Mayaki that he had suspected that an Iraqi commercial delegation to Niger in 1999 might be interested in buying yellowcake, but that the uranium topic didn’t come up at Mayaki's meeting with the Iraqis and – whatever their intentions – nothing was sold to Iraq.

In 2002, the State Department’s intelligence analysts, who had already correctly concluded that the Niger claims were baseless, reviewed Wilson’s report and believed that his information corroborated their judgment that the Iraq-yellowcake story was bogus.

However, CIA analysts, who then were pushing the Niger allegations, seized on Wilson’s comment about Mayaki suspecting that Iraq was in the market for yellowcake as corroboration for the CIA position.

That’s why the Republican-controlled Senate Intelligence Committee wrote in its July 7, 2004, assessment of the WMD intelligence that “for most analysts, the information in the [Wilson] report lent more credibility to the original CIA reports on the uranium deal, but State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research analysts believed that the report supported their assessment that Niger was unlikely to be willing or able to sell uranium to Iraq.”

The CIA analysts had “cherry-picked” the one fact from Wilson’s report that could be used to support their faulty judgment about the Niger uranium, while the State Department analysts, who had debunked the Niger story, also found backing for their correct assessment from Wilson’s report.

But either way, it wasn’t Wilson’s fault that the CIA and other erroneous analysts outnumbered the State Department analysts who drew the right conclusions from Wilson’s investigation.

Yet, the Senate Intelligence Committee, the Republican National Committee and the Washington Post’s editorial page did their own “cherry-picking” in seizing on the phrase “most analysts” as a way to attack Wilson’s honesty. Under any logical scrutiny, however, that argument makes no sense.

Retaliation

The Post editorial goes on to slam Wilson again, by citing the supposed findings of special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, who has been investigating the administration’s leak of the identity of Wilson’s wife, undercover CIA officer Valerie Plame.

“Mr. Wilson subsequently claimed that the White House set out to punish him for his supposed whistle-blowing by deliberately blowing the cover of his wife,” the Post editorial said. “After more than 2 ½ years of investigation, Mr. Fitzgerald has reported no evidence to support Mr. Wilson’s charge.

“In last week’s court filing, he [Fitzgerald] stated that Mr. Bush did not authorize the leak of Ms. Plame’s identity. Mr. Libby’s motive in allegedly disclosing her name to reporters, Mr. Fitzgerald said, was to disprove yet another false assertion, that Mr. Wilson had been dispatched to Niger by Mr. Cheney. In fact Mr. Wilson was recommended for the trip by his wife.”

But again, the Post editorial writers have gotten almost all their facts wrong, especially the assertion that Fitzgerald didn’t find evidence to support Wilson’s claim that he had been targeted for reprisals because of his whistle-blowing.

In the court filing on April 5, 2006, Fitzgerald said his investigation uncovered government documents that “could be characterized as reflecting a plan to discredit, punish, or seek revenge against Mr. Wilson” because of his criticism of the administration’s handling of the Niger evidence.

Fitzgerald added that “the evidence will show that the July 6, 2003, Op-Ed by Mr. Wilson [in the New York Times] was viewed by the Office of Vice President as a direct attack on the credibility of the Vice President (and the President) on a matter of signal importance: the rationale for the war in Iraq. Defendant [Libby] undertook vigorous efforts to rebut this attack during the week following July 7, 2003.”

In other words, Libby’s “vigorous efforts” against Wilson were not simply part of some educational program for reporters; the goal was to defend the credibility of Bush and Cheney at a time (summer 2003) when the American people were learning that the principal argument for going to war – Iraq’s supposed stockpiles of WMD – was false.

It’s also untrue for the Post editorial to say that Fitzgerald concluded that Libby’s motive for leaking was to disprove the “false assertion” that Wilson had been sent to Niger by Cheney. A fair reading of Fitzgerald’s April 5 filing would support a conclusion that Libby was sent out in a counterattack against the threat that Wilson posed to the overall White House credibility on Iraq’s WMD, not to clarify who authorized Wilson's trip.

The Post editorial also exaggerates when claiming that Fitzgerald “stated that Mr. Bush did not authorize the leak of Ms. Plame’s identity.” The filing contains nothing definitive on this point, beyond Fitzgerald recounting Libby’s grand jury testimony which has Bush approving disclosure of selective pieces of intelligence, but doesn’t mention Plame.

The absence of Libby’s testimony about whether Bush also may have approved the leak of Plame’s identity is not proof that Bush didn’t give such authorization to others; it simply means that Libby didn’t testify to that suspicion. Libby is facing a five-count indictment for perjury, obstruction of justice and lying to the FBI.

Republican Assault

Another troubling aspect of the Post’s April 9 editorial is how closely it tracks with the long-running Republican assault on Wilson.

For years now, Republicans and their right-wing media allies have focused on tiny points of Wilson’s statements as a way to blur the larger picture – that Wilson was right about the absence of an active Iraqi nuclear program while the Bush administration was wrong.

The Post editorial page followed the Republican lead again in an April 18 editorial entitled “the Generals’ Revolt.” A sub-head characterized the Iraq War complaints from a half dozen retired generals as “finger-pointing” that should be excluded from the debate over whether Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld should resign.

While acknowledging valid concerns about Rumsfeld’s mismanagement of the Iraq War, the Post editorial calls the “rebellion” of the retired generals “problematic.”

“It threatens the essential democratic principle of military subordination to civilian control – the more so because a couple of the officers claim they are speaking for some still on active duty,” the editorial said.

It then compares the Iraq War critiques by these retired generals to the opposition from the uniformed military, including then-Gen. Colin Powell, chairman of the Joint Chiefls of Staff, against President Bill Clinton’s plan to allow gays in the military.

But the comparison is faulty. For one, the retired generals are retired, not active-duty as Powell was in 1993. Also, until these half dozen or so ex-generals spoke out critically about Bush’s Iraq policies, no one in memory had ever argued that private citizens who previously served in the military should remain silent about questions of war and peace.

The Post editorial board never objected when retired generals appeared on CNN or other TV news programs supporting the Iraq War or when President Bush claimed that he was following the advice of the generals in Iraq, including some of those now out of uniform who are contradicting Bush’s claim.

Rather than following the facts and logic to a conclusion, the Post editorials seem to start with an ideological conclusion – that Bush must be defended – and then cobble the available spin points together into some dubious argument.

Long Pattern

These two editorials in April also do not stand alone. They are part of a long pattern at the Post to ignore or denigrate Iraq War critics – both in the news columns and on the opinion pages.

Sometimes before the Iraq invasion, Post readers learned about voices of dissent by reading Post columnists denouncing the dissenters. For instance, when former Vice President Al Gore gave a speech about Iraq and Bush’s “preemptive war” doctrine on Sept. 23, 2002, his talk got scant press coverage, but did elicit a round of Gore-bashing on the TV talk shows and on the Post’s Op-Ed page. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “Politics of Preemption.”]

Post columnist Michael Kelly called Gore’s speech “dishonest, cheap, low” before labeling it “wretched. It was vile. It was contemptible.” [Washington Post, Sept. 25, 2002] Post columnist Charles Krauthammer added that the speech was “a series of cheap shots strung together without logic or coherence.” [Washington Post, Sept. 27, 2002]

When reading the Post’s pre-war coverage, there was a whiff of totalitarianism in which dissidents never get space to express their opinions but are still excoriated by the official media. When the state speaks, however, the same media hails the government’s brilliance.

For instance, after Secretary of State Powell’s now-infamous speech to the United Nations Security Council on Feb. 5, 2003, a Post editorial called his arguments “irrefutable,” adding: “it is hard to imagine how anyone could doubt that Iraq possesses weapons of mass destruction.”

That judgment was echoed across the Op-Ed page by Post columnists from Right to Left, a solid wall of misguided consensus.

But the Post’s gullibility about Powell’s testimony wasn’t an exception. As a study by Columbia University journalism professor Todd Gitlin noted, “The [Post] editorials during December [2002] and January [2003] numbered nine, and all were hawkish.” [American Prospect, April 1, 2003]

After the U.S. invasion of Iraq in March 2003 and the failure to discover evidence supporting the administration’s pre-war claims, editorial-page editor Fred Hiatt acknowledged that the Post should have been more skeptical.

“If you look at the editorials we write running up [to the war], we state as flat fact that he [Hussein] has weapons of mass destruction,” Hiatt said in an interview with the Columbia Journalism Review. “If that’s not true, it would have been better not to say it.” [CJR, March/April 2004]

Repeat Offenders

But Hiatt’s supposed remorse hasn’t stopped him and the Post editorial page from continuing their assault on anyone who questions Bush’s Iraq War strategy.

On Feb. 7, 2005, Hiatt penned a column under his own name, entitled “Bad News Donkeys,” in which he chastised Sen. John Kerry and other Democrats for not showing enough enthusiasm over the Jan. 30, 2005, elections in Iraq.

Hiatt wrote that Kerry “grumped” his answer about the Iraq election when the senator told NBC’s Tim Russert that “I think it’s gone as expected.” Days later when House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi pressed for a clearer exit strategy for U.S. troops, Hiatt judged that her comments “sounded grudging and morose.”

In case Post readers hadn’t gotten Hiatt’s point, he finished up his column comparing the Democrats to the sad-sack character Eeyore in the Winnie-the-Pooh stories.

Though the Jan. 30, 2005, election turned out to be more a mirage than an oasis, the Post’s editorial page was back asserting its august judgments again in June 2005 after thousands of readers complained that the Post was ignoring the “Downing Street Memo” and other evidence of Bush’s Iraq War deceptions.

On June 15, 2005, the Post’s lead editorial asserted that “the memos add not a single fact to what was previously known about the administration’s prewar deliberations. Not only that: They add nothing to what was publicly known in July 2002.”

While that claim may be true in a way – because some people indeed were challenging Bush’s case for war, albeit without the damning details – the problem was that the Post and other pro-war news outlets were treating those skeptics as fringe characters who should be ignored.

Looking back to 2002 and early 2003, it would be hard to find any “reputable” commentary in the mainstream U.S. press calling Bush’s actions fraudulent, which is what the “Downing Street Memo” and other British evidence have since revealed Bush’s actions to be.

The British documents prove that much of the pre-war debate inside the U.S. and British governments was how best to manipulate public opinion by playing games with the intelligence.

On July 23, 2002, for instance, Blair met with his top foreign policy advisers to review the Iraq situation. According to the minutes, which became known as the “Downing Street Memo,” Richard Dearlove, chief of the British intelligence agency MI6, described a recent trip to Washington at which he discussed Iraq with Bush’s top national security officials.

“Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy,” Dearlove said.

One might have thought that this pattern of official deception – effectively making fools out of the Post’s editorial page and, to a lesser extent, the news columns – would have stirred up some outrage from Hiatt and his boss, Washington Post Chairman Donald Graham.

But Hiatt and Graham seem to be beyond shame, or perhaps they are committed neoconservatives who simply won’t let facts get in the way of their ideological convictions.

Now, despite even more evidence of the Bush administration’s pre-war lies, the Post editorial board is back at its role trying to construct a consensus by marginalizing Ambassador Wilson and silencing the retired generals.

The Post’s goal apparently is to protect George W. Bush from public outrage over his Iraq War deceptions – that have led to so much death, injury and destruction – while sparing the Post’s editors from the journalistic disdain that they have so richly earned.

Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories in the 1980s for the Associated Press and Newsweek. His latest book, Secrecy & Privilege: Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq, can be ordered at secrecyandprivilege.com. It's also available at Amazon.com, as is his 1999 book, Lost History: Contras, Cocaine, the Press & 'Project Truth.'

Herald Sun: 'Free' detainees not allowed home

'Free' detainees not allowed home
By Will Dunham in Washington
22apr06
original


Nearly 30 per cent of the Guantanamo detainees have been cleared to leave the prison but remain jailed because the US government has been unable to arrange for their return to their home countries, the Pentagon said on Friday.

The Pentagon refused to identify these 141 men despite having released on Wednesday its first comprehensive list of detainees held at the prison for foreign terrorism suspects at the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Of these 141 detainees among the 490 still at Guantanamo, various military reviews have cleared 22 to be freed in their home countries and the remaining 119 for transfer to the control of their home governments.

"It's just an outrageous situation where people have gone through this system that has been established, such as it is, and the (US) government itself has found there's no reason for them to be held any longer, and yet they continue to be held," said Curt Goering, a senior Amnesty International USA official.

"It makes a mockery of any kind of system of justice," Mr Goering added.

Defence officials said the United States has no interest in detaining anyone for any longer than necessary and has been able to arrange for some detainees, but not others, to return to their home countries.

Officials cited US policy not to expel, return or extradite individuals to other countries where it is more likely than not that they will be tortured or persecuted.

**please tell me I'm not the only one that sees the irony in that ridiculous statement... EG:) **


Asked why the government will not identify men cleared to leave Guantanamo, Navy Lt. Cmdr. Chito Peppler, a military spokesman, cited the sensitive nature of US government discussions with other countries about the detainees.

"We do not discuss detainee movements or details related to their movements until after the movement has been completed for operational security reasons," Cmdr Peppler said.

Rights activists decry the indefinite detention of Guantanamo detainees since the jail opened in January 2002, and accuse the United States of torture. The Pentagon denies the torture allegations and says many dangerous al Qaeda and Taliban figures are held there.

Air Force Maj. Michael Shavers, a military spokesman, said 10 detainees still at Guantanamo were cleared for release to their home countries and 12 for transfer to the control of their home governments under review processes in place until July 2004.

Nine detainees still at Guantanamo were deemed by military panels not to be an "enemy combatant," with these decisions coming no later than March 2005, officials said. The United States has labelled detainees "enemy combatants," denying them rights normally accorded to prisoners of war.

Maj Shavers said five of these nine are members of the Uighur ethnic group from far western China. Many Muslim Uighurs seek greater autonomy for the region and some want independence. China has waged a campaign against what it calls their violent separatist activities.

The Supreme Court declined on Monday to consider whether a judge can free two of them, Abu Bakker Qassim and A'del Abdu Al-Hakim, refusing to review the judge's decision that a federal court cannot provide them relief while the United States seeks a country to take them.

Also still jailed are three detainees cleared for release and 107 cleared to be transferred to the control of their home governments by military panels that review each detainee's case at least annually, officials said. These hearings ran from December 2004 to December 2005.

The Pentagon said the detainees hail from 40 countries and the West Bank, with the largest number from Saudi Arabia, followed by Afghanistan and Yemen.

More muscle, with eye on China�-�Nation/Politics�-�The Washington Times, America's Newspaper

original

More muscle, with eye on China
By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Published April 20, 2006

The Pentagon is engaged in an extensive buildup of military forces in Asia as part of a covert strategy to strengthen and position U.S. and allied forces to deter -- or defeat -- China.

The buildup includes changes in deployments of aircraft-carrier battle groups, the conversion of nuclear-missile submarines and the regular dispatch of bombers to areas close to targets in China, according to senior Bush administration officials and a three-month investigation by The Washington Times.

Other less-visible activities that are part of what is being called a "hedge" strategy include large-scale military maneuvers, increased military alliances and training with Asian allies, the transfer of special-operations commando forces to Asia and new requirements for military personnel to learn Chinese.

President Bush approved elements of the first phase of the strategy within the past several months. The key architect is Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. The State Department's point man on the strategy is Deputy Secretary of State Robert B. Zoellick, who has led three rounds of strategic talks with China in the past several months.

Mr. Bush will express U.S. concerns about China's hidden military buildup during his meeting today with Chinese President Hu Jintao, but will not discuss the hedge strategy, administration officials said.

Officials said the objective of the Asian buildup is to dissuade China from becoming a hostile power and to have the military capability to swiftly defeat the communist nation in a conflict using military forces that are forward-deployed in Asia or are available to be moved on short notice from Alaska, Hawaii, California and elsewhere.

Bush administration national security officials said most of the military moves are being carried out in ways designed to avoid provoking Beijing. Masking the buildup is not strategic deception, they said, but is part of what is called strategic denial: playing down the focus on China and highlighting the global nature of overall U.S. military transformation.

"I'm partly saying to them, 'Look, if you, the Chinese, are not transparent as you grow and you become more influential, and you add to your military, you will recognize that others are going to respond to that,' " Mr. Zoellick told The Times. "And if you are not transparent, if you're not emphasizing cooperation with people, they're going to respond in ways that build their defenses, not only their own military defenses but how they work with others."

Japan, Australia, India and nations in Southeast Asia also share U.S. worries about China, he said.

A senior defense official involved in Asia policy said the rapid force transformation that Mr. Bush and Mr. Rumsfeld approved will take place in three to five years. It will give U.S. forces in Asia and other parts of the world much more power and speedier response times to international crises, whether they involve China, North Korea or Iran.

The island of Guam in the western Pacific Ocean is a key element in the plan because strategic bombers deployed there can reach targets throughout Asia within three hours. A total of $5 billion is being spent to improve the U.S. territory for ships, submarines and bombers.

Much of the force enhancement involves naval weaponry. For example, the Navy is reorganizing the operating methods of aircraft-carrier battle groups in ways that will double their ability to project power. Once transformed in two or three years, the Pentagon can dispatch four carrier battle groups at once in Asia. In the past, because of maintenance schedules and crew limitations, only two carriers were battle-ready on short notice.

Other planned naval enhancements in Asia include the deployment to Guam of attack submarines and the addition of two strategic missile submarines, and perhaps as many as four. The converted boomers, as the missile submarines are called, each will be outfitted with up to 150 cruise missiles.

The large missile submarines also will play a key role in moving special-operations forces covertly to conflict areas in Asia. The Pentagon is considering the deployment of the 1st Special Operations Group to Japan, officials said. Marine commandos also are being readied to be able to counter the spread of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.

Adm. Michael Mullen, chief of naval operations, said concerns about China are "fairly significant, and I think it's fair to say that it's growing."

To meet the challenge, the Navy will add one more carrier battle group to its Pacific Fleet. Additionally, it is shifting 60 percent of submarine forces to the Pacific and Asia in the next few years.

"Obviously, the outcome I seek is one of peace and security and stability," Adm. Mullen said during a recent breakfast with reporters. "There are just a lot of questions about the significance of the Chinese investment in missiles, in submarines, in ships, in technology, in capabilities that make you wonder, 'Why so much so fast?' And clearly, putting ourselves in what I would call a strong deterrent position is very important."

The buildup by the Air Force in Asia includes plans to upgrade Anderson Air Force Base in Guam so strategic bombers, including B-2 and B-1 bombers, can be based there for faster deployment. The bomber forces will be part of Air Expeditionary Forces that are moved there routinely on temporary but regular deployment.

The defense official said the bomber forces, which are equipped with a large number of precision-guided bombs such as cruise missiles and Joint Direct Attack Munitions, are "creating a capability that is exponentially more powerful in a new location."

"I don't think that is missed by people [in the region]," the official said, noting that North Korea already has protested bomber deployments in Guam.

Additionally, the Pentagon plans to build a new long-range strategic bomber in the next 15 years that will have the capability to conduct deep strikes in Asia with a large number of precision-guided munitions.

The U.S. ground forces' role in the Asia strategy will include repositioning forces in the Western United States, Japan and Guam. The Pentagon plans to dispatch the headquarters of the Army's I Corps, now based at Fort Lewis, Wash., to Japan in the coming years to be ready to fight in Asia.

The Marines also are moving the headquarters element of the Marine force from Okinawa to Guam. The transfer is part of a force realignment in Japan, but a Marine general revealed last year that the deployment to Guam will have the added benefit of protecting the headquarters against a decapitating missile attack from China or North Korea.

Missile defenses also play a role in the strategy. The current system -- designed to stop long-range missiles from North Korea -- will be adapted in the coming years, both through U.S. enhancements and development of a Japanese missile defense system.

The force restructuring has been accompanied by public statements by high-ranking U.S. military and civilian defense officials who have tried to minimize the U.S. activities and emphasize that China, which itself is involved in an aggressive arms buildup, poses no immediate threat.

The low-key approach is similar to China's strategy of building up its forces in ways designed to avoid provoking the "hegemon," what China has used as code for the United States in its internal military and Communist Party writings. Outwardly, China continues to insist that its military and economic growth pose no threat.

"The Chinese, tragically, have brought this on themselves," said Michael Pillsbury, a China affairs specialist who first identified China's covert anti-U.S. strategy for the Pentagon several years ago. "Their history and culture make it impossible for China to accept American leadership and forces them to use secrecy and subterfuge in their buildup, while ignoring Secretary Rumsfeld's appeals for openness."

Other elements of the hedge strategy include development of systems that will be capable of countering Chinese space weapons, which are viewed as a future threat. The Pentagon also has directed the military to develop Chinese-language skills and to have a cadre of Chinese speakers available if the military needs to "surge" its ability to communicate in the language. The requirement was couched in terms of learning several other languages as priorities, as well, including Farsi and Central Asian languages.

Adm. William J. Fallon, commander of U.S. forces in the Pacific, declined to directly address the China elements of the hedge strategy. In an e-mail exchange, Adm. Fallon said the force "transformation actions presuppose neither a specific potential adversary nor discrete threat."

Military exercises in Asia also will play a key role in the hedge strategy. The Navy this summer plans the largest aircraft-carrier exercises in the Pacific in decades. Naval maneuvers slated to begin in June in the western Pacific will include three carrier strike groups. Each group includes at least three warships, an attack submarine and a support ship.

Two carrier groups then will participate in Pacific Rim exercises in July near Hawaii. Those will include forces from Australia, Japan, South Korea, Chile, Peru and other nations. An August naval exercise will include an Atlantic Fleet carrier.

Additional military exercises are being held with U.S. friends and allies. For example, the Navy's 7th Fleet currently holds 100 exercises per year and will increase that number. It will include exercises with India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Australia, the Philippines, South Korea and Japan.

"The Chinese or anybody else has to ask themselves: 'What is it the Americans are doing differently now with their carrier battle groups ... that allows them to do this now and will allow them to do it any time they want to?' " the senior defense official said.

The answer is different operating procedures, including a changed maintenance schedule and "crew swapping," in which crews on ships are replaced with fresh, land-based sailors to allow for longer deployments.

"You're creating a capability that you didn't have before just by the way that you're operating the same basket of assets you had before," the official said. "So this is a big signal. Now is this a hedge? I guess it's a hedge that says we can't predict where we're going to have to fight, so we're going to have to be organized differently."

All branches of the U.S. military also have been conducting secret war games that use China as an adversary. The war games have been kept secret to avoid alerting the Chinese.

Officially, the branches are told to conduct exercises at higher rates than they did in the past and to consider a range of adversaries, including China. The true purpose, however, is to be prepared to respond to a Chinese military move against Taiwan, an attempt by China to seize oil-rich territory in Russia or Southeast Asia, or to control strategic sea lanes from the Middle East to Asia, defense officials said.

Mr. Zoellick said his talks with the Chinese have been helpful in trying to persuade China to become a responsible "stakeholder" in the current U.S.-led international system but that Beijing's doubts remain.
The Chinese are wary of the current international system and recognize U.S. leadership of it but have not accepted the sole superpower role.

"I don't get a sense that they don't feel they can work with the United States," Mr. Zoellick said. "But I think they, of course, want to assess under what terms and whose rules." China's questions "really go more to stakeholder in an international system and who defines the system," he said.





Copyright © 2006 News World Communications, Inc. All rights reserved.

'Diplomatic' Terrorism- by Justin Raimondo

'Diplomatic' Terrorism- by Justin Raimondo

'Diplomatic' Terrorism Nuclear blackmail: The essence of U.S. foreign policy

by Justin Raimondo

Is anyone surprised that our Supreme Leader has refused to rule out nuking Iran? Asked if there was anything to Seymour Hersh's scoop revealing U.S. plans for a nuclear strike against Tehran, Bush replied: "All options are on the table. We want to solve this issue diplomatically and we're working hard to do so." All options? Including genocide? Well, uh, yes – but don't worry. We'll issue a good number of threats before we actually commit mass murder: we'll bellow and beat our chests, like King Kong atop the Empire State Building. Then we'll nuke 'em! That's "diplomacy" in the Age of Bush II. Bush says he plans to discuss the Iran issue in his talks with Chinese President Hu Jintao. One hopes the discussion will be informed by Mr. Jintao's knowledge of Chinese history, especially including Mao Tse-Tung's crazy-yet-plausible belief that China could survive a nuclear war and still come out on top. Maybe then the Americans will realize that someone, someday, will finally call their bluff. I think we have reason to be grateful, at least on this one occasion, for our president's crudity. His bluntness is a blessing. Now we know that, stripped of its moral pretensions, its "strategic doctrines," and its highfalutin' rhetoric, American foreign policy is nuclear blackmail, pure and simple. In the interest of parsimony, both budgetary and literary, let us dispense with the high-flown policy pronouncements, communiqués, and other effluvia of diplomatic parlance, and boil it down to a simple statement of unmistakable clarity: Defy us and we'll destroy you. There are, of course, degrees of destruction, and also various styles. There is economic warfare, ranging in intensity from the Iraq sanctions that Madeleine Albright infamously characterized as "worth it" – in spite of the horrific human toll, including half a million children – to the wrist-slapping diplomatic sanctions imposed on Belarus as punishment for President Lukashenko having won the election. This latter example blends into the realm of ideological warfare, aimed at provoking hatred and war hysteria at home, while rationalizing war preparations in the eyes of the world, and is usually carried out indirectly by the government's spear-carriers in the media. Reporters who take dictation from government officials, often their sources; columnists who function as courtiers; and lobbyists, especially those in the pay (or under the influence of) foreign governments – all these are the shock troops of the War Party's propaganda corps, whose function is to send out scouting parties in search of fresh conquests. The shooting begins only after the last volleys have been fired in the war on the home front over the future of America's foreign policy. Will we adopt a frankly terrorist doctrine that asserts a "right" to initiate force anywhere, at any time, against anyone for any – or no publicly revealed – reason? This is the question that confronts us as we begin to evaluate – or, rather, back away from in horror – the consequences of the so-called Bush Doctrine to date. Over 2,300 U.S. troops dead, tens of thousands horribly wounded. It's no wonder the U.S. military refuses to estimate the number of Iraqi dead and debilitated. After all, we can't expect every mass murderer to enumerate his own criminality – although some do. As the neocons try to beat the rap – in a court of law, as well as the court of public opinion – the debate hinges on the awareness and inherent skepticism of the American people when it comes to government. That's where Antiwar.com comes in. The War Party is relentless: no sooner had we invaded Iraq than we were already preparing for war against Iran, and now that we are moving against the mullahs one can only wonder which future targets are being contemplated: Damascus? Beirut? One is reminded of the most extravagant expression of neoconservative triumphalism, uttered by one Laurent Murawiec in those halcyon days when war advocates were confidently predicting the road to Baghdad would be strewn with rose petals. Murawiec, a former LaRouche cultist who somehow talked his way into the Rand Corporation, told members of the president's Foreign Policy Advisory Board that we ought to prepare an invasion of Saudi Arabia, adding with a flourish: "Iraq is the tactical pivot , Saudi Arabia the strategic pivot, Egypt the prize." As a pure expression of the brazen kookery, the odd mixture of naïveté and pure evil, that lies at the dark heart of neoconservative foreign policy doctrine, that statement has few equals. Murawiec was dismissed as a marginal crank at the time, but now that the administration is moving against Iran and rattling its saber elsewhere in the Middle East, one has to ask whether the inmates have taken over the asylum. In the Bizarro World we've fallen into, on account of the sheer force of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, such "logic" as Murawiec's makes perfect sense – that is, if you're as completely disconnected from reality as those strategic geniuses in the Pentagon. In the world of reality-as-it-is, however, the consequences of our crazed foreign policy continue to roll in, to our growing horror. How will the American people respond? If we mean to take our foreign policy – and our country – back from the little Napoleons [.pdf] who have seized the reins of power, we have to turn Murawiec's words on their heads, and realize that Iraq is the tactical pivot – and if we don't draw the right lessons from that disaster, we will live to repeat them. It's time to start identifying, blaming, and when appropriate prosecuting the gang that lied us into war. If we take Saudi Arabia as a metaphor for our relations with the whole of the Sunni Arab world, we have to realize what the furor over the Dubai ports deal really means: the start of a civilizational war that is not in our interest to launch. The strategic pivot of our struggle with Islamist extremism has to be an effort to isolate the Osama bin Ladens, not empower them. As for "the prize," it is not Egypt, but the reclaiming of our foreign policy and our government from those who purport to speak – and act – in our name. The reputation and moral standing of the United States has been badly damaged, but the destructive effects are not irreparable. We can win, because we have the truth on our side. Our main task is to get the truth out there – and that, my friends, is what Antiwar.com is all about.

Neil Young's protest album heads to Internet first on Yahoo! News

original

Neil Young's protest album heads to Internet first

By Steve GormanFri Apr 21, 10:09 PM ET

Neil Young's newly recorded protest album "Living With War," including a song calling for the impeachment of President Bush, will be posted for free Internet streaming next week, his label said on Friday.

Starting April 28, fans can log onto Young's Web site, www.neilyoung.com, and listen to the 10-track collection in its entirety, free of charge, said Bill Bentley, a spokesman for Warner Music Group's Reprise Records.

The album will first become commercially available as a digital download beginning May 2, "and we plan to get it into retail stores as soon after that as we can get them manufactured," Bentley said.

He said the label anticipates getting the album into retail outlets between May 5 and May 15. "Neil wants this album out there as soon as possible," Bentley added.

The Canadian-born Young, 60, who has tackled social and political themes through four decades as a singer-songwriter, wrote and recorded his latest studio offering over a two-week period this month, backed by a 100-member choir, according to his longtime manager, Elliot Roberts.

Much of the album conveys a sense of outrage, vowing repeatedly in the title track "to never kill again," mocking Bush's conduct of the Iraq war in "Shock and Awe" and calling for his removal from office in a provocative song titled "Let's Impeach the President."

The album also strikes a chord of empathy with soldiers separated from their families, and features lyrics ridiculing America's consumer culture, political corruption and religious fundamentalism.

Juxtaposed to "Let's Impeach the President" is one of the album's more hopeful selections, "Lookin' for a Leader," with such lyrics as: "Someone walks among us ... and I hope he hears the call. And maybe it's a woman, or a black man after all."

The album closes with an a capella version of "America the Beautiful."

Young, who voiced support for Bush's efforts to expand law-enforcement powers in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks, acknowledged in published remarks on Friday the provocative nature of his latest work.

"You're always going to rub someone the wrong way when you sing, 'let's impeach the president,"' he told the Los Angeles Times. "But that's what this country's all about -- being able to express your views."

Young's new set comes just seven months after the release of his last album, "Prairie Wind," which has sold about 450,000 U.S. copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

The Raw Story | Cheney has tapped Iranian expatriate, arms dealer to surveil discussions with Iran, officials say----Manucher Ghorbanifar

Cheney has tapped Iranian expatriate, arms dealer to surveil discussions with Iran, officials say

Larisa Alexandrovna
Published: Thursday April 20, 2006
original



The Department of Defense and Vice President Dick Cheney have retained the services of Iran-Contra arms dealer and discredited intelligence asset Manucher Ghorbanifar as their “man on the ground,” in order to report on any interaction and attempts at negotiations between Iranian officials and US ambassador to Iraq, Zelmay Khalilzad, current and former intelligence officials say.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, three intelligence sources identified the Iran-Contra middleman as having been put back on the payroll, acting as a human intelligence asset and monitoring any movement in discussions about Iran’s alleged burgeoning nuclear weapons program.

“Khalilzad has been authorized to enter into discussions with the Iranians over the issue of stability inside Iraq,” one former intelligence source said.

These discussions, however, are now on hold for unspecified reasons. Sources close to the UN Security Council and a former high ranking intelligence official say that this latest failed attempt to bring Iran to the table is part of an ongoing attempt by Cheney and Rumsfeld to squash diplomatic activities.

Another intelligence source confirmed the spiking of diplomatic action on Cheney’s behalf, explaining that the Bush administration sees such talks as a “sign of weakness.”

Asked if Ghorbanifar was essentially being employed as a spy, one former senior counterintelligence official said, "You could put it that way."

A former high ranking state department official, however, doubted that the Office of the Vice President would employ Ghorbanifar directly.

“In my experience it would be highly unusual and even extraordinary if the Office of the Vice President would have such activities,” the ex-State Department official said. Yet the source added that the current Vice Presidency is in itself “unusual” and “extraordinary.”

Cheney’s office did not return calls seeking comment for this article.

As reported by RAW STORY last Thursday, the Defense Department has created a special operations arm of various Iranian dissidents, using terror group Mujahedeen-e Khalq to conduct operations on the ground in Iran. According to current and former intelligence officials, the latest revelations of Ghorbanifar’s involvement again illustrate that Cheney and the Pentagon continue to work on the periphery of protocol in order to bypass US intelligence agencies and resources.

Reports of the Bush administration’s interest in meeting with Iranian officials continue to suggest that it is Iran that is pushing back against diplomatic talks. Yet all three intelligence sources and sources close to the UN Security Council say it is the US that is squashing attempts at talks between the two nations.

Earlier this month, for example, the New York Times reported that Iran’s UN Ambassador, Javad Zarif, wanted discussions. In a New York Times op-ed, Zarif contended that Iran is committed to nuclear nonproliferation and eager for talks.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Peter Hoekstra (R-MI) approved using Ghorbanifar as an intermediary, intelligence sources say. Hoekstra attended at least one meeting in Paris with Curt Weldon and Harold Rhode to meet with Ghorbanifar.

“Hoekstra okayed these channels,” one intelligence source said. “He gave his blessing.”

In response to an email from RAW STORY, the House Intelligence Committee’s Republican spokesman Jamal Ware said he was out of the office and unable to discuss this issue with Congressman Hoekstra, adding: it was “doubtful we would have a comment either way.”

Iran Contra middleman

If these allegations are true, Ghorbanifar’s recruitment reinstates him to a position he held during the Iran Contra affair, when he was implicated in the scandal of selling arms to Iran in order to fund a right wing terrorist group, the Contras, who were battling the democratically-elected Sandinista government in Nicaragua.

Ghorbanifar was also present at discussions in Rome in 2001 – talks which have received much attention because they were attended by Pentagon and Iranian officials. According to neoconservative Michael Ledeen, who participated in the talks, the topic was Iran. A second set of meetings later took place in Paris.

“The Rome meetings had nothing whatsoever to do with Iraq, but with Iran and Afghanistan," Ledeen told RAW STORY.

In an exclusive interview with Newsweek late last year, Ghorbanifar stated that the meetings in Rome and Paris were about regime change in Iran. The meetings included Larry Franklin, a Pentagon Iran analyst who has been convicted for passing secrets to an Israeli lobby, and Harold Rhode, a Defense Department consultant also under investigation in the case.

“Ghorbanifar, a former Iranian spy who helped launch the Iran-contra affair, says one of the things he discussed with Defense officials Harold Rhode and Larry Franklin at meetings in Rome in December 2001 (and in Paris last June with only Rhode) was regime change in Iran,” Newsweek wrote.

Ledeen says that Ghorbanifar’s role in the Rome meeting he attended was that of “occasional translator” and “organizer”.

“Please note, once again, that Ghorbanifar was not an active participant in the December, 2001, meetings in Rome,” says Ledeen.

“In all the discussions I attended, there was no discussion of Iraq; we talked about Iran, and particularly about Iran's activities in Afghanistan, aimed at American forces there,” he added.

“Ghorbanifar has never made a secret of his desire to rid his country of the mullahs' tyranny,” Ledeen continued. “He has said that constantly since the first day I met him, in 1985. It shouldn't surprise anyone to hear that he may have spoken about that with US Government officials, in Rome and elsewhere. But if that happened, it was outside the meetings I attended.”

As previously reported by RAW STORY, the Paris meetings, which were also attended by Congressman Curt Weldon (R-PA) on at least two occasions in the spring of 2003, involved attempts by Ghorbanifar to advance false intelligence in order to implicate Iran in a bizarre uranium theft claim. The assertions were debunked by the CIA and by other US intelligence and military experts.

According to two of the three intelligence sources, the arms dealer was brought in to observe attempts by Khalilzad or Iranian officials at diplomatic activities and report back to Rumsfeld and/or Cheney through whomever is “holding” Ghorbanifar, sources say.

FEMA Wants $4.7M Back From Katrina Victims on Yahoo! News

Print Story: FEMA Wants $4.7M Back From Katrina Victims on Yahoo! News

FEMA Wants $4.7M Back From Katrina Victims

By RON HARRIST, Associated Press WriterFri Apr 21, 7:18 PM ET

Thousands of Gulf Coast residents have been told they must repay millions of dollars in federal Hurricane Katrina benefits that were excessive or, in some cases, fraudulent.

In Mississippi alone, the Federal Emergency Management Agency said it is seeking $4.7 million from 2,044 people, telling them in a form letter that they have four months to repay or set up a payment plan.

Some storm victims got duplicate or extra benefits because of FEMA errors, FEMA spokesman Eugene Brezany said, and others might have received benefits for expenses that later were reimbursed by insurance settlements.

Some others benefited "by intentional misrepresentation" or the mistaken belief that secondary residences qualified for payments, he said.

More people could get repayment notices as more applications are reviewed, Brezany said. Recipients could have received $2,000 to $26,200.

People who get the form letter have 30 days to respond. If they don't meet the four-month deadline, the U.S. Treasury will attempt to collect the money, Brezany said.

James McIntyre, FEMA spokesman for Louisiana, could not immediately provide figures for his state or others hit by Katrina. Aaron Walker, the agency's chief spokesman, said in an e-mail he also could not immediately respond.

The form letter sent to the aid recipients said that they could appeal the charges. Even so, it said, "FEMA strongly encourages" them to pay the debt or set up a repayment plan to avoid being charged penalties or interest in case the appeal fails.

Federal auditors have faulted FEMA for much of the benefit abuse after last fall's hurricanes, citing an inadequate accounting system. The federal Government Accountability Office has said thousands of inappropriate payments were made because people could repeatedly apply for and collect benefits.

In February, audits by the General Accounting Office and the Department of Homeland Security found that as many as 900,000 of the 2.5 million applicants who received aid under FEMA's emergency cash assistance program — which included $2,000 debit cards given to evacuees — were based on duplicate or invalid Social Security numbers, or false addresses and names.

Also in February, the Justice Department said federal prosecutors charged 212 people with fraud, theft and other counts in scams related to Gulf Coast hurricanes.

___

Associated Press Writer Brett Martel in New Orleans contributed to this report.

___

On the Net:

http://www.fema.gov

Iraqi Lawmakers End Months of Deadlock on Yahoo! News

original

Iraqi Lawmakers End Months of Deadlock

By QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA, Associated Press Writer 37 minutes ago

Iraq's president formally designated Shiite politician Jawad al-Maliki to form a new government Saturday, starting a process aimed at healing ethnic and religious wounds and pulling the nation out of insurgency and sectarian strife.

The move ends months of political deadlock among Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds that threatened to drag the nation into civil war. Al-Maliki has 30 days to present his Cabinet to parliament for approval.

Parliament elected President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, to a second term and gave the post of parliament speaker to Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, a Sunni Arab. Al-Mashhadani's two deputies were to be Khalid al-Attiyah, a Shiite, and Aref Tayfour, a Kurd.

The tough-talking al-Maliki was nominated by the Shiites on Friday after outgoing Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari gave up his bid for another term. Al-Jaafari's attempt to stay in office was adamantly opposed by Sunnis and Kurds, causing a monthslong deadlock while the country's security crisis worsened in the wake of December's election.

U.S. and Iraqi officials hope that a national unity government representing Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds will be able to quell both the Sunni-led insurgency and bloody Shiite-Sunni violence that has raged during the political uncertainty. If it succeeds, it could enable the U.S. to begin withdrawing its 133,000 troops.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the Bush administration is hopeful that the latest political developments in Iraq will lead to significant progress in forming a permanent government.

"We hope to see good progress in the coming days," McClellan told reporters traveling with President Bush to California. "We'll be watching."

Suspected insurgents, meanwhile, set off two bombs in a public market in central Iraq, killing at least two Iraqis and wounding 17. The second blast was timed to hit emergency crews arriving at the scene.

The first bomb exploded at 7:30 a.m. in the middle of Muqdadiyah, about 60 miles northeast of Baghdad, causing a large fire, police said.

When fire engines arrived, the second bomb went off, killing a firefighter and a civilian, and wounding 17 civilians, police said.

The bullet-ridden bodies of 10 Iraqis were found in and around Baghdad, many blindfolded with their hands and legs bound in rope. Some appeared to have been tortured, and one had been decapitated, police said.

Police also found a body with signs of torture floating in the Tigris River in Kut, 100 miles southeast of Baghdad, said Hadi al-Ittabi, an employee of the Kut Forensic Center.

In Baghdad, gunmen in a speeding car sprayed a police patrol with machine-gun fire, killing one officer, police said. Gunmen killed a civilian riding in a car, and a roadside bomb wounded two policemen, police said.

On Friday, at least 22 Iraqis were killed, including six in a car bombing in Tal Afar in western Iraq and six off-duty Iraqi soldiers slain in Beiji in northern Iraq, police said.

An Australian soldier shot himself in the head in a "tragic accident" inside Baghdad's Green Zone housing the U.S. Embassy and Iraqi government buildings, Australian defense officials said Saturday.

He was the Australian military's first casualty since the Iraq war began in 2003. Last year, an Australian-British citizen serving in Britain's Royal Air Force was killed.

Al-Maliki has a reputation as a hard-line, outspoken defender of the Shiite stance — raising questions over whether he will be able to negotiate the delicate sectarian balancing act.

From exile in Syria in the 1980s and 1990s, he directed Dawa guerrillas fighting Saddam Hussein's regime. Since returning home after Saddam's fall, he has been a prominent member of the commission purging former Baath Party officials from the military and government.

Sunni Arabs, who made up the backbone of Saddam's ousted party, deeply resent the commission.

Al-Maliki also was a tough negotiator in drawn-out deliberations over the new constitution passed last year despite Sunni Arab objections. He resisted U.S. efforts to put more Sunnis on the drafting committee as well as Sunni efforts to water down provisions giving Shiites and Kurds the power to form semiautonomous mini-states in the north and south.

Sunnis and Kurds blamed the rise of sectarian tensions on al-Jaafari, saying he failed to rein in Shiite militias and Interior Ministry commandos, accused by the Sunnis of harboring death squads. Those parties refused to join any government headed by al-Jaafari.

Al-Jaafari, prime minister since April 2005, was nominated by the alliance for a second term in February by a one-vote margin, relying on support from radical, anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Al-Jaafari had stalwartly rejected pressure to give up the post until Iraq's most powerful Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, sent word that he should go. On Thursday, al-Jaafari gave the alliance the go-ahead to pick a new nominee.

The new prime minister nominee will now face the task of putting together a national unity government, meaning divvying up the ministries among Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish parties.

One source of conflict is likely to be the powerful Interior Ministry, which currently is held by SCIRI. Sunnis probably will push for a change and demand the uprooting of Shiite militias from the ministry's security forces.

US intel report: Major increase in terrorist incidents | csmonitor.com

US intel report: Major increase in terrorist incidents
But experts say a common definition of terrorism is a great challenge and a global issue.
By Tom Regan | csmonitor.com
original

In a report to be released next week, US government figures will show that the number of terrorist attacks in the world jumped sharply in 2005, totalling more than 10,000 for the first time. That is almost triple the number of terrorist attacks in 2004 -- 3,194. Knight Ridder's Washington bureau reports that counterterrorism experts say that there are two reasons for the dramatic increase: a broader definition of what consitutes a terrorist attack, and the war in Iraq.

More than half the fatalities from terrorism worldwide last year occurred in Iraq, said a counterterrorism official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the data haven't been made public. Roughly 85 percent of the US citizens who died from terrorism during the year died in Iraq. The figures cover only noncombatants and thus don't include combat deaths of US, Iraqi and other coalition soldiers.

"There's no question that the level of terrorist attacks in Iraq was up substantially," said the official, who's familiar with the methods used by the National Counterterrorism Center to track terrorist trends. The center is part of the US intelligence community.

Knight Ridder also reports that the new definition was used in 2004, but 2005 was the first year that analysts had more time to use the new method. In past years, only terrorist attacks that involved people from more than one country were counted. But officials realized this would, for instance, leave out incidents like the one in the Philippines where terrorists sank a ferry killing 132 Filipinos.

The latest figures will be released in conjunction with the US State Department's annual report on terrorism.



04/20/06
Iraq corruption probe to expand
04/19/06
Israel to forgo military response to bombing
04/18/06
Report: Blair will not back Iran strike




Sign up to be notified daily:


Find out more.

Subscribe via RSS Feed:
Feed for Daily Update (RSS file) What is this?
Add to My Yahoo!
Add to Google
Subscribe with Bloglines
Add to My AOL

Earlier this month, the EUobserver.com reported that two officials from the US State Department slammed Europe's policies on the integration of Muslim communities into broader communities, saying that Europe's failure to do so is creating a "particularly dangerous mix." Daniel Fried, the undersecretary for European affairs, told a US Senate committee that "the failure to integrate Muslim minorities in Europe constitutes a security risk for the US."

Mr Fried said unemployment, discrimination and lack of integration among Europe’s Muslim communities had created an "audience" open to extremist messages, according to Reuters. He added that some European countries’ far-reaching freedom of expression laws helped radical elements to spread anti-democratic ideologies.

"Add to this a deeply negative perception and a distorted perception of US foreign policy among Western European Muslim communities, and relative freedom of movement across the Atlantic, and you have a particularly dangerous mix," he said.

Both European and US experts also say that a key difference is that what the US considers terrorism, Europe often considers a criminal act.

The Philippines' Sun Star reports that a universal definition of what constitutes terrorism was discussed Friday at the Counter-terrorism Experts’ Conference being held in Cebu, attended by 500 people from around the world. Nobel Peace Prize laureate Jose Ramos-Horta, minister for foreign affairs, referred to a paragraph defining terrorism in a draft act before the Philippine House of Representatives.

"Terrorism is the premeditated, threatened, actual use of violence, force or by any other means of destruction perpetrated against person/s, property/ies, or the environment, with the intention of creating of sowing a slate of danger, panic, fear or chaos to the general public, group of persons or particular person, or of coercing and intimidating the government to do or abstain from doing an act,” the draft stated. Horta said in a press conference that the draft “provides useful contribution towards the definition of terrorism.”

The Sun Star reports that Mr. Horta also said that government had to be wary "not [to] trample on human rights as they seek to crush terrorist cells". He said that putting a "'greater premium on sophisticated law enforcement and intelligence operations' would help to both force more terrorists out into the open, and protect citizens caught in the middle."

In a United Press International opinion piece last week on the problem of coming up with a universal definition of terrorism, Jennie Kim writes that there are real-world consequences of the application of any definition of terrorism.

Distinguishing between terrorists and legitimate resistance groups remains notoriously difficult in the international arena. Witness the United Nations' ongoing effort to define the term without neglecting "the legitimate right of peoples under occupation to struggle for their independence and in defen(se) of their right to self-determination."

Further complications arise for the United States when its designated foreign terrorist groups – such as the ANC in 1980s South Africa, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Hamas in the Palestinian Territories – come to be accepted as legitimate political actors by both their domestic constituents and international players ...

These conflicting definitions represent more than a problem of semantics – they reflect decades of struggle, bloodshed and humiliation. History itself imbues these words with layers of sometimes conflicting meanings, and there is little reason to believe a resolution acceptable to all will be reached soon.

In an opinion piece for the South Korean news site, OhMyNews.com, Amin George Forji argues that this lack of agreement raises the question of whether there can be a real definiton of terrorism at all.

As Jarna Petman [Research Fellow at The Erik Castrén Institute of International Law and Human Rights, Faculty of Law, University of Helsinki, Finland] writes, the problem with defining terrorism is this. On the one hand, any such definition will have to encompass any serious enemy that one might have in the future. But the future remains unknown and the experience of the past is insufficient to grasp it. She asked the following hypothetical questions. What if one's Mujahedeen friend turns into tomorrow's Taliban adversary? Or if one's former Kosovo Liberation army ally is transformed into a saboteur of one's future governance plans? So the definition would have to be open-ended enough so as to govern future perceptions of the enemy. On the other hand, it should not be such as to enable the definition of one's own action, or those of one's ally, as terrorism.

But again, she adds, it is impossible to know what kinds of action may be needed in order to protect important values in the future. What if one's country is invaded by a foreign occupier and one needs to set up a clandestine organization of military resistance? Such a definition should not cover such actions. In other words, any definition should be binding so as to bite hard on the acts of one's adversaries, but open-ended as to be adjustable as needed in changing circumstances. This analogy leads us to the next problematic (perhaps the most outstanding) question when it comes to defining terrorism: Is one man's terrorist another man's freedom fighter?

Finally, the Chinese news agency Xinhua reports that Russia and NATO announced Thursday they will make joint efforts to fight international threats, including terrorism and criminal activities.

Here it comes - Pravda.Ru

original


The price of gold has climbed to over US$ 600 an ounce. Many are saying this is because of the pending war with Iran. However, this leap in gold prices has little to do with a real or imagined war with Iran, it has to do with greed.

Remember the Bruce Willis movie, DIE HARD 3, where 'terrorists' stole dump-trucks full of gold from the N.Y. Federal Reserve Bank that belonged to different foreign countries? Think what that gold was doing there in the first place: in 1973 all the OPEC member countries agreed with the USA to sell OPEC oil only for U.S. dollars. This forced every nation in the world to buy U.S. federal reserve 'dollars' in order to purchase OPEC oil for import. They have been exchanging their gold for our otherwise worthless 'dollars' for years, having no other choice in order to import critical oil.

In March of 2006, Iran broke the OPEC oil-for-U.S. dollars-only agreement by offering oil on the Paris stock market for EUROdollars. Other OPEC countries fed up with U.S. hegemony are sure to follow. China and Japan, with their wallets stuffed with yuan and yen, are cheerfully holding Iran's coat while waiting for the dust to settle.

Since our "federal reserve notes" have no value unless all countries are forced to buy them at economic gunpoint, Iran is the leak in the dike. If the USA doesn't stick its finger in it, it will definitely grow. Once other nations see Iran getting away with selling her oil for real money, they will stop buying U.S. dollars and the USA will be flooded with inflation because of her idiocy in having federal reserve notes backed by nothing.

Inevitably, a major OPEC producer, Iran, just said NO!, and is selling its oil for more viable currency, with the benefit of wrecking the US economy far more than a thousand attacks on U.S. buildings could yield. Even our allies are rubbing their hands in glee as they eagerly await us to go down in economic flames.

Saddam Hussein attempted to sell his oil for other than U.S. dollars, and look what happened to him under the false excuse that he had "WMD's." Now Iran is attempting the same thing, so it looks like we might attack Iran under the false excuse that they may be thinking of developing breeder reactors in a few years that will take another 3-7 years to produce fissionable uranium and then develop a viable delivery system. But just THINKING of it years in the future is an excuse for war today, because when all is done, we gotta protect American dollar-based oil companies and their shareholders which comprise all the movers, shakers and campaign donors in the USA. And if it takes killing another 50,000 of your teenage children to protect their estates and trust funds, hey, it's worth it.

All across the U.S. patriotic Americans are being appointed to manage local draft boards by Duuhbya & Rummy who "...have no plans for a Draft." Yet Martha Stewart they send to prison for lying.

So, please pass this info along and tell people to get ready for:

1.
inflation,
2.
another war ( Iran has a pact with China ....Armageddon?), and
3.
the unconstitutional and unconscionable Draft that wants to kill your children for profit.

The government says to the people, "Just say NO to drugs." When will the people finally learn that they are less free than 40 other countries and 'Just say NO to government'?

Jack Duggan

Discuss this article on Pravda.Ru English Forum

Latest on the Iran Oil Bourse and collapsing $ story

WHATREALLYHAPPENED.COM

Latest on the Iran Oil Bourse and collapsing $ story

Saddam Hussein attempted to sell his oil for other than U.S. dollars, and look what happened to him under the false excuse that he had "WMD's." Now Iran is attempting the same thing, so it looks like we might attack Iran under the false excuse that they may be thinking of developing breeder reactors in a few years that will take another 3-7 years to produce fissionable uranium and then develop a viable delivery system. But just THINKING of it years in the future is an excuse for war today, because when all is done, we gotta protect American dollar-based oil companies and their shareholders which comprise all the movers, shakers and campaign donors in the USA. And if it takes killing another 50,000 of your teenage children to protect their estates and trust funds, hey, it's worth it.

Posted Apr 21, 2006 10:12 AM PST
Category: IRAN

Reuters AlertNet - Russia must freeze arms deals with Iran, says U.S.

original

Source: Reuters
WASHINGTON, April 21 (Reuters) - Russia must stop any arms deals with Iran and other nations must bar the sale of dual-use technologies to Tehran to put pressure on Iran to abandon its nuclear program, a senior U.S. officiaL said on Friday

"It's time for countries to use their leverage against Iran," said senior State Department official Nicholas Burns, adding: "We think its very important that countries like Russia freeze any arms sales planned for Iran."

Does Iran's President Want Israel Wiped Of The Map - Does He Deny Te Holocaust?

original

Does Iran's President Want Israel Wiped Off The Map - Does He Deny The Holocaust?

An analysis of media rhetoric on its way to war against Iran - Commenting on the alleged statements of Iran's President Ahmadinejad .

By Anneliese Fikentscher and Andreas Neumann
Translation to English: Erik Appleby

04/19/06 "Kein Krieg!" -- -- - "But now that I'm on Iran, the threat to Iran, of course -- (applause) -- the threat from Iran is, of course, their stated objective to destroy our strong ally Israel. That's a threat, a serious threat. It's a threat to world peace; it's a threat, in essence, to a strong alliance. I made it clear, I'll make it clear again, that we will use military might to protect our ally, Israel, and -- (applause.)" George W. Bush, US-President, 2006-03-20 in Cleveland (Ohio) in an off-the-cuff speech (source: www.whitehouse.gov) But why does Bush speak of Iran's objective to destroy Israel?

Does Iran's President wants Israel wiped off the map?

To raze Israel to the ground, to batter down, to destroy, to annihilate, to liquidate, to erase Israel, to wipe it off the map - this is what Iran's President demanded - at least this is what we read about or heard of at the end of October 2005. Spreading the news was very effective. This is a declaration of war they said. Obviously government and media were at one with their indignation. It goes around the world.

But let's take a closer look at what Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said. It is a merit of the 'New York Times' that they placed the complete speech at our disposal. Here's an excerpt from the publication dated 2005-10-30:

"They say it is not possible to have a world without the United States and Zionism. But you know that this is a possible goal and slogan. Let's take a step back. [[[We had a hostile regime in this country which was undemocratic, armed to the teeth and, with SAVAK, its security apparatus of SAVAK [the intelligence bureau of the Shah of Iran's government] watched everyone. An environment of terror existed.]]] When our dear Imam [Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Iranian revolution] said that the regime must be removed, many of those who claimed to be politically well-informed said it was not possible. All the corrupt governments were in support of the regime when Imam Khomeini started his movement. [[[All the Western and Eastern countries supported the regime even after the massacre of September 7 [1978] ]]] and said the removal of the regime was not possible. But our people resisted and it is 27 years now that we have survived without a regime dependent on the United States. The tyranny of the East and the West over the world should have to end, but weak people who can see only what lies in front of them cannot believe this. Who would believe that one day we could witness the collapse of the Eastern Empire? But we could watch its fall in our lifetime. And it collapsed in a way that we have to refer to libraries because no trace of it is left. Imam [Khomeini] said Saddam must go and he said he would grow weaker than anyone could imagine. Now you see the man who spoke with such arrogance ten years ago that one would have thought he was immortal, is being tried in his own country in handcuffs and shackles [[[by those who he believed supported him and with whose backing he committed his crimes]]]. Our dear Imam said that the occupying regime must be wiped off the map and this was a very wise statement. We cannot compromise over the issue of Palestine. Is it possible to create a new front in the heart of an old front. This would be a defeat and whoever accepts the legitimacy of this regime [Israel] has in fact, signed the defeat of the Islamic world. Our dear Imam targeted the heart of the world oppressor in his struggle, meaning the occupying regime. I have no doubt that the new wave that has started in Palestine, and we witness it in the Islamic world too, will eliminate this disgraceful stain from the Islamic world."
(source: www.nytimes.com, based on a publication of 'Iranian Students News Agency' (ISNA) -- insertions by the New York Times in squared brackets -- passages in triple squared brackets will be left blank in the MEMRI version printed below)

It's becoming clear. The statements of the Iranian President have been reflected by the media in a manipulated way. Iran's President betokens the removal of the regimes, that are in power in Israel and in the USA, to be possible aim for the future. This is correct. But he never demands the elimination or annihilation of Israel. He reveals that changes are potential. The Shah-Regime being supported by the USA in its own country has been vanquished. The eastern governance of the Soviet Union collapsed. Saddam Hussein's dominion drew to a close. Referring to this he voices his aspiration that changes will also be feasible in Israel respectively in Palestine. He adduces Ayatollah Khomeini referring to the Shah-Regime who in this context said that the regime (meaning the Shah-Regime) should be removed.

Certainly, Ahmadinejad translates this quotation about a change of regime into the occupied Palestine. This has to be legitimate. To long for modified political conditions in a country is a world-wide day-to-day business by all means. But to commute a demand for removal of a 'regime' into a demand for removal of a state is serious deception and dangerous demagogy.

This is one chapter of the war against Iran that has already begun with the words of Georg Meggle, professor of philosophy at the university of Leipzig - namely with the probably most important phase, the phase of propaganda.

Marginally we want to mention that it was the former US Vice-Minister of Defence and current President of the World Bank, Paul D. Wolfowitz, who in Sept. 2001 talked about ending states in public and without any kind of awe. And it was the father of George W. Bush who started the discussion about a winnable nuclear war if only the survival of an elite is assured.

Let's pick an example: the German online-news-magazine tagesschau.de writes the following about Iran's president on 2005-10-27: "There is no doubt: the new wave of assaults in Palestine will erase the stigma in countenance of the Islamic world." Instead of using the original word 'wave' they write 'wave of assaults'. This replacement of the original text is what we call disinformation. E.g. it would be correct to say: "The new movement in Palestine will erase the stain of disgrace from the Islamic world." Additionally this statement refers to the occupation regime mentioned in the previous sentence.

As a precaution we will examine a different translation of the speech - a version prepared by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), located in Washington:

"They [ask]: 'Is it possible for us to witness a world without America and Zionism?' But you had best know that this slogan and this goal are attainable, and surely can be achieved. [[[...]]] "'When the dear Imam [Khomeini] said that [the Shah's] regime must go, and that we demand a world without dependent governments, many people who claimed to have political and other knowledge [asked], 'Is it possible [that the Shah's regime can be toppled]?' That day, when Imam [Khomeini] began his movement, all the powers supported [the Shah's] corrupt regime [[[...]]] and said it was not possible. However, our nation stood firm, and by now we have, for 27 years, been living without a government dependent on America. Imam [Khomeni] said: 'The rule of the East [U.S.S.R.] and of the West [U.S.] should be ended.' But the weak people who saw only the tiny world near them did not believe it. Nobody believed that we would one day witness the collapse of the Eastern Imperialism [i.e. the U.S.S.R], and said it was an iron regime. But in our short lifetime we have witnessed how this regime collapsed in such a way that we must look for it in libraries, and we can find no literature about it. Imam [Khomeini] said that Saddam [Hussein] must go, and that he would be humiliated in a way that was unprecedented. And what do you see today? A man who, 10 years ago, spoke as proudly as if he would live for eternity is today chained by the feet, and is now being tried in his own country [[[...]]] Imam [Khomeini] said: 'This regime that is occupying Qods [Jerusalem] must be eliminated from the pages of history.' This sentence is very wise. The issue of Palestine is not an issue on which we can compromise. Is it possible that an [Islamic] front allows another front [i.e. country] to arise in its [own] heart? This means defeat, and he who accepts the existence of this regime [i.e. Israel] in fact signs the defeat of the Islamic world. In his battle against the World of Arrogance, our dear Imam [Khomeini] set the regime occupying Qods [Jerusalem] as the target of his fight. I do not doubt that the new wave which has begun in our dear Palestine and which today we are also witnessing in the Islamic world is a wave of morality which has spread all over the Islamic world. Very soon, this stain of disgrace [i.e. Israel] will vanish from the center of the Islamic world - and this is attainable."

(source: http://memri.org, based on the publication of 'Iranian Students News Agency' (ISNA) -- insertions by MEMRI in squared brackets -- missing passages compared to the 'New York Times' in triple squared brackets)

The term 'map' to which the media refer at length does not even appear. Whereas the 'New York Times' said: "Our dear Imam said that the occupying regime must be wiped off the map" the version by MEMRI is: "Imam [Khomeini] said: This regime that is occupying Qods [Jerusalem] must be eliminated from the pages of history."

MEMRI added the following prefixed formulation to their translation as a kind of title: "Very Soon, This Stain of Disgrace [i.e. Israel] Will Be Purged From the Center of the Islamic World - and This is Attainable". Thereby they take it out of context by using the insertion 'i.e. Israel' they distort the meaning on purpose. The temporal tapering 'very soon' does not appear in the NY-Times-translation either. Besides it is striking that MEMRI deleted all passages in their translation which characterize the US-supported Shah-Regime as a regime of terror and at the same time show the true character of US-American policy.

An independent translation of the original (like the version published by ISNA) yields that Ahmadinejad does not use the term 'map'. He quotes Ayatollah Khomeini's assertion that the occupation regime must vanish from this world - literally translated: from the arena of times. Correspondingly: there is no space for an occupation regime in this world respectively in this time. The formulation 'wipe off the map' used by the 'New York Times' is a very free and aggravating interpretation which is equivalent to 'razing something to the ground' or 'annihilating something'. The downwelling translation, first into English ('wipe off the map'), then from English to German - and all literally ('von der Landkarte löschen') - makes us stride away from the original more and more. The perfidious thing about this translation is that the expression 'map' can only be used in one (intentional) way: a state can be removed from a map but not a regime, about which Ahmadinejad is actually speaking.

Again following the independent translation: "I have no doubt that the new movement taking place in our dear Palestine is a spiritual movement which is spanning the entire Islamic world and which will soon remove this stain of disgrace from the Islamic world".

It must be allowed to ask how it is possible that 'spirtual movement' resp. 'wave of morality' (as translated by MEMRI) and 'wave of assaults' can be equated and translated (like e.g tagesschau.de published it).

Does Iran's President deny the Holocaust?

"The German government condemned the repetitive offending anti-Israel statements by Ahmadinejad to be shocking. Such behaviour is not tolerable, Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier stated. [...] Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel proclaimed Ahmadinejad's statements to be 'inconceivable'" (published by tagesschau.de 2005-12-14.

But not only the German Foreign Minister Steinmeier and the Federal Chancellor Merkel allege this, but the Bild-Zeitung, tagesschau.de, parts of the peace movement, US-President George W. Bush, the 'Papers for German and international politics', CNN, the Heinrich-Böll-Foundation, almost the entire world does so, too: Iran's President Ahmadinejad denies the Holocaust.

What is this assertion based on? In substance it is based on dispatches of 2 days - 2005-12-14 and 2006-02-11.

"The Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has stepped up his verbal attacks against Israel and the Western states and has denied the Holocaust. Instead of making Israel's attacks against Palestine a subject of discussion 'the Western states devote their energy to the fairy-tale of the massacre against the Jews', Ahmadinejad said on Wednesday in a speech at Zahedan in the south-east of Iran which was broadcasted directly by the news-channel Khabar. That day he stated that if the Western states really believe in the assassination of six million Jews in W.W. II they should put a piece of land in Europe, in the USA, Canada or Alaska at Israel's disposal." - dispatch of the German press agency DPA, 2005-12-14.

The German TV-station n24 spreads the following on 2006-12-14 using the title 'Iran's President calls the Holocaust a myth': "The Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has stepped up his verbal attacks against Israel and called the Holocaust a 'myth' used as a pretext by the Europeans to found a Jewish state in the center of the Islamic world . 'In the name of the Holocaust they have created a myth and regard it to be worthier than God, religion and the prophets' the Iranian head of state said."

The Iranian press agency IRNA renders Ahmadinejad on 2005-12-14 as follows: "'If the Europeans are telling the truth in their claim that they have killed six million Jews in the Holocaust during the World War II - which seems they are right in their claim because they insist on it and arrest and imprison those who oppose it, why the Palestinian nation should pay for the crime. Why have they come to the very heart of the Islamic world and are committing crimes against the dear Palestine using their bombs, rockets, missiles and sanctions.' [...] 'If you have committed the crimes so give a piece of your land somewhere in Europe or America and Canada or Alaska to them to set up their own state there.' [...] Ahmadinejad said some have created a myth on holocaust and hold it even higher than the very belief in religion and prophets [...] The president further said, 'If your civilization consists of aggression, displacing the oppressed nations, suppressing justice-seeking voices and spreading injustice and poverty for the majority of people on the earth, then we say it out loud that we despise your hollow civilization.'"

There again we find the quotation already rendered by n24: "In the name of the Holocaust they created a myth." We can see that this is completely different from what is published by e.g. the DPA - the massacre against the Jews is a fairy-tale. What Ahmadinejad does is not denying the Holocaust. No! It is dealing out criticism against the mendacity of the imperialistic powers who use the Holocaust to muzzle critical voices and to achieve advantages concerning the legitimization of a planned war. This is criticism against the exploitation of the Holocaust.

CNN (2005-12-15) renders as follows: "If you have burned the Jews why don't you give a piece of Europe, the United States, Canada or Alaska to Israel. Our question is, if you have committed this huge crime, why should the innocent nation of Palestine pay for this crime?"

The Washingtonian ''Middle East Media Research Institute' (MEMRI) renders Ahmadinejad's statements from 2005-12-14 as follows: "...we ask you: if you indeed committed this great crime, why should the oppressed people of Palestine be punished for it? * [...] If you committed a crime, you yourselves should pay for it. Our offer was and remains as follows: If you committed a crime, it is only appropriate that you place a piece of your land at their disposal - a piece of Europe, of America, of Canada, or of Alaska - so they can establish their own state. Rest assured that if you do so, the Iranian people will voice no objection."

The MEMRI-rendering uses the relieving translation 'great crime' and misappropriates the following sentence at the * marked passage: "Why have they come to the very heart of the Islamic world and are committing crimes against the dear Palestine using their bombs, rockets, missiles and sanctions." This sentence has obviously been left out deliberately because it would intimate why the Israeli state could have forfeited the right to establish itself in Palestine - videlicet because of its aggressive expansionist policy against the people of Palestine, ignoring any law of nations and disobeying all UN-resolutions.

In spite of the variability referring to the rendering of the statements of Iran's President we should nevertheless note down: the reproach of denying the Holocaust cannot be sustained if Ahmadinejad speaks of a great and huge crime that has been done to the Jews.

In another IRNA-dispatch (2005-12-14) the Arabian author Ghazi Abu Daqa writes about Ahmadinejad: "The Iranian president has nothing against the followers of Judaism [...] Ahmadinejad is against Zionism as well as its expansionist and occupying policy. That is why he managed to declare to the world with courage that there is no place for the Zionist regime in the world civilized community."

It's no wonder that such opinions do not go down particularly well with the ideas of the centers of power in the Western world. But for this reason they are not wrong right away. Dealing out criticism against the aggressive policy of the Western world, to which Israel belongs as well, is not yet anti-Semitism. We should at least to give audience to this kind of criticism - even if it is a problematic field for us.

2006-02-11 Ahmadinejad said according to IRNA: "[...] the real holocaust should be sought in Palestine, where the blood of the oppressed nation is shed every day and Iraq, where the defenceless Muslim people are killed daily. [...] 'Some western governments, in particular the US, approve of the sacrilege on the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH), while denial of the >Myth of Holocaust<, based on which the Zionists have been exerting pressure upon other countries for the past 60 years and kill the innocent Palestinians, is considered as a crime' [...]"

The assertion that Ahmadinejad denies the Holocaust thus is wrong in more than one aspect. He does not deny the Holocaust, but speaks of denial itself. And he does not speak of denial of the Holocaust, but of denial of the Myth of Holocaust. This is something totally different. All in all he speaks of the exploitation of the Holocaust. The Myth of Holocaust, like it is made a subject of discussion by Ahmadinejad, is a myth that has been built up in conjunction with the Holocaust to - as he says - put pressure onto somebody. We might follow this train of thoughts or we might not. But we cannot equalize his thoughts with denial of the Holocaust.

If Ahmadinejad according to this 2006-02-11 condemns the fact that it is forbidden and treated as a crime to do research into the Myth of Holocaust, as we find it quoted in the MEMRI translation, this acquires a meaning much different from the common and wide-spread one. If the myth related to the Holocaust is commuted to a 'Fairy Tale of the Massacre' - like the DPA did - this can only be understood as a malicious misinterpretation.

By the use of misrepresentation and adulteration it apparently succeeded to constitute the statements of the Iranian President to be part and parcel of the currently fought propaganda battle. It is our responsibility to counter this.

Concluding:

A dispatch by Reuters confirms 2006-02-21: "The Iranian Foreign Minister Manuchehr Mottaki has [...] repudiated that his state would want the Jewish state Israel 'wiped off the map'. [...] Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had been misunderstood. 'Nobody can erase a country from the map.' Ahmadinejad was not thinking of the state of Israel but of their regime [...]. 'We do not accredit this regime to be legitimate.' [...] Mottaki also accepted that the Holocaust really took place in a way that six million Jews were murdered during the era of National Socialism."

The next step is to connect the Iranian President with Hitler. 2006-02-20 the Chairman of the Counsil of Jews in France (Crif) says in Paris: "The Iranian President's assertions do not rank behind Hitler's 'Mein Kampf'". Paul Spiegel, President of the Central Counsil of Jews in Germany, 2005-12-10 in the 'Welt' qualifies the statements of Ahmadinejad to be "the worst comment on this subject that he has ever heard of a statesman since A. Hitler". At the White House the Iranian President is even named Hitler. And the German Federal Chancellor Angela Merkel as well moves over Iran's President towards Hitler and National Socialism by saying 2006-02-04 in Munich: "Already in the early 1930's many people said that it is only rhetoric. One could have prevented a lot in time if one had acted... Germany is in the debt to resist the incipiencies and to do anything to make clear where the limit of tolerance is. Iran remains in control of the situation, it is still in their hands."

All this indicates war. Slobodan Milosevic became Hitler. The result was the war of the Nato against Yugoslavia. Saddam Hussein became Hitler. What followed was the war the USA and their coalition of compliant partners waged against Iraq. Now the Iranian President becomes Hitler.

And someone who is Hitler-like can assure a hundred times that he only wants to use nuclear energy in a peaceful way. Nobody will believe him. Somebody like Hitler can act within the scope of all contracts. Acting contrary to contract will nevertheless be imputed to him. "Virtually none of the Western states recognize that uranium enrichment is absolutely legal. There is no restriction by contract or by the law of nations. Quite the contrary: Actually the Western countries would have the duty to assist Iran with these activities, according to the Non-Proliferation Treaty. As long as a state renounces the bomb it is eligible for technical support by the nuclear powers." (Jörg Pfuhl, ARD radio studio Istanbul 2006-01-11) But - all this does not count if the Head of a state is stigmatized as Hitler.

Think Progress � Secret Service Officers Remove CNN Producer from Hu Photo-Op For Asking Question

original


Secret Service Officers Remove CNN Producer from Hu Photo-Op For Asking Question

President Hu can’t suppress dissent in the United States like he does in China, but the Bush adminstration is helping out where it can.

According to a CNN Wire report, CNN producer Joe Vaccarello was removed by Secret Service officers “from covering a private meeting Friday at Yale University after calling out a question about whether Chinese President Hu Jintao had seen protesters lined up outside”:

Vaccarello was told he had broken a rule against asking questions at the “photo op,” during which Hu and Levin exchanged gifts and Hu met with four students. Vaccarello was escorted from the building by members of the Secret Service who were escorting people in and out of the building.

Vaccarello said he had not been told he could not ask questions at the event.

A Yale spokeswoman actually defended the producers’ removal, calling the talk a “very intimate event” and claiming that “[e]very other reporter knew the ground rules.”

But she said she could not be sure the CNN staffers were specifically informed that questions would not be allowed at the event.

She argued the rule was “obvious.”

CNN staffers said they were not aware of the rule.

It is not unusual for journalists to ask questions at designated photo ops. Often, the questions are ignored.

Already, President Bush has broken protocol by not holding the typical “press availability” with Hu. Instead, the White House limited the session to a few “pool” reporters, under a “mutual agreement” with the Chinese, who did not want a more public setting.

Capitol Hill Blue - Army suicides on the rise

original

Army suicides on the rise
April 22, 2006 04:44 AM / War .
The number of U.S. Army soldiers who took their own lives increased last year to the highest total since 1993, despite a growing effort by the Army to detect and prevent suicides.

The number of U.S. Army soldiers who took their own lives increased last year to the highest total since 1993, despite a growing effort by the Army to detect and prevent suicides.

In 2005, a total of 83 soldiers committed suicide, compared with 67 in 2004, and 60 in 2003 _ the year U.S.-led forces invaded Iraq. Four other deaths in 2005 are being investigated as possible suicides but have not yet been confirmed. The totals include active duty Army soldiers and deployed National Guard and Reserve troops.

"Although we are not alarmed by the slight increase, we do take suicide prevention very seriously," said Army spokesman Col. Joseph Curtin.

"We have increased the number of combat stress teams, increased suicide prevention and training, and we are working very aggressively to change the culture so that soldiers feel comfortable coming forward with their personal problems in a culture where historically admitting mental health issues was frowned upon," Curtin said.

Of the confirmed suicides last year, 25 were soldiers deployed to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars _ which amounts to 40 percent of the 64 suicides by Army soldiers in Iraq since the conflict began in March 2003.

The suicide rate for the Army has fluctuated over the past 25 years, from a high of 15.8 per 100,000 in 1985 to a low of 9.1 per 100,000 in 2001. Last year it was nearly 13 per 100,000.

The Army recorded 90 suicides in 1993, with a suicide rate of 14.2 per 100,000.

The Army rate is higher than the civilian suicide rate for 2003, which was 10.8 per 100,000, according to the National Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But the Army number tracked closely with the rate for civilians aged 18-34, which was 12.19 per 100,000 in 2003.

When suicides among soldiers in Iraq spiked in the summer of 2003, the Army put together a mental health assessment team that met with troops. Investigators found common threads in the circumstances of the soldiers who committed suicide _ including personal financial problems, failed personal relationships and legal problems.

Since then, the Army has increased the number of mental health professionals and placed combat stress teams with units. According to the Army, there are more than 230 mental health practitioners working in Iraq and Afghanistan, compared with "about a handful" when the war began, Curtin said.

Soldiers also get cards and booklets that outline suicide warning signs and how to get help.

But at least one veterans group says it's not enough.

"These numbers should be a wake-up call on the mental health impact of this war," said Paul Rieckhoff, executive director of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. "One in three soldiers will come back with post traumatic stress disorder or comparable mental health issues, or depression and severe anxiety."

Rieckhoff, who was a platoon leader in Iraq, said solders there face increased stress because they are often deployed to the warfront several times, they are fighting urban combat and their enemy blends in with the population, making it more difficult to tell friend from foe.

"You don't get much time to rest and with the increased insurgency, your chances of getting killed or wounded are growing," he said. "The Army is trying harder, but they've got an incredibly long way to go."

He added that while there are more psychiatrists, the soldiers are still in a war zone, "so you're just putting your finger in the dam."

___

On the Net:

Defense Department: http://www.defenselink.mil

© 2006 The Associated Press

Halliburton's Immigrant Detention Centers

Halliburton's Immigrant Detention Centers

By Ruth Conniff

http://progressive.org/mag_rcb041706
The Progressive
April 17, 2006

While thousands of people were celebrating the
contribution America's undocumented immigrants make to
our economy, and demanding justice and recognition for

workers who are denied basic rights, the government was
making plans for large-scale detention centers in case
of an "emergency influx" of immigrants.

KBR, the Halliburton subsidiary recently reprimanded

for gross overcharging in its military contracts in
Iraq, won a $385 million contract to build the centers.
According to the Halliburton website--
www.Halliburton.com--"the contract, which is effective

immediately, provides for establishing temporary
detention and processing capabilities to augment
existing ICE Detention and Removal Operations Program
facilities in the event of an emergency influx of
immigrants into the
U.S., or to support the rapid
development of new programs."

What new programs might those be?

The web was abuzz with speculation after the contract
was awarded on January 24. Pacific News Service gave

the most detailed analysis.

It connected the new "immigration emergency" plans with
older plans that involved imposing martial law.

Certainly the detention centers raise the specter of WW

II Japanese internment camps.

The new facilities could be used for round-ups of
Muslim Americans or other American citizens tagged as
"enemy combatants.'

The use of military personnel and military contractors

in the event of a Katrina-like disaster, which the
Halliburton contract provides for, brings us closer to
martial law, whether it is officially declared or not.

It also means record profits for Halliburton, which

declared 2005 "the best in our 86-year history." David
Lesar, Halliburton's chairman, president and CEO,
declares on the company website, "For the full year
2005 we set a record for revenue and achieved net

income of $2.4 billion with each of our six divisions
posting record results."

Not bad for a company that has been repeatedly cited
for inflating charges and wasting taxpayer money in
Iraq.


The immigration detention centers ought to raise a red
flag, not just about nepotism and waste among military
contractors, but about what our government has in store
for us.

Perhaps the same energy that propelled immigrant rights

into the national headlines could be harnessed to
demand an explanation for what, exactly, Halliburton is
helping to prepare for with this latest big chunk of
taxpayer largess.

Ruth Conniff covers national politics for The

Progressive and is a voice of The Progressive on many
TV and radio programs.

(c) 2006 the Progressive

INDEFENSIBLE CENSORSHIP.. Play Pushed Underground

Play Pushed Underground Cancelled in New York, the first Toronto reading of My Name Is Rachel Corrie is being held at a secret location

by Richard Ouzounian

Rachel Corrie was born in Washington, killed in the Gaza Strip, praised in London and censored in Manhattan. A memorial of candles and flowers for Rachel Corrie at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington on March 17, 2003. One of the most disturbing things about 'My Name Is Rachel Corrie,' the Royal Court play based on the journals and e-mails of a young American who died in Palestine for no apparent reason, is that it has yet to be seen in the United States. (Anthony P. Bolante/Reuters) Now she's being forced to go underground in Toronto. My Name Is Rachel Corrie is a play based on the life and words of the 23-year-old American activist who died in Gaza on March 16, 2003, after an incident involving an Israeli Defence Forces bulldozer. Corrie's supporters claim she was run over deliberately during the course of a peaceful political demonstration. Those on the opposing side insist the bulldozer driver couldn't see her and it was simply an accident. The New York production of the play was recently cancelled, because of fears that its pro-Palestinian stance would upset the Jewish community at a difficult political time. This decision provoked a worldwide debate that has become so heated it has become necessary to keep secret the exact location of a simple reading of the script for 50 people at the University of Toronto Sunday night. But the astonishing thing about this whole affair is that at no point in the play's history has it been the cause of any actual confrontations or demonstrations. It's the fear of what might happen that seems to be motivating people's actions. Paul Leishman, who is directing Sunday's reading with actress Marya Delver, explains that "the play was intended to be an exploration of a girl's life, but now it's caught up in the crossfire of much larger issues." Shortly after Corrie's death, a series of emails she wrote from her time in Gaza were published in The Guardian and came to the attention of London's Royal Court Theatre. They contacted Corrie's family, who made their daughter's writings from the age of 10 available to them. The script, compiled by actor Alan Rickman and journalist Katherine Viner, opened in April 2005, to reviews that were mostly highly enthusiastic. Charles Spencer, in The Daily Telegraph, captured the tone when he called it "a powerful, thought-provoking and deeply moving piece of theatre." After a sold-out run at the Royal Court, it transferred to the West End, where it is still running. The rights for the first North American production were awarded to James Nicola, head of the highly regarded New York Theatre Workshop. Nicola scheduled a March 22 opening, but a month before the date, he wrote to the Royal Court asking if he could "indefinitely postpone" the production. He gave his reasons in an interview with The Guardian: "In listening to our communities in New York, what we heard was that after Ariel Sharon's illness and the election of Hamas, we had a very edgy situation. We found that our plan to present a work of art would be seen as us taking a stand in a political conflict that we didn't want to take." Rickman was furious and pulled the rights instantly, claiming, "This is censorship born out of fear." The ensuing battle was waged in newspapers, on radio and television and all over the Internet. Some praised Nicola for being responsible; others damned him as a coward. It was in this atmosphere that Leishman contacted the Royal Court and asked for the rights to a single reading — as opposed to an open-ended production — of the play in Toronto. Leishman is an ex-New Yorker who came to Canada in the mid-'90s to work as Richard Monette's assistant at the Stratford Festival. When he left that job, he temporarily set aside the theatre as well, going to work for a Toronto law firm. But Rachel Corrie's story lured him back. "I remember hearing about her death in 2003," he recalls, "how gruesome and sad it was." But he hadn't read the script until the cancellation occurred and then he picked it up "to see if there was anything there to provoke all this tempest." What he discovered was "the story of a young woman who begins by asking what she should do with her life and experiences an awakening of concern and compassion for people." Leishman says that roughly 40 per cent of the script deals with Corrie's life up until her decision to go to Palestine and the remaining 60 per cent with her time spent in Gaza. Leishman felt it was important to have the play read "in a neutral, classroom situation, because Rachel was a student." He was given just such a space, but then asked not to publicize the time and place of the reading, "because of the political partisans on both sides it might attract and the unpredictability of their responses." Copyright © 2006 Toronto Star Newspapers Limited ###

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines06/0421-06.htm

Anti-Iranian Hysteria

Source: Lewrockwell.com
Published: April 21, 2006 Author: Eric Margolis
http://www.libertyforum.org/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=news_international&Number=294581974#Post294581974


It's both fascinating and dismaying watching the manufactured "crisis" over Iran reach new intensity each week.

Iran poses no real military threat to anyone, but listening to the Bush Administration or the US media one would think that Tehran was about to unleash a nuclear holocaust on the world.

What we are seeing is a rerun of the administration's massive propaganda offensive that led to the invasion of Iraq. There is also no doubt that the Bush Administration has been planning a major air war against Iran.

The highly respected American investigative journalist Seymour Hersh even claims the Bush Administration is considering the use of tactical nuclear weapons against Iran's underground nuclear facilities.

This writer reported last December that the US was preparing a massive air campaign against Iran and already probing Iranian air defenses and mounting special forces ground missions to both target high-value nuclear and strategic targets, and to stir up domestic unrest among Iran's ethnic minorities.

On the list for possible US -- and likely Israeli -- air and missile strikes: more than twenty Iranian nuclear facilities, including the Bushehr reactor; airfields, missile and naval bases; communications nodes; military and intelligence headquarters; military factories; power plants and oil terminals.

No major ground offensive by the US is planned, though its special forces will play an important role in any attack. The surest sign of an impending US attack will be the massing of US strike aircraft in the Gulf and possibly Pakistan and Central Asia, the arrival of additional US aircraft carriers in the Arabian Sea, concentration of US Navy minesweepers and shallow-water vessels around the Strait of Hormuz, and heightened activity at US bases in Turkey, Romania, Bulgaria, and, of course, Iraq.

Respected international experts say that it if Iran wanted to produce nuclear warheads, it would take 5 -10 years. UN nuclear inspectors report no signs Iran is working on nuclear weapons.

But the Bush Administration has used Iran's gleefully announcement that it enriched uranium to 3.5% (83% is needed for nuclear weapons), to generate a major US-Iranian crisis seven months before national mid-term elections. The administration clearly hopes its lurid claims that Iran is a nuclear threat to the world will whip gullible Americans back into war fever. A bombing campaign before elections would likely reverse the Republicans' steep decline in the polls.

Much of the administration's anti-Iranian jihad has been orchestrated, like the attack on Iraq, by Vice President Dick Cheney, who increasingly emerges as the Rasputin of the Bush presidency. Cheney is very close to Israel's political far right. He is carrying out former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's command to the US that once it invaded Iraq, "march immediately on Tehran."

Cheney, and the pro-Israel neoconservatives around him, have long worked closely with Israel's rightists, Mossad intelligence service, and Israel's strategic planners. All agree that Iran, not Iraq, was the greater enemy of Israel, and one that had at all costs to be crushed before it could develop nuclear warheads and the means to deliver them.

Much of the current anti-Iranian hysteria campaign that is currently being trumpeted by the compliant US media and members of Congress is being orchestrated from Cheney's office. It is clear that in spite of the debacle in Iraq, the vice president intends to pursue his personal jihad against all Muslim regimes that are uncooperative and hostile to Israel.

Cheney has persistently frustrated efforts by the US State Department and CIA to improve relations with Tehran. America's mighty Israel lobby has become Cheney's personal army in this struggle, and is mounting a high-powered campaign to generate war fever against Iran. Jewish Americans have been panicked by false claims that Israel is in the direst nuclear peril.

For its part, Iran has played right into the hands of the war party in Washington. President Ahmadinejad's calls for Israel to be wiped out, his denial of the Jewish Holocaust, and the lavish song and dance spectacular he produced over nuclear enrichment delighted many ordinary Iranians. But abroad, Ahmadinejad's fiery pronouncements created an international firestorm of condemnation and made Iran look precisely what Israel's supporters claim: a rogue nation with a dangerous, erratic leadership that absolutely cannot be trusted with nuclear arms. In short, a Mideast North Korea.

Iranians may be forgiven for over-reacting to nuclear Viagra -- Indians and Pakistanis responded the same way. But Iran should have adopted a lower key approach to enrichment and invited UN and European observers to attend.

By flaunting its infant nuclear technology, Tehran provides the US and Israel with an excellent pretext to attack Iran. In such an event, Iran will have precious few sympathizers around the globe. Many will say, "Iran got what it deserved." One really wonders if Iran's leaders -- many battle-scarred veterans of the frightfully bloody Iran-Iraq war-- are daring the US to attack.

The Iranian leadership and the Bush Administration are feeding off one another, gaining domestic popularity with each now escalation but drawing their nations into a clash whose outcome could be dangerously unpredictable and would surely shake the entire Mideast and world oil markets.

US Physicists: Use of Nuclear Weapons on Iran "Gravely Irresponsible"

US Physicists: Use of Nuclear Weapons on Iran "Gravely Irresponsible"

Prominent US Physicists Send Letter to President Bush
By Kim McDonald
Physorg.com

Monday 17 April 2006

Thirteen of the nation's most prominent physicists have written a letter to President Bush, calling U.S. plans to reportedly use nuclear weapons against Iran "gravely irresponsible" and warning that such action would have "disastrous consequences for the security of the United States and the world."

The physicists include five Nobel laureates, a recipient of the National Medal of Science and three past presidents of the American Physical Society, the nation's preeminent professional society for physicists.

Their letter was prompted by recent articles in the Washington Post, New Yorker and other publications that one of the options being considered by Pentagon planners and the White House in a military confrontation with Iran includes the use of nuclear bunker busters against underground facilities. These reports were neither confirmed nor denied by White House and Pentagon officials.

The letter was initiated by Jorge Hirsch, a professor of physics at the University of California, San Diego, who last fall put together a petition signed by more than 1,800 physicists that repudiated new U.S. nuclear weapons policies that include preemptive use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear adversaries . Hirsch has also published 15 articles in recent months documenting the dangers associated with a potential U.S. nuclear strike on Iran.

"We are members of the profession that brought nuclear weapons into existence, and we feel strongly that it is our professional duty to contribute our efforts to prevent their misuse," says Hirsch. "Physicists know best about the devastating effects of the weapons they created, and these eminent physicists speak for thousands of our colleagues."

"The fact that the existence of this plan has not been denied by the Administration should be a cause of great alarm, even if it is only one of several plans being considered," he adds. "The public should join these eminent scientists in demanding that the Administration publicly renounces such a misbegotten option against a non-nuclear country like Iran ."

The letter, which is available at http://physics.ucsd.edu/petition/physicistsletter.html, points out that "nuclear weapons are unique among weapons of mass destruction," and that nuclear weapons in today's arsenals have a total power of more than 200,000 times the explosive energy of the bomb that leveled Hiroshima, which caused the deaths of more than 100,000 people.

It notes that there are no sharp lines between small and large nuclear weapons, nor between nuclear weapons targeting facilities and those targeting armies or cities, and that the use by the United States of nuclear weapons after 60 years of non-use will make the use of nuclear weapons by others more likely.

"Once the U.S. uses a nuclear weapon again, it will heighten the probability that others will too," the physicists write. "In a world with many more nuclear nations and no longer a 'taboo' against the use of nuclear weapons, there will be a greatly enhanced risk that regional conflicts could expand into global nuclear war, with the potential to destroy our civilization."

The letter echoes the main objection of last fall's physicists' petition, stressing that the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty will be irreversibly damaged by the use or even the threat of use of nuclear weapons by a nuclear nation against a non-nuclear one, with disastrous consequences for the security of the United States and the world.

"It is gravely irresponsible for the U.S. as the greatest superpower to consider courses of action that could eventually lead to the widespread destruction of life on the planet. We urge the administration to announce publicly that it is taking the nuclear option off the table in the case of all non-nuclear adversaries, present or future, and we urge the American people to make their voices heard on this matter."

The 13 physicists who coauthored the letter are: Philip Anderson, professor of physics at Princeton University and Nobel Laureate in Physics; Michael Fisher, professor of physics at the Institute for Physical Science and Technology, University of Maryland and Wolf Laureate in Physics; David Gross, professor of theoretical physics and director of the Kavli Institute of Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara and Nobel Laureate in Physics; Jorge Hirsch, professor of physics at the University of California, San Diego; Leo Kadanoff, professor of physics and mathematics at the University of Chicago and recipient of the National Medal of Science; Joel Lebowitz, professor of mathematics and physics, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey and Boltzmann Medalist; Anthony Leggett, professor of physics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Nobel Laureate, Physics; Eugen Merzbacher, professor of physics, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and former president, American Physical Society; Douglas Osheroff, professor of physics and applied physics, Stanford University and Nobel Laureate, Physics; Andrew Sessler, former director of Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory and former president, American Physical Society; George Trilling, professor of physics, University of California, Berkeley, and former president, American Physical Society; Frank Wilczek, professor of physics, MIT and Nobel Laureate, Physics; Edward Witten, professor of physics, Institute for Advanced Study and Fields Medalist.

The physicists are sending copies of their letter to their elected representatives, requesting that the issue be urgently addressed in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.

--------

Source: University of California, San Diego, by Kim McDonald.

Condoleezza Rice Implicated in New Leak Scandal

Lawyer: Rice Allegedly Leaked Defense Info
By Matthew Barakat
The Associated Press

Friday 21 April 2006
original


Alexandria, Va. - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice leaked national defense information to a pro-Israel lobbyist in the same manner that landed a lower-level Pentagon official a 12-year prison sentence, the lobbyist's lawyer said Friday.

Prosecutors Disputed the Claim

The allegations against Rice came as a federal judge granted a defense request to issue subpoenas sought by the defense for Rice and three other government officials in the trial of Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman. The two are former lobbyists with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee who are charged with receiving and disclosing national defense information.

Defense lawyers are asking a judge to dismiss the charges because, among other things, they believe it seeks to criminalize the type of backchannel exchanges between government officials, lobbyists and the press that are part and parcel of how Washington works.

During Friday's hearing, U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III said he is considering dismissing the government's entire case because the law used to prosecute Rosen and Weissman may be unconstitutionally vague and broad and infringe on freedom of speech.

Rosen's lawyer, Abbe Lowell, said the testimony of Rice and others is needed to show that some of the top officials in U.S. government approved of disclosing sensitive information to the defendants and that the leaks may have been authorized.

Prosecutors opposed the effort to depose Rice and the other officials. Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin DiGregory also disputed Lowell's claim, saying, "She never gave national defense information to Mr. Rosen."

The issuance of subpoenas does not automatically require Rice or anybody else to testify or give a deposition. A recipient can seek to quash the subpoena.

Calls to the State Department seeking comment Friday evening were not immediately returned.

The judge also granted subpoenas for David Satterfield, deputy chief of the U.S. mission to Iraq; William Burns, U.S. ambassador to Russia and retired Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni.

"Each of these individuals have real-life dealings with the defendants in this case. They'll explain what they told Dr. Rosen in detail," Lowell said. "On day one, Secretary of State Rice tells him certain info and on day two one of the conspirators tells him the same thing or something less volatile."

The indictment against Rosen and Weissman alleges that three government officials leaked sensitive and sometimes classified national defense information to the two, who subsequently revealed what they learned to the press and to an Israeli government official.

One of the three government officials is former Pentagon official Lawrence A. Franklin, who pleaded guilty to providing classified defense information to Rosen and Weissman and was sentenced to more than 12 years in prison.

Franklin has said he was concerned that the United States was insufficiently concerned about the threat posed by Iran and hoped that leaking information might eventually provoke the National Security Council to take a different course of action.

The indictment against Rosen, of Silver Spring, Md., and Weissman, of Bethesda, Md., alleges that they conspired to obtain classified government reports on issues relevant to U.S. policy, including the al-Qaida terror network; the bombing of the Khobar Towers dormitory in Saudi Arabia, which killed 19 U.S. Air Force personnel; and U.S. policy in Iran.

Lowell said it is impossible for Rosen and Weissman to determine what is sensitive national defense information when they are receiving the information from government officials who presumably understand national security law and therefore would not improperly disclose national defense information.

The World War I-era law has never been used to prosecute lobbyists before.

BBC NEWS | Middle East | Israel 'could occupy Gaza again'

original

Israel 'could occupy Gaza again'
An Israeli general has said Israel will consider re-occupying part or all of Gaza, if Palestinian militants continue firing rockets across the border.

Gen Yoav Galant said the move would be considered if such attacks reached an intolerable level, or involved more powerful, longer-range weapons.

Gen Galant is head of the Israeli military's southern command.

Palestinian militants in Gaza frequently fire short-range and crudely made rockets into Israel.

The rockets rarely cause significant damage or casualties.

Israeli forces say they fired more than 2,000 artillery shells into the northern Gaza Strip, in the first two weeks of April. Israel says this is an attempt to halt the growing number of rocket attacks by Palestinian militants.

A number of civilians have been killed and injured in the shelling.

'Operational plans'

"I don't want to get there, but if necessary we can re-occupy part or all of the Gaza Strip, and there are operational plans," Gen Galant told the Israeli Maariv newspaper.

He said Israeli forces were "already operating inside the Gaza Strip", but did not give any details.

Gen Galant's comments echo those of other army Israeli officers.

Two senior army officers also gave newspaper interviews recently saying that ground operations could be launched in the future in Gaza.

Israel withdrew its settlers and soldiers from Gaza last September, after almost four decades of military occupation.

Venezuela-Colombia Uneasy Neighbors - Prensa Latina

Venezuela-Colombia Uneasy Neighbors - Prensa Latina

Venezuela-Colombia Uneasy Neighbors

Caracas, Apr 21 (Prensa Latina) Criticism today over the use of Colombian territory to conspire against the Venezuelan government is straining relations, which are already damaged by conflict along a 2,000-kilometer border.

Colombia is considered Washington´s most strategic tool to attack Venezuela because of its proximity and the concentration of US troops in that nation.

Hundreds of demobilized Colombian paramilitaries have become smugglers, hired assassins, kidnappers and attackers and operate on both sides of the border.

Those groups are linked with the nearly 200 murders of campesinos and indigenous leaders in the latest years, ascribed to assassins hired by landowners opposing the agrarian reform.

Witnesses or victims of kidnappings frequently identify their captors as people with a Colombian accent.

Administrative Security Department (ASD) agents in that country were linked to the killing of fiscal Danilo Anderson, who was in charge of investigating participants in the April 2002 coup on President Hugo Chavez.

More recently, former ASD Computing director Rafael García revealed to the media the participation of that institution in a plan to kill Chavez.

Meanwhile, the Venezuelan Parliament has designed a special commission to inquire into the situation with 30 days to present a preliminary report to the plenary.

Don't Let Congress Ruin the Internet

Dear Friends,

I thought you might be interested in this campaign to save the
Internet.

Congress is pushing through a law that would permit large
telephone and cable companies, like AT&T, Verizon and Comcast,
to control what you do, where you go and what you watch online.

Visit the URL below to check out what's at stake and send a
message directly to the Congress:
http://action.freepress.net/campaign/savethenet?rk=mdwkTS71mBzvW

US Military Shift To The Pacific A Hedge Against China

US Military Shift To The Pacific A Hedge Against China

US Military Shift To The Pacific A Hedge Against China

Presidents Bush and Jintao meet at the White House to discuss a range of trade and security issues. Photo courtesy of AFP.

by Jim Mannion
Washington (AFP) Apr 21, 2006
The United States is equipping its forces for high tech expeditionary warfare, in part as a hedge against the uncertainties posed by China's military buildup, a Pentagon spokesman Thursday. "It is US policy to encourage China to emerge as a responsible international partner," said Bryan Whitman.

"However, there is also a lack of transparency and some uncertainty surrounding China's future path. Therefore, we and others have to naturally hedge against the unknown," he told reporters here.

His comments came as Chinese President Hu Jintao was at the White House to meet with President George W. Bush on a range of trade and security issues, and to assure US leaders they have nothing to fear from China's rising might.

His visit is playing out against a backdrop of US concern about China's intentions as it pursues a major military buildup that the Pentagon believes threatens the military balance in region.

The United States also has been modernizing and reorienting its military forces in recent years, shifting its weight from Europe to the Asia-Pacific region and south Asia.

It has revamped its military alliance with Japan, and moved to strengthen military ties with India and countries in southeast and central Asia.

Guam is being transformed into a hub for long range bombers, intelligence and surveillance aircraft, and logistics support. The military plans to move 8,000 marines to Guam from Okinawa by 2012.

The US Navy is adding a sixth aircraft carrier to the Pacific Fleet and has decided to home port 52 attack submarines -- 60 percent of its fleet -- in the Pacific theater by 2010.

The navy also is changing the way it maintains and mans its warships to be able to deploy four aircraft carrier battle groups in the Pacific at a time.

Billions of dollars are being invested to acquire costly F-22 fighter aircraft capable of cruising at supersonic speeds and develop a new long range bomber, all with an eye on China.

"We're looking at changing from being a garrison miilitary to being a globally expeditionary force, shifting the strategic balance, enabling the military to be more agile across the spectrum of challenges that exist out there," Whitman said.

"So DoD (Department of Defense) continues to prepare for unforseen eventualities, from full spectrum combat operations to counter-insurgency operations, stability operations, and homeland defense while creating the best structure to train and equip forces for those missions," he said.

Pentagon and US military officials in the past have insisted that the US military realignment was not directed at any specific country, or aimed at containing China.

But Whitman's acknowledgement that the changes were a "hedge" against China indicates Washington is opting for a more candid approach in spelling out the consequences of Beijing's military buildup.

The change in tone began last June when US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld warned at a international security conference in Singapore that China was spending much more on its military than officially acknowledged.

"Since no nation threatens China, one wonders: why this growing investment?" Rumsfeld asked.

A major Pentagon strategy review made public in February singled out China as having "the greatest potential to compete militarily with the United States and field disruptive military technologies that over time offset traditional US military advantages absent US counter strategies."

The extent to which the concern about China is driving military budgets, weapons requirements, war games and other activities is "fairly significant, and I think it's fair to say that it's growing," Admiral Michael Mullen, the chief of naval operations said last month.

"There are just a lot of questions about the significance of the Chinese investment in missiles, in submarines, in ships, in technology, in capabilities, that make you wonder why so much so fast?"

"And clearly, putting ourselves in a position, what I would call a strong deterrent position, is very important," he told defense reporters.

Source: Agence France-Presse

US Intel Chief Says Iran Still Years Away From Having Nukes

US Intel Chief Says Iran Still Years Away From Having Nukes

US Intel Chief Says Iran Still Years Away From Having Nukes

The uranium conversion facility Isfahan, Iran.

by Staff Writers
Washington (AFP) Apr 21, 2006
US intelligence chief John Negroponte said Thursday Iran's resumption of uranium enrichment is "troublesome" but the country is still years away from having enough fissile material to make a nuclear weapon.

Negroponte expressed concern both about Iran's claim to have resumed uranium enrichment with a cascade of 164 centrifuges in Natanz and extreme statements made by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

"The developments in Iran -- clearly they're troublesome," he said in response to questions after a speech to the National Press Club.

"By the same token, our assessment at the moment is that even though we believe that Iran is determined to acquire or obtain a nuclear weapon, that we believe that it is still a number of years off before they are likely to have enough fissile material to assemble into, or to put into a nuclear weapon; perhaps into the next decade," he said.

"So I think it's important that this issue be kept in perspective," he said.

Negroponte is marking his first year in office as the director of national intelligence, a post created in the wake of the intelligence fiasco over Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

Critics have complained that the new intelligence directorate, which is supposed to coordinate the work of some 15 US intelligence agencies, is developing into another bloated bureaucracy with nearly 1,000 people reportedly working for it.

Negroponte denied that the reforms he is pursuing have been "a theory-based experiment or an exercise in bureaucratic bloat."

"Government programs require government officials to implement them," he said, adding that the last three embassies he led as an ambassador were larger than his intelligence directorate.

Source: Agence France-Presse

Scoop: NSA Director William Odom Dissects Iraq Blunders

original

NSA Director William Odom Dissects Iraq Blunders
Friday, 21 April 2006, 11:45 am
Opinion: Michael Hammerschlag
NSA Director Odom Dissects Iraq Blunders

by Michael Hammerschlag
April 16 -Providence RI

Former National Security Agency Director Lt. General William Odom dissected the strategic folly of the Iraq Invasion and Bush administration policies in a major policy speech at Brown University last week for the Watson Institute- America�s Strategic Paralysis .

"The Iraq War may turn out to be the greatest strategic disaster in American history. In a mere 18 months we went from unprecedented levels of support after 9-11..to being one of the most hated countries�Turkey used to be one of strongest pro-US regimes, now we�re so unpopular, there�s a movie playing there- Metal Storm, about a war between US and Turkey. In addition to producing faulty intel and ties to Al Qaida, Bush made preposterous claim that toppling Saddam would open the way for liberal democracy in a very short time. Misunderstanding the character of American power, he dismissed the allies as a nuisance and failed to get the UN Security Council�s sanction. We must reinforce international law, not reject and ridicule it.�

Odom, now a Yale professor and Hudson Institute senior fellow, was director of the sprawling NSA (which monitors all communications) from 1985-88 under Reagan, and previously was Zbigniew Brzezinski�s assistant under Carter. His latest 2004 book is America�s Inadvertent Empire.

Even if the invasion had gone well, Odom says it wouldn�t have mattered: �The invasion wasn�t in our interests, it was in Iran�s interest, Al Qaida�s interest. Seeing America invade must have made Iranian leaders ecstatic. Iran�s hostility to Saddam was hard to exaggerate.. Iraq is now open to Al Qaida, which it never was before- it�s easier for terrorists to kill Americans there than in the US. Neither our leaders or the mainstream media recognize the perversity of key US policies now begetting outcomes they were designed to prevent� 3 years later the US is bogged down in Iraq, pretending a Constitution has been put in place, while the civil war rages, Iran meddles, and Al Qaida swells its ranks with new recruits. We have lost our capacity to lead and are in a state of crisis- diplomatic and military.�
ADVERTISEMENT

Odom believes in an immediate phased withdrawal. �There isn�t anything we can do by staying there longer that will make this come out better. Every day we stay in, it gets worse and the price gets higher.�

He decried the �sophomoric and silly� titled war on terrorism. �Terrorism cannot be defeated because it�s not an enemy, it�s a tactic. A war against Al Qaida is sensible and supportable, but a war against a tactic is ludicrous and hurtful� a propaganda ploy to swindle others into supporting one�s own terrorism ... and encourages prejudices against Muslims everywhere. What if we said, �Catholic Christian IRA hitmen�? �

�The hypocrisy is deeper than this. By any measure the US has long used terrorism. In �78-79 the Senate was trying to pass a law against international terrorism- in every version they produced, the lawyers said the US would be in violation.�

The fixation on spreading democracy was wrongheaded. �Holding elections is easy, creating stable constitutional orders is difficult. Only 8-9 of 50 new democracies created since the 40�s have a constitutional system. Voting only ratifies the constitutional deal that has been agreed to by elites- people or groups with enough power- that is guns and money, to violate the rules with impunity� Voting does not cause a breakthrough� One group will win out and take them off the path to a liberal breakthrough .. Spreading illiberal democracy without Constitutionalism is a very bad idea, if we care about civil liberties. We are getting that lesson again in Hamas.�

Odom called for a �great reduction in US oil consumption� and pilloried our �energy policy of no energy policy. As long as large sums of money roll into the coffers of a few Middle East states, a lot of it will leak into the hands of radical political activists. A �$2-3 a gallon tax could fund massive R+D programs for alternative fuels and generate a strong demand for greater fuel efficiency � Getting serious about nuclear power could also lessen our oil dependency.�

�No government that believes radical terrorist groups in Middle East are serious threat to us would do any less on energy policy.�

Withdrawing our troops from Europe and NE Asia was also dangerous, he said. �Large US land forces in Europe and East Asia have been important in keeping the peace among our allies� allowing businessmen to lower transaction costs� and account for unparalleled economic growth.� President Clinton reduced the Army by about half, but Bush�s deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan �will leave the US unprepared to meet any other significant military contingency� leaving only one brigade in Germany and one in Italy, and eroding troop levels in Korea and Japan.� Rumsfeld�s plans threaten to �hollow out NATO, ensuring the failure of military transformations of its new members.�

The adult crowd was wowed by the extraordinary density of strategic wisdom and expertise in the hour lecture and Q+A. Asked about the current NSA spying controversy, Odom said, �Well he just invited you to invite me to commit a felony. 18 US Code798 says �to disclose anything about how signal intelligence is done is a felony.� � �Oh come on, Bill,� joshed a professor to a round of laughter. �After 9-11 Congress was willing to do anything. It�s inconceivable to me that they would not have cooperated to find a legal way to do this (warrantless spying).�

Most radically, Odom sees the US obsession with non-proliferation of nukes as damaging. �It dictated the invasion of Iraq, and now inspires calls for invading Iran. At the same time we ignore Israeli nukes, we embrace Pakistan and India, in spite of their nukes. This policy is not only perverse, but downright absurd. We will have more proliferation and we better get used to it.

A reporter�s question about the benefits of an attack on Iranian nuclear facilities provoked a fervent response. �I think we could have a rapprochement with Iran. You do that and you put it off for another 20 years. You want to be at war with all the Muslims forever?� Regarding a nuclear terrorist attack on a US city, �It�s gonna be bad. But they won�t kill us with one nuke. We can track a nuke back to the country where it came from (at least the fissile material, if there is a recorded elemental signature). These people know that! If we deterred the Soviet Union, think we can�t deter these pipsqueaks? We�re talking ourselves into hysteria. Now we have the incentives so structured that we cause proliferation.. If we bomb, good God man, that tells everyone in the world, get a nuke. We won�t bomb you if you have a nuke.�

He agreed that a catastrophic 10 year civil war like Lebanon was �a pretty realistic view�. �Iran has told the Shiites, �don�t fight, do what the Americans tell you- the electoral process will put you in power, meanwhile we�re arming you and building up your militias. The Sunni insurgency is trying to provoke the civil war while we�re still there so they�re not left to face these militias after we�ve leave.� The Kurds �will get as much autonomy as they can and back out of the system. An independent Kurdistan is likely, but the two factions of Peshmerga might fight. Al Qaida can�t operate up there, so that will be a stable little island.� But Kurdish independence �won�t please Iran, Syria, or Turkey- a NATO ally.�

The victory of the numerically dominant Shiites (4 to 1) isn�t assured. �Odds look better for the Shiites right now. But the organizational capacity of the Baathists remain sufficient to be a serious contender. How much confidence and capability are these Iranian trained Shiite militias developing? They could fragment among themselves. The clerics may or may not be good organizers of the troops and police. The Baathist Party was modeled after the Soviet system- their ability to implement and impose and compel is pretty impressive. Syria is a pretty stable regime; Iraq was a stable regime.� The civil war could spread the Shiite-Sunni conflict among Arabs in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, maybe Bahrain.

Iraq �will have some sort of dictatorship- either a highly disciplined party or military organization. We just don�t have fragmented societies with such deep sectarian and ethnic divisions that are also nice stable liberal systems. Look at Canada with just two ethnic groups, that teeters occasionally. Where is Saddam when you need him?�

On escaping Iraq: �Once it became obvious I was getting out, I would go to Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Syria, Turkey, and Iran and say, �I invite you to this meeting to handle stabilization issues as I get out.� I would have a secret chamber with Iran and say, �You hate the Taliban, we hate the Taliban; you want to sell oil, we need to buy oil; your alliance with Russia is very unnatural; if you want to discuss the West Bank- I�ll talk about it but won�t give anything away.�

�Oh, and by the way, I�m taking the nuclear issue off the table. You want nukes, have them. You live in a bad neighborhood.� There�s no single diplomatic move that would so revolutionize our position up there.�

In North Korea Odom �anticipates a collapse. That regime is very much like the Soviet regime, they do not transform, they degenerate. When the leadership loses capacity or will to blood or terrorize the population, it collapses.� He sees a sudden reunification of the Koreas, followed by tensions with ancient overseer Japan. �Those 2 countries don�t like each other.�

The Koreans say, �The Americans are crazy.�- just look at the public opinion polls and attitude of the South Korean government. Kim Jong Il knows just what to do to get the US to spin up in the air 3 times and bribe him on the way down. I see us on autopilot on a self-destructive path. China�s slowly replacing us. They�re becoming the peacemaker- they�re the ones who use their hegemony to settle things constructively.�

Odom sees ominous parallels with Vietnam. �How did we get in the (Vietnam) war? Phony intelligence over the Tonkin Gulf affair. Once we got in, it was not legitimate to go back and talk about strategic purpose, we were only allowed to talk about how we were doing- the tactics. We would not go back and ask whether this was in our interests. I see the pattern so clearly here. We have Iraqization- if they stand up, we�ll stand down. Training troops is not the problem. Political consolidation, not military consolidation, is the issue. Unless troops know to whom they should be loyal, they�ll fight some days, not others (and maybe against the wrong side).�

�If they (military power) get ahead of political consolidation, we know what happens then- a military coup.�

�This was imminently foreseeable by my poly sci colleagues who did not stand up and speak out loudly enough at the absurdity of spreading democracy when we�re really talking about Constitutionalism. Creating Constitutions- we don�t know how to do that! (at least not for 220 years) We are essentially paralyzed and can�t do much in the world cause we are bogged down in Iraq.�

�The declinists wake us up, so that we avoid decline; but the endists urge us to celebrate as we drift towards disaster. Those who urged us to invade Iraq are endists; I�m a declinist�. but only to revive my strategic optimism.�

*************

Michael Hammerschlag's commentary and articles (HAMMERNEWS.com) have appeared in Seattle Times, Providence. Journal, Columbia Journalism Review, Hawaii Advertiser, Capital Times, MediaChannel; and Moscow News, Tribune, Times, and Guardian. He spent 2 years in Russia from 1991-94, while the Empire collapsed and multiple wars raged in the Islamic southern republics. hammerschlag@bigfoot.com

Capitol Hill Blue: So many working in intelligence, so little to show for it

So many working in intelligence, so little to show for it
By KATHERINE SHRADER
Apr 21, 2006, 06:40
original


Nearly 100,000 Americans are working in intelligence in the U.S. and around the world, the nation's spy chief says, revealing the number for the first time.

In a speech at the National Press Club marking his first year on the job, National Intelligence Director John Negroponte indicated his willingness to make some normally classified information public.

"The United States intelligence community comprises almost 100,000 patriotic, talented and hardworking Americans in 16 federal departments and agencies," he said.

"To the extent that the requirements of secrecy permit," Negroponte added later, "the country should know what they are doing, why they are doing it, and how well they are doing it."

The figure means the total U.S. intelligence force is slightly smaller than the population of Green Bay, Wis. Secrecy expert Steven Aftergood of the Washington-based Federation of American Scientists welcomed the disclosure and said the government had no reason to keep the figure secret.

"If you think about all of the infrastructure needed to support that number of people, you start to get a sense of just how vast our intelligence system has become," Aftergood said. "Think about all the things going on that we don't know about."

The government has long protected details about the size and budget of its spy agencies, which include the CIA, National Security Agency, parts of the FBI and other lesser-known outfits, such as the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency.

But some classified morsels have gotten out.

For instance, Mary Margaret Graham, Negroponte's top deputy for intelligence collection, goofed in a speech last fall and said the overall U.S. intelligence budget is $44 billion _ a number that open-government advocates have sued unsuccessfully to get.

It's not clear how far Negroponte is willing to go to provide more information to the public. On Thursday, he condemned leaks of classified information, but he also said, "Public understanding is important."

Negroponte's comments came as part of a speech summing up his first year as the nation's inaugural spy chief. The position was created to get intelligence agencies to work together after the mistakes of Sept. 11, 2001, and Iraq.

Without delving into details, Negroponte said he has used his powers to fix a satellite program that was on the wrong track.

He rejected the idea that his job overseeing intelligence reform is too burdensome to allow him to be among President Bush's top advisers on national security and attend the daily White House briefing.

And Negroponte challenged those who say his office has become another bureaucratic layer on top of an old one. One of his deputies last week said Negroponte has requested more than 1,500 people for his office next year. "Intelligence reform has not been a theory-based experiment or an exercise in bureaucratic bloat," Negroponte said.

In a wide-ranging question-and-answer session, Negroponte touched on other hot intelligence issues:

_Negroponte said Osama bin Laden's ability to operate has been diminished since 2001 and "his style has been cramped." He added: "It would of course be desirable that he be captured or killed at the earliest opportunity. ... And we wish that this might have happened sooner."

_He reiterated the U.S. assessment that Iran is determined to acquire a nuclear weapon, but remains years away from having enough fissile material _ perhaps into the next decade. "It's important that this issue be kept in perspective," Negroponte said.

_The former U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Negroponte called it "important and urgent" that Iraqis form a new government under the constitution approved last year. He said only when new senior officials take office will the government "be able to take on some of the serious challenges that are posed by the sectarian violence."

_Negroponte was asked if Russia shared wartime intelligence with Iraq in the run-up to the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, as some recently released documents suggested. The State Department has asked Russia to investigate. "I don't believe it's been confirmed that the government in Moscow itself was witting to any of the activities that took place, although _ perhaps _ the Russian ambassador in Baghdad was involved in some of these activities," he said.

_He said he has made it one of his highest priorities to improve U.S. intelligence analysis. He noted that his office has hired an ombudsman who will test the quality of reports and receive complaints. "We can't afford to repeat the mistakes that led to the WMD fiasco with respect to Iraq," he said, referring to the overblown estimates of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. No WMD were found.

_Negroponte said he planned to improve information sharing within the government. A written question from an audience member who claimed to have worked for the Defense Intelligence Agency asked Negroponte how he'd handle a stamp marked "Military Eyes Only," meaning the material couldn't go to the CIA and elsewhere.

Negroponte replied: "Take away the stamp."

___

On the Web:

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence: http://odni.gov/

Another screwup in the so-called 'war on terrorism'

Another screwup in the so-called 'war on terrorism'
By JOHN SOLOMON
Apr 21, 2006, 07:34
original


A botched Detroit terrorism case that already has embarrassed the Bush administration is taking a new twist: A fresh FBI analysis of the evidence undercuts the recent indictment of the former chief prosecutor in the case.

The 13-page report by FBI Agent Paul George concludes that satellite photos of a Jordanian hospital closely match hand-drawn sketches found in 2001 inside the apartment of four Detroit men who the government claimed had surveyed the site as part of a terrorist plot.

The new analysis conflicts with the Justice Department's argument that photographic evidence did not match the sketches, and renews questions about whether the government correctly arrested the four men as a terrorist cell shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks.

George testified at the 2003 Detroit terrorism trial and produced the new analysis around the time he was called to testify late last year before a grand jury that eventually indicted the prosecutor for wrongdoing in the case, officials said. The agent's report was obtained by The Associated Press.

Convictions of three of the four Detroit men were tossed out in 2004 after the Justice Department told the court its own prosecutors withheld photos from defense lawyers that could have helped prove the defendants innocence.

Last month, former Assistant U.S. Attorney Richard G. Convertino and a State Department investigator were indicted on charges they conspired at the trial to withhold the pictures because they would have shown that the drawings were not surveillance sketches of the hospital, as Convertino and trial witnesses had portrayed.

"The object of the conspiracy was to present false evidence at trial and to conceal inconsistent and potentially damaging evidence," the indictment alleges.

In an earlier court filing, Justice went further, claiming the photos disproved the sketches: "It is difficult if not impossible to compare the day-planner sketches with the photos and see a correlation."

Department officials said they were aware of George's report, but remained confident they could prove the ex-prosecutor and the State Department official lied about the existence of photos, which were e-mailed to Convertino before the trial and were not turned over to defense lawyers. Convertino said he never saw the e-mail or photos.

"The pending prosecution is not about the guilt or innocence of the defendants" in the original terror case, Justice spokesman Bryan Sierra said. "This is about lies perpetrated by a federal prosecutor and a federal agent, as alleged in the indictment. It's about perjury and the integrity and fairness of the judicial system."

Justice officials also acknowledge they don't possess one of two sets of photos taken in the case and don't know if they exist anymore. Aerial photos believed to have been taken by helicopter before the trial are missing, but prosecutors do have a set of ground and helicopter photos of the Jordanian hospital they say were e-mailed to Convertino before the trial.

Convertino alleges he is being prosecuted solely because he sued then-Attorney General John Ashcroft in 2004, alleging mismanagement of the war on terror.

Convertino is due in court Friday. His lawyer said Thursday the new FBI analysis "disproves the indictment's preposterous allegations" and vindicates the original terrorism convictions.

"The government now agrees, after three years of inquiry and millions of dollars, that the evidence in the original case proves the terrorist convictions originally rendered by the jury," attorney Bill Sullivan said

The criminal charges against Convertino are based on the principle that prosecutors must turn over to defendants all evidence that could help them prove their innocence.

Legal experts said the emergence of George's analysis could help Convertino's lawyer create reasonable doubt. Defense lawyers could argue that if photos matched the sketches _ instead of disproved them _ Convertino would have had no motive to hide them and no obligation to turn them over, experts said.

"We don't know yet what other evidence Justice might have, so we have to wait and see, but this new information seriously weakens the allegations as initially reported," said New York University School of Law professor Stephen Gillers.

Gillers said the fact that an FBI agent would create an analysis that could undercut Convertino's indictment "signals disagreement about the wisdom of this prosecution within the enforcement agency."

The FBI analysis is the latest twist in a case that once was hailed by the administration as a major success in the war on terror but has become a lingering embarrassment.

Three of the four defendants were convicted on various charges, but the Justice Department reversed course after the trial and took the rare step of persuading a judge to throw out their convictions, alleging misconduct by Convertino.

George, who was one of Convertino's witnesses at the 2003 trial, conducted his analysis late last year as Justice was pursuing the criminal charges against Convertino and threatening at least one fellow FBI agent with prosecution.

The agent overlaid satellite photos of the Jordanian hospital obtained from the Google satellite photo service with the defendants' original sketches. He identified numerous matching points.

"Close up showing Parking reference on sketch," George wrote on a page showing a satellite photo with the parking lot and how it matched the sketch. George noted the defendants had written in Arabic on the sketch, "Behind (Back) Parking, Private Non-Direct."

George wrote that two darkened lines on the sketch closely resembled two roads on the satellite photos and that X's marked on the sketches "may indicate highway exits" shown on the satellite images.

© 2006 The Associated Press

'Total Information' deputy gets new role

original


WASHINGTON, April 20 (UPI) -- Private sector intelligence contractor Aptima, Inc. has hired a key figure from the Pentagon's canceled Total Information Awareness project.

Robert Popp was the second-ranking official on the program, the deputy to retired Adm. John Poindexter, the controversial Reagan-era national security adviser and Iran-Contra figure.

The company, which bills itself as the "pioneer in human-centered engineering," and has over 200 contracts with the Department of Defense, announced the hiring of Popp as executive vice president in a Wednesday statement.

The Total Information Awareness program was a project run by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency or DARPA -- the blue-sky technology thinkers in the Pentagon.

The aim was to comb through vast amounts of data -- like credit card transactions, phone connections, and airline passenger manifests -- looking for patterns and relationships that might indicate terrorist activity. But angry lawmakers stripped funding for the program out of the unclassified DARPA budget after a storm of protests about the privacy implications of the project that its defenders said was fueled by misunderstandings.

After the effort was reportedly moved to the Pentagon's classified budget, Popp went on to be deputy head of DARPA's Information Exploitation Office, where he oversaw a $240 million portfolio of intelligence and surveillance programs, according to a biography released by Aptima.

U.S. Newswire : Releases : "Over 50 New Homeland Security Products Debuting at GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready 2006..."

Over 50 New Homeland Security Products Debuting at GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready 2006; April 26-27 in Washington

4/20/2006 8:15:00 AM

To: National Desk

Contact: Jenn Heinold of GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready!, 703-706-8253 or 800-687-7469 ext. 253, press@govsecinfo.com or Linda Dickerhoof, 703-527-1231, govsecshow@signaturestrategy.com

WASHINGTON, April 20 /U.S. Newswire/ --
original
The newest, cutting edge homeland security technologies will take center stage April 26-27, 2006 at GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready!, America's Premier Homeland Security Event.

"The future of homeland security is at the GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready! Exposition," said Kristina Tanasichuk, director of government and industry relations. "Last year, the innovation hotspot was in the secure wireless communications market. This year -- for obvious reasons -- we're seeing a tremendous increase in emergency response products in addition to continued emphasis on wireless solutions."

Tanasichuk attributes the increased number emergency response products to the hurricanes last year, and adds, "From mobile hospitals, to interoperable communications solutions and bio/chem agent detection, companies and first responders know that all response is local. They all come together at GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready! to see the best of what our nation has to offer to assure that every jurisdiction across the nation is prepared for acts of terror whether initiated by man or not."

Another area of the Exposition that has increased is the vehicle sector. From ATVs to SWAT vehicles, to Police fleet vehicles, Hummers(r) and mobile command centers that can be moved in and out of an area as needed, this year's Exposition will offer attendees an unprecedented look at the amazing vehicle capabilities and technology available today.

The GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready! Exposition offers attendees the opportunity to review and compare technology and services from more than 500 of the industry's leading homeland security suppliers. Products displayed on the show floor include biometric identification devices, bomb diffusers, mobile and wireless communication equipment, ammunition, personal protection devices, emergency response and police fleet vehicles and more.

New product highlights of the GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready! Exposition include:

-- Customized Mobile Command Units: A customized mobile command post built by LDV, Inc. for the State of Maryland Transportation Authority, will debut at GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready!. According to Pamela Thorne, Public Information Officer at the Maryland Transportation Authority, this command center will be utilized for disaster event coordination and communications as well as planned crowd control situations.

-- Biological Detection and Identification Device: The Guardian Reader System (tm) introduces the Defender TSR, the first hand-held biological detection and identification device, field-ready for HAZMAT crews with eight biological tests.

-- Mobile Hospital: Spevco will present a new 53' medical FEMA vehicle, outfitted with an operating room, 8 critical beds and more. This unit is used in areas of the Gulf Coast where healthcare facilities were destroyed.

-- Mobile Satellite Radio: Mobile Satellite Ventures developed the two-way mobile satellite radio, MSAT-G2, to address the increasing needs and demands of public safety and emergency response personnel. The MSAT-G2 is interoperable with land mobile radio systems and across multiple agencies. In addition, all radios are outfitted with GPS, enabling emergency management coordinators to know the exact location of their responders.

-- Instant Access Control and Credential System: Secure Network Systems is announcing General Availability of NIMS- IMPACT, a unified credential issuance and mobile access control product family that has been proven in multiple field exercises, most recently during Hurricane Katrina. The system enables emergency managers to create identity credential cards onsite, use electronic access control for perimeters, quarantine areas, and hot zones. The system was used to keep track of evacuees, volunteers and emergency management personnel after Hurricane Katrina.

-- Outdoor Perimeter Protection: The R-300 microwave barrier, a perimeter protection detector created using Russian military technology, is able to distinguish between a human and various animals, minimizing the amount of false alarms. The system is designed to continuously learn and adjust to changing weather and terrain conditions.

GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready! takes place April 26-27, 2006 in the Washington Convention Center, 801 Mount Vernon Place, Washington, D.C. Registration for the GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready! Exposition is free; visit http://www.govsecinfo.com to register online.

About GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready!

Celebrating its 5th anniversary in 2006, GovSec, The Government Security Expo and Conference, features an Exposition with a full spectrum of physical, IT and cyber security solutions, alongside wireless and mobility communications equipment for federal, state and local governments. GovSec is co- located with U.S. Law, the U.S. Law Enforcement Exposition and Conference for federal, state and local law enforcement and Ready!, The Emergency Preparedness and Response Conference and Exposition, for emergency first responders and homeland response managers. Together, GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready! is a one-of-a- kind event that unites all facets of the homeland security community-from the decision-makers at the federal level to the firefighters and police officers responding to catastrophic events in their hometown, and every homeland security professional in between. Northrop Grumman is the Title Sponsor of GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready! For more information on attending or exhibiting in GovSec, U.S. Law and Ready! 2006, call 800-687-7469 or visit http://www.govsecinfo.com.

http://www.usnewswire.com/

-0-

/© 2006 U.S. Newswire 202-347-2770/

Lockheed Martin to vie for $20B in Army contracts

original


Lockheed Martin in Seabrook was selected by the Army to compete for up to $20 billion in future information technology task orders under the Information Technology Enterprise Solutions-Services contracting vehicle.

Lockheed Martin’s teammates include CACI International Inc., ManTech International Corp., SRA International Inc., PricewaterhouseCoopers and many small business and hardware vendors.

Dever Designswins national award

Dever Designs of Laurel recently won several awards in the American Corporate Identity⁄22 Competition, which showcases graphic design work in the United States.

Dever won awards for the Society for Neuroscience 2005 annual report, the National Association of Counties 2006 conference logo, the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation 2004 annual report, the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute on Aging progress report on Alzheimer’s disease 2004-05 publication, and a Jamaican tour logo for Takoma Academy.

Wynn hosts14th annual job fair

Rep. Albert R. Wynn (D-Dist. 4) of Mitchellville will host his 14th annual job fair at the Prince George’s Sports & Learning Complex, 8001 Sheriff Road, Landover.

The event will be held from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. May 1.

The fair is expected to feature more than 200 businesses and employers, including federal and local government agencies. Job seekers, admitted free, are asked to bring their résumé and dress in business attire.

Alban Tractor holds open house in Upper Marlboro

Alban Tractor will hold an open house for construction contractors and trucking companies from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Friday.

Alban Tractor is in a 102,000-square-foot complex at 8400 Westphalia Road, Upper Marlboro, that includes 18 truck service bays, two bays dedicated to recreational vehicles and 15 oversized tractor bays that accommodate 40 to 60 types of construction equipment.

The Daily Texan - DeLay cleared of conspiracy charges

DeLay cleared of conspiracy charges
Patrick George
Posted: 4/20/06
original

A Texas appeals court ruled Wednesday to dismiss felony charges of conspiracy against U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay, R-Sugar Land, affirming a lower court's decision to remove one of the indictments against him.

Although DeLay still faces charges of money laundering, the three-judge panel unanimously ruled that he could not face charges of conspiring to violate the Texas Election Code, a decision originally made by District Judge Pat Priest in December. In March, Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle's prosecution team attempted to reinstate the charge.

Although the Legislature amended the election code in 2003 to incorporate a conspiracy offense, DeLay is charged with conduct that took place in the 2002 elections.

"They agreed with what we've been saying all along, and they did so unanimously, that 30 years of precedent are not to be overturned," said Dick DeGuerin, DeLay's attorney. "Ronnie Earle is charging us with crimes that are not on the books."

Earle said in a written statement that his office is studying the opinion of the court to determine what course of action they will take next.

DeLay announced earlier this month that he will resign from Congress. The representative has faced much turmoil during the past few years, including being associated with lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who pleaded guilty to of fraud and conspiracy charges. Tony Rudy, one of DeLay's former staffers, pleaded guilty in March to conspiracy charges while he was working for DeLay from 1995 to 2000.

DeGuerin said that DeLay's case is on hold as long as Earle continues to appeal, but the defense team plans to file more pleadings soon. © Copyright 2006 The Daily Texan

Pentagon Declines Comment On Report Of Iran Strike Plans

Pentagon Declines Comment On Report Of Iran Strike Plans

Pentagon Declines Comment On Report Of Iran Strike Plans

Navy planners have evaluated coastal targets and drawn up scenarios for keeping control of the Strait of Hormuz.

by Staff Writers
Washington (AFP) Apr 18, 2006
The Pentagon declined to comment Monday on a report that US military planning for Iran began in 2002 and has been continually updated since. "This is the United States Defense Department. We plan for all sorts of things," said Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman.

"With respect to Iran the United States governnment approach has been very clear," he added, saying it was working through the international community to try to resolve concerns about Iran's nuclear program diplomatically.

William Arkin, a well-connected military analyst writing in the Washington Post on Sunday, said the planning has been conducted under the codename TIRANNT, an acronym for Theater Iran Near Term.

It includes a scenario for a land invasion led by the US Marine Corps, a detailed analysis of the Iranian missile force and a global strike plan against any Iranian weapons of mass destruction, Arkin wrote.

Army General John Abizaid, the commander of the US Central Command, was given the task of planning military options for Iran in 2002 and by May 2003 the planning was underway in earnest, according to Arkin.

Air Force planners have modeled attacks against Iranian air defenses, while Navy planners have evaluated coastal targets and drawn up scenarios for keeping control of the Strait of Hormuz.

A follow-on TIRANNT analysis, which began in October 2003, calculated the results of different scenarios to provide options to commanders, Arkin wrote.

The Marines, meanwhile, explored the possibility of moving forces from ship to shore without establishing a beachhead first.

Arkin's account of the planning followed a report in the New Yorker magazine April 9 that said options under consideration include the use of nuclear bunker-busting bombs to destroy deeply buried targets.

The Washington Post reported the same day that planning for Iran strike options was underway as part of a campaign of coercive diplomacy.

"With respect to stories that I have seen that try to characterize military planning with respect to Iran, I would characterize as wild speculation," Whitman said, echoing President George W. Bush's reaction to the New Yorker story.

Source: Agence France-Presse

Rolling Stone : The Pentagon's New Spies

original

The Pentagon's New Spies
The military has built a vast domestic-intelligence network to fight terrorism -- but it's using it to track students, grandmothers and others protesting the war
Last October, before the public learned that president Bush had secretly ordered the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on Americans without a court order, the Pentagon approached the Senate intelligence committee with an unprecedented request. Military officials wanted the authority to spy on U.S. citizens on American soil, without identifying themselves, in order to collect intelligence about about terrorist threats. The plan was so sweeping, according to congressional sources who reviewed it, that it would have permitted operatives from the Defense Intelligence Agency to spy on dissidents by posing as peace activists and infiltrating anti-war meetings.

Senators on both sides of the aisle refused to go along with the plan. "The Department of Defense should not be in the business of spying on law-abiding Americans -- period," said Sen. Ron Wyden, a Democrat from Oregon. In closed-door deliberations, the intelligence committee blocked the request.

In fact, however, the Pentagon has already assembled a nationwide domestic spying machine that goes far beyond the National Security Agency's warrantless surveillance of telephone and e-mail traffic. Operating in secret, the Defense Department is systematically gathering and analyzing intelligence on American citizens at home -- and a new Pentagon agency called Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA) is helping to coordinate the military's covert efforts with federal, state and local law enforcement agencies.

Those responsible for the military's new spy network insist that it is aimed at preventing another attack by Al Qaeda. "The premise is that there needs to be a nexus to foreign terrorism," says David Burtt, CIFA's director. "In the wake of 9/11, there was a lot of criticism about the ability to collect dots and connect dots."

So far, the military's efforts at domestic spying have caught few, if any, terrorists. But the Pentagon has tracked the activities of anti-war activists across the country who have staged peaceful demonstrations against military bases and defense contractors such as Halliburton. Traditionally restricted to action overseas, America's armed forces -- including the National Guard -- are now linked in a growing domestic spying apparatus which, thanks to technology, has far greater power than the Army units that conducted a massive operation to infiltrate, disrupt and destabilize Vietnam and civil rights protests during the 1960s and '70s. "We are deputizing the military to spy on law-abiding Americans in America," said Wyden. "This is a huge leap without even a congressional hearing."

* * * *

Intelligence gathered by the military runs into and out of the U.S. Northern Command in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Here, beneath the snow-covered summit of Pike's Peak, the Defense Department has set up its first command dedicated to homeland security in a gleaming new $90 million facility. Before Northcom was established in 2002, the facility was best known as the home of the North American Aerospace Defense Command, the ultra-high-tech war room depicted in the movie WarGames, where sharp-eyed military personnel spent the Cold War watching for a nuclear attack by the Soviet Union.

Nowadays, the place is more like a real-life version of the counterterrorism unit on 24. Judging from the bustle of activity at Northcom, anti-terrorism is good for business. The corridors are filled with dust from construction and the smell of paint, and a brand-new wing is nearly ready to open. Over the past four years, Northcom has doubled in size and now boasts a staff of 1,200 and an annual budget of $93 million.

At the center of the operation is a core group of 300 intelligence analysts and staff who inhabit Northcom and its state-of-the-art facility, called the Combined Intelligence Fusion Center. "Intelligence fusion" is a spy master's term of art that refers to melding together data from all points -- including intelligence agencies, the armed forces, law enforcement and other sources -- and analyzing all the seemingly disparate information for patterns. "The fusion and analysis that these kids do is different than anything I've seen in forty years," says Adm. Timothy Keating, the commander of Northcom.

The intelligence streaming into the center can be anything from highly polished analyses from the CIA and FBI to the military's own alerts and warnings. At the bottom are Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) filed by many government agencies, which are often little more than rumors based on unfounded information -- a financial officer who notes an odd money transfer or a military spouse who spots a suspect individual near a base. More official are Threat and Local Observation Notices (TALONs), part of a surveillance program started by the Pentagon in 2003. More than 15,000 TALONs have been collected so far, from sources such as soldiers manning gates outside military bases, law-enforcement agencies, local businesses and the media. The SARs and TALONs -- along with intelligence from the armed forces, such as the U.S. Air Force program known as Eagle Eyes -- are eventually integrated into a single intelligence database called JPEN, for the Joint Protection Enterprise Network.

In its homeland-security role, Northcom has mobilized troops for hundreds of events since 2002, including the Super Bowl, the Daytona 500, Boy Scout jamborees and the presidential inauguration. The sixty-four members of its instant command center, including an intelligence team that can be mobilized in hours, have been sent into action at special events nine times in the past two years. In addition, scores of federal agencies -- from the CIA and FBI to the Coast Guard and FEMA -- have officials based at Northcom to coordinate their work. "We're fully integrated with the Special Operations Command," says Maj. Gen. Richard Rowe, Northcom's director of operations. "We have people who've done operations from a Special Ops perspective."

Inside Northcom's operations center, where wall-size screens flank rows of computer terminals linked to federal agencies, military analysts monitor everything from the president's travels to routine air traffic. A placard in the war room lists fourteen events that merit immediate attention -- "we call them 'wake me up in the middle of the night' stuff," says Col. Bob Felderman of Northcom operations. Adds another Northcom official, "We get reports if somebody's pounding on a cockpit door in flight, or there's a drunk passenger, or somebody's taped a note in an airplane restroom." But the list also includes a category for "civil disturbances of more than 1,000 persons" -- a directive broad enough to include an anti-war demonstration or anti-globalization protest.

Keating, a gray-haired commander who led the U.S. Fifth Fleet, insists that Northcom does not spy on Americans. "We are not allowed to gather intelligence on U.S. persons unless there is a clearly defined, well-understood terrorist nexus," he says.

Ever since 1878, when the Posse Comitatus Act barred the U.S. military from taking part in law enforcement, the responsibility for domestic security has traditionally resided with the police and the FBI. The Defense Department, for the most part, has been confined to protecting U.S. military bases. But shortly after September 11th, the Pentagon began muscling in on the FBI's turf. In 2002, in a move that received little public attention, the Bush administration created Counterintelligence Field Activity and charged the new agency with consolidating all Pentagon intelligence to "protect DOD and the nation against espionage, other intelligence activities, sabotage, assassinations and terrorist activities."

The agency got another boost last year when a commission appointed by Bush urged that CIFA be empowered to collect and analyze intelligence "both inside and outside the United States." Three of the commission's consultants, it turns out, were employees of MZM -- one of CIFA's primary contractors -- and federal prosecutors are now looking into whether Pentagon personnel have committed crimes in steering CIFA contracts to MZM. Nevertheless, the president agreed last October to significantly broaden the agency's mission, giving it the authority to actually direct military intelligence operations. From a small unit designed as a clearinghouse for reports, CIFA was transformed overnight into a major arm of domestic intelligence. Both its budget and its staff, thought to be in excess of 1,000 people, are classified.

According to a Defense Department strategy paper, military spying encompasses not only "defense critical infrastructure" -- highways, bridges, communications facilities, chemical plants and nuclear reactors -- but also the "defense industrial base," which the paper describes as "a worldwide industrial complex with capabilities to perform research and development and design, produce, and maintain military weapons systems, subsystems, components or parts to meet military requirements." In other words, the Pentagon sees itself as defending the entire military-industrial complex -- a mission broad enough to include intelligence on virtually any conceivable threat.

* * * *

It didn't take long for the pentagon to begin using its new powers to collect intelligence on anti-war groups. In December, NBC News reported that CIFA had collected dozens of incident and threat reports on peace activists and other nonviolent organizations that have nothing to do with terrorism. By matching the unnamed groups in the news reports to specific activities of activists nationwide, the American Civil Liberties Union discovered that the military's spying effort had ensnared the American Friends Service Committee, United for Peace and Justice, and Veterans for Peace, as well as local anti-war groups from Florida to California.

A group at University of California Santa Cruz called Students Against the War was included in CIFA's terrorism database in April 2005, when it staged a protest against military recruiters on campus. Although the protest was peaceful, a TALON report called the demonstration a "threat," an assessment that CIFA deemed "credible." A Florida group called the Truth Project ended up in the database in November 2004, when they gathered at a Quaker meetinghouse to plan a protest against high school recruiting by the military. Five months earlier, ten peace activists in Texas merited a TALON report for donning papier-m?ch? masks and handing out peanut-butter sandwiches to highlight "war profiteering" outside the offices of Vice President Dick Cheney's former firm, the defense contractor Halliburton.

In May 2005, a California group called the Raging Grannies ran afoul of military spies when it helped organize a peaceful Mother's Day demonstration to protest the war in Iraq. Unbeknownst to them, their action was brought to the attention of a new intelligence unit at the California National Guard -- a program that went by the cumbersome title of Information Synchronization, Knowledge Management, and Intelligence Fusion. According to internal e-mails, the Guard forwarded information about the protest "to our Intell folks who continue to monitor."

Asked why the Guard was spying on the Grannies, a spokesman suggested that terrorists might try to take advantage of the activists. "Who knows who could infiltrate that type of group and try to stir something up?" Lt. Col. Stan Zezotarski told reporters. "After all, we live in an age of terrorism, so who knows?"

Joe Dunn, a California state senator, was having none of it. He launched an investigation and helped force the Guard to shut down its intelligence center. "What got us to the point of the National Guard setting up units in which, at least in California, they start down the path of domestic spying?" he asks. "Our fear is that this was part of a federally sponsored effort to set up domestic surveillance programs in a way that would circumvent the Posse Comitatus Act."

The ACLU, which is demanding more information about CIFA's activities, cites a "broad and disturbing pattern" in the military's intelligence gathering, saying the efforts are being used to target legitimate protesters. "The chilling effect of this may be the most significant," says ACLU staff attorney Ben Wizner. "There is a real danger when the military is seen as being used as part of the administration's political goals."

According to Denice Denton, the chancellor at Santa Cruz, the military's covert intelligence operation is already deterring dissent. "It has intimidated people," she says. "I spoke to one of the students involved, and she feels intimidated about speaking openly because she is being watched. Students wonder, 'How was this information being collected? Were people standing behind a tree?' "

Some of the military intelligence, in fact, appears to be based on very little intelligence. "These reports are nothing more than a gossip and rumor index," says Christopher Pyle, a former Army intelligence officer who exposed some of the abuses by military spy agencies in the 1960s. "A lot of them are filed by paranoid housewives and rabid, retired colonels with nothing better to do than spy on the people around them."

With the military spying on peace groups, some activists say they are on the lookout for moles within their own ranks. Ray Del Papa, who attended the Truth Project meeting in Florida, told reporters that he believes government agents infiltrated the organization. "You could pretty much pick out who are the infiltrators," he said. "It gets you mad. It is wrong for anyone from the government to have to spy on U.S. citizens."

No one disputes that the Pentagon has a responsibility to protect its facilities and personnel. But its broad definition of "terrorism" could easily lead it back into the business of targeting legitimate protesters. In the late 1960s, more than 1,500 Army personnel tracked a wide range of dissident groups and monitored every demonstration involving more than twenty people, amassing files on more than 100,000 Americans.

The Pentagon has apologized for the latest abuses and pledged to clean up its act. Robert Rogalski, acting deputy undersecretary of defense for counterintelligence and security, says a complete review of CIFA's database is under way, adding that any data on dissidents was included by mistake. "We've laid our dirty laundry on the table, we recognize that mistakes were made, and we've done the right thing," he says. "It did cause us to realize that we have to sharpen the focus."

But it may be hard to undo the damage. By law, TALON reports that do not warrant further investigation are supposed to be purged from all databases after ninety days. Yet the information is shared with so many agencies, there is simply no way for citizens to know that their names have been cleared. "It's impossible to know how many databases there are," says Jim Harper, an information-policy specialist at the conservative Cato Institute in Washington, D.C. "And every other week, databases are being combined."

The broader threat is that military spies will gradually expand their anti-terrorist mission to include more and more ordinary citizens. "The danger is that we create an apparatus for spying -- and that becomes the essential apparatus of a police state," says Pyle, the former intelligence officer. "It goes from clipping articles to sending people out to watch protesters to taking video and sending it back to the Pentagon. If some kids knock down a power line somewhere, soon they'll be looking at every member of Earth First! and the Earth Liberation Front." The military's intelligence gathering got out of hand thirty-five years ago, Pyle observes. "And my sense is," he says, "the bureaucracy forgets stuff like that."

ROBERT DREYFUSS

Posted Apr 18, 2006 8:18 PM

DefenseNews.com - Pentagon To Host Exercise on Iran Options - 04/19/06 16:01

original


Pentagon To Host Exercise on Iran Options
By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE


Members of Congress and top government officials will be invited to play out options in a fictional crisis involving Iran in a Pentagon-sponsored exercise in July, a spokesman said April 19.
The exercise, which was first reported by USA Today, comes amid tensions with Iran over its nuclear program and recent U.S. press reports of stepped up military planning for strike options.
The July 18 exercise is designed to give senior policymakers, military leaders and members of Congress an opportunity to explore the kinds of options they may be faced with in a real crisis.
Groups of about 15 to 20 people will react to an unfolding series of events in a fictional scenario during a morning-long conference at the National Defense University (NDU).
”We develop scenarios based on things that are fairly current in the real world, but the schedule is set way in advance,” said David Thomas, a spokesman for the NDU, the Pentagon’s school for advanced military education and research.
”The intent is to teach, to educate, the complexity of decisions in formulating policy,” he said. “So there is no school solution.”
”We may draw from something that happened in real life or could happen in real life to make it as current or realistic as possible,” he said.
He said the university’s National Strategic Gaming Center, which devises the exercises, has not yet developed the scenario for the Iran exercise.
Currently they are preparing for another exercise on U.S.-China issues that is scheduled for next month.
Past exercises have explored the ramifications of events such as an escalation of proliferation concerns on the Korean peninsula and a crisis over the Taiwan Straits.
Others had as their premise terrorist attacks on the U.S. transportation system, a cyber-attack on public utilities, a terrorist attack with biological agents, and a disruption of the U.S. agricultural infrastructure.

China's military rise weighs on US - Financial Times - MSNBC.com

China's military rise weighs on US - Financial Times - MSNBC.com

China's military rise weighs on US
By Demetri Sevastopulo in Washington
Financial Times
Updated: 11:42 p.m. ET April 19, 2006

When Chinese President Hu Jintao meets President George W. Bush at the White House today, much of the focus will be on trade and currency issues. But lurking in the background will be US concerns about the rise of the Chinese military and whether China's intentions are peaceful.

The Sino-US military relationship turned very sour in 2001, when a Chinese fighter jet and an American EP-3 spy aircraft collided off the Chinese coast. But in the three years following the September 11 attacks, Chinese co-operation in the "war on terror", and the US preoccupation with Iraq and Afghanistan, appeared to push US concerns about its military expansion off the public radar.

Early last year, however, Pentagon and Central Intelligence Agency officials started publicly raising concerns about the rapid growth in the Chinese military budget.

A senior administration official said on Wednesday that some of those concerns would be raised during Mr Hu's visit to Washington, although they would not feature prominently.

Donald Rumsfeld, US defence secretary, startled the Chinese last June when he addressed a meeting of defence ministers in Singapore with the question: "Since no nation threatens China, one wonders: why this growing investment?"

The Pentagon soon after released its annual military report on China, which said Beijing was increasing its efforts to prepare for a conflict over Taiwan, including developing long-term measures to help defend itself from any other country that got involved in a Taiwan conflict. The report also criticised China for a lack of transparency in its military budget.

The tabular content relating to this article is not available to view. Apologies in advance for the inconvenience caused.

Earlier this year, the Pentagon released its Quadrennial Defense Review – an important military strategy document that outlines future threats – which concluded that China had the "greatest potential to compete militarily" with the US. China responded angrily to the Pentagon reports. It argues that its intentions are peaceful.

The US says it hopes China does not have belligerent intentions, but that Washington must prepare for more hostile scenarios. "Uncertainties about how China will use its power will lead the US ... to hedge relations with China," Robert Zoellick, deputy secretary of state, said in a speech on China last September.

The senior administration official said the military discussion during the Hu visit would focus on issues such as improving military exchanges, particularly of middle-ranked officers, and increasing confidence-building measures to understand the structures of their armed forces.

In the aftermath of the EP-3 incident, the Pentagon has been pushing the People's Liberation Army to agree to establish a telephone hotline between the two militaries.

Pentagon officials encouraged China to set up the hotline during Mr Rumsfeld's visit to Beijing last year. But the official on Wednesday said that no progress had been made.
Copyright The Financial Times Ltd. All rights reserved.

© 2006 MSNBC.com

Bay of Pigs anniversary reminds Cubans of US threat�|�Reuters.com

Bay of Pigs anniversary reminds Cubans of US threat�|�Reuters.com

Bay of Pigs anniversary reminds Cubans of US threat
Wed Apr 19, 2006 11:13 AM ET

By Anthony Boadle

PLAYA GIRON, Cuba (Reuters) - Forty-five years after it defeated a CIA-trained invasion force at the Bay of Pigs, Cuba still sees the United States as the biggest threat to its socialist society.

"The empire threatens Cuba permanently. The threat is still there today," Cuban Vice President Jose Ramon Fernandez, told Reuters by telephone as Cuba celebrated on Wednesday its defeat of the now infamous attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro.

Cuba's closest Latin American ally, Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, this week accused the United States of threatening his country and Cuba with the deployment of four U.S. warships in the Caribbean.

Wreckage of downed B-26 bombers and a captured M-41 tank exhibited at a museum recall the failed landing on this beach in the Bay of Pigs on Cuba's south coast.

At dawn on April 17, 1961, as the B-26s strafed coastal villages, 1,500 Cuban exiles organized and armed by the CIA came ashore in launches from U.S. merchant ships. Two days before, the B-26s had bombed Cuba's three main air bases.

"At first we thought it was thunder and lightning when the attack began," said retired sugar mill worker Ramon Medina, 62, who joined up as a militia fighter. "We could not believe they would land in such an inhospitable place," he said.

The invaders never got beyond the mosquito-infested swamps surrounding the Bay of Pigs, as Castro's fledgling revolutionary government scrambled to defend itself.

After three days of fighting, the invaders were defeated, 108 had been killed and 1,197 captured, their hopes of sparking an uprising against Castro dashed.

The disastrous attempt to overthrow Castro was the CIA's biggest fiasco and a diplomatic embarrassment for President John F. Kennedy.

A year later, the prisoners were returned to the United States after Washington paid out $53 million in food and medicines in exchange for their release.

The invasion served to strengthen Castro, who declared his government to be Socialist on the eve of the imminent attack.

It also pushed Cuba into a strategic relationship with the Soviet Union, leading to the Cuban missile crisis in October 1962 that brought the world to the brink of nuclear war.

DEFEAT LIKE IRAQ

"It was a real defeat for the United States, like Iraq is a defeat today, and President Kennedy had to accept that," said Fernandez, a U.S.-trained infantry officer whom Castro put in charge of the defense forces at the Bay of Pigs.

Fernandez said the current threat is the Bush administration's plan to hasten a transition to multi-party democracy and "capitalist exploitation" in Cuba.

Moves to undermine Castro by tightening economic sanctions are backed by anti-Castro exiles in Miami who were calling for "Cuba next" in 2003 when U.S. troops invaded Iraq and toppled Saddam Hussein.

Bush administration officials are concerned by the growing alliance between Castro and Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez, a populist who has turned his oil-exporting country against U.S. policies in Latin America.

For Cuban authorities, another anniversary of the Battle of the Bay of Pigs serves to keep the island's 11 million people alert to the threat of a U.S. invasion.

Castro's critics say the siege mentality serves as tool for political control, distracting Cubans from the hardships of a bankrupt economy.

Dissident Vladimiro Roca, a former MiG pilot, said Cubans are tired of being permanently at war with the United States, but the "war propaganda" allows the government to maintain tough laws such as the death penalty to deter protest.

For Castro's supporters, the Bay of Pigs is a shrine to a revolutionary feat.

"This was the first defeat of U.S. imperialism in Latin America," said Alejandro Figueroa, 61, who cycled 129 miles

from Havana to Playa Giron with his children.

At the museum, he proudly showed them uniforms, badges and bits of parachutes used by the "mercenary" invaders.

"The children must be educated ideologically," he said.

(Additional reporting by Esteban Israel in Havana)

CIA mines 'rich' content from blogs -- The Washington Times

CIA mines 'rich' content from blogs
By Bill Gertz
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Published April 19, 2006
original


President Bush and U.S. policy-makers are receiving more intelligence from open sources such as Internet blogs and foreign newspapers than they previously did, senior intelligence officials said.
The new Open Source Center (OSC) at CIA headquarters recently stepped up data collection and analysis based on bloggers worldwide and is developing new methods to gauge the reliability of the content, said OSC Director Douglas J. Naquin.
"A lot of blogs now have become very big on the Internet, and we're getting a lot of rich information on blogs that are telling us a lot about social perspectives and everything from what the general feeling is to ... people putting information on there that doesn't exist anywhere else," Mr. Naquin told The Washington Times.
Eliot A. Jardines, assistant deputy director of national intelligence for open source, said the amount of unclassified intelligence reaching Mr. Bush and senior policy-makers has increased as a result of the center's creation in November.
"We're certainly scoring a number of wins with our ultimate customer," said Mr. Jardines, who became the first high-level official in charge of the government's nonsecret intelligence in December.
"I can't get into detail of what, but I'll just say the amount of open source reporting that goes into the president's daily brief has gone up rather significantly," Mr. Jardines said. "There has been a real interest at the highest levels of our government, and we've been able to consistently deliver products that are on par with the rest of the intelligence community."
Mr. Naquin said recent OSC successes have included the discovery of a technology advance in a foreign country. Also, most data on avian flu outbreaks come from open sources, he said.
"Have we got coups out of it? Close to it," Mr. Naquin said. "But certainly we've had more insight than we've ever had before."
The OSC uses powerful computers and software technology to "sift" the Internet for valuable intelligence. It also buys information from commercial databases.
In the past, open-source reports were used mainly by intelligence analysts.
"But now our customer base literally ranges from the president to local police departments," Mr. Naquin said. The Fairfax County police use OSC products, as do police departments in San Diego, New York and Baltimore. The center also provides support to the U.S. military.
A Defense Department official said Chinese military bloggers have become a valuable source of intelligence on Beijing's secret military buildup. For example, China built its first Yuan-class attack submarine at an underground factory that was unknown to U.S. intelligence until a photo of the submarine appeared on the Internet in 2004.
The center took over the CIA's Foreign Broadcast Information Service, known as FBIS, that was formed in 1941 to translate foreign broadcasts.
The OSC is doubling its staff and bringing in material from 32 government agencies that also produce unclassified reports, Mr. Jardines said.

Raytheon splits $289.7M mini-bomb deal with Boeing - Boston Business Journal:

Raytheon splits $289.7M mini-bomb deal with Boeing
Boston Business Journal - 1:14 PM EDT Tuesday
original


Raytheon Co.'s Missile Systems business split a $289.7 million deal with the Boeing Co. to make a small diameter bomb that can destroy moving targets in poor weather and from a long range.

Raytheon (NYSE: RTN) of Waltham, Mass., will collect about $143.9 million and Boeing Co. of Chicago will reap about $145.8 million, according to a defense department release. The so-called Small Diameter Bomb (SDB) Increment II is expected to advance the development of miniature bombs. The companies are slated to finish the work for the Headquarters Air-To-Ground Munitions Systems Wing at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., by October 2009.

Raytheon earned $871 million on sales of $21.9 billion last year.

Venezuela president says he'd blow up oilfields if U.S. attacked

Venezuela president says he'd blow up oilfields if U.S. attacked
Canadian Press
Published: Wednesday, April 19, 2006
original

Paraguay -- Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez warned Wednesday his government would blow up its own oilfields if the United States ever were to attack -- the latest in a series of warnings against Washington.

U.S. officials have repeatedly denied any military plans against Chavez but also have called him a threat to stability in the region. Speaking with other South American leaders, Chavez said his conflict with the United States is rooted in Washington's thirst for oil.

If the United States were to attack, Chavez said: "We'll do like the Iraqis. We won't have any other alternative -- blow up our own oilfields but they aren't going to take that oil.''

Chavez, however, cited what he called a regular flow of threatening statements and actions from the U.S. government -- from naval exercises behind held this month in the Caribbean to U.S. complaints about Venezuela's deepening ties with Iran.

Chavez rattled off a list of insults he said the United States is trying to pin on him: "tyrant, dictator, abuser of human rights, there is no freedom of expression in Venezuela.''

"The real reason for the open conflict...is energy,'' Chavez said.

"They will never admit that because, of course, they're looking for other excuses.''

Venezuela is the world's fifth-largest oil exporter and remains a major supplier of oil to the United States.

Chavez called U.S. Ambassador William Brownfield, whom he recently threatened to expel, "a constant provocation'' and accused Washington of stirring up suspicions about his country's relations with Iran.

"The latest they've invented is that we're sending uranium to Iran and what's more, yesterday, it came out in the Venezuela press that we're making a secret plan to bring Iranian nuclear missiles and install them in Venezuela,'' he said.

The Venezuelan newspaper 2001 published that report Tuesday, citing unidentified U.S. intelligence sources saying Iran and Venezuela had made a secret deal to ship missiles to Venezuela and Cuba aboard oil tankers. It did not provide any details about its sources and the report was roundly denied by Venezuelan officials as preposterous.

Chavez said the United States seems to be "searching for an excuse for anything'' against Venezuela, noting U.S. warships are holding naval exercises this month in the Caribbean -- "there under our very noses.''

In Caracas, meanwhile, Venezuelan Defence Minister Admiral Orlando Maniglia said the military plans to hold its own exercises soon along its coasts and with neighbouring countries' armed forces.

"We have the same sort of exercises,'' Maniglia said.

"We already have planned some future exercises with the government of Curacao and also with the Dutch, with the navy and armed forces of Colombia...with the Brazilians.''

The dates of the training were unclear but the defence minister suggested Venezuela's military is planning air and naval exercises along its coast in the short-term.

US Firms Suspected of Bilking Iraq Funds

US Firms Suspected of Bilking Iraq Funds

US Firms Suspected of Bilking Iraq Funds
By Farah Stockman
The Boston Globe

Sunday 16 April 2006

Millions missing from program for rebuilding.

Washington - American contractors swindled hundreds of millions of dollars in Iraqi funds, but so far there is no way for Iraq's government to recoup the money, according to US investigators and civil attorneys tracking fraud claims against contractors.

Courts in the United States are beginning to force contractors to repay reconstruction funds stolen from the American government. But legal roadblocks have prevented Iraq from recovering funds that were seized from the Iraqi government by the US-led coalition and then paid to contractors who failed to do the work.

A US law that allows citizens to recover money from dishonest contractors protects only the US government, not foreign governments.

In addition, an Iraqi law created by the Coalition Provisional Authority days before it ceded sovereignty to Iraq in June 2004 gives American contractors immunity from prosecution in Iraq.

"In effect, it makes Iraq into a 'free-fraud zone,' " said Alan Grayson, a Virginia attorney who is suing the private security firm Custer Battles in a whistle-blower lawsuit filed by former employees. A federal jury last month found the Rhode Island-based company liable for $3 million in fraudulent billings in Iraq.

Even the United Nations panel set up to monitor the use of Iraq's seized assets has no power to prosecute wrongdoers.

"The Iraqi people are out of luck, the way it stands right now," said Patrick Burns, spokesman for Taxpayers Against Fraud, a watchdog group that helps US citizens file cases such as the Custer Battles action.

Iraqi leaders, paralyzed by political deadlock in forming a new government, have so far made no formal complaint about funds that were paid out to dishonest contractors. But US officials say the need for Iraq to recoup the stolen money has become more urgent as it faces a budget shortfall of billions of dollars.

The problem has become so acute that an interagency working group, which includes officials from the State Department and the Department of Justice, has been set up to try to come up with a mechanism to return the funds, according to two US officials who are involved.

The issue dates to the earliest days after the March 2003 invasion, when US officials thought Iraqi money would cover the costs of reconstruction. As the Coalition Provisional Authority took control just after the fall of Saddam Hussein, it seized Iraq's oil revenues, money found in bank accounts and in Hussein's palaces, and the balance from the UN's oil-for-food program.

The coalition ultimately controlled more than $20.7 billion in Iraqi funds. The money was deposited into an account called the Development Fund for Iraq, or DFI, which was set up, in the words of the US administrator at the time, L. Paul Bremer III, "for the benefit of the Iraqi people."

The fund represented the first cash reservoir US officials turned to as they worked to rebuild roads, bridges, and clinics. It carried fewer restrictions than the $18.4 billion in US funds appropriated around that time for reconstruction because those funds could only be used in ways designated by Congress.

But the Coalition Provisional Authority lacked basic controls and accounting procedures to keep track of the billions in Iraqi money it was doling out to contractors, according to a series of audits issued in 2005 and 2006 by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, a temporary office set up by Congress to oversee the use of reconstruction funds. One review of the files relating to 198 separate contracts found that 154 contained no evidence that goods or services promised by contractors were ever received, according to an April 2005 audit by the inspector general.

In some cases, contractors were paid twice for the same job. In others cases, they were paid for work that was never done.

In June 2004, the Coalition Provisional Authority handed power and control of the DFI back to an Iraqi government. By then, the coalition had spent or disbursed about $14 billion of the Iraqi fund on reconstruction projects and on the administration of the government, according to the audits.

Among the contracts paid for out of the Iraqi fund was Halliburton's controversial no-bid contract to restore Iraq's oil infrastructure, worth $2.4 billion. The Pentagon's auditors found $263 million in excessive or unsubstantiated costs for importing gasoline into Iraq, but the Pentagon said in February that it had agreed to pay a Halliburton subsidiary all but $10 million of the contested charges.

The special inspector general's investigations have resulted in the arrests of five suspects on criminal charges and is investigating 60 more cases involving alleged fraud and corruption in Iraq involving both US and DFI funds, according to James Mitchell, a spokesman for the inspector general.

In addition, at least seven more cases against contractors have been filed in US civil courts under the federal False Claims Act, according to two private lawyers who have personal knowledge of the suits. The act, which dates to the Civil War, allows citizens to sue on behalf of the government when they suspect fraud in federal contracting. The cases are currently under seal until the Justice Department investigates them to determine whether the government will join the suit.

The cases eventually could help the US Treasury recover hundreds of millions of dollars from corrupt contractors, according to Grayson, the attorney suing Custer Battles, the first such case to reach the courts and become public.

But the False Claims Act has not helped Iraq. Last month, a federal judge in Virginia ruled that it only protects the US government from fraud and that the United States suffered no direct economic loss from fraud involving Iraqi funds.

The result is a victory for American taxpayers, but a loss for Baghdad: In the first phase of the fraud claim involving Custer Battles, the jury ruled in March that the company should pay triple damages to the US Treasury for the $3 million it was paid for delivering a fleet of trucks that didn't work and old, spray-painted Iraqi cranes that were passed off as new imports. But the company, which has denied the charges in court and in other statements, does not have to repay any of the $12 million that came from the Development Fund for Iraq on the same contract, according to the judge's ruling.

Grayson said the injustice surrounding wasted Iraqi funds has helped fuel the insurgency.

"The DFI was essentially treated as a 'slush fund' for various quasi-military projects, run by US contractors over whom Iraqis had no control," he said. "Like a colonial power, the Bush administration took Iraq's oil money, and wasted it. The Iraqis well know that. That's one reason why they're shooting at US soldiers."

Representative Henry A. Waxman, Democrat of California, has urged the administration to repay Iraq for the money paid to Custer Battles. "This was Iraqi money, and it should be returned to the Iraqi people," he said in a statement.

The Justice Department, which is pursuing criminal cases against contractors, says there is a chance that Iraq eventually could receive some restitution.

In February, Robert J. Stein Jr., a North Carolina man who issued contracts on behalf of the Coalition Provisional Authority, pleaded guilty to conspiring with at least three others to steal more than $2 million from the Iraqi fund. The money, earmarked for refurbishing a police academy and library in the town of Hillah, was spent on expensive cars, machine guns, jewelry; hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash was also smuggled into the United States.

As part of a plea deal, Stein has agreed to pay $3.6 million in restitution, but Bryan Sierra, a spokesman for the Department of Justice, said it is too early to say whether Iraq will receive the money as part of that deal.

"It is possible that some of the money could go back to the Development Fund for Iraq," he said. "But that hasn't been determined yet."

-------

Fred Weir | Russia, US Slipping Into Familiar "Chill?"

original

Russia, US Slipping into Familiar "Chill?"
By Fred Weir
The Christian Science Monitor

Monday 17 April 2006

Moscow - Call it cold war II, the sequel.

An intensifying shouting match between the US and Russia has stirred fears that the two former adversaries could be drifting back to a familiar ideologically charged rivalry.

Most experts play down the new mood as a worrisome "chill," and some suggest that a change in leadership - slated for 2008 in both countries - might reverse the slide in mutual ties. But many Russians, who have watched as Western influence has thrust decisively into the former Soviet heartland since the USSR's 1991 demise, see it in darker, more visceral tones.

The US is bent on spreading its power by "buying leaders and organizing state coups" throughout the former USSR, says Yevgeny Ivanov, chief ideologist for the pro-Kremlin group Nashi, Russia's biggest political youth movement. He's referring to the recent wave of pro-democracy "colored revolutions" that wrenched Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan from Moscow's orbit. "Their type of globalization is aimed at having the right to decide the world's destiny," he says.

At the other end of the age spectrum, Fyodor Suvorov, a retired military officer, agrees. "What is the US doing [in the former USSR]? It's as if Russia went to 'protect its interests' in Mexico. While we give in to their pressure, the Americans have pushed NATO right to our doorstep," he says.

A January poll conducted by the independent Levada Center in Moscow found that 57 percent of Russians regard the US as a "threat to global security," while just 33 percent think it isn't.

As in the original cold war, which lasted from the end of World War II until the 1991 Soviet collapse, each of the two sides blames the other for the rift.

A report issued last month by the bipartisan US Council on Foreign Relations faulted "Russia's wrong direction" under President

Vladimir Putin, and listed a catalog of alleged Muscovite sins that included growing authoritarianism, use of Russian energy supplies to bully neighbors such as Ukraine, and anti-American policies in areas such as Iran and former Soviet Central Asia.

A US State Department human rights report accuses the Kremlin of sidelining parliament, straitjacketing the media, pressuring the judiciary, and harassing nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). The White House National Security Strategy, a policy blueprint released in mid-March, warned that "efforts to prevent democratic development at home and abroad will hamper the development of Russia's relations with the US, Europe, and its neighbors."

"There is clearly a policy shift underway," says Masha Lipman, an analyst with the Carnegie Center in Moscow. "We're talking about a bad trend; not just a cooling but a deterioration in relations."

The crunch could come in July, when Russia is set to host a Group of Eight wealthy democracies summit in St. Petersburg - a moment that experts say Mr. Putin sees as crucial to his efforts to gain Russia's acceptance into the club of Western nations. A growing number of US politicians, including Sen. John McCain (news, bio, voting record) (R) of Arizona, are urging

President Bush to boycott the event. "The glimmerings of democracy are very faint in Russia today, so I would be very harsh," Mr. McCain told a TV interviewer recently.

Russia's 12-year-old bid to join the World Trade Organization, which awaits only US agreement to become official, has already fallen victim to the new chill, Russian officials complain. "The negotiation process is being artificially set back," Putin told Russian business leaders this month, citing US demands over issues "we thought had been settled long ago."

Experts say the Russian security establishment was stunned by a report in the current issue of the US journal Foreign Affairs which suggests that due to the post-Soviet decay of Russia's nuclear forces coupled with key advances in America's strategic weaponry Russia has "become vulnerable to a US disarming attack." Russian officials have attacked the article as a "provocation."

"There is no doubt that such articles influence security thinking in the opposite country," says Natalia Narochnitskaya, vice chair of the Duma's International Affairs Committee. "Inevitably, it makes us think about how to respond. That's a dangerous thing to start."

The first cold war erupted amid Western alarm over the march of Soviet power into Eastern Europe after WWII, as Moscow staged coups against democratic governments and encouraged local Communist Parties to turn their countries into Soviet "satellites." Ironically, Russians today report similar feelings of outrage at what they view as Western incursions into the post-Soviet region through pro-democracy revolts. "Russians feel that these [neighboring] countries are part of us, and they can't accept that someone else wants to control them," says Yevgeny Bazhanov, vice rector of the Diplomatic Academy, which trains Russian diplomats.

Mr. Bazhanov argues that Washington is misreading Russia's efforts to restore national pride as "some kind of reversion" to the USSR. "There is no doubt that under Putin, Russia is more stable and better organized," he says. "What we had in the 90s was chaos. When we hear US criticism of what's going on here, it sounds to Russians as if Americans want us to be weak. They want to provoke chaos - not to democratize, but to destroy."

Top Court Rejects Appeal at Guantanamo

original

Top Court Rejects Appeal at Guantanamo
By James Vicini
Reuters

Monday 17 April 2006

Washington - The Supreme Court declined on Monday to consider whether a federal judge can free two Chinese Muslims who remain imprisoned unlawfully at Guantanamo Bay, despite being cleared as "enemy combatants."

The justices refused to review the judge's decision that a federal court cannot provide any relief to Abu Bakker Qassim and A'del Abdu Al-Hakim, two members of the Uighur ethnic group held at Guantanamo while the United States searches for a country to take them.

Their attorneys urged the justices to decide whether a federal court has the power to craft a remedy for those who are indefinitely and unlawfully imprisoned at the U.S. military base in Cuba.

They took the unusual step of appealing directly to the high court after the ruling by U.S. District Judge James Robertson.

The two men, who were captured by Pakistani forces in Pakistan, have been detained since June 2002 at Guantanamo, where the United States holds about 490 terrorism suspects. In March last year, the U.S. military determined the two Uighurs should no longer be considered enemy combatants.

Their lawyers asked the judge to order the two men released while the U.S. government tries to find a country that will grant them asylum.

The U.S. government has said it cannot return the Uighurs to China because they would face persecution there.

Many Muslim Uighurs, who are from Xinjiang in far western China, seek greater autonomy for the region and some want independence. Beijing has waged a relentless campaign against what it calls the violent separatist activities of the Uighurs.

"What Justice Requires"

Robertson ruled in December that the continued, indefinite detention of the Uighurs at Guantanamo is unlawful, but said he had no authority "to do what I believe justice requires" in ordering their release.

Robertson said he could not grant the Uighurs' request for asylum in the United States because the law gives that power solely to the president. The Bush administration has opposed bringing them to the United States.

Their lawyers urged the Supreme Court to intervene now and decide the case, without following the usual procedure of waiting for a ruling by a U.S. appeals court.

"The district court's decision once again renders Guantanamo Bay a place and a prison beyond law," they said. "Liberty can never be secure when the judicial branch declares its impotence."

The American Civil Liberties Union and more than 300 Guantanamo prisoners supported the appeal.

Solicitor General Paul Clement of the U.S. Justice Department opposed the appeal. He urged the justices to put off any review of the case until after the appeals court ruled.

The high court rejected the appeal by the Uighurs without any comment or recorded dissent. The case could return to the high court after the appeals court decides it.

-------

Syria Pledges to Restore the Occupied Golan

original


Local News /
Apr 17, 2006 - 04:05 PM

Quneitra, Southwest, April 17 (SANA)-

Syria undertook today to restore the occupied Golan saying the independence, which was made by our people due to sacrifices and heroism, is now unaccomplished and our happiness is not complete.

“ This will never be realized while the occupied Golan is under the occupation and since his folks want to go back to their houses and home as well as to their ancestors land … It is a legitimate right that should be made real by all available means,” Assistant Regional Secretary of the Baath Arab Socialist Party Mohammed Said Bkhetan said in a ceremoney on the national day representing President Bashar al-Assad.

Bkhetan delivered his speech in the liberated city of Quneitra, recalling back the Syrian Army and people, women and men's struggle, heroism and sacrifices to defend and free the home as well to attain independence, and stressing that Syria has been assuming a great and important role and bearing the Arabism flag.

" Since the occupation of the Syrian Golan, a number of the international legitimacy resolutions that call for withdrawal from the occupied Arab territories are issued. Syria has taken the just and comprehensive peace as her strategic option that guarantees right, preserves stability and stops the aggressor so she went to Madrid and agreed on the land for peace principle," he said.

" While Israel has always been turning a deaf ear to the international legitimacy; it didn't implement any of its resolutions," Bkhetan said, adding " Syria didn't let any political, diplomatic or legal means but to demand of her legitimate rights."

He reiterated Syria's support to the Palestinian people’s democratic choice and their right to return home, liberate their occupied land as well as establish an independent state with Jerusalem as its capital.

Regarding Lebanon, Bkhetan said that Syria has offered aid to Lebanon in the most critical circumstances to stop blood shedding and the civil war noting that she has contributed to enhancing Lebanon’s identity, stability and sovereignty, " Bkhetan indicated, stressing that Syria will never give up her Arab belonging, national and pan-Arab responsibilities and will not stop between her and Lebanon but all brotherhood and cooperation.

Syria won its Independence on the 17th of April in 1946 when the last French and British soldier left the territorial Syrian Arab Republic land.

Syrians in all Syrian regions celebrated today the anniversary of Independence Day, the day in which the last foreign soldier left the country.

For this occasion and under the patronage of President Bashar al-Assad al-Quneitra branch for the Baath Arab Socialist Party held a mass rally with the participation of all social, economic and popular activities from all Syrian governorates.



Chousson A. Hassoun / S. Younes

IOL: US planned Iran invasion since 2003 - analyst

IOL: US planned Iran invasion since 2003 - analyst

US planned Iran invasion since 2003 - analyst

Washington - A former US intelligence analyst says the United States began planning a full-scale military campaign against Iran to establish control over the Strait of Hormuz even before the March 2003 invasion of Iraq.

William Arkin, who served as the US Army's top intelligence mind on West Berlin in the 1970s and accurately predicted US military operations against Iraq, said the plan was known in military circles as TIRANNT, an acronym for Theater Iran Near Term.

The plan includes a scenario for a land invasion of the country led by the US Marine Corps, a detailed analysis of the Iranian missile force and a global strike plan against any Iranian weapons of mass destruction, Arkin wrote. He said the US and British planners had already conducted a Caspian Sea war game as part of these preparations.

"According to military sources close to the planning process, this task was given to army general John Abizaid, now commander of CENTCOM, in 2002," Arkin wrote, referring to the Florida-based US Central Command.

But preparations under TIRANNT began in earnest in May 2003, when modellers and intelligence specialists pulled together the data needed for Theatre-level warfare analysis for Iran, Arkin said.

Meanwhile, Iran has formed battalions of suicide bombers to hit American and British targets if its nuclear installations are attacked, London's Sunday Times newspaper said.

According to Iranian officials, 40 000 trained suicide bombers were ready to strike.

Iran is in a stand-off with the West over its nuclear programme, which the Islamic republic insists is entirely for peaceful purposes.

* This article was originally published on page 4 of The Star on April 17, 2006

General to Testify in New Abu Ghraib Trial

original

General to Testify in New Abu Ghraib Trial
The Associated Press

Tuesday 18 April 2006

Judge grants request from lawyers for accused soldier.

Washington - A military judge Tuesday ordered an Army general who instituted tougher interrogation policies at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq to testify at the court martial of a dog handler in the prison scandal.

The judge, Marine Lt. Col. Paul McConnell, agreed to allow attorneys to question Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller during the trial of Sgt. Santos A. Cardona, who is accused of using his dog to abuse inmates at Abu Ghraib in Iraq.

Miller would become the highest-ranking military officer to testify in the Abu Ghraib scandal. Early this year, Miller said he was refusing to answer questions, but he is prepared to testify now, Cardona's lawyer said.

McConnell rejected a request from Cardona's lawyers to summon Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to testify.

Cardona's lawyers say that Miller, who was sent to Abu Ghraib by Rumsfeld shortly after the US invasion of Iraq, has valuable testimony about the interrogation techniques that led to prisoner abuse.

Miller was commander of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, when he was dispatched to Abu Ghraib in 2003 as the US military sought intelligence from prisoners in an effort to stamp out a growing insurgency.

In August 2004, an independent review panel found that Miller's call at Abu Ghraib for strong, command-wide interrogation policies contributed to a decision authorizing a dozen aggressive interrogation techniques beyond the traditional ones specified in the Army Field Manual.

In addition, dog teams were sent to Abu Ghraib in November 2003 on Miller's recommendation.

In January, Miller invoked the military's version of the Fifth Amendment right to not incriminate himself.

Cardona, a 31-year-old soldier from Fullerton, Calif., is scheduled to go on trial next month. Cardona faces charges of maltreatment of detainees and dereliction of duty.

Background to the Scandal

A month ago, another Army dog handler at Abu Ghraib, Sgt. Michael Smith, 24, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., received six months behind bars for using his snarling dog to torment Iraqi prisoners. Smith and Cardona worked together.

The Abu Ghraib prison scandal erupted during the presidential campaign in the spring of 2004 when photographs of the abuse were leaked to the news media.

Nine other soldiers have been convicted of abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib. Critics have called for an outside investigation into whether high-ranking military officers and civilian Defense Department officials condoned abuse at the prison.

Former Cpl. Charles Graner Jr. received the longest sentence - 10 years in prison.

Lynndie England, a 23-year-old reservist photographed giving a thumbs-up in front of naked prisoners, is serving three years behind bars.

Smith's trial saw the highest-ranking officer yet take responsibility for abuse at Abu Ghraib.

Col. Thomas M. Pappas, the former top-ranking intelligence officer at Abu Ghraib, testified under a grant of immunity at Smith's trial that he failed to set appropriate controls for the use of dogs at the Baghdad-area prison.

Pappas testified that he approved a one-time use of muzzled dogs inside interrogation booths but he later learned he lacked the authority to give such an order.

Pappas was reprimanded, fined and relieved of his command for his role in the scandal.

Miller's account conflicts with that of Pappas.

Miller has said he recommended in 2003 that dogs be used for detainee custody and control, but not for interrogations. Pappas, however, told investigators that Miller told him dogs had been useful at Guantanamo Bay in setting the atmosphere for interrogations.

The alleged mistreatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib occurred in late 2003 and early 2004, when military interrogators were under tremendous pressure from superiors to gather intelligence in an effort to stamp out the spreading insurgency in Iraq.

In the Smith case, military jurors found that he let his unmuzzled Belgian shepherd threaten three detainees at the prison, conspired with another dog handler to try to frighten prisoners into soiling themselves and directed his dog to lick peanut butter off other soldiers' bodies.

Earlier in the Smith case, Maj. Matthew Miller, the prosecutor, said that a prison term of less than three years would undermine the message of disapproval that Smith's conviction should send.

"Every soldier must understand that individual acts of misconduct have strategic implications," he said. "This is a global war on terror. It is a global battle for the hearts and minds of people all over the world."

The defense had argued that Smith should serve no jail time and instead be returned to his family and his unit. Capt. Scott Rolle told the jury that although Smith made mistakes at Abu Ghraib, he was also a hero for saving the lives of other US soldiers during a mortar attack.

Smith was found guilty of maltreatment involving three prisoners, conspiring with Cardona in a contest to make detainees soil themselves, dereliction of duty, assault and an indecent act. The assault charge was dismissed.

The five charges on which Smith was found guilty carried up to eight-and-a-half years behind bars.

-------

email issues...

sorry for not sending out daily blog listings, I've been having email issues from hell.
I'm hoping it gets back to normal soon.
thank you
EG:)

Spy Chief: CIA Detainees Will Be Held Indefinitely

Spy Chief: CIA Detainees Will Be Held Indefinitely
Exclusive: John Negroponte says accused Al-Qaeda members will remain in secret prisons as long as 'war on terror continues'
By MICHAEL DUFFY AND TIMOTHY J. BURGER/WASHINGTON
original


John Negroponte has seen his share of tribal warfare. As the top U.S. official in Baghdad in 2004, Negroponte spent more than a year trying to transform long-standing and often violent resentments between Shi'ites, Sunnis, and Kurds into a shared desire to form a new democratic government In Iraq.

That experience was just one reason Negroponte seemed the right man to take on a just-as-impossible task when he came home last summer: convincing three secretive, self-protecting and hidebound Washington tribes — the FBI, the CIA and the Pentagon — to put aside their differences and work together to avoid the kind of intelligence failures that have beset the U.S. in the last decade. The job came with a new title — Director of National Intelligence — and impressive but hardly unlimited new powers.

Negroponte's first year has been challenging, to say the least. TIME spent several weeks talking to current and former U.S. officials from the intelligence agencies, on Capitol Hill and in the DNI's office itself about the progress made since Negroponte was confirmed as the nation's intelligence czar a year ago. Progress has been made, most experts agree, but it is difficult to measure. Each of the agencies Negroponte is trying to get in harness has at times dragged — or is still dragging — its feet. And few of the reform's original authors are satisfied with the pace of the change. "We have had a bit of a slow start at the DNI," said Rep. Jane Harman, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Agency. "There have been a number of disappointments."

In an exclusive interview, Negroponte, a career diplomat who has been a senior White House official and a U.N. ambassador, told TIME that the intelligence is "improving and we intend to improve it some more. We're off to a good start. But I don't want to make exaggerated claims here because this is a job that's going to take some time."

Nor did Negroponte exaggerate the claims about the quality of U.S. intelligence on Iran, which this week announced that it is accelerating its production of enriched uranium, which Western countries fear is a step on the road to building nuclear weapons. Negroponte told TIME the U.S. had good but not perfect intelligence on the state of Iranian nuclear facilities. "Certainly, we know where the key installations are. Are there others that we're not aware of at all? You don't know what you don't know."

Negroponte also told TIME that three dozen or so of the worst al-Qaeda terrorists held in secret CIA prisons are likely to remain in captivity as long as the "war on terror continues." He added, "These people are being held. And they're bad actors. And as long as this situation continues, this war on terror continues, I'm not sure I can tell you what the ultimate disposition of those detainees will be." Negroponte's comments appear to be the first open acknowledgement of the secret U.S. detention system and the fact that captives such as Khalid Shaikh Mohammad — involved in Sept. 11 or other major attacks on U.S. interests around the world — may be held indefinitely.

Before Congress created the super spook's job in late 2004, America's intelligence system was verging on dysfunction. Too many agencies were doing too many unrelated missions. Intelligence officers were hostile to the concept of information sharing; each agency had its own procedures for tradecraft, hiring, promotion and discipline. There was far too much overlap in some areas and huge gaps in others. Human intelligence — agents stealing secrets — had fallen into decline while often useful public information was considered unreliable. Most worrisome of all, and perhaps as a consequence, the intelligence itself was often poor; first on the warning signs before 9/11 and then on their assessment in 2002 that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. Both were massive intelligence failures for which no senior officials were fired, or even punished.

The question now is: What has changed? Negroponte started at the top: U.S. officials point first to a more careful and conditioned and "painstaking" President's Daily Brief, or PDB. "Rather than saying, 'Country X has system Y,' we say, 'A source over whom we have some control who has secondhand knowledge, secondhand access to this information, reports that...' There is a much higher tolerance for ambiguity," explained Deputy Director Michael Hayden. Added Kenneth Brill, director of the DNI's new National Counterproliferation Center: "If there is a disagreement, we flag it."

DNI officials also say a new "open source" center near Reston, Virginia, where analysts sift through information that comes from public sources like websites and chat rooms, is adding value, too. Open source data was available to the spooks before the reform was enacted but was not "terribly valued in the product for the ultimate consumers," Mary Margaret Graham, deputy director of national intelligence for collection, told TIME. U.S. officials say they are gathering more from open sources on counter-proliferation and terror in particular. For example, open source analysts recently detected what Hayden called a "shift in the themes that have been appearing on Jihadist websites." He described the catch as "pretty useful strategic intelligence," though he declined to describe the shift further.

Negroponte says he is trying to boost the number of Chinese-, Arabic- and Farsi-speaking officers and get them into the field; Graham says they are pouring money into computational linguistics, or machine translation, so that the relatively few translators the U.S. has don't waste time translating irrelevant documents. Negroponte has hired an ombudsman to hear complaints from officers when their views are ignored or underemphasized, and officers are now encouraged to start chat rooms to exchange ideas and tips. Another change: when mistakes are made, a review is launched immediately. For example, when the U.S. failed to predict the election of Hamas in the Palestinian territories earlier this year, an after-action team fingered poor sampling assumptions in the opinion polls analysts had relied on.

But the real test of the new super spook is whether he can bring the CIA, the FBI and the Pentagon to heel. These three agencies have distrusted one another for decades, hoarding information and dismissing one another's accomplishments. Getting them to work together — much less relinquish control of their both human and technical assets — could take years. Even Hayden admits this is an uphill climb: "Let me tell you what we've learned. There is no way to get to self-aware, self-synchronizing [intelligence] system without a kickass center because no one plays nice with each other voluntarily."

It is clear that the DNI's office has created something of a culture shock at CIA, an agency accustomed to virtual autonomy and an almost evangelical faith in its own leaders. Negroponte's arrival has made the storied office of CIA Director less important in Washington and around the world; and the DNI has fought and won a series of personnel fights with the agency as well. Negroponte insists he is not yet running operations from his downtown office and says he never will be. His office recently asked for a list of all the CIA's stations and bases worldwide, as well as the rotation schedule for station chiefs. But he told TIME he would not be choosing them. "That's below my level of interest," he said.

If Congress gave Negroponte considerable power over the CIA, a purely intelligence agency, it gave him much more limited clout over the Pentagon. Nonetheless, lawmakers on Capitol Hill have been disappointed by Negroponte's unwillingness to "reach in" to Pentagon matters and direct policy — in part because Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who opposed the reforms in the first place, doesn't like outside meddling. One example: Negroponte, lawmakers told TIME, too quickly deferred to the Pentagon on the rewriting of the Army interrogation manual over the winter. Both the Army and the CIA have an interest in how that manual is reworded in the wake of abuses at Guantanamo Bay and a Congressional directive to revise the manual. But Negroponte told TIME the revision is in the Pentagon's hands. "That's extremely disappointing," said Sen. Christopher Bond, a member of the intelligence committee, "but it's par for the course." Bond and other lawmakers said Negroponte still lacks the legal authority of a real intelligence czar. Negroponte, said Bond, is a "good man" who "doesn't have a good hand to play."

At the Pentagon, there is an unmistakable feeling of satisfaction that the new director of national intelligence isn't as powerful as some in Congress had hoped. Stephen Cambone, the Pentagon intelligence chief, said it was unrealistic to expect the DNI to get everything right immediately. "I think it does Ambassador Negroponte a grave disservice if he is expected to be clairvoyant in an undertaking which is by any stretch of the imagination one of the most difficult" ever undertaken in government.

There seems to be lingering tension with the FBI as well. Negroponte told TIME that the FBI is "moving toward the idea of having officers writing up reports for their intelligence value, not only to make cases." But he added that the G-men have not been quick to make the leap from law enforcement to intelligence analysts. "They're probably not doing it as much as they could." Asked about FBI complaints that the DNI has underemphasized the bureau in budgetary decisions, Negroponte said, "The FBI has experienced some fairly consistent increases in budget which I think compare very favorably." The joke going around the FBI, meanwhile, is that Negroponte is going to give the bureau one new agent — "but it's going to be a good one."

Negroponte's minders on Capitol Hill, meanwhile, would prefer that he wield a stronger hand in budgetary matters, particularly in shifting funds in Pentagon and CIA operations to more useful purposes. The DNI and his aides say this will emerge over the next year, but point to Negroponte's decision to correct serious management and technical problems in a highly classified Pentagon satellite imagery system. Negroponte's critics dismiss this feat, however, saying Congress had all but ordered it anyway and add that he is still too tentative. "Negroponte has not been a change agent," said Harman. "The goal we had is that he would use the budget to force change. I don't see him doing that."

And there are complaints from members of both parties on both House and Senate intelligence committees that the DNI's office has slowed the flow of intelligence briefings to Capitol Hill. Republican Bond says it is because the reports have to "go through another bureaucracy on the way to us." For his part Negroponte says he has made more than 100 reports on intelligence matters to Capitol Hill in his first year.

Almost all observers have noted an obvious division of labor between Negroponte and Hayden, the four-star Air Force general. Negroponte, the smooth Yale-trained diplomat who once played grammar-school football against the President's uncle, appears to leave the day-to-day management of the office to Hayden, a trim, energetic Pittsburgh native known for his football analogies.

If Negroponte's start has been too slow for his critics, it's little wonder after a visit to his headquarters. The DNI suite looks nothing like the sleek and spacious workspaces of TV's "24" — the Hollywood version of U.S. terror-hunting headquarters. Instead, it's a warren of pathetic-looking workspaces in a 40-year-old building around the corner from the White House. The rooms are dingy, stuffy and overcrowded. People are working with heavily classified material almost on top of each other; there's hardly space for a visitor to sit and not much more to stand. Next week, the DNI will move all operations across the Anacostia River to an Air Force base — a long way from the White House.

Big Rewards for Defense Firms

original

Big Rewards for Defense Firms
Extra Fees Paid Regardless of Performance, GAO Finds

By Charles R. Babcock
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, April 17, 2006; D01

In late February 2004, the Army announced that it was canceling plans to build a radar-evading helicopter called the Comanche, a project that was nearly three years behind schedule and more than $3.5 billion over budget. Those problems, however, didn't stop an Army panel a few weeks later from granting the Boeing Co.-Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. partnership running the program a $33.9 million "award fee" for their work on the helicopter, part of more than $200 million in such fees paid to the partnership over four years.

Award fees are meant in theory to motivate defense contractors with extra money for performance. But a recent Government Accountability Office study found that the fees are often paid regardless of whether a project is on schedule and within its budget.

Instead of encouraging efficiency, the GAO found, award-fee payments have become routine in some major weapons contracts, built into company expectations and paid almost as a matter of course.

Current practices "undermine the effectiveness of fees as a motivational tool and marginalize their use in holding contractors accountable," the GAO concluded. Defense contractors are paid award fees for work that is simply "acceptable, average, expected, good, or satisfactory."

An estimated $8 billion was paid in award fees from fiscal 1999 to 2003, when many of the projects involved were over budget and behind schedule. Bethesda-based Lockheed Martin Corp., for example, collected $1.5 billion in award fees on three major programs, the F/A-22 Raptor jet fighter, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, and the Space-Based Infrared System High satellite, despite cost, schedule and reliability problems, the GAO found.

Defense industry officials say award fees are sometimes the only way companies can profit from high-risk contracts that might never reach full-scale production -- and are of particular importance to companies that bid on large weapons systems.

Government officials say they are tightening the rules for awarding them. Late last month, the Pentagon issued new guidance that said that award fees must be tied to identifiable outcomes as much as possible and that the contracting officials should limit the common practice of rolling over fees from one period to the next, effectively giving companies a second chance to earn them.

Shay D. Assad, a former Raytheon Co. executive who is the Pentagon's new director of defense procurement and acquisition policy, said in an interview Friday that it was clear that defense officials have been granting award fees on the basis of "process performance and behavior" -- a category the GAO said included things such as whether reports were filed on time.

Instead, he said, they should concentrate on "events . . . that are going to be correlated to the outcome" of the contract.

The GAO began looking at corporate award fees after Marvin Sambur, who was the Air Force acquisition chief, attended a New York investor conference in 2003 and heard defense industry executives talk cavalierly about receiving high award payments.

"I was amazed," Sambur said in a recent interview, likening the executives' attitude to that of students expecting an "A" in class "just for showing up." He then found that the Air Force was paying contractors about 90 percent of the possible fees, no matter what their performance, so he said he set out to tighten Air Force policies.

The GAO study was requested by John Ensign (R-Nev.) and Daniel K. Akaka (D-Hawaii), members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, in response to Sambur's concerns.

Industry officials say that award fees are not simply bonuses and that the question of how and when they should be given is complicated.

John W. Douglass, president of the Aerospace Industries Association, whose members include the large defense contractors, said award fees may look "almost automatic" to the outside world, but actually are the result of complex negotiations.

In the case of the Comanche, for example, an Army spokesman said, "The fact that the Army was considering termination and did terminate would not relieve the government in any way of paying the contractor the fee he earned." The program was killed to allow the Army to pay for many other priorities, the spokesman said.

Joseph LaMarca Jr., a spokesman for Boeing, said in a statement that Boeing-Sikorsky received the final award fee for work completed prior to the termination. The decision to cancel the contract "was based on changing requirements and not due to technical costs or schedule issues," he said.

Thomas J. Jurkowsky, a Lockheed Martin spokesman, said in a written statement that large, complex development programs like the three the report cited for Lockheed "have cost, technical and schedule issues in their early stages because of the unpredictability of the technology."

The Pentagon has approved full-rate production of the F-22, "a decision that reflects the government's confidence in the aircraft," while the strike fighter is on schedule for a first flight this fall, Jurkowsky said. And though the satellite project "has faced technical challenges because of its sophisticated design," it has met some significant milestones and the government says "the program has turned the corner," he said.

Richard L. Aboulafia, an investment analyst with the Teal Group Corp., said award fees have become more important to the defense industry in recent years as the size of lucrative production contracts have been cut. As companies must invest relatively more in research, award fees became a way to boost earnings.

The difficulty in being more strict about award fees, Aboulafia said, is determining "who is at fault for mission creep and changing requirements," the usual reasons for programs escalating in cost while falling behind schedules.

Lt. Gen. Donald J. Hoffman, the military deputy for Air Force acquisition, said Friday that his service was following "the spirit" of Sambur's initiatives but has not formally adopted a new award fee policy. He said, for example, that Air Force headquarters now reviews the findings of award-fee panels and at times has cut fees it found excessive.

Sambur left the Air Force early last year.

Some Defense Department agencies have done better than others in connecting fees to performance, the GAO said. The Missile Defense Agency, for example, restructured Boeing's airborne laser contract in 2002. In the process it changed the award-fee plan to focus on a successful demonstration of the system by the end of 2004.

Until that restructuring the contractor received 95 percent of the available fees, even with cost increases and schedule delays, the GAO report said. But because it didn't meet the 2004 test deadline, Boeing received none of the $73.5 million award fee available under the revised plan.

Rick Lehner, a spokesman for the Missile Defense Agency, said Boeing also lost $107 million in fees last year for not meeting goals in the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense System, which is based in Alaska and California and is supposed to shoot down long-range ballistic missiles.

"We have a policy of rewards for good performance and penalizing for bad performance," Lehner said.

Maria McCullough, spokeswoman for Boeing's missile defense programs, said it was not surprising that fees were reduced because they were tied to performance in particular flight tests. More recent successful tests show both programs are "absolutely on track," she said.

US allies are behind the death squads and ethnic cleansing

original


Iraq's American overlords at last seem to have grasped the danger posed by their friends' militias. But it may be too late

Jonathan Steele in Baghdad
Friday April 14, 2006
The Guardian

Much ink, as well as indignation, is being spent on whether Iraq is on the verge of, in the midst of, or nowhere near civil war. Wherever you stand in this largely semantic debate, the one certainty is that the seedbed for the country's self-destruction is Iraq's plethora of militias. In the apt phrase of Zalmay Khalilzad, the US ambassador in Baghdad, they are the "infrastructure of civil war".

He is not the first US overlord in Iraq to spot the danger. Shortly before the formal transfer of sovereignty to Iraqis, America's then top official Paul Bremer ordered all militias to disband. Some members could join the new army. Others would have to look for civilian work.

Article continues
His decree was not enforced and now, two years later, this failure has come back to haunt Iraq. "More Iraqis are dying from militia violence than from the terrorists," Khalilzad said recently. "The militias need to be under control."

His blunt comment came in the wake of over 1,000 abductions and murders in a single month, most of them blamed on Shia militias. Terrified residents of Baghdad's mainly Sunni areas talk of cars roaring up after dark, uninhibited by the police in spite of the curfew. They enter homes and seize people, whose bodies turn up later, often garotted or marked with holes from electric drills - evidence of torture before assassination.

Khalilzad's denunciation of the militias was an extraordinary turnaround, given that the focus of US military activity since the fall of Saddam Hussein has been the battle against foreign jihadis and a nationalist Sunni-led insurgency. Suddenly the US faces a greater "enemy within" - militias manned by the Shia community, once seen by the US as allies, and run by government ministers.

The new line, if it sticks, marks an end to previous ambiguity. Under Bremer there was a tendency to see some militias as good, that is on the US side, such as the peshmerga fighters that belong to the two large Kurdish parties, and others as bad, such as the Mahdi army of the Shia cleric, Moqtada al-Sadr, who opposes the occupation.

A third militia, the Badr organisation, was also tolerated. It is the armed wing of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, a leading Shia political party which supported the invasion and is Washington's main interlocutor in the Shia coalition.

US officials paid lip service to the need to disband the militias, but never showed any sense of urgency. As a Pentagon report to Congress put it last year: "The realities of Iraq's political and security landscape work against completing the transition and reintegration of all Iraq's militias in the short term."

Iraqi leaders praised the militias, claiming they were subordinate to the defence and interior ministries, and therefore in no way a rogue element. The Badr organisation has even been put in charge of defending the home of the Shias' revered religious leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

The prime minister, Ibrahim Jaafari, described the Badr organisation last summer as a "shield" defending Iraq, while the president, Jalal Talabani, claimed the Badr organisation and the peshmerga were patriots who "are important to fulfilling this sacred task, establishing a democratic, federal and independent Iraq".

The flaw in the picture was that while the Kurds and Shias had two militias each, the Sunnis had none. Sunni chiefs could rustle up a few gunmen from extended family ranks, when necessary, as had been done for centuries, but there was nothing on the scale of Badr, the Mahdi, or the peshmerga. Many Sunnis welcomed the anti-occupation insurgents as a kind of surrogate militia.

Sunni anger increased with evidence of secret prisons, run by the interior ministry, where hundreds of men and boys, mainly Sunnis, were tortured, and of "death squads" operating against Sunnis. In response, Baghdad's Sunni neighbourhoods have started to form vigilante groups to defend their turf.

US officials now view the militias differently. Phasing them out by integrating their members into the official forces of law and order is seen as risky, unless the leadership changes. In February this year the new Pentagon line was that integration could result in security forces that "may be more loyal to their political support organisation than to the central Iraqi government", according to a new study, Iraq's Evolving Insurgency and the Risk of Civil War by Anthony Cordesman, an Iraq expert at Washington's Centre for Strategic and International Studies. Now the US is trying to ensure that political control over the interior and defence ministries is jointly managed by an all-party security council.

The encouraging signs are that Iraqi leaders are denouncing sectarian violence. Provocations such as last week's suicide attack on a Shia mosque in Baghdad appear to be the work of "outsiders". No one has claimed responsibility, but they were probably planned by agitators, foreign or Iraqi, who want to split Iraq's fragile society for their own political ends. There is also comfort in the fact that sectarian street murders stem from militias who are controllable rather than from unorganised mobs.

Just as generals do, diplomats and journalists tend to refight the last war. Schooled in Bosnia and Kosovo, Washington's officials came to Iraq with the notion that because some Iraqis were Shia and others Sunni, these identities were bound to clash. This simplification was accepted by much of the media, influenced by their own Balkan experiences. It gathered weight when people watched the sectarian behaviour of Iraq's religious leaders, particularly among the Shia. They had led the resistance to Saddam and saw no reason to retreat from politics once he was gone.

In fact Iraq has no history of Balkan-style pogroms where neighbour turns against neighbour, burning homes and shops. But it could develop now. The rampaging by Shia militias and the rise of defensive Sunni vigilantes have launched a low-intensity ethnic cleansing. Up to 30,000 people have left their homes in the last few weeks.

The crucial question is whether the militias can be rolled back at this late stage. Having allowed them to defy their initial banning orders, as well as Iraq's new constitution, which outlawed them, can the US persuade or force its Iraqi allies to disband them? Confronting the Sunni insurgency means, in crude terms, confronting an enemy. Confronting the biggest militias, Badr and the Kurdish peshmerga, means the US must confront its friends.

j.steele@guardian.co.uk