I don't have enough knowledge to comment on this intelligently, but it's interesting.
In 1956, Shell Oil geologist M. King Hubbert discovered a grand illusion in the American oil industry. For tax purposes, he noted, American oil companies regularly delayed the declaration of new oil reserves by years and even decades. The result was a false impression that new oil was being found all the time. In fact, discoveries had peaked in 1936.
Based on this observation, Mr. Hubbert predicted that American oil production would peak in 1969. He was wrong by one year. We briefly produced 10 million barrels a day in 1970 but have never hit that level since. Even with the addition of Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, American production has slipped to eight million barrels a day--which is why we import 60% of our oil.
Across the oil industry, the uneasy feeling is growing that world production may be approaching its own "Hubbert's Peak." The last major field yielding more than a million barrels a day was found in Mexico in 1976. New discoveries peaked in 1960, and production outside the Middle East reached its high point in 1997. Meanwhile world demand continues to accelerate by 3% a year. Indonesia, once a major exporter, now imports its oil.
Before an uneasy feeling grows into full-blown pessimism, however, one must consider the supposedly vast oil resources lying beneath Saudi Arabia. The Saudis possess 25% of the world's proven reserves. They routinely proclaim that, for at least the next 50 years, they could easily double their current output of 10 million barrels a day.
But is this true? Matthew R. Simmons, a Texas investment banker with a Harvard Business School degree and 20 years' experience in oil, has his doubts. In "Twilight in the Desert," Mr. Simmons argues that the Saudis may be deceiving the world and themselves. If only half of his claims prove to be true, we could be in for some nasty surprises.
First, Mr. Simmons notes, all Saudi claims exist behind a veil of secrecy. In 1982, the Saudi government took complete control of Aramco (the Arabian American Oil Co.) after four decades of co-ownership with a consortium of major oil companies. Since then Aramco has never released field-by-field figures for its oil production. In fact, no OPEC member is very forthcoming. The cartel sets production quotas according to a country's reserves, so each member has reason to exaggerate. Meanwhile, OPEC nations are constantly cheating one another by overproducing, so none wants to publish official statistics.
As a result, the world's most reliable source for OPEC production is a little company called Petrologistics, located over a grocery store in Geneva. Conrad Gerber, the principal, claims to have spies in every OPEC port. For all we know, Mr. Gerber is making up his numbers, but everyone--including the Paris-based International Energy Agency--takes him seriously, since OPEC produces nothing better.
The Saudis, for their part, obviously enjoy their role as producer of last resort and feel content to let everyone think that they have things under control. Yet as Mr. Simmons observes: "History has frequently shown that once secrecy envelops the culture of either a company or a country, those most surprised when the truth comes out are often the insiders who created the secrets in the first place."
Mr. Simmons became suspicious of Saudi claims after taking a guided tour of Aramco facilities in 2003. To penetrate the veil, he turned to the electronic library of the Society of Petroleum Engineers, which regularly publishes technical papers by field geologists. After downloading and studying more than 200 reports by Aramco personnel, Mr. Simmons came up with his own portrait of Saudi Arabia's oil resources. It is not a pretty picture.
Almost 90% of Saudi production comes from six giant fields, all of them discovered before 1967. The "king" of this grouping--the 2000-square-mile Ghawar field near the Persian Gulf--is the largest oil field in the world. But if Saudi geology follows the pattern found elsewhere, it is unlikely that any new fields lie nearby. Indeed, Aramco has prospected extensively outside the Ghawar region but found nothing of significance. In particular, the Arab D stratum--the source rock of the Ghawar field--has long since eroded in other parts of the Arabian Peninsula. The six major fields, having all produced at or near capacity for almost 40 years, are showing signs of age. All require extensive water injection to maintain their current flow.
Based on these observations, Mr. Simmons doubts that Aramco can increase its output to anywhere near the level it claims. In fact, he believes that Saudi production may have already peaked. Is he right?
Mr. Simmons's critics say that, by relying on technical papers, he has biased his survey, since geologists like to concentrate on problem wells the way that doctors focus on sick patients. Still, the experience in America and the rest of the world shows that oil fields don't last forever. Prudhoe Bay, which was producing 1.2 million barrels a day five years after being brought on line in 1976, is now down to less than 400,000.
The mystery of Saudi oil capacity bears an eerie resemblance to Saddam Hussein's apparent belief that his scientists had developed weapons of mass destruction. Who are the deceivers and who is the deceived? No one yet knows the answers. But at least Matthew Simmons is asking the questions.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/28/2005 15:43 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
No, of course not. And what they have is getting "heavier" every year.
#2
I have a couple friends in the oil industry and support a company that specializes in oil exploration. Both say there is a huge amount of oil and natural gas deposits not being used or tapped at the moment. It just isn't cost effective until oil reaches 60-70 dollars a barrel. As for Saudi, I do not know what is going on there. But Columbia, Venezuela and Central America have huge untapped reserves that could keep the US in the black for many decades into the future. Just keep China out of there...
#3
I grew up in Soddiland as an ARAMCOn, left in 1970, but still have contacts among expats and retirees. A problem I have consistently heard is the Saudi-fication of ARAMCO has been a disaster. Non-Americans just don't have the expertise to maximize output and minimize damage to the productive capacity of the oil field.
Also, the Saudi fields were pressurized and would flow up to 10K bbd. Compare that to the sucker pumps we see in the US which might product 1-20 bbd, but require electricity to pump, tank trucks to pick up the oil, etc. Those expenses mean many 'merican wells won't begin to pump until it is economically feasible (i.e. you get more sales revenue that it costs to extract it).
In any case, there is more than enough oil out there (see the Alberta tar fields) IF the price is high enough to justity the expense of extracting the resource.
#5
Shipman, believe me, you DON'T want the Saudis to peak already.
Because if they do we're past Peak Oil already and you DON'T want to be there.
Forget tar sands and oil shales for now, maybe forever. The question is not when does it become lucrative to start exploitation but can you do it without using more energy in the process than you win.
Right now, the only thing that can help is to curb demand. And we really need to do it now.
I know you won't like it but TAX gasoline higher. Yes it will hurt but if you don't it will hurt more. Curb gas demand with taxes. One dollar more on a gallon. Sounds crazy? No. If you think you can't pay $3,50 a gallon, wait one or two years and you will be paying $5. But to OPEC.
#6
The problem is, because we don't have visibility on the real state of OPEC reserves and supply capacity, the market can't operate (correctly). If you read the industry commentaries on future oil supply there are regular references to $10/b oil less than 10 years ago. And therein lies the problem, companies wo'nt take the risk of spending billions when there is the risk OPEC will ramp up production, send the price of oil down and cause them to lose huge amounts of money. BTW, there is a widespread belief that SA/OPEC deliberately engineered $10 oil to send a message - develop alternative sources and we will bankrupt you.
#7
phil_b
most countries outside the Middle East are at peak or beyon already... Venezuela, Mexico, Norway, UK...
Why should the Saudis have infinite, easy to tap supplies? How much oil have they discovered in the last years?
We may not be heading downstairs yet but we can't take risks to be late.
If the Saudis could significantly increase output they would do it NOW. They know that the oil embargo was a major mistake. It lead to worldwide recession from which many Third World countries never recovered, it made the West look for alternative sources.
If you were a Saudi you would want to squeeze your clients gently, not kill him.
#8
Hard to say for sure what is going on in Mexico. They've had nationalized oil since 1939? There's probably plenty left we could get to if they'd explore porperly. Same for Venezuela. But whether the peak is this yera or 5 years, it seems to be coming. I remember Alaska being discovered when I was in Jr, Higi and there hasn't been anything like that since. But there's still plenty of earth unexplored, especially the part under the ocean.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
06/28/2005 19:18 Comments ||
Top||
#9
Yes but the question is not how much oil there is but how much we can make available for the next decades until we managed the transition to something better.
The questions are:
How fast can we get it?
How expensive is it to get it?
How energy consuming is it to get it?
If peak oil comes in ten or 20 years we should resolve the problem.
If it's upon us already we probably can't
#10
Living in right in between 2 major California Oil Fields I can say that we are finding new oil in unexpected places everyday. The facts are we have no idea how much oil we have. US producers have cut back on production of known reserves seeing the oil as money in the bank. They continue to make new finds everyday. I know of one location that is producing 1/3 the amount of oil it did 3 years ago only because the owners of the lease are saving the oil for recovery in the future.
That said we need to find a new way to produce energy, chemicals and plastics and save our oil reserves for lubrication. Dumping the internal combustion engine would be a good idea.
I hear lots of people who are "experts" talking lots of shit on "known reserves" We really don't know crap. Admitting that would be a good start. We could have way less than we think but we likely have way more.
#12
Forget tar sands and oil shales for now, maybe forever. The question is not when does it become lucrative to start exploitation but can you do it without using more energy in the process than you win.
Hoping you're wrong TGA. I figure it's just a matter of price. Once oil hits say.... 90 bucks (American :>) There's all sorts of things that can happen, most of which are unforseen. It's like Phil_B sez, we're not running out of oil, but there is a potential shortfall in a couple of years. Unless of course demand falls due to the flu. :)
#13
Ship, I say stratify and use other currency, save big dollars that way.
Posted by: Red Dog ||
06/28/2005 20:23 Comments ||
Top||
#14
There are only two things you need to know about the whole thing. 1. Energy is THE fundamental input to economic activity. 2. Energy inputs are almost without exception fungible, that is you can replace one with another (given cost and time constraints). So we are dependant on oil only becuase we have not developed other sources of energy (and this problem has been exacerbated by ludicrous 'alternative energy' schemes and of course Kyoto). There will be an economic trainwreck caused by oil supply (lack thereof) and it was completely avoidable.
OK. Let me see... the peak oil "proponents" basically try to prove that we're running out of oil by plotting the known reserves of oil in a region on a graph and taking that data at face value, _as if the people producing in that region are on the level and have a main goal of maximizing long-term production_.
Well, they don't.
Take Venezuela, for example. Over the last six years or so, PDVSA has both cut back on investment in further exploration and has mismanaged the reservoir management of the wells they've already drilled.
This caused a massive strike, which caused a political crisis for Chavez, who at one point not only fired everyone who was on strike, but _banned them from working in the Venezuelan oilfield ever again_.
SO: You have a whole lot of factors converging to reduce production there now: a lack of investment in new drilling, the reservoir mismanagement (which both reduces the production rate and sustainable levels of production from a formation), the fact that a lot of the people who know how to run things properly are no longer employable, the Venezuelan tax ministry's (and other government agencies') threats creating a "hostile work environment" for those foreign oil companies that were investing in Venezuela (but AFAIK they didn't try to pressure the Chinese, who they'd sold some oil to), and finally, the fact that someone in the government's embezzled about a billion dollars to either their private slush funds, black wetworks projects, or some combination of the two...
And Venezuelan oil production is going to go way down regardless of whether they're actually "running out of oil!"
But these guys are going to plot their data points, and throw some darts for good measure, and say "See! Venezuela has passed maximum oil production, therefore they're in decline and RUNNING OUT OF OIL!"
Posted by: Lord Waldemart ||
06/29/2005 0:09 Comments ||
Top||
Several commanders of the Al Qaida movement in Saudi Arabia have transferred their operations to Iraq in an effort to fight the U.S.-led coalition.
Islamic sources said the movement of scores of leading Al Qaida fighters from Saudi Arabia has hampered operations against the Saudi regime. They said the Saudi members of Al Qaida have become aides and financiers of Abu Mussib Al Zarqawi in Iraq.
About 3,000 to 5,000 Saudis have been fighting the U.S. military in Iraq. Over the past few months, about 200 Saudis returned to the kingdom.
On June 23, a leading Saudi operative was reported to have been killed in a battle with U.S. troops in Al Qaim, near the Iraqi border with Syria. The operative was identified as Abdullah Al Rashoud, who was No. 24 on the Saudi Interior Ministry's list of top 26 fugitives.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/28/2005 11:18 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[8 views]
Top|| File under:
#2
More targets for the good guys. It's awfully nice of alQ/Arabia (I assume they wouldn't want it to be referred to as Saudi Arabia) to announce this, so we'll know when we've got them all.
The fight against terrorism, representation of the Islamic world at the United Nations Security Council, intra-OIC cooperation in human rights, role of women, situation of youth, environment, and sustained development, would be the highlights of the discussion during the three-day 32nd session of the Islamic Conference of Foreign Ministers (ICFM) that opens in Sanaa, Yemen, today.
"Which we'll get to just as soon as we're done denouncing Israel."
âThe conference acquires particular importance in view of the current political circumstances, the situation in the Arab-Islamic region, and the various challenges of the new era,â Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, Secretary-General of the 57-member Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), which was established in 1969, said in a statement made available to Arab News here yesterday.
The secretary-general, who would be submitting a report on the OICâs reform program to energize the organization and make it more efficient so as to better promote joint Islamic action, and boost Islamic solidarity, explained that the ICFM was also significant as it would discuss a wide range of issues. He said the ICFM was a principal OIC organ, second only to the Islamic Summit, and convenes in an ordinary session on an annual basis to consider ways of implementing the organizationâs general policy, adopt resolutions on the mater in accordance with OICâs goals and objectives, and approve the annual budgets of the general secretariat and subsidiary organs.
He said the agenda includes more than 80 items addressing important issues such as Palestine and the Arab-Israeli conflict, with particular focus on Al-Quds Al-Sharif and the current status of the peace processor in the Middle East, Muslim representation in the Security Council and the increasing importance of the Islamic nations in the international arena. Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, Sudan and Cyprus, in addition to Kashmir, the peace process between India and Pakistan, and the problem of the refugees in the Islamic world will also figure at the meeting.
With perhaps some small discussion of a democratic Iraq bristling with US Marines.
ID CARDS could turn Britain into a "surveillance society", the Government's own data protection watchdog warned last night. Information Commissioner Richard Thomas condemned the project as "unnecessary and disproportionate", adding that it would allow civil servants to build a detailed picture of how every adult lives their lives. His warning came as Tony Blair vowed to pull the plug on the scheme if costs spiral out of control.
The Prime Minister refused to put a cap on the possible cost of the micro-chip cards but dismissed a new independent report which put the total price-tag at up to £19.2 billion. At his weekly press conference Mr Blair insisted identity cards were "an idea whose time has come".
Ironically, his audience had just suffered at the hands of a new Downing Street security system which had seen the press conference delayed by more than 20 minutes. Mr Blair apologised to journalists - and quipped the culprit would be flogged.
On the eve of today's Second Reading of the Identity Card Bill, Mr Thomas urged MPs debating the measure to consider the impact of creating a huge database of citizens' personal details. Mr Thomas said the plans had to be seen alongside developments such as the use of CCTV with facial recognition, number plate recognition and satellite tracking of vehicles.
His report said: "Each development puts in place another component in the infrastructure of a 'surveillance society'. To avoid this it is important that each component limits to the minimum the recording of information about individuals, otherwise we risk unleashing unwarranted intrusion into lives by government." He concluded: "The measures go well beyond a secure, reliable and trustworthy ID card. Measures in relation to the National Identity Register and data trail of identity checks risk unnecessary and disproportionate intrusion into individuals' privacy."
Academics at the London School of Economics estimate the hi-tech scheme could cost a minimum of £10.6billion and could spiral to £19.2billion.
Mr Blair responded: "No government is going to be introducing ID cards if the cost to the public is seen by them as unreasonable." But he added: "We have to make our passports here biometric if UK citizens are to continue to enjoy the right to travel freely around the world. "We have the chance to use this opportunity to get ahead in this change and the move, therefore, to biometric passports makes identity cards an idea whose time has come."
Posted by: Steve ||
06/28/2005 15:43 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
ID CARDS could turn Britain into a "surveillance society"
And all the surveillance cameras that Britain has (more per capita than any other country in the world) hasn't?
Direct from the fever swamps of Britian Have just been informed that police visited the home address of a member of the Bristol Indymedia Collective (BIM) late this afternoon (approx 5.30pm) armed with a search warrant.
They seized from the property the persons personal computer, as well as the Bristol Indymedia server. The member of the collective has also been taken into custody, although his partner was told this was just for a 'chat' and he'd be home soon!?
That's what they always say. Next thing you know, you're waking up in an orange jumpsuit in a tropical "resort"
LIBERTY, who have previously been involved in this matter have been advised of the situation, and action is being taken to contact a local solicitor to take on the immediate case. As at 7pm Avon & Somerset police, specifically the Trinity Rd police station custody suite, have stated that the collective member is not presently in their custody. It is possible he is being held by Bristish Transport police?
No one expects the Transport Police!
The background to this situation is that on approx 17 June an anonymous post to the Bristol Indymedia newswire reported an 'action' in which objects were dropped onto a freight train carrying new cars somewhere near Avonmouth (I think). The action was contextualised as highlighting climate change/car use/over-consumption etc in the run up to the G8 summit. Rumours suggest the action caused around 100k damage. One regular poster to Bristol Indymedia, and expelled ex-collective member, Mark Watson (of Zaskar films) then posted a comment saying he morally disagreed with the action, that the post breached BIM guidelines, and that he had contacted the police & advised them BIM kept IP info (since denied by BIM).
Mark is a traitor to the cause, we hates him, yeeesssss we does.
There was then a period of dialogue between BIM, Liberty & the police, in which Liberty/BIM argued that any info on the server was in any case subject to special rules covering journalistic info, and the server could not be seized using a standard search warrant. No links to Bristol Indymedia are included here as the site is presently down!
Hard to link to a missing server
Whatever the legal case, the cops have now gone ahead and seized the server. This differs from the recent instance when UK Indymedia's servers were seized from their 'host' Rackspace, as BIM have their own stand-alone server. This poster sincerely hopes they have some mirror servers to back it up!
This poster is also trying to contact the rest of the BIM collective to discuss/find out what action can be taken to defend Indymedia.
"collective" being the perfect word to descibe this group
As the G8 summit approaches, threats to our freedom of expression, and action, appear to be increasing rapidly. Friend of BIM More "friends" chime in:
Please I hope people have thought seriously about decentralising IMC UK so there is no chance it can be taken out during the G8 protests! It is a vital resource and those bastards will probably be trying to think up a way to disable it...
Also, I hope Scotland's imc server is safe! Anony
The initial post is correct, and was posted onto UK IMC as BIM was down. Indeed it seems BIM is now being redirected direct to UK IMC - which is sensible. Regards the arrested BIM collective member, am informed the person has eventually turned up at...Trinity Rd (Bristol) police station! Due to be released 'tonight', charges, if any, unknown.
It is correct that BIM's server was home made/built, and was located in a BIM collective person's home, although that person (the arrested one) had not actually built it.
The struggle continues... Friend of BIM
In the run-up to G8, Bristol Indymedia (BIM) has had itâs server seized by police. Recent press-releases released by the BIM collective are reproduced below. The person responsible for the latest repression against Indymedia is a Bristol-based part-time film-maker, and well-known local trouble-causer and liar, Mark âZaskarâ Watson. Watson recently edited a film for CIRCA, the âClown Armyâ, and runs his own website at www.zaskarfilms.com He is also well-known for hounding activists and filming them without their permission. While actually working as a nurse, Watson claims to be a journalist and NUJ member, something which is actually untrue, and if he possesses a press card as he claims, it is a forgery. Perhaps more importantly Watson is a former member of BIM, and since being thrown out of the BIM collective, for what he characterises on Urban 75 as sexism, he has waged a malicious campaign against BIM and his former colleagues, which has now reached rock-bottom.
The following is a rather incoherent post, which recently appeared on BIM:
stopping them in their tracks?
by s.p.RAY of freshair
alternative panel-beating for oxygen.
with the G8 on the horizon, we looked for a simple yet effective way to stick two fingers up to this oil-addicted society.we found one! a train that carries brand-new cars from portbury dock nr avonmouth through the avon gorge to ashton and bedminster to desperse at temple meads for the rest of the country. Some questions that came into our little minds were:is portbury dock fianancially-competative? [yes], who paid for the tracks and maintance from portbury to parson St bedminster?. has anyone ever seen a passenger train on this route?,and sitting on a hot coach because you can't afford hiked-up train fayres, you see yet more new cars you can't afford to buy being transported by rail,to consume more oil, that our enviroment can't take. So we did an oxygen-grab as a kind of work-out up to the summit.Lifting and then dropping rocks onto useless pieces of metal.[17/06/05] We are feeling fit now for the greedy-ate, we suggest others should take aim and practice. The forth-coming event around gleneagles will not automatically mean a head-on confrontation with the old-bill, they have more spiteful weapons than us, so let us side step them and unbalance them using our minds. good luck stay free, S.P. ray.
Nothing like derailing a train to make you feel big. I see why the British cops might take a dim view of this
Since Indymedia do not retain IP addresses it is not known who posted this, nor is there any evidence of any actual incident occurring. Nonetheless Mark Watson, a self-confessed long-standing police informer, used the posting as an excuse to escalate his campaign against BIM. Without making any attempt to first contact BIM, Watson phoned the police and spoke to DC 1062 Saysell of Temple Meads CID. Since the police routinely monitor Indymedia it is unlikely that they had not already seen the post above, but Watson informed them that he was a former member of the BIM collective, and alleged that BIM kept the IP addresses of contributors and that these could be obtained by seizing the server. He also gave the name, address and contact details of at least one BIM volunteer, including all their employment details.
I feel like buying Mark a drink
The details of Watsonâs malicious and treacherous actions originally came out on the Urban 75 forum in which he initially, and characteristically, lied through his teeth, before proclaiming himself, âAn unrepetent grass.â Coming under attack from other Urban posters, Watson, who posts under the name âZaskarâ (and possibly other names), attempted to get his attackers to contact the police, and sent them private messages, asking them to telephone him (on 07861 287069.) Apparently, Watson, is well-known for doing this, and then alleging that people have threatened him.
It should be clear to anyone reading this that Mark âZaskarâ Watson is a self-confessed police-informer, and a malicious individual, responsible for closing down Bristol Indymedia at a particularly crucial time, and for subjecting Indymedia vounteers to police harassment and action. As such, he has no place in our movement, and should at the very least be ostracised. Beware of the tout âZaskarâ.
----------
Whatever the legal case, the cops have now gone ahead and seized the
server. This differs from the recent instance when UK Indymedia's servers were seized from their 'host' Rackspace, as BIM have their own stand-alone server. This poster sincerely hopes they have some mirror servers to back it up! This poster is also trying to contact the rest of the BIM collective to discuss/find out what action can be taken to defend Indymedia.
As the G8 summit approaches, threats to our freedom of expression, and
action, appear to be increasing rapidly."
Red N Black
I would have expected this story to be picked up by the corporate media. That it is not reported suggests that a DA-notice has been applied to it. I suggest that people lay off Zaskar. It is unrealistic to assume that Bristol Indymedia was not regularly monitored by the police. Wouldn't they have seized the server regardless of whether Z contacted them?
MnK. Don't let the bastards get you down.
Bristol resident
They're coming to take you away, ha ha he he ho ho...
Posted by: Steve ||
06/28/2005 13:46 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
I can see why he turned, being is expelled from the collective is worse than death.
#3
Indymedia, worthless TRANZI drivel. All of them deserve an ass kicking. I hope the Peelers spread steel wool shavings over the MoBo before they return it.
Yeah. That should work. It's always worked in the past...
British and Irish leaders on Monday called on the Irish Republican Army to unequivocally reject violence and commit to the democratic process. That's the key, they said, to building trust between Catholics and Protestants, and restoring Northern Ireland's own government. "The issue for months now has been trust and confidence and being able to build that up again," Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern said at a joint news conference with British leader Tony Blair. "If you get a clear and decisive statement about the IRA's intentions, that allows us to positively move forward, if it is a statement that carries the necessary credibility," Ahern said.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/28/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
The IRA rep is lower than whale sh*t in the Irish Sea.
verify verify verify and then don't trust them.
Posted by: Red Dog ||
06/28/2005 0:08 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Men urged to stop drinking beer and farting while watching sport on tv, and women urged to stop nagging about buying more pointless stuff. Talks still in progress.
#3
Problem is that the good old thugeens can't help themselves (same can be said for their loyalist counterparts). They is what they is and ain't what they ain't. 95% thug and little else of redeeming value these days. If it aint thinly veiled political violence then just plain criminal violence will have to do. We are not talking about an intelligent, thoughtful, creative or hardworking collection of misfit toys here. Mass decomissioning of IRA and loyalists thugeen with video and photographs to verify would be the preferred means to the end.
Russian forces who tried to free hostages from a school in Beslan last year were poorly led and an inquiry into the causes of the bloodbath that ended the siege will absolve those in command, an official said on Tuesday.
Stanislav Kesayev heads a probe into the tragedy for the North Ossetian regional government and, in a wide-ranging interview with Vremya Novostei daily, said top officials had not taken responsibility for the siege.
His comments echoed criticism of the government voiced by Beslan residents, who say no officials have been punished for failing to stop the rebel hostage raid which killed 330 people -- half of them children -- last September.
"It would be funny if it wasn't so sad," he said, saying officials like Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov should have come down to head the operation like in previous cases when Chechen rebels have taken hundreds of hostages.
He said the largely peaceful end to the 1995 siege in the village of Budyonnovsk, also caused by rebels loyal to warlord Shamil Basayev, showed what could have been done. The gunmen were then allowed to leave in return for freeing the hostages.
"(Then-premier Viktor) Chernomyrdin stood up to Basayev in Budyonnovsk. Of course, it was bad there but the results were better. But we didn't see Fradkov. In Beslan there was a complete lack of coordination."
The regional probe has been condemned by prosecutors, but Kesayev said the official investigation had mislaid evidence and was refusing to investigate troops' use of tanks and flame-throwers that witnesses say caused many of the deaths.
"The investigation does not want to know this. There are too many bodies. And it isn't clear who's to blame," he said.
Officials at the time said the rebels had made no demands, but later admitted they had wanted troops out of Chechnya and peace talks with now-dead rebel leader Aslan Maskhadov.
Peace talks have long been anathema to Moscow, which calls all Chechen rebels terrorists, and Kesayev suggested troops could have provoked the siege to stop Maskhadov coming to Beslan and gaining the credit for freeing the hostages.
"Maskhadov promised and guaranteed that he could be there by the end of September 3 ... but then the chain was broken," he said. "And behind this are questions you don't even want to think about."
Tuesday was also due to see another session of the trial of the only surviving hostage-taker from the siege, which started in May, but the hearing was postponed until Thursday.
Many former hostages and bereaved relatives say Nurpashi Kulayev is being made a scapegoat for the tragedy, and the officials who should be punished will escape by blaming everything on him. Kesayev agreed.
"Nurpashi Kulayev will die, then no one will ask anything any more. There's an old Italian film called 'the case is closed, forget about it'," he said. "It is obvious that in the investigation there have been clear discrepancies."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/28/2005 11:21 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) -- New Zealand's foreign minister has compared Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe's administration to the genocidal regime of Cambodia's Pol Pot. Phil Goff made the remarks on Tuesday while pushing for his country's cricket team to call off a planned tour of the southern African nation.
In Zimbabwe today, "for the first time since the ... days of Pol Pot you're seeing people shifted out of town and into the countryside, left to suffer from exposure, deprived of all of the rights and dignities that we would say (are) the birthright of every human being," Goff said.
"for the first time" You don't get out much, do you Phil?
Mugabe's regime is involved in what he portrays as a campaign to fight crime, maintain health standards and restore order in cities. But the opposition, whose strongholds are among the urban poor, says the blitz is intended to punish those who voted against the government in recent parliamentary elections. Since the May 19, police have torched and bulldozed tens of thousands of shacks, street stalls and -- amid acute food shortages -- vegetable gardens planted by the urban poor. Independent estimates of the number affected range from 300,000 to 1.5 million. Police acknowledge 120,000.
Goff, campaigning to stop New Zealand's Black Caps cricket team from touring Zimbabwe in August, said the International Cricket Council should not ignore the "massive human rights abuses" in Zimbabwe. "You can't simply play a game of cricket and ignore those things happening around you," Goff said on National Radio.
The New Zealand team could be fined US$2 million by the International Cricket Council if it fails to tour Zimbabwe. It would also have to pay fines and costs to Zimbabwe cricket officials.
"There's no way New Zealand Cricket or the New Zealand taxpayer would want to ... pay money to Zimbabwe and Mugabe himself, or the ICC, because they're too bloody-minded, in the case of the ICC, to recognize what is happening," Goff said. Goff plans to write to the ICC, recommending that obligations on sports teams to tour should be waived in the event of a severe human rights crisis. "It's not appropriate to play cricket as if nothing was happening," he said. "Somewhere you have to draw a line in the sand."
New Zealand is seeking support for its stance from British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw and Australian Foreign Minster Alexander Downer.
He said the ICC is "dominated" by nations that seem unprepared to take a stand on the issue, "whether you're talking South Africa and Zimbabwe, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, etc." "How can you move ahead when the African countries are prepared to tolerate such outrageous behavior from one of their own? They need to do a lot of soul searching," he said.
You have to have a soul in order to search it.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/28/2005 11:37 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
This is a Papua New Zealand government wanker calling a spade a spade, and not even taking any gratuitous swipes at the US ?
Whoa, severe cognitive dissonance.
I'm going to go back and read the Souter thread until I get my bearings back.
Posted by: Carl in N.H. ||
06/28/2005 17:12 Comments ||
Top||
Former prime minister Malcolm Fraser, Amnesty International and Liberty Victoria have criticised ASIO's increased terrorism powers after raids in Sydney and Melbourne yesterday. Australian Federal Police (AFP) and ASIO officers conducted raids on properties in Melbourne and Sydney but no charges have been laid. The Federal Government's anti-terrorism legislation is under review, though the Government has indicated it wants to retain the broader powers introduced in the wake of the September 11 attacks in 2001.
Mr Fraser says he is concerned Australia is losing its democratic values. "You can be arrested because ASIO thinks you know something which you don't know and then your defence is to prove you don't know it," he said. "Well, how do you prove a negative? And how do you prove you don't know something if you don't know something in the first place?"
Amnesty International spokeswoman Nicole Bieski says the issue goes beyond ASIO's increased powers. "It's also into the criminal code," she said. "They've inserted terrorism provisions which are of significant concern to Amnesty and create some very uncertain and unclear offences. So we've been concerned for some time as to what's happening through the Australian political system in relation to the terrorism issue."
Barrister Brian Walters, a senior legal figure and president of Liberty Victoria, has also warned the intelligence laws are a threat to democracy.
Raids
The ABC was informed about the raids by a spokesman for the federal Attorney-General Philip Ruddock last night but neither ASIO nor the AFP are revealing any details. Mr Ruddock has rejected claims that someone in his office has been leaking information about the operations. New South Wales police Commissioner Ken Moroney has also refused to provide any details. "The lead role in these issues is of course a matter for ASIO and Australian Federal Police," he said.
Details of the raids have emerged from unnamed sources involved in the investigations, who say the targets are Islamic extremists who were planning to attack Australian landmarks like the Sydney Opera House, Melbourne's Flinders Street Station and the Australian Stock Exchange. ASIO was granted warrants to search and enter the properties, based in part on the surveillance of so-called cell members who had discussed the possibility of launching terrorist attacks in Australia. The Herald Sun today quotes an unnamed source who says the alleged cell members "talk like mercenaries looking for a war".
Professor George Williams from the University of New South Wales says without any information there is no way of testing whether ASIO is using its powers wisely. "The problem here is that when you're dealing with an organisation like ASIO, with very little if any external scrutiny, we're simply left to take these things on trust," he said.
Two leading US-based civil and human rights groups released a new report Monday, accusing the US Department of Justice of wrongly detaining at least 70 Muslim men and denying them their lawful rights.
O dear. And after the GTMO gulags, we get another helping of guilt...
The new 101-page report, released by Human Rights Watch and the American Civil Liberties Union, said the Bush administration rounded up and detained the Muslim men indefinitely without any charges and on baseless accusations of terrorist links. According to the report, the Department of Justice relied on false or faulty evidence and said the men were typically arrested at gunpoint, held around the clock in solitary confinement, and subjected to the "harsh and degrading high-security conditions usually reserved for prisoners convicted of the most dangerous crimes." "These men were victims of a Justice Department that was willing to do an end run around the law," said Jamie Fellner, a director at Human Rights Watch, in a statement...In addition, both rights groups said many of the detainees were not informed of the reasons for their arrest and were not permitted to see the evidence used against them. - The exact number of so-called material witnesses detained has not been released by the Justice Department, but the report said the majority of the men were found to be from the Middle East and all were Muslim except for one. The report said, "One cannot help but ask whether ignorance and prejudice about Muslims in the United States has helped color the analysis of the government in these cases." Anjana Malhotra, one of the reports authors, believes prejudice played a role in these detentions. "Muslim men were arrested for little more than attending the same mosque as a September 11th hijacker or owning a box-cutter," she said.
Words fail me. Fisking would be too good for this piece of drivel. It's the anti-American prejudice and willful ignorance that will lose this war, not our detention of men intent on jihad.
#2
I already have an ACLU-Enemy of the State coffe mug. I was really surprised at the positive comments here at work
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
06/28/2005 7:29 Comments ||
Top||
#3
"One cannot help but ask whether ignorance and prejudice about Muslims in the United States has helped color the analysis of the government in these cases."
ignorance? Uh...yeah. It didn't take brilliance to realize there was no reason to round up Swedes.
#5
In addition, both rights groups said many of the detainees were not informed of the reasons for their arrest and were not permitted to see the evidence used against them.
Uh, I'm just a dumb red-stater, but doesn't this only apply to American citizens on US soil (including foreign embassies)? Much like the ACLU backing that Atheist goon in California trying to overturn the Pledge of Allegience, this should've been tossed out first thing for "lack of standing"...the legal theory that someone must be intimately involved or be affected by the actions of the defendant...first thing I learned here at my gov't job, and I'm not even an attorney. Michael Newdow should've been tossed to the curb because he didn't have legal custody of his child first thing (much like these jihadis, who are NOT on U.S. soil, are NOT U.S. citizens, and, in fact, are NOT even subject to the Geneva Convention, as they were not uniformed soldiers of a country's army and they intentionally target civilians).
Posted by: BA ||
06/28/2005 10:29 Comments ||
Top||
#6
I still think the President should publicly announce that he is going to follow the advice of the ACLU, AI, the Dim-o-cRats, ad nauseum, and apply the rules of the Geneva Conventions to the illegal combatants held at Gitmo.
The rules that say illegal combatants caught on the battlefield can be summarily executed.
AND he's going to then send a letter of condolence to each of the jihadis' families explaining that their "loved one" (and I use the term very loosely) was executed at the insistence of said morons listed above. With names and addresses where the families of the dead jihadis can send their thanks. :-D
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/28/2005 12:20 Comments ||
Top||
#7
HISTORY TEST
Please pause a moment, reflect back, and take the following multiple choice test. The events are actual cuts from past history. They actually happened!!!
1. -1968 Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed by
a. Superman
b. Jay Leno
c. Harry Potter
d. Muslim male extremist between the ages of 17 and 40
2. In 1972 at the Munich Olympics, athletes were kidnapped and massacred by
a. Olga Korbett
b. Sitting Bull
c. Arnold Schwarzenegger
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
3. In 1979, the US embassy in Iran was taken over by:
a. Lost Norwegians
b. Elvis
c. A tour bus full of 80-year-old women
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
4. During the 1980's a number of Americans were kidnapped in Lebanon by:
a. John Dillinger
b. The King of Sweden
c. The Boy Scouts
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
5. In 1983, the US Marine barracks in Beirut was blown up by:
a. A pizza delivery boy
b. Pee Wee Herman
c. Geraldo Rivera
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
6. In 1985 the cruise ship Achille Lauro was hijacked and a 70 year old
American passenger was murdered and thrown overboard in his wheelchair by:
a. The Smurfs
b. Davy Jones
c. The Little Mermaid
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
7. In 1985 TWA flight 847 was hijacked at Athens, and a US Navy diver trying to
rescue passengers was murdered by:
a. Captain Kidd
b. Charles Lindberg
c. Mother Teresa
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
8. In 1988, Pan Am Flight 103 was bombed by:
a. Scooby Doo
b. The Tooth Fairy
c. Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
9. In 1993 the World Trade Center was bombed the first time by:
a. Richard Simmons
b. Grandma Moses
c. Michael Jordan
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
10. In 1998, the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed by:
a. Mr. Rogers
b. Hillary Clinton, to distract attention from Wild Bill' s women problems
c. The World Wrestling Federation
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
11. On 9/11/01, four airliners were hijacked; two were used as missiles to take out the World Trade Centers and of the remaining two, one crashed into the US Pentagon and the other was diverted and crashed by the passengers.Thousands of people were killed by:
a. Bugs Bunny, Wiley E. Coyote, Daffy Duck and Elmer Fudd
b. The Supreme Court of Florida
c. Mr. Bean
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
12. In 2002 the United States fought a war in Afghanistan against:
a. Enron
b. The Lutheran Church
c. The NFL
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
13. In 2002 reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and murdered by:
a. Bonnie and Clyde
b. Captain Kangaroo
c. Billy Graham
d. Muslim male extremists mostly between the ages of 17 and 40
Nope, .....I really don't see a pattern here to justify profiling, do you?
So, to ensure we Americans never offend anyone, particularly fanatics intent on killing us, airport security screeners will no longer be allowed to profile certain people. They must conduct random searches of 80-year-old women,
little kids, airline pilots with proper identification, secret agents who are members of the President's security detail, 85-year old Congressmen with metal hips, and Medal of Honor winning and former Governor Joe Foss, but leave Muslim Males between the ages 17 and 40 alone because of profiling.
VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) - A radical environmentalist who is one of the FBI's most wanted fugitives told an extradition hearing Monday he was being unfairly targeted by the U.S. government and should be allowed to remain in Canada. Tre Arrow, born Michael Scarpitti, is accused of taking part in the 2001 firebombings of logging and cement trucks in Oregon. The FBI also claims he is associated with the Earth Liberation Front, a group that has claimed responsibility for dozens of acts of destruction over the past few years.
"I am being targeted by the U.S. government and the FBI, not because I am guilty but because I have chosen to challenge the status quo," Arrow, and a Green Party candidate for Congress in 2000, said at his extradition hearing. In order for an extradition to be ordered, the judge must find there is sufficient evidence to convict the accused on the same charges in Canada.
Prosecutor Rosellina Patillo said evidence from the federal prosecutor in Oregon indicates Arrow was among four conspirators involved in the bombings of a gravel company and a logging company between April and June of 2001. The evidence comes from statements of Arrow's three coconspirators who have pleaded guilty. The suspects intended to firebomb a U.S. Forest Service office, but abandoned the idea after they found the security system was too tight, Patillo said. Arrow is seeking refugee status in Canada, his lawyer said.
The 30-year-old Arrow - who says the trees told him to change his name - contends he would not get a fair trial in the United States because of the FBI's assertion that his alleged crimes are acts of terrorism. He faces federal charges in Oregon of using fire to commit a felony, destroying vehicles used in interstate commerce and using incendiary devices in a crime of violence. He faces up to 80 years in prison if convicted.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/28/2005 09:50 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
"Help! Help! I'm being held accountable for my own actions - done by my own free choice repressed!
#2
ELF expects every single one of you reactionary environmentalists to do your duty - come and face the music for what you've done before a jury of your peers and maybe you can grab 15 minutes in the Slimelight before the verdict and sentencing!
#3
I'm glad they finally cornered that punk. I hope he gets 80 years and 1 day. He needs to go down hard for his terrorist acts. These wannabe 60's rejects never stop pushing the envelope for idiocy.
Allen: But the truth of the matter is that existence in general is very very tragic, very very sad, very brutal and very unhappy. Every now and then, something happens that's funny. And that's refreshing.
Like a Coke, or one of those nice cool damp towels they bring you at the hotel.
Q. So is this one of the reasons why we don't see any hint of what happened on September 11 in your recent films? Would your fans be scared?
Is this what German entertainment writers think? Silly little American fans, ready to bolt in fear if Woody tackles 9/11? I know what his characters think about it. I can imagine the cast of "Interiors" leaving for thier seaside home to stare at the water and brood about all the pottery that was lost in the attack.
Allen: No, it's because I don't find political subjects or topical world events profound enough to get interested in them myself as an artist. As a filmmaker, I'm not interested in 9/11.
Thatâs fine; his prerogative, of course. It would be wrong to insist that every filmmaker say something about 9/11 as some sort of litmus test. But let's review.
Insufficiently profound: Attack on America by illiberal religious fanatics; the mass murder of Jews at a hotel; the Holocaust; the tsunami
Sufficiently profound: The incessant attempts of nebbishy intellectuals to get into the pants of ripe young women
(Continuing with Allen: ) Because, if you look at the big picture, the long view of things, it's too small, history overwhelms it. The history of the world is like: he kills me, I kill him. Only with different cosmetics and different castings: so in 2001 some fanatics killed some Americans, and now some Americans are killing some Iraqis.
And in my childhood, some Nazis killed Jews. And now, some Jewish people and some Palestinians are killing each other. Political questions, if you go back thousands of years, are ephemeral, not important. History is the same thing over and over again.
Gah. So: if the Romans kill to conquer, and build cities, streets, sanitation systems, water-delivery systems, courts, and regulate trade to provide a stable economy not based on raiding the next town, this is the same as Barbarians sacking Rome and carting off the gold. Because in both cases you have killing. âSome Nazis killed Jews, and now some Jewish people and some Palestinians are killing each other.â Same thing. Without the ability to make moral distinctions based on motive, consequences, the ethical constructs of various parties, everything is equal, and you end up with people like Woody Allen: a tiny speck of compacted narcissism, revolving around the dead sun in an empty universe. Whatâs left? Well, thank heavens for little girls.
Not that thereâs a heaven.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/28/2005 12:59 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[9 views]
Top|| File under:
#2
And Hollywood wonders why it's in such a slump.
A studied unwillingness to tackle the relevant topics of the day is not a sign of sophistication; it's a sign of intellectual flaccidity (and I'm sure that's not the only thing flaccid about Mr. Allen).
Don't build it, and they most assuredly won't come.
#3
When Woody goes to the Great Beyond, not only will the lights on Broadway be dimmed, but all the barely legal Asian porn sites will go offline for one minute...
#4
What's the problem? Woody doesn't think he has anything worthwhile to say about 9/11. I'm sure he's right. I just wish Michael Moore had made the same decision.
#5
Some sketch comedy show--think it was In Living Color--once did a parody commercial in which Woody was making a pitch for his new charity, "Date the Children."
Posted by: Mike ||
06/28/2005 15:08 Comments ||
Top||
#6
Woody, if history is too complex for you to grasp, just make up your own version of it, like Ridley Scott.
#8
Woody is another exemplar of why it is important pour les artistes to shuddup and play le guitar.
Two of my favorite films are Allenkraft : Zelig, and Radio Days. The latter being an inadvertant paean to the beauty of immigrant embrace of and assimilation into America. A kind of goofball "Avalon." The former is what it is, a manifestation of Allen's narcissism, yes, but extraordinarily funny, and technically amazing for the time of its creation. Yes, we could do without Susan Sontag's participation in the faux documentary, but it is best to not speak ill of the dead.
And before any of you get too worked up with my giving Allen a pass for some his work, I am a registered Cro-Magnon Branch Rightie.
former is a wonderful
Posted by: Red Lief ||
06/28/2005 23:18 Comments ||
Top||
WASHINGTON - President Bush is using the first anniversary of Iraq's sovereignty to try to ease Americans' doubts about the mission and outline again a winning strategy for a violent conflict that has cost the lives of more than 1,740 U.S. troops and has no end in sight. And the end of the war on terror is in sight?
In a prime-time address from Fort Bragg, N.C., home of the Army's elite 82nd Airborne Division, Bush was to argue Argue? With who? that there is no need to change course in Iraq despite the upsetting images produced by daily insurgent attacks. The terrorists make the images and you guys distribute them. Perfect.
His assessment comes on the heels of a recent Associated Press-Ipsos poll that showed public doubts about the war reaching a high point â with more than half saying that invading Iraq was a mistake.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Tuesday that Bush will stress the need for patience as Iraq moves toward establishing a permanent democratic government. She acknowledged that continuing insurgent violence and the loss of life makes it hard for Americans "to focus on the quiet process that's going on in Iraq of building a political consensus toward a stable and democratic Iraq."
"I know it's difficult and the president will acknowledge that," Rice said on NBC's "Today" show. "But the United States has been through difficult times before to come out on the other side with a more stable world."
Although attacks frequently take the lives of American troops, Bush has said they will not leave until Iraqi security forces are trained and equipped to keep the peace. He has refused to give a timetable for troop withdrawal, even though some Democrats and a few Republicans in Congress are supporting a resolution that calls for Bush to start bringing them home by Oct. 1, 2006. Whether the job is done or not, like Somilia.
"The key to success in Iraq is for the Iraqis to be able and capable of defending their democracy against terrorists," Bush said Monday, then turned to what has been the signature achievement of the conflict that began in Baghdad more than two years ago. "Parallel with the security track is a political track. Obviously, the political track has made progress this year when 8 million people went to the polls and voted."
Bush's 2004 Democratic presidential opponent, Sen. John Kerry, urged the president to "tell the truth to the American people." What about your military records, John? "Happy talk about the insurgency being in 'the last throes' leads to frustrated expectations at home," Kerry, D-Mass., said in an op-ed piece that appeared in Tuesday's editions of The New York Times. And your kind of talk encourages the bad guys around the world, John. "The president must also announce immediately that the United States will not have a permanent military presence in Iraq," Kerry wrote. "Erasing suspicions that the occupation is indefinite is critical to eroding support for the insurgency." While encouraging the hard-liners at the same time.
The administration appears to be shifting its strategy subtly, focusing more on political solutions to the insurgency. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has confirmed then denied that talks have taken place with some insurgent leaders, and the U.S. commander of the multinational coalition in Iraq has said the conflict will ultimately be resolved in a political process.
Tapping into Americans emotions over terrorists attacks in the United States, White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Bush will talk about insurgents killing innocent people and how stopping the violence "will be a major blow to the ambitions of the terrorists."
"This is a time of testing," McClellan said. "It is a critical moment in Iraq. The terrorists are seeking to shake our will and weaken our resolve. They know that they cannot win unless we abandon the mission before it is complete."
Bush also scheduled two and a half hours to meet with families of soldiers who have died, as he usually does when he visits military bases. Outside the base, opponents of the war planned protests.
"There's a groundswell against this war,'" said Bill Dobbs, spokesman United For Peace and Justice, an anti-war coalition of more than 1,300 local and national groups. "You can see it in Congress, you can see it in newspaper editorials and what young people are saying to military recruiters: 'No.'"
Bush's speech is part of a new public-relations campaign from the White House to try to calm anxieties about the war. It comes after several conflicting or perplexing messages about the nature and duration of the conflict. Wassamatta? You can't all agree on the same lie?
Vice President Dick Cheney made headlines last month with his assertion that the insurgency in Iraq was "in its last throes." He was later contradicted by the top U.S. commander in the Middle East, Gen. John Abizaid, and by Rumsfeld, who said the insurgency could drag on for years. Could be both.
Rumsfeld also told an interviewer this month that Iraq is "statistically" no safer today than it was before the ouster of Saddam Hussein, although he maintains progress is being made. Could be both. If it's no safer than before Saddam was booted, then it's GOT to be a lot safer than last year, right?
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/28/2005 09:18 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Yes I fully agree we should leave Iraq post haste and also retreat from Japan, Korea, and Germany. In fact we should bring all of our troops home and leave the world to stew in its own mess for a while. This worked very well in the late 18th and early 19th centruries. All those European and Asian powers managed drag the world into two global confilcts. It was only through engagement and containment that we avoided a third War against the Communists. I am sure that we can leave the world to the un and eu and they will keep us secure and ward off any attacks by rouge states of organization. Heck after we return ALL of our troops to U.S. territory I bet all the bad guys in the world lay down their arms and begin a chorus of "Kum-by-ya". End dripping sarcasm.
#2
"There's a groundswell against this war,'" said Bill Dobbs"You can see it in Congress, you can see it in newspaper editorials and what young people are saying to military recruiters: 'No.'"
Good. Then you should have no trouble winning them thar elections in 2006.
#3
"...The administration appears to be shifting its strategy subtly, focusing more on political solutions to the insurgency..."
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Tell that to any insurgent in the crosshairs!
Posted by: Tom ||
06/28/2005 13:20 Comments ||
Top||
#4
Jesus, cant we just kill our enemies like the good old days?
Freakin pep talk on Bush's war.
The war's timing was the mistake, we should have been concentrating on 2007 in Iran, and saved our political capital for that war, a good war with a nation state to fight, not this non linear Jihadi crap.
We could have cleaned up Iraq anytime after that with little or no problem, and we wouldn't have really needed an excuse either, besides, "well, we were already here". Was that an option, maybe not.
But here's where things got tricky...
Bush didn't go to war over WMD, he went to war over currency and regional dominance which are one in the same.
Iraq requested that the UN make its oil for food payments to Iraq totally in Euros beginning in May of 2003, and the Saudis had hinted that they wanted to transfer their reserves into Euros as well, that's why the Europeans were so favorable to Saddam, they wanted to stall long enough to establish the Euro as the new trading currency for the Middle Eastern oil producers in order to squeeze the Americans out for good. This would have created significant inflation and eventually a significant devaluation of the dollar had it happened.
No dice though, Bush pushed the timetable of the war up by six months and proceeded to end all currency "transitions". The Iraq war was a statement by the US that we would destroy anyone who even thought about transferring their reserves to Euros.
After all, going to war with the dollar means going to war with America. Why do you think so much of the Iraqi national banks money was in Euros?
Because the whole deal was about American dominance over middle eastern commodities including currency, and we refused to play by anyone else's rules.
The problems that have resulted from this decision include a nuclear armed Iran and a weaker middle east,(revolutions are bad for oil and gas output) but as long as there aren't car bombs in Chicago who cares? At least that seems to be the administration's logic.
The terrorist are an excuse to stay in the region, and ten more years of strategic placement against Iran, Syria and the gang seems to be the order of the day.
If Bush and Dicki were smarter they would listen to McCain and prepare folks for the long haul as that's reality, but George ain't ever been accused of being too smart...he's just acting as the trigger man for the industries that would have been hit the hardest by the currency transfer. Anyway, what's he care he's a lame duck and Dick ain't ever running. The money's has been made, the deals done, and the next joker will have to deal with the problem, not them.
More war to come.
MM
Posted by: Mountain Man ||
06/28/2005 16:33 Comments ||
Top||
#5
Hey Yahoo, thanks for reminding me to tune in tonight. I almost forgot.
#6
he went to war over currency
Damn, that explains it.
Fear the Federal Reserve.
Posted by: Alcoa Good Things Ya ||
06/28/2005 18:01 Comments ||
Top||
#7
Why do you think so much of the Iraqi national banks money was in Euros?
And yet our troops found stashes of millions in US currency.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
06/28/2005 18:39 Comments ||
Top||
#8
After reading Mountian Man's comment, I googled "UN iraq euros currency" and found some actual news about Iraq's switch from dollars to Euros in 2000 and a bunch of tinfoil-hat type sites, including ZMag, a far-far-far-left publication. So color me unconvinced. Bobby's comments from the original post confused me -- what is the right thing to do, Bobby? Leave or stay? I couldn't figure out what you would prefer. Not that I care.
On the other hand, Cyber Sarge's comments were crystal clear.
Posted by: Tibor ||
06/28/2005 18:57 Comments ||
Top||
One week before the September 11 commission was scheduled to send its final report to the printers in July 2004, Philip D. Zelikow, the commission's staff director, gathered members together for an unusual briefing.
Commission staff members had discovered a document from a U.S. intelligenceagencythat described in detail Iran's ties to al Qaeda, he said. It had been buried at the bottom of a huge stack of highly classified documents on other subjects that had been delivered to a special high-security reading room in an undisclosed location in Washington. The document summarized the findings of seventy-five distinct intelligence reports.
The commissioners realized that if their report was published and word of the missing documents leaked out later, it would discredit their entire investigation, so they ordered staff to make a last-minute panic run. Mr. Zelikow arranged to have his team review the 75 documents in person the following morning â Sunday â at seven-thirty.
Everything the CIA had been telling the commission up until that point was absolutely cut and dried: There was no connection between al Qaeda and Iran. None, no way. Nada. This was "the Concept," and the intelligence community was wedded to it. "We found perplexing the settled CIA position . . . that there was no meaningful connection at all between al Qaeda and Iran," one commissioner told me when I asked him about this incident.
The documents the team began reading that Sunday morning told a whole different story. The brief, two-page summary that appeared in the September 11 commission's final report gives no idea of the scope of the material the CIA had been sitting on, or the sheer number of intelligence reports. That story has never been told until now.
What the team found that Sunday morning was nothing less than a complete documented record of operational ties between Iran and al Qaeda for the critical months just prior to September 11. "The documents showed Iran was facilitating the travel of al Qaeda operatives, ordering Iranian border inspectors not to put telltale stamps on their passports, thus keeping their travel documents clean," the team leader, a former CIA analyst, told me. "The Iranians were fully aware that they were helping operatives who were part of an organization preparing attacks against the United States."
The U.S. intelligence community was also aware of the help Iran was providing Osama bin Laden's men. But because the analysts were driven by the Concept, they consistently downplayed that relationship. "Old School Ties" was the dismissive title of one post-September 11 analytical report issued by the CIA's counterterrorism center that summarized the early days of bin Laden's cooperation with Iran. These reports showed that, as the team leader told me, "by late 1993, early 1994 there had been a handshake between bin Laden and Iran." A handshake and operational cooperation.
Most troubling were masses of reports on Iranian intelligence operative Imad Mugniyeh, whom the September 11 commission report obliquely refers to as "a senior Hezbollah operative." The raw reporting showed that well before September 11, the United States had hard intelligence that the Tehran regime had appointed Mugniyeh as the point man for operational contacts with bin Laden's men. That coincided with information an Iranian defector brought to the CIA four months before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Before September 11, Mugniyeh had killed more Americans than any other terrorist. Putting him together with bin Laden was like throwing a match onto a pile of oil-soaked rags. And yet no alarm bells seem to have gone off. Mugniyeh is not even named in the final commission report.
The source reports showed that Mugniyeh coordinated the travel of eight to ten of the "muscle hijackers" between Saudi Arabia, Beirut and Iran in October and November 2000, and personally traveled with one hijacker from Saudi Arabia to Beirut before his trip on to Iran.
Frustrated by their late discovery of the documents, which prevented them from investigating further, the authors of the September 11 commission report's chapter 7 resorted to irony. It was always possible that so much coordination was simply a "remarkable coincidence" and that "Hezbollah was actually focusing on some other group of individuals traveling from Saudi Arabia during this same time frame, rather than the future hijackers."
Even in its post-September 11 reporting, which then CIA director George Tenet tried unsuccessfully to prevent the commission from reviewing, the CIA simply assumed that the hijackers were traveling through Iran, not to Iran, my sources on the commission said. It was the Concept again. The fact that Mugniyeh had become al Qaeda's travel agent never hit home. "Every time they came up with a smoking gun, the analysts came back and said, yes, that's interesting, but it's not actionable," one commissioner told me. It was the supreme putdown.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/28/2005 11:13 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
More proof the CIA is hopelessly rotten. Much like the UN.
#2
The "supreme put-down?" WTF? This is actionable, if true! This proves even more that the CIA needs to be cleaned out (like the State Dept.) and quick! Hope that Porter Goss is taking this to heart!
Posted by: BA ||
06/28/2005 11:35 Comments ||
Top||
#3
This was the pre-Goss CIA, though many of the problems from it remain.
And people wonder why they were wrong on WMDs ...
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/28/2005 11:37 Comments ||
Top||
#4
finally, liberals and conservatives can agree. The CIA sucs
#5
That Karl Rove guy is pretty bright. He knew we'd have to have a base to attack the Mullahs, so that was the real reason we invaded Iraq - to get airfields right next to the real target.
As soon as Hilly, Billy, Johnny, Dickey, Joey, et al hear this, they'll see it as an opportunity to show how dumb W is and eventually get on board with the plan to punish the real perpetrators of 9/11. Maybe we could even get the "insurgents" to join us in attacking the old enemy?
Sometimes I wonder about myself...
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/28/2005 11:53 Comments ||
Top||
#6
I have too question the time and evidence. We are near a HUGE national holiday and nearing the One-year anniversary according to the first sentence in the article. Also, no names from the commission, no names from the CIA, no date of WHEN the author talked to the commissioner in question, who's name we don't know. It all sounds shocking and detailed, yet easy to write up fiction. And do oyu REALLY think the commission would hold this back if they found it? This finding could make the politcal careers skyrocket. "The men who discovered the Bush Conspiracy!" That's what the headlines would read if they revealed it! I Don't think this is true at all.
Posted by: Charles ||
06/28/2005 12:36 Comments ||
Top||
#7
How would this represent the Bush conspiracy? If anything, it would simply serve to highlight the problems with the CIA that we've discussed before.
Moreover, remember how politicized the 9/11 Commission was.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/28/2005 12:47 Comments ||
Top||
#8
A lot of Air Force and Army photo interpreters end up in DC, working for NPIC, NISC, NMIC, NIMA, or whatever else they're calling the imagery intelligence fusion center there these days. They all have the same complaint: they report, the CIA "senior analysts" ignore their reports. The rot is in the upper levels, not the rank and file. Porter Goss has his hands full cleaning house. Condoleese Rice has a similar problem at State, in THEIR intelligence organization, as well as among the "senior management". The same goes for most of the other cabinet agencies. The entire Washington culture needs to be broken up and disposed of, but it's not going to happen until the people of this country decide enough is enough, and break some heads.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
06/28/2005 15:03 Comments ||
Top||
#9
I'm not too sure about the breaking heads, but issuing pink slips and promoting folks that can tell the difference between "actionable intel" and "intel to get promoted by" would be nice.
Posted by: 49 pan ||
06/28/2005 19:40 Comments ||
Top||
TAMPA - Federal agents planted bugs inside the offices of an Islamic think tank suspected of serving as a front for a Palestinian terrorist group, a retired FBI supervisor testified Monday morning. But the effort appeared to bear little or no fruit. Agents could not get the microphones to work properly, Julian ``Jay'' Koerner said.
It marked the first discussion of secret wiretaps as the trial of former University of South Florida Professor Sami Al-Arian and three co-defendants entered its fourth week. The men are charged in a 53- count federal indictment accusing them of racketeering and providing material support to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
Koerner described the process of securing eavesdropping warrants under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The law targets people suspected of being agents of a foreign intelligence service or of an internationally based terrorist organization. Each warrant is approved by a secret panel of U.S. district judges that meets in Washington and is good for three months.
The eavesdropping, which started in late 1993, sought intelligence information, he said. Criminal activity also was recorded if it was picked up and some of that was shared with other FBI agents pursuing the criminal case against Al-Arian and the others. The warrants allowed agents to record all calls on targeted telephone lines, receive copies of fax transmissions, and late in the investigation, to intercept some forms of computer communication, Koerner said.
Conversations and faxes intercepted from 1993 until 2003 make up the heart of the prosecution's case. It isn't clear whether the bugs inside the World and Islam Studies Enterprise office contributed to the prosecution. ``I won't say they never worked,'' Koerner said. ``They didn't work as we anticipated they would work.''
In other testimony, an FBI computer analyst testified about documents and images found at defendant Hatim Fariz's home. They included a picture of the Islamic Jihad's founder and a mission statement for a charity considered a fundraising arm for the terrorist group.
Defense attorneys argued the Web-based evidence shouldn't be admitted. Computers automatically download files from Web sites that may or may not be desired by the viewer, defense attorney Kevin Beck said. Beck said prosecutors cannot prove who actually viewed the Web pages.
The Web hits may be part of the case for proving a material support for terrorists charge. In overruling the defense objections, U.S. District Judge James Moody said the government has the burden of proving the defendants knew the Islamic Jihad engaged in violence. One way to do that, he said, is to show what information they may have seen about the group. Defense attorneys can attack the gaps in proof when they get to cross examine Arndt, Moody said.
Posted by: Mrs. Davis ||
06/28/2005 16:36 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
FBI can't make wiretaps work
/Ima way past verclemped
Posted by: Red Dog ||
06/28/2005 21:58 Comments ||
Top||
#2
should make em watch "The Conversation" with Gene Hackman about 10 times
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/28/2005 22:14 Comments ||
Top||
#3
They'd better go to Plan B, because I want Al-Arian to go down.
Update on a story from a few weeks back.
DALLAS - A group for mothers whose children died in war voted Monday to allow non-U.S. citizens to join, after coming under criticism for denying membership to a Filipina mother whose son was killed in Afghanistan.
The 1929 charter of American Gold Star Mothers had prevented foreign citizens from joining. Earlier this year, the organization's 12-member executive board voted against changing the rule. That prevented Ligaya Lagman, of Yonkers, N.Y., from joining, although she is a legal resident and her son, 27-year-old son Army Staff Sgt. Anthony Lagman, was a U.S. citizen. After hearing about her interest in joining, New York Gov. George Pataki and other lawmakers urged the group to change its rules.
"Quite simply, the loss a mother endures when her son or daughter makes the ultimate sacrifice for our nation â is no less honorable or admirable because of her citizenship status," Pataki said Monday.
The change was approved unanimously Monday during the American Gold Star Mothers' annual convention in the Dallas area. "This change to our constitution was the right thing to do, but we had to make the change the right way," said Judith Young, the group's new president.
More than 140 military service members who were not U.S. citizens have died in Iraq and Afghanistan. Legal residents who are not citizens have long served in the U.S. military.
#3
Good for them, too... good they could see how things are now as rthey are, not how they might have been 50 years ago.
And I speak as one whose grandmother was a member, from 1943 (on the death of my uncle over Germany) on to her own death in the early 1990ies. They do good work, not least in helping their own membership to come to terms with the most horrible of losses.
Christmas 2003 became a season of terror after the federal government raised the terror alert level from yellow to orange, grimly citing credible intelligence of another assault on the United States. "These credible sources," announced then-Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge, "suggest the possibility of attacks against the homeland around the holiday season and beyond."
For weeks, America was on edge as security operations went into high gear. Almost 30 international flights were canceled, inconveniencing passengers flying Air France, British Air, Continental and Aero Mexico. But senior U.S. officials now tell NBC News that the key piece of information that triggered the holiday alert was a bizarre CIA analysis, which turned out to be all wrong.
CIA analysts mistakenly thought they'd discovered a mother lode of secret al-Qaida messages. They thought they had found secret messages on Al-Jazeera, the Arabic-language television news channel, hidden in the moving text at the bottom of the screen, known as the "crawl," where news headlines are summarized.
U.S. officials tell NBC News that CIA experts â technicians working for the Directorate of Science and Technology â thought they had found numbers embedded in the crawl signaling upcoming attacks; dates and flight numbers, and geographic coordinates for targets, including the White House, Seattle's Space Needle, even the tiny town of Tappahanock, Va. What the analysts thought they had found was something called "steganography" â messages hidden inside a video image.
President Bush and Ridge were briefed on the Al-Jazeera analysis, U.S. intelligence sources say.
In an exclusive interview with NBC News, Ridge defended the government's actions, although he called the intelligence analysis "bizarre, unique, unorthodox, unprecedented." "Maybe that's very much the reason that you'd be worried about it, because you hadn't seen it before," recalls Ridge. He says the administration had to take the suspected terror messages seriously, although "speaking for myself I've got to admit to wondering whether or not it was credible."
Was he himself skeptical? "Yeah, we weren't certain," says Ridge. "Still, in the context of everything else (intelligence chatter and a terror attack in Saudi Arabia), we could not set it aside and dismiss it as not credible."
So the United States raised the alert level and canceled flights.
"I'm astonished," says author and intelligence expert Jim Bamford, "that they would put so much credibility in such a weak source of intelligence." Bamford says the CIA shouldn't be criticized for considering the theory, but that analysts should have weighed how implausible it was. "What you have to do is judge the intelligence versus what your actions are going to be. And this is the equivalent, basically, of looking at tea leaves," Bamford says.
Intelligence sources say that even within the CIA, the analysis was a closely guarded secret. Still, they say, some top CIA officials who learned about it were skeptical. Top officials at the Directorate of Operations, which conducts clandestine operations, and others who worked at the CIA Counterterrorism Center, felt that the whole theory was implausible and was being taken far too seriously.
As discredited as the CIA's interpretation now is, experts say steganography is a valid subject for CIA analysis, and could be used by terrorists to hide data in files on the Web, in still photographs or in broadcast television images. "Steganography," says professor Nasir Memon of Polytechnic University in Brooklyn, N.Y., "is the art, if you will, of secret writing. And when two parties want to talk to each other and not let anybody know they are indeed communicating, they would use steganography."
Memon is an expert in "steganalysis" â using sophisticated software to locate hidden messages. He says such analysis is valuable but not always reliable, because there are many "false positives." In general, he says, "it's not something I would bet the farm on because there is a significant chance that it could be wrong."
TV networks commonly hide digital "watermarks" in their video broadcasts, a legitimate use of video encoding to pass along innocuous digital information. The CIA's Al-Jazeera analysis is classified, and it is still unclear exactly what the CIA technicians were looking for in the network's "crawl."
Regardless, Ridge told NBC News that the CIA analysis certainly did turn out to be wrong. He confirms there were no secret terror messages. He also says there was no evidence that terrorists were actively plotting against aviation at the time.
But Ridge insisted it was not a mistake to raise the alert level or to cancel the flights. "I think it was the right thing to do," he said.
Even if raising the alert level frightened a lot of people? "We acted accordingly based on our best information and best conclusions and the information that we had at the time," Ridge said. Ridge added that the faulty CIA analysis was a significant factor in raising the alert level, but not the only factor.
As for the CIA, a spokeswoman would not confirm or deny this report, but said it's the "agency's job to run all plausible theories to the ground, especially when American lives could be at risk."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/28/2005 09:54 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[9 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Lessee ... weren't there a bunch of skeptics on September 10th, who were later vilified? Hindsight is always 20-20. Must be a slow news day.
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/28/2005 11:04 Comments ||
Top||
#2
It's getting air-time because the CIA had the audacity to 'meddle' with a media outlet. Call it 'circling the wagons'.
#3
More like Mexico and Canada will tighten their security to prevent Americans from getting into those countries while helping anyone and everyone, from wherever and for whatever reason, to get into the U.S.
And if some of those people just happen to commit terrorist acts in the U.S., that will be icing on the cake. :-(
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
06/28/2005 12:32 Comments ||
Top||
#4
Whatever. The people in the beltway want to to believe in fairy tales, they can't handle the truth. I don't really beleive that either Mexico or Canada is going to do anything for our security. Mexico is far too corrupt to be believed on anything. I foresee the US spending billions in our tax dollars to enrich a few corrupt politicians who will put the money in Swiss bank accounts and then run off to Spain once the treasury is drained. Oh, did anybody happen to tell the beltway people that Mexico WILL TAKE A BRIBE FROM ANYONE!! This is what the best and brightest amoung has to offer ? Sad.
The United States is ending eight years of often difficult relations with Iran under President Mohammad Khatami, who portrays himself as a reformer. Now, it must contend with President-elect Mahmud Ahmadinejad, who is seen as a hard- liner. U.S. President George W. Bush reiterated Monday that it would be "unacceptable" for Tehran to obtain a nuclear weapon or the ability to make one. Bush also criticized the election itself, saying a vote is never free and fair when a group of unelected people get to decide who is on the ballot. Will Ahmadinejad's term mean more difficult relations between Iran and America?
At a postelection news conference, Iranian President-elect Mahmud Ahmadinejad said Tehran's policy toward the United States has been clear and consistent for decades.
Iran, he said, is a strong nation and doesn't need the Americans.
Despite this rigid stance, Ahmadinejad appeared to have softened his words, although he did not mention the United States by name.
"We will consider diplomatic relations with any nation that is not hostile with the Islamic Republic [of Iran] and Iran's people," Ahmadinejad said. "I think those who are willing to develop diplomatic relations with the Islamic Republic need to state their policies transparently so our government, our nation, our system can examine them."
Does this mean Ahmadinejad is prepared to work to improve relations with the United States?
Ted Carpenter, the vice president for defense and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, a private research institute in Washington, said he believes that question should be reversed.
Carpenter told RFE/RL that the administration of George W. Bush is concerned that Iranian hard-liners and its country's religious leadership might have ties to Al-Qaeda. They are also worried that Ahmadinejad's government will proceed with Iran's nuclear program without restraint, he said.
"The problem is not whether the Iranian government might be willing to cut deals with the United States; we really don't know what their position is going to be," Carpenter said. "But it's unlikely that the United States is going to be very interested in cutting a deal with this government. I think [the Bush administration] sees this as the final triumph of the hard-liners."
Carpenter also said much of the Bush administration's view of Iran and its intentions might be distorted because it is based largely on information from Iranian dissidents and exiles. He comparef this to the run-up to the Iraq war two years ago when, he said, the administration was also largely misinformed about the situation inside the country.
"In dealing with [Middle Eastern] exile groups, we should not only take their views with a grain of salt," Carpenter said. "We should do so with the entire salt shaker at hand (be extremely skeptical). They are usually not representative of the larger population back home. They're better educated. They tend to be more urban. They're the type of people all too often that we want so desperately to win in these societies, but they typically are weaker than we believe that they are."
Carpenter said the United States might have to get used to the idea that Ahmadinejad's government actually does enjoy broad popular support.
Anthony Cordesman, a former intelligence analyst for the Defense and State departments, said it is too early even to begin to guess the direction Ahmadinejad will take in foreign policy.
Cordesman said too little is known about Ahmadinejad. He said there is no way to tell how he would deal with the Majlis, Iran's parliament, or with the country's religious leaders, led by Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The only clue so far to Ahmadinejad's intentions, Cordesman said, is what he said during his presidential campaign.
"It is certainly clear that he did not run on improving relations with the U.S. In fact, he took the opposite viewpoint," Cordesman said. "The difficulty is, can he change his position? The other difficulty is, does the supreme leader want him to? This president is not really the leader of the country. It is Khamenei who is going to make these decisions."
In fact, Cordesman said, Ahmadinejad, only now finishing his job as mayor of Tehran, probably doesn't yet have a foreign policy of his own, given his alternately hard-line and conciliatory messages at his 26 June news conference.
"I think it's fairly clear that [Ahmadinejad] has not solidified his foreign policy," Cordesman said. "We're going to have to wait and see how much he purges the former president's [Khamenei's] Foreign Ministry, how much he articulates a new foreign policy. It's going to be a matter of interacting with U.S. policy. And right now, it's not clear that there's a great deal of incentive for him to take any risks or to push for changes unless he's sure that the United States is going to respond in kind."
Cordesman said the world should expect both sides to spend a lot of time exploring each other's intentions before either settles on a firm policy.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/28/2005 11:06 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[7 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Anthony Cordesman, a former intelligence analyst for the Defense and State departments, said it is too early even to begin to guess the direction Ahmadinejad will take in foreign policy.
Lets wait and see whether water really runs downhill.
#2
Like Brookings, any Cato Institute pronouncement should be met with skepticism. Especially Cato and foreign policy. It's like an undertaker giving out health and fitness advice.
On September 12, 2001, commanders from Iran's Revolutionary Guards gathered in Tehran. General Mohammad Ahayi began his speech with a verse from the Koran: "Whosoever battles with Allah, Allah will do battle with him."
General Ayahi then turned to his fellow commanders. Did you see how we (banging his fist into his chest) brought them down? How we brought America to its knees?
Colonel B, a Revolutionary Guards officer, was in the audience. Just the year before, he had been assigned to a terrorist training camp northeast of Tehran, and had seen with his own eyes the Lebanese, Libyans, Azeris, Chechens, Iraqis, and others who had come to Iran to learn the disciplines of murder.
He turned to a friend, the intelligence director of the Qods battalion, the Revolutionary Guards' overseas action arm responsible for terrorist attacks and assassinations. "Did we have anything to do with this event?" he asked.
His friend smiled and admonished him with a shake of his finger. "Don't dig into details. Leave it alone. You don't want to know more."
"How come I wasn't told about any of this before?" Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz asked.
The date was October 26, 2001. Mr. Wolfowitz had just learned from a Defense Intelligence Agency briefer about the al Qaeda "rat line" that operated between Afghanistan and Europe, with the full knowledge and cooperation of the Iranian government. Once they crossed the border into Iran, al Qaeda operatives were welcomed at special camps outside the eastern Iranian city of Mashad, then given fresh travel documents so they could travel on to Europe and America without arousing suspicion, the briefer said. The level of cooperation between Iran and al Qaeda was stunning, and went against everything Mr. Wolfowitz thought he knew.
The briefer mumbled some excuse to Mr. Wolfowitz's question. But the real reason was that DIA higher-ups had forbidden the analysts from presenting the briefing to Mr. Wolfowitz earlier because it contradicted "the Concept" -- the intelligence community's firm belief that Iran had no operational ties to al Qaeda and had gotten out of the terror game with President Mohammad Khatami's election in 1997. It also violated the doctrine that had become a matter of faith among Middle East analysts and "experts" on Islam that there could be no cooperation between the Shia and Sunni fundamentalists.
Whenever intelligence personnel or journalists turned up evidence that al Qaeda was working with Iran, those analysts made sure the reports were discredited. Bucking the conventional wisdom was an invitation to ridicule, as the briefer's colleagues at the DIA's tiny Iran unit at Bolling Air Force Base knew well. They had gotten approval to brief Mr. Wolfowitz only because he had explicitly tasked the DIA to examine the possibility of Iran/al Qaeda ties -- a possibility their political bosses at the DIA's policy support office in the Pentagon had discounted long ago.
Al Qaeda had been working with Iran since at least 1992, when Iranian general Mohammad Bagr Zolqadr was running a Revolutionary Guard training camp in the Sudan, the briefer said. Zolqadr's ties to Osama bin Laden had been brokered by Ayman al-Zawahri -- the Egyptian terrorist known as "the Doctor."
Zawahri and his Egyptian Islamic Jihad group provided the muscle men for al Qaeda, giving bin Laden access to a virtually unlimited pool of manpower. Zawahri was the man with the Iran contacts. Throughout the 1990s, he traveled repeatedly to Iran as the guest of Minister of Intelligence and Security Ali Fallahian and the head of foreign terrorist operations, Ahmad Vahidi. Vahidi was the commander of the Qods Force and the man who supervised the 1996 Khobar Towers bombing.
In the months before Sept. 11, Egyptian Islamic Jihad commanders transited in large numbers through Mashad en route to Afghanistan to join bin Laden's ranks, the briefer said. They had solid reporting and hard evidence from human sources and from national technical means confirming the rat line.
Bin Laden preferred the Iranian route because he believed that U.S. intelligence officials were monitoring Pakistani airports and were responsible for the arrest of several of his top operatives during the last six years.
Seven to ten days before the Sept. 11 attacks, Iran suddenly closed the Mashad rat line to the Egyptian jihadis, the briefer said. Some sources believe it was because the Iranians knew a major terrorist attack was about to occur and didn't want to give the United States cause for military retaliation against Iran.
The latest piece of the puzzle was still being evaluated, he said. Just one week ago, the DIA had reports that the notorious terrorist Imad Mugniyeh had come to Mashad with Hossein Mosleh, Vahidi's deputy. According to one source, the two met with Iraqi intelligence chief Tahir Jalil Habbush.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/28/2005 10:02 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[8 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
W.O.W.
I had always thought that the MM in Iran weere involved with Al Queda, but never to this extent. In legal terms, this is at least "accessory before the fact" in terms of culpability for 9/11.
#2
Looks like the Shemiranat district was a bit overzealous. I guess all that Koran studying takes its toll on learning basic arithmetic. [Remember Saddam's last election? No extra voters, and all the voters were in complete agreement. A model of unity.]
Posted by: Tom ||
06/28/2005 10:27 Comments ||
Top||
#3
wasnt modern arithmetic originally concieved of by muslim scholars
Posted by: bk ||
06/28/2005 12:08 Comments ||
Top||
#4
sounds like Washington state's governer's election
Posted by: bk ||
06/28/2005 12:10 Comments ||
Top||
#5
bk
IMO, Islam's most important achievement in math is transmitting hindu numerals to the west, especially the zero
there were some talented mathematicians (I think the word 'algebra' is arabic in origin) and, in fact, some interesting algebaic arguments have been advanced to resolve the anomalies in the Quran with respect to inheritance (a straight forward reading of a number of inheritance cases results in the estate being divided up into more than 100%).
#6
"the estate being divided up into more than 100%"
ROTFL
mhw, are you serious? Sounds like the Shemiranat district is just using the same 6th century algebra!
Posted by: Tom ||
06/28/2005 13:14 Comments ||
Top||
#7
Tom
Sura 4:11-12 and 4:176 state [some of the] the Qur'anic inheritance law. When a man dies, and is leaving behind three daughters, his two parents and his wife, they will receive the respective shares of 2/3 for the 3 daughters together, 1/3 for the parents together [both according to verse 4:11] and 1/8 for the wife [4:12] which adds up to more than the available estate. A second example: A man leaves only his mother, his wife and two sisters, then they receive 1/3 [mother, 4:11], 1/4 [wife, 4:12] and 2/3 [the two sisters, 4:176], which again adds up to 15/12 of the available property.
- from a part of http://www.geocities.com/freethoughtmecca/quranlogic.html
Nope. You can say Algebra was invented in Babylon (where there was found a method for solving the second degree equation and there is also a very fast algoritrhm for extracting squatre roots called the Babylonian method of square root extraction) but Babylon was waaaaaaay before Islam.
And according to Ibn Warrak all scientific "islamic" progress was made either by dhimmis or by people who were only nominally muslims (and often openly hostile to Muhammad's teachings). There was never a Muslim Cauchy (Cauchy was one of the greatest mathematicians in all time and an ardent Catholic. Ardent as in hearing mass several times a week)
#9
I'm no Catholic but several years of Anglican/Episocopalian services have given me an excellent sense of time, how it can stand still, reverse, etc.
#10
It was worse in me Baptist upbringing, the powers of the Frist Baptist Church would subtlely change the timing of the service to foil my inner church watch.
Russia wants to construct up to six new nuclear reactors for
Iran, despite U.S. criticism of its assistance to the Islamic republic, Moscow's top nuclear boss was quoted as saying on Tuesday.
Russia has pressed ahead with construction of Iran's first nuclear power plant near the southern city of Bushehr, dismissing Washington's belief that Tehran could use Moscow's technology and know-how to make an atom bomb. "When Iran announces new tenders to construct nuclear reactors, we'll take part in them," Alexander Rumyantsev, head of Russia's Atomic Energy Agency, told Itar-Tass news agency.
"Tehran intends to build another six nuclear reactors."
Rumyantsev's remarks came just days after Russian President
Vladimir Putin said Moscow would continue developing nuclear ties with Iran after ultra-conservative Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's election as president of the Islamic Republic last week.
Iran says its nuclear program is peaceful.
For Russia, Iran is a key market in the Middle East as it seeks a bigger share of the global nuclear industry, but Moscow is worried it may lose its near-monopoly status there as its Western rivals try to push into the Iranian market.
Moscow and Tehran, whose nuclear ties date back to the early 1990s, signed a fuel supply deal earlier this year that paved the way for Bushehr to start up in late 2006. Once operational, Bushehr will generate 1,000 megawatts of electricity. Initiated before Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution and badly damaged during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, the project was later revived with Russian help and has cost about $1 billion.
Posted by: ed ||
06/28/2005 06:27 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[9 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Cold War over? Nah. Putty Putputz. Meet the new Kremlin Boss, same as the old Kremlin Boss. I'm thinking it's time to start paying back in kind - sabotaging everything Russian, every deal, every power play, everything. Close up shop on the ISS until we can boost our own folks up. Cut off the hard currency flow - dealing with Putty & Co is precisely the same as dealing with Arabs. They take whatever they can get, then give you shit in return and goodwill gestures buy you nothing - in fact, that merely becomes the new starting point for the next negotiation.
Patton had it dead solid perfect right 60+ yrs ago, and we should sincerely regret that Ike, Marshall, et al were too thick and too full of politics to listen.
Lebanon's anti-Syria coalition is accepting the return of a staunch Damascus ally as parliament speaker, focusing its energy instead on picking a new prime minister â and the real fight, forming a new government. The coalition wants to put together the first Lebanese government in years not dominated by Syria's allies. But it must win the approval of President Emile Lahoud, the country's most powerful pro-Damascus politician, who will seek to ensure his camp has a place in the Cabinet.
Outgoing parliament speaker Nabih Berri was all but assured of retaining his post when the new legislature votes on a speaker during its inaugural session Tuesday. For 13 years, Berri has been seen as one of the enforcers of Syria's policies in Lebanon. But Berri â a Shiite Muslim, as the speaker must be under Lebanon's sectarian division of posts â will preside over a very different body. For years, Syria dominated Lebanon and its Lebanese allies controlled parliament. In elections over the past weeks, the anti-Syrian coalition won a strong majority in the 128-member body. The main factions of the coalition announced their acceptance of Berri, leader of the Shiite Amal party. Trying to stop him would have meant a political fight with Amal and the Hezbollah movement, which together hold 36 seats in parliament and want Berri in the post. That would have strained the coalition. Walid Jumblatt, a top anti-Syrian leader, backed Berri because he owed Hezbollah and Amal a favor after they helped him in the elections â one of the many convoluted alliances that arose during the vote.
Fourteen Christian lawmakers from the alliance debated Monday whether to vote against Berri or cast blank ballots. They didn't agree on a stance, but in any case their votes can't stop Berri. The 14-member parliamentary bloc headed by Gen. Michel Aoun, the Christian opposition leader, decided during a meeting Monday to cast blank ballots. In a statement, the bloc lamented the lack of "an opportunity for a complete democratic choice" in the speaker race.
The anti-Syrian alliance is focusing on using its new legislative majority to pick the prime minister, the parliament's next step after selecting a speaker. Two names have been touted as likely candidates: former finance minister Fuad Saniora or former justice minister Bahij Tabbara, both close associates of Saad Hariri, the son of slain former prime minister Rafik Hariri. Another possibility is the current caretaker prime minister, Najib Mikati, who has ties to Syria. He was seen as a compromise candidate â more acceptable to Lahoud.
Within coming days, Lahoud will start polling lawmakers for their choice of prime minister and under the constitution he must accept whoever has the most backing. But he is free to approve or reject the Cabinet that the premier-designate puts together. If parliament puts forward a government too heavily anti-Syrian, Lahoud could veto it, leaving Mikati's current Cabinet in place — possibly for months.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/28/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Mmm. Are they trying to split off Amal, in the case of a showdown?
I don't know, I find the longer I look at Lebanon, the less I understand it...
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
06/28/2005 8:09 Comments ||
Top||
#2
look at it this way and it is easier to understand. The anti-syrian forces aren't anti-syrian. They are pro-keeping their seat at the power table. Only Hezbollah and Aoun are honest about their true intent. Otherwise, this is just a shuffling of the seating chart to appease the angry masses.
#1
Goodness gracious! No wonder the MSM doen't report all of this! There is way too much! Why, I have read a John Le Carre novel, just to prove that I could, so I do read above the 5th grade level, but there is too much for me to handle here! Maybe Dubya will summarize tonight?
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/28/2005 16:05 Comments ||
Top||
Iraq's most powerful Shiite cleric appeared to offer a major concession to the Sunni Arab minority on Monday when he indicated that he would support changes in the voting system that would probably give Sunnis more seats in the future parliament.
In a meeting with a group of Sunni and Shiite leaders, the cleric, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, outlined a proposal that would scrap the system used in the January election, according to a secular Shiite political leader, Abdul Aziz al-Yasiri, who was at the meeting. The election had a huge turnout by Shiites and Kurds but was mostly boycotted by Sunni Arabs.
Such a change would need to be written into Iraq's new constitution, which parliamentarians are drafting for an Aug. 15 deadline. Although there has been little public talk about what form elections might take under the constitution, Ayatollah Sistani has been highly influential in Iraq's nascent political system.
Under the proposal, voters in national elections would select leaders from each of the 19 provinces instead of choosing from a single country-wide list, as they did in January. The new system would essentially set aside a number of seats for Sunnis roughly proportionate to their numbers in the population, ensuring that no matter how low the Sunni turnout, they would be guaranteed seats.
Sunni Arabs welcomed news of the suggestion. "This should have been done from the beginning," said Saleh Mutlak, a member of the National Dialogue Council, a Sunni Arab political group that has pressed for a more active role in politics. "That election was wrong."
The January elections ended in a decisive victory for Shiite Arabs and Kurds, leaving just 17 seats for Sunni Arabs in the 275-seat National Assembly. Voting in largely Sunni areas was extremely low, depressed by threats from insurgent groups who opposed the election.
Also on Monday, two American soldiers were killed when their Apache helicopter crashed about 11 a.m. near Taiji, a large air base northwest of Baghdad, said Master Sgt. Greg Kaufman, a military spokesman. It was the third loss of an American helicopter in about a month.
The military did not say what caused the crash. The Associated Press quoted an Iraqi witness as saying a rocket had hit it, and other witnesses heard heavy gunfire. Sergeant Kaufman could not confirm any of the details.
Another American was killed Monday in central Baghdad while he helped Iraqi policemen investigate a burning car, the military said.
In a Pentagon briefing on Monday, the top American commander in Iraq, Gen. George W. Casey Jr., confirmed that American and Iraqi officials had been meeting with Sunni leaders in Iraq in hopes of defusing the insurgency and drawing their followers into the political process. General Casey denied that the meetings constituted negotiations, and said he was unaware of any direct contacts with insurgent fighters.
"They're discussions primarily aimed at bringing these Sunni leaders and the people they represent into the political process," he said at a briefing with Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. "But to characterize them as negotiations with insurgents about stopping the insurgency, we're not quite there yet."
Both General Casey and Mr. Rumsfeld have said there have not been any contacts with foreign fighters like the Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who is believed to be responsible for some of the most deadly suicide attacks in Iraq.
The statements by Ayatollah Sistani are the latest foray into Iraqi politics by the Shiite leader. Pressure from him was a major factor in establishing an accelerated timetable for the elections in January. That pace, however, largely dictated the election's countrywide system, because United Nations organizers considered it the simplest and quickest way to organize the vote.
When United Nations officials met with the ayatollah in March, he chastised them for choosing the system, and said he favored setting assembly seats aside district by district, a preference he reiterated Monday. Mr. Yasiri, the Shiite politician, said Ayatollah Sistani had characterized the January election as flawed.
In the past, the ayatollah has reserved his efforts to pushing for measures, like nationwide elections, that were likely to enhance the power of Iraq's Shiite majority. His endorsement of a new voting system seemed to be made out of concern for the delicacy of the current political situation here.
"He said there were a lot of mistakes," Mr. Yasiri said. "He said this election must be different than the old one. He said we prefer that all the people share in it."
In other news, Iraq's foreign minister under Saddam Hussein, Tariq Aziz, in a videotape of his interrogation that was released Monday and described by Agence France-Presse, said Mr. Hussein had personally ordered the crackdown on a Shiite uprising in 1991 without consulting top aides. The testimony could help prosecutors build a case against Mr. Hussein for his trial.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/28/2005 11:44 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Sistani seems to be a pretty good ace in our hand when it comes to putting out bonfires before they start.
Posted by: bk ||
06/28/2005 12:05 Comments ||
Top||
#3
So, the solution to fears of excess democracy is republicanism. I wonder if Sistani will next propose a bicameral parliament, the upper house republican, and the lower house based on population?
#6
Iraq's most powerful Shiite cleric appeared to offer a major concession to the Sunni Arab minority on Monday when he indicated that he would support changes in the voting system that would probably give Sunnis more seats in the future parliament.
His call. After all, he's gonna have to live with the consequences, if there are to be any. (this assumes he doesn't bug out should the situation spin out of control)
..Tariq Aziz, in a videotape of his interrogation that was released Monday and described by Agence France-Presse, said Mr. Hussein had personally ordered the crackdown on a Shiite uprising in 1991 without consulting top aides.
Hmmmm, I wasn't aware that it was necessary to actually "consult" top aides in a dictatorship...
#7
"Voting in largely Sunni areas was extremely low, depressed by threats from insurgent groups who opposed the election."
Although in reality, the Sunnis only have themselves to blame for intentionally boycotting the election.
#8
So this canard about Sunni seating is still circulating. Across all parties, there were 49 Sunnis elected. Including the Kurds, who are also Sunni, there were well over 100. Also, BTW, across all parties there were 15 Sadrists elected, not just the 3 always mentioned in the overtly Sadrist party.
Posted by: Brian H ||
06/28/2005 20:52 Comments ||
Top||
#9
just like the IDF wanted a "wider role" for St. Corrie?
Posted by: Frank G ||
06/28/2005 21:15 Comments ||
Top||
Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari yesterday said terrorist training camps outside his country must be targeted for elimination to stem the flow of foreign insurgents illegally entering the country to wreak havoc on Iraqi citizens.
"We should look at their sources. It's not impossible to tackle them at their sources. Some of them are based abroad. We need to tackle their bases abroad," Mr. al-Jaafari said.
"There are bases in other countries outside our borders that are feeding these terrorist networks. They are training them. They are giving them money. What's happening in Iraq is not isolated," Mr. al-Jaafari said. "We cannot look at it in isolation. In fact, we should look at the impact of what's happening in Iraq on the whole world."
Mr. al-Jaafari appeared on CNN's "Late Edition" with Wolf Blitzer and confirmed that captured insurgents say they had training in Syria and carried passports from Saudi Arabia, Sudan and other foreign countries.
"I am not saying their governments are responsible, but we are looking at their nationality. This gives us an indication that there is a reasonable dimension to this terrorism and not simply an Iraqi phenomenon. It has intermingled with these sources. We expect governments to do more to tackle this issue," Mr. al-Jaafari said.
"I would say governments might not know what's happening in their countries. But in reality, their countries have become hubs, where young people are being trained, are being indoctrinated to go and commit mass murder," Mr. al-Jaafari said.
Mr. al-Jaafari, although he did accuse specific countries in this context, said some nations "are allowing loose control over their borders or transfer of monies." That'd be the Soddies ...
"Or some countries even are sympathetic to these insurgents." That'd be Syria and Iran.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
06/28/2005 09:56 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
Airbus parent company EADS recently announced its choice of a site in Alabama to build a new refuelling plane for the US military, as part of its bid to win the USAF's $23.5 billion contract to supply the next generation of air-air refuelling aircraft. EADS said the Brookley Industrial Complex in Mobile, AL had beaten off competition from Florida, Mississippi and South Carolina as part of a very competitive process to host the "KC-330 Advanced Tanker" production facility, which would hire up to 1,100 personnel if EADS should win against Boeing's KC-767. The A330 was selected as Britain's next-generation tanker aircraft, for instance, in an innovative leasing arrangement that echoes some aspects of the cancelled Boeing KC-767 deal. This effort is also interesting in light of EADS recent corporate and legislative challenges.
EADS took pains to stress that the company was in Alabama for the long haul, with an on-site "Airbus Engineering Center" that EADS spokespeople claim will begin recruiting next year. The company has been working hard to improve its access to the U.S. defense market, despite congressional hostility and legislative proposals that has hampered its efforts to be considered for military contracts, and even put a crimp in project-related alliance discussions with U.S. contractors like Northrop Grumman. Efforts to become a "more American" company and create job dependencies in key congressional districts are certainly part of that game. The firm has also been reeling lately over a major executive battle that has left its top jobs in limbo, even as the cost of the super-jumbo A380 has left the firm somewhat tight for cash and rival Boeing has surged ahead with projects like the 777 and 787. That executive conflict was recently resolved, but it has cost the company considerable momentum and some fallout from that conflict is expected to persist.
I'd perfer Boeing, but just hurry up and get us a new tanker before the KC-135's start falling out of the skies.
Posted by: Steve ||
06/28/2005 09:41 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
..even as the cost of the super-jumbo A380 has left the firm somewhat tight for cash and..
Haahahahahaha, why would they care? If the A380 isn't a commercial success, what is Airbus going to do, go out of business? Not likely, when aircraft development costs are subsidized.
If Airbus wants a shot at a defense contract, tell 'em they have to stop subsidizing their commercial airplane development, otherwise no dice.
Pakistan's Supreme Court has suspended the acquittals of five men in a notorious gang rape case that has sparked worldwide outrage. The Supreme Court said it would retry the men convicted and then acquitted of raping Mukhtar Mai in 2002, allegedly on the orders of a village council. Ms Mai, who had appealed against the acquittals, said she was delighted with the decision.
The court ordered the men be detained in judicial custody until the trial. The acquittals had earlier been ordered by the Lahore High Court in March on the grounds of lack of evidence. The Supreme Court will now try a total of 14 men - the five acquitted by the Lahore court, a sixth man whose death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment by that court and another eight men acquitted at the original trial. The date of the new trial has yet to be fixed.
Ms Mai, who was in court with human rights activists to hear the ruling, said she hoped she would finally get justice. "I am very happy. I am feeling highly satisfied," Ms Mai, 33, said.
Congratulations. Now, double your bodyguard.
A village council allegedly ordered the rape because her younger brother was seen with a woman from a more influential tribe.
Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry said in the ruling: "The inspector general of Punjab police is directed to arrest them and hand them over to judicial custody, pending final disposal of the appeals."
The arrest order is a legal mechanism as all 14 men are already in custody.
The case acquired political overtones after President Pervez Musharraf barred Ms Mai from travelling abroad, fearing she might undermine Pakistan's image. The government has stationed police at her home in Meerwala, in central Punjab province, saying she needs protection. But she has complained that she is under virtual house arrest.
On Monday Ms Mai confirmed she had now been given back her passport.
Critics of Pakistan's judicial and social systems say the Mukhtar Mai case is an example of appalling treatment often handed out to women, particularly in feudal, rural areas. President Musharraf says the case is not representative. "We are no worse than any other developing country," he said earlier this month during a tour of New Zealand.
Ms Mai spoke of her ordeal in an interview with the Christian Science Monitor on Monday. She said: "I had three choices. Either to commit suicide by jumping in a well or shed tears all my life like any other victim in such cases, or challenge the cruel feudal and tribal system and harsh attitudes of society." She also said she had been flooded with marriage proposals but believed most were motivated by greed.
"I could see dollars flashing in their eyes. I tell them if you want to marry me then live with me in the village and serve the people. Then they don't return."
Posted by: Steve ||
06/28/2005 09:26 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
A Syrian diplomatic and security delegation will travel to Baghdad on Tuesday for talks with Iraqi officials on methods of cooperation in different domains, a Syrian diplomatic source said Monday. The source said in a statement the delegation would be headed by Ambassador Mohammad Saeed Al-Bunni and would convey a message from foreign minister Farouk Al-Shara to his Iraqi counterpart Hoshiyar Zebari. The Syrian delegation, added the source, would discuss necessary steps to open the Syrian embassy in Baghdad.
Interesting diplo factoid:
Syrian-Iraqi Diplomatic ties severed in 1980, but the neighboring states agreed in the mid-1990s to resume economic ties through interest sections under the Algerian flag.
The Afghan government has not yet "formally informed" Pakistan about the arrest of its three nationals for allegedly plotting to kill former US ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, Foreign Office spokesman Jalil Abbas Jillani said on Monday. "Neither was Pakistan's embassy in Kabul approached nor did the Afghanistan Embassy in Islamabad inform the Foreign Office about the arrests," Jillani told Daily Times on the phone from the Lahore airport before his departure for India.
He said no consular access was granted to the three young Pakistanis in Kabul. "That is why we say there are many holes and we demand an independent inquiry," the FO spokesman said, adding that Kabul had not provided evidence about the three men's involvement in the alleged plot. Both the Afghan embassy in Islamabad and consulate in Peshawar declined to comment on Kabul's reluctance to inform Islamabad about the arrests through diplomatic channels. "We cannot comment," a senior Afghan diplomat in Peshawar told Daily Times.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/28/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
we are waiting for the bruises and burns to heal.
Tanzeem Hablillah, a non-government organisation, has called for Muslims to boycott American products. "Muslims should boycott American products because the US has desecrated the Holy Quran, ridiculed the Islamic way of life and made a woman into an imam," said Dr Iftikhar Hussain Waris, patron-in-chief of Tanzeem Hablillah, at a meeting on Sunday. Dr Waris said Americans were prejudiced against Islam. He urged Muslims to boycott American products as they were "minting money" from Pakistan and that money was being used against Muslims.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/28/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Love the picture. Is this like Mardi Gras, do they throw garlands of beads when you 'show us your Koran'?
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/28/2005 0:31 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Yes I agree, all leftists and islamonazis *should* boycott American goods, because posting mindless drivel onto the net without a cpu would be a truly character-building challenge for them.
#5
I'll bet the Aisha figure looks like a 9 yr old Barbie, only not so blonde and everything.
On the minting money thingy, what's he smoking? I'm thinking, just for instance, that PepsiCo isn't using any PakiWakiLand profits against Muzzies. I have it on good authority that they just luvs the Muzzies, and hate Americans, to boot. Why the upper mgmt would make fine PakiWakis.
#6
I got your Aisha here. I imagine Mo looked a lot like crazy eyed ayatollahs such as Khomenei, since Khomenei and co. spent a lifetime emulating Mohammed and, much like dogs, come to look like their master.
Posted by: ed ||
06/28/2005 2:29 Comments ||
Top||
#7
Lol, ed! The Iranian woman looks suitably unimpressed / skeptical / critical, heh. And the Aisha / Sara is dressed like an Eskimo... in a tutu... in the desert... hahahahahahaha!
#14
Yep, keep buying all that cheap Russian military equipment. Excellent in keeping the local population down. Just makes the job easier for the Americans if you make that one stupid mistake and provoke them.
The Islami Jamiat Talaba, which has considerable influence in the Punjab University (PU), launched a religious training camp, 'Feham-e-Din', in the unviersity's New (Quaid-e-Azam) Campus on Sunday afternoon. The IJT is the youth wing of the Jamaat-e-Islami
PU authorities categorically denied having knowledge of such activities on campus, which are illegal, but refrained to rule out the possibility that a camp had been set up underground. The 12-day training camp, which has been privately organised by select IJT members, is being attended by about 200 people from all over Pakistan. IJT activists from outside are staying in the Quaid-e-Azam Hall (hostel number one) and Alamgir Hall (hostel number seven) of the New Campus. The camp courses include topics related to religion. "Jihad may be one of the topics," said an IJT member. "The situation of Muslims all over the world and the Kashmir issue might be discussed in formal or informal discussions. It is all in-house. There will be no public gathering." The programme was inaugurated in the Institute of Chemical Engineering and Technology of the Punjab University and was attended by top IJT leaders. PU students witnessed flocks of IJT supporters chanting pro-IJT and anti-government slogans.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/28/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[3 views]
Top|| File under:
An Afghan Foreign Ministry spokesman on Monday called the statement of Pakistani Information Minister Sheikh Rashid saying Pashtuns in Afghanistan were being ignored despite being in majority an interference in Afghanistan's internal affairs, Pajhwok Afghan News reported. It said Sheikh Rashid had made the statement on Sunday.
Pajhwok Afghan News quoted spokesman Naveed Maez as saying Sheikh Rashid's remarks were a direct interference in the internal affairs of Afghanistan. "'Such statements will harm relations between both countries', Maez said, advising Pakistani officials to strengthen relations between both countries," it reported. It quoted Mohammad Hassan Wolasmal, chief editor of Afghan National Journal, as saying that although Pashtuns had been discriminated against, the issue was an internal problem of Afghanistan.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/28/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[2 views]
Top|| File under:
The Palestinian Authority, under pressure to crack down on militants, tried to convince Islamic Jihad of committing to a fragile truce, as Israel faced the widest protest so far against the planned pullout from the Gaza Strip. Speaking to reporters about ongoing talks between the PA and Islamic Jihad, presidential national security adviser Jibril Rajjoub said: "We have been engaged in a serious dialogue with Islamic Jihad to put an end to the attacks which go against our national interests." He added: "The Palestinian Authority is still committed to the truce and we will not accept any violation of the agreement." Islamic Jihad and the other main Palestinian militant factions began observing a de facto truce at the beginning of the year but Islamic Jihad's commitment has been called into doubt after being involved in at least two deadly attacks in recent days.
Posted by: Fred ||
06/28/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#3
But it isn't a real truce anyway, it's a hudna. Which means that the fighting afterward will be worse because they'll have rearmed. But Israel's security fence will by then be higher and longer, so the Palestinians will use those armaments on one another, and on their own innocents. Creating Hell on Earth -- a longstanding Palestinian tradition.
LONDON - Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari said two years would be âmore than enoughâ to establish security in his country, a task US Defence Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld believes may take up to 12 years.
Following talks with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, al-Jaafari said such factors as building up Iraqâs own security forces, controlling the countryâs porous borders and pushing ahead with the political process would all help end the violence. âI think two years will be enough, and more than enough, to establish security in our country,â he said Monday.
Asked about al-Jaafariâs comments, Rumsfeld told a Pentagon news conference on that âI recognize things I donât know, and thatâs one of them. ... There are so many variables that I would be reluctant to pretend that I could look into that crystal ball and say, X number of months or X number of years. I canât.â
On Sunday, Rumsfeld said âthat insurgency could go on for any number of years. Insurgencies tend to go on five, six, eight, 10, 12 years.â
They're in violent agreement. The country will be secure, and the insurgency will sputter on for a while.
Bolstering the Iraqi security forces and taming the insurgency are considered critical to US plans to withdraw from Iraq.
Rumsfeld also acknowledged that US officials have met with some insurgents - an approach Britain has also employed as it tries to bring stability to the country, Blair disclosed Monday. âItâs our job politically to pull as many people into the political process. That is an engagement not just by the Iraqi government, but by the Americans, ourselves, others. Everybody,â Blair told a news conference Monday. âWe are not compromising our position with terrorism or any of the rest of it. We are simply trying, perfectly sensibly, to pull as many people into the democratic fold as possible.â
Later, in a joint news conference with his Iraqi counterpart, Blair refused to give further details of the contacts with insurgents. âI would not exaggerate what is happening here,â he told reporters, when asked if Britain and America were coordinating their efforts. âIt is a sensible part of trying to make sure you are bringing as many people into the democratic process as possible.â
Al-Jaafari said he had no objection to the United States and Britain having âdialogue with all the political forcesâ so long as they were not engaged in violence. âWe have not negotiated with anybody who has been involved in bloodshed or explosions,â he added.
Blair said there was a spectrum within the insurgency, ranging from Jordanian-born Abu Musab Al Zarqawi, Iraqâs most-wanted terrorist, and others who are âutterly implacable,â to those who âarenât engaged in violence but are sympathetic to the violence.â
âAnd then in the middle (there are) some people who may be involved in the violence or not,â Blair said. âWhat itâs trying to do is to make sure ... you get those people for example in the Sunni community ... to recognize their best way forward is participating in the December elections,â Blair said.
Members of Iraqâs Shiite-dominated government are hoping more Sunnis will turn out for the planned December vote for a full-term government.
Posted by: Steve White ||
06/28/2005 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Iraqi PM says two years âmore than enoughâ to secure country
Well I guess it depends on what you mean by 'secure country'. The jihad against Iraq will last for a long time and suicide bombers will get through and kill people for many years. But perhaps people will simply go on with their life anyway.
I think the US should withdraw some troops this calendar year (maybe only 5-10k) simply as a statement that we have more confidence in the Iraqi forces.
#2
Just remember, US troops remained in Germany because of the Soviet Union and in Japan and South Korea because of China and North Korea. With Iran on one side and, the source of terrorist manpower, the Kingdom of Saud on the other, its likely a good force slice of American forces will remain in country for a while.
#3
I think having a timetable is a great idea. Think how much shorter World War Two could have been if we only set a timetable. Why even the Hundred Years War could have been over in a couple decades if they had only set a timetable.
FORMER soldiers in the Israeli Defence Force have come forward with claims of widespread abuses against the Palestinians amid what they say is a growing climate of "moral corruption". A group of 300 ex-service personnel gathered together by the Breaking the Silence group made a series of damaging allegations about the behaviour of soldiers. In public testimonies, the troops alleged the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) routinely carried out "deterrent gunfire" into Palestinian areas without a specific target and also used Palestinian civilians to investigate suspected bombs and as human shields during arrest operations. The claims, which are beginning to filter into the Israeli media, contrast sharply with government assertions that the Israeli army is a "role model for the world" because of its particularly moral behaviour...Breaking the Silence, which was launched a year ago, recently released testimonies showing that the Israeli army in 2001 had killed 15 Palestinian policemen as revenge for the killing of six soldiers. Avichay Sharon, an activist in the group, said the incident reflected a pervasive "moral corruption" resulting from the occupation of Palestinian territory. More at the link if you must.
#1
That's right, the Israelis must stick to the Queensbury rules, while the Hamastinians put bombs in girls pants and move fighters around in ambulances and UN vehicles.
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.
The fight against terrorism, representation of the Islamic world at the United Nations Security Council, intra-OIC cooperation in human rights, role of women, situation of youth, environment, and sustained development, would be the highlights of the discussion during the three-day 32nd session of the Islamic Conference of Foreign Ministers (ICFM) that opens in Sanaa, Yemen, today.
Former prime minister Malcolm Fraser, Amnesty International and Liberty Victoria have criticised ASIO's increased terrorism powers after raids in Sydney and Melbourne yesterday. Australian Federal Police (AFP) and ASIO officers conducted raids on properties in Melbourne and Sydney but no charges have been laid. The Federal Government's anti-terrorism legislation is under review, though the Government has indicated it wants to retain the broader powers introduced in the wake of the September 11 attacks in 2001. 
Two leading US-based civil and human rights groups released a new report Monday, accusing the US Department of Justice of wrongly detaining at least 70 Muslim men and denying them their lawful rights.
Lebanon's anti-Syria coalition is accepting the return of a staunch Damascus ally as parliament speaker, focusing its energy instead on picking a new prime minister â and the real fight, forming a new government. The coalition wants to put together the first Lebanese government in years not dominated by Syria's allies. But it must win the approval of President 
Tanzeem Hablillah, a non-government organisation, has called for Muslims to boycott American products. "Muslims should boycott American products because the US has desecrated the Holy Quran, ridiculed the Islamic way of life and made a woman into an imam," said Dr Iftikhar Hussain Waris, patron-in-chief of Tanzeem Hablillah, at a meeting on Sunday. Dr Waris said Americans were prejudiced against Islam. He urged Muslims to boycott American products as they were "minting money" from Pakistan and that money was being used against Muslims.
The Islami Jamiat Talaba, which has considerable influence in the Punjab University (PU), launched a religious training camp, 'Feham-e-Din', in the unviersity's New (Quaid-e-Azam) Campus on Sunday afternoon. The IJT is the youth wing of the Jamaat-e-Islami
An Afghan Foreign Ministry spokesman on Monday called the statement of Pakistani Information Minister Sheikh Rashid saying Pashtuns in Afghanistan were being ignored despite being in majority an interference in Afghanistan's internal affairs, Pajhwok Afghan News reported. It said Sheikh Rashid had made the statement on Sunday. 
The Palestinian Authority, under pressure to crack down on militants, tried to convince Islamic Jihad of committing to a fragile truce, as Israel faced the widest protest so far against the planned pullout from the Gaza Strip. Speaking to reporters about ongoing talks between the PA and Islamic Jihad, presidential national security adviser Jibril Rajjoub said: "We have been engaged in a serious dialogue with Islamic Jihad to put an end to the attacks which go against our national interests." He added: "The Palestinian Authority is still committed to the truce and we will not accept any violation of the agreement." Islamic Jihad and the other main Palestinian militant factions began observing a de facto truce at the beginning of the year but Islamic Jihad's commitment has been called into doubt after being involved in at least two deadly attacks in recent days.
