A UC professor says heâs solved one of the darkest mysteries in U.S. history: Was J. Robert Oppenheimer, the brilliant Berkeley scientist known as "the father of the atomic bomb," a secret member of the Communist Party?
Recently uncovered documents show that Oppenheimer belonged to a hidden Communist Party cell of professionals in Berkeley, according to UC Merced history Professor Gregg Herken.
Charges of Communist associations led to Oppenheimerâs downfall during the McCarthyist hysteria of the early 1950s, and he became, in the words of the Encyclopedia Britannica, "the victim of a witch hunt." In 1954, he was stripped of his security clearance and his position as a high-level U.S. government adviser.
#1
Was he a witch or a communist? Make up your damn mind, SFGate. I don't have time for all these wild speculations. What next, "communisms ancient wiccan roots"? "Oppenheimer- Warlock or Warlord?" Phelgm at 11. "McCarthy hysteria"? McCarthy patriotism more like. Good God, man, the psyche of these delusionists! They're always a victim of the boogie man. In your dreams pal. "Do you have suudden dihiarheia every time you think of the McCarthy hysteria rising from the dead to abscond with you in the night? Try SFGate. Side effects include listlessness, more vomiting, more dihiarheia, dizziness, swelloing, itching burning reddness, hemmoroids, forgetfulness, dizziness, feeling left out, etc..."
Now, if only they could apply this reasoning to their clients, the Palestinians, then surely there, would be peace in the Middle East. But itâs not going to happen, is it?I
If one man has a dispute with another, how would he try to convince the world of the correctness of his argument? Would he set out his case point by point so that the virtue of his position could be judged? Or would he instead take a totally innocent 11-year-old girl whom he had never met and slice her into little pieces? If he did the second, how significantly would he be advancing his cause? What would he be proving? The obvious answers are that he would not only be exposing his arguments to revulsion but would be demonstrating conclusively that he was mad. Such a person is somewhere in the Kingdom now. On Wednesday he sent one of his fanatical accomplices in a car loaded with explosives to Al-Washm Street. Among the four dead was an 11-year-old Saudi girl.
What virtue, what nobility, what sense is there in a cause whose supporters can stoop so low as to write their propaganda in the blood of a child? The only good thing that came out of Wednesdayâs horror was that with the death of the bomber there is now one less demented bigot in this country. Something calling itself the Al-Haramain Brigades, which boasts of links with Osama Bin Ladenâs Al-Qaeda, has said it was responsible for the Riyadh crime. For most ordinary people, admitting to such barbarity beggars belief. No civilized person could ever do such a thing. It is clear therefore that we are dealing with men who have lost all decent instincts if they ever had them in the first place. The one emotion that can blind moral judgment, destroy all traces of humanity and lead to the wicked enormities in Riyadh is hatred.
Hatred is a deadly poison, because it so often springs from fury at shortcomings within the hater himself. One man hating alone develops psychotic responses. A group of men who channel their hatreds together into a single cause rapidly feed each otherâs bigotry and malevolence. The cause is incidental to their own sickness. What really matters is the opportunity it gives them to share their intolerance and fanaticism. Together they pass into a world of utterly distorted reality, where they will actually congratulate themselves on the general revulsion and loathing that their evil deeds inspire. There are therefore men who could be living close to any of us today who regard the blood baths on Wednesday in Riyadh and Basra as wonderful victories, who rejoiced at the gruesome wreckage they helped create. These, then, are our enemies. They deserve not a momentâs sympathy, not a nanosecond of consideration. Utterly consumed by hatred, they are deaf to reason and blind to the great wrong that they are doing. They dishonor the cause of Islam. They dishonor the dust they walk on.
But somehow this doesn't apply to Hamas. Terrorism is terrorism, blood lust is blood lust.
Posted by: tipper ||
04/23/2004 11:10:30 AM ||
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"Hatred is a deadly poison, because it so often springs from fury at shortcomings within the hater himself."
Amazing, how clearly they can think when they themselves are on the receiving end of that murderous hatred. Utterly amazing. Yet they seem, most of them, incapable of the same clarity when the principle is applied to the 9/11 hijackers, or to Palestinian suicide bombers, or when the principle is extended to focus not just on the hatreds within themselves, but those built into their malevolent brand of Islam.
I spent many months after the 9/11 attacks reading Arabnews.com every day, and came away from the experience convinced that Arab culture renders its members completely, utterly self-centered--it makes them, effectively, permanent two-year-olds.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
04/23/2004 11:34 Comments ||
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You notice this is from the English language daily. I doubt if either the sentiments or words find their way into the arab language press.
If you never had culture, you're a barbarian. If you are the decayed, dissolute remnant of a once great culture, you're a Morlock. These people are morlocks.
#3
If one man has a dispute with another, how would he try to convince the world of the correctness of his argument? Would he set out his case point by point so that the virtue of his position could be judged?
The way that Moslems deal with apostates from their stupid religion is to kill them.
.
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
04/23/2004 22:20 Comments ||
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Security forces have killed five wanted militants and were pursuing others after shootouts that spread over two days in the port city of Jiddah, a Saudi security official said Friday. Police cordoned off the al-Safaa neighborhood late Thursday after receiving a tip that some militants were in the neighborhood, according to a statement from the Interior Ministry. "The wanted militants started shooting, using different kinds of weapons." The ministry said three militants were killed in shooting late Thursday, and one was arrested. Media reports had earlier said two terrorists were killed and three captured. The gunfire continued into Friday, and the security official said two more wanted men had been killed after refusing to surrender. Their companions fled the scene in a car and police were pursuing them, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Anyone want to give odds on the coppers catching them?
One policeman was slightly injured in the shooting, the ministry statement said. It was not immediately clear whether any of the dead or captured were on Saudi Arabia's most wanted terrorist lists.
Or if they are really dead, or if Saudi really has a list.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 10:15:58 AM ||
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.... In Saudi Arabia, a strategic ally of the United States, violence against the occupation in Iraq is seen by many as jihad, or a holy struggle, but virtually no one accepts violence as jihad when it unrolls here at home, in the heart of what is supposed to be the most Muslim of countries. In Iraq, attacks by American troops serve as evidence to some that the United States occupation of a Muslim land must be reversed. Requests for God to avenge American actions pour down from mosque minarets, and some women university students sport Osama bin Laden T-shirts under their enveloping abayas to show their approval for his calls to resist the United States. But many Saudis consider the attack here on Wednesday a shocking and unsettling crime, especially since the attackers chose for their first major government target an office building that virtually every adult male must visit to collect a license or car plates. ....
Fowziyah Abukhalid, a sociology professor at the university, has noticed a parallel phenomenon among her students. "Many young women are saying `My God, bin Laden is so charming,â or `My God, bin Laden is so handsome,â " she said. "He is politically appealing, that is why they view him as handsome." ....
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
04/23/2004 6:02:21 AM ||
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"Many young women are saying `My God, bin Laden is so charming,â or `My God, bin Laden is so handsome,â " she said. "He is politically appealing, that is why they view him as handsome." ....
Distance lends pespective...Most people see a 6 foot 5 inch beanpole, Who just coincidentally happens to be a murderous piece of crap.
Rebel MP George Galloway has denied pocketing more than £1 million from ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. The MP's name appeared on a list of individuals and firms allegedly rewarded by Saddam with vouchers for millions of barrels of oil. The list was put before the US Congress, The Sun newspaper reported. But Mr Galloway denied the allegations, saying he was the victim of a smear campaign. "This is a trumped-up smear campaign," he said.
"Lies, all lies!"
Speaking on GMTV he added: "It is perfectly easy to establish that no barrel of oil or voucher for a barrel of oil has ever been given to me or been bought and sold by me." Evidence presented to Congress suggests the vouchers were handed over to the Glasgow Kelvin MP's Jordanian intermediary, Fawwaz Zureiqat.
Mr. Galloway must have had his lawyer write his speech.
They could be redeemed for cash without any oil being involved.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 10:05:45 AM ||
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steve have purdy good keyboard. im not see that symbol in title on my keyboard.
Excerpt from State Department Daily Briefing for Thursday.
QUESTION: All right. And my last question is: In Geneva today, earlier today, the Cubans withdrew their resolution that was going to condemn the United States for human rights abuses of the prisoners at Guantanamo. And when they withdrew it, they said the reason they were withdrawing it was that the United States and its allies were preparing a no-action motion to prevent this -- to prevent the resolution from being debated, and that they gave up because they realized they werenât -- now, Iâm wondering, in light of your past criticism of countries using no-action motions to prevent debates, specifically last week when you went after China and Zimbabwe on this score, why is it not a double standard for you guys to try and -- to use the threat of a -- or to even move to consider using a no-action motion to stifle debate or to stop debate on something that another country, for whatever reason, feels needs to be talked about?
MR. BOUCHER: Well, first of all, there was a debate. Many countries felt it was sufficient, and I think we were looking at an end to that debate. But it was not the no-action motion that other people have used to stifle all discussion, period.
The bottom line is that Cuba was forced to withdraw its resolution because they didnât have support. We think the Cuban resolution was a diversion, an attempt to discredit the Commission, which has just condemned Cuba for its domestic human rights practices; and it was therefore purely political move on their part, and not any serious attempt to address a human rights situation.
I would point out that the situation in Guantanamo is under careful scrutiny. The United States has made very clear our commitment to treating people there in a humanitarian fashion consistent with the international Geneva Convention requirements for prisoners of war; that there is, indeed, a domestic judicial process that reviews the situation of the prisoners down there, and that case was -- there was a case argued just this week in front of the Supreme Court.
And Iâd point out that the Red Cross has visited as well. In fact, the only prison in Cuba that the Red Cross has visited is the one in Guantanamo.
So Iâd just leave it at that.
I believe thatâs set and match.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
04/23/2004 8:46:53 PM ||
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Cuba avoided a showdown with the United States on Thursday by withdrawing a resolution from the top U.N. human rights body that called for an investigation into the treatment of prisoners at the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The resolution alleged widespread abuses at Guantanamo, where few of the more than 600 terrorism suspects being held by U.S. authorities have been charged with crimes or given access to lawyers. But Cuban Ambassador Jorge Mora Godoy told the 53-nation commission he would not ask for a vote on the resolution because U.S. "threats and blackmail" had ensured its failure.
We threatened to tell the truth again? Dang it, Colin!
Did the Cubeheads beat anybody up this time?
The United States, Mora Godoy alleged, had warned commission members with citizens being held at Guantanamo that voting for the resolution could lead American authorities to block the release or transfer of their nationals. Among the commission members believed to have detainees in Guantanamo are Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt and Pakistan.
Surprise meter didn't twitch on those nationalities.
"Tangible is the fear of Western countries and some in Latin America to stand up with dignity to the fascist practices of the U.S. administration lest they receive reprimands and retaliations," he said. U.S. Ambassador Richard Williamson, the head of the American delegation, called the Cuban resolution a "goofy, idiotic stunt" and denied Cuban allegations of America strong-arming countries into opposing the resolution. "You know when a Cuban lies. It's when they move their mouth," he told reporters after the meeting. "They tried to withdraw and do it gracefully. But a loss is a loss is a loss."
Yoikes! That was a diplomatic smash-mouth quote!
The Guantanamo resolution had been expected to ignite fierce debate at the commission, which ends its annual six-week session Friday. But Mora Godoy and German Ambassador Michael Steiner, who thanked Cuba for withdrawing the resolution, were the only delegates to address Thursday's meeting.
The others got in a round of golf.
Germany had been expected to use a "no action" procedural move to block debate on the resolution - a tactic regularly employed by developing countries, such as Cuba, to stop the commission from condemning their human rights records.
Why thank you, Germany!
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 12:19:24 AM ||
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"Cuba" and "human rights" in the same sentence is a joke.
That the UN has such members as Cuba confirms how worthless it is.
I say we tell them to take a hike (Paris is nice this time of year) and form a league of Democracies. No dictators allowed, except for target practice.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/23/2004 1:04 Comments ||
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Cuba complaining about Human rights abuses is like the skunk calling the polecat a stinker.
"But a loss is a loss is a loss." Is that"Nuanced"enough for"Flip-flop Kerry".I'll take a plain talkin,straight-shootin cowboy over a wishy washy,nuanced patrician any day.
#3
Uh, Gitmo's on the same island as Cuba. If they have a problem with it, they can try to do something about it.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
04/23/2004 9:44 Comments ||
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The US should take the same exact bill and turn it on Cuba to demand a look into the way Cuban prisons are handled and how religious prisoners are dealt with, etc. I'm sure the comparison would be enlightening.
#5
Robert, I feel certain that we would welcome the opportunity to change the regime of that little island when they attempted to remove the Marine base at Gitmo. Aside from getting humiliated by having their entire force walloped by the small number of Marines, I feel certain that Castro paid very close attention (just like Ghaddafi {Khadafi?}) to Saddam getting pulled out of that hole in the ground . . .
Posted by: Ben Silver ||
04/23/2004 16:13 Comments ||
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The press was trying to spin this as the US using the same "no action." technique as we have criticized Zimbabwe and China for adopting. Richard Bouchard gives the straight scoop on what really happened.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
04/23/2004 20:44 Comments ||
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#2
Dang - thats weird. do you think this was an intentional coverup or just a mistake by the publisher?
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
04/23/2004 14:05 Comments ||
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the picture on left sure looks different...and you would think the plume would be larger with the reports coming out of the size of the blast....to bad it missed kimmy
Posted by: Dan ||
04/23/2004 14:12 Comments ||
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#4
2 points. The right hand image looks to be a few seconds after a big explosion. If it was 18 hours in, I would expect the smoke to be a lot more diffuse. 2nd point, if it's supposed to be a satellite image, the angles all wrong, unless it's a *really* low orbit.
#6
Imagery intelligence was my military specialty. The second shot is not of anywhere near the same area as the first shot - none of the buildings can be made to match the first shot. It's also of such a scale that matching anything is next to impossible - like blowing up a 35mm slide to the size of a football field.
French SPOT satellite imagery is readily available for a price to anyone who wants to buy it. The Russians also offer their satellite imagery for sale. I'm surprised some enterprising newspaper hasn't bought the pics yet, unless the NKOR government is paying a very LARGE price to keep them from being disclosed.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/23/2004 17:31 Comments ||
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A redo of yesterday's article...
The South Korean government has confirmed that two trains loaded with oil and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) collided in the Ryongchon railway station near the border of North Korea and China at around 1 p.m. on April 22, killing or injuring as many as 3,000 people, according a statement from the Chinese Foreign Ministry. The Ministry further disclosed that one Chinese citizen was killed and two were severally injured in the explosion.
Cargo's been reported as other substances, to include dynamite and gunpowder for use in digging a canal...
Additionally, 10 Chinese citizens living in North Korea are believed to have suffered minor injuries in the explosion. Five of them are receiving medical treatment in a local hospital, while the other five have been already been released from medial facilities. The two seriously injured Chinese nationals are being treated in a different hospital in Sinjiuju. Nicholas Bonner, Director of Koryo Tours, which has specialized in travel to North Korea since 1993, told Interfax that the train line is not blocked, as the evening train from Pyonyang had arrived in Beijing. "I can only speculate, but it seems that the explosion was slightly off the main track," Bonner told Interfax, "we have been told there is still train travel into North Korea." Curious! Big blast on railway line, but trains still running.
The situation is still confused, as "the border (between China and North Korea) may have been closed," said a checkpoint official in Dandong when contacted by Interfax. "The explosion happened beyond Siniuju. It was a distance from the bridge (crossing the Yalu river), so we didnât manage to hear anything," he added. You can hear a big blast a long way off.
"I heard nothing! No-thing! Tell them, Hogan!"
Officials from Chinaâs Embassy in Pyongyang held an emergent meeting with their counterparts from the North Korea Foreign Ministry late night on Thursday, hours after the two trains collided at one in the afternoon, said the Chinese Foreign Ministry. The Chinese Embassy is ready to provide first aid to North Korea, added the statement from the Chinese Foreign Ministry. The Chinese checkpoint official would not confirm whether any injured people had been sent in through the bridge following the explosion, defining it as "secret information." The Chinese state media, quoting South Koreaâs Yonhap News Agency, said the collision had triggered a massive explosion and fire, leaving a train station in ruins. Still pictures taken from TV were printed by the Beijing based Chinese newspaper Xin Jing Bao, which showed firemen spraying water into a smoldering train compartment. Curiouser still! mixing freight and passenger carriages on the same train is not a common practice especially with hazardous cargoes.
According to South Koreaâs cable television YTN, the explosion occurred nine hours after the heavily armed train of North Koreaâs reclusive leader Kim Jong-il passed the station. Its the norm when a dictator dies that everyone says heâs alive and well until the succession has been arranged or fought over.
"The Ryongchon train station has turned into ruins after the explosion, as if it had been heavily bombed. The debris from the blast flew high into the sky, with some even falling down into Siniuju, on the border between China and North Korea," a witness told Yonhap. As I pointed out yesterday, the winds are blowing strongly from the North and debris would not be blown into China.
An anonymous spokesman from South Koreaâs Defense Ministry said, "we have noticed these news reports, but we cannot make any comment on this at the present stage." My read on this is that Kimmie was boomed and may well be dead.
We can only hope. There're a lot of coincidences, and a lot of misinformation, but that could be because of all the commies involved. I wouldn't get my hopes up...
Posted by: Phil B ||
04/23/2004 3:06:02 AM ||
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If I recall correctly, Kimmie doesn't fly. Can't fly. Can't take the train. What's a dictator to do?!?
Posted by: Rafael ||
04/23/2004 3:22 Comments ||
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Kim does ride the train...and he'd just come back from China.
So what this a hit on him?
Posted by: Jen ||
04/23/2004 3:40 Comments ||
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Wow! Those North Koreans really managed to get the most out of their old outdated Iranian trainbomb plans.
#7
Update from BBC: In the first independent account, the Red Cross said the train blast killed at least 54 people and injured 1,200. But diplomatic sources in Pyongyang say the figure is much higher, as reports indicate the blast happened when two wagons of dynamite hit a live wire. A Red Cross team sent to the scene has reported that 1,850 homes have been flattened and 6,350 seriously damaged. The blast was initially thought to have been caused by two trains colliding. But North Korean government sources have been quoted as saying it was triggered by an electric wire dropping on to two wagons loaded with dynamite. South Korean officials say it appears to have been an accident and not linked to Mr Kim's trip. However, there have been suggestions that trains were held up while Mr Kim's train passed through, causing problems later.
Picture at BBC shows houses clustered next to tracks, death toll will be high. NK trains are electricly powered, so that could be line mentioned. Didn't know electricity alone could set off dynamite, unless they had detonators in same car.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 8:57 Comments ||
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#8
Maybe it's just me, but this is the strangest and one of the most horrible stories I've heard in a while (and since 9/11, they've been pretty weird and bad).
Who did this and why?
Posted by: Jen ||
04/23/2004 9:12 Comments ||
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#9
Who did this and why?
Odds are pretty good it's an accident. Totalitarian systems aren't that good at dealing with safety issues.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
04/23/2004 9:50 Comments ||
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#10
Some of the spin coming from China is that this was an accident that happened as NK was trying to restart rail traffic after the Dear Leader's China excursion. Supposedly when his train is on the track, all the rest are on sidings.
The casualty spin is bizarre. How do you flatten 1,850 homes and seriously damage 6,350 more and only kill 52, no 150, no some other number of people? I guess the only damage control the NorKs are good at is propaganda. As the rubble is cleared the number will move into the thousands.
#12
I agree R.C. the passing of the train carrying the great dictator probably caused other trains to be halted or sidetracked, most likely some aparatchick F****** up bigtime in trying to get everything back on track.
#15
After some reflection, I think Phil B.has it right. I think the Dear Leader has been sent on to join the Great Leader in that great Stalinist paradise in the sky and that the other capos are meeting to see who takes over. Given the general lack of quality and preparation in the Dear Leader's progeny, that meeting could take a long time.
#16
If we're lucky and NK's designated gourmand, Dear Leader Kim, was blasted off this mortal coil, how long will it take for the black helicopter crowd to blame this on Dick Cheney? After all, he did visit the Chinese just before they directed Kim the Pudgy to take the train to Beijing. And isn't this the second major train explosion in the last few weeks? As muck4doo would say, "Chaney and the CIA did it."
Posted by: Random thoughts ||
04/23/2004 11:00 Comments ||
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The Independent (UK) is now reporting that one of the trains "may" have been carrying ammonium nitrate.
Since everybody else is floating guesswork, I'll add my .02 to the pile:
Tanker cars filled with rocket fuel or rocket fuel components.
The NorKs are gearing up before the AB Laser and and our ABM land-based systems become operational.
#24
Funeral Hymn for Kim Jong-Il
Sung to the tune of "Waltzing Matilda":
Once a sad short man rode inside his special train,
To see the only friends that he thought he had,
And he sadly said, when he wa-as heading home,
âHow come that nobody really likes me?â
Peaceful Rynchon, peaceful Rynchon
Went ka-boom as he was riding through
And his ghost may be heard as he goes to the underworld,
"Damn the Chinese; the bastards set me up!"
Given the attention to safety in the NKor transportation system you have to wonder how many NKor nuke scientists have quietly died of radiation poisening in the past few years.
#26
Oh, its better than that. The "Deal Leader" Travels by train. Unbeliveable! Now, think about that for a second. If you want to assassinate someone, what do you need? Predictability and rigidity in the target. You need to know where he's going to be and when, and you need to know that once the target is on a specific route, that the route is not flexible. A train is an assassins dream.
This "genius" has chosen the only form of transportation where one can predict with extreme accuracy the route that will be taken. Train tracks are pretty reliably in place months prior to the trip. In a country with NO infrastructure, and only three rail lines coming out of China, One can guess if the 'dear leader' is in china, hes going to come back into NKOR via train. Now we know he's only got three routes into his country.
Once you know the 'dear leader' is on board the train in beijing, there are any number of methods that can be used, with great precision, to remove the train from its tracks.
Add to that, the "deal Leader has standing orders that ALL other train traffic is off the routes while he is in movement, and you get an even better scenario, ANY moving train is likely to contain your target, you dont even have to look hard for that.
Now, check out the path of that train route from youngchen to pyongyang - its runs right next to the coast! you don't think a few boys in the "rubber boat yacht club" couldnt land in the middle of the night and take out a small bridge at just the right time? Perhaps trigger a convieneint landslide?
How this moron has survived this long is beyond me.
Posted by: Frank Martin ||
04/23/2004 13:30 Comments ||
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#27
Excellent OR excellent for Waltzing Matilda always makes me sad.
#28
I was suspicious at first that this was a small nuclear blast, with the debris raining down in all directions. If NK allows foreign aid agencies to assist with disaster cleanup, I'm sure more than a few will be checking for radiation at the site.
Yeah, but it was just the flash from that train explosion.
Thu Apr 22, 2:00 PM ET
By SOO-JEONG LEE, Associated Press Writer
SEOUL, South Korea - Prospects for delaying six-nation talks on prolonging ending the North Korean nuclear crisis ignited brightened Thursday as the complete trainwreck of a communist stateâs leader Kim Jong Il promised to show rigor mortis "patience and flexibility" in the negotiations.
In North Koreaâs first confirmation of Kimâs secretive S&M fixation trip to China this week, its official news agency KCNA said Kim Chee and Chinese food go great together! President Hu Jintao agreed to try to resolve the dispute peacefully through talks with the United States, South Korea, Japan and Russia.
The countries are to convene a third round of talks in July aimed at persuading North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons program. Previous rounds have made not even a little progress.
"Noting that the DPRK remained unchanged for centuries in its main stand for negotiated blackmail peaceful settlement of the nuclear issue with a final target of being glassed and Windexed denuclearization, (Kim) said that the DPRK would take an active part in the six-party stalling talks with patience and flexibility and make zer-f%&king-oh contributions to the progress of the talks," KCNA said.
DPRK stands for the Dumbsh!t Democratic Peopleâs Republic of Korea, the Northâs official insult name.
During Kimâs visit, China pledged to castrate him aid to help North Koreaâs economic development, KCNA said without elaborating. Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao also promised to encourage Chinese businesses to avoid all increase dealings with North Korea, it added.
Aside from being gang banged while meeting President Hu and Wen, Kim fellated met former President Jiang Zemin. He also stroked off met Vice President Zeng Qinghong and Wu Bangguo, the No. 2 leader of Chinaâs Communist Party.
KCNA said Kim invited Hu to visit North Korea and Hu accepted. Itâs not who you know, but Hu Yao Bang.
In Beijing, Foreign Ministry spokesman Viet Kong Quan said China and North Korea agreed to work together to promote a new round of six-nation delays talks on the nuclear issue, and that the Beijing leadership would continue its longstanding policy of propping up providing aid to its psycho impoverished neighbor.
The United States and other countries hope nuclear threats on China can use its leverage as North Koreaâs leading supplier of oxygen food and energy aid to get it to disarm.
North Korea needs regime change outside aid to rebuild its skeletal hunger-stricken economy, and Kim has shown interest in copying Chinaâs porn flick library capitalist-style experiments. On his way home by train, he nearly stopped for a tour at the booming trainwreck Chinese port city of Tianjin, KCNA said.
Two fuel trains were rocketed collided and exploded in a North Korean train station Thursday, seconds hours after Kimâs train passed through at full throttle, South Korean media regretted reported. Thousands were reported MURDERED killed or injured, the reports said.
Posted by: Zenster ||
04/23/2004 2:29:13 AM ||
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A newspaper out of Chosun is reporting that when Cheney went to China not long ago, he told the Chinese that if they could not stop NK's nuke program, the US could not stop Japan's or Taiwan's. Don't know how true it is, but sounds about right.
Posted by: Ben ||
04/23/2004 4:39 Comments ||
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Too many strike-outs; knew it had to be Zipster.
Posted by: Jen ||
04/23/2004 8:15 Comments ||
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Oh, and Strike-out King, it was your boys--Clinton and Carter--that handled the capitulations negotiations that made it possible for Kim to go nuclear, so don't pretend that it this problem "just appeared" after President Bush came into office.
I suppose you're now demanding that he act preemptively, but then you'll be one of those Liberals who'll howl that Bush is a warmonger when he does.
Posted by: Jen ||
04/23/2004 8:19 Comments ||
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#4
Easy, Jen, I like the strikeouts :-)
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 11:33 Comments ||
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After a six-month investigation across three countries, police have arrested the alleged mastermind of a planned major terrorist attack on Australiaâs energy supplies. Faheem Lodhi, 34, of Punchbowl, was charged with seven terrorist offences yesterday. Along with the deported Frenchman Willy Brigitte, he is believed to be the nucleus of a bomb plot which authorities believe would have centred on Sydney. Lodhi is accused of having sought information on the nationâs energy supplies, including electricity and oil. Lodhiâs arrest comes a week after Pakistani-born university student Izhar ul-Haque was charged with training with the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorist group. It also follows admissions by Brigitte - who has been linked to the top ranks of al-Qaeda - that Lodhi was the alleged Sydney commander of a developing terrorist cell. To Brigitte, Lodhi was known as Abu Hamza.
Central Local Court heard yesterday that ASIO had observed Lodhi, an architect, dumping documents in a bin. The retrieved material had included photographs downloaded from the internet showing the layout of the Sydney-based military facilities Holsworthy Army Base, Garden Island Naval Base, Victoria Barracks and the HMAS Penguin base in Balmoral. The Joint Counter Terrorism Task Force has yet to establish the specific target for the first strike. Lodhiâs lawyer, Stephen Hopper, told the court his client was mild-mannered, married and a professional architect. "He has never expressed views he hates people who are non-Muslim. He loves Australia and would not want to hurt any Australia citizen in any way."
Yesterdayâs arrest is the culmination of a long investigation in Australia, Pakistan and France. During interrogation in Paris, Brigitte identified a photograph of Lodhi and described him as the representative of LeT in Australia. He also revealed details of a network planning an attack. The French judge alerted Australian security forces, urging an investigation into what he concluded were plans for a "terrorist act of great size in Australia". Brigitte also told French authorities that he had attended an LeT training camp in Pakistan where he met a Pakistani man, Sajid, who later organised and paid for his trip to Australia. He said Sajid had ordered him to link up with Lodhi. Brigitte recalled Lodhi telling him to expect an unnamed house guest at Brigitteâs Wiley Park flat, possibly an explosives expert. The French dossier says Lodhi had the keys to the flat and would organise "meetings there with the brothers".
Posted by: Paul Moloney ||
04/23/2004 2:12:23 AM ||
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What a surprise, he lives in Punchbowl!
Just deport Punchbowl and Lakemba: no more problems!
Spainâs new prime minister told President Bush last month that the U.S. war on terrorism "isnât hitting the mark," according to an interview published Friday. Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero also said in the interview with the El Mundo newspaper that he decided to remove Spainâs troops early from Iraq after a top U.S. official stated American soldiers would only take orders from their own commanders, and not from the United Nations. According to Zapatero, the U.S. official, whom he did not identify, told Defense Minister Jose Bono, "Can you imagine 130,000 American soldiers being commanded by someone who is not an American general?"
After that, Zapatero told El Mundo, "we reached a clear conclusion" to pull out Spainâs 1,300 troops by June 1, a month early. Zapatero said he told Bush by phone after winning the March 14 election that "his strategy of fighting international terrorism isnât hitting the mark." In the interview, Zapatero also defended Spainâs foreign policy shift toward the European Union, especially France and Germany; and away from the U.S. focus that had been a priority of his predecessor, Jose Maria Aznar. "It seems pretty unusual" that Aznar would turn his back on the EU countries that have subsidized Spainâs economy in recent years with huge development subsidies, Zapatero said.
Zapatero told El Mundo that the overriding lesson from the invasion of Iraq was that a war that arouses public opposition rather than support shouldnât be undertaken, and terrorism is not best fought by conventional warfare. "What do the Shiites and Sunnis have to do with al-Qaeda? Absolutely nothing," he told El Mundo. "Theyâre religious communities in Iraq that donât like the occupation."
Zapatero stated publicly since the Socialists ousted the conservative Popular Party that Spain would withdraw its troops unless the United Nations took control of Iraqâs postwar occupation. He and top officials, including Bono, have said in recent days that the decision to pull out the troops â rather than leave them in southern Iraq at least through the June 30 commitment â was made once they concluded the United Nations could not take political and military control anytime soon. "It was evident there was no possibility the United Nations would take charge," Zapatero said.
Bono met with Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld earlier this month. Trying to patch up the foreign policy disagreement, Foreign Minister Miguel Moratinos met Secretary of State Colin Powell on Wednesday. Zapatero stressed the pullout did not indicate Spain was withdrawing from its international commitments, nor was it wavering about confronting terrorism. The country has 3,000 peacekeepers on duty in various countries including Afghanistan, he said, and is eager to help resolve the Israel-Palestinian conflict. On other issues, Zapatero endorsed U.N. efforts led by former Secretary of State James A. Baker III to resolve the Western Sahara dispute. In 1975, Spain abandoned the territory and Morocco annexed it. Some 200,000 Saharawi people fled into exile and live in refugee camps in Algeria.
#1
Spainâs new prime minister told President Bush last month that the U.S. war on terrorism "isnât hitting the mark," according to an interview published Friday.
Heh, pulling your country's troops out right after a terrorist attack isn't a high water mark to be proud of, that's for sure. But it's all well and good; we know who we can count on, and Spain's Socialists don't make the grade.
#4
Bono met with Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld earlier this month. Trying to patch up the foreign policy disagreement, Foreign Minister Miguel Moratinos met Secretary of State Colin Powell on Wednesday. Zapatero stressed the pullout did not indicate Spain was withdrawing from its international commitments, nor was it wavering about confronting terrorism.
They are maintaining a policy of stealth commitment. shhhh... Don't let Usama know. I recommend that we turn Rota into stealth Naval Base faster than you can say Roosevelt Roads.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
04/23/2004 23:02 Comments ||
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#6
Zapetero must be reading the Spanish version of "How to Win Friends and Influence People." Spain isn't withdrawing from its international commitments, just its commitments to America. I wonder if he was on the UNSCAM Oil for Influence list.
Finnish police have reportedly seized over 200 kilograms of illegal explosives at the parking place of the Vermo trotting-track in Espoo, just outside Helsinki. The police had reportedly made the finding in a trailer that had been parked near the trotting track. The police suspected that this was the largest amount of illegal explosives ever seized in Finland. According to the Finnish news agency STT, the police did not yet know when, why or by whom the explosives were brought to the parking place.
#1
Explosives stolen in Norway, Islamic suspects arrested in Sweden and now explosives found in Finland. May not be connected, but that looks like a straight line east to west to me.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 14:25 Comments ||
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#2
Err, west to east.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 14:25 Comments ||
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#3
That's ok Steve, my compass has only two directions on it: north and not-north.
#6
More info on the explosives:
Police said terrorist motives could not be ruled out, but that the explosives were more likely intended for the domestic market, to be sold in small quantities.
"Most likely this was a distribution center, and the explosives would have been sold from here in smaller amounts," Espoo Police Inspector Rauli Salonen said.
Police said the trailer, parked next to horse racing track, contained some 175 kilograms of commercial explosives based on ammonium nitrate, and 15 kilograms of dynamite, or a mixture of dynamite and ammonium nitrate, as well as detonators.
The explosives have been handed over to the military for investigation, police said.
"They've told us, after investigating the contents, that all of the explosives were in working order," Salonen said.
http://framehosting.dowjonesnews.com/sample/samplestory.asp?StoryID=2004042316290007&Take=1
#9
Agreed, Frank. WTF are they talking about? Legit "domestic" users get their explosives legitimately, not from some guy selling them out of a trailer in a parking lot.
Lessee, they got (hopefully all of) those guys who were going to blow up that football match in Manchester. Now this find at a racetrack. I think if I was attending any sporting events this weekend, I'd be extra observant.
Posted by: Old Grouch ||
04/23/2004 19:15 Comments ||
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.... Led by Brigadier General Benton K. Partin (USAF, ret.), former director of the Air Force Armament Technology Laboratory and one of the worldâs premier explosives and ordnance authorities, critics have argued compellingly that the blast wave from the ANFO [ammonium nitrate/fuel oil] truck bomb was totally inadequate to cause the collapse of the massive, steel-reinforced concrete columns of the federal building in Oklahoma City. This fact ... points inescapably to the conclusion that additional demolition charges had to have been placed on columns inside the building. ....
The new Eglin [Air Force Base] blast study convincingly proves the fundamental points set forth by General Partin: That air blast is an inefficient mechanism against hardened, reinforced concrete structures, and that "the pattern of damage [to the Murrah Building] would have been technically impossible without supplementing demolition charges." Entitled Case Study Relating Blast Effects to the Events of April 19, 1995 Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, (hereafter referred to as the Eglin Blast Effects Study, or EBES), the 56-page report includes photographs and data from the Eglin blast tests, as well as extensive technical analysis of those tests .....
As General Partin has taken great pains to emphasize, the inefficiency of a blast wave through air is dramatic -- particularly outdoors, where the blast energy is dissipated in all directions -- with its pressure and destructive force falling off more rapidly than an inverse function of the distance cubed (distance expressed in radius units). This means that the blast wave from an explosive device which yields a maximum blast pressure of one-and-a-half million pounds per square inch at the center of the device will have dropped off to under 200 pounds per square inch by the time it has traveled 20 radii. This makes air blast alone very ineffective against hardened concrete structures, such as heavy, steel-reinforced columns. .... Accordingly, the EBES found: "A limited area of the third and fourth floors of the Murrah Federal Building immediately adjacent to the position of the Ryder truck would be affected.
.... the EBES conclusions have a built-in margin of error that, if anything, overstate the extent of damage to be expected at the Murrah Building. Moreover, the computations for the Ryder truck bomb also are overly generous. "Because ANFO is also a low-energy explosive (approximately 30% that of TNT) and due to the inherent inefficiency of eight barrels forming the explosive assembly [according to the governmentâs estimates], it is doubtful that the device produced blast pressures close to the calculated maximum potential blast pressure," the study asserts. "This being the case, it is doubtful that the radius of damage even approached the 42.37 foot range as calculated herein."
Finally, the EBES concludes:
[quote]
Due to these conditions, it is impossible to ascribe the damage that occurred on April 19, 1995 to a single truck bomb containing 4,800 lbs. of ANFO. In fact, the maximum predicted damage to the floor panels of the Murrah Federal Building is equal to approximately 1% of the total floor area of the building. Furthermore, due to the lack of symmetrical damage pattern at the Murrah Building, it would be inconsistent with the results of the ETS test [number] one to state that all of the damage to the Murrah Building is the result of the truck bomb.
The damage to the Murrah Federal Building is consistent with damage resulting from mechanically coupled devices placed locally within the structure.... It must be concluded that the damage at the Murrah Federal Building is not the result of the truck bomb itself, but rather due to other factors such as locally placed charges within the building itself.... The procedures used to cause the damage to the Murrah Building are therefore more involved and complex than simply parking a truck and leaving....
[unquote]
Mike Smith, a civil engineer in Cartersville, Georgia commissioned to review the Eglin Blast Effects Study, states: "The results of the Blast Effect Test One on the Eglin Test Structure present strong evidence that a single Ammonium Nitrate and Fuel Oil device of approximately 4800 lbs. placed inside a truck could not have caused the damage to the Murrah federal Building experienced on April 19, 1995. Even assuming that the building had structural deficiencies and that the ANFO device was constructed with racing fuel, the air-coupled blast produced from this 4800 lb. device would not have damaged the columns and beams of the Murrah Building enough to produce a catastrophic failure."
Robert Frias, president of Frias Engineering of Arlington, Texas, after examining the EBES, concluded: "The Murrah Building would still be standing and the upper floors would be intact had the truck loaded with explosives been the only culprit. .... Explosives had to have been placed near, or on, the structural columns inside the building to cause the collapse that occurred to the Murrah Building."
Likewise, Alvin Norberg, a licensed professional engineer ... writes that evidence from the ETS data "verifies that the severe structural damage to the Murrah Building was not caused by a truck bomb outside the building," and that "the collapse of the Murrah Federal Building was the result of âmechanically coupled devicesâ (bombs) placed locally within the structure adjacent to the critical columns." ....
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
04/23/2004 7:08:26 AM ||
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#1
Another one of my pet peeves. Go back to the pictures of the Saudi building boomed the other day. Vertical supports are buckled and floors are partially collapsed. These were clearly "air coupled" explosive effects. Just because a guy is a licensed civil-structual engineer or has imploded buildings, doesn't make him an expert in the effects of several thousand pounds of HE 20 or 30 feet outside an office building. I would instead look to the after WWII bomb damage surveys for empirical data based on a large number of samples.
#2
BTW, here are the effects of overpressure waves from explosions:
A 55.2 kPa (8 PSI) overpressure wave is considered to be highly lethal and can collapse building floors. According to paragraph 3 above, the blast wave at OK City was 200 PSI when it intersected the Murrah building facade. This is in fact greater than the overpressure needed to topple unreinforced structures (e.g. wood stud construction).
#3
11A58, I appreciate your knowledge and information. Before I posted this I did view the photographs of the Saudi building with this comparison in mind. I had the impresssion that the Saudi buildings were not as solidly built as the Murrah building.
I wrote and posted these articles in order to get useful feedback such as yours. I also appreciate the forum that Rantburg provided. I don't intend to write any more on this subject.
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
04/23/2004 9:49 Comments ||
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#4
Watched one of those engineering disaster shows on Learning Channel a few years back. They did a indepth examination of this collapse. Found that the Murrah Building had a design flaw. Structure depended on gravity to keep load from upper floors straight down on the cross members.The structure didn't have a strong enough joint holding columns to cross members. The blast kicked cross members on first floor off the vertical column, then gravity brought the upper floors down like a house of cards.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 9:51 Comments ||
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#5
Speaking as an associate editor here, Mike, you've done a great job on this, and I appreciate it.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 11:38 Comments ||
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#6
Speaking as a netizen of Rantburg, Mike S. I also appreciate all the time and effort you've put into this series.
#7
Hi Mike: I liked the article. I'd just leave the explosive conspiracy stuff out. It just doesn't check out. I'd read the link I posted. It's not just the blast wave. The ground transmits energy too and blast waves can be reflected and combine and subtract for surreal effects. Nobel's brother was standing next to him during an accidental explosion. The brother was killed. Nobel didn't have a scratch. He was standing in a dead spot.
#8
I have to say that the removal of the explosive argument (you've convinced me) makes most of my previous arguments less compelling for me.
Anyone else who wants to research all this should begin and end with the book American Terrorist, which is basically McVeigh's statement that he did it alone (with some coerced help with Nichols). In my series of articles I tried to develop the idea that perhaps McVeigh himself did not know some significant factors that Nichols introduced into the events.
If McVeigh's truck did indeed suffice to blow up the building, then those other factors are rather irrelavant. Maybe Nichols did inform a "Yousef group" that then showed up to watch, but those watchers were probably not involved actively.
There are many, many eyewitness reports of other people and other trucks, but they don't stand up very well against American Terrorist.
Anyway, I did want to develop this idea, and I was looking for a forum, and when I found Rantburg, I felt this was the perfect place for me to be.
Posted by: Mike Sylwester ||
04/23/2004 13:29 Comments ||
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#9
"55.2 kPa (8 PSI) overpressure wave is considered to be highly lethal and can collapse building floors. According to paragraph 3 above, the blast wave at OK City was 200 PSI when it intersected the Murrah building facade. This is in fact greater than the overpressure needed to topple unreinforced structures (e.g. wood stud construction)."
I have no doubt that the McVeigh truck bomb could have knocked down the walls and ripped out the floors. What I'm more interested in is the failure of the columns. Specifically, the columns Partin designates as 'B3' and 'A7'. You'd need about 3,300 psi to knock fail one of these steel-reinforced concrete columns, no? And that's a conservative number, assuming bad concrete. (There was a brief concrete discussion at Rantburg last year sometime - I think it had to do with the three gorges dam.)
It doesn't help that I'm a technical ignoramus while trying to sort through this stuff. I hadn't considered the reflections or a design flaw - thanks for that information.
Posted by: Pete Stanley ||
04/23/2004 13:56 Comments ||
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#10
What I'm more interested in is the failure of the columns.
Pete, from what I can remember on the program examining the failure of the Murrah building, the columns didn't fail. The blast wave pushed the cross members sitting on the column up and sideways, the center of the blast being lower than the joint. That kicked the crossmember off the column. The upper floor supports rested on this crossmember and when it dropped they dropped with it. The floor panels, cross members and other columns mostly stayed intact, the joints between them failed. I seem to remember them saying because this was a low velocity pressure wave, it had more of a long slow push on the cross member and more load was transmitted to the joint causing it to fail. Again, I'm doing this from memory, but it made perfect sense at the time I viewed it.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 14:57 Comments ||
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Excerpt...
According to the Zhongguo Xinwen She news agency, the Chinese ambassador to the United Nations, Sha Zukang, blasted the U.S. for "racial discrimination" and cited "the recent case against Chinese American Yousef Yee" as an example of America's "domestic human rights situation." The absurdity of turning this into a racial issue is topped only by the sanctimony of Ambassador Sha, representative of the Falun Gong-torturing, political dissent-steamrolling, one-child-policy pioneers in Beijing, who fulminated that "the United States should look at itself in a mirror." Captain Yee's stateside defenders, such as Cecilia Chang of the San Francisco Bay Area-based grievance group Justice for New Americans, likewise pretend he was viciously singled out for being the child of "immigrant minorities." Chang complained, "Many people who don't look very 'American' are being targeted."
This is identity-politics opportunism of the worst kind. The fact that Yee was of Chinese descent had about as much to do with the case as his shoe size. The issue is our continued vulnerability to Islamist infiltration, particularly in the armed forces. Yee's race card-playing team conveniently ignores the recent arrest of Ryan Anderson, the white Muslim National Guardsman accused of trying to pass information about military capabilities to al Qaeda over the Internet -- as well as the other alleged espionage cases at Guantanamo Bay involving Ahmad F. Mehalba, an Egyptian-American Muslim civilian interpreter charged with lying about computer CDs in his baggage that contained classified information from Guantanamo, and Air Force Senior Airman Ahmad I. al Halabi. Al Halabi, a Syrian-American Muslim, faces 17 charges of espionage, lying and disobeying orders, and also stands accused of failing to report his contacts with the Syrian Embassy to his superiors and of repeatedly lying to Air Force investigators.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
04/23/2004 04:15 ||
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It's about a week since I muffed one. The title was supposed to be: Malkin Red Chinese Join Captain Yee's Sympathy Circle.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
04/23/2004 4:17 Comments ||
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WASHINGTON (AP) - Fearing that terrorists might target Congress, the House on Thursday approved a bill to set up speedy special elections if 100 or more of its members are killed.
I had thought that the states would handle this; most states have provisions to replace reps who die in office.
Governors can appoint Senators, not Represenatives. See below.
The House, in a 306-97 vote, put aside for now the larger issue of whether the Constitution should be amended to allow for temporary appointments in the event that an attack caused mass fatalities among lawmakers.
Thursday's vote came two and a half years after the Sept. 11 attacks and the crash in Pennsylvania of United Flight 93, a plane that many believe was destined for the U.S. Capitol. "Those passengers gave their lives to give us a second chance," said Rep. Brian Baird, D-Wash., a supporter of the broader constitutional approach. "Eternal shame on us if we do not take action" to protect Congress' survival after a possible attack.
The measure would require special elections within 45 days of the House speaker confirming that a catastrophic event had left at last 100 of the 435 seats vacant. Language was added to ensure that military personnel stationed overseas would have their voting rights protected. The current legislation has split the two parties in the House, with many Democrats saying they were not given the chance to offer a constitutional amendment that would allow for temporary appointments until special elections could be held. The Constitution requires that House vacancies be filled by elections. Senate vacancies can be temporarily filled by appointments made by governors. The Senate has not taken up the terrorist attack issue, though Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, has proposed a constitutional change giving states the flexibility to come up with their own solutions.
Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., sponsor of the elections bill and a foe of appointments, said expedited elections could get the House back on its feet after a disaster without betraying the democratic underpinnings of the chamber. As for the possibility of a largely appointed House, he asked, "Is that what the framers of the Constitution had in mind?" His answer: "No way."
Correct.
In a gesture to Democrats and some in his own party who favor the constitutional approach, Sensenbrenner pledged that his committee would vote down on a proposed constitutional amendment in the near future.
Critics of the 45-day election plan said it was both too short a time for some states to prepare for elections and too long to leave Congress in a paralyzed state. Several warned of a martial law condition, with the executive branch taking over legislative authorities such as declaring war during the 45 days that Congress is unable to function. "A catastrophe that could prevent whole states from being represented for 45 days is at the heart of the concern," said Rep. John Larson, D-Conn., another backer of amending the Constitution.
You do have to trust the people to have elected a decent President for such situations.
The constitutional approach is backed by the non-partisan Continuity of Government Commission, formed in the fall of 2002 to study how to keep Congress functioning after a disaster. The commission's chairs former Sen. Alan Simpson, R-Wyo., and Lloyd Cutler, White House counsel to presidents Carter and Clinton, said in a recent letter that not one of their members went into the task with the desire to amend the Constitution. "Nevertheless, the evidence we considered led us to conclude that, for the sake of the Constitution itself, the security of our nation and the preservation of the Congress, a constitutional amendment is necessary to provide continuity in the face of a catastrophic attack."
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 1:55:41 AM ||
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Sigh. I would have been in favor of this before the 3/11 attacks. Now I worry that a special election following quickly upon a major attack on the legislature could theoretically result in a Zapatero failure of will. A states-based appointments scheme would be less prone to errors driven by short-term popular hysteria.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
04/23/2004 9:21 Comments ||
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#2
I favor state appointment for a temporary replacement for one year or the next election, which ever comes first.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 9:56 Comments ||
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#3
My state (Illinois) has provisions to appoint a representative until a special election can be held. I don't see why other states couldn't do the same or similar thing. Alternately, hold the special election in 60 days. Electing a representative isn't the same as a governor or senator. Get it done and get the rep to Washington. No need for an amendment (I suppose you could convince me otherwise).
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 11:43 Comments ||
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#4
This was discussed soon after 9/11. If the fourth plane had made it to Capitol Hill, the work of the government would have been essentially crippled. All appropriations begin in the House; if the reps were mostly dead or incapacitated, there could be no funds for WTC rescue/recovery, and no funds for the DoD to begin plans to respond to the attack. I am glad they are considering the possibilities now, while our skies are still clear. And thanks again to the brave passengers on Flight 93!
A US appeals court has ruled that the government's case against a man charged in connection with the 11 September 2001 attacks can go ahead. The federal appeals court in Virginia also lifted a ban on prosecutors using evidence related to the attacks.
Zac just moved one step closer to a date with a needle.
Frenchman Zacarias Moussaoui is the only person charged in the US over the attacks on New York and Washington. He admits being a member of al-Qaeda but denies involvement in the plot to hijack planes and crash them.
The panel ordered the district judge to work out whether Mr Moussaoui could have access to al-Qaeda witnesses. The 35-year-old French citizen of Moroccan origin was indicted more than two years ago on four counts of conspiracy to commit terrorism, which carry the death penalty. He had been under arrest on immigration charges when hijackers crashed civilian airliners into the World Trade Center and other targets, killing more than 2,800 people.
In preparing his case, Mr Moussaoui was seeking to interview three major al-Qaeda suspects who are being held by the US at undisclosed locations but prosecutors had objected, citing security concerns. The government had argued that District Judge Leonie Brinkema in Virginia exceeded her authority by ruling that Mr Moussaoui could interview the men.
But the panel backed Judge Brinkema's findings that "the enemy combatant witnesses could provide material, favourable testimony on Moussaoui's behalf". However, the appeals judges said that written statements from the prisoners could substitute for direct questioning of the witnesses - and rejected Judge Brinkema's argument that it was not possible to craft a compromise.
Eugene Volokh has a different opinion, thinks this hurts the government. Scroll down if it isn't at the top.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 12:55:10 AM ||
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Last Sunday a newspaper in Seattle, Washington, published a rare photograph of soldiers' coffins, each of them containing the body of an American who had died in Iraq. The coffins, each draped with the Stars and Stripes, had been loaded into the back of a cargo aircraft for a final journey to the US, where they would be buried. There were at least 18 of them in the picture, which was taken by a 50-year-old civilian contractor, Tami Silicio. On Wednesday Ms Silicio was sacked from her job, for taking the photograph and sharing it with news organisations.
Seems appropriate to me...
Ms Silicio worked for Maytag Aircraft Corporation, which has a $US18 million contract to handle cargo for the US Government at Kuwait airport. As part of that job she would often see soldiers' coffins in the back of aircraft, on their way from Iraq to burial in the US. Earlier this month Ms Silicio decided to photograph the coffins. She asked a friend, Amy Katz, to forward the image to her local newspaper, The Seattle Times. Ms Katz said she was "amazed" when she saw the photo. "I immediately picked up the telephone and because [Ms Silicio] is from Washington state, I called The Seattle Times," she said. "Tami wanted to share the image with the American people."
And get paid for it, of course.
The US military generally bans photographs of soldiers' coffins, and few have been published in US newspapers during the war in Iraq. On Wednesday Ms Silicio engaged an agent, who offered her photograph to newspaper outlets for $1400 for one-time, non-exclusive use.
In the end, it's all about the money.
The editor of the Times, Mike Fancher, said in a column this week that he decided to publish the photograph on the front page because it was "undeniably newsworthy". Readers would have "differing reactions to the photo, depending on their views of the war", he said. The managing editor of The Seattle Times, David Boardman, told the magazine Editor & Publisher this week that "we weren't attempting to convey any sort of political message".
For him, it was all about selling newspapers.
Ms Katz said that after the picture was published Ms Silicio was "called into her supervisor's office and severely reprimanded. She explained why she did it, but they sacked her and her husband [David Landry] too". She said Ms Silicio "really wanted mothers of the soldiers to know how the coffins were handled". In an interview with The Seattle Times, Ms Silicio said the coffins were prayed over and saluted before being shipped. "Everyone salutes with such emotion and respect," she said. "The families would be proud to see their sons and daughters saluted like that."
They know that without you selling your photo for money.
William Silva, the president of Maytag Aircraft, was quoted by The Seattle Times as saying the sackings had been for violating US government and company regulations.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 12:42:48 AM ||
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Shame on them. One of the Seatle Times editorial guys was on the radio today. He went "quack, quack, quack, thoughtful, quack, quack, respectful, quack, quack, well reasoned, non judgemental, quack, quack, quack. supportive, quack, reverence, quack."
#2
When I saw the picture of the rows of coffins, with the soldier saluting them, the poem "In Flanders Fields" popped into my head.
Some things never change.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/23/2004 1:24 Comments ||
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#3
I'm damn proud of how are soldiers treat our fallen. But I believe when they come off that plane that the only ones who deserve to be there are other soldiers and family of the fallen. Simply showing them lined up, with no distinguishable markings on them takes away the tragedy of each unique person their that died. If you want pictures, go to the funeral, their Honorable 'home-coming' isn't the place.
Posted by: Charles ||
04/23/2004 2:23 Comments ||
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#4
Anybody know why they fired the husband, too? I haven't seen any account of this that mentions him being involved.
#5
This be our part, for so we serve you best,
So best confirm their prowess and their pride,
Your warrior sons, to whom in this high test
Our fortunes we confide.
-- Owen Seaman, "Pro Patria"
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 11:45 Comments ||
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#7
as they should - like it or not they broke standing rules on thier company's contract.
plus the fact that this aids and abides our enemy (al-jeeeze).
the us military is top notch on respect!
god bless our men and women.
Posted by: Dan ||
04/23/2004 11:46 Comments ||
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#8
Were the photos supposed to rile us against the war? Well I have something to say to the leftist toady and their newly unemployed agents.
1:We knew in our minds eye abount scenes like this. It isn't helping your agenda at all.
2:You think The use of similar images at ground zero at 9/11 are bad because it hurts your agenda.
Screw politics, you guys just want power to f*** things up like you did for 8 years of Clinton where he would only attack Saddam's bad stuff and admit that it was there because of the necessity of diversions.
Let's get to the truth. Our brave folks died there to try to prevent more 9/11s here.
We know that the leftist toady unemployed photographer will find a job quicky in the Kerry campaign, so just shut up, and be satisfied that you breached a moment of privacy for some grieving families. But realize this will have ZERO effect on the presidential campaign. In that you will be sorely disappointed.
#9
Well the photo made the Tacoma paper's front page this AM. Headline, "War dead photo released, Pentagone slips up as casket images posted on internet."
#10
I should think, having been in the art world for some time, that the families of the fallen could do something about this, if they are so inclined.
Taking a photograph of a person does not give you the right to use it as you please.
If I take your picture and do not get a model release signed, then I can only use it with your permission. Selling the photo is out of the question and can bring legal action by you against me, for the amount of the sale and any damages deemed appropriate by the court. Maybe they could take the paper to court for publising, as well.
Maybe not.
Posted by: Ben Silver ||
04/23/2004 16:24 Comments ||
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Looks like the 93rd Volunteer Infantry better be ready.
Airport security screeners employed either by the federal government or private companies do not detect weapons as they should, a government investigator told a House panel yesterday. Department of Homeland Security Inspector General Clark Kent Ervin said the two groups "performed about the same, which is to say, equally poorly."
Ervin's testimony was part of two government reports discussed before the House Transportation and Infrastructure's aviation subcommittee yesterday that described the strikingly similar performance between federal security screeners and those working for private companies in a test program at five airports. A second report, conducted by consulting firm BearingPoint, found that at one of the test airports, Kansas City, private security screeners performed better than their federal counterparts. The study concluded that overall "there is no evidence that any of the five privately screened airports performed below the average level of the federal airports."
They're all hiring from the same pool of people.
Although the number of weapons screeners detected was not made public, a member of Congress familiar with the results said the BearingPoint study showed that screener performance had not improved since the 2001 terrorist attacks. "The failure rates are comparable from 1987 to today," said Rep. Peter A. DeFazio (D-Ore.). That year, screeners failed to detect 20 percent of prohibited items that undercover agents tried to sneak through checkpoints, according to a General Accounting Office report.
David M. Stone, the acting head of the Transportation Security Administration, agreed to the meeting but said screener testing today is much more rigorous than it had been. "Testing in the '90s was in no way even comparable to what we do," Stone said.
Yesterday's hearing was held to discuss a forthcoming "opt out" program this November, in which more U.S. airports will be eligible to use private screeners. Unlike the security system in place before the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, the private security firms employing the screeners work directly for the TSA, not the airlines. The TSA, which was created after the attacks and employs the airport screeners, did not dispute the performance findings yesterday and said that the results would be used to develop the "opt out" program.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 12:34:11 AM ||
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Turkish Cypriot leader of the Sufi faith in Cyprus Sheik Nazim has called on Cypriots on both sides of the Green Line to vote âyesâ to the Annan plan in tomorrowâs referenda. âThis is Godâs will,â said the octogenarian Sheik, appearing on local Turkish Cypriot TV. âNo human alive can stand in the way of Godâs wishes, not even with tanks and guns, armies and planes,â he added. In typical style, the Sheik criticised the Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash, saying: âFor the last 30 years he has been cooking his shish kebab on one side. Now itâs time for him to cook the other side a bit. After all, the side heâs been cooking for 30 years has turned to ash. Even if itâs raw on one side, lets try and eat it. It may be raw, but add a little salt and itâll be fine.â Asked whether this meant he supported a âyesâ vote in the referendum, Sheik Nazim answered, âI say, âletâs eat kebabâ.â
Sheik Nazim recently drew heavy criticism from Denktash and his supporters for visiting Archbishop Makariosâ grave at Kykkos monastery. During the visit, Nazim said he had met with Orthodox bishops in an attempt to persuade them to advocate a âyesâ vote to in the referendum. âI told the bishops Satan was cast out of heaven for saying ânoâ to God. I asked them, âdo you think this plan was written to create war between us?â No, itâs a peace plan. And if itâs a peace plan and you say ânoâ to it, maybe we should prepare ourselves for combat,â Nazim said.
Posted by: TS ||
04/23/2004 8:15:45 AM ||
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His shish kebab is ash on one side and raw on the other? Let's eat the raw side with some salt? How do these freaks come up with this shit? I hope he gets sick from eating his raw kebab.
#3
lol! How 'bout a BBQ cookoff? I'm sure we have some independent consultants who would be happy to advise the Greek Cypriots.
Posted by: Cthulhu Akbar ||
04/23/2004 10:43 Comments ||
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#4
I would imagine that the onions and peppers get burned long before the meat does. At least that always happens to me.
Also, I am not impressed by this metaphor because rice pilaf is nowhere mentioned.
Posted by: Carl in N.H. ||
04/23/2004 10:44 Comments ||
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#5
This vote is like couscous with some couscous being undercooked, while other couscous is overcooked and yet some other couscous is flavored of parmesean cheese while this other couscous is flavored of sundried tomato. It is the will of almighty Allan that we should eat the couscous that is like mush, but damn the Italians and their satanic cheeses, eat ye not the flavored couscous or you will surely burn in hell!
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - Secretary-General Kofi Annan accused critics of the U.N. oil-for-food program Thursday of treating allegations of corruption as fact and ignoring the program's role of providing aid to nearly every Iraqi family. The U.N. chief declared that he was "very keen" for the three-member panel led by former U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker to report "as soon as possible." And he promised that any U.N. official found guilty of accepting bribes or kickbacks would be dealt with "very severely."
Kofi's worried.
Annan said he met Wednesday with Benon Sevan, who headed the oil-for-food program and has been accused of receiving kickbacks from Saddam's government, to discuss the allegations and cooperation with the investigation. Officials said Sevan is retiring on May 31 but would remain available for the investigation.
As long as you can find him in Kolyma.
"Benon has stated quite clearly that he is innocent," Annan said. "He has indicated he will cooperate as I expect all other staff members to cooperate."
He'll cooperate at least as well as the other staff members!
Volcker received support Thursday from European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana. "Be sure that all the European countries are going to participate and to cooperate on the investigation and clarify everything," Solana told reporters after meeting Annan.
They'll also cooperate at least as well as the UN staff.
Annan told reporters Thursday it is "unfortunate" that some allegations are "being handled as if they were facts," and that in the process the oil-for-food program's importance to Iraqis had been lost. "The fact that (there) may have been wrongdoing by a few should not destroy the work that many hardworking U.N. staff did," he said.
"We had good intentions!"
"If the Iraqi government has smuggled oil and done all sorts of things, I don't think it is fair to lump it all together and blame the U.N. and the Secretariat because there are things that were definitely beyond our control - not only the Secretariat but even the member states," Annan said.
"And the rest, phiff, as the French would say, it was a truffle."
Annan said it is important to separate the oil-for-food investigation from the effort led by his special adviser, Lakhdar Brahimi, to help Iraqis decide on a transitional government that will take power from the U.S.-led coalition on June 30.
One could see how it wouldn't exactly fill the Iraqi people with a lot of confidence in the UN.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 12:11:58 AM ||
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#1
"We had good intentions!"
Oooh ... paving stones!
Why are we in this handbasket and where are we going?
#2
All this amongst the push for the Prez to nominate Rudy Giuliani to replace John Negroponte as UN Ambassador.
This would be juicy! At a time of this scandal, having a former US Procecutor, with a very high reputation outside of law as well, ask very pointed questions just is to halarious to think about.
Obi-1-Kenobi enters the Star Wars Tattoine Cantina with his light sabre.
If Kofi were to have accept the credentials from the former Mayor, he may choke under the circumstances.
#4
"If the Iraqi government has smuggled oil and done all sorts of things, I don't think it is fair to lump it all together and blame the U.N. and the Secretariat because there are things that were definitely beyond our control - not only the Secretariat but even the member states," Annan said.
YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE IN CONTROL OF THE SITUATION, YOU SILLY LITTLE TWAT. If your programs are going to lack accountability, then DON'T BOTHER RUNNING THEM.
Armed assailants fatally shot an army officer Friday, just hours after unidentified attackers set fire to about 50 public buildings in the worst day of arson attacks in Thailand's Muslim-dominated south in recent months. Sgt. Sarathon Kadie, 45, died after a gunman on a motorcycle rode up and opened fire as the officer was washing his car around 6:30 a.m. (2330 GMT) Friday morning in the Rayang district of Pattani province, said police Capt. Vipat Suwanarat.
Motorcycles of Doom strike again!
The attack came just hours after unidentified attackers torched about 50 public buildings in almost simultaneous attacks late Thursday and killed two firefighters rushing to put out one of the blazes.
50 fires at once? That's a pretty large torch job.
The unrest signaled the worst day of arson attacks since Jan. 4, when assailants burned 21 schools in Narathiwat province and raided an army camp, stealing hundreds of weapons and killing four soldiers. Since then, more than 70 people, mostly police and local officials, have been killed in drive-by shootings and other attacks that the government has blamed on alleged Islamic insurgents. Thursday's fires broke out in all 13 districts of Narathiwat, with the attackers targeting at least 11 schools, 24 phone booths, government offices, living accommodations for railway officials, a highway rest area and some Buddhist monasteries, police said earlier.
Phone booths?
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said Friday that at least 10 suspects had been arrested following the attacks, which amounted to a "last-minute struggle'' by followers of an Islamic militant who would soon be caught.
Suspects caught, huh? Need to borrow some truncheons?
Police said late Thursday that a combined force of police and soldiers had rounded up about 20 suspects. Thaksin, on a tour of Thailand's northeastern provinces, told reporters that the arrest of the suspects, who range from 14 to 20 years old, marked "the first time that security forces have been able to arrest arsonists red-handed.''
14 to 20, this would be the easily replaced cannon fodder.
He said the arrests showed that "local people are now lending a hand to the authorities.'' "This was the last-minute struggle of the perpetrators as the government is on the right track and is about to get the real mastermind'' behind the recent violence, who has been "instigating youths to create trouble and has been using religion as a tool to cause trouble.''
And which religion would that be, hummm?
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 3:50:48 PM ||
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Phone booths are unislamic. Cell phones, on the other hand, are very islamic. They make great bomb triggers.
Posted by: ed ||
04/23/2004 16:29 Comments ||
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Former NFL player Pat Tillman was killed Thursday while serving as an Army Rangers soldier on a mission in southeastern Afghanistan, Pentagon officials have told CNN. He was 27.
Pentagon sources confirmed that a soldier killed during an ambush on a coalition combat patrol, reported in a U.S. Central Command release, was Tillman.
The incident took place at 7:30 p.m. local time Thursday near the village of Sperah, 40 kilometers southwest of Khowst.
"The enemy action was immediately responded to by the coalition patrol with direct fire and a firefight ensued," the release said. "During the engagement, one coalition soldier was killed and two wounded."
It also said an Afghan Militia Force soldier was killed and that "the enemy broke contact during the engagement."
Tillman, who walked away from a $3.6 million contract as a safety with the Arizona Cardinals to join the military after the Sept. 11 attacks, was in an area where numerous U.S. troops have been killed in battles with suspected al Qaeda and Taliban fighters.
Tillman was a member of the 75th Ranger Regiment, a light infantry unit out of Fort Benning, Ga. The White House put out a statement of sympathy that praised Tillman as "an inspiration both on an off the football field."
Former Cardinals head coach Dave McGinnis said he felt both overwhelming sorrow and tremendous pride in Tillman, who "represented all that was good in sports."
"Pat knew his purpose in life," McGinnis said. "He proudly walked away from a career in football to a greater calling."
Several of Tillmanâs friends have said the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks influenced his decision to enlist.
"In sports we have a tendency to overuse terms like courage and bravery and heroes," said Cardinals vice president Michael Bidwill, son of the teamâs owner Bill Bidwill, "and then someone like Pat Tillman comes along and reminds us what those terms really mean."
A memorial was set up outside Cardinalsâ headquarters in Tempe, Ariz., with Tillmanâs No. 40Â uniform in a glass frame alongside two teddy bears and two bouquets. A pen was left for people to write messages to Tillmanâs family.
Gov. Janet Napolitano ordered flags at Arizona State University, Tillmanâs alma mater, flown at half-staff.
"Pat Tillman personified all the best values of his country and the NFL," commissioner Paul Tagliabue said in a statement. "He was an achiever and leader on many levels who always put his team, his community, and his country ahead of his personal interests."
Former teammate Pete Kendall, the Cardinalsâ starting center, said Tillmanâs death was a jolt of the reality regarding the nationâs fight in the Middle East.
"The loss of Pat brings it home," Kendall said. "Everyday there are countless families having to get the same news."
Kendall remembered going out with Tillman and his future wife, Marie.
"We had a meal and a couple of beers," Kendall said. "It was a nice night. I really looked forward to buying him another beer sometime down the road."
Several members of Arizonaâs congressional delegation released statements on Tillmanâs death. Arizona Sen. John McCain noted that Tillman declined to speak publicly about his decision to put his NFL career on hold. IOW, unlike so many other celebrities he refused to grandstand about how great what he was doing was to the (sports) Media.
"I am heartbroken today by the news of Pat Tillmanâs death, " Sen. McCain said. "The tragic loss of this extraordinary young man will seem a heavy blow to our nationâs morale, as it is surely a grievous injury to his loved ones."
Sen. John Kyl released a statement calling Tillman "a great American hero in the truest sense. He had already given up so much, including an incredible football career and loving family, to fight for his country in the war on terrorism. His patriotism and courage are an inspiration and we are grateful for his ultimate sacrifice."
Rep. Jeff Flake said, "Pat Tillman exemplified the sacrifice, selflessness, and service of the U.S. military. Nowadays, genuine role models in professional sports are few and far between, but Tillman proved that there are still heroes in sports."
Tillman played four seasons with the Cardinals before enlisting in the Army in May 2002. He made the decision after returning from his honeymoon with his wife, Marie. In a 2002 story, Tillman told Sports Illustrated that he planned to return to the NFL in three years. My prayers and Iâm sure yours are with Patâs wife, Marie, as well as the rest of his family. Bless her heart, it doesnât sound like she was able to enjoy being his wife for very long.
"He knew what was important to him, and he made his decision and stood by it," said quarterback Eli Manning, expected to be a top pick in Saturdayâs NFL Draft.
Tillmanâs brother, Kevin, a former minor league baseball prospect in the Cleveland Indiansâ organization, also joined the Rangers and served in the Middle East. They committed to three-year stints in the Army. And weâre praying for Kevin Tillman, too.
Some 110 U.S. soldiers have died -- 39 of them in combat -- during Operation Enduring Freedom, which began in Afghanistan in late 2001.
Tillmanâs agent, Frank Bauer, has called him a deep and clear thinker who has never valued material things.
In 2001, Tillman turned down a $9 million, five-year offer sheet from the Super Bowl champion St. Louis Rams out of loyalty to the Cardinals, and by joining the Army, he passed on millions more from the team.
Tillman turned aside interview requests after joining the Army. In December, during a trip home, he made a surprise visit to his Cardinal teammates.
"For all the respect and love that all of us have for Pat Tillman and his brother and Marie, for what they did and the sacrifices they made ... believe me, if you have a chance to sit down and talk with them, that respect and that love and admiration increase tenfold," Coach Dave McGinnis said at the time. "It was a really, really enriching evening."
It was not immediately clear when Tillman went to Afghanistan.
The 5-foot-11, 200-pound Tillman was distinguished by his intelligence and appetite for rugged play. As an undersized linebacker at Arizona State, he was the Pac-10âs defensive player of the year in 1997.
He set a franchise record with 224 tackles in 2000 and warmed up for last yearâs training camp by competing in a 70.2-mile triathlon in June.
Tillman carried a 3.84 grade point average through college and graduated with high honors in 3 1/2 academic years with a degree in marketing.
"You donât find guys that have that combination of being as bright and as tough as him," Phil Snow, who coached Tillman as Arizona Stateâs defensive coordinator, said in 2002. "This guy could go live in a foxhole for a year by himself with no food."
Tillman and his brother Kevin last year won the Arthur Ashe Courage award at the 11th annual ESPY Awards.
This dear, courageous and outstanding young man chose and lived the values of Duty. Honor. Country.
Night Rangers donât quit and Pat didnât either.
Heaven needed a Hero today and so Pat was taken from us.
Thank God for his life and his sacrifice.
Posted by: Jen ||
04/23/2004 8:19:24 PM ||
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Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said on Friday he was no longer bound by a pledge he gave President Bush not to harm Palestinian President Yasser Arafat. "I said during in our first meeting about three years ago that I accepted his request not to harm Arafat physically," Sharon told Israelâs Channel 2. "But I am released from this commitment. I release myself from this commitment regarding Arafat." . . . Arafat is seeing handwriting on the wall, but I doubt he the reads Hebrew letters which say, "Your ass is grass, creep!"
I prefer the King James version: "You have been weighed in the balance and found wanting."
Posted by: Carl in N.H ||
04/23/2004 16:55 Comments ||
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#2
"Integrated testing of airborne death ray completed" - another article in this blog makes one ask the question about a ground target, and the Isralei's asking if they can suggest a guinea pig.
Oh, Fred - With all due respect, I think to are offering Arafat too much dignity with your scriptural offering.
#3
Well okay Sharon, then let's get it on and fry the bastid.
Posted by: Laurence of the Rats ||
04/23/2004 20:44 Comments ||
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#4
Arafat has been now warned by Sharon and the Rassim example: one, only one Israeli death from the next al-fatah attack is all the justification necessary to reduce a certain building in Rahmallah to kindling. Which explains why the boyz are all submitting change of address.
The tough question for Arafat is how long much control does he actually have; every two bit thug in Gaza and the WB has the same message. Just a matter of time....
Sharon is obviously pondering a pre-emption on the next attack.
Posted by: john ||
04/23/2004 22:53 Comments ||
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ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. -- Liquid armor for Kevlar vests is one of the newest technologies being developed at the U.S. Army Research Laboratory to save Soldiersâ lives. This type of body armor is light and flexible, which allows soldiers to be more mobile and wonât hinder an individual from running or aiming his or her weapon. The key component of liquid armor is a shear thickening fluid. STF is composed of hard particles suspended in a liquid. The liquid, polyethylene glycol, is non-toxic, and can withstand a wide range of temperatures. Hard, nano-particles of silica are the other components of STF. This combination of flowable and hard components results in a material with unusual properties. "During normal handling, the STF is very deformable and flows like a liquid. However, once a bullet or frag hits the vest, it transitions to a rigid material, which prevents the projectile from penetrating the Soldierâs body," said Dr. Eric Wetzel, a mechanical engineer from the Weapons and Materials Research Directorate who heads the project team. To make liquid armor, STF is soaked into all layers of the Kevlar vest. The Kevlar fabric holds the STF in place, and also helps to stop the bullet. The saturated fabric can be soaked, draped, and sewn just like any other fabric.
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
04/23/2004 3:35:34 PM ||
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Interesting. It sounds a little like a liquid version of this stuff, which becomes more rigid with increasing force until it actually shatters.
Police on Friday arrested five Iraqis believed linked to Al Qaeda and suspected in this weekâs suicide bombings in Basra, and the men led police to a stash of 20 tons of explosives, a police intelligence chief said. Sound like these policemen are doing their job
Two of the men were caught in a truck carrying 3.5 tons of TNT, and the other three were captured in a house where another ton of explosives, along with mortar shells and rockets were found, said Col. Khalaf al-Badran, head of police intelligence in Basra. The men led police to a second house where police found 20 tons of explosives, TNT, mortar shells, rockets and artillery shells, al-Badran said. The five confessed to working with a Syrian connected to Al Qaeda who travels between Iraq and neighboring Kuwait, he said. On Wednesday, suicide attackers blew up cars stuffed with explosives and rockets outside police stations, killing 74 people, including children.
EFL
The top American official in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer III, presented his plan today to allow former Baathists to re-enter the military and the government. The plan, disclosed on Thursday by administration officials here, is a major rollback of a policy aimed at purging the Iraqi government of members of Saddam Husseinâs former governing party. The change represents a sharp split with the American-appointed Iraqi Governing Council. The Americans are breaking in particular with Ahmad Chalabi, a former exile, who is now the council member in charge of the purges. Mr. Chalabi denounced the move to rehabilitate some Baathists.. "This is like allowing Nazis into the German government immediately after World War II," he told a Reuters correspondent. "This policy will create major problems in the transition to democracy, endanger any government put together by U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi and cause it to fall after June 30."
Military officers who served in Mr. Husseinâs army and had clean records would be allowed to join the new army, Mr. Bremer said. The softened policy on de-Baathification will allow the quick return to the government payroll of former Baath Party members "who were Baathists in name only," Mr. Senor said. Many Iraqis â teachers, engineers, bureaucrats and others â say they became members only to advance their careers. As part of the policy change, senior army officers, including generals and full colonels, will be allowed to return, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, a spokesman for the occupation forces, said. The Iraqi Defense Ministry has recently said that it is appointing several top former officers to lead the new Iraqi Army, a crucial element for any stability.
The de-Baathification policy was one of the first sweeping changes â which included the dissolution of the old Iraqi Army â made by L. Paul Bremer III when he took office as the top civilian administrator last May. The policy drew sharp criticism from politicians, military officers and others in Washington and Iraq, who said it shut out the skilled technocrats and intellectuals. The chief White House spokesman, Scott McClellan, said on Thursday that the Bush administration was "reviewing how the policies are being implemented and looking at how we can better balance the need for expertise and experience that some Iraqis have with the need for justice." The shift comes as a blow to Mr. Chalabi, who built close ties to the Pentagon during his exile. He heads a Governing Council committee that revises and carries out the policy. In mid-January, he announced new restrictions that barred top-level Baathists from any chance of re-entering the government.
Occupation authority officials praised the new change in policy as a step toward "reconciliation." Last month, Mr. Bremer said he had warned Mr. Chalabi that his de-Baathification efforts were going too far. "Iâve told him that theyâve got to stop this overzealous approach if weâre going to allow this to continue," Mr. Bremer said to reporters. Mr. Bremer estimated that of the two million former members of the Baath Party, about 15,000 to 20,000 were affected by his the restrictions he ordered last May. But more were pushed out of their jobs in "spontaneous" purges throughout the provinces, he said.
Here in Bangkok, I turned on my computer this Friday evening to read that Pat Tillman had been killed in action in Afghanistan this date. I cried - and I canât even remember the last time I cried. Sometime last year, I had picked this great man as my present day hero - as a shining example of what John Stuart Mill once wrote about ... scorning those men "who had no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of men better than themselves." There are many malcontents out there who owe their ability to whine in freedom to heroes like Pat Tillman.
My pen name here is not about cowboys and Tonto - it is about Dahlonegoa Georgia and Ranger Class 11-76, back in 1976 - when I graduated from Ranger School. My deepest and utmost respect to this fine Ranger who gave the utmost measure of sacrifice, sticking up for his country. I know of no finer recent example of honor and sacrifice.
#2
As a football fan I have to admit that I had never really paid attention to him. But the next ime I hear some overpaid pampered pumped-up steriod ridden POS in a football uniform talk about going to "war" I wish some one would kick him in the balls
#3
Can't get this out of my mind today. Whether these people leave behind million dollar contracts and beautiful families or some minimum wage job and and a questionable future, they have given everything they had and everything they would ever have. Breaks my heart and makes me proud at the same time. God bless them all, Semper Fi.
Nine Iraqi people and one Iranian, who worked at the military base of the Bulgarian contingent in Karbala, died in the shooting in Karbala, which also took the life of the Bulgarian Senior Sergeant Dimitar Dimitrov, reported Focus correspondent Dragomir Petkov. Five of Muqtada Sadrâs supporters were wounded when the Bulgarian soldiers fired back. The incident occurred at 11:50 a.m. when a group of Bulgarian soldiers was returning from a mission for guarding the city hall in Karbala and came across an ambush. The Bulgarian soldiers were fired at with mortars and submachine guns.
Posted by: TS ||
04/23/2004 11:59:53 AM ||
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A Shiite Muslim cleric threatened on Friday to launch suicide attacks if U.S. troops attack him and his forces in the holy city of Najaf.
Not personally, of course.
Be a real shame if he had a work accident.
Muqtada al-Sadr, was speaking during the Friday prayers sermon in Kufa, another Shiite Muslim holy city few kilometres from Najaf. The area is mostly controlled by his Al-Mahdi army militia, whose members have clashed with U.S. troops several times since their uprising began on April 4.
Be a shame if something didn't happen to him on the way back to Najaf, if he is going back.
"Some of the Mujahideen brothers have told me they want to carry out martyrdom attacks but I am postponing this," al-Sadr said in front of thousands of worshippers. "When we are forced to do so and when our city and holy sites are attacked, we will all be timebombs in the face of the enemy."
"We? What you mean we, turban boy?
He condemned suicide bombings Wednesday in the southern city of Basra that killed 73 people because they targeted Iraqi police and civilians.
"No, no, no! You're supposed to be booming infidels!"
U.S. forces are deployed outside Najaf, but their mission to capture or kill al-Sadr has effectively been put on hold while negotiators try to resolve the standoff. U.S. commanders say they have no intention for the time being of entering Najaf, the holiest Shiite city.
Got to wait his turn, Fallujah is first in the barrel.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 10:46:23 AM ||
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Wouldn't this be a good time to cut off his route between Kufa and Najaf? It would solve a lot of probems if we can keep him from returning to his 'holy city'.
Either that or do a 'IDF' on him while he is scurrying back to his hidy-hole.
#2
Would be even better to spread the word that Sadr's boys provided intel for Al Q in previous suicide bombs in Shiastan. Since it probably did happen it might even be believable.
#5
Muqtada al-Sadr, was speaking during the Friday prayers sermon in Kufa, another Shiite Muslim holy city few kilometres from Najaf.
I've said this here before and I'll say it again. Just how many "Holy Cities" do these asshats need. It seems every frigging place that some body stubbed their toe is a "holy site"
Shiite Muslim militiamen clashed with Polish-led coalition troops in the holy city of Karbala on Friday, the latest skirmish between followers of a radical cleric and coalition forces in the south. One soldier was injured and taken to a military hospital for treatment, officials said.
How many milita boys bought it? Polish forces had better keep the ratio at 20:1 or better, just so the milita hard boyz know there aren't any weak spots in the Coalition.
Militiamen attacked a military convoy made up of Polish, Bulgarian, Lithuanian and Latvian soldiers near city hall in the center of Karbala around the time of weekly Muslim prayers, said Lt. Col. Robert Strzelecki, spokesman for Camp Babylon, the main Polish base. Gunmen and soldiers exchanged fire.
Lithuanians, my grandparents on my dad's side. And working under Poles!
Strzelecki said he would withhold the nationality of the injured soldier until the soldier's national ministry of defense was notified. After the attack, a combat force made up of Poles, Bulgarians, Lithuanians and Latvians were sent in to "secure the area and reinforce the city hall," according to a statement e-mailed by another multinational force spokesman, Maj. Slawomir Walenczykowski.
The militia of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr rose up across the south at the beginning of April, taking control of several cities and engaging in bloody battles with coalition forces in the region. Over the past week the militiamen have returned police stations in Karbala, Kufa and Najaf to Iraqi authorities, but gunmen continue to roam the streets and have occasionally fired on coalition troops. Friday's broad daylight attack came just hours after city hall was slammed by mortar fire, injuring an Iraqi policeman, the division reported. On Wednesday and again Thursday, the coalition base in Karbala, known as Camp Kilo, was pounded with rebel mortar rounds. No one was injured, the division reported. Mortar attacks on coalition bases throughout south-central Iraq - including those in Karbala, Najaf and Hillah - have grown more frequent in recent weeks.
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 10:19:53 AM ||
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Just reported on local news(confirmed on CNN):Pat Tilman gave up multimillion pro football carrer to join Army Rangers.Killed in action in Afgainistan.Both Pat and his brother enlisted at the same time.
A true American Heros.
Posted by: raptor ||
04/23/2004 10:24:30 AM ||
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Pat Tillman, who gave up a lucrative NFL contract with the Phoenix Cardinals to join the Army Rangers, reportedly has been killed in Afghanistan.
In the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, Tillman decided to turn down a three-year, $3.6 million contract with the Arizona Cardinals to enlist in the Army.
#16
Thank God for people like Pat Tillman and all of the other brave men and women fighting and dying for FREEDOM. God Bless all who suffer the same loss.
Posted by: KariB ||
04/23/2004 11:27 Comments ||
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#17
I can picture Saint Peter giving him a "butt slap" on his way through the Pearly Gates.
Tillman is a hero.
Posted by: Chris W. ||
04/23/2004 11:28 Comments ||
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#18
God Bless You Pat Tillman. May rest easy in your fathers arms.
#19
I am constantly amazed at the quality of men and women that we have in our armed forces and consider myself fortunate that I am able to interact with them on a regular basis. Tillman exemplefied this quality. May his family find comfort in knowing that he was and will be an example to us all. Thanks Pat.
Posted by: remote man ||
04/23/2004 11:44 Comments ||
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#20
. . . words fail. To know that men such as these are the brothers I serve with . . .
Posted by: Ben Silver ||
04/23/2004 11:48 Comments ||
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#21
I'm ashamed of myself for sitting at this desk after learning this.
Posted by: Yosemite Sam ||
04/23/2004 11:56 Comments ||
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#22
It does hurt YO. I've been bumned all morning. I think Pat wouldn't have it any other way.
#29
Yeah, that bummed me out, too. My college roommate was good friends with Pat. I had the honor of meeting him and playing against him in college.
No matter how much people claim this country is hated around the world, they can never deny the amount of sacrifice that Americans give for the cause of freedom. Pat is a testament to that. And that's why it is so hard to believe those claims that we are hated.
Thank you, Pat.
Posted by: Matt ||
04/23/2004 13:43 Comments ||
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#30
All of Arizona is in mourning today. The last I felt this bad was the Saturday after 9-11.
Posted by: Pat Curley ||
04/23/2004 17:22 Comments ||
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#31
He died fighting to protect us (though many don't understand that). He was a true hero, and an inspiration.
Rest in peace, Pat.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/23/2004 17:50 Comments ||
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#34
"Night Rangers don't quit."
I can barely write--Pat Tillman was an American Hero and a great patriot.
Duty. Honor. Country.--He knew it, he lived it and he loved it.
God rest him and comfort his family, friends and loved ones.
He will be greatly missed, but we thank Heaven for his life and for making the ultimate sacrifice.
Posted by: Jen ||
04/23/2004 20:38 Comments ||
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A group of 50 Pakistanis armed men attacked aid workers in Afghanistanâs volatile southern province of Kandahar on Friday, setting fire to eight vehicles, but no casualties were immediately reported, Western aid workers said. In the pre-dawn attack, the men burst into a compound of the Central Asia Development Group, a non-governmental organisation partly funded by the United States, in a Panjwai district village and torched the vehicles and destroyed equipment, they said. CADG is involved in a major road reconstruction project in the area, they added. Afghan aid workers were in the compound at the time of the attack. The aid workers said they had received unconfirmed reports that another NGO base had been attacked late on Thursday in the same district.
Posted by: TS ||
04/23/2004 9:17:35 AM ||
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Human rights campaigners are outraged that a United Nations report alleging grave abuses in western Sudan is being withheld from a UN debate on the issue. The international body's Commission on Human Rights is due to discuss the crisis in Darfur, where up to a million people have been displaced. The debate has been delayed by behind-the-scenes negotiations with the European Union seeking a harsher resolution than African delegates want. The report, seen by the BBC, details claims of rape, looting and killing by militias with government help. Meanwhile the government has resumed talks with Darfur rebel groups in Chad.
The report says the atrocities in Darfur "may constitute war crimes and/or crimes against humanity". It was compiled by a UN team of experts who visited Chad to speak to refugees from the conflict. It is not being tabled at Thursday's discussions in Geneva, because the UN investigators have just been granted permission by Sudan to visit Darfur itself. Diplomats said the five-man team was in Nairobi awaiting clearance to continue its task in Darfur. The report has been delayed until they complete their investigation, but human rights groups are accusing Sudan of a ploy to prevent evidence of atrocities coming under discussion. Jemera Rone of Human Rights Watch told BBC News Online: "The Sudanese government is playing games with the international community, trying to delay the day of reckoning and prevent any systematic monitoring of its atrocities in Darfur." The investigators conclude in the report that the Sudanese government has not only allowed militia groups to commit atrocities with impunity, but has worked with them, using its air force to bomb villages and its own troops to drive out the population.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
04/23/2004 03:42 ||
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#1
Human rights campaigners are outraged that a United Nations report alleging grave abuses in western Sudan is being withheld from a UN debate on the issue.
Who came up with the idea of making our representative to the UN a G-7 who could only vote NO and was not allowed to say anything more than "good day, pleased to see you"???? It's time to implement that plan.
Posted by: B ||
04/23/2004 11:46 Comments ||
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THE STRATFOR WEEKLY Summary
U.S. forces have reached a written cease-fire agreement with Sunni guerrillas operating in Al Fallujah. More than ending -- or at least suspending -- the battles in Al Fallujah, the cease-fire has turned the political situation in Iraq on its head, with the United States now positioned strategically between the majority Shia and the Sunni insurgents.
The hudna ceasefire vaporized shortly after being signed. The purpose of such things in Arab usage is to get the other side to relax its vigilance so the True Believers can mount a devastating surprise attack. The Marines continued paying attention.
Analysis
The United States and the Sunni guerrillas in Iraq agreed to an extended cease-fire in Al Fallujah on April 19. Most media treated the news as important. It was, in fact, extraordinary. The fact that either force -- U.S. or Iraqi -- would have considered negotiating with the other represents an astounding evolution on both sides. For the first time in the guerrilla war, the United States and the guerrillas went down what a Marine general referred to as a "political track." That a political track has emerged between these two adversaries represents a stunning evolution. Even if it goes no further -- and even if the cease-fire in Al Fallujah collapses -- it represents a massive shift in policy on both sides.
The ceasefire was an opportunity for the local holy men to gain some legitimacy. Since the hudna didn't work, they don't have any legitimacy.
To be precise, the document that was signed April 19 was between U.S. military forces and civilian leaders in the city. That distinction having been made, it is clear that the civilian leaders were authorized by the guerrillas to negotiate a cease-fire.
Not necessarily. In the interests of avoiding having their homes, businesses, and mosques flattened, the local largewigs seem to have tried sweet reason with both sides. One of the two sides doesn't believe in sweet reason. Either that, or the local collaborators won the Bad Guys a chance to rest and regroup. The downside to that for them is that the Marines have also rested, regrouped, resupplied, and reinforced.
The proof of that can be found in the fact that the leaders are still alive and were not executed by the guerrillas for betraying the purity of their cause.
Again, that doesn't follow. The local largewigs were winning the Bad Guys breathing space, even though the Bad Guys don't intend to adhere to any ceasefire.
It is also clear that the Americans believe these leaders speak for the guerrillas in some definitive way; otherwise, there would have been no point to the negotiations. Thus the distinction between civilian and guerrilla in Al Fallujah is not entirely meaningful.
I don't think the Marines trust the locals any further than they can throw them. They were told to hold off while the negotiations went on, and they did. I haven't seen any reports that the Marines thought the negotiations were going to work, though...
The willingness of the United States to negotiate with the guerrillas is the most significant evolution. If we recall the U.S. view of the guerrilla movement in May and June 2003, the official position was that there was no guerrilla movement, that there were only the uncoordinated remnants of the old regime, bandits and renegades. The idea of negotiating anything with this group was inconceivable for both ideological and practical reasons. A group as uncoordinated as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld portrayed them could not negotiate -- or be negotiated with -- under any circumstances. We believed then that the Sunni guerrillas were an organized movement preplanned by the Iraqis, and we believe now -- obviously -- that their organization has improved over time. It has certainly become an army that can be addressed as a cohesive entity and negotiated with.
You can't conduct talks with an "organization" that has no command structure. There's a command structure here, though I think it's headed by some combination of Izzat Ibrahim, Zarqawi, and other actors as yet unidentified.
More important is the fact that both sides felt constrained -- at least in this limited circumstance -- to negotiate. In that sense, each side was defeated by the other.
No. We were quite capable of flattening the city. The constraints were political, not military, despite the fact that Moqtada and his hard boyz were making faces at the time.
The United States conceded that it could not unilaterally impose its will on Al Fallujah.
We could, however, make a desolation and call it peace. That may still be the ultimate solution...
There are political and military reasons for this. Politically, the collateral damage of house-to-house fighting would have had significant political consequences for Iraq, the alliance and the United States. The guerrillas could not have been defeated without a significant number of civilian casualties.
And they were making sure of it...
Militarily, the United States has no desire to engage in urban combat. Casualties among U.S. troops would have been high, and the forces doing the fighting would have been exhausted. At a time of substantial troop shortages, the level of effort needed to pacify Al Fallujah would have represented a substantial burden. The guerrillas had posed a politico-military problem that could not readily be solved unilaterally.
All of that's subject to differing interpretations. The Marines are currently engaged in urban combat, even in the course of the ceasefire. Their casualties aren't very high, and in fact our kill ratio is about 30-1. I recall they were running short of ammunition, but that should be rectified by now — thanks to the negotiators. And tackling the assault on the city as a combined arms problem, rather than a frontal assault by ground troops problem, would vastly lighten the level of effort required to take the city.
It was also a defeat for the guerrillas. Their political position has been unalterable opposition to the United States, and an uncompromising struggle to defeat the Americans. They have presented themselves not only as ready to die, but also as representing an Iraq that was ready to die with them. At the very least, it is clear that the citizens of Al Fallujah were ready neither to die nor to endure the siege the United States was prepared to impose. At most, the guerrillas themselves, trapped inside Al Fallujah, chose to negotiate an exit, even if it meant surrendering heavy weapons -- including machine guns -- and even if it meant that they could no longer use Al Fallujah as a battleground. Whether it was the civilians or the guerrillas that drove for settlement, someone settled -- and the settlement included the guerrillas.
I entirely disagree. The ceasefire was a hudna, a tactical measure, that was supposed to allow them to rest and regroup. In the course of it, they've been trying to probe and mount surprise attacks, feeling out the Marines' weak spots. They have no more intention of abandoning Fallujah than they do of turning in their small arms, much less their heavy weapons.
The behavior of the guerrillas indicates to us that their numbers and resources are not as deep as it might appear. The guerrillas are not cowards. Cowards donât take on U.S. Marines. Forcing the United States into house-to-house fighting would have been logical -- unless the guerrillas in Al Fallujah represented a substantial proportion of the guerrilla fighting force and had to be retained. If that were the case, it would indicate that the guerrillas are afraid of battles of annihilation that they cannot recover from. Obviously, there is strong anti-American feeling in Iraq, but the difference between throwing a rock or a grenade and carrying out the effective, coordinated warfare of the professional guerrilla is training. Enthusiasm does not create soldiers. Training takes time and secure bases. It is likely that the guerrillas have neither, so -- with substantial forces trapped in Al Fallujah -- they had to negotiate their way out.
With no place to go, unless it's back to Syria. I believe their objective is to inflict casualties on the Marines, casualties that will be high enough to set the Kennedies squealing like piggies, which they predictably do. The objective is to force the home front to pull the Marines to desert positions (prior to being eased out of the country entirely), leaving Iraq to the butcher boyz...
In short, both sides have hit a wall of reality. The American belief that there was no guerrilla force -- or that the guerrillas had been crushed in December 2003 -- is simply not true.
Obviously it's a replenishable force, with outside help coming in and with a flow of bad boyz to the other side. The sleepers are waking, but once you've woken all the sleepers you've got to lay more.
If the United States wants to crush the guerrillas, U.S. troops will have to go into Al Fallujah and other towns and fight house to house.
Not necessarily so. If we wanted to go into Baghdad, remember, we were going to have to fight house to house, too. Once the cause is well and truly lost there's a bubble effect — once it bursts, self-preservation kicks in. Then wounds can be licked and the defeat redefined until the players have their nerve worked up again for the next effort.
On the other hand, the guerrilla wish for a rising wave of unrest to break the American will simply has not come true. The forces around Al Fallujah were substantial, were not deterred by political moves and could come in and wipe them out. That was not an acceptable prospect.
That's what I've been saying. The bucket on the Marines' foot is political, not military...
Al Fallujah demonstrates three things:
First, it demonstrates that under certain circumstances, a political agreement -- however limited -- can be negotiated between the United States and the guerrillas.
Second, it demonstrates that the United States is aware of the limits of its power and is now open, for the first time, to some sort of political resolution -- even if it means dealing with the guerrillas.
Third, it demonstrates that the guerrillas are aware of the limits of their power, and are implicitly prepared for some solution short of complete, immediate victory.
The question is where this all goes. To begin with, it could go nowhere. First, the cease-fire could be a guerrilla trap. As U.S. forces begin the joint patrols with Iraqi police that were agreed to, the guerrillas could hit them, ending the cease-fire.
That's what's gonna happen, if it hasn't yet...
Second, the cease-fire could break down because of a lack of coordination among the guerrillas, dissident groups, or a U.S. decision to use the cease-fire as a cover for penetrating the city and resuming operations. Third, the cease-fire could work in Al Fallujah but not be applied anywhere else. The whole thing could be a flash in the pan. On the other hand, if the Al Fallujah cease-fire holds, a precedent is set that
could expand.
Yeah. That pretty well covers the range of possibilities, I guess, except for divine intervention or alien invasion...
In 1973, after the cease-fire in the Arab-Israeli war, Israeli and Egyptian troops held positions too close to each other for comfort. A disengagement was necessary. In what was then an extraordinary event, Israeli and Egyptian military leaders met at a point in the road called Kilometer 101. In face-to-face negotiations, days after guns fell silent in a brutal war, the combatants -- not the politicians -- mediated by the United States, reached a limited technical agreement for disengaging forces in that particular instance, and only in that instance. In our view, the Camp David accords between Israel and Egypt were framed at Kilometer 101. If disengagement could be negotiated, the logic held that other things could be negotiated as well.
Except that the negotiators here aren't the forces involved. They're polticians and clerics.
There were powerful political forces driving toward a settlement as well, and the military imperative was simply the cutting edge. But there are also powerful political forces in Iraq. The United States clearly does not want an interminable civil war in Iraq. The jihadists -- the foreign Islamist militants -- obviously do want that.
So where's the point of agreement?
But the view of the Sunni guerrillas might be different. They have other enemies besides the Americans -- they have the Shia. The Sunnis have as little desire to be dominated by the Shia as the Shia have to be dominated by the Sunnis. In that aversion, there is political opportunity. Unlike the foreign jihadists, the native Sunni guerrillas are not ideologically opposed to negotiating with the Shia -- or the Americans.
The Role of the Shia
The United States has banked heavily on the cooperation of the Shia. It reached agreement with the Shia to allow them a Shiite- dominated government. After the December 2003 suppression of the Sunni guerrillas, Washington cooled a bit on the deal. Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani demanded elections, which he knew the Shia would win. Washington insisted on a prefabricated government that limited Shiite power and would frame the new constitution, leading to elections. Al-Sistani suspected that the new constitution would be written so as to deny the Shia what the United States had promised. Al-Sistani first demanded elections. The United States refused to budge. He then called huge demonstrations. The United States refused to budge. Then Muqtada al-Sadr -- who is either al- Sistaniâs mortal enemy, his tool or both -- rose up in the south. Al-Sistani was showing the United States that -- without him and the Shia -- the U.S. position in Iraq would become untenable. He made an exceptionally good case. The United States approached al-Sistani urgently to intercede, but al-Sistani refused to budge for several days, during which it appeared that all of Iraq was exploding. Then, he quietly interceded and al-Sadr -- trapped with relatively limited forces, isolated from the Shiite main body and facing the United States -- began to look for a way out. Al-Sistani appeared to have proven his point to the United States: Without the Shia, the United States cannot remain in Iraq. Without al-Sistani, the Shia will become unmanageable.
From al-Sistaniâs point of view, there was a three-player game in Iraq -- fragments notwithstanding -- and the Shia were the swing players, with the Sunnis and Americans at each otherâs throats. In any three-player game, the swing player is in the strongest position. Al-Sistani, able to swing between the Americans and the Sunnis, was the most powerful figure in Iraq. So long as the Americans and Sunnis remained locked in that position, al-Sistani would win. The Sunnis did not want to see a Shiite-dominated Iraq. So long as al-Sistani was talking to the Americans and they were not, the choice was between a long, difficult, uncertain war and capitulation. The Sunnis had to change the terms of the game. What they signaled to al-Sistani was that if he continued to negotiate with the United States and not throw in with the guerrillas, they would have no choice but to open a line of communication with the Americans as well. Al Fallujah proved not only that they would -- but more importantly -- that they could.
From the U.S. point of view, the hostility between Sunnis and Shia is the bedrock of the occupation. They cannot permit the two players to unite against them. Nor can they allow the Shia to become too powerful or for the Americans to become their prisoners. While al-Sistani was coolly playing his hand, it became clear to the Americans that they needed additional options. Otherwise, the only two outcomes they faced here were a Sunni-Shiite alliance against them or becoming the prisoner of the Shia. By opening negotiations with the Sunnis, the Americans sent a stunning message to the Shia: The idea of negotiation with the Sunnis is not out of the question. In fact, by completing the cease-fire agreement before agreement was reached over al-Sadrâs forces in An Najaf, the United States pointed out that it was, at the moment, easier to deal with the Sunnis than with the Shia. This increased pressure on al-Sistani, who saw for the first time a small indicator that his position was not as unassailably powerful as he thought.
The New Swing Player
The Al Fallujah cease-fire has started -- emphasis on "started" - a process whereby the United States moves to become the swing player, balancing between Sunnis and Shia. Having reached out to the Sunnis to isolate the Americans and make them more forthcoming, the Shia now face the possibility of "arrangements" -- not agreements, not treaties, not a settlement -- between U.S.and Sunni forces that put realities in place, out of which broader understandings might gradually emerge. In the end, the United States has limited interest in Iraq, but the Iraqis -- Sunnis and Shia alike -- are not going anywhere. They are going to have to deal with each other, although they do not trust each other -- and with good reason. Neither trusts the United States, but the United States will eventually leave. In the meantime, the United States could be exceedingly useful in cementing Sunni or Shiite power over each other. Neither side wants to wind up dominated by the other. Neither wants the Americans to stay in Iraq permanently, but the United States does not want to stay permanently either. A few years hardly makes a major difference in an area where history is measured in millennia.
The simple assumption is that most Iraqis want the Americans out. That is a true statement, but not a sufficient one. A truer statement is this: Most Iraqis want the Americans out, but are extremely interested in what happens after they leave. Given that, the proper statement is: Most Iraqis want the Americans out, but are prepared to use the Americans toward their ends while they are there, and want them to leave in a manner that will maximize their own interests in a postwar Iraqi world. That is the lever that the Americans have, and that they seem to have been playing in the past year. It is a long step down from the days when the Department of Defense skirmished with the State Department about which of them would govern postwar Iraq, on the assumption that those were the only choices. Unpleasant political choices will have to be made in Iraq, but the United States now has a standpoint from which to manipulate the situation and remain in Iraq while it exerts pressure in the region. In the end -- grand ambitions notwithstanding -- that is what the United States came for in the first place.
Posted by: tipper ||
04/23/2004 2:34:34 AM ||
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#1
Strafor covers all the bases. We're winning, losing, it's a tie, rainout.
#3
Pfft. Stratfor proves once again that they can't tell their ass from a hole in the wall. I don't think they grasp the situation in Fallujah, and seem to believe that the negotiating powers in Fallujah are either a)defenseless or b)the insurgents. It's far simpler to conclude that the people who are negotiating are tribal sheikhs with only glancing relations with the intransigent elements. They probably control some local gunmen - but I'm willing to bet that there are a half-dozen to a dozen different armed factions in Fallujah, including al Queda cells, tribal gangs, non-tribal criminal gangs, non-al Queda foreign adventurers, non-al Queda Iraqi adventurers, and a good number of well-armed individual lunatics or small affinity-groupings. It's my guess that the negotiators represent, at best, the tribal gangs. The Coalition negotiators are looking to split off the tribal gangs from the other elements, in an attempt to divide-and-conquer.
They appear to be setting themselves up for a honeypot defense - holding defensive positions which have been attracting the negative attentions of the enthusiasts, and killing them. The ongoing negotiations are in this sense political cover, and at the same time, psyops. The ongoing slaughter can be characterized in the press as self-defense, while offering the impression of weakness. Weakness attracts further macho-blinkered victims, who are eliminated. Essentially, they've turned the area around the marine positions into killing grounds, and the reputation they've gotten for civilian killing keeps the civilians away from their positions. As always, the problem isn't in Fallujah - they've gotten in there, and nothing in the city will crowbar them out. The problem is the supply lines elsewhere in Baghdad and the Triangle, and the West. The vast number of coalition fatalities and casualties are coming on the lines of communication, especially the roads between Fallujah and Baghdad.
As for Stratfor's al Sistani fixation, I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt and write it up as a minor cult of personality issue. They act as if al Sistani and al Sadr are the only players in the Shia corner. I count at least five other players in that corner - the al-Dawa people, one or more sets of Iranian puppetmasters, the imams' union, the local tribal sheikhs of al Kut and elsewhere, and what I suspect is a bloodied, very pissed-off, still very well-armed SCIRI.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
04/23/2004 10:02 Comments ||
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#4
i think they exagerrate the degree to which the civilian leadership in Falujah = the guerillas. Their basis is that the guerillas didnt kill the civilian leadership - really the guerillas dont want the Tribal and other leaders turning on them. ISTM that the "civilian" leaders are more like neutrals, or leaning toward the guerillas, but are not negotiating on their behalf. The US chose to negotiate with them NOT because they represent the guerillas and the US wants to avoid urban warfare - but to assuage Iraqi politicians in general, and the Sunni Arabs among them in particular. The OVERALL Stratfor point - that taking a hardline on the Sunnis makes the US captive to Sistani, and that some outreach to the Sunnis is necessary to balance Sistani - seems reasonable, and todays announcement of more jobs for low level ex-Baathists, etc fits into that. But I also think the US is still trying to seperate the tribal and professional elements among the Sunni, if not the clerical, from the insurgents. That would better explain why the ceasefire is failing, and why the USMC seems eager to take advantage of every insurgent violation to eliminate as many insurgents as possible.
#5
" I count at least five other players in that corner - the al-Dawa people, one or more sets of Iranian puppetmasters, the imams' union, the local tribal sheikhs of al Kut and elsewhere, and what I suspect is a bloodied, very pissed-off, still very well-armed SCIRI."
At this point SCIRI, Dawa, and the lesser Shiite imams all seem to defer to Sistani, to a greater or lesser extent. The Shia tribal sheiks may be an alternative power structure, but its not clear that theyre as strong as the Sunni sheiks - remember the whole point of being a sheik was largely to funnel goodies from the central govt to the locals, and from the Ottomans on that meant largely Sunnis. Especially under Saddams most goodies went to the Sunnis, giving Sunni sheiks a larger role - and whatever Shia sheiks did work with the govt thereby lost legitimacy among the Shia. THATS why the clerics have disproportionate influence among the Shia. As for the Iranians, they HAVE to work through somebody. Sadr is pretty much a dead end (or at least so it would appear) so to the extent that the other elements defer to Sistani, Sistani has the Iranians over a barrel as well.
#6
I think US Psyops have been a failure in Iraq. Where are the Islamic voices calling out that the resisters are fighting against the will of Allah and thus failing so miserably? Call that out everytime they have their call to prayer, and then call it out a few times in between to make sure the message gets through. Add that the 72 houri's are not available for those that go against Allahs' will. Hammer it home.
Or how about spreading the "fact" that most RPGs or AK-47s are packed in Pigs grease for shipment. Kind of the reverse Sepoy mutiny game.
"All non-terrorist civilians have 24 hours to clear out of the city of Al Fallujah, after which it will be cleared by force and/or destroyed outright. Terrorists are encouraged to stay in place."
#8
I stopped reading Stratfor when they started talking about a secret US/Iranian alliance. They are no better than Debka, but at least Debka is entertaining.
#9
Or how about spreading the "fact" that most RPGs or AK-47s are packed in Pigs grease for shipment.
Actually, you'd find that most jihadis would care less. That these guys are religious fanatics is in reality propaganda; it's something for public consumption. They only worship one thing: the AK47 and RPG.
Posted by: Rafael ||
04/23/2004 16:09 Comments ||
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#10
Stratfor had a good war in Kosovo. It's been downhill since.
Edited for length Jahir Jan is dead! No sooner had this information made its way to Landi Dok village in Kaloosha, some 10 kilometres west of Wana on March 16, than the ferocious and enraged Zillikhel tribesmen poured out of their homes, and by the afternoon had surrounded the few hundred South Waziristan Scouts (SWS) that had laid siege to the house of Noorul Islam, one of the five wanted Al Qaeda backers.
But who is Tahir Jan? None other than Tahir Yuldashev, the charismatic leader of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU). That is the way the local tribesmen know and refer to him. The army intelligence was right; Tahir was holed up in the compound with at least 25 followers. Tahir and his men responded with fire when the scouts led by Col Khalid Usman Khattak, asked them to surrender. But what the scouts were not counting on was the reaction of the local tribesmen. Tribesmen told TFT during a visit to the area â it is still out of bounds for non-local journalists â that it was Zillikhel tribesmen that turned the tables on the scouts. âSuddenly, the scouts found themselves sandwiched between Tahirâs men and the Zillikhel,â a source told TFT. Tahir Jan, say local tribesmen, is a household name, held in high esteem for his chivalry and his âlove for Islamâ.
The wounded Tahir Jan escaped in the heat of the battle. But what followed thereafter was bloody and messy. Caught between the Zillikhel tribesmen and Tahirâs men, locals say the scouts faced heavy casualties â 46 according to official sources, including the two tehsildars. Scores of scoutsâ vehicles were rocketed and torched (the road between Azam Warsak and Kaloosha still bears signs of the burnt out vehicles, with bullet-ridden boundary walls of the apple orchards). During the fighting, dozens of scouts took shelter in mosques and some private houses, locals said, and were rescued by their friends from Wana. Most had to change into civvies in order to survive. The series of bloody and dramatic events have left a trail of grievances and allegations of plunder, denied by troop commanders.
During the visits to areas between Wana and Azam Warsak, an outpost on the way to Angoor Adda, the last Pakistani border town, TFT set out to get eyewitness account from the furious but terrified tribesmen and seek answers to some fundamental questions: when did Al Qaeda come into play in the area; who belongs to Al Qaeda; are Al Qaeda and Taliban the same entities; do common people support these organisations; and is this support embedded in the Islamic faith or flows from the famous code of Pashtoonwali (that values and upholds chivalry, and considers protection of the guests dearer to oneâs own life)...
Some of the most influential maliks and tribal chiefs close even to the administration had hosted âmujahideenâ from across the border after the fall of the Taliban. Local sources claimed that people like Naik Mohammad, charged with abetting al-Qaeda and Taliban, had been thick even with the intelligence agencies. Naik used to dine with the maliks of the area and was present in Wana not only before the March 16 operation but even after that. The wanted men enjoyed good relations even with the political administration, which must have been aware of the 600-plus foreigners (Chechen, Uzbeks) the government now claims were present in the area.
If the interviews with tribesmen were to be synthesised, the main points would probably read like this: You might eliminate or arrest âterroristsâ but the Islamic faith runs deep in the tribal society, which has been kept backward and ignorant by the administration for its own vested interests. Strangers to âpragmatism or enlightened moderationâ, these are straightforward people, averse even to the thought of betrayal. For them Al Qaeda means being staunch Muslims, and Pashtoonwali demands that these brothers must be protected. Incessant government pressure and continued army build-up in the border areas, however, has infused new thinking. Why should tens of thousands people suffer for the alleged crimes of a few dozen? People hold Al Qaeda followers in esteem, but privately concede they would do other Muslims a great favour by moving out or abandoning their mission to save the common tribesmen from the wrath of the government.
Posted by: Paul Moloney ||
04/23/2004 1:59:47 AM ||
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Cracks are deepening within the six-party religious alliance, Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal. The alliance has been beset with internal problems for the past year. The smaller component parties, especially Jamiat-e-Ulema Islam of Maulana Sami-ul Haq, are unhappy with the two bigger parties, the Jamaâat-e Islami and the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam of Fazlur Rehman. But things seem to be spinning out of control now.
The JUI-S has decided not to support the MMA candidates in the upcoming by-elections on the vacant seats for the national and provincial assemblies. Instead, it wants to support those candidates who would promote âthe real causeâ for which the MMA had been set up two years ago, JUI-S sources have told TFT. âWe have decided not to support the MMAâs candidates and work for those who really deserve it and will help us in our cause to make Pakistan a true Islamic society,â says JUI-S deputy secretary general, Mufti Usman Yar Khan. A formal announcement to this decision will be made on Sunday (April 25) in the Difa-e-Pakistan convention of the JUI-S in Karachi in which most of the 36 parties and individuals from the erstwhile Milli Yakjehti Council and Difa-e-Afghanistan Council will participate, party leaders say. TFT reported two weeks ago that the JUI-S was planning to expand the alliance in order to break the monopoly of the two bigger parties. Insiders say it is likely to use the April 25 gathering to this purpose. The main, and for many political analysts, the only objective of the convention is to announce âanother MMAâ in the end.
Interestingly, the JUI-S has already sent invitations for the convention to Imran Khanâs Tehrik-e-Insaf and General (Retd) Aslam Begâs Awami Qayadat Party. The party will also contact Hafiz Mohammad Saeedâs Jamaâat-ud Dawa (the reincarnated version of the banned Lashkar-e Taiba) and the proscribed Jaish-e Mohammad. A prominent presence at the convention will be the former DG-ISI, Lt-Gen Hameed Gul. A target rich environment.
The local leaders of the banned Millat-e-Islamia Pakistan (reincarnated version of the banned Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan) say they will attend the convention. âYes, we have got a formal invitation from the JUI-S leadership and we will attend their convention in Karachi,â MIPâs provincial spokesman, Qari Shafiqur Rehman told TFT. According to him, participating in the convention should not be taken as his partyâs decision to join the JUI-Sâs MMA. But he made it clear that the party was not concerned about its legal status or the consequences of joining a mainstream alliance despite having been banned by the government. âIf a Shia banned group (Allama Sajid Naqviâs Tehrik-e-Islami) can be a component of the MMA and enjoy open support of Maulana Fazlur Rehman and Qazi Hussain Ahmed, why canât we be part of an allianceâ he says, adding: âThere is a precedent and our joining another religious alliance will not be a violation of law.â When TFT asked the JUI-S leaders about the MIP leaderâs opinion on this count, they backed him. On the other hand, the fact that a banned organisation is able to run for election means the JUI-S shouldnât have anything to worry about.
JUI-S sources say their leaders met the Lashkar leader Hafiz Mohammad Saeed recently in Lahore where the proposal for inducting Dawa into a new alliance was discussed. The JUI-S leaders have also held meetings with General Hameed Gul. It looks like the "Real MMA" is going to be made up mostly of hardcore Deobandi/Wahabi parties, while the MMA will remain a party of all sects. Unless it disintegrates even further.
Posted by: Paul Moloney ||
04/23/2004 1:49:08 AM ||
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Israeli troops killed three members of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat'sFatah movement early today at Kalkilya in the north of the West Bank, Palestinian medical sources said. The three were shot by a "special unit" disguised as Palestinians who arrived in an unmarked car, security sources said.
The old "fake Paleo" trick. Gets 'em every time!
A fourth Palestinian, Atef Shaaban, head of the armed radical group Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades which is linked to Fatah, was seriously wounded by the Israeli unit.
"Cheez, David, you winged one."
"You saw how fast he was running away! And remember, when we're dressed like this my name is 'Mahmoud.'"
The dead, aged between 20 and 25, were named as Abdel Rahman Nazal, a member of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, Mohammed Nazal and Mohammed Odeh, two Fatah hard boyz political activists. An Israeli military spokesman confirmed the incident. He said that initially the Israeli unit had tried to capture alive the four men who were wanted for taking part in anti-Israeli attacks. "They fled and the soldiers then shot at them, killing three and wounding the fourth," the spokesman told AFP.
"Moshe! Send for the bloodhounds!"
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 12:28:20 AM ||
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#1
What a wierd war. A special unit disguised as sheppards....
Mohammed Domeh was relaxing on his living room sofa, watching the TV news when he heard the fateful words: President Bush was flatly ruling out the return of Palestinians such as himself to what is now Israel. "When I heard what Bush had to say - and I am saying this as a Palestinian intellectual - I wished I could wear an explosive belt around my waist and blow myself up in front of Bush," said Domeh, 44.
Remind me, Mo' -- when in 1948 did you get evicted from Israel? Oh right, you didn't, you weren't born yet. Why would you have a right of return?
Why would you want a right of return to another country if you have a Paleostinian state all your own?
Such anti-American rage, from an otherwise mild-spoken, middle-class Palestinian writer, is being echoed around the Arab world at a volume some say is unprecedented.
Oh, the seething of the Arab Street! A sight to behold!
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, a close ally of Washington, told France's Le Monde newspaper that U.S. support for Israel, on top of the war in Iraq, has driven Arabs to a "hatred never equalled" toward America.
Gosh, I feel so ... hated right now.
The trigger was Bush's meeting with Ariel Sharon last week, after which the president publicly backed the Israeli prime minister's plans to withdraw from the Gaza Strip, endorsed the permanence of some big Jewish settlements in the West Bank and said a solution of the refugee question "will need to be found through the establishment of a Palestinian state, and the settling of Palestinian refugees there, rather than in Israel."
Otherwise, why have a Paleostinian state? I keep asking that question. No one seems to have an answer...
Unlike Domeh, teacher Raja Dirbash said she wasn't surprised. It merely confirmed what Israel and the United States had agreed long ago. "What do you expect from a murderer?" she said.
But enough about Rantisi.
Fifty-six years after they fled the land that would become Israel, millions of Palestinians still cling to claim a right to return. Some, like Domeh, have built new lives and citizenships, while many others live in squalid refugee camps. Dirbash, 46, insists on living in the Baqaa refugee camp outside Amman until she returns to her ancestral home. Domeh yearns for the 100 acres he says his family abandoned when they fled their village near Haifa in 1948. He thinks it must be worth $1 million today.
And every other family in the refugee camp had a 100-acre farm too. You could ask them, they'd tell you.
While Israel has always insisted there can be no refugee return, Palestinians have clung just as stubbornly to their "the right of return." It played a big part in derailing the last Palestinian-Israeli peace effort four years ago. Hopes for a return are strong even in Jordan, the one Arab country that has integrated its 1.7 million Palestinian refugees and given most of them full Jordanian citizenship. Prominent Palestinian families control much of Jordan's trade and banking. The queen is of a renowned Palestinian family.
I seem to recall a certain time period when Jordan was supposed to be the home for the Arabs of that region.
Domeh, who was born in the West Bank seven years before Israel captured it in the 1967 war, reckons many Palestinians would probably not go back even if they could, especially those who do not have property in what is now Israel. But it's the principle that counts- "it's a question of rights," he said. "To be frank, I hate the Americans. I don't like them. Now my hatred has tripled. Before, I didn't like them because of their unfair policies. Now, it's about me; it's personal. It's my right. It's not just about my country," said Domeh.
"Wanna see me seethe and roll my eyes?"
And Israel is only one source of anger. Iraq is another. Then there are thugs in waiting reformers who accuse Washington of backing repressive Arab regimes, and turban wound mullahs conservatives who blame American pop culture for declining morals. Sarah Ghanem, 52, who lives in the Baqaa camp, said if it weren't for U.S. money, weapons and diplomacy backing Israel, "we would have been able to drive the Israelis out of our lands."
"We could have killed them all!"
And the Israeli bomb, don't forget that.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 12:00:00 AM ||
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#1
The fact that the UN has supported these camps since 1948 is criminal. Living on the dole is debilitating at best. It relieves people from the need to earn a living while removing their self-respect. Over long periods it fosters the creation of alternate realities and renders these people incapable of communicating with people who live in our world. I see absolutely no advantage to the US to continue to feed and fund these people.
We should tell Mubarek that if he wants to keep the annual $2B bribe from us, Egypt just became the proud owner of the Gaza Strip and its newly minted Egyptian citizens.
#3
I wish , the intelectual, Mohommed, age 44, gets collateralated.
Collateralated? LOL! That's a word that deserves to end up in mil-speak! How 'bout it OS, OP, and Jarhead? Start spreading this one around!
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/23/2004 0:57 Comments ||
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#4
Great rant, Steve! Very on target.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/23/2004 0:59 Comments ||
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#5
You want to see real seething Arab streets and massive frothing from the mullahs?Have Sharon announce any Palestinian can return and live in Israel,as long as he/she converts to Judaism. ;)
Posted by: Stephen ||
04/23/2004 1:10 Comments ||
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#6
I've got visions of Mr age 44 getting trampled by the car swarm at arrafats stain.
Thx Steve. It did take a few minutes to get that thought out.
Stephen has got issues man, chill. Peace. Hate crimes bro.
#7
Why, lucky? It's what the Arabs do. In fact, they want everyone in every country in the world to be Moslem, and are willing to kill for it to happen.
Anyway, it Sharon did say that, he wouldn't be serious. The Arabs aren't worthy of being Jews.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
04/23/2004 1:28 Comments ||
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#8
Barb, I can't help it. My real name is Michael Jackson, I'm about dancing, right there on the spot. I once told Paul, "I'm a lover not fighter".
#9
Hopes for a return are strong even in Jordan, the one Arab country that has integrated its 1.7 million Palestinian refugees
Hahaha. Wotta joke. Jordan (Trans-Jordan) took over the east bank, where "Palestine" used to be. They weren't refugees. They were simply absorbed.
Posted by: Rafael ||
04/23/2004 2:19 Comments ||
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#10
Lucky,while reading article I had a mental image of Israeli cabinet meeting,and someone asking how can we really p.o. the Arabs,and someone saying why don't we let them in,but first they have to become Jews.Thought it funny and wasted Fred's bandwidth by posting.
Seriouly tho,I am tired of the seething Arab street blaming their problems on everyone in the world except themselves.The cold truth is at any time after Israel's invasion of Lebanon,Arafat could have declared the West Bank was the nation of Palestine and his country would have been recognized by 90% of world and definitely by the UN.By now a decent Palestinian economy would be in place(w/no Infatada,Palestinians would still be working in Israel)and groundwork would be laid for a (re)union w/Jordan when current king dies.If Arafat had cracked down on terrorist groups,Jerusalem would probably be administered by UN until "status resolved",and Muslim Palestine would be tourist haven,w/Islamic tourists/pilgrims staying in Palestinian hostels/hotels/inns-not Israeli ones.Arafat threw it all away,because he wants Israel,not the West Bank.Arafat and the PLO plan to get Israel by either 1)killing so many Israelis the rest flee or 2)killing so many Israelis that Israel asks Arafat to join government as Palestinian PM of dual Israel/Palestine like old Austro-Hungarian Empire,and belief that Islamic birthrate will swamp Jewish,thus in generation or so creating Islamic Israel.Until the Palestinians decide to follow leaders who put the Palestinians first,and not political or personal ambition,they will continue to live in a quagmire.
Posted by: Stephen ||
04/23/2004 3:04 Comments ||
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#11
Dirbash, 46, insists on living in the Baqaa refugee camp outside Amman until she returns to her ancestral home.
And it's a good thing, too.
Domeh yearns for the 100 acres he says his family abandoned when they fled their village near Haifa in 1948. He thinks it must be worth $1 million today.
Bzzzzt! Claim dismissed ... He failed to include the mule.
But it's the principle that counts- "it's a question of rights," he said. "To be frank, I hate the Americans. I don't like them. Now my hatred has tripled. Before, I didn't like them because of their unfair policies. Now, it's about me; it's personal. It's my right. It's not just about my country," said Domeh.
Oooh! Tripled, now we're really in trouble!
And Israel is only one source of anger.
Wha ... there's someone else? You said I was the only one!
#12
Jordan was supposed to be the Palestinian homeland. But Arafat's boys started causing trouble for the Hashimites, so they kicked them out. Yes, Muslims kicking out Muslims. So much for that much vaunted solidarity.
Who they really should blame is their Arab brothers for putting them in this mess in the first place.
Posted by: Ben ||
04/23/2004 5:47 Comments ||
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Ben, you said it all!
The Paleostinians should be mad at their Arab brothers--they could have accepted and had an independent state living side-by-side with Israel in 1948, but noooooo, their Muslim "brothers" wouldn't let them accept that, but they should especially blame Arafat above all for keeping them in the squalor.
Posted by: Jen ||
04/23/2004 5:51 Comments ||
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#14
Title should read "Entire World Blames Everything Bad on U.S., Israel"
#15
Any sympathy for the Silisian Germans ousted from land incorporated into Poland and ethnically cleansed? That was 1945, only a few years before the founding of Israel. The Germans were resettled into the present German borders long ago and as part of the fall of the iron curtain, the unified Germany renounced claims to those ancestrial lands.
Posted by: Don ||
04/23/2004 7:47 Comments ||
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#16
Pardon me, Don, but weren't those Germans put there by Hitler, after he invaded Poland in '39 and "deported" the Silesian Poles?
(And how many of them were Jews? Lots, I'll bet.)
Hitler would "plant" Germans in places he wanted like Poland saying he had come to "liberate" them, like the Sudendeutsch.
The Allies were right to "resettle" those Germans in what was their home anyway.
Likewise with Arafat and the "Palestinians." (See Ben's comment above.)
Posted by: Jen ||
04/23/2004 7:58 Comments ||
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#17
In other surprising developments, the sun rose in the east, several incidents of dogs biting people were reported, birds flew, water flowed downhill, and the Vatican revealed that the Pope is a member of the Catholic Church.
Posted by: Mike ||
04/23/2004 9:10 Comments ||
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#18
Any sympathy for the Silisian Germans ousted from land incorporated into Poland and ethnically cleansed?
Not particularly. Should there be?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
04/23/2004 9:42 Comments ||
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#19
Gee, as long as we're playing The Irrendentist Game - can Mr. Librarian's family get back the property the Bolshies stole from them in 1918? Can my family get back our hereditary estates in Lithuania that were taken first by the Russians and then by the Communists? And while we're at it, my grandmother wants back the village the Holy Roman Empire swiped from her Moravian Brethren ancestors ... The Palestinians sound like they've been the targets of a little too much modern education, since they apparently believe life is meant to be "fair." Perhaps someday there will emerge one of them bright enough to realize, You lost. Deal with it. You can't fight hard enough to make Israel give it back. Either move on or die trying.
Sofia the Librarian
Posted by: Sofia ||
04/23/2004 11:03 Comments ||
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#20
Allah sez it belongs to the Jews: "To Moses We [Allah] gave nine clear signs. Ask the Israelites how he [Moses] first appeared amongst them. Pharoah said to him: 'Moses, I can see that you are bewitched.' 'You know full well,' he [Moses] replied, 'that none but the Lord of the heavens and the earth has revealed these visible signs. Pharoah, you are doomed.'"
"Pharoah sought to scare them [the Israelites] out of the land [of Israel]: but We [Allah] drowned him [Pharoah] together with all who were with him. Then We [Allah] said to the Israelites: 'Dwell in this land [the Land of Israel]. When the promise of the hereafter [End of Days] comes to be fulfilled, We [Allah] shall assemble you [the Israelites] all together [in the Land of Israel]."
"We [Allah] have revealed the Qur'an with the truth, and with the truth it has come down. We have sent you [Muhammed] forth only to proclaim good news and to give warning."
[Qur'an, "Night Journey," chapter 17:100-104]
Posted by: Steve ||
04/23/2004 11:48 Comments ||
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EFLWhat the . . . ?
The young Japanese taken hostage in Iraq returned home this week, not to the warmth of a yellow ribbon embrace but to a disapproving nationâs cold stare... "You got what you deserve!" one Japanese held up a hand-written sign at the airport where they landed. "You are Japanâs shame," another wrote on the Web site of one of the hostages. They had "caused trouble" for everybody. The government, not to be outdone, announced it would bill them $6,000 for airfare. Treated like criminals, the three have gone into hiding, effectively becoming prisoners inside their own homes. The kidnapped woman was last seen arriving at her parentsâ house, looking defeated and dazed from taking tranquilizers, flanked by relatives who helped her walk and bow deeply before the media, as a final apology to the nation.
Dr. Satoru Saito, a psychiatrist who has examined the three twice since their return, said the stress they are enduring now is "much heavier" than what they endured during their captivity in Iraq. Asked to name their three most stressful moments, the ex-hostages told him, in ascending order: the moment when they were kidnapped on their way to Baghdad; the knife-wielding incident; and the moment they watched a television show, on the morning after their return here, and realized Japanâs anger with them. "Letâs say the knife incident, which lasted about 10 minutes, ranks 10 on a stress level," Dr. Saito said in an interview at his clinic today. "After they came back to Japan and saw the morning news show, their stress level ranked 12."
Beneath the surface of Japanâs ultra-sophisticated cities lie the hierarchical ties that have governed this island nation for centuries and that, at moments of crises, invariably reassert themselves. The ex-hostagesâ transgression was to ignore a government advisory against traveling to Iraq. But their sin, in a vertical society that likes to think of itself as classless, was to defy what people call here "okami," or, literally, "what is higher." To the angry Japanese, the first three hostages â Nahoko Takato, 34, who started her own non-profit organization to help Iraqi street children; Soichiro Koriyama, 32, a freelance photographer; and Noriaki Imai, 18, a freelance writer also interested in the issue of depleted uranium munitions â had acted selfishly. Two others kidnapped and released in a separate incident â Junpei Yasuda, 30, a freelance journalist, and Nobutaka Watanabe, 36, a member of a pro-peace non-governmental organization â were equally guilty. Pursuing individual goals by defying the government and causing trouble for Japan was simply unforgivable.
Posted by: sludj ||
04/23/2004 12:00:00 AM ||
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#2
And these three just might have scammed the entire world. I saw enough info in various places, such as a email by one of them bragging about the big deal he was involved in that would fool everyone, that they are suspect, at least. If it was a scam, they certainly received at least a taste of what they deserved.
As for breaking the norms of Japanese society, well, I just have insufficient information. They certainly knew better, even if I / we didn't.
I feel a grim satisfaction - so I guess my suspicions exceed my sympathy.
#6
I see nothing to gloat about in evidence that culturally Japan is still in love with authoritarianism.
Because I suspect that these three were anti-war idiotarians does not mean I think that the correct response to their kidnapping is to blame the victim (I don't believe they planned to do it to themselves, due to the rash of other kidnappings that occured).
I am sorry the Japanese don't instead turn their anger to the Jihadis who think that kidnapping aid workers is acceptable behaviour in a theatre of war.
#7
Maybe that is just it. Maybe in the eyes of the Japanese, they aren't victims, that Japan figured out they were being scammed.
Think here folks. Of the 5, only one is identified as someone actually helping the Iraqi children. The rest are a freelance writer, journalist, and a photographer, with the last one from a pro peace NGO. Only one looks like they were there to help. The rest were there to get in the way and interfere.
Posted by: Ben ||
04/23/2004 5:41 Comments ||
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#8
Note that this NYT hit piece against an entire nation did not even mention the widespread belief among Japanese that the incident resulted from sort of collusion between kidnappers and their alleged victims.
"Two others kidnapped and released in a separate incident â Junpei Yasuda, 30, a freelance journalist, and Nobutaka Watanabe, 36, a member of a pro-peace non-governmental organization â were equally guilty."
Horse manure. Notably, no evidence is presented that Watanabe and Yasuda were subjected to the same disapproving treatment, and they were not billed for air fare.
The NYT's collective psychoanalysis of an entire country, bordering on racism, is simply a smokescreen for the real issue, growing public awareness of active collusion among various media, activist groups, and terrorists.
#9
This piece is absurd. It looks like it's supposed to be news but it's full of opinion and unsubstantiated assertions. Bringing up the concept of "Okami" was is needlessly exotic and esoteric when describing Japanese culture to NYTimes readers. How about mentioning regular politics? Like the fact that the Koizumi gov't was naturally angry since the hostages had caused them to have nightmares about a replay of Aznar's defeat in the wake of the Madrid slaughter. Nobody wants to have their policy whold policy held hostage. Comparing the Foreign Ministry to the Foreign Ministry during Pearl Harbor is just ridiculous. Powell's comment was obviously diplomatic blather.
No, they did not receive hero's welcomes - and they don't deserve them. I think this guy overstates the level of callousness shown in the press. There was lots of news coverage of their plight.
Posted by: John in Tokyo ||
04/23/2004 8:42 Comments ||
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#10
Hiaku easy to write
when the em dash is allowed
to impower the masses
#11
John, we heard rumors on this side of the Pacific that the hostages were peaceniks or Lefty war-protesters.
Any truth to that?
Posted by: Jen ||
04/23/2004 8:44 Comments ||
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#12
Anon1, I don't think the Japanese are in love with authoritarianism at all. They simply have a strong cultural inclination against individualism. I think its Buddist but it could be Confuscist influence. Even if these three are legit they went against the governmet policy designed in a paternal way to protect the citizens and protect the government from this sort of incident. If it was authoritarian the people/gov might have pushed for them to be arrested.
I hadn't heard they folks worked with the bad guys, its possible, but seeing that the bad guys tried to grab at least one of every coalition member it seems unlikely. Being peaceniks or lefty war-protestors probably made them easier to grab, and intimidate, that's all.
#14
Jen; for sure, they're true. In fact, the rumors about the scam mainly centered on Noriaki Amai, the "DU munitions writer", and a message board post on a thread about meeting up with one of the future-"hostages" for a big plan ...
Posted by: Edward Yee ||
04/23/2004 11:14 Comments ||
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#16
Jen, the Japanese media and websites had the same speculation about this being a scam that we do. Unless there has been new evidence in the past few days, this is at the level of speculation only.
John in Tokyo is on the money in decrying the "exoticization" of the story, which seems to happen a lot when our media write about Japan.
The truth is that you have in Japan the same sorts of useless idiots and the anti-idiotarians who oppose them that exist anywhere, and this story is playing up the opinions of those for whom the speculation about the scam rings true.
Posted by: Carl in N.H. ||
04/23/2004 11:29 Comments ||
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#17
The story also exaggerates by using the words "scorn and hatred heaped..." I think "disapproval" would be a better word. The writer uses one sign at the airport as proof that they have been universally reviled - and that's simply too much. The interview with the psychologist is also bullsh*t. All stress they experience now is because they're in the spot light and what they did was not smart. This doesn't mean that the Japanese are overly callous.
Posted by: John in Tokyo ||
04/23/2004 19:21 Comments ||
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#18
And to think, without Rantburg I would have taken this article at its word.
Posted by: Rafael ||
04/23/2004 19:26 Comments ||
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#19
Cannot you understand why Japanese people blaming three hostages?
There are many reasons, which were not reported outside of Japan, why many Japanese blamed them.
They had deep relation to the group which professed itself to being anti-America and
anti-Japanese government.
When three people were kidnapped, their family criticized government powerfully on only a point
that "They were kidnapped for Japanese government having dispatched the Self-Defense Force
in Iraq, and to withdraw the Japanese Self-Defense Force right now from Iraq" since a beginning
of the case, repeatedly.
The groups, which supported them and their families, have Anti-America and Anti-Japanese goverment
thout, and they thout that this case was a chance, and put on a display of an anti-war campaign
on a large scale.
Many Japanese saw through true intention of such doubtful groups.
In Japan, past, a similar group hijacked an airplane, and Japanese goverment payd large sum of money
to the group, released members of the group which have been arrested, and helped them to take refuge
in North Korea for life of a passenger, and that was the bitter experience for Japanese goverment
and many Japanese citizens.
In Japan, there is such experience and many Japanese embrace a feeling of hatred for people
using life of a person simply as a tool for one's political opinion and a political action.
Japanese citizens criticizing three hostages does not blame volunteer activity itself, and does
not blame rashness itself either.
Many Japanese feels sense of incongruity in an act of such a group in the rear of the three persons,
and are blaming such groups' unnatural activities.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
