The molotov cocktail attack on the home of KFC Holdings (M) Bhd executive director Ahmad Aznan Nawawi at Bukit Bandaraya here on Saturday night was not an isolated case -- a similar attack was carried out on a senior KFC manager at his Damansara Utama, Petaling Jaya home 15 minutes earlier. Petaling Jaya Deputy OCPD Supt Abdul Rahman Ibrahim when contacted by Bernama confirmed the second incident but declined to reveal the identity of the senior manager. He said the police were trying to establish whether the attacks were related to any business rivalry.
"Investigations are ongoing and we are trying to establish the link between the two attacks. The police are looking at all angles," he said.
According to a source, the senior manager did not feel the seriousness of the attack which occurred between 9.15pm and 9.30pm until after he watched the TV news, Monday night.
The attack on the home of Ahmad Aznan occurred at about 9.45pm. One of the molotov cocktails hit his bedroom window and the other a wall. No one was injured and there was no serious damage to the house. The senior manager and his family were out during the incident leaving only the maid in the house. The senior manager only realised that the incident could be "pre-meditated" when he related it to another KFC director through the phone, Sunday.
Media reports speculated that the attack was "most probably" related to the corporate tussle where plantation-based company Kulim Bhd eventually emerged as a controlling shareholder in KFC through its holding in QSR Brands Bhd.
KFC is also involved in another controversy when it filed a lawsuit in the High Court here on March 3 against its former managing director Datuk Ishak Ismail for alleged breach of fiduciary and trust duties and Said @ Shuaib Bakar for conspiring with Ishak. The suit alleged that Ishak had wrongfully procured RM10 million from KFCH for his personal benefit while he was managing director of the company.
In the period before the Iraq war, Saddam Hussein's foreign minister Naji Sabri was a secret paid source of the CIA, "NBC Nightly News" reported on Monday. Citing unnamed current and former U.S. intelligence officials, NBC said Sabri provided details of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction that turned out to be more accurate than CIA estimates.
Intelligence sources said Sabri was paid more than $100,000 through an intermediary in a September 2002 deal brokered by the French. Sabri may have thought he was working with the French, but some U.S. intelligence officials believe he knew it was the CIA. The CIA questioned Sabri through a go-between about Saddam's WMD program, the report said. According to the intelligence sources, Sabri indicated that Saddam had no significant weapons program and that while the deposed Iraqi leader desperately wanted a nuclear bomb it would have taken more time for him to build one than the CIA's several-months-to-a-year estimate, NBC reported. Both the CIA and Sabri said Saddam had stockpiled chemical weapons, but both were wrong.
Love the editorial insertion...
Citing intelligence sources, NBC said the CIA's brief relations with Sabri ended after he refused to defect to the United States. The agency had been hoping for a public relations coup, the network said. Sabri was not named among the former senior Iraqi officials on the U.S. most-wanted list of 55 Iraqi fugitives. NBC said it found Sabri teaching at a university in the Middle East, but was not revealing his location for security reasons. Sabri declined to be interviewed or to comment as did the CIA, NBC said, adding that the agency also would not say why it did not listen to Sabri's warnings. A CIA representative had no comment on the report.
Gee. Golly. Shucks. It'd be too bad if somebody bumped him off for revenge. NBC Nightly News wouldn't turn a hair, of course.
There it is. Cards on the table. Expect the attack - I call Mar 28 New Moon
US President George W. Bush said he hoped to resolve the nuclear dispute with Iran with diplomacy, but warned Tehran he would "use military might" if necessary to defend Israel.
"The threat from Iran is, of course, their stated objective to destroy our strong ally Israel. That's a threat, a serious threat. It's a threat to world peace," the US president said after a speech defending the war in Iraq.
"I made it clear, and I'll make it clear again, that we will use military might to protect our ally Israel," said Bush, who was apparently referring to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's call for the destruction of Israel.
On the atomic dispute, Bush said he hoped "to solve this issue diplomatically" with a "united message" to Tehran from Washington, London, Paris, Berlin as well as Russia "hopefully" and China.
The message would be that "your desire to having a nuclear weapon is unacceptable," he said.
Bush also touched on Iran's agreement to discuss Iraq with the United States, saying that "it's very important, however, for the Iranians to understand that the discussion is limited to Iraq.
"We're using this as an opportunity to make it clear about our concerns of interference within a democratic process that is evolving," he said, saying that the talks will not decide Iran's relations with a sovereign Iraq.
"Ultimately, Iraq-Iranian relations will be negotiated between the Iraqi government and the Iranian government," he said.
maybe not the CURRENT governments, but their governments nonetheless
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/20/2006
21:03 ||
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#1
Possible interpretations:
1- "Israel, keep your powder dry - I got your back."
2- "Mullahs, back off. I'm just about there."
3- "Whiteman AFB, this is the Commander in Chief..."
Posted by: Matt ||
03/20/2006 21:15
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#2
The military planning and positioning is almost finished.
The diplomats are almost finished.
The northern hemisphere winter is almost finished.
4- "People, brace yourselves, Iran's military, nuclear facilities, and leadership are soon to be finished."
#3
Bush said today, regards the NSA surveillance program, it's the right thing to do, it's constitutional, and we're going to continue doing it -- in the face of threats of censure, though empty today there is the definite possibility that the Democrats could gain control of the House in Nov, and if they do they will certainly float impeachment. Who knows if they'd do it, but I think they probably would. Bush is not deterred or frightened because he knows he's doing the right thing and has faith he will be judged correctly - if not now then by history. He's got serious brass behind his words.
In precisely the same vein, Bush will prosecute an attack on Iran if they do not verifiably cease and dismantle their nuke program. I believe he will do it in the name of National Security, with or without a congressional resolution for cover. I believe he will do the right thing and take his chances with congress, rather than make us take our chances with an insane ideology in possession of nuclear weapons. He clanks when he walks, IMO.
#8
my son joined for a 5 yr Army committment beginning Sept. I just wish I knew the President to follow W cares as much about him and America as W does
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/20/2006 23:13
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#9
Don't forget that Dubya and America have to also be prepared for NORTH KOREA andor NK-TAIWAN scenarios, as the Mullahs and Kimmie both like to beat the war rhetoric in parallel. Will say again that if and when China ever does succ conquer Taiwan, however imperfectly the PLA will inevitably go after JAPAN, the Asian democracies, and ultimately the entire PACRIM/OCEANIA. Iran, etc = NK-Taiwan . JUST THE OPENNING SHOTS.
Calls for truly independent investigation, joins growing ranks of prominent credible whistleblowers
Alex Jones & Paul Joseph Watson/Prison Planet.com | March 20 2006
Actor Charlie Sheen has joined a growing army of other highly credible public figures in questioning the official story of 9/11 and calling for a new independent investigation of the attack and the circumstances surrounding it.
Over the past two years, scores of highly regarded individuals have gone public to express their serious doubts about 9/11. These include former presidential advisor and CIA analyst Ray McGovern, the father of Reaganomics and former Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury Paul Craig Roberts, BYU physics Professor Steven Jones, former German defense minister Andreas von Buelow, former MI5 officer David Shayler, former Blair cabinet member Michael Meacher, former Chief Economist for the Department of Labor during President George W. Bush's first term Morgan Reynolds and many more.
Speaking to The Alex Jones Show on the GCN Radio Network, the star of current hit comedy show Two and a Half Men and dozens of movies including Platoon and Young Guns, Sheen elaborated on why he had problems believing the government's version of events.
Sheen agreed that the biggest conspiracy theory was put out by the government itself and prefaced his argument by quoting Theodore Roosevelt in stating, "That we are to stand by the President right or wrong is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public."
"We're not the conspiracy theorists on this particular issue," said Sheen.
"It seems to me like 19 amateurs with box cutters taking over four commercial airliners and hitting 75% of their targets, that feels like a conspiracy theory. It raises a lot of questions."
Sheen described the climate of acceptance for serious discussion about 9/11 as being far more fertile than it was a couple of years ago.
"It feels like from the people I talk to in and around my circles, it seems like the worm is turning."
Posted by: Captain America ||
03/20/2006
20:20 ||
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Well! Of all the big thinkers and ex-post facto experts cited in the article Charlie Sheen certainly matches them all, wit for wit. I mean, HE's the one *I'd* believe!
Moonbat McBobby
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/20/2006 20:26
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Police and intelligence officers are poring over documents seized in a fresh round of counter-terrorism raids in New South Wales. The action is part of the ongoing Operation Pendennis, which has resulted in multiple terrorism-related arrests and charges in Sydney and Melbourne since November last year.
On March 9 Federal Police, their New South Wales counterparts and ASIO raided homes at Hoxton Park and Bankstown, in Sydney's south-west. A number of prison cells at Goulburn jail were also raided. The Australian Federal Police (AFP) and ASIO are now assessing documents seized in the raids. No arrests were made and no homes were searched in Victoria. The AFP has confirmed the raids are related to Operation Pendennis. Last November, police claimed they had foiled a major terrorist plot when they simultaneously raided homes in Sydney and Melbourne in the early hours of the morning.
Meanwhile the lawyer for a man arrested during terrorism raids in Sydney last year says authorities breached legal privilege by taking documents from his client's cell during a jail raid. Lawyer Greg Walsh says Omar Baladjam's cell and family home were raided. Mr Walsh says confidential notes Mr Baladjam had made were removed from his cell. "I'm very concerned that authorities, knowing that I was going to visit Mr Baladjam, would in those circumstances seize documents that he'd prepared for the sole purpose of seeking and obtaining legal advice from his lawyer," Mr Walsh said. "So there's a remarkable coincidence that authorities raid his former home and raid his cell, and take confidential records or documents that he's prepared to get legal advice [on]. So any citizen in the community out there can be subject to obviously an arbitrary raid and it would be simple outrage that such documents could be seized by authorities in these circumstances."
Analyses of H5N1 Southeast Asian bird flu samples shows the two strains causing human disease are related and belong to two distinct genetic subgroups.
"As the virus continues its geographic expansion, it is also undergoing genetic diversity expansion," said Rebecca Garten, a researcher on the study. "Back in 2003 we only had one genetically distinct population of H5N1 with the potential to cause a human pandemic. Now we have two."
What that means, says Garten, is that the pool of H5N1 candidates with the potential to cause a human influenza pandemic is getting more genetically diverse, which makes studying the virus more complex and heightens the need for increased surveillance. She expects further continued diversity in the future.
"Change is the only constant," said Garten. "Only time will tell whether the virus evolves or mutates in such a way that it can be transmitted from human to human efficiently."
The findings by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were reported Monday in Atlanta, Ga., during the International Conference on Emerging Infectious Diseases.
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/20/2006 21:20
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This really is the #1 risk factor. Killer flu has long menaced the US because we know what it can do.
AIDS is tiny in comparison. So is every other biological threat short of smallpox. The bad form of smallpox had a 20-40% mortality. Avian flu has somehow maintained 50%. This puts these two in a class by themselves.
It close to matches the projected lethality of a nuclear detonation in a major city in the US.
It is the big one. And yet, having said all of that, the US will get off lightly, compared to most of the rest of the world.
Don't panic. That will accomplish nothing. All you can do is wait. And when and if it comes keep your wits about you.
#5
This strain is considered to be possibly related to the Spanish Flu strain that killed millions worldwide. (My aunt died from that when she was 2. My dad was their parents' replacement baby.)
It's worth it to study this. Even if it doesn't turn into another Spanish Flu, there is probably something else out there that could turn into one. Keep in mind that people can and do jet from the jungles to major population centers in about a day, and factor in the scary truth that we don't have any "magic bullet" antibiotics left. If we are unlucky, some virus could wreak destruction even worse than the Spanish Flu did.
Get some of the lessons out of the way now. We waste billions on other stupid crap, why not spend a little on something that might actually pay off?
Another voice has been added to those who believe that air strikes should halt Iran's quest to develop nuclear weapons.
Gary Berntsen, the former senior CIA operative who led the search for Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan in late 2001, believes the United States has the ability to easily destroy Iran's nuclear facilities. He said the US could use bunker-buster bombs and other weapons to carry out the operation.
"We can dig those things out. We can destroy them," he told The Jerusalem Post in an interview.
"We can take care of it in a couple of days with air strikes and they wouldn't be able to stop us," he added. "It wouldn't be difficult to plan. They'd be some dangers but I think the United States can do it." Berntsen, who left the CIA in June last year after more than 20 years of service, believes it will be difficult to persuade Iran to stop its nuclear program.
"I know the Iranians. I've worked against the Iranians for years. They are determined to get this no matter what, and they will lie and cheat and do whatever they have to do to get themselves a weapon," he said.
Berntsen ruled out covert action because of the scale of Iran's nuclear program. "This is a huge system of facilities they have. This is not going to be a small sort of engagement. We are probably going to have to destroy 30 facilities in 30 locations. Or at least 15," he said.
Berntsen's comments came after former Pentagon adviser Richard Perle said earlier this month that Iran's prime nuclear facilities could be devastated in one night by a small fleet of US B-2 bombers. I'm
sensing a theme here ....
In addition, Moshe Ya'alon, Israel's former chief of General Staff, said the IDF has the capabilities to attack Iran's nuclear facilities and could do it in conjunction with the US and some EU countries. However, Berntsen believes Israel should not carry out any operation.
"It's better for the United States to do it. If you (Israel) do it, we'll have all sorts of problems in the Middle East, all sorts of countries that will align themselves with the Iranians over this. Politically it makes more sense for the US to do it," he said.
Berntsen also ruled out a ground operation. "This is huge country. There are 70 million people there. It's gigantic. We don't need to be getting into something like that," he said.
However, Berntsen believes that the US should first exhaust all the political options before carrying out a strike.
"We should do what we're doing right now. That means taking them to the United Nations and make this 'the world against Iran,' because the Iranians appear determined to create a weapon," he said. "If by chance they disarm, then we can avoid this, but if they don't disarm we will need to take care of this ourselves."
"The Iranians have to know that we mean business. They will either disarm or we will destroy their facilities. No ifs, ands, or buts. They present a threat to peace in the Middle East. They present a threat to Israel. We cannot accept that," he added.
Berntsen predicted that if Iran doesn't disarm, President George Bush would carry out an attack regardless of domestic opposition.
"I think that President Bush has demonstrated that he says what he means and he means what he says. A lot of people didn't think he would do Iraq. This is a guy who doesn't put his finger in the air to see which way the wind is blowing. President Bush means business.
"The problem right now is that the Iranians are going to miscalculate. They are going to believe that because 2006 is an election year (in Congress), and due to all this political opposition to the president because of Iraq, they're going to think that he's weak in the knees, he can't do it and they're not going to negotiate.
"That would be a very serious mistake for them. They're going to miscalculate. They think he's politically weak and George Bush won't care. He's going to do it anyway when it comes down to it," Berntsen said.
"I believe that we'll get past the mid-term election in 2006 and then the Iranians ought to disarm themselves or suffer the consequences," he added.
Berntsen recently released a book called Jawbreaker, which is about the search for bin Laden after al-Qaida's attacks on the US in September 2001. The book has been on the best-seller lists in the US but has yet to be released in Israel.
#2
Two days and it's toast. 'Bout what I figured...
Posted by: Dave D. ||
03/20/2006 19:44
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This theme doesn't actually surprise me. Our air force is built to take out strategic targets deep inside Russia - a country ten times the size of Iran and with air defenses far superior to Iran's. If we can't something similar to Iran, we need to scrap the current Air Force and rebuild from scratch. People who cast doubt on the Air Force's abilities vis-a-vis Iran don't understand its capabilities.
#4
While it sound all good and nice, I doubt it. It assumes that the strike force wouldn't have its hands tied by political considerations. Shock and awe was far less because of concerns of collateral damage and inability to employ all the weapons available in the arsenal. Now if we had really unleashed a real shock and awe, I doubt the Iranians would be playing games at this moment.
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/20/2006 20:10
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All of this assumes our intelligence is accurate, something I don't think is safe given what happened in Iraq. Also, the whole idea of an air war against Iran doesn't take into account the fact that doing so will almost certainly shore up the regime.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006 20:10
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Berntsen's book has an interesting account of what really happened at Tora Bora, up close and personal.
#8
DD: Also, the whole idea of an air war against Iran doesn't take into account the fact that doing so will almost certainly shore up the regime.
That's kind of silly. If Saddam couldn't be toppled by his internal opposition in a country that was 80% against him on account of religious or ethnic differences, the regime in Iran surely can't be toppled by its opposition. The regime doesn't need shoring up - it is not in danger of falling. The Shah fell because he wasn't willing to exterminate his opposition. The mullahs don't have that problem.
Posted by: Captain America ||
03/20/2006 20:28
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"I know the Iranians. I've worked against the Iranians for years. They are determined to get this no matter what, and they will lie and cheat and do whatever they have to do to get themselves a weapon," he said.
'Bout time someone said this loud and clear. You hearing this Pentagon?
If Saddam couldn't be toppled by his internal opposition in a country that was 80% against him on account of religious or ethnic differences, the regime in Iran surely can't be toppled by its opposition.
Bingo, ZF. At least we don't hear many voices talking about an occupation or some such nonsense anymore. Get overhead, break lots of nasty things in a big, bad way and get the he|| back out.
#15
I have read reports that Iran shifts its mobile missile positions every 2 days. Some of these could be launched on either a sporadic or mass basis against Carrier groups, if a command structure exists to so order. The best bet for the US is to force regime change in Iran, rather than accepting another 5, 10, or 20 year circus. Given the success of nuclear-blackmail in removing Soviet occupation troops from Iran, post WW2, exercise of that option is essential. The logic-chopping sandbags - we just don't do that; that would offend our values; blah, blah, blah - of a solution that would ultimately end up with Iranians hanging their Ayatollahs from lampposts, border on infantilism.
Either support nuclear-blackmail as a moral means for de-proliferation in Iran, or force on future generations a preventable nuclear-jihad capability, usable by a tyranny whose leaders orchestrate "death to America" shrieks, at every opportunity.
#16
Shock and awe was far less because of concerns of collateral damage and inability to employ all the weapons available in the arsenal.
"Shock and awe" had much less to do with the volume of bombing as the targets; the description intentionally focuses on mental state, the purpose is to induce "shock and awe" by taking apart the target's communication.
That happened in Iraq; the problem is, the results happened where the press was least able and willing to look -- inside the Saddam regime.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/20/2006 21:08
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I have read reports that Iran shifts its mobile missile positions every 2 days.
Ya know what the call missiles that move every 2 days?
"Soft targets".
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/20/2006 21:09
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#18
To me, the best explanation of 'shock and awe' or 'effects based' bombin campaigns is that we bombed the houses of baathist officials (i.e. we had GPS coords on their street address) not just the normal government sites. Not sure if this is an accurate descriptor, but it got it home for me. It is not about making a big show on CNN but for destroying the enemies command and control in ways he did not forsee.
Being a mere civilian I found it interesting that they call it 'effects based' operations. I am curious what a non-effects-based campaign would look like.
#19
LTD - once the MM's are emasculated, they will be desposed. They rule the country like a criminal gang, not a religion. Basij are foreigners brought in to do their thugwork. Does that sound like a religion. We need to de-claw them and their troops in their barracks/positions, let nature take its' course
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/20/2006 21:24
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#20
Let's be rational, as the author of this piece was. BTW, he's no desk-bound analyst, so I'd be very very slow to dismiss him.
A few observations:
We have been watching, probably tasking more than one satellite at all times, since the info about their program surfaced. Our people, those who analyze the take, are very very good, as are our optics. The best.
Building a nuclear weapon production capability requires construction of facilities. Alot of facilities. Large facilities. It cannot be completely hidden from the satellites and our people, those who analyze the take, are very very good, as are our optics.
These facilities require power, water, transportation of employees, delivery of matériel, etc. Alot of all of them. Again, these things are visible.
Everyone here is aware that we're talking about multiple facilities dispersed to make it harder to knock it out. Well that creates a new vulnerability: intermediate product must be moved from stage to stage, facility to facility. Visible.
You don't have to take out everything, you only have to sever the production stream. If you know most of the locations where the work is occurring, you can do that with solid redundancy. If you only know the locations of two or three choke points in the process, you can shut it down. Think strategically. Your intel doesn't have to be perfect, just good enough. I'm banking that it is. I know for a fact that every Pentagon type who's been asked to put his career on the line for a best estimate is playing it clean. Don't know about the CIA, but why should it be any different there? Careers SHOULD be held at risk in weighty matters of National Security and nuclear threats. I hope they know it's successful plans and estimates balanced against their asses.
Deep facilities don't have to be blown up, just in. Entomb them. They have ventilation. They have entrances. They have resources running to them that are required to maintain livable conditions. There are signs and vulnerabilities to underground facilities, too. Gravity is our friend. Four or five consecutive bunker busters with GPS precision with a time on target spread can undo anything the Iranian engineers can devise, whether it's to cause collapse or to simply seal them up. Regardless, knocking the crap out of a facility, whether it's a total loss or not, terminate its function.
I'm very inclined to listen to a guy who's an insider, who knows his craft, and isn't some desk jockey "expert", but the real deal.
#21
Being a mere civilian I found it interesting that they call it 'effects based' operations. I am curious what a non-effects-based campaign would look like.
The opposite is the more traditional military planning process that focuses on broad measures: attrit the enemy, seize/control territory. This is a top-down planning process.
Effects based planning starts from specific outcomes desired and works back to means - which might be changed over time based on partial results. It started with the Air Force, which began looking at the specific effects desired from a bombing raid, working back to choose the munitions and delivery method to suit each target. It's expanded now to a broad range of operations.
One thing EBO does is to account for political and economic as well as obviously military objectives. In the traditional model, if there was a main bridge the enemy might use, you would probably take it out to deny him that means of transit. In EBO you still might, but you'd pay a lot more attention to any commanders' intents re: keeping the civilian economy alive if that bridge were a key transit point for crops or exports, for instance.
EBO at least in theory gives a lot more flexibility down the command chain. Mid and lower-level echelon commanders are given objectives and left to their best judgement, to a fair degree, in how to attain them.
Like a lot of things, it sounds simpler than it is in practice. Effects based assessment requires careful consideration of the evaluation measures you will use to measure progress towards each objective. Get those wrong and it's quite likely they will incent unhelpful decisions over time. And since multi-dimensional objectives may well be in tension with one another, senior commanders must be able and willing to establish their relative priorities among them.
Caveat: I am not military or a military planner. I've had some role re: effects based assessment in the last few years, hence the above.
The short answer is the enemy gets to vote. The Iranians will respond. We can play tit for tat for a while but the question is how we reach an end state. It may require Shermanization once we start down that path. That would result in domestic problems for Bush given the domestic preparation to date.
#23
For someone my age, domestic preparation involved watching Iran humiliate the US for 444 days until somebody they feared was inagurated. If we get into it with Iran, especially if they start it, Bush has the green light. I think he knows this but hopes it can end bloodlessly with internal regime change.
#24
Shock and awe was disinformation. Invoking memories of the much more dramatic campaign of Gulf War 1 to keep Iraqi heads down while the modern guided weapons- now known in Iraq as "the bomb that never misses"- picked Saddam's defenses apart.
#26
I've been ready since '79. Time to blow shit up and take these assholes down a century or two. Iranian people will persevere, and hopefully not let the same assholes back in charge
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/20/2006 23:11
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#27
I've had no input and no information on what's going on in Washington, but I do know a bit about Iran's defensive and offensive capabilities.
- I watched them build their first few Silkworm launch sites and the supporting infrastructure for them. They're not "hardened" - they can't be. "Hardening" a Silkworm facility would make it difficult to fire a missle, and it would take forever to reload. They're vulnerable to cluster weapons and aerial mining operations - two areas we're experts in.
- Many of their naval facilities ARE hardened, much as the German "submarine pens" were hardened. We no longer have to attack from above - we can send missiles right into the facilities. Trapping the expolsions within thick concrete walls will only make the results more deadly.
- The Iranian Air Force is starved for spare parts. Even without that starvation, they wouldn't be able to "surge" more than two sorties a day. The AVERAGE USAF and Navy pilot expects to fly five or six sorties a day during hostilities. Most of their aircraft will be caught on the ground and destroyed within the first eight hours, or shot out of the sky. They'll lose over a third to simple maintenance problems.
- Moving their "missiles" from one place to another every two days is a waste of time. We know all the pre-surveyed sights. We'll hit them all, probably as close to simultaneously as possible. We'll hit with high explosives and air-sowed mines. If they're at a particular point, we'll kill them. If they're not, the next time they pull into a point, we'll kill them with our mines.
- They have an army of a gazillion troops, but they have few, first-rate armored vehicles, and all of them are susceptible to some of the stuff we put in the air. The best air defences the Russians could sell them can't be everywhere at once, and our ECM is second to none.
- You don't have to kill everybody to change hearts and minds. Just eliminate those that are in charge, and do it with what appears from outside as "no sweat", and the rest will scurry into the deepest holes they can find.
The one thing the Iranians DON'T want to do is to close, or attempt to close, the Straits of Hormuz. The Japanese will decide they have no option but to end Iran's powers in order to secure a continuing flow of oil. A resolution to allow Japanese forces to conduct offensive operations will pass with a huge majority, and they'll be on the warpath the next day. Europe will be faced with an "either/or" situation: either they get off their lazy a$$es and stand up to Iran, or they'll pay through the nose for oil from now on. In the end, I think at least half of the nations of Europe would side with the US, because they have no other choice.
One other thing: two can play that "close the Straits" game. The US can not only do it, but can do it much better than Iran ever thought of trying. They need the Straits for oil exports, food and material imports. There are NO decent harbors on the southern coast of Iran, and even if they were, they're a long way across a hostile desert from anywhere else. You can supply a city by air, but you cannot supply a nation a quarter the size of the United States, with 70 million people by air. Iran's backed itself into a tough spot, and has no wiggle room left. It's going to get VERY interesting in the coming months.
As for the political scene, I think you're going to see the Democrats even more marginalized than they are now after the next election. They've just done too many stupid things in too many different scenarios for most Americans to trust them with helping Granny across the street, much less to elected office. I live in a "military" town. Military people and their families are VERY upset with the Democrats in Congress. Military families have parents, friends, and extended families. The disconnect between military people and the Democrats is far greater now than it was even during the Vietnam War. I saw my first "Impeach John Kerry" bumper sticker a week ago Friday. I've seen eight others since then. Three of the cars had Massachusetts plates.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
03/20/2006 23:19
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#28
OP. Very interesting perspective and info.
A week or so ago somebody posted an article stating that Iran imports refined gasoline and therefore is very vulnerable to a naval blockade, which builds on your point about 2 being able to play the 'close the straits' game.
#29
Slobedon was removed from power in Yug/Serbia because he dragged his nation in to a war and they lost face. Are we so sure that an attack would shore up the Mullahs? Might do the opposite since Islam is such a shame culture they might very well take the heat for pushing a conflict everyone knew they couldn't win.
#30
9-11 and the WOT for the Lefties and anti-US agendists is about inducing = forcing the USA under "justified" anti-American Socialism and OWG where the US is no longer sovereign nor has control of its own government or endowments - Iff this were WW2 we're talking about VICHY WASHINGTON.The DemoLeft has no scruples attaining PC power be it proclaiming to "save America-World" from GOP-led "quagmire(s)" and Nuke Brinkmanship, or by weirdly and mysteriously surviving any new [GOP-caused]Amer Hirosohima agz Dubya, his Admin, the NPE, anti-Clinton/Socialist Congress, or any other centres of pol power-influence. The only thing the Dems have is JImmy Carter's tenure and even then the debate atill goes on vv how "liberal" vs "Conservative" Carter's policies were. The Dems can't claim anything from the Clinton '90's thanx to Clinton himself. As for Iran, the Mullahs want a US invasion, not just air attacks.
Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi said Saddam Hussein should still be considered Iraq's legal president and the current government illegitimate as it was elected under an occupation regime.
In an interview with the Italian Sky TG24 television channel, he slammed the practice of sending in troops to get rid of heads of state, saying that by that theory he could be next.
keep talking, we're taking notes.
more at the link
Phone-tapping case in SC ---- The Government on Monday admitted in the Supreme Court that during the six months between September 2005 and February 2006, 15 telephones were tapped without the requisite order from the authorities. In five other cases, the confirmation or approval by the authorities arrived beyond the stipulated period.
In separate affidavits, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs and the Delhi Government disclosed that during the six-month period, altogether 439 phones were tapped, out of which in 419 cases, the requisite permission from the competent authority was obtained within the stipulated period of 15 days from the date of request for interception. In other cases, the phones were tapped in violation of Government norms.
The matter came up during the hearing of an application by Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh, who had sought the Court's intervention for stay on telecast, broadcast or publication of his illegally tapped telephone conversation.
A visibly annoyed Bench headed by Chief Justice YK Sabharwal observed, "Whether a call has been intercepted illegally is one aspect. But first the service providers have to show the authority of law by which they can entertain the request by any person seeking to tap telephone of another person."
Noting that under the formal procedure, either the State Government or the Centre can process the request for interception of private cell phone numbers, the bench added, "But in reality it does appear in some cases that phones are tapped without a request from the designated authority to the concerned service provider."
Cautioning the service providers and the Centre to prepare their replies addressing these concerns within three weeks, the court outlined its two-fold concern. Firstly, the Bench said, "Strict procedure is to be followed on interception under authority of law and further guidelines or change in existing Telegraph Act with respect to the changed scenario of technology."
Its second concern was addressed specifically to the service providers. It said, "The illegal interception, if any, by telephone companies or their officials with or without following procedure and steps taken to prevent such practice needs to be addressed too."
The Solicitor General, appearing on behalf of the Centre conveyed the Centre's decision to "comprehensively"study the law. The court demanded a balance between the rights in national security and rights of a person's privacy. It was pointed out to court that as on date there existed 138 service providers catering to a subscriber base of 135 million, which was too gigantic a figure to be monitored.
The Delhi Police too apprised the court of certain checks and balances newly introduced in the procedure for obtaining authorisation for interception, which would essentially counter the prevailing malaise.
It must be recalled that on the previous date of hearing, court had restricted all television and print media from airing or publishing any clandestine operation conducted via cell phone after an application to this effect was filed by Samajwadi Party leader Mr Amar Singh. In his application, Mr Amar Singh had alleged that his phones were tapped illegally by the Delhi Police.
Mr Singh's counsel had argued on the previous date that a total of 323 phones, including the one of his client was tapped illegally. The Delhi Police, however, refuted the claim by supplying figures on Monday stating with regard to 245 phones, due permission was obtained. In cases of 15 phone lines, request was not sent by police to Delhi Government since the same pertained to those involved in criminal activities. While in some cases, the phones were found to be non-operational and thus discarded, in others, the tapping was discontinued after the accused were arrested or the purpose of investigation had concluded. Besides Reliance, information pertaining to VSNL, BSNL, MTNL, Tata, Idea Cellular, Hutch, and Airtel were also supplied to court.
I've always viewed him as an incompetent sloth of dubious moderation - even more incompetent than al-Sadr - Sadr has the battalions, and Sistani has none. It appears that my instincts were accurate - at least about the limits to Sistani's moderation:
There are new revelations about the teachings of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the supreme religious authority of Shiite Iraq, who has been lavished with praise here and elsewhere as a leading voice of Muslim moderation, perhaps even worthy of Nobel Peace Prize consideration.
A human-rights group in London which lobbies for homosexuals alleged last week that Sistani had held a press conference in which hed issued a fatwa setting forth his judgment on gay sex. According to the group, Sistani pronounced that the conduct was forbidden and that those who engage in it should be punished, in fact, killed. The people involved should be killed in the worst, most severe way of killing.
Not wanting to take an interest groups allegation at face value, this report stirred the operators of a blog called Healing Iraq to check Sistanis website. I discussed that site here on NRO a few weeks ago in connection with Sistanis stated view that non-Muslims should be considered in the same category as urine, feces, semen, dead bodies, blood, dogs, pigs, alcoholic liquors, and the sweat of an animal who persistently eats [unclean things].
Healing Iraq found a relevant page in the Arabic section of Sistanis site. The page is evidently not available in the English section (suggesting that the grand ayatollah is familiar with the practice, turned into an art form by Yasser Arafat, of shielding gullible Westerners with whom one is ingratiating oneself from some of the more alarming things one says to Arabic-speaking audiences). The Arabic page is here. Ive confirmed with language experts that the following translation of the relevant passage is accurate:
Q: What is the judgment on sodomy and lesbianism?
A: Forbidden. Those involved in the act should be punished. In fact, sodomites should be killed in the worst manner possible.
Now, NRs editor, my friend Rich Lowry, has written an extremely interesting cover article, called The To Hell with Them Hawks, in the current print edition of National Review (subscription required). Even for those, like me, who disagree with Richs conclusions, he has with characteristic insight captured the foreign-policy divide among conservatives as visions of the war on terror edge beyond the waning years of the Bush administration.
Nonetheless, I confess to not being thrilled to recognize myself as among those being labeled a To Hell With Them Hawk any more, I imagine, than those of a different bent of mind would appreciate being called Anything Goes conservatives, willing to tuck the manifest flaws on which they would base policy under a rug of polite fiction such as that Islam simply must deemed be a religion of peace, notwithstanding the abundant evidence of sense.
More useful than labels in analyzing the divide are the comparative perceptions about Sistani, who has been regarded as a crucial figure by both supporters and skeptics of the administrations democracy project.
From the skeptical side of the house, these pearls of Sistanis wisdom, including this latest raving about the appropriate Islamic response to gay sex, cannot be blithely disregarded as, to borrow Richs phrase, beliefs that seem bizarre to a Westerner as if the problem here is our alien ear rather than Sistanis seventh-century mind. Sistani is not merely saying homosexuality is condemnable, a view shared by many a religious tradition. He holds, authoritatively within his tradition, that those who engage in it should be brutally murdered.
It is neither naïve nor reflective of a lack of imagination to observe that Sistanis fatwas are powerfully indicative of a coarse view of human life. In fact, they are powerfully indicative of a view that rejects the very humanity of those who do not adhere to Islam (indeed, Islam as Sistani rigorously construes it).
That view is a sine qua non of terrorism. It matters little that Sistani, in the fashion of lip service, is, as Rich observes, consistent in condemning terrorism. He is a central influence in the Islamic world. That is the world which is, undeniably, the font of virtually all modern terrorism. How surprised, then, should we be to find him giving animating voice to beliefs integral to the pathology that is spurring global barbarism? The pathology that says there is an us and a them, and the them is a sub-human species, not fit to be touched and, at least occasionally, worthy of being killed in the worst manner possible.
What is dangerously naïve is to conflate two very different, and at times contradictory, goals of American foreign policy: opposition to terrorism and democratic reform in Muslim countries. Lets say one is inclined to suspend disbelief and regard as an ally in the struggle against Islamist terrorism someone whose profoundly influential views actually bolster core conceits of the jihadists. That would still not make Sistani an ally in the related but distinct project to build a democracy recognizable as such.
The only democracy the United States should be building is one based on liberty, equality, the inherent dignity of all human beings, and the conviction that authority to rule is reposed in the people rather than in some external theological or political force. That, surely, is the democracy of President Bushs soaring rhetoric, if not his administrations on-the-ground practice. If we are going to sacrifice American blood and treasure on this project, that better be what we are sacrificing them for.
That project calls for a very long-term cultural evolution, one that may take decades if it can happen at all. It is not achieved by a mere election or twos being given the green-light by a savvy Shiite imam one who can count, and who sees Shiites outnumbering everyone else by about two-to-one. It is not achieved by a celebrated constitutions being given the green-light by such an imam only after Islam has been installed as the official state religion and the sharia made a primary source of fundamental law.
To believe Sistani is an ally in that project is to hallucinate.
#3
Sistanis stated view that non-Muslims should be considered in the same category as urine, feces, semen, dead bodies, blood, dogs, pigs, alcoholic liquors, and the sweat of an animal who persistently eats [unclean things].
Bah! I've been called worse.
The only democracy the United States should be building is one based on liberty, equality, the inherent dignity of all human beings, and the conviction that authority to rule is reposed in the people rather than in some external theological or political force.
And that, right there, is the deal breaker for these wingnut fundamentalists. It is affront to all they believe in to even remotely consider that mere mortals can possibly rule themselves as good or better than the word of God as put down in the Koran.
This is why democracy is seen as the sworn enemy of Islam. It is time for us who believe in democracy to understand that Islam is the sworn enemy of representative elected government by the people, for the people and of the people.
The sooner we get over these notions that Islam is in any way compatible with progressive self-government, the sooner we'll be able to fight the war that is truly needed to eliminate this vicious threat to human freedom. Sistani can blow me.
Building rapidly on the civilian nuclear deal, Washington has now invited India to appoint military officers to liaison posts in the US Strategic Command (Stratcom), its largest and most critical defence set-up mandated to control strategic nuclear assets, space and missile defence and global deterrence against weapons of mass destruction (WMDs).
The Stratcom, whose area of operation spans the globe, controls all American nuclear delivery platforms, including ballistic missile submarines, B-52 Stratofortress strategic bombers, Minuteman-III intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and Tomahawk land attack systems.
Having an Indian liaison officer on board will allow a more efficient link between Stratcom centres and Indias relatively new Strategic Forces Command (SFC) which controls Indian military nuclear assets.
The possibility of posting Indian officers at the Stratcom headquarters in Nebraska first came up when US Secretary for Defence Donald Rumsfeld brought up the idea with Indian counterpart Pranab Mukherjee on June 28 last year, the day the new Indo-US defence framework was signed. Nine months later, the offer is now formal.
Iran will stand by its right to obtain nuclear technology and anyone spreading propaganda against its atomic programme will come to regret it, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Monday.
"No one can take away our nuclear technology. The Iranian nation has obtained it and will preserve it. Some are against the Iranian nation's development," he said in a televised address to mark the start of the Iranian year on March 21.
He spoke as senior foreign affairs officials from the five veto-holding U.N. Security Council powers and Germany were to meet to try to break the impasse over Iran's nuclear ambitions.
The Council has been unable for nearly two weeks to issue a statement telling Iran to halt uranium enrichment efforts which the West believes are a cover for bomb making. Iran says its nuclear programme is simply for generating electricity.
Ahmadinejad said Iran would resist efforts to undermine its nuclear programme just as it pursued the nationalisation of its oil industry last century against the wishes of Western powers
"A while ago, they were against the nationalisation of our oil industry. They were saying that this (oil) smelt bad and is useless and you don't need it. That day the Iranian nation resisted, and today they are saying the same things about nuclear energy," he said.
"The Iranian nation will resist with God's help," he added.
Iran had previously agreed to suspend its uranium enrichment activities under an agreement with Britain, France and Germany. That deal broke down last year and, in February, Iran started tests on enriching uranium.
"They were hoping through propaganda and psychological war to take this (nuclear technology) away from us. I am suggesting to them to learn their lesson and apologise to the Iranian nation," he said.
"They should be sure that if they continue, they will regret continuing to make baseless propaganda against Iran," he said without elaborating.
Posted by: Captain America ||
03/20/2006
18:06 ||
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#1
"They should be sure that if they continue, they will regret continuing to make baseless propaganda against Iran," he said without elaborating.
#6
Now, if he had said that Iran will resist with Russia's help, I would have sat up and taken notice. Allah's help is a much devalued currency these days - given the relative lack of success terrorists have had in planning a follow-up to 9/11.
Posted by: God ||
03/20/2006 20:26
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#8
Counting on a supernatural being to show up just in the nick of time is a dubious proposition at best. I'd need a signed black-border confirmed RSVP before shooting off my mouth like Ahmadinejad is doing. Something tells me he's in for a really big surprise when the excrement impacts those whirling blades.
#9
If all the Ayaterrorists face is smart-bomb strikes that leave most of the terror infrastructure intact, while Iranian strategic missile forces are relatively free to launch mass strikes on US Carrier groups, then Iran will resist. They have to be made to understand that resistance is futile.
Post WW2 Arab and Muslim power was a factor of strategic Cold War alliances which no longer exist. Any power they possess is grounded on the sick weakness of our pathological indulgence of the most vicious enemy that the West has ever faced.
There are hints that cause me to believe that the President will force regime change on Iran. However, if he adapts to the Democratic appeasement position as a means to regain lost support, nuclear-jihad capacity will arise in Iran.
#10
Iran = North Korea > regional belligerency is as much for WILFUL NATIONAL SUICIDE/DESTRUCTION as for anything else. NUKES = "GREAT POWER/NATION" STATUS, however surreal, ergo ITS ALL OR NOTHING with these failed and failing minor Socialist Rogue-ish states. Iff these can't have "manifest Destiny" they'll take their people plus the world with them to hell.
The question was raised earlier as to how to cope with a swarm attack by 101 Iranian pest boats. This should handle it.
The Solution: Raytheons Phalanx Block 1B Surface Mode is a complete weapon system to counter threats of today and tomorrow. With an integrated FLIR and operator control panels merged with a proven anti-ship missile defense capability,the Block 1B system is unique in the world.The system has been thoroughly tested in real world scenarios against a variety ofship defense threats and will soon be deploying on U.S. Navy vessels.
Optimized Gun Barrels The original M61A1 gun barrels were designed for short bursts and are subject to wear and increased dispersion patterns. The new OGBs are 18 inches longer, substantially thicker and include both a barrel brace and muzzle restraint to improve life expectancy and projectile dispersion patterns.In addition, the optional Enhanced Lethality Cartridge (ELC) will provide a 50 percent increase in penetrator mass.
Phalanx FLIR To provide its unique Surface Mode tracking and engagement capability, Phalanx Block 1B incorporates a Thermal Imager with Automatic Acquisition Tracking.The system operates in the 812 micron wavelength and is mounted on a stabilized pedestal attached to the existing Phalanx Track Antenna radome. This system provides a reliable day/night passive search and track capability against slow-speed air threats and surface craft,while improving Anti Air Warfare performance in multi-path and glint environmentsvia enhanced angular track accuracy (50100 microradians) against the high-G maneuvering ASM.
Operational Features
Autonomous detect, prioritization, track, engagement and kill assessment ofair targets from wave-top to steeply diving
Day/night detect,identification, track and engagement,and kill assessment ofsurface craft and low-speed aircraft
Remote designation available from other shipssensors against air and surface targets
Interface and control to provide fire-control and search sensor capability for other shipboard gun and missile systems
Phalanx Specifications Gun: M61A1 20-mm cannon
Magazine: 1550-round enhanced lethality cartridge
Fire Rate: Dual Fire rate,3000 or 4500 spm
Electric Power: 3-phase,440 V,60 Hz,18 kW in Search,70 kW in Track
Weight: 14,500 lb
Search Radar: Ku-band,digital MTI
Track Radar: Ku-band,pulse Doppler monopulse
E/O Sensor: FLIR Imaging system with Automatic ACQ Tracker
Seawater Cooling: 20 gpm,30 psig
#5
I'll take one, and I'd like an extra Enhanced Lethality Cartridge please. Or two. Can I get a discount for volume orders?
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/20/2006 19:07
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The trouble is, they go through a hella lot of ammo in a hurry, designed to throw a curtain of steel up against incoming aircraft and missiles. I doubt they come with a "3-round burst" option.
I still like the idea of 5" guns firing Willy Pete with proximity fuses. Talk about a hailstorm in hell.
Forcible regime change in Iraq has proved to be a costly undertaking. As of January 2006, it appears likely that the Iraq intervention will ultimately unfold along a path that implies present value costs for the United States in the range of 410 to 630 billion in 2003 dollars. These figures reflect a 2 percent annual discount rate. They capture the estimated economic costs of U.S. military resources deployed in the war and postwar occupation, the value of lost lives and injuries sustained by U.S. soldiers, the lifetime medical costs of treating injured soldiers, and U.S. outlays for humanitarian assistance and postwar reconstruction.
Containment required the continuous engagement of a potent U.S. military force in southern Turkey, the Middle East and the Persian Gulf. The United States devoted roughly 28,000 troops, 30 naval vessels, 200 military aircraft and other equipment to Iraqi containment efforts prior to the pre-war buildup. We estimate the economic cost of these military resources to be about $14.5 billion per year. Based on our assessment of the likely duration of a dangerous regime in Iraq, absent external intervention, this annual flow translates into an expected present value of nearly $300 billion.
Contingencies can sharply raise the expected cost of the containment policy. We also develop an integrated analysis that simultaneously captures several possible contingencies under a policy of containment. The integrated analysis focuses on three scenarios chosen to capture a range of views about the likelihood and cost of the contingencies. Factoring the contingencies into the analysis yields present value costs for the containment policy in the range of $350 to $700 billion. These large sums are in the same ballpark as the likely costs of the Iraq intervention seen from the vantage point of early 2006. Thus, even with the benefit of partial hindsight, it is difficult to gauge whether the Iraq intervention is more costly than containment.
We also consider the consequences of the war-versus containment choice in two other respects: the economic well-being of Iraqis, and the loss of Iraqi lives. Based on our analysis, we conclude that the war will lead to large improvements in the economic well-being of most Iraqis relative to their prospects under the policy of containment. If, over the course of a generation, Iraqis recover even half of the economic losses they suffered under Saddam Hussein, then they will be significantly better off in material terms as a consequence of forcible regime change.
The economic failures of the Saddam Hussein regime were not its greatest crimes. The regime brought torture, repression, displacement and death to huge numbers of Iraqis and others. We review some of the evidence in this regard, drawing heavily on work by others. All told, the regime killed or caused the deaths of more than 500,000 Iraqis. Under the policy of containment after the 1991 Gulf War, a reasonable estimate is that at least 200,000 Iraqis died prematurely at the hands of the regime or as a direct consequence of its policies, including its refusal to comply with U.N. Security Council Resolutions and its diversion of oil revenues and other resources to palaces and monuments. Had containment remained in effect, the historical record suggests that premature Iraqi deaths would have continued indefinitely at the rate of 10,000 to 30,000 per year. There is, of course, a great deal of uncertainty about the number of premature Iraqi deaths under either war or containment, but we think the weight of evidence points to a greater Iraqi death toll from a continuation of the pre-war containment policy. Perhaps the strongest reason to question this assessment is the possibility that a post-war Iraq could devolve into an extended and large-scale civil war. This possibility cannot be ruled out. What can be ruled out in light of the evidence is that the leading alternative to war involved little loss of Iraqi lives.
A top Norwegian authority says that Islamist militants are operating in the Nordic countries, exploiting their open, liberal societies and will sooner or later launch an attack in Scandinavia.
"It's only a matter of time before we have a terrorist attack in Scandinavia; in Norway or Denmark or Sweden," Jørn Holme, head of the Police Security Service (PST), Norway's domestic intelligence service, told Reuters.
Al Qaeda named Norway as a potential target, alongside the United States, Britain, Australia and other countries, in 2003.
Norway, the world's third largest oil exporter, is a member of NATO and has troops and fighter jets in Afghanistan but did not back the US-led invasion of Iraq. In 1993 Norway brokered a peace deal between the Palestinians and Israel.
Extremists have previously planted members in Norway to help plan bomb attacks in Europe, Holme said during an interview at the PST's headquarters in Oslo.
"If our integration policy is not good enough, we will have home-made networks. It is very important that our politicians are aware of this," Holme said.
Scandinavia's reputation for liberalism and equality also attracts Muslim radicals who may view the Nordics as a safe, soft option, he said, adding that this reputation must change.
He described as incredible Norway's inability to expel an Iraqi Kurdish mullah who has links with extremist groups and whom the government has called a security risk.
An expulsion order against Mullah Krekar, former head of the radical Islamist group Ansar al-Islam, was originally issued in 2003 but he is still in Norway, taking advantage of a law forbidding the expulsion of anyone to a country where they might risk the death penalty.
"We need a more active system for handling these immigrant issues when the government has declared this person is a threat against our country," Holme said. "We should be able to say 'goodbye' without this long process."
But he stressed that police powers had to strike a balance with Norway's tradition of human rights.
"Its very important that our methods and needs are based around the human rights standards," he said.
#1
Since Norway is one of the signatories to the Anarctica Treaty, perhaps they could arrange to send Mullah Krekar there. He could then proselytize to the penquins while avoiding any risk of a death penalty.
#2
Denmark, land of offensive cartoons, is probably at the top of terrorism's Christmas list. I can only hope these goons do not destroy some irreplaceable landmark.
However little I look forward to this, if it does happen, Danish Muslims are in for a big surprise at just how quickly the welcome mat can be withdrawn. It will certainly be a much needed (tho little desired) wakeup call for Scandinavia.
The 2006 hurricane season will be more active than normal and could bring a devastating storm to the U.S. Northeast, private forecaster AccuWeather said on Monday. The outlook comes after the most costly hurricane season on record in 2005, with storms crippling New Orleans and other parts of the U.S. Gulf Coast and briefly knocking out a quarter of domestic fuel production.
"There are now indications that the Northeast will experience a hurricane larger and more powerful than anything that region has seen in a long time," said Ken Reeves, senior meteorologist at AccuWeather.com. "The Northeast is staring down the barrel of a gun," said Joe Bastardi, AccuWeather.com's chief hurricane forecaster.
Dammit, they've found me again. I get assigned to Keesler in 1985, Elena hits the next month. Every time I went TDY to Okinawa, a typhoon showed up. The det finally asked me to stay away. We went on vacation every year to New Orleans, now that's gone. Move to Virginia, and we're looking down a gun barrel. Just great
The current storm cycle and above-normal water temperatures in the Atlantic are reminiscent of the pattern that produced the 1938 hurricane that struck Providence, Rhode Island, killing 600 people, Bastardi said.
The 1938 hurricane flooded out the town in Massachusetts where I grew up, it knew I was coming 14 years later
"The Northeast coast is long overdue for a powerful hurricane, and with the weather patterns and hydrology we're seeing in the oceans, the likelihood of a major hurricane making landfall in the Northeast is not a question of if but when," he said.
The Texas coast from Corpus Christi to the Louisiana border is also likely to be the target of higher than normal hurricane activity over the next 10 years, according to the forecast. Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans and the Mississippi coast last August with winds above 135 mph and a 30-foot-high storm surge, causing more than $60 billion in damage. Katrina was followed by Hurricanes Rita in Texas and Wilma in Florida. Each wreaked more than $10 billion of insured losses, making 2005 the most expensive year for hurricanes ever. Bastardi said this year's storm activity will be above normal, but could be less active than 2005.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006
13:48 ||
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Its all Bush's fault!!! Global Warming!!! AAAAAAAA!!!!! /MSM hysteria
#2
Joe Bastardi *used* to be the am weatherman for WMAL in DC. I never found him to be either funny or accurate, though not for lack of trying. As it is, DC has had its share of hurricanes lately. The last big one left the lights out for two months in some parts of town, but fortunately Fred saved the sandbags for the Rantburg server, "just in case".
#5
They crooks up there in Boston are no dummies - they can see how the NO crowd is milking us. Probably terminally jealous - they have two insane Senators who enjoy juicy committee assignments and no ethics to bellow for them... The Big Dig would become the most important thing EVER, lol.
#6
I was in Boston when Hurricane Bob came through. The coast got hit pretty bad but the only thing we got in Boston was a lot of rain and a bit of gusty wind. On the elevator next day I heard someone say, "Is that all there is to a hurricane? i was really wanting to see something". I thought about dope slaping him but held back.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
03/20/2006 15:59
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cmon, somebody has to say it, "Bastardi". Refreshing to see a weird name that isn't Islamic.
#9
About 6 years ago, I worked with someone who was nearly finished w/ his PhD in weather modelling from Penn State. IIRC, AccuWeather's predictions are based on that model. At the time, at least, it was considered by far the most accurate and detailed one out there.
Bastardi likes to mug, but the longterm prediction about hurricane seasons is based IIUC on things like relative ocean temps and current locations. Things that don't change from week to week, but do shift from year to year and affect the temp/humidity of the air above.
ERUSALEM, March 19 When the radical Islamic group Hamas presented a cabinet it dominates to the Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas, on Sunday, Yossi Alpher was reminded of an earlier revolution.
Mr. Alpher was an Israeli intelligence analyst on Iran from 1978 to 1980, and for him, the Hamas victory has the paradigm-shifting quality of the Iranian revolution that brought the mullahs of Shiite Islam to power. Today, he recognizes the same kind of dislocation.
The "old Iran hands" were confident that the revolution could not last, he said, and that the mullahs would be tamed by the merchants of the Iranian bazaar, or the country's youth or the experience of power. "These people knew a very different Iran, and their analysis was not just useless but diversionary," he added. And, of all people, Jimmy Carter is one of those "old hands" who thinks Hamas will becomre more moderate. OF ALL PEOPLE! The guy who got his a** wiped by Iran!
"I have an incredible sense of déjà vu now when I talk to Palestinians about Hamas," said Mr. Alpher, co-director of a Web site dedicated to Israeli-Palestinian dialogue. "Secular Palestinians don't understand what's happened. They don't know what the Muslim Brotherhood is all about. They're in a state of denial." the muslim brotherhood (or mobro, as we call 'em in the hood) is way scarier than the west gives them credit (or blame) for.
After Hamas's victory in the Palestinian legislative elections, analysts and diplomats suggested that nothing fundamental would change: Hamas's win was not so resounding, some said, and its convictions would be moderated by power, keeping foreign aid and the peace effort continuing roughly as before. Jimmuh Cahtah's leading the pack, in fact.
After all, the job of diplomacy, like antacids, is to try to make the inedible digestible. But as Hamas completes its cabinet, there is a sense that the landscape has changed for some time to come.
The Hamas victory is not just a little local difficulty. Hamas is the Palestinian part of the Muslim Brotherhood and the first to win an election; its victory has enormous resonance for radical Islam heartened? emboldened? . It is a defeat for secular nationalism, Nasserite corporatism and for Fatah, the chosen partner of Washington and Israel.
Many Muslims wish for Hamas to succeed, and some will give it money. The anxious Arab governments nearby especially Jordan, with its many Palestinians, and Egypt, with its active Muslim Brotherhood, but also fragile Syria will feel that they cannot set higher public hurdles for Hamas than, say, Russia or the European Union. why the f**k not! are they so afraid of a popular uprising and losing power just because they stand up to a bunch of hoodlums?!!?? Why not join the ranks of the civilized world? Jordan and Egypt are victims of terrorists, from the same people, albeit in a different form.
Palestinian and Sunni, Hamas legislators say they are wary of further dependency on Iran and reject Al Qaeda. They say they prefer a period of quiet; how they will deal with Islamic Jihad, Iran's proxy in the Palestinian territories, remains unclear. prolly fund 'em. turn 'em into the "armed resistance" wing so Hamas can enjoy international legitimacy.
New elections are not scheduled for four years. That gives Hamas's leaders, whom Mr. Alpher calls "pragmatic ideologues," time for their long-view strategy: softly, softly; slowly, slowly. by that time Israel will have separated completely and Hamas will have had enough time to create an Islamic paradise in paleoland.
Hamas calls for national unity. It is likely to push a domestic agenda of reform and social welfare. It seems unlikely that it will fire the Fatah security commanders. When new legislators have talked of Islamicizing education or imposing Shariah law, Hamas has silenced them. al-yoda: talk not. only do.
The indications are that Hamas will continue to talk tough toward Israel but maintain a cease-fire that has lasted roughly a year. It will give Israel no sufficient pretext to reinvade Gaza, where Hamas's army of 6,000 men can operate openly; will appeal to the world's Muslims for support; and will blame Israel and Washington for every deprivation i.e., business as usual.
While many international officials want Hamas to be a partner, its leaders may have other ideas.
On Jan. 30, five days after the election, the United States, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations known as the quartet warned that a Hamas-led government must recognize Israel, forswear violence and accept previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements. what a bunch 'o crapola. so let's say they did recognize Israel, forswear violence and accept agreements. what would that accomplish? they'd be lying. at least this way, they retain a modicum of integrity, odious as it may be
Given what even a partial reduction of aid will mean for Palestinians, the quartet is looking for ways to soften those demands. the french contribution
The quartet has pushed Mr. Abbas to postpone H-Day, when a Hamas government takes over, until after Israeli elections on March 28. Now the European Union and the United Nations say that a Hamas government should be given time to prepare a program before any aid cutoff.
Some diplomats suggest that if Hamas supports a moribund 2002 Saudi peace initiative, it will somehow "recognize" Israel without having to say so; some suggest that a Hamas offer of another cease-fire may be enough to "forswear violence."
But so far, Hamas is not playing along. It sees the agreements with Israel as a honey trap and recognition of Israel as impossible. In the meantime, Hamas is working on the heartstrings and sense of justice of the West, to keep aid flowing.
Hamas's victory also signaled the death of the "peace process" as it has been practiced. oh. the peace process that calls for suicide bombs and kassam rockets? er, thanks anyway.
The diplomatic assumptions of recent years a peace treaty after a territorial compromise, or "land for peace" have been blown apart. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel tried to redefine the bargain as "a state for security" an independent Palestinian state in return for dismantling all armed "terrorist" groups, including Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades. That was a commitment undertaken in the "road map" by Yasir Arafat and reconfirmed by Mr. Abbas. in english only. the arabic commitment was much different
But it seems unlikely that Hamas will dismantle itself. Nor, its leaders say, will it abandon "the right of resistance to occupation." Its religious conviction is that all of Palestine, including the current state of Israel, is Islamic waqf land, land belonging irrevocably to the world's Muslims. and if they ONLY had the land occupied by the Zionists, the muslim world would flourish. We would see an explosion of muslim scientists, artists, doctors, philosophers, philanthropists....all contributing to improving the world. But the Jooooos are preventing all that.
Hamas talks of a long-term armistice with Israel, so long as Israel returns to its 1967 boundaries, unannexes East Jerusalem and lets all refugees and their descendants return to their pre-1948 homes and move west into the Mediterranean Sea. The state of Israel itself, they insist, has no right to exist on waqf land.
So with Hamas, the argument has moved from nationalism and territorial compromise, which can be negotiated, to religious conviction and a temporary Israeli lease on its sovereignty. In that light, the quartet seems to have given Israel a free pass for unilateral action. there's a better chance for a lasting peace with Israeli unilateral action than there is through "negotiating" anyway.
Israel, which has done little to support Mr. Abbas, now says it has no partner. Hamas gives Israel more freedom in the West Bank, creating borders, thickening settlements, or dismantling them, as it pleases. Last Tuesday, as troops crushed a Jericho prison to extract wanted men, acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Israel would keep the settlement bloc of Ariel in the West Bank. Washington did not complain.
Alpher worked for Adm Stansfield Turner, the CIA Boffo for Carter. The guy who completely blew it on Iran, the Shah, and Khomeni. I'm not terribly sure Alpher knows his ass from his elbow. I note that he left the CIA when Reagan / Casey took over in 1980.
KABUL, Afghanistan - An Afghan man is being prosecuted in a Kabul court and could be sentenced to death on a charge of converting from Islam to Christianity, a crime under this country's Islamic laws, a judge said Sunday.
The trial is believed to be the first of its kind in Afghanistan and highlights a struggle between religious conservatives and reformists over what shape Islam should take here four years after the ouster of the Islamic fundamentalist Taliban regime. You get the feeling they usually dispense with the formalities of a trial in these types of situations.
The defendant, 41-year-old Abdul Rahman, was arrested last month after his family accused him of becoming a Christian, Judge Ansarullah Mawlavezada told the Associated Press in an interview. Rahman was charged with rejecting Islam, and his trial started Thursday.
During a one-day hearing, the defendant confessed that he converted from Islam to Christianity 16 years ago while working as a medical-aid worker for an international Christian group helping Afghan refugees in the Pakistani city of Peshawar, Mawlavezada said.
"We are not against any particular religion in the world. But in Afghanistan, this sort of thing is against the law," the judge said. It is an attack on Islam.
Mawlavezada said he would rule on the case within two months.
Afghanistans constitution is based on Shariah law, which is interpreted by many Muslims to require that any Muslim who rejects Islam be sentenced to death, said Ahmad Fahim Hakim, deputy chairman of the state sponsored Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission. Either maintain your faith in The Religion of Peace or we kill you. Any questions?
Repeated attempts to interview Rahman in detention were barred.
The prosecutor, Abdul Wasi, said he had offered to drop the charges if Rahman converted back to Islam, but he refused.
"He would have been forgiven if he changed back. But he said he was a Christian and would always remain one," Wasi said. "We are Muslims, and becoming a Christian is against our laws. He must get the death penalty."
After being an aid worker for four years in Pakistan, Rahman moved to Germany for nine years, his father, Abdul Manan, said outside his Kabul home.
Rahman returned to Afghanistan in 2002 and tried to gain custody of his two daughters, now 13 and 14, who had been living with their grandparents their whole lives, the father said. A custody battle ensued and the matter was taken to the police.
During questioning, it emerged that Rahman was a Christian and was carrying a Bible. He was immediately arrested and charged, the father said. At that point the custody battle seemed almost trivial to Abdul.
Afghanistan is a conservative Islamic country. About 99 percent of its 28 million people are Muslim, and the remainder are mainly Hindu. And the rest aint talkin.
At times I wonder if we shouln't have leveled the place completely. It's about time for W. to have a heart to heart talk with Ben Kingslay Hamid Karzai about this kind of shit. Why are we there if the so-called "moderate moslems" are doing this?
This should be publicized by everyone. Enough is enough. If Iraq goes civil war? Try to help the Kurds (secular Moslems mostly) and Assyrians, but sometimes I feel as though we should just let the Sunnis and Shias wipe each other out. I have had enough of this.
Recently I watched the TV show, "The Bachelor". On that show, one of the 25 girls was a very pretty girl from Chicago who was a Christian of Arab descent. Her name is Jehan Huleisy. I just wonder what kind of krap she and her family would have if they lived over there.
Jehan Huleisy
The more and more I hear about this, and the polygamy being considered in the UK and all. I wonder if Spencer in his book, "Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam and the Crusades" wasn't correct after all. Violent and Anit-woman. Religion of Peace? Excuse me while I spit. Some of the stuff seemed truly over the top, but maybe not. If those people over there are kept in line by force and intimidation, that has nothing to do with God, or Allah or the Great Spirit. HE has many names. Ones heart goes out to the ones who know something isn't right with that Imam, and are in horrible fear to do anything about it.
#3
Ones heart goes out to the ones who know something isn't right with that Imam, and are in horrible fear to do anything about it.
What imam? He was turned in by his relatives, charged by a prosecutor, and tried by a judge. It's not a handful of imams twisting the Koran; it's the whole fricking faith applying the contents of the Koran.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/20/2006 13:44
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Ones heart goes out to the ones who know something isn't right with that Imam, and are in horrible fear to do anything about it.
RC : This sentence applies to anyone in the Moslem world who is a Moslem, wishes they weren't, and is afraid to say something because of SHIT like this.
#5
This whole feakin religion and all who practice it are sick sick sick.
It makes me feel angery and helpless and numb all at the same time.
It causes me think thoughts that fill me with shame.
Posted by: kelly ||
03/20/2006 15:57
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This is why there are no moderate muslims. There is no wiggle room for leniency or moderation. There is just submit or die. Or preferably submit and kill.
Not clear to me that there ever was much separation, but let's see where this goes.
MALANG, Indonesia Yusman Roy, a former boxer and a convert to Islam, is serving two years in prison because he believes that Muslims should pray in a language they can understand.
Roy, who led bilingual prayer sessions at his small East Java boarding school, is seen as a heretic by conservative Muslims here. They believe true prayer can be conducted only in Arabic. Roy's desire to pray in Indonesian has sparked such an outrage that he was convicted last year in criminal court of "spreading hatred." Animosity toward Roy ran so high that police posted guards to keep an angry mob from torching his house and school.
Now, he is kept in a cell by himself at overcrowded Lowokwaru prison, and the warden has warned him not to preach to his fellow inmates in any language.
Roy is one of at least 10 Muslims incarcerated in recent months for what the Indonesian Council of Ulemas, the country's most influential Muslim body in setting religious policy, has deemed deviant thinking. "The government and the council have been working together to suppress my ideas," Roy said during an interview in prison. "But this will not stop me from doing what I believe."
Indonesia is a democratic, secular country, and there is no constitutional basis for using Islamic law in court in most regions. But insulting a religion is a crime, and a fatwa, or religious edict, issued by the Council of Ulemas can carry great weight as evidence of an alleged offense to Islam.
Indonesia, which has more than 190 million Muslims, the world's largest Islamic population, has become increasingly conservative since the 1998 collapse of President Suharto's military regime. In recent years, the government has grown more active in enforcing religious law. In recent months, fatwas issued by the Indonesian Council of Ulemas and its regional councils denouncing clerics and cults as deviant have been followed by arrests, prosecution and sometimes mob violence against the accused.
Can't have a holy religion without a Council. Next you need a Caliph and a Grand Vizier.
Sumardi Tappaya, 60, a high school religious teacher on the island of Sulawesi, was locked up in January after a relative told police he had heard Sumardi whistling while he prayed. The whistling was declared deviant by the local ulemas, and Sumardi is now in jail awaiting trial on charges of religious blasphemy. He faces five years in prison.
Ardhi Husain, 50, who ran an Islamic center in East Java that treated drug addiction and cancer with traditional medicine and prayer, was sentenced in September to five years in prison for writing a book that the ulemas said contained 70 "errors," such as claiming that Muhammad was not the last prophet and that non-Muslims could go to heaven. Five editors of the book also received five-year terms. An employee who sold a copy to a neighbor received three years. After Husain's arrest, a mob burned down his facility. No one has been arrested in the attack.
Guess the drug addicts will fend for themselves -- until they're stoned to death.
Lia Aminuddin, 58, who claims to be the Virgin Mary and leads the quasi-Islamic God's Kingdom of Eden cult, was arrested in December on blasphemy charges after thousands of angry protesters surrounded her headquarters in Jakarta, the Indonesian capital. The ulemas and demonstrators accused her of insulting Islam by claiming that she was married to the archangel Gabriel and that God spoke to her through him. (In Islam, Gabriel, or Jibril, is revered as the archangel who communicated God's word to Muhammad.)
Prominent human rights lawyer Adnan Buyung Nasution, whose Indonesian Legal Aid Foundation represents several of the accused, says the government is ignoring zealots who commit religious violence and instead prosecuting the targets of religious hatred. "The intolerance is becoming worse," Nasution said. "Why are the victims being punished?"
Well duh, they're infidels and/or apostates. Didn't you learn this at your madrassah?
Fighting between Muslims and Christians has claimed thousands of lives in Indonesia in recent years, and Islamic suicide bombers have staged high-profile attacks in Bali and Jakarta that have killed hundreds. Less visible has been the effort by conservative Muslims to compel other members of their faith to hew to a more traditional line.
The Indonesian Council of Ulemas, which is made up of 43 Muslim scholars and leaders of major Islamic organizations, was formed in 1975 to guide Muslims on how to live in accordance with Islamic principles. Muslims make up more than 85% of the nation's population. The council has recently issued fatwas banning women from leading prayers if a man is present and prohibiting Muslims from praying alongside members of other religions. Provincial and local branches of the council also have issued numerous fatwas regulating Islamic practices.
A nice, layered hierarchy that leads to total thought control. Orwell would be proud, and horrified.
Ma'ruf Amin, a vice chairman of the Indonesian Council of Ulemas and the chairman of its fatwa committee, says the ulemas' role is to define proper behavior for Muslims and to set boundaries that protect the purity of Islam.
He denies that the ulemas are promoting hatred, and says Muslims who engage in deviant practices are bringing violence upon themselves. "These kinds of people are the ones who cause all the trouble, and the people wouldn't bother to riot if there was no one who deviated," Amin said. "These kinds of people should not exist."
That's about as clear as it needs to be. If you just think properly you won't have any problems.
Some moderate Muslim leaders charge that the Council of Ulemas has been infiltrated by hard-line groups, particularly the Islamic Defenders Front. Defenders Front Chairman Habib Rizieq, who declares himself a follower of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, says it is important to keep Muslims from being swayed by ideas deemed to be heretical, such as bilingual prayer. "All deviant teaching has to be banned," he said.
Well of course it does. Can't have the rubes starting to think for themselves.
It is clear that Roy, 51, is not a conventional Muslim. An eagle carrying a red heart is tattooed on the back of his left hand. His Koran is in Indonesian as well as Arabic, and on nearly every page he has highlighted passages in yellow and marked them in pen. A flattened nose and a cauliflower ear testify to his days as a professional boxer. He says he once held the Indonesian lightweight record for the fastest knockout: 59 seconds.
Sitting cross-legged on a thin mat on the floor of the prison visiting room, the father of nine contends that he is a victim of religious persecution. He says he is being silenced for challenging the Islamic establishment, particularly the Council of Ulemas, with his effort to ensure that all Muslims understand the principles of their religion.
They don't need to understand, they need to obey their betters. It's a simple concept.
"My original thinking has made them jealous," said Roy, wearing his prison denims and sporting a few short whiskers on his chin.
Born to a Dutch Catholic mother and an Indonesian Muslim father, Roy chose Catholicism as a teenager but converted to Islam when he was in his early 30s. He says Islam helped save him from a life of a crime and violence. Even as he boxed professionally, he says, he hired himself out to businessmen and politicians to beat up rivals and critics, collect money from debtors and recruit thugs to carry out mayhem. He avoided prison by bribing police whenever he was arrested, he says.
Roy embraced Islam but, like most Indonesians, never learned Arabic well. The disadvantage is greatest when it comes to salat, the prayers performed by the faithful five times a day while facing Mecca. Many scholars interpret Muhammad's guidance to "pray like you see me praying" to mean that salat can be performed only in Arabic. But other scholars disagree, saying there is nothing sacred about Arabic itself.
It's the Master Language of the Master Race of the Master Religion.
In theory, Indonesian Muslims learn the meaning of their prayers in their own language as they memorize the Arabic words. But Roy estimates that at least 70% of Indonesia's Muslims don't know what their prayers mean. Most Indonesians defer to Arabic speakers in interpreting the Koran, he says, which can make them vulnerable to the teachings of militant Muslims. "Because of their lack of understanding, they do not have high-quality prayers," he says. "That is why there are people who are angry and commit violence. If they had high-quality prayers, they would not become terrorists."
Roy's a smart fellow. Too bad he can't become an American right now; he'd learn and fit in.
At his small boarding school and residence on the outskirts of Malang, Roy quietly began three years ago to lead salat in Indonesian for a few of his followers. His practice might have gone unnoticed, but in his zeal to spread his idea, he made a video of himself praying in Indonesian and Arabic and distributed copies at nearby mosques.
Word of Roy's practices soon reached members of the Islamic Defenders Front, whose white-robed members confronted him during a debate at his school. The local and provincial ulema councils issued fatwas against him. Some in the community became outraged, and Roy was put on trial. Prosecutor Ahmad Arifin, 39, who tried the case against Roy, presented nine witnesses, including three from the local and provincial ulema councils. The fatwas were entered as evidence that Islam rejects bilingual prayer and that Roy had insulted Islam.
"He distributed his video, and it spread hatred in the community," Arifin said. "People hated Roy for spreading his ideas in a public way."
Translation: the Council hated him because he threatened their lock on power.
In August, the judge acquitted Roy of the charge that his teachings deviated from Islam, but found him guilty of inciting hatred by challenging the views of local clerics.
Can't have that, can we?
Roy seems to accept his fate with equanimity. Serving two years in prison for his faith, he says, helps atone for his violent crimes that went unpunished. He says prison has only affirmed his belief in bilingual prayer, and he plans to continue pushing for its adoption once he is freed.
Roy's sentence is only six months shorter than the term given radical cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, the purported spiritual leader of Jemaah Islamiah. The Southeast Asian affiliate of Al Qaeda is believed to have killed at least 225 people in suicide bombings in Bali and Jakarta.
There's the real injustice.
Yet some think two years behind bars may be too short for Roy. "Whether it is enough depends on whether he realizes his error," said Rizieq, the Islamic Defenders Front leader. "If he doesn't, not even a life sentence is enough."
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/20/2006
12:19 ||
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Sumardi Tappaya, 60, a high school religious teacher on the island of Sulawesi, was locked up in January after a relative told police he had heard Sumardi whistling while he prayed. The whistling was declared deviant by the local ulemas, and Sumardi is now in jail awaiting trial on charges of religious blasphemy. He faces five years in prison.
Five years in prison for having a gap between your teeth...
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/20/2006 12:58
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As is necessary for foundation myths of virtually all religions, the first followers of the new faith had to endure persecution, fleeing to Christian Ethiopia around the year 615. While those Muslims-in-the-making were out of town, Mohammed and the disciples who had stayed with him in Mecca were confined under siege - to be starved into submission.
Just in the nick of time, Mohammed received a revelation that helpfully clarified the theopolitical questions at issue for the Meccan guardians of the gods in the Ka�aba. When Mohammed had reported that Allah was the only god in town, it turned out that he hadn't received the entire satellite transmission. Perhaps Gabriel had mumbled and Mohammed missed part of the message. Wouldn't you know? The three favorite goddesses of Mecca - al-Lat, al-Uzzah, and al-Manat - were also real! This saved Mohammed's neck and all body parts attached thereto, and the exiles were able to return from Ethiopia. Later, when it was safe to do so, this all-important revelation was expunged from the Qur�an and it was explained that the revelation had come from Shaitan (Satan), not Allah. Thus began the legend of the "Satanic Verses," which more than a thousand years later was to prompt the Ayatollah Khomeini to issue a fatwa of death against the novelist Salman Rushdie.
To draw attention to the Satanic Verses is to galvanize a still-raw nerve in the body politic of Islam.
To draw attention to the Satanic Verses is to galvanize a still-raw nerve in the body politic of Islam. The Satanic Verses are an acute embarrassment to Mohammedan authorities because they imply that it was Satan, not Allah, who had saved their prophet's life. If Allah was the only god, and if he had previously selected Mohammed to be his last and greatest mouthpiece on this planet, why didn't he save his own appointed prophet? Why would the god of evil want to save his enemy's ambassador? Might not there be more Satanic Verses in the Qur�an � verses that have never been recognized as the handiwork of the prince of devils? Who knows what evils yet may lurk in the Book of Books?
#3
the people wouldn't bother to riot if there was no one who deviated
Ah, yes. The traquil stability of a stagnant monoculture. Just the ticket for a country that direly needs to enter the 20th century while most others are entering the 21st.
Roy's sentence is only six months shorter than the term given radical cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, the purported spiritual leader of Jemaah Islamiah. The Southeast Asian affiliate of Al Qaeda is believed to have killed at least 225 people in suicide bombings in Bali and Jakarta.
Wow, I guess they take it pretty seriously if you try to pray in another language.
Or is it that they don't take it very seriously if you slaughter over two hundred innocent people, so long as they are mere infidels?
Hands off My Fridge, Meathead
BY SHIKHA DALMIA AND LISA SNELL
Thursday, March 16, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST
LOS ANGELES--Hollywood film director turned political activist Rob Reiner believes that he ought to be exempt from accountability because of his good intentions. That was the clear message from his press conference on Tuesday, called to address accusations that he violated a state ban when he diverted taxpayer dollars from First 5--an unelected commission to promote children's health that he's headed for six years--to run an ad campaign promoting his latest ballot initiative called Preschool for All. A bipartisan group of senators has ordered an audit of the commission's funds. Mr. Reiner, who first rose to fame when he played Meathead, Archie Bunker's liberal son-in-law on "All in the Family," vowed not to resign, because he wants to do "right by the four-year-olds."
This is not the commission's only questionable contract. First 5 has received to date $800 million--about 20%--of the tobacco proceeds that Mr. Reiner convinced California voters to impose on themselves in a 1998 referendum. Of this, the commission has awarded contracts totaling about $230 million to firms or individuals known to Mr. Reiner--some of them without competitive bidding. Meanwhile, the Sacramento County District Attorney's Office is mulling whether to launch its own investigation to determine if there was any cronyism involved in awarding the ad campaign contract to a firm with long-standing ties to Mr. Reiner.
Mr. Reiner is unfazed by all of this. The commission's ad campaign, he says, was perfectly legitimate because it was merely informing parents of the benefits of preschool--not telling them how to vote on his new initiative. No doubt this is the kind of creative thinking that has made him such a successful Hollywood director. If state authorities buy this logic, however, they will effectively legitimize a scheme to leverage the tax proceeds from one referendum to support another involving still more taxes.
But now that Mr. Reiner has succeeded in putting his Preschool for All initiative on the ballot, the most immediate issue for voters is not how he financed it, but what he is selling them. The initiative sounds like a great bargain: By imposing a 1.7% tax on couples making over $800,000 ($400,000 for individuals), it seeks to generate $2.4 billion to fund three hours of free preschool every day for California's four-year-olds.
Yet even the Reiner folks don't expect to enroll all four-year-olds in the program--just 70% of them. However, 66% of California's four-year-olds already attend some form of preschool. This means that $2.4 billion will fund 22,000 new kids--about $109,000 per new preschooler, according to a recent analysis by the Reason Foundation. For this kind of money, a lot of poor parents could put their kids through a good state college and graduate school and still have some change left for a family field trip to the Galapagos.
Mr. Reiner's spokesman Nathan James disputes Reason's cost estimate on grounds that although 66% of four-year-olds currently get preschool, only about 25% get "quality" preschool. "It could be baby-sitting or throwing a kid in front of a TV set," he told the New York Sun. The proof of the pudding, however, is in the eating--and what's coming out of Oklahoma and Georgia, two states that implemented universal preschool over a decade ago--is not particularly appetizing. Last year, the gains in reading scores of fourth graders in both states ranked among the bottom 10 on the National Assessment of Education Progress tests--the premier benchmark for comparing student performance across states. Even more stunning, not one of the 10 best performing states had universal preschool programs.
Even before Mr. Reiner went on the offensive this Tuesday, some California Democrats were beginning to wonder about the wisdom of his scheme. Two of them, Tom Torlakson of Antioch and Don Perata of Oakland, have publicly withdrawn support from his initiative, citing concerns that it would only subsidize kids who already have preschool, not those who most need it. Indeed, because universal preschool programs are by definition not means-tested, they help not the poor so much as middle-income or wealthy families who are better at negotiating the system. In Quebec, for instance, which implemented the most ambitious universal preschool program eight years ago, about half of the government-funded day care spots are taken up by families in the top 30% income bracket who can well afford to pay out-of-pocket.
But this is not the only way that Mr. Reiner's attempt to play Robin Hood would end up back-firing on the poor. An analysis by LECG, an economic consulting firm in California, has found that the Reiner tax-hike would actually result in more than $4 billion in general fund losses over the first five years as rich taxpayers either flee the state or report less taxable income. This would either mean cuts in health, welfare and other programs for the poor--or an even bigger fiscal deficit. There is a better way to help poor parents without soaking taxpayers or jinxing the budget. California already spends $3 billion on preschool. It would make far more sense to hand this money to lower- and middle-income families in the form of targeted preschool tax credits.
Mr. Reiner's ad campaign mentions neither the indifferent results of universal preschool nor its budgetary consequences. This, in itself, would not be a problem, because a democracy counts not on any one person's script, but many partial ones from numerous interested parties, to get the full story across to voters. But there is a problem when someone has unfair access to taxpayer dollars to bankroll his script over others. This is why California authorities need to give close scrutiny to Mr. Reiner's tactics--and California voters to his grand taxing plans. As Archie Bunker would say: Hands off my fridge, Meathead.
Ms. Dalmia is a senior analyst and Ms. Snell the director of education policy at the Reason Foundation.
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
03/20/2006
12:17 ||
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#1
MEAT HEAD__ DEAD FROM THE NECK UP!!!!!!!! JEESH HA !!!!
#2
God save us from the self-appointed social engineers... as played by rich Hollywood Movie Stars!
*adds Meathead to the list*
Note that his TV wife, who was reduced to pitching some sort of training school in late-night TV spots, Sally Struthers, hasn't been as fortunate as the Meathead - and he hasn't helped her, apparently. Something kinda rotten about that, especially in buddy-buddy Hollywood.
#3
I sent an email to EJ Dionne regarding his WAPO article on Meathead Reiner:
Mr. E. J. Dione
Are you aware (apparently not, judging by the article) that Meathead and C. Everett Koop, former surgeon general, have been receiving California tobacco tax money for over eight years. The tax was voted in for preschool childrens funding, it goes directly to these two stalwart liberals, and no accountabilty is mandated on the use of the money. At 50 cents per pack of cigarettes, they have received close to a billion $, have only publicly shown a couple of preschool projects when they were forced to back in '02. Reiner and Koop are disengenuous crooks at best, and escalating the state income tax to 11% is insane.
Mr. Dionne responded with a thanks for the comment, but at least he responded. It will be interesting to see if the audit is done this year.
A 75-year-old grandfather has become the newest star of Russia's growing porn industry, after wandering on to a film set by mistake, thinking it was a muscle man show.
David Bozdoganov has since starred in the films The Old Neighbour and Handyman at Work.
Director Alexander Plahov said: "We were auditioning for a new film and had a number of couples on stage simulating sex when I saw an old guy standing at the back.
"I wandered over to ask him to leave when I saw this massive package straining against his trousers.
"I thought, now this could be an original idea. And I was right: all the movies we've made with David have been huge successes."
The beast with two backs - and a walking stick. But not everyone is delighted. The priapic pensioner apparently believes in the beneficial powers of garlic and his female co-stars have complained about his habit of rubbing it on his genitals before filming action scenes.
The bird-flu virus found in Israel last week was sent by Allah to punish the Jews for being "the worst of humanity" and is the beginning of the outbreak of other diseases meant to destroy the Jewish state within the next twenty years, a Gaza preacher said at mosque services this weekend.
Sheikh Abu Muhammed, an imam at the popular Al-Tadwa mosque in Beit Lahia north of Gaza City, went on to ask Muslims at his Friday night sermon to pray for the sexual organs of Jews to "dry out" so they cannot reproduce, a Palestinian in attendance at the mosque services told WorldNetDaily.
"Praise Allah the bird flu has hit the Jews. It came because of their sins against the Palestinians; because they are the most cruel enemy of humanity; because they are themselves the enemy of humanity; because they don't believe in Allah; because they falsify the book of Allah; because they cheated the prophet Muhammed; and because they cheated Allah and even their own prophet, Moses," Sheikh Muhammed was quoted as saying.
"This bird flu will be the beginning of diseases which will hit the nonbelievers. Please Allah keep hitting the enemy with more diseases. This is no doubt the beginning of the end of the Israelis. Like [late Hamas spiritual leader] Sheikh Yassin said, 2025 will be the end of Jews. This [bird flu] is the sign," said Sheikh Muhammed, according to congregants.
Yassin, who was assassinated by Israel in March, 2004, told followers he used Quranic verse to divine Israel would be destroyed by the year 2025.
In his mosque speech, Sheikh Muhammed reportedly went on to explain Allah decided to "hit the Israelis with birds," since birds are mentioned in the Quran as a tool used to defeat infidels.
He asked for congregants to "pray for Allah to dry out the sexual organs of the Jews with a disease so they won't be able to reproduce anymore."
Muhammed made his comments in spite of predictions the virus found in Israel may surface through migrating fowl in the nearby Palestinian territories.
Bird flu was immediately suspected here last week after more than 1,000 birds were found dead in southern Israel. The Agriculture Ministry said yesterday it was almost certain H5N1, the deadly strain of the virus, was responsible.
Veterinary and state health officials proceeded with the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of turkeys and chickens in quarantined farms in attempts to halt the spread of the suspected virus. Israel is set to receive from Holland four million units of vaccine to treat birds in the event officials are not able to contain the virus.
In neighboring Egypt, officials yesterday confirmed a woman who died Friday had bird flu, making her likely the first human death from the disease in that country. Egyptian officials also reported last night a second possible case of a human contracting the virus, but have not released further details.
The H5N1 strain of bird flu has killed or forced the slaughter of tens of millions of chickens and ducks across Asia since 2003, and recently spread to Europe, Africa and the Middle East. Some experts fear H5N1 could evolve into a virus that can be transmitted between people and become a global pandemic, but others caution there is little evidence that can happen.
At least 98 people have died from the bird flu throughout the world, two-thirds of them in Indonesia and Vietnam, according to figures released by the World Health Organization.
#1
No Jews have died of bird flu. Too bad the Mohammed worshippers can't say the same.
Hope no muzzies took any of that Salk or Sabin Jew polio vaccine. It will cause their doinkers to fall off and their wimmin to get hot all over at the sight of a Hebrew National hotdog.
Posted by: ed ||
03/20/2006 11:58
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#2
Move Sheikh Abu Mohammed (An obvious alias) to the head of Mosad's hit list.
Be obvious that he was hit, and state loudly "It's obviously The will of Allah" or he'd still be alive.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/20/2006 12:02
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#3
May Allah deny the Islamofascists use of their "precious bodily fluids"...
#4
The ignorance of people like Sheikh Abu Muhammed never ceases to amaze me. If any one place was ill-equipped to deal with an avian flu outbreak, it would be his own backyard.
Of course, if/when it does happen, he will expect Israel to provide the necessary medical assistance to deal with the problem and then turn around and blame them (and the infidel Americans) for everything bad anyways.
I'm not a violent person and I'm all for free speech, in this country and everywhere else. Yet sometimes I wonder, why do we let people who say such patently misleading, inciteful, and ignorant things live? Their preaching is not doing the human race any favors, that's for sure. There is a part of me that wishes we could set up some super secret and covert snatch-and-grab squad that was tasked only with eliminating jerks who spread venomous ideas like Sheikh Abu. Keep it way down on the low-low. Just grab these guys out of thin air, so to speak, and poof... nobody ever hears from them again. They're just gone, nobody knows what happened to them. Disappeared without a trace only to show up on the paleo version of "Unsolved Mysteries" with Robert Stack as host.
I wonder if that wouldn't go a long way in fixing this problem of islamic extremism once and for all.
Sort of like a League of Shadows thing, a la Batman. Wishful thinking, I know.
#5
The first pillar is the recitation (preferably in Arabic) of the creed, or shahada: "There is no god but Allah, and Mohammed is his prophet." If Allah is the only god in the neighborhood, Trinitarian Christians and Hindus are endlessly blaspheming true religion. Despite the occasionally tolerant references in the Qur�an to "People of the Book" (Jews and Christians in addition to Muslims), the non-Muslims need to be eliminated. Convert them or kill them, or make them pay a religious ransom to continue the private practice of their religion. (Of necessity, Muslims must reject the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.) Atheists and Agnostics, who deny the reality of Allah, are also wicked blasphemers. They need to be eliminated also. It is preferable to kill them.
#6
Now what could the GUIDE have to say about the second pillar?
Prayer and your Friday Sermon.
The second pillar of Islam, salat, is daily ritual prayer. This is mandatory only five times per day (at dawn, noon, mid-afternoon, sunset, and nighttime), but extremely religious Muslims such as suicide bombers and aerial terrorists usually pray more frequently. Prayer requires a person to face Mecca and the Ka�aba, a roughly cubical building containing a magical black stone thought by some to be a meteorite. (Archaeological and other evidence shows, however, that in the early years of Islam, prayers were directed at Jerusalem, not Mecca.) Prayer is preceded by ritual purification and involves a series of bowings, prostrations, and recitations from the Qur�an. On Fridays, prayer is communal and conducted in a mosque (Arabic masjid, 'place for prostration'). Led by an imam (from Arabic amma, 'to walk before'), with worshippers standing in rows behind him, prayers normally are followed by a sermon. (Contrary to common western opinion, it is not mandatory for sermons to contain the slogans "Death to America" or "Death to Israel.") Women do not generally attend these public prayers, and when they do enter into mosques they are segregated from the men. Although this offends the western sense of sexual equality, it is quite understandable. The minds of men bowing down to the ground might wander from thoughts of the singularity of Allah if their noses were merely inches away from the raised derrieres of women kneeling on prayer rugs in front of them. Even if the women were completely shrouded in burqas, their intermingled presence would be a deterrent to patriarchal piety.
#8
Sheikh Abu Muhammed, an imam at the popular Al-Tadwa mosque in Beit Lahia north of Gaza City, went on to ask Muslims at his Friday night sermon to pray for the sexual organs of Jews to "dry out" so they cannot reproduce.
The Sheik went on to say, "The Mad-Cow protien prions have invaded my brain, and soon they will have to diaper me, and my beard will be matted with yellow drool."
#9
Like [late Hamas spiritual leader] Sheikh Yassin said, 2025 will be the end of Jews.
Funny how Yassin isn't around to continue his spittle flecked campaign of hatred and genocide.
Yet sometimes I wonder, why do we let people who say such patently misleading, inciteful, and ignorant things live? Their preaching is not doing the human race any favors, that's for sure. There is a part of me that wishes we could set up some super secret and covert snatch-and-grab squad that was tasked only with eliminating jerks who spread venomous ideas like Sheikh Abu. Keep it way down on the low-low. Just grab these guys out of thin air, so to speak, and poof... nobody ever hears from them again. They're just gone, nobody knows what happened to them.
Myself, too, eltoroverde. That's why people like .com, Old Spook, Frank G, myself and others hereabouts have for some time supported the notion of wetwork hunter-killer teams to take out this trash.
The psychopathic and toxic meme of Islamism is spread by these type of individuals. Until we attach a price tag to spewing this sort of genocidal bile, it will merely continue to grow in scope. The sooner such maggot imams and mullahs have to look over their shoulder before launching into these murderous tirades, the better.
According to actor and comedian Richard Belzer, American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan are too uneducated to be expressing support for the U.S. military mission since they're just "19 and 20-year-old kids who couldn't get a job" and "they don't read twenty newspapers a day."
Belzer, who's best known as Detective John Munch on NBC's "Homicide: Life on the Street" and "Law & Order: Special Victim's Unit," is a frequent guest on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher." On one previous appearance, he threatened to walk off the set when told columnist Ann Coulter was also appearing, calling her a "fascist party doll." On Friday night's live broadcast, Belzer attacked claims by fellow guest Florida Congresswoman Ileanna Ros-Lehtinen's that U.S. soldiers continue to express support for the war.
In the lively exchange, captured by the website NewsBusters, Belzer dismisses Ros-Lehtinen accounts of meeting with troops in Iraq and their credibility as "bull----."
Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen: "Having been in Iraq a few times, and Afghanistan, having met the troops one-on-one with free reign and asking them what they're doing, they're saying 'We're proud of our mission, we know what we're doing over here. We don't want you guys in Washington to lose it over there'. And there is a great sense of determination that what they are doing is making a difference. And yes, it has been an important mission what we're doing ... come on."
Richard Belzer: "Yeah, come on. Our soldiers now are at ..."
Ros-Lehtinen: "Are a volunteer force, a volunteer force."
Belzer: "Okay, fine. No one questions the nobility and the honor that these men and woman who are serving and what they're doing. No one questions that. But now they're targets, they're not going out. Now they're just protecting each other and they're in the middle of a civil war. So it's really not fair to have these people who volunteered their lives to protect our nation under false pretenses to now be a target ..."
[Loud applause for Belzer]
Ros-Lehtinen: "Ask them. Ask them if it's fair! Wait a minute, wait a minute. My stepson, wait a minute, my stepson ..."
Belzer: "That's bull----: Ask them! They're not .. they don't read twenty newspapers a day. They're under the threat of death every minute. They're not the best people to ask about the war because they're going to die any second."
Ros-Lehtinen: "Wait a minute! You are talking about my stepson, my stepson who just finished last week eight months of duty ..."
Belzer: "God bless your stepson. Doesn't mean he's a brilliant scholar about the war because he's there. And God bless him."
Ros-Lehtinen: "Oh, you are though! You are though? Okay."
Belzer: "Well I have more time, I'm not there. My life is not under threat."
Ros-Lehtinen: "Thank you. Thank you. I'm glad."
Bill Maher: "I think the point he's trying to make is that a 19-year-old who is in that army because he probably couldn't find other employment ..."
Ros-Lehtinen: "He's a college graduate. He's a Marine officer. He volunteered for the Marines."
Belzer: "He's the exception for the rule."
Ros-Lehtinen: "He's not the exception for the rule. I've been there ..."
Belzer: "You think everyone over there is a college graduate? They're 19 and 20-year-old kids who couldn't get a job ..."
Ros-Lehtinen: "Yeah, you know because you've been there and ..."
Belzer: "What, I don't f---ing read!? Don't do that!"
Maher [to Belzer]: "Woe, woe, woe. Come on. Wait, wait, wait. That ... Don't."
Belzer: "Pardon my French."
Maher: "Yes ... that was over the line and now you're going to lose ..."
Belzer: "It's this patronizing thing that people have about if you're against the war everyone's lumped together. You know, the soldiers are not scholars, they're not war experts ..."
Maher: "You're going to lose even me like Michael Moore did when he came down on Charlton Heston in Columbine."
Belzer, a conspiracy theorist who once hosted several conspiracy-themed specials for the Sci-Fi Channel, is the author of the 1999 book, "UFOs, JFK, and Elvis: Conspiracies You Don't Have to Be Crazy to Believe."
To view the exchange between Richard Belzer and Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, click here [Note: Contains vulgar language].
#3
"UFOs, JFK, and Elvis: Conspiracies You Don't Have to Be Crazy to Believe."
But it probably helps.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
03/20/2006 11:57
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#4
....Hell, it must be nice to have a job that is so undemanding that you have TIME to read 20 newspapers a day.
Reality check - he's still pissed because his career in standup never quite took off.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
03/20/2006 12:40
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#5
career in standup
It would have helped if he were funny or even mildly amusing.
Posted by: ed ||
03/20/2006 12:55
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#6
Maybe if he was forced to carry a large wooden cross through downtown Jerusalem while being scourged by Gilbert Gottfried, dressed as a Roman soldier.
I'm not saying it would do anything, just that it sounds like a good idea.
#7
..Gilbert Gottfried as a Roman soldier...twisted, but funny.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
03/20/2006 13:14
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#8
According to Wikipedia, he got tossed out of every school he attended, supposedly because he was too funny. (uh huh) Unsuccessfully tried junior college, enlisted in the Army when he failed there, then tried to get out.
White, straight, Jewish, cousin of Henry Winkler. Married 3 times.
Yup, just the go-to guy for serious military analysis.
#11
This exchange tells you everything you need to know about the left: They are smarter and know what is best for YOU. Obviously neither Bill nor Richard has met anyone currently in the military or they would not make such idiotic statements. I would make a blanket statement that ANYONE currently serving in the Military could land a good paying job in the private sector without too much difficulty. Further you can read tons of newspapers and still get it wrong. If you only read Pravda or any of the commie rags you would be mystified why communism failed.
#12
Damn, another actor I will refuse to watch. The list is growing
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
03/20/2006 14:56
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#13
Belzer, a conspiracy theorist who once hosted several conspiracy-themed specials for the Sci-Fi Channel, is the author of the 1999 book, "UFOs, JFK, and Elvis: Conspiracies You Don't Have to Be Crazy to Believe."
Kinda says it all, don't it?
Posted by: Mike ||
03/20/2006 15:01
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#14
Belzer was funny as a snarky know-it-all talk show host on one of the National Lampoon LPs back in the '70's. That was 30 years ago.
Obviously, he still has an ax to grind with the military and just as obviously he doesn't know any active or recently active military.
#15
May he rot in hell with his back broken.
A worse fate - may he be forgotten and ignored, even by his "friends" in Hollyweird. There is no greater punishment for these attention-hounds than to be ignored. May that be the fate of all of them, Hollyweird types,Cindy Sheehan types, and the rest of the looney left.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
03/20/2006 16:59
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#16
I saw comments somewhere lately that the military volunteers test in the upper third of physical and mental competence of the population as a whole.
I worked with Hollywood types for ten years in Beverly Hills. They are not in the upper third. They just believe their own BS and whatever words their agent puts in their mouths.
#17
thanks Richard - you do a good job of reading words and emotions written by others. Your own work seems to have gotten you .....middle of nowhere. We should listen to you for advice? YJCMTSU
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/20/2006 20:08
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#18
I'm always stuck between amusement and anger at these high school dropouts who think they are qualified to pass judgement on foreign policy and military matters.
If the American public didn't over pay them and idolize them, their view of themselves might be a little more realistic.
#19
Law and Order SUV drops from any viewing lists I had. Buh-bye
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/20/2006 20:43
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#20
Let me get this straight. Since *he* couldn't manage to cut it in the Army after failing in civilian life (sure, baby, you were too damn funnay and got kicked out of school for that....right) back in the 70's, he thinks *all* the current crop of soldiers are like him?
When Doreen Hunt collapsed in her bathroom during the night there was no one awake to raise the alarm. Step forward Gizmo, an elderly Siamese cat with one tooth. Sensing something was wrong, the 15-year-old pet stirred from his usual spot at the bottom of Mrs Hunt's bed and began meowing loudly.
Lassie calls for help. Cat owners will recognize this as Gizmo bitching about her being up and not petting him.
The noise eventually woke Mrs Hunt's husband, Peter, 76, who found his wife slumped on the floor of their house in Stafford and called an ambulance. Speaking from her hospital bed, Mrs Hunt, 73, who suffered paralysis down her left side, said: "He's a super cat and I'm so grateful."
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006
11:10 ||
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You might want to keep an antacid handy before reading the NYT spin on this issue. I was tempted to file it under Fifth Column.
Since the Republican majority has decided to allow President Bush to usurp Congress's role in matters of national security, the battle to save the constitutional balance of powers moves to the judiciary. A critical test of judicial independence will come this month, when the Supreme Court hears arguments in a case that has become a focus of Mr. Bush's imperial vision of the presidency.
Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni national accused of having been a bodyguard and driver for Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan, has been detained since 2002 in Guantánamo Bay. He filed suit to challenge the legitimacy of the military commission that upheld his designation as an "unlawful enemy combatant" a term Mr. Bush invented after 9/11 to deny the protections of the Geneva Conventions, international statutes or United States law to certain prisoners.
Mr. Hamdan argued, rightly, that the commissions are not legitimate because prisoners are routinely barred from seeing evidence, much less confronting their accusers or having access to real legal representation. But his case has now become a much larger battle over the principle of habeas corpus, which is embedded in the Constitution and says that a prisoner cannot be denied the right to challenge his detention. Mr. Bush's decision after 9/11 that he had the power to put prisoners beyond the reach of the law at his choosing was the first attempt to suspend habeas corpus on American territory since the Civil War.
The Supreme Court two years ago emphatically rejected the president's claim that its jurisdiction did not extend to Guantánamo. Seeking to reverse that ruling, the White House in December helped push through a special amendment as part of the deal that also saw Mr. Bush sign a watered-down ban on torture of military detainees. The amendment, sponsored by Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican, and Senator Carl Levin, a Democrat, stripped Guantánamo detainees of the normal rights of judicial review. It also designated a single appellate court to conduct a limited review of decisions by the military commissions, and left "enemy combatants" held without a trial in a seemingly inescapable legal black hole.
As soon as Mr. Bush signed this law, he declared that the administration was going to apply it to all pending cases, about 160 or so, and the solicitor general told the Supreme Court it no longer had a right to hear Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. This is court-stripping the attempt by another branch of government to prevent the court from deciding a particular issue. The White House tried to justify this outrageous tampering with the judiciary by ignoring the new law's actual language and legislative history to argue that the new legislation took away the power of the courts to hear not just future cases but also cases already filed and accepted for review. The Supreme Court responded by adding the jurisdictional objection to the list of issues it will consider when the case is heard on March 28.
At a minimum, we hope the court will rule that Congress and the president may not deny the justices the power to review pending cases. But it should also reject the defective military commissions, as well as the idea of denying access to the courts for future valid claims brought by Guantánamo detainees, including claims of torture.
If Congress wants to take the extreme step of suspending the Supreme Court's jurisdiction over habeas corpus, especially pending appeals, it must say so in unmistakable terms, which it has not done. Both the text and the legislative history of the Graham-Levin amendment demonstrate an intention to avoid touching pending cases. Moreover, the Constitution itself requires an "invasion" or a "rebellion" as a prerequisite for suspension of habeas corpus. It's hardly likely that the founding fathers intended to give Congress the right to eliminate judicial review during an ongoing international struggle against terrorism that may well go on for generations.
The retired Justice Sandra Day O'Connor observed in a recent speech that the framers created three separate and equal branches of government because they knew that preserving liberty requires that no single branch or person can amass unchecked power. According to NPR's Nina Totenberg, who heard the speech, Justice O'Connor cited Republican court-stripping efforts as an example of dangerous overreaching. "It takes a lot of degeneration before a country falls into dictatorship," Justice O'Connor said, "but we should avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings."
The president seems to forget that and Congress clearly will not remind him. The nation cannot afford for the Supreme Court to forget as well.
#2
Isn't 'unlawful enemy combatant' specifically defined and encoded in the Geneva Convention iself? Specifically that they do not get GC protections and can be summarily executed without trial?
This looks like the NYT is trying to rewrite history (ala 1984....).
#3
Isn't 'unlawful enemy combatant' specifically defined and encoded in the Geneva Convention iself? Specifically that they do not get GC protections and can be summarily executed without trial?
AFAICR, the GCs define lawful combatants and protected persons. They don't spell out what to do with people who fit neither definition.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/20/2006 14:39
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#5
Since the Republican majority has decided to allow President Bush to usurp Congress's role in matters of national security...
Uh, Congress has the power to declare war -- which they did -- not to wage it. The NYT needs to stop smoking those funny little cigarettes.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/20/2006 14:52
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#6
"It takes a lot of degeneration before a country falls into dictatorship," Justice O'Connor said, "but we should avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings."
Does the current trend of judicial overreach count as degeneration?
BAGHDAD - Every day, more violence. And more uncertainty for Iraqis than they have ever known, as they mark three years since American troops invaded. The wave of optimism that once buoyed Iraqis after the fall of Saddam Hussein is now being marked as yet another casualty of the bombs and murders that are part of daily life here. But even as Iraq slides toward full-scale civil war, Iraqi analysts are trying to envision a way out of a vicious insurgency, political deadlock, and sectarian bloodshed.
One factor they are considering is the changing American role. Despite the continued presence of 130,000 American troops, and arm-twisting efforts by US diplomats to forge a unity government, Iraq's democratic political process is, by definition, giving the US even less leverage to shape this broken nation's future.
"The majority of Iraqis are now against this occupation, whether they are Sunni, Shiite or Kurd," says Wamidh Omar Nadhmi, a political scientist who heads a Sunni-led group called the Foundation Conference. "But those in government positions are trying to unleash a campaign of suppression, to take advantage [of the violence], to dominate. Remind me why the Kurds would be upset that Shiia and Sunni are killing each other, now they get what they've wanted all along, their own country.
"Now we are told: '[The Americans] are not going to take sides,' " says Mr. Nadhmi, referring to remarks by US officials last week that Iraqi forces must handle sectarian strife on their own. "But if it comes to civil war, and the US does not try to keep order, as the controlling power, then why do they stay in Iraq?"
Tens of thousands of Iraqis have died in a maelstrom of insurgent violence. Many hundreds more are dying in sectarian killings that flared a month ago, after the destruction of the gold-domed Shiite shrine at Samarra. The grim reality today - and the perception among so many Iraqis that the US is responsible - could not be in sharper contrast from the faith Iraqis once held, that the all-powerful Americans would solve their problems.
"It is unfortunate that we are in civil war," Iyad Allawi, Iraq's former prime minister, told BBC news Sunday. "We are losing each day an average of 50 to 60 people throughout the country, if not more. If this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is." Comments? Any Civil war naysayers?
That view is hotly disputed by US officials and commanders, but is on the lips of many Iraqis here. "Maybe we have not reached a point of no return yet, but we are moving towards this point," said Mr. Allawi. But escaping that vortex will not be easy, analysts say.
"The new government is incapable of ruling the street without the American presence," says Ahmad al-Rikabi, head of the popular Radio Dijla in Baghdad. "If [US forces] left Iraq, the future of the country would be in the hands of the militias. This is the case already, but we still have some hope [the US] will keep some balance." The stakes could not be higher, for Iraq or for the region, President Bush said last week. "The battle lines in Iraq are clearly drawn for the world to see, and there is no middle ground," he said. "The enemy will emerge from Iraq one of two ways: Emboldened or defeated."
US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad has been pushing Iraqi leaders to form a unity government, that would mend rifts inside the main Shiite bloc, and ensure a significant role for the minority Sunni Arabs. At the formal opening of parliament last Thursday, he had a place in the handshaking line alongside Iraqi political leaders. But diplomats close to the talks say not all Iraqi leaders welcome the forceful US intervention. Both Washington and Tehran have signaled that they could commence talks to solve the crisis, in what would be the first publicly acknowledged contact since Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution.
"Saddam Hussein is still ruling Iraq - he may be behind bars, but he created the mentality we have today," says Mr. Rikabi. "Saddam has to be executed. It's not revenge, and won't be satisfying for his victims. But it will be good for Shiite and Kurds, and even Sunnis, to help them focus on their leaders."
"The symbols of the past are still in front of our eyes; we're still living in the past, and must get rid of the past," says Rikabi.
Sectarian violence grows
But getting rid of the past means getting rid of business as usual, and that means coming to terms with the increasingly pervasive Shiite militia influence in Iraq's security forces, which are accused of abuse, torture, and operating death squads that target Sunni Arabs. They also reportedly let other Shiite militias, like the Mahdi Army of anti-US cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, operate with impunity.n"The first thing is to change the minister," says a Shiite police colonel who asked not to be named, referring to Bayan Jabr, the minister of interior and a former Badr militia leader. "We need an independent one."
Ambassador Khalilzad has pushed for such a change. Shiites are targeted almost exclusively by the Sunni Arab extremist insurgents. But Sunni Arabs say they see little change on the ground. "Nobody obliged the minister of interior to resign - he should be arrested," says Mr. Wamidh. "There have been no actual steps in favor of the Sunnis, but accumulated attacks against them."
The daily toll was again evident Sunday, as hundreds of thousands of Shiite pilgrims made their way by foot to the sacred city of Karbala, south of Baghdad, to mark Monday the death of Hussein, the grandson of the prophet Muhammad. Pilgrims have been subject to drive-by shootings and bombings by Sunni Arab extremists that have killed four. A mortar landed near the shrine of Imam Hussein but caused no harm. An extra 700 American troops were deployed from Kuwait, to boost security during the religious event. In Baghdad four bodies killed execution-style were found Sunday; 22 were found, by one count, the day before.
Whatever the result of the political wrangling, many Iraqis say it will not be enough to correct three years of US mistakes - from disbanding Saddam Hussein's 400,000-strong army with the stroke of a pen, to a vigorous de-Baathification plan that swept capable bureaucrats from government - that helped fuel insurgency.
"If only they had left those murdering thugs in charge......."
But there is a further problem, analysts say, that no amount of US influence can help: The fact that insecurity is so pervasive, that Iraqi leaders and the government meet inside the bubble of the Green Zone, among a labyrinth of 12-foot-high concrete blast walls woven together with coils of concertina wire that keep them safe, as well as isolated. "The politicians are out of touch with the street, so it is like a group of blind people negotiating," says Rikabi. "They have nothing to do with the Republic of Iraq ... they do not feel a power cut for a second, while outside, [electricity] is off for 22 hours a day. You can't make the right decision, when the prime minister still has his family in London."
Relying on such politicians also risks the endgame for the US, which wants a unity government to take control - and control Iraqi security forces - so American forces can begin withdrawing. "I can see their dilemma," says Nadhmi. "[President George] Bush is triumphant about democracy in Iraq, but if he tries to intervene and put in a prime minister of his own, it would be a contradiction."
Still, options are limited for the US - both military and political - which last week accused Iran of "meddling" in Iraqi affairs, and claimed that Iran had helped insurgents improve their explosive techniques. The US military's "kinetic or muscular approach has failed to produce sustained success," says a report last month from the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS), noting that insurgent attacks at a tempo of 75 per day against coalition forces show "no signs of diminishing."
It notes that several key non-Al Qaeda insurgent groups secretly agreed to a 21-point "principles for dialogue" with US forces last December. Such talks have not taken place in part, the IISS says, because "the very logic of elections, bringing to power an indigenous government with a mandate, has directly reduced US influence over Iraqi politics."
This has been clear for months to many in Iraq, who look back with nostalgia on Saddam Hussein, in the way that older Russians often crave the order once instilled upon the Soviet Union by Josef Stalin. "People were executed in Saddam's days, but it is the same today," says Rikabi, of Radio Dijla. "Then it was behind high walls, now it is by this or that militia. "Before, people respected the traffic police, there was an organization, a state; today we have the smell, the shadow of a government," says Rikabi. "Before, people would go to restaurants until 2 a.m.; today their lives are full of fear.
"And the trains used to run on time"
"Then, we had one Saddam Hussein," concludes Rikabi. "Today, we have many Saddam Husseins."
#2
50 dead a day is not a civil war for gods sake.
If they really have a civil war the US will hunker down while the Shia go Rwanda on the Sunni. It will be over in two weeks and we'll feel really bad about the carnage and politically be damaged because we allowed it to happen but in the grand scheme of things on week three Iraq would be peaceful.
We have no civil war in Iraq because the bulk of the Sunni's are looking for power, not graves. They see what will happen and watched as the US stayed out of the way after the Mosque attack.
#3
Probably we should have had a typology of civil war that we can refer to when discussing situations like Iraq.
Class A Civil War = Heavy arms used by both sides in continuous and organized violence between armies both of which are indiginous to the same country (e.g. American Civil War)
Class B = substantial number of organized raiding parties of each side kill numerous members of other side's population over a substantial period of time (Bosnia 90s).
Class C = occasional organized raiding parties (Iraq Jan-Mar 2005)
Class D = sporadic violence between factions (N Ireland 1985-2003)
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
03/20/2006 12:39
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#5
When are these people going to understand that we did not go into Iraq to impose freedom - but to give them a chance at freedom - it is up to them to reach out and grasp it.
By defintion you cannot 'force' people to be free - they have to seek and earn it (often at a very high price....) - that is also how they grow to apprecaite it.
Personally I couldn't give a rats ass if Iraq breaks into open civil war. It is their choice.
Criminal killed in 'shootout'
A listed criminal was killed during a "shootout" between police and his accomplices at Mashiali under Khanjahan Ali Police Station early yesterday.
The dead is Wazir Mohammad Bhuiyan alias Mukul Bhuiyan, 38, from Damodar under Phultala upazila. He was arrested on Saturday night at Tootpara in Khulna Sadar.
"Evening, Muk. Why don't you come down to the station for a little "talk".
Police said they took him to Mashiali at around 4:30am to recover illegal arms following leads extracted from him.
"The needlenose pliers, please"
As they reached the spot, Mukul's accomplices opened fire on them prompting the law enforcers to retaliate.
"Da law got Muk! Open random aimless fire!"
Mukul received bullet when he fell in the line of fire during the 15-minute long shootout and died on the spot.
"Ouch....rosebud"
Police recovered two pipe guns and eleven cartridges from the spot. Two constables were also injured during the gunfight.
Later, police recovered the body and sent it to Khulna Medical College Hospital morgue for autopsy.
"Dr. Quincy! Another stiff for you."
According to police, Mukul had been working as a liaison cadre of Purbo Banglar Communist Party (PBCP-Janajuddho) since 2004 and was also involved in extorting money from the transport owners of Phultala. He was the elder brother of top PBCP leader Mahmud Hasan alias Shimul Bhuiyan who was sentenced to 42 years of rigorous imprisonment in 2002 in three murder cases. Mukul was also accused in several cases filed with the Phultala Police Station for murders and bomb attacks.
2 AK-47, ammo seized
CHITTAGONG, Mar 19: Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) seized some arms and ammunition including two AK-47 rifles from a house at Noapara village in Fatikchari upazila here early on Sunday, reports UNB.
RAB sources said they arrested Naziruddin and Jamaluddin, both wanted in several cases including murder, from Kathgar area of Potenga thana Saturday evening. As per their confession the elite force along with the two terrorists went to a house at the village and dug out two AK-47 rifles, three magazines and 197 rounds of bullet from the house.
What? No cadre lying in wait? No "killed while attemping to escape"?
A case was filed against them under arms act.
Student killed for kissing teacher!
SATKHIRA, Mar 19: A spoiled student expelled from the school for kissing young lady teacher was found dead on the school verandah on Sunday, reports UNB.
Police picked up the body of Masud Ali, student of Class X of Polashpole Adarsha High School in the town. The body was lying on the verandah of the first floor. Firsthand police report said unknown assailants murdered the boy.
Headmaster S M Masud Hossain said the boy misbehaved with a lady teacher of the school and threatened her on phone on March 13. The managing committee in an emergency meeting decided to expel Masud Ali immediately. When the school reopened after the weekly holidays the boy was found dead on the verandah.
His classmates said Masud forcibly kissed the young lady teacher on March 13. He may have been murdered as a sequel to the incident.
Family honor, ya know
Masud Ali came from Laxminathpur village in Kaliganj upazila. He used to stay with his maternal uncle, a schoolteacher living in the town.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006
10:48 ||
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Ah, just like the old days.
"rounds of bullet" -and- "received bullet"
The reference to cartridges put me off just a touch, but it was more than made up for by Steve's:
"Da law got Muk! Open random aimless fire!"
LOL. Excellent.
BTW, a curious thing caught my eye - putting shootout in scare quotes... Of course it was a shootout!
The banned Islamic outfit Jamaatul Mujahidden chief Shaikh Abdur Rahman, during his second-term interrogation, on Sunday said they had hired some local goons to carry out the August 17 blasts to hide the identities of their operatives from lawmen.(The New Age BD) He was arrested from a house in Sylhet in the morning on March 2. He has been giving important information on the countrywide series of blasts on August 17, 2005, said sources in the task force, a combine of intelligence agencies and the Rapid Action Battalion.
We carried out the blasts in some districts by hired goons to hide the identities of our operatives from law enforcers, a source in the task force quoted Adbur Rahman as saying. He said they handed over the charge of blasts to their divisional and districts commanders, who were directed by his younger brother Ataur Rahman, also military commander of the outfit, and his son-in-law Abdul Awal. As we tried to establish Islamic rule by launching suicide attacks at key installations by our own operatives, we did not want that some of our operatives would go in hiding after the blasts. So we decided to carry out the attack by some hired goons at some places, an official of the battalions intelligence wing quoted him Sunday night as saying.
Investigators said Rahman said his operatives had carried out the blasts by some rickshaw pullers giving them Tk 350 to Tk 500 in Coxs Bazar, Khagrachari and Brahmanbaria on August 17, but they did not have the idea of Jamaatul Mujahideen. Rahman proudly said his operative were capable of getting things done by others without giving them an idea of the outfit.
Two young men Mohammad Shohel and Alamgir Hossain, now in custody, meanwhile told the magistrate on Saturday that they had carried out the attacks on August 17 for money in Brahmanbaria. They made statements to Magistrate Habibur Rahman, saying that Sabbir Ahmed Dulal of the outfit distributed money among 11 persons. The attack was planned at a meeting at the Kazipara Eidgah a day before the incident. The police said the two agreed to make statements before the magistrate on the third day of their five-day remand.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006
10:31 ||
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So, Abner paid Tk350 and Tk 500 to the rickshaw boyz. How much is that?
A judge ousted a key Syrian al-Qaida suspect from his courtroom Monday for contempt of court after he refused to stand up on the opening day of his trial for allegedly masterminding deadly bombings in Turkey. Loai Mohammad Haj Bakr al-Saqa is on trial along with 72 other suspected al-Qaida militants for alleged involvement in a series of suicide bombings that killed 58 people in Istanbul in 2003. Judge Zafer Baskurt asked al-Saqa several times to stand up in court, and then ordered him thrown out when he refused. 'My beliefs prevent me from standing in front of people like you,' al-Saqa told the judge. As soldiers escorted him out, al-Saqa shouted: 'I fought a jihad, I killed Americans, I will not stand up before you!' Baskurt also ordered a spectator detained for shouting in support of al-Saqa.
Earlier, the judge asked lawyer Osman Karahan - who recently has been charged with aiding and abetting a terrorist organization for allegedly giving money to one of his clients - to leave the courtroom, saying he was barred from the case for one year. Karahan, who represents 15 of the 72 suspects including al-Saqa, faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted. The court then proceeded with the trial, formally joining al-Saqa's case with the case of the 72 other suspects.
Prosecutors claimed that Osama bin Laden personally ordered al-Saqa, 32, to carry out terror attacks in this predominantly Muslim but pro-Western country.
Al-Saqa is accused of serving as a point man between al-Qaida and homegrown militants behind the November 2003 bombings, which destroyed a British bank, the British Consulate and two synagogues, an indictment said. It said al-Saqa gave the Turkish militants about $170,000. Prosecutors have demanded life in prison for al-Saqa, calling him 'a high-level al-Qaida official with a special mission.'
Al-Saqa and his alleged Syrian accomplice, Hamid Obysi, were captured in Turkey in August after an alleged failed plot to attack Israeli cruise ships. Obysi was also standing trial Monday. Al-Saqa reportedly told interrogators the plot against one cruise ship was financed by Taliban chief Blinky Mullah Omar, who allegedly gave him $50,000 to carry out attacks against Israeli targets in his name. Al-Saqa already has been sentenced in absentia by Jordan in 2002, along with al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, for a failed plot to attack Americans and Israelis in Jordan with poison gas during millennium celebrations. Al-Saqa has also been implicated in the killing of a Turkish truck driver by insurgents in Iraq and accused of bomb-making and smuggling explosives into Turkey.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006
10:08 ||
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...and then ordered him thrown out ...
Hope it was out a window preferrably five or more stories up.
Damascus, SANA: Inauguration of the Chinese Town project in Adra is very soon after that preparations of the infrastructure which is extended on 7000 cubic meters have been finished, General Director of General Organization for Free Zones (GOFZ) in Syria Dr. Adnan Sulieman has said. In a statement to Tishrin daily published Monday, Dr. Sulieman added: The Chinese products were shipped to the city where it will be a center that meets needs of the neighboring countries, including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iraq, Turkey, Cyprus and Lebanon of the Chinese products,
Some Chinese "products" may meet a varity of "needs"
The Chinese side has presented a new proposal to invest a bout 60,000 cubic meters as a warehouses. In case of success of the Chinese experience in Syria as a center for distributing the Chinese products through a trade representatives bureaus, then the Chinese factories will be conveyed to Syria that matter that positively will reflect on the national economy, He pointed out.
The Chinese Town was licensed on 2004 with a capital estimated at USD 6,7 million. This investment will create 265 work job for Syrian and Chinese workers. Number of the companies in the Chinese Town reached 200 foreign companies.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006
10:00 ||
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The showroom for the weapons kiosk is to die for. They serve tea and everything. Plantinum Amex Card = no waiting in line.
It's a little smelly walking past the chicken feet booths, but by Allah, those prices are right!
March 20, 2006: Here's an example of how misleading news gets made. A story about the Taliban getting their hands on batteries, for their American made Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, has been circulating around South Asia. The rumor is that "Pakistani government officials" have given Stinger batteries to the Taliban, so they can revive their 1980s vintage Stinger missiles, and proceed to shoot down lots of U.S. aircraft. The reality is a bit different.
Some 2,000 Stinger missiles were given, in the 1980s, to Afghans fighting Russian invaders. Most of the missiles were not used, and most of those subsequently disappeared, instead of being returned to American control. The missile batteries are dead by now, and the rocket propellant has gone bad as well. Moreover, you cannot just get some geek to cobble together new batteries. The "Stinger battery" also contains cooling elements that make the missile seeker work (by allowing it to pick up the hot exhaust of a jet engine.) The rocket motor is only good for 15 years (after that it will start to degrade and give erratic performance.) Replacing the rocket motor is even more difficult that trying to rig replacement batteries. Other components are also expected to become unreliable after two decades, not to mention the damage done by rough treatment the missiles may have received by the tribesmen holding then. In other words, those 1980s era Stingers are useless unless you replace most of the components. It's unlikely that Pakistan has any capability to refurbish Stinger missiles.
The real danger is from Russian SA-7 portable anti-aircraft missiles. Not as capable as the Stinger, there are still lots of SA-7s available with good batteries. Several have been fired in Iraq recently, although without bringing down anything. In Afghanistan, there are lots of small aircraft and helicopters flying around that are very vulnerable to an old-tech missile like the SA-7. During the 1980s, the Afghans got their hands on lots of SA-7s, fired over 500 of them, and brought down 47 aircraft and helicopters, and damaged 18 others. During the Vietnam war, 528 SA-7s were fired, bringing down 45 aircraft and helicopters, and damaging six others.
These missiles were originally intended for use against jet fighters operating low over the battlefield, but the reality turned out to be different. The most likely targets encountered were helicopters, or propeller driven transports. These aircraft proved to be just the sort of thing twenty pound missiles, with 2-3 pound warheads, could destroy. Against jet fighters with powerful engines, the missiles caused some damage to the tailpipe, but usually failed to bring down the jet. This was first noted during the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, where the Egyptians fired hundreds of SA-7s at Israeli A-4 light bombers. Most of the A-4s, with their 11,187 pounds of thrust engines, survived the encounter. Larger jets, like the F-4 and it's 17,000 pound thrust engines, were even more difficult to bring down. Smaller commercial jets, like the 737 or DC-9 (each using two 14,000 pounds of thrust engines) have proved vulnerable. But a 757 has much larger engines with 43,000 pounds of thrust, and the 747 is 63,000. Moreover, the rear end of jet engines are built to take a lot of punishment from all that hot exhaust spewing out. Put a bird into the front of the engine and you can do some real damage. But these missiles home in on heat, and all of that is at the rear end of the engine. Since the 1970s, about 40 commercial aircraft have been brought down by SA-7s, killing over 500 people.
Russia no longer makes the SA-7, but does manufacture more modern versions, closer to the Stinger in capabilities. Egypt and Pakistan do still make versions of the SA-7. There are still tens of thousands of recently manufactured SA-7s out there, as well as many of the more modern versions (like the SA-18). These are the missiles you have to worry about. Many SA-7s have been found in Iraq and Afghanistan, and some SA-18s have shown up in Iraq. We know from experience that for every ten SA-7s you fire, you are likely to bring down a smaller aircraft or helicopter. An SA-18 is about twice as effective. These missiles are designed to be used by untrained troops, and take some rough handling in the field. One thing that discourages their use, aside from the fact that most will not bring something down, is the fact that they do not have a long range (about four kilometers), and leave a distinctive smoke and flame trail that shows nearby troops or police where the missiles were fired from. These angles should not be underestimated, for they appear to be a major impediment to more widespread use of the missiles.
American helicopters and aircraft are equipped with missile detection and protection (lasers or flares) systems. Twenty year old Stingers, even if they were still in working order, would be no more effective than some of the more modern Russian missiles on the black market.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006
09:50 ||
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rofl - there was good video sometime back of some jihadi clowns trying to fire a large recoilless rifle, after cries of Allan ackbar the big nonse pulled the trigger and kaboom! 1 less jihadi clown on the planet. an absolutle classic video - yes the video is called 'allah caused it' try a google search for it its great
#3
Anyone else notice that on the anniversary of the Iraq War, in the MSM about 439 negative stories (like the one here about eeeeevil amerkians having their own technology used against them) were published with no stories about all the good that has happened?
#5
The Russians, however, regard the Stinger as the flyswatter from hell. Near the end of their time in Afghanistan, pilots would take off, head straight up to maximum altitude, and could not be persuaded to go lower until it was time to land. Needless to say, this sort of dampened their CAS effectiveness.
A man is being held by German police after walking into a petrol station with his wife's severed head in a bag.
Would his name be Hans? Gunther? Fritz?
The 40-year-old man, of Turkish origin, was covered in blood when he approached the night counter at about 0400GMT and asked the attendant to call the police.
Guess that's a "no".
Hamburg police said officers found the head in a bag on a grass verge and arrested the man, who was in a confused state and admitted killing his wife. The body of the woman, aged 39, was found in their nearby flat.
Hamburg police spokeswoman Ulrike Sweden said the man seemed "a bit crazy" and may have to see a doctor before charges can be brought. She said police found a large knife in the flat in Eissendorf, in the south of the city. "It seems he used the knife to kill his wife and cut off the head," she told the BBC News website. The couple's two children - girls aged 13 and six - were found in the flat and taken into police care.
"It seems they didn't see the body or what was going on," the spokeswoman said. A motive for the attack is still unclear.
SEE: Religion of Peace
Both the man and his wife were of Turkish origin, with German citizenship.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006
09:44 ||
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"I come home from a hard day's spittle at the mosque, just picked up the welfare cheque and what do I find? Dinner? Nooooo, they's all watching cartooooons. I just lost it."
#5
"She always wanted to be the head of the family, so . . . ."
Posted by: Mike ||
03/20/2006 12:34
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An elegant solution to the age old problem of the wifey complaining, "You never take me anywhere" and the muslim injuction to keep their women hidden.
Posted by: ed ||
03/20/2006 12:49
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In honor of Steak N Knobber Day - a head story
Posted by: Frank G ||
03/20/2006 13:07
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Doesn't he know you're supposed to send the body someplace else and bury the head under a rose bush?
In a move that shouldn't be a shock to anyone, Susan Sarandon has signed on to portray anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan.
Won't Susan have to move to the right to play Cindy?
But the all new Cindy-revue doesn't stop there. A crew will reportedly film Sheehan for a weekly reality series on the Sundance Channel.
Somehow the word "reality" and "Cindy Sheehan" just don't seem to go together
Her letters to President Bush inspired "Peace Mom," a one-woman monologue show in London. A memoir is due to her publisher April 1.
Has "60 Minutes" booked her yet to pimp her book?
And according to the San Francisco Chronicle, "she hopes to reschedule a trip to address the European Union, postponed, she says, because of injuries when she was arrested yet again and jailed earlier this month on charges of blocking entrance to the U.S. Mission to the United Nations."
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006
09:32 ||
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So who will play Casey Sheehan? Tim Robbins?
Of course, there is no reason to have Casey in the biography of Mother Sheehan. He is not important to her. /sarcasm
#3
Wow, a weekly reality TeeWee series! Right up there with Paris Hilton living the "real life".
Excellent. Kiss of death for Sheehan "credibility" - going Hollywood. Appropriate - creation returns to her roots of fiction and drama and fame. her very own TeeWee show! Wow!
#4
I was wondering what the whore would do for her next trick! I bet your wondering if I am talking about Susan or Cindy and my answer is: "yes." On another note the Anti-America War protest were not well attended this weekend. This makes me wonder about those polls that the MSM media is waiving around. If support for Bush and his handling of the War are at a "all-time low" wouldn't the street still be clogged with protestors?
The Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan were destroyed by the Taliban with the help of Pakistani and Saudi engineers. According to an account published here on Saturday, a local Afghan told the makers of a Swiss documentary on the giant statues which had stood there, carved in the side of a mountain for hundreds of years, had been destroyed by engineers from Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. The dynamiting of the statues took place in March 2001. Swiss documentary filmmaker Christian Frei, who has made several documentaries that have won praise at various international film festivals, shot The Giant Buddhas in Afghanistan. The film is due to be shown at the National Gallery of Art in Washington on 26 March.
The Taliban went ahead with the destruction of the giant statues, revered for centuries, because they considered them offensive to Islam. They ignored appeals from around the world, including UNESCO and an appeal from the then Government of Pakistan, made, it would appear now, more for the record than any serious intent to stop the Islamist zealots from destroying what the rest of the world considered mankinds heritage.
Taliban minister of information Qudratullah Jamal said in a statement later, The destruction work is not as easy as people would think. You cant knock down the statues by dynamite or shelling as both of them have been carved in a cliff. They are firmly attached to the mountain. Museums and governments around the world kept hoping until the end that the Taliban would desist from committing what the rest of the world saw as an act of cultural sacrilege but they were adamant in their resolve.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006
09:28 ||
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what a suprise eh. who would have thought eh. Just don't expect to hear this important tit bit of info mentioned on any mainstream media!
#2
Mullah Krekar referred to the destruction of the Buddhas as merely, "breaking stones."
In light of Pakistan's, and especially Saudi Arabia's participation in this, they should both be billed for the restoration work. If Saudi Arabia resists such a notion, we may wish to let them know that their precious black rock in Mecca is just another "stone" that can be broken.
By Debbie Schlussel Excerpts:
But unlike the fictional "24," real-life FBI counter-terrorism agents lost out to the suits at the top, and 3,000 people were murdered. I and many others have written about how FBI brass refused to allow a complete investigation of Moussaoui--in the name of not profiling Arab Muslims. But it is even more disturbing as it is conveyed by agent Samit.
You can feel the pre-9/11 desperation of counter-terrorism agents in Samit's testimony. According to USA Today's Kevin Johnson, Agent Samit testified that "hours into an interrogation, investigators suspected Moussaoui was involved in 'a plot involving airliners.'" Investigation of Moussaoui became "an obsession" of FBI terrorism investigators.
But it wasn't an obsession--or even a slight concern--for Robert Mueller and company. The FBI Director and his sachems fought these agents every step of the way.
According to Samit, the effort to investigate Moussaoui intensified
when top bureau officials at FBI headquarters in Washington refused to support requests for warrants to search Moussaoui's belongings and residences in Minnesota and Oklahoma.
Investigators were desperate for a break and sensed a terrorist action might be moving forward based on Moussaoui's unusual behavior, Samit said.
So what did the FBI higher-ups do in response? They reluctantly agreed to send a milquetoast bulletin of "a possible hijacking plot" to other federal agencies, almost a month later, on September 5th--just six days before the attack.
...
But wait, there's more. USA Today's Johnson's report gets even more disturbing. Because OUR FBI and federal government authorities were so intransigent on investigating this VERY suspicious man's belongings, smart-AND-desperate FBI terrorism agents had to cook up a plot to let the FRENCH do it. The French? The French!
Still lacking authority for a fuller search of Moussaoui's belongings, federal authorities cut an unusual deal with French officials Sept. 10, Samit said. Under terms of that agreement, Moussaoui would be deported to his native France, and French authorities would conduct a search of his luggage and computer.
Suicide hijackers launched their attacks the next day, and the transfer never occurred.
Posted by: ed ||
03/20/2006
09:25 ||
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At the risk of earning a fatwa, let us speak a simple truth. With regard to Mohammed, there are three sorts of people in the world. First, there are those who have never heard of him, or know too little of him to have an opinion. Disregard them.
Second, there are the Muslims, who believe him to be the messenger of God, the true Prophet.
Finally, there are those of us who know who Mohammed was, and have chosen not to regard him as a prophet, the Messenger of God, or as having any religious significance at all. By definition, the best we can think of Mohammed was that he was a charismatic leader who invoked myths of his own creation to inspire a bunch of Arabian tribes to attack, kill and subjugate peoples within his reach who did not willingly submit to him. In this, the most favorable possible conception of Mohammed to a non-Muslim, he was an imperialist of the first order who launched an extended war -- one that some would say has never ended -- against the Jews and Christians within the reach of his armies, or those of his descendants.
This should start you out:
Mohammedans don't like to be called Mohammedans � that smacks too much of terms such as Christians. As everybody knows, Christians worship Christ as a god. Mohammedans don't want people to think they worship Mohammed (Arabic, Muhammad A - 'Praiseworthy'), and so dislike referring to their religion as Mohammedanism. However, Confucians don't worship Confucius (Chinese, K'ung Fu-tsu � 'K'ung [a family name] the Grand Master'), even though their system is called Confucianism and often is considered to be a religion. Even so, Mohammedans don't want Mohammed to be viewed as a parallel of the Christ of the Christians.
Mohammed was merely a prophet, they will argue, who disclaimed the ability to do miracles. Mohammed was just a man - albeit the perfect man, leading a completely sinless life which has become the model for all true believers to emulate. Moreover, it will be asserted, Mohammed did not choose to be a prophet; he was chosen by Allah. He did not himself compose the 'revelations' that were spoken from his mouth; they were delivered to him by an angel who got them from the 'Mother of the Book' which has existed in heaven either forever or for just a little bit less.
Mohammed was a passive agent of Allah, simply serving as his mouthpiece or oracle. It is his message that is important, not his biography. He was one of a series of prophets who reported Allah's wishes to men (perhaps even to some women). These prophets included Jesus (Arabic �Issa), who, to spite the Christians, is demoted by Mohammedans from non-profit to prophet status. Most importantly, Mohammed was Allah's last prophet. Thus, Joseph Smith was an impostor, and Mormon missionaries are not welcome in Mohammedan territories. (Of course, no missionaries of any kind are welcome in such places, where it is often a capital offense to convert a Mohammedan to 'infidelity'.)
Despite such protestations by the faithful (all non-Mohammedans are infidels), the reverence accorded to Mohammed at times has bordered on the threshold of worship if not actually transgressing it. Very early, his followers came to attribute a number of miracles to him and passed along fabulous tales of supernatural signs and wonders relating to his birth and career. (One night, it is believed, Mohammed set out on a nocturnal journey or Miraj up to the heavens where he communed with Allah face-to-face.) It is still believed by many that at the Last Judgment, Mohammed will be an intercessor like the Virgin Mary and the Catholic saints, pleading for the exculpation of those who have submitted themselves to his teachings.
Among the mystical Sufis (from the Arabic suf, meaning 'wool' - alluding to the woolen hair shirts worn by early Sufis, not to the woolliness of their thinking), exaltation and veneration of Mohammed seems to have reached Christian proportions. In Sufism, Mohammed has become the eternal manifestation of the Divine Light in the world, pre-existent like the Christian Logos, representing the primal, divine force which created and sustains the universe, the only intermediary through whom one may approach Allah and have knowledge of him. For all practical purposes, the Sufi Mohammed (peace be upon him) is a supernatural being, even if not quite a full-fledged god.
[..]
#6
Actually, there's a fourth, like me, who know enough about Mohammed and conclude that she was an opportunistic, warlord scum bag, whose radical adherents are sick pieces of puke.
This panel discussion took place as part of "Restoration Weekend," on February 24, 2006, at the Arizona Biltmore in Phoenix.
Speakers:
Lt. General Thomas McInerney
Daniel Pipes
Robert Spencer
Phyllis Chesler
Steve Emerson
Posted by: ed ||
03/20/2006
09:10 ||
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The WMD was moved out by the Russians. Primakov went there in December, but he had a colonel general there, a former airborne commander, who led the Spetsnaz team in combination with GRU and they went down there and moved the WMDs into Syria during the October to December 2002 timeframe. Three locations in Syria and one into the Baca Valley. This was exposed by a former deputy assistant secretary of defense, Jack Straw. A Ukrainian chief of intelligence who has very close ties with the Russians, who exposed that in a meeting with MI6 in London, Jim Clapper, whos the head of the National Geospace Intelligence Agency, former chief of DIA, Retired Air Force three star.
So that was the fourth source I had heard it from. But I had heard it from three other sources that theyd moved the WMD out. I never saw any evidence that Saddam did have WMD except that it just disappeared. It must impress you that the Iraqi survey group found zero evidence of WMD. Now if they found parts around, it would say, okay, you know, they have destroyed something. But when you find zero, that is a clean indication that it was very thoroughly done.
The finally thing that came out of this regards the Russians, who since the Cold War have been brilliant in maskirovka, or deception. Once the Iraqi survey group didnt find WMD, which they already knew, then they carefully weaved into the capitals in Europe and in UN, See? there was no WMD. And that stuck
#2
Now if they found parts around, it would say, okay, you know, they have destroyed something. But when you find zero, that is a clean indication that it was very thoroughly done.
Sorta obvious, when yiou think about it.
I wonder why the Main Stream Media didn't observe that?
No, I don't.
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/20/2006 20:39
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Excerpt:
FP: It appears that many people also remain in denial about the WMD issue. The released audiotapes reveal Saddam Hussein and his key officials discussing their WMD programs from the mid-1990s onwards, correct?
McInerney: Yes, Jamie. It was a fascinating experience to see the transcripts of Saddams conversations. He discussed hiding WMDs from the UN inspectors and knowing where the inspectors were going to go in advance. He discussed their efforts to develop Plasma Enrichment for nuclear weapons totally unknown to the UN inspectors.
But the most telling to me was the conversation between Tariq Aziz his foreign minister and Saddam in which they discussed having proxies implant nuclear and biological weapons in US cities. They concluded that Iraq would be blamed for an explosion but not biological as they could use deception and blame US facility ( Ft Dietrick) which makes me conclude that Iraq was responsible for the anthrax attack in US less than 30 days after 9/11.
The FBI has not determined who did it although they tried to charge unsuccessfully a former Ft Dietrick employee. It is obvious that we should aggressively be translating the remaining 3,000 hours of tapes!
FP: So the evidence appears to suggest the Russians moved the WMDs out of Iraq, correct?
McInerney: Yes -- to three locations in Syria and one in Lebanon (Beka Valley) in the Sept Dec 2002 time frame. This information was provided by Jack Shaw, the former Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for international technology security. He charged that Saddams stockpiles of WMDs were moved by a Russian Spetznatz team headed by Yevgeny Primakov, the former Russian Intelligence Chief, who came to Iraq in December 2002 to supervise the final cleanup.
Mr. Shaw found this out through a meeting in London with the head of MI6 (UK CIA), the Ukrainian Intelligence Chief and others in the summer of 2003. The Ukrainians were very close and supportive of the Russians at that time.
Posted by: ed ||
03/20/2006
09:04 ||
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Palestinian gunmen from the ousted Fatah Party stormed government buildings, briefly took over a power plant and blocked a vital road in the Gaza Strip on Monday, injecting more chaos into the volatile area as Hamas militants readied to take power. Nine people were wounded in five separate firefights with Palestinian police. The violence was a foretaste of what might happen if Hamas tried to impose its will on Fatah gunmen.
The bloodiest of the five confrontations Monday took place at Gaza's government compound. Three dozen potential civil servants gunmen demanding jobs charged toward the complex, firing in the air. Some burst into the Finance Ministry, while others began firing at random, wounding a doorman outside the adjacent Foreign Ministry before Palestinian police pulled up in jeeps and began exchanging fire with the attackers. An Associated Press reporter was in the Foreign Ministry at the time of the attack. Just yards away from him, two stray bullets hit a security guard in the legs. Other ministry employees ran for cover, pressing close to walls or hiding under tables as bullets smashed windows. Police eventually stormed the ministry, arresting three gunmen from the Fatah-affiliated Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades. In total, two gunmen and two security officials were wounded in the firefight.
Dozens of gunmen also exchanged fire with members of the security forces at Palestinian police headquarters.
Earlier in the day, gunmen blocked a road leading to the main Israel-Gaza crossing point, briefly took over Gaza's power plant and entered a military hospital. About 35 gunmen traded fire with policemen who tried to remove them from the road leading to the Erez crossing point, which Abbas had been scheduled to use Monday morning to leave Gaza for the West Bank. Two gunmen and a policeman were wounded. Two dozen gunmen also briefly infiltrated Gaza's power plant elsewhere in Gaza, exchanging fire with police and wounding two, officials said.
No one was hurt at the military hospital near the town of Khan Younis.
Hamas' designated foreign minister, Mahmoud Zahar, blamed the violence on Fatah mismanagement. "We are going to deal with it by the proper means in order to solve these problems," Zahar said.
If I was Fatah, right now I'd be considering laying low, maybe take a vacation, stay home and play with the wife and kiddies. But they're Paleos, which means they won't.
The gunbattles on Monday were the most intense in months, and came a day after Hamas' designated prime minister, Ismail Haniyeh, handed Abbas a proposed 24-member Cabinet dominated by Hamas activists.
#5
I've always wondered why people that have any money at all stick around when conditions get like this. If I was in Paleostine right now, I'd scrape beg and borrow every cent I had for an airplane ticket to anywhere but there. It's going to be chaos and it will be bloody. Time to get out of Dodge - shoot out at the OK Corral is going to be soon.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006 11:35
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Actually, a not-so-civil war. These are Palestinians, after all. I must have reversed the polarity on my pity and sympathy meters. They're both pegging below zero.
#13
One Israeli statesman was quoted as saying that God's gift to Israelis was giving them Arabs as enemies. The Palestinians must spend all their time learning to cut throats because they certainly can't shoot. Can you imagine the carnage that would have resulted from a gunfight between a squad of Marines and this rabble?
Muslims in Britain are to challenge UK law which forbids husbands from having more than one wife.
They say they will refer Britain's ban on polygamous marriage to the European Court of Human Rights this autumn.
Under Islamic law a man is allowed to have up to four wives, but the Muslim Parliament of BritainWTF? says that many families are being forced to live outside the law because their polygamous marriages are not recognised here.
There are no official figures on the number of people practising polygamy in Britain, but it's estimated that there may be hundreds.
One British Muslim wife suffering as a result of polygamy is Sameera, whose 55-year-old husband took up a second wife after 30 years of marriage.
He married a 26-year-old cousin in January, whilst on holiday in Pakistan, without Sameera's knowledge or consent. Maybe this isn't such a bad idea...
Told by her in-laws she says she was devastated, but feels she has no choice but to accept the situation.
"I just fainted when I first heard," says Sameera. "The fact that he's married such a young girl, a girl old enough to be his daughter. I cried and cried and felt like my mind was exploding. It felt like the ground had just fallen from under me, why did he do it? It shouldn't happen."
Although Islam allows a man to marry up to four wives, he can only do so if his first wife is infertile, or if he marries women who are considered social outcasts. It is not, as many believe, meant to be for the sexual gratification of men. Oh, no no no. The Prophet (PTUI) would never allow that. No, never. The Prophet (PTUI) is pleased to note that 9 year old girls are universally seen as social outcasts. Heh.
Noshaba Hussein from the Muslim Parliament "I am aware that this practice is taking place in Britain and there are couples who are quite happy and satisfied with their relationship and they would like it to carry on and be protected by law."
The police say there is little they can do. Colin Cramphorn from the Association of Chief Police Officers says he finds cases like Sameera's disturbing, but he believes that politicians need to clarify the law.
"Clearly those communities that have a tradition which allows polygamous marriage have a point of view and they are keen to have that point of view taken into account and recognised as part of a multi-cultural society," says Mr Cramphorn.
"But of course if the law is equivocal, as it currently is, then that prevents all of us achieving the kind of clarity that would no doubt be helpful in the longer term." What's equivocal about one man, one woman?
Come October, when the Human Rights Act comes into force, British law on such matters will be open to challenges, under article eight of the act which says everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life.
Noshaba Huseein says that if the government refuses to accept the legality of polygamous marriages then the Muslim parliament will take it to the European court of human rights.
"There will be a need to do something much more, in the way of a campaign, if there is a denial of rights and certainly people will be taking actions to the European court to ensure that we have the rights of freedom of religion."
The issue of polygamy encapsulates the debate over whether minorities have the right to follow their own customs or conform to established Judaeo Christian values. The bishop of Rochester, Dr Nazir Ali, believes the government should not succumb to such pressures.
"I don't think that polygamy should be enshrined in law because it will affect the mutual love and companionship that a marriage needs and it will also affect the stability of the family," says Dr Ali.
But Noshaba Hussein warns that if the government continues to overlook their demands they could end up losing ethnic minority votes.
"Muslims are very strong supporters of the Labour government," she says.
"So far I think we've been getting a relatively rough deal and maybe it will be reflected in the polls." We'll vote Tory. That'll teach 'em.
#1
Ask Sameera if she thinks her hubby up and marrying his niece is a rought deal. Bet those kiddies will be fine, upstanding examplars of islamist foaming.
#2
bet the BBC are thinking 'yeah sht hot lets let em marry there cousins and brothers' ,typical of that dumbfck cooperation to start shouting about in glee about this. I'm getting to the point of getting myself armed up and going on a rampage through that damned BBC t.v centre they fck me off so much with there constant pathetic transparent muslims are great bullshit! and as for this 'Muslim parlament of britain' - its the first i've heard but rest assured it'll be running half of the U.K soon the way things are going and the BBC will trumpet them as a wonderfull caring bunch as always. Sickening stuff. I wanna move and move outa the UK fast because this is just to much for any sane human beings!
#3
Hopefully, they will simultaneously incorporate into that same new law a prize for the losing first wife-a really long, really sharp, serrated knife and a bottle of sedatives.
"Honey, you've had such a hard day at work-here's some tea. Why don't you have a nice lie-down?"
The latest winner of the Kennedy Profile's in Courage Award is . . . Jack Murtha?
by Noemie Emery The Weekly StandardEFL'd
IT IS AXIOMATIC that political families end up in time turning into their opposites, and quite often both eerie and sad. . . . A history lesson might be in line here, as the Kennedy story is somewhat complex: Before Ted there was Jack, a defense hawk and war hero, before Jack, there was Joe. Joe, of course, was a whole other story, an isolationist and an appeaser, a fan and facilitator of the Munich agreement, a man who avoided service in World War I, and earned the scorn of the British during the Blitz by leaving the embassy to spend nights out of town (and the
range of the Luftwaffe) during the later unpleasantness. Historians claim that by the start of the war, the elder Kennedy had so damaged the family name that only the wartime heroics of his two older sons made it once again viable. In his first speech as a congressman, in l947, Jack Kennedy ripped into the Munich agreement as a catastrophic mistake that must not be repeated, and spent his political life preaching Churchillian vigilance.
As a state of mind, Camelot began in August, l943, with Jack's swim into Blackett Strait to try to get help for his wounded compatriots, and ended in July, l969, with Ted's swim from Chappaquiddick to Edgartown, leaving his brother's assistant to die in his car. In the public assessment of the Kennedy legacy, Jack has always been bracketed by his father and brother, with courage and sacrifice in a death struggle with cowardice and self-preservation. The embrace of Murtha tips the balance all the more in the appeasement direction, especially as Murtha lacks so completely the courage criteria that JFK set up in his book[ Profiles in Courage].
In the press release from the Kennedy Library, Murtha is praised for "the difficult and courageous decision of conscience . . . when he reversed his support for the Iraq war . . . [which] made him the target of withering political attacks. "Huh? In the first place, Murtha had never supported the war in Iraq; and the attacks on him were no more "withering" than what passes for normal in current political discourse; and in most instances were softened with lavish praise for his Vietnam tours of duty. In his book, Jack Kennedy wrote of famous men who put big careers in jeopardy, and frequently suffered "the loss of his friends, his fortune, his contentment, even the esteem of his fellow men." Before his recent outspokenness, Murtha was wholly unknown to most of the public. In speaking out against the war, he has risked and lost nothing. Instead, he has become a cult hero and media darling who is now in no danger of losing his seat.
IF MURTHA has nothing in common with John Kennedy, or with his subjects, he has a great deal in common with Joe and Ted Kennedy, at least when it comes to demoralizing people in battle. . . . Not too repugnant for the party of Joe and Ted Kennedy, and just one more nail in the coffin of Camelot, done in, of course, by its heirs.
Posted by: Mike ||
03/20/2006
06:46 ||
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#1
We have seen the transformation of the Nobel Piss Prize, I guess it shouldn't be surprising to see the Kennedy thing turned into a farce, as well.
Buy a Dell computer and turn a nice young Indian into a pot smoking pervert? I guess globalization is worse than we thought.
Recent polls of Indians working in call centers for British and American companies found that they are adopting the values of Hollywood movies and British TV.
Two recent surveys found many staffers admitting to casual affairs, The Times of London reported. In one poll, one in four admitted to casual sex -- and in the other, one in five said they had had an affair with a colleague.
Shankar Rao, deputy commissioner of the New Delhi Police, suggested that the call centers provide counseling to keep staffers off drugs and sex and that they should make sure no one works more than three nights a week.
Wouldn't that give them more time to hook up?
"The companies should insist on certain standards," Rao said. "I want to make sure these call centers do not become dens of evil." I'm surprised they didn't just try to profit off of it instead. Y'know...press 1 for a Hindi Hottie, press 2 for a Bengali Babe...
#1
And what's different about a call center than any other office job?
Oh, that's right, you can blame anything that happens there on the evil Westerners who foisted these evil jobs on India.
Good grief. This can't be taken seriously by anyone - other than a Blame Specialist, lol. After having a cab driver in Bombay try to sell me his "daughter" for the night and being propositioned by the hotel maid every day I was there, I'd say this is definitely a bit overwrought. Call me a Western hottie, cool to the game.
#2
huh - how i know why whenever i phone anything in this country i end up talking to some seemingly smacked up or just mumbling and occassionally giggling! but remember like every problem in this modern world it is the wests fault!
#5
Please stay on the line. Your call is important to us. Your call is being directing to the first available agent. Your call will be taken in priority sequence right after someone finds a box of tissues. Thank you and have a nice day.
#8
There's a Bollywood potboiler just waiting to be made about this.
Posted by: Mike ||
03/20/2006 11:52
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#9
Two recent surveys found many staffers admitting to casual affairs, The Times of London reported. In one poll, one in four admitted to casual sex -- and in the other, one in five said they had had an affair with a colleague.
So is the story that contact with America leads them to admit to more stuff than they did before? Let the truth set you free baby.
#11
you know that must weigh alot - 1.2 billion in such a small area. say 120 billion times an average of i dunno say 6 stone thats alot of weight , i dont do mathes (or english) but surly it must put a hefty weight on the earth to hold???
#13
Cyber Sarge, it might be a cultural thing. Really.
A good Bengali friend of mine tried to make that same argument ("Indians don't have sex...they are very shy."). I told him that I called bullshit on that, and he angrily demanded to know why. When I told him "Come on, there's a billion Indians. How the hell did they all get there??", he sheepishly admitted that I had a point. If he could have blushed, I'm sure he would have right then.
He is from the middle class, and they don't tend to have large families (just like the west). Add in the relatively tame "love scenes" in Indian movies, and they think of themselves as rather reserved sexually. Hence the big shock about what's mentioned in the article.
How they can believe that while being surrounded by a sea of humanity is something I'll leave for an anthropologist to explain....
#14
DB: How they can believe that while being surrounded by a sea of humanity is something I'll leave for an anthropologist to explain....
Actually, it's pretty simple. Sex without contraceptives leads to children. Lots of them, even if the sex occurs once a year. Westerners have a lot of sex. But we also use a lot of contraceptives.
Why are there so many Indians? Because India is the size of the Western Europe, but has been a civilization for 5,000 years - meaning it has had access to relatively advanced agricultural methods and been able to sustain large populations for that time. Another reason is that Indians, being conservative about sex, aren't real educated about contraceptives, oral or otherwise.
I think there's a misperception among Indians that Westerners are alley cats, due to some of the things they see on American television programs and Hollywood movies. They think Westerners see adultery and promiscuity as a positive good, when the reality is, of course, that we expect our significant others to behave themselves and have zero toleration for misbehavior. In the realm of sexual fidelity, Indian values are Western values. What they perceive as Western values is actually the use of sexual themes to bump up TV ratings and movie box office. (Do Indians believe everything they see on TV? Evidently they do - at least the salacious bits).
On the eve of the war's third anniversary, nearly 1,500 U.S. and Iraqi soldiers on Sunday sought to root out insurgents from farming villages an hour's drive north of the capital, and at least 35 people died in insurgent and sectarian violence nationwide.
Iraqi politicians still had not formed a government more than three months after landmark elections for the country's first permanent post-invasion parliament, but they announced an agreement on naming a Security Council to deal with key matters while negotiations proceed.
Returning to the White House after a weekend at the presidential retreat in Camp David, Md., Bush offered an upbeat assessment.
"We are implementing a strategy that will lead to victory in Iraq. And a victory in Iraq will make this country more secure and will help lay the foundation of peace for generations to come," he said.
Many politicians both inside and outside Iraq said the continuing violence could only be described as a civil war.
"It is unfortunate that we are in civil war. We are losing each day as an average 50 to 60 people throughout the country, if not more," former interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi told British Broadcasting Corp. "If this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is."
The Bush administration and U.S. military leaders disagreed.
"Personally don't believe, one, that we're there now; two, that civil war is imminent; and, three, that it is inevitable that it will happen," Gen. George Casey, the U.S. commander in Iraq, said in an interview with Fox television.
In a sign of political progress, Iraq's top politicians emerged from the fourth in a series of U.S.-brokered all-party meetings on forming a new government and reported they had established an advisory, 19-member Security Council.
The council, to be headed by President Jalal Talabani, was established as an interim measure as politicians struggle to agree on the makeup of a new government following the Dec. 15 parliamentary elections.
"It was a successful meeting, and we have agreed on forming a National Security Council whose powers will not contradict the constitution," Adnan al-Dulaimi, a Sunni Arab political leader, told The Associated Press.
Al-Dulaimi said nine council seats would go to Iraq's Shiite Muslim majority, while Kurds and Sunni Arabs each would control four seats and the secular bloc two. Talabani, a Kurd, would head the group.
The exact powers of the council, if any, were not explained. But it appeared to have been formed to ensure that politicians from minority blocs would at least be consulted in advance on important government and security decisions.
The intense political discussions on forming a government began last week under pressure from U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad. Al-Dulaimi said the talks would not resume until Saturday because of Shiite and Kurdish holidays this week.
Khalilzad has urged patience for the prolonged political negotiations. "I think it will take a few more weeks," he said Friday.
The speedy formation of a government has become a top U.S. priority on the theory that a unified leadership with representatives from all major factions would quell violence and open the way for American hopes to begin withdrawing troops this summer.
As politicians met in Baghdad, Iraqi police said eight civilians, including a child, were killed during clashes between U.S. troops and gunmen in Duluiyah, 45 miles north of Baghdad. The U.S. military said it was checking the report.
The town is in Iraq's Sunni Arab heartland where the Iraqi army and U.S. forces opened a major airborne campaign last week to hunt insurgents. The American military called it the largest "air assault" operation since the invasion.
Casey, the U.S. commander, said the significance of the operation may have been overblown. "I think it might have got a little bit more hype than it truly deserved," he said on CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer."
But he disputed allegations by some U.S. politicians that the operation was ordered for political reasons.
"Nothing could be further from the truth. This operation was planned with the Iraqi security forces, as intelligence was available. ... it was an intelligence based operation and had nothing to do with politics," he said.
Evidence of nightly sectarian violence among Sunnis and Shiites showed up at two Baghdad sewage treatment plants Sunday. Police said they found 14 bodies, bound hand and foot and shot execution style. Such discoveries are being made almost daily since a bombing at a Shiite shrine in Samarra.
Assailants in southwestern Baghdad gunned down a man as he was leaving a Shiite mosque, police said.
A Baghdad policeman driving on a rural road in Latifiyah, about 20 miles south of the capital, was killed by gunmen, police said. Four men riding in the car were wounded.
Elsewhere, two civilians were killed and 10 wounded when gunmen attacked U.S. troops stationed at the governor's office in Ramadi, 70 miles west of Baghdad.
Gunmen killed four guards at archaeological sites in the northern city of Mosul. A fifth policeman and a bystander were wounded.
A roadside bomb exploded on a police patrol in Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, killing one officer and injuring 10 others, the Iraqi military said.
Near the southern city of Basra, two officials of the Iraqi Islamic Party were gunned down by four assassins.
In the northern region of Kirkuk, two Iraqi soldiers were found stabbed to death two days after they were reported kidnapped, U.S. authorities said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:55 ||
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#1
...MSM says it must be a Civil War, right? 35 people lost their lives in Iraq on Sunday, March 19, 2006. GOTTA be a civil war.
In one day in 2004 - the most recent year I was able to Google records for - 16, 137 American citizens were murdered. That works out to 44.90 per day.
Yeah, GOTTA be a civil war.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
03/20/2006 12:20
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The U.S. intelligence community has quietly concluded that Osama Bin Laden was in a town in Pakistan. Intelligence sources said major U.S. agencies have assessed that the Al Qaida chief has relocated from the Afghanistan-Pakistani border to a town or city within Pakistan. The sources said Bin Laden was equipped with advanced communications. "There seems to have been changes made and Bin Laden is now in a position where he has the capability to be in communications with people anywhere in the world," an intelligence source said.
The assessment was drafted in wake of Bin Laden's taped message in December 2005, the first in more than a year. The sources said several intelligence agencies analyzed the content of the message and determined that Bin Laden has maintained steady contact with the outside world.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:45 ||
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All major Al Qaeda terrorists have been captured in Pakistan's major cities.
We know the ISI used the Konduz airlift not just to extricate thier trainers but many high value terrorists as well. From Afghanistan to a Pak air force base and then to military cantonments.
Perv probably drives past Bin Laden's safehouse every day on his way to work.
Posted by: john ||
03/20/2006 13:26
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#8
Can't touch me. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.
THE Vatican has begun moves to rehabilitate the Crusaders by sponsoring a conference at the weekend that portrays the Crusades as wars fought with the noble aim of regaining the Holy Land for Christianity. The Crusades are seen by many Muslims as acts of violence that have underpinned Western aggression towards the Arab world ever since. Followers of Osama bin Laden claim to be taking part in a latter-day jihad against the Jews and Crusaders.
The late Pope John Paul II sought to achieve Muslim- Christian reconciliation by asking pardon for the Crusades during the 2000 Millennium celebrations. But John Pauls apologies for the past errors of the Church including the Inquisition and anti-Semitism irritated some Vatican conservatives. According to Vatican insiders, the dissenters included Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI.
CONFLICT OVER THE HOLY LAND
# Historians count eight Crusades, although dates are disputed: 1095-1101, called by Pope Urban II; 1145-47, led by Louis VII; 1188-92, led by Richard I; 1204, which included the sack of Constantinople; 1217, which included the conquest of Damietta; 1228-29 led by Frederick II; 1249-52, led by King Louis IX of France; and 1270, also under Louis IX.
# Until the early 11th century, Christians, Jews and Muslims coexisted under Muslim rule in the Holy Land. After growing friction, the first Crusade was sparked by ambushes of Christian pilgrims going to Jerusalem. The Byzantine Emperor Alexius appealed to Pope Urban II, who in 1095 called on Christendom to take up arms to free the Holy Land from the Muslim infidel.
Pope Benedict reached out to Muslims and Jews after his election and called for dialogue. However, the Pope, who is due to visit Turkey in November, has in the past suggested that Turkeys Muslim culture is at variance with Europes Christian roots.
At the conference, held at the Regina Apostolorum Pontifical University, Roberto De Mattei, an Italian historian, recalled that the Crusades were a response to the Muslim invasion of Christian lands and the Muslim devastation of the Holy Places.
The debate has been reopened, La Stampa said. Professor De Mattei noted that the desecration of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem by Muslim forces in 1009 had helped to provoke the First Crusade at the end of the 11th century, called by Pope Urban II. He said that the Crusaders were martyrs who had sacrificed their lives for the faith. He was backed by Jonathan Riley-Smith, Dixie Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Cambridge University, who said that those who sought forgiveness for the Crusades do not know their history.
Professor Riley-Smith has attacked Sir Ridley Scotts recent film Kingdom of Heaven, starring Orlando Bloom, as utter nonsense. Professor Riley-Smith said that the script, like much writing on the Crusades, was historically inaccurate. It depicts the Muslims as civilised and the Crusaders as barbarians. It has nothing to do with reality. It fuels Islamic fundamentalism by propagating Osama bin Ladens version of history. He said that the Crusaders were sometimes undisciplined and capable of acts of great cruelty. But the same was true of Muslims and of troops in all ideological wars. Some of the Crusaders worst excesses were against Orthodox Christians or heretics as in the sack of Constantinople in 1204.
The American writer Robert Spencer, author of A Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam, told the conference that the mistaken view had taken hold in the West as well as the Arab world that the Crusades were an unprovoked attack by Europe on the Islamic world. In reality, however, Christians had been persecuted after the Muslim conquest of Jerusalem.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:41 ||
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Posted by: Mike ||
03/20/2006 6:39
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#2
Jihad and Crusade are the same. What tainted the noble intentioned Crusade 1000 years ago is what taints Jihad today. Basically, it's the criminals that are doing the fighting. 1000 years ago europeon prisons were opened for bodies to fight for the cause. Today, it's the Arabs turn. Many Arabs who have naturally championed Jihad have also been disgusted at the indiscriminant slaughter by Zaquawi and crew.
#4
Because of the Crusades the idea and ideal of Freedom exists in a large part of the world and not a Dark Age. But Europe has a short memory and too many selfish post modern jerks without a clue about what is truly evil.
#5
I am enjoying watching the Catholic Church slowly square off against Islam, in contrast to the ankle grabbing of the English church and emotionalism of the US Evangelical churches. I can just see someone in the "Strategic Opportunities" office, or whatever, at the Vatican chuckling when Iran proposed revisiting the history of the Holocaust. "Thanks! We have been meaning to revisit a little history ourselves". By choosing the crusades, the church is basically building much more powerful case against Islam than the US. We in the US act like our cultures have been at war since 1979, and the Catholic Church is now saying Islam has been a menace for 1000 years. There are still a lot of good Catholics in Europe, maybe the Church will be the institution that finally brings them to face the enemy.
#6
There are still a lot of good Catholics in Europe, maybe the Church will be the institution that finally brings them to face the enemy.
Posted by: Beau 2006-03-20 09:45
#9
The Church should come right out and say it. The Crusades were a counter-attack against Islam after the Islamic horde conquered Spain and started moving into Turkey and the Balkans.
The only regret they should have about the crusades is they didn't plan it out better. Sweeping the Muslims out of Europe first, and then across North Africa and then into the Holy Land last. The effect would have opened up far more trade and given more staying power to the enterprise. Instead they went for the gold and had minimal lasting effect except angering the Muslims.
#10
Why don't we talk about non-Moslems in a Moslem majority country. The kind of s**t they have to put up with. I submitted a thread, not yet up, about an Afghan man who converted to Christianity from Islam and the (I elieve) "aroused" procecutor is seeking the death penalty. "Allah Akhbar, baby. Allah Akhbar"
#11
All of the Crusades? What about the Fourth, which conquered the (Christian) Byzantine Empire? Thanks to that episode, the Turks were eventually able to prevail in the Balkans.
#12
Jihad and Crusade are the same. What tainted the noble intentioned Crusade 1000 years ago is what taints Jihad today.
Sorry but Jihad and Crusade are NOT the same
1) Crusades are a reaction against centurie"s of continual agressions by Islam. Jihad was and is a war of agresion even if Muslims ever have played the victim. (Remember that picture the day after 9/11 where a womabn brandished a sign "Strop terrorism against Muslims?)
2) Jihad has ever been intended as something finacially rewarding for Muslims. As a proof review the articles in Koran and Haddths who deal with teh sharing of booty and captives.
By contrast the financial incentuive is conspicusously absent from the callsto crusades. Inn fact most crusaders were well established and going to crusades was a sure way to become poorer (liberation of serfs by empoverished lords was one of the consequence of crusades).
3) Islam has at a diabolic mechanism: first it deprives the poors of sex through poligamy. Meaning that if you are poor you are going to die completely (ie wiothout descendency). So Jihad is teh only hope for sex (in afterlife if things go badly, with captives if you were victorious).
#13
About the only thing I disagree with Rumsfeld was when he cancelled the Crusader artillery system.
Well I guess I understand his reasons, but it would have been sooo satisfying to see a big honkin' cannon named Crusader rumbling thru the desert on its way to Bagdad.
Would've drove some folks wild...
Posted by: kelly ||
03/20/2006 15:34
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#14
jihad can be either offensive or defensive. Crusades in Israel could be perceived as defenseive,as the muslims had taken the land - however they had taken it from the (Greek) Roman empire and the crusaders did NOT hand it back to them. In fact in the 4 crusade they took Constantinople itself.
Some crusaders did quite well in establishing feudal kingdoms in the levant. Many lost money, but that was hardly the goal. And of course the Venetians and Genoans often did quite well.
And the crusades were also accompanied by many atrocities. I will mention again the Jerusalem massacre. Some will say that was simply stand op proc in that era - which just shows that the crusaders treated Holy Jerusalem as just any other city. And, I think, that ANY army from that era is questionable for honoring today.
And of course there were plenty of atrocities committed against Jews and Orthodox Christians on the way TO the Levant.
And its true that in the 11th century the Muslim world was more advanced than the west. But of course the same could be said for Greek Byzantium, as well, so thats not such a big deal.
#16
Much to my own surprise, all Crusades aside, I applaud Pope Benedict's demand for reciprocity by Islam when it comes to freedom of religion. This one single issue may well lead to a significant tipping point in the perception of Islam by the outside world.
Islam must be read the riot act when it comes to cultural dominance. If it cannot abide the presence of other religions, then there is no reason for other countries that have freedom of religion to be obliged to allow the practice of Islam. The Muslim quest for dominance must eventually be reinterpreted as representing a form of political ideology.
Once this critical change in perception has occurred, only then will this world go about securing itself from the threat that is Islam. I hope the Pope maintains an increasingly vocal position with respect to this. His bully pulpit is one of the few that carries sufficient weight whereby the attention of world leaders can be gotten and held.
#17
Well, there was the small matter of the Invasion of Spain and France in the 8th century and the attack on Rome in the 9th. That it took 300 years for the west to decide, after repeated invasions, to hit back, is about par for the course.
#18
Rome had been the subject of sackings since the 5th century -- that's why the Roman emperors moved to Ravenna before finally settling in Byzantium. There was nothing new in Islam's sack of Rome as well. It was the rest of their behaviour that triggered a response.
Al-Guardian, so you'll have to ignore some of the window dressing ...
A former US army general yesterday called for Donald Rumsfeld to resign on grounds of incompetence in Iraq, hours after Ayad Allawi, the former US-backed Iraqi prime minister, declared the country to be in the thick of a civil war that could soon "reach the point of no return".
Three years after Iraq was invaded, statistics published yesterday show that the frequency of insurgent bombings and group killings is growing, but both Mr Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, and George Bush have vowed to fight on.
"Turning our backs on postwar Iraq today would be the modern equivalent of handing postwar Germany back to the Nazis," the defence secretary wrote in a Washington Post commentary, as the administration tried to quell growing concern that the conflict was unravelling beyond Washington's control.
President Bush made a brief appearance on the White House lawn to say he was "encouraged" by progress on forming a unity government in Iraq. But he had no other good news to mark three years of a war in which more than 2,300 Americans have died, and which has so far cost $500bn (nearly £290bn).
The US commander in Iraq, General George Casey, said that the troop withdrawals he had forecast for this spring or summer might have to wait until the end of the year or even 2007. And Paul Eaton, a former American army general in charge of training Iraqi forces until 2004, marked the anniversary with a furious attack on Mr Rumsfeld, saying he was "not competent to lead our armed forces".
In London, Mr Allawi told BBC 2's Sunday AM programme: "We are losing each day, as an average, 50 to 60 people throughout the country, if not more. If this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is."
Britain's defence secretary, John Reid, rejected that assessment. In Baghdad's green zone, he said that most of Iraq was under control: "There is not civil war now, nor is it inevitable, nor is it imminent".
In Washington, the US vice-president, Dick Cheney, also appeared on television to play down ideas of civil war. He told the CBS programme Face the Nation that the surge in attacks aimed at fomenting sectarian conflict simply reflected the insurgents' "state of desperation".
The remark echoed a similarly optimistic phrase used by Mr Cheney in March last year, when he claimed the insurgency was in its "last throes". Yesterday, he maintained that that description was still "basically accurate".
There were signs yesterday that the Bush administration was losing its ability to shape perception of the conflict, even among partisan Republicans. George Will, an influential conservative commentator, yesterday compared Iraq's war to that of the 1930s Spanish civil war.
Mr Allawi now heads a list of secular parties that had hoped to broker a compromise between the Shia and Sunni parties. He warned that if Iraq reached the point of no return it would "not only fall apart, but sectarianism would spread through the region". He said even Europe and the US would "not be spared all the violence" linked to sectarian problems.
There were no public gatherings in Baghdad yesterday. People continued to race to work and back home, fearing explosions, kidnapping or murder.
Iraqi police reported that US troops had killed eight people, after a patrol was ambushed in the Sunni town of Duluiya, north of Baghdad, early yesterday. The victims included a 13-year-old boy and his parents, who were shot dead.
According to figures compiled by the Brookings Institution, in Washington, there were 75 attacks a day last month, compared with 54 on average a year earlier. The number of Iraqi civilians being killed in the conflict rose to 1,000 in February, from 750 in February 2005. There are now 232,000 Iraqi security personnel, up 90,000 over the past 12 months, but their ability to control the situation is a matter of dispute. Oil production, the mainstay of the economy, is in decline.
The Islamist parties have failed to agree on a national unity government and sectarian violence has markedly increased.
Last July Gen Casey predicted that if the political process went well there could be "fairly substantial reductions" in US troops in Iraq this spring or summer.
Yesterday, calling on the US to keep its nerve, Mr Rumsfeld pointed to the swelling ranks of Iraqi government forces. But Mr Eaton, a former major general, said the defence secretary had "shown himself incompetent strategically, operationally and tactically", and was "far more than anyone else, responsible for what has happened to our important mission in Iraq". Mr Rumsfeld had to step down, he said.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:38 ||
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#1
Technically, retired Generals can be recalled to active duty at any time. Wonder how Gen. Eaton would take it if he found himself in front of Secty Rumsfeld after a briefing from the JAG on Art. 88. Ouchie.
As Allawi is to be soon. It's amazing that as he seems to have lost the election he has begun to parrot the donk line. Maybe he'll start being a regular on the Sunday morning talk shows.
#5
I think it's highly likely that most of these former CIA employees, former Generals, former whatevers were once promised juicy slots somewhere in the bureaucracy of the Gore and Kerry administrations-that-never-were.
#6
Anyone catch the response from General Casey on the talk shows when presented with the Allawi statement?
Russert cited former Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi as having declared that there was a civil war in Iraq. Did General Casey agree? The general said that since Allawi has "been out of the country for a while," they haven't had a chance to speak, but he doesn't think Allawi is correct. He doesn't think we are in a civil war, and he doesn't think one is imminent or inevitable. (Hint, hint, I'm here in country, he's elsewhere.)
#8
Very odd, in this story here, he's called "the father of the Iraqi army".
BAGHDAD, Iraq, June 14, 2004 Less than a year ago an unassuming man from Weatherford, Okla., arrived in this country to guide an organization that didnt even exist to build an army that wasnt there. There was no plan, no force, and only slight guidance.
And 363 days later despite a host of staggering setbacks and difficulties with logistics, contractors, funding, cultural differences and a plan that changed in scope, size and overall delivery Iraqs armed forces and civil security forces total more than 230,000 people. In only a matter of months, the army will consist of a 27-battalion, nine-brigade, three-division army and air force, navy, coastal defense force, civil defense corps, police service, facilities protection service, border police force, customs police force, immigration police force, national security police force and a diplomatic protection service officers force.
Theres nothing that could have prepared me for what Ive encountered here but a number of things have happened to me in my career that have proven helpful, said U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton, the former Office of Security Transition Commanding General.
I think his beef with Rumsfeld is not so much about the war in Iraq, but Rumsfeld's reorganization and transformation of the Army.
Retired Maj. Gen. Paul D. Eaton, who ran Iraqi military training from 2003 to 2004, describes the hiring of civilians to do jobs previously done by the military as a "shell game" created by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to keep the "force strength static on paper." In an op-ed piece in yesterday's New York Times, Eaton wrote, "This tactic may help for a bit, but it will likely fall apart in the next budget cycle with those positions swiftly eliminated."
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006 14:29
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#9
More from Eaton: In today's NYT retired Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton has called for Bush to accept Rumsfeld's resignation which he offered. Twice. Eaton says Rumsfeld is not competent strategically, operationally, and tactically and is more than anyone else, responsible for the chaos in Iraq. He says he sees a growing reluctance of experienced military and civilians to challenge his leadership. He says they are intimidated by Rumfeld because of the way he retaliates by undercutting them.
The Army finds itself severely undermanned-cut to 10 active divisions but asked by the administration to support a foreign policy that requires at least 12-14. Eaton says that the Pentagon is at the mercy of Rumsfeld's ego, his unrealistic confidence in technology to replace manpower. Rumsfeld fails to understand the nature of protracted counterinsurgency warfare and the demands it places on the ground forces, his only call is for 1,500 Special Operations forces.
Rumsfeld ignored the Powell Doctrine, which led to looting and the general destruction of the infrastructure. Too few troops, then, according to J. Paul Bremer, the money that was to go for things like hospital building, providing police uniforms, money to pay for Iraqi firms to build barracks, was withheld. The contracts for purchasing military equipment for the new Iraqi army were rewritten in DC.
Eaton says Rumsfeld demand more than loyalty, he demands fealty. And he has hired men who give it. The new Army Sec. Francis Harvey, who when faced with the compelling need to increase the size of the service, refused, instead he relied on a shell game of hiring civilians to do jobs previously done by soldiers. He kept the force strength static-on paper. Eaton says that it will work for a while but it will all fall apart in the next budget cycle.
What to do? He says first of all, Rumsfeld should resign. Then Congress, with the power of the purse, should call upon our generals, colonels, captains and sergeants to testify frequently. Ask them their opinions and needs. Ask them publicly if they need more men. Then it will be made clear to all what they need.
Last, he says that the most important of the Pentagon's judges are it's subordinates. A lesson, he says, Rumsfeld seems incapable of learning.
I guess Rummy didn't listen to poor Paul.
Posted by: Steve ||
03/20/2006 14:39
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#10
Does the name MacArthur ring a bell General?
He's not an 'ex'. He's retired and on the retired rolls, subject to recall. The only way you become an 'ex' is to be stripped of your commission, which by the way takes an act by the service secretary. Usually after a courts martial or less than honorable discharge for cause.
Iraqi officials announced Sunday that they had agreed to form a council of the country's top politicians to make policy on security and economic issues in the new government. The council, which will include the prime minister and president, is an attempt to include all the country's major factions in decision-making at a time of rising sectarian tensions.
I believe King Chuck I had a Star Chamber, too, until the Long Parliament. Cromwell ended up cutting his head off.
The Iraqi constitution approved by voters last fall does not have language supporting the creation of such a council. The 19-member body will essentially concentrate power in the hands of the country's political elites party leaders, and supersede the Cabinet and parliament in making broad decisions. The move is a step forward in the snail-paced negotiations over the formation of a full, four-year government.
It also sets an awful precedent.
Debate over creating what is being described as the national security council, and what powers it would wield, had contributed to the deadlock in the talks. The main Shiite political bloc, which is expected to hold the most executive power in the new government, had opposed formation of the council, while the Kurds, Sunni Arabs, secular politicians and U.S. officials had pushed for it. Many Shiite leaders viewed the idea of the council, first proposed by Massoud Barzani, the president of Iraqi Kurdistan, as an attempt to hamstring the prime minister, expected to be a Shiite, and check the power of the main Shiite bloc, known as the United Iraqi Alliance.
But on Sunday, after five hours of negotiations at the president's guest villa in Baghdad, the Shiites agreed to the council's formation. Because of the way the council will be set up, the Shiites, who constitute the largest political bloc in parliament, will have an effective veto over council decisions. Furthermore, the prime minister or president will be able to override any decisions they disagree with if the decisions conflict with the executives' constitutional authority. Otherwise, the council's actions will be binding. "It's a good thing," said Adnan Pachachi, the speaker of parliament and a secular politician. "It's a safety valve in a way. Decisions will be taken in which all major political parties will be part of. No one will accuse the prime minister of making decisions on his own."
Sammy's in jug, on his way to the gallows, but the Revolutionary Command Council lives on...
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:36 ||
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SADDAM Hussein ordered plans to be drawn up for a chemical weapons attack on Kurdish guerrilla bases in northern Iraq in 1987, according to a letter signed by his personal secretary.
The letter was among a series of memos between Saddam's office, military intelligence and the army found by United States troops in Iraq; they do not say if the attack was carried out.
The planned attack appears to have been part of the 1987-88 campaign that left more than 180,000 Kurds dead and demolished hundreds of Kurdish villages in northern Iraq. In the most notorious incident, the town of Halabja was bombed with mustard and nerve gas in 1988, killing 5,000 residents.
In the papers released by the US, a report from Iraq's military intelligence details the bases of Kurdish rebels, led by Ibrahim Barzani, and Iranian troops.
Saddam's secretary replies, saying, "The leader Mr President has ordered that your department study with experts a surprise attack with special ammunition in the areas of Barzani's gangs and the [former Iranian leader Ayatollah] Khomeini Guards."
"Special ammunition" is the phrase used throughout Saddam's regime for chemical weapons. Later documents mention specifically the nerve agent sarin and mustard gas.
The US military says the government "has made no determination regarding the authenticity of the documents, validity or factual accuracy of the information contained therein".
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03/20/2006
05:35 ||
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Fewer than 100 Islamist rebels have surrendered under an Algerian amnesty and at least 700 remain at large fighting for a purist Islamic state, the interior minister said on Saturday.
The guerrillas, mostly from the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), continue to launch attacks, making it impossible to lift a state of emergency imposed in the oil-exporting North African country in 1992, Noureddine Zerhouni told state radio.
Under the amnesty approved on February 21, Islamists were given six months to surrender and be pardoned, providing they were not responsible for massacres, rapes and bombings of public places.
"Fewer than 100 surrendered so far. To be precise, I would say between 50 to 100 have surrendered since the amnesty entered into force on February 30," Zerhouni said.
Algeria has been freeing hundreds of jailed Islamist fighters under the amnesty, but Zerhouni said any release of Amari Saifi, one of the GSPC's highest profile members who kidnapped 32 European tourists in 2003, was doubtful.
The latest amnesty was aimed at promoting national reconciliation after more than a decade of conflict, but Zerhouni said a state of emergency would remain.
"The state of emergency helps coordination between the army and the security forces to fight terrorism. I do not think it is wise to lift it as terrorist actions are still taking place on the ground," Zerhouni said.
The minister said between 700 to 800 Islamic rebels were still at large, mostly from the GSPC which is listed as a terrorist organisation by the United States.
Zerhouni said that although violence had fallen sharply in recent years, terrorist attacks were still being carried out, particularly in the two provinces of Boumerdes and Tizi Ouzou, east of the capital Algiers.
"We have a maximum of four to five terrorist actions per day. Most of the actions are located in Boumerdes, Tizi Ouzou, and at a lower intensity in the regions of Jijel, Batna and Tebessa, as a small GIA group is still present in the region of Chlef," he said.
Referring to the release this month of Ali Belhadj, deputy chairman of a banned Islamic party, Zerhouni said Islamic leaders could not play a political role under the amnesty.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Belhadj was among the most influential radical leaders of the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), attracting hundreds of thousands to hear him speak.
"Those who have had a responsibility in using religion as a tool cannot aspire to any political activity," Zerhouni said.
Referring to Saifi, who was sentenced in absentia to life in jail in Algiers last year for helping to create a terrorist group, Zerhouni said the courts would have to decide his fate.
"It is a sensitive case. It is not easy. We will see what to do. But it is up to the judges to say whether he should be released or not," Zerhouni said.
Observers had been expecting his release under the amnesty after authorities freed this week a founder of the Islamic Armed Group (GIA), Abdelhak Layada also known as Abu Adlane. Algeria says 2,629 Islamists were being freed under the amnesty.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:28 ||
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From being the most odious Chechen field commander and principal enemy of Russia, Shamil Basayev is increasingly turning into a figure who is somehow unreal. It is now several years since the Russian special services began their hunt for him.
There have been many reports of Basayevs death, and there was even information that he had gone mad. All of this information was supplied by the Russian special services, which have thereby attempted to shrug off responsibility for the fact that they are unable to catch him, while at the same time hinting at their involvement in his illnesses and poisonings.
On several occasions Basayev has indeed fallen into traps arranged by the special services, but each time he has succeeded in slipping away at the last moment.
Basayevs luck gives rise to the most diverse rumours, not only among the people, but even among some law enforcement officials. And the rumours are appropriate, if we consider that during the last three years Basayev has been almost the only figure under whose command perceptible blows have been delivered to Russias image.
These rumours include the claim that in 1999 Basayev and his forces left Daghestan under cover of Russian helicopters, and that his actions are coordinated by the GRU, the Military Intelligence of the General Staff of the Russian Federal Ministry of Defence.
Supporters of the version alleging Basayevs "protection" by Russian army intelligence refer, though without proof, to his activity during the Georgia-Abkhazia conflict, where he rose to the post of Abkhaz Deputy Minister of Defence, heading a voluntary contingent from the entire Caucasus.
It is asserted that Basayev was able to form his contacts with the Russian special services when Russia openly took the side of separatist Abkhazia, to which it rendered all its military aid.
There is also another matter: why are the Russian special services, in this case military intelligence, conducting this "dirty" game, and what are its purposes?
Some Chechen political scientists believe that there actually exists in Russia a so-called "plot of the generals", who are trying to weaken Russia to please the countries of the West, with the aim of securing a Russian withdrawal from the Caucasus.
Others think that Basayev is simply endowed with good fortune, and because of his brilliant military talent and wolf-like instinct remains invulnerable to his enemies. Not even a reward of 10,000,000 dollars has managed to trace Russias terrorist ¹ 1.
From merely being a thorn in Russias side Basayev long ago turned into a chronic illness for the country. But that is not the end of it. With more events of the same kind, the processes of this illness will become irreversible. The signs are already present.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:27 ||
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Why couldn't Uncle Sam catch Ted Kaczynski? He killed and maimed people over a period of 18 years, yet managed to remain undetected among a population hostile to his avocation. In the end, Kaczynski wasn't even found by clever investigative work - he deliberately put himself in danger by sending a rambling manifesto to the New York Times - after which his brother identified him as the author.
COVENTRY-BORN Mohammed Ajmal Khan, who also spent time growing up in Pakistan, acted as a "quartermaster" for al-Qaida-linked terrorist organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba, getting whatever they required for their operations. The defendant used an e-mail address he set up at Coventry University to research and purchase equipment, particularly items which were more readily available in the west.
Prosecutor Andrew Edis told the court: "(He) succeeded in acquiring some equipment and he planned to gather more. He acted as a quartermaster for the terrorists, obtaining whatever was required, particularly items that are more easily acquirable in the west than in Pakistan. Shortly before his arrest in March 2005 there is evidence he was acquiring equipment for himself to use, from which can be inferred he was planning to go back to Pakistan to join the fight personally."
Khan also bought air pistols which could be converted to fire bullets which, said Mr Edis, "would be useful in committing murder". He said he could not say where they were intended to be used, but added: "It is more likely they were personal defence weapons for operatives in the UK."
He said the Crown believed Khan was a "dedicated terrorist and a person of authority in Lashkar-e-Taiba", adding: "He is trained in Pakistan and travelled widely. He clearly has a source of funds for this work which has not been fully identified. He is an important man in this terrorist network."
Mr Edis said he used innocent dupes as a front for his activities, including Palvinder Singh, of Anley Way, Coventry, whose bank accounts and name were used to buy military equipment. Mr Singh, aged 30, was last week cleared of conspiracy to supply property for the purposes of terrorism. Khan used the then homes of a cousin in Broad Street and Hampton Road, Foleshill, and his mother's then home in Ransom Road while carrying out the conspiracy. Intercom equipment used inside planes was also delivered to his own former home in Freeman Street, Foleshill.
Khan was arrested during a swoop in Foleshill Road, Coventry last March. He pleaded guilty to conspiracy to supply cash and equipment for the purposes of terrorism. In mitigation, Lawrence McNulty said what Khan had managed to acquire amounted to very little and if he was a key player in Lashkar-e-Taiba it suggested the organisation was a small one.
But jailing him, Mr Justice Fulford said: "Terrorism... profoundly affects countless numbers of innocent lawabiding people both directly and indirectly." Khan was jailed for eight years for terrorism and a further year for contempt of court after repeatedly refusing to answer questions during the trial of Palvinder Singh. The court heard he is now likely to face extradition proceedings to face further similar charges in America where it is alleged he also had links with terrorists.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:21 ||
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Suspected militants have blown up the transmission tower of the Voice of Islamabad a government radio station in Pakistan's restive South Waziristan tribal region, halting its broadcasts, local officials said today. The government had established the radio station to convey its policy against Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants, who are believed to be hiding in the region close to Afghanistan. The attack late last night was the second on the radio station located in Wana, the headquarters of South Waziristan tribal region. The first bomb attack was carried out in 2004, few days after the station began functioning. Officials said the blast did not cause much damage to the radio building but transmission was suspended. They said repair work may take three to four days. The attackers planted the explosives near the Aerial Transmitting Unit, they said.
The radio has a six-hour programme schedule in local Pashto language, which also includes news.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:18 ||
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Three years to the day after they invaded Iraq , most American troops still believe in their mission but know that the general population has -- at best -- mixed feelings about their presence.
Many are as keen as most Iraqis to see U.S. forces go home and, inspired by the sense they bring freedom and prosperity, regret the resentment they face among many local people.
"In one town they will thank the troops for what they are doing," said Staff Sergeant Jim Mayhan, 40, a veteran of the 2003 invasion and now on his second rotation in Iraq, based at Hilla, 100 km (60 miles) south of Baghdad.
"Go to another town and you get ugly stares and cultural gestures showing their displeasure."
Hilla, close to the site of Babylon and capital of the province named for the ancient city, is often held up by U.S. officials as a model for the reconstruction effort in Iraq.
A mainly Shiite Muslim town surrounded by Sunni rural areas, it saw the bloodiest al Qaeda suicide bombing of the conflict a year ago, when 125 people were killed, and has since seen other sectarian attacks, including on its mosques.
U.S. forces have withdrawn into the background, however, as newly trained Iraqi troops and police have taken over the streets. U.S. soldiers in Hilla on their second tour of duty in Iraq say the reaction of locals is better both to U.S. forces and what they are trying to accomplish than on their first tour.
That is at odds with general perceptions that the welcome for Americans in 2003 was often warm from Iraqis grateful to see the end of Saddam Hussein -- even in towns like Hilla that saw significant civilian casualties -- but that disillusion has set in as U.S. forces have failed to establish security.
Killings of civilians by nervous U.S. troops and widespread arrests have added to Iraqi frustrations with the occupation.
The Americans too want to go home. Though contractors supply all the food and comforts of home that a soldier might need, fried chicken, ice cream and the Internet cafe are only physical reminders of what home is.
Sergeant Justin Edmondson, 23, who has been in the army for five years, was typical. "Everybody wants to go home."
Most U.S. soldiers believe they will leave Iraq a better place than when they arrived but complain Iraqis demands on them are increasing. Those that say that the U.S. mission will not leave improvements say Iraq will be no worse off.
"It will be a little bit rocky when we go," said Specialist Veronica Almanza-Briones, 21, from Chicago, a truck driver who was here in 2003 and just re-enlisted for another four years.
"But with their new government, they will adjust and it will be better than it was before."
Soldiers at Charlie Base in Hilla, home to the 1st Squadron, 10th Cavalry Division, point to tangible evidence of what the U.S. military has accomplished -- a new school, clinic, a bridge or road, and have figures showing a decline in rebel attacks.
Many Iraqis remain unimpressed, however. At an Iraqi army base nearby, Captain Mark Kovalcik, commander of Charlie Troop, hears a list of requests from local forces including repeated questions from the Iraqi commander about lack of electricity.
Power shortages, lasting much of the day, are a feature across Iraq. Kovalcik repeats the same answer to every question. There will be electricity within a month and he will only hand over cash to fix the generator if the commander supplies two bids from local contractors.
Many troops are earnest in their desire to do more for the local people and worry about what lies in store once they leave.
"A lot needs to be done but I dont know the Iraqi people are picking up on our direction," said Corporal Brian Cetrone, 27, from Randolph, Massachusetts, a substitute teacher before joining the army.
"Were doing good things with the intention of them doing the job after we have gone home. I dont know that they see how good it could be."
But even as troops accentuate the positive they are aware the risk of death is little less than it was three years ago during the invasion. While believing themselves well trained and equipped, with confidence in their commanders, they understand they are seen as an occupying power and vulnerable personally.
More than 2,300 U.S. troops have been killed in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.
"Its a different kind of risk," said Edmondson. "There is less direct fire but (roadside bomb) attacks are a bigger factor."
Mayhan, a 15-year veteran from Little Rock, Arkansas, exhibits a cool professionalism. Though he prefers to pass out hand-cranked radios and soccer balls, he said the war has changed from his first tour in 2003.
U.S. forces now find themselves potentially caught in the middle of a sectarian civil war as Shiite militias have stepped up reprisals after years of Sunni guerrilla attacks.
"Everything is not so cut and dried as to who the enemy is," said Mayhan, describing the complexities of his current mission. "You have the three Ps," he said. "Be polite, be professional but be prepared to kill."
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:17 ||
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"Go to another town and you get ugly stares and cultural gestures showing their displeasure."
And what happens if they do that to the insurgents?
Pakistani security agencies have arrested a key al-Qaeda member during a raid in its southern city of Quetta. An intelligence source on condition of anonymity told Pajhwok Afghan News the detained Nasir Mustafa was wanted to the United States in several cases.
The 47-year-old Musatafa is a Syrian citizen and his name is included in the American list of most wanted men, said the official. Besides the 9/11 attacks on World Trade Centre in the United States, the detainee was allegedly involved in the 2004 bomb blasts in Madrid, Spain. A member of Taliban, who wished not to be named, confirmed the arrest of Nasir Mustafa. Speaking to this correspondent over the telephone, the source said he was living in Kandahar during the reign of Taliban. Ahmad Suleman, an al-Qaeda member, told this scribe by the telephone, Mustafa was a common member of the group. He was known as Musal al-Suri among his colleagues, said Suleman.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:16 ||
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#3
I think it must be a fault in the retirement program. Human Resources did such a bang up job planning cost-of-living adjustments for married/ multiply married vs. single men, annual vacations, housing and so forth -- all the kinds of things new hires ask about -- but they must have run out of steam when it came to the long term stuff. ;-)
Saudi Arabia's interior minister said on Sunday the kingdom's war against al Qaeda was not over, even after the death of top leaders of the group's Saudi wing.
"The battle with them is not finished," Prince Nayef bin Abdul-Aziz told state-run television. "You never know, some new leaders might emerge," he added.
Saudi-born Osama bin Laden's group has been waging a violent campaign in the kingdom for nearly three years, aimed at toppling the pro-U.S. monarchy and expelling Westerners from the birthplace of Islam.
Prince Nayef's brief remarks came in response to a question about the damage caused to al Qaeda by the killing of five militants, including four who were on a most-wanted list of al Qaeda-linked suspects, in a clash with security forces last month.
The killings meant that almost all of 15 wanted men thought to be at large inside Saudi Arabia from a list of 36 that was issued last year had been killed or arrested.
Security analysts say the other 21 are outside the country, many believed to have joined insurgents fighting in Iraq, and that some may be dead.
Those killed last month included Fahd al-Juweir, who the government said was a leader of the Saudi wing of al Qaeda.
In a video tape posted on the Internet after his killing, Juweir warned Americans to leave the kingdom or face more bloodshed and bombings.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
05:14 ||
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Y'know, there MIGHT be someone I trust less than Nayef, but I can't think of him right now.
By Abdel Bari Atwan, the editor of the anti-American al-Quds al-Arabi (Arab Jerusalem) paper and as big a fan of Osama's as you could possibly hope for. Edited for spittle and neocon conspiracy quackdom.
The Feb. 22 bombing of the golden mosque in Samarra - considered one of Shiite Islam's holiest shrines - triggered the unprecedented levels of sectarian violence currently under way in Iraq. The hand behind this strike at the Shiite majority in all probability points to Al Qaeda, intent on fomenting the low-level civil strife that has churned for months into something far greater.
A full-out civil war in Iraq would strengthen Al Qaeda's growing reach in Iraq. Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi, the leader of Al Qaeda in this Land of the Two Rivers, has long expressed a vitriolic hatred for the "heretic and atheist" Shiites, the "secret allies of the Americans." In a June 15, 2004, letter to Osama bin Laden, Mr. Zarqawi described Shiites as "a sect of treachery and betrayal through the ages."
He had earlier claimed responsibility for the assassination of Iraqi Shiite leader Ayatollah Mohammed Bakir al-Hakim in August 2003. And his expressed hatred for the Shiites leads me to believe he was also behind the March 2, 2004, massacre of 185 Shiite pilgrims in Karbala and Baghdad and a string of other attacks on Shiite civilians. Studying this pattern of aggression reveals that Zarqawi's strategy to create such internal chaos to the detriment of US troops and the Iraqi military is indeed being carried out.
Thus it is highly likely that Zarqawi's group carried out the bombing of the golden mosque in Samarra last month. The Shiite majority, who have most to gain from maintaining stability in Iraq, have to this point exercised some restraint in retaliating against attacks on their members, but the destruction of one of their most sacred shrines unleashed a wave of reprisals and summary executions that has already resulted in hundreds (if not thousands) of Sunni and Shiite deaths.
In a letter to Zarqawi dated June 2005, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Mr. bin Laden's deputy, questioned whether targeting Shiite civilians might alienate the more moderate Sunni element from Al Qaeda. Zarqawi, however, disregarded such concerns, reasoning that in the event of the all-out civil war he hopes for, moderate and radical differences will disappear - a prognosis that may well prove gruesomely correct.
Zarqawi's rationale is threefold: Civil war in Iraq will undermine the current political process by preventing the engagement of Sunni factions and unseating the Shiite leaders; it will render the country ungovernable and ensure the failure of the United States project in the region; finally, an expanded conflict would draw on the huge reserves of Sunni Muslim military support available in neighboring countries - either on a national level or in terms of individual mujahideen pouring into Iraq to protect fellow Sunnis from annihilation at the hands of Iran-backed Shiite militia.
Sectarian civil strife could rapidly spread throughout the region. Many Sunni leaders are already unnerved by the growing influence of Shiite Iran in Iraqi internal affairs, and sectarian tensions have been brewing in several countries including Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Lebanon. Civil war in Iraq may well prompt the Kurds to declare independence, drawing Turkey into the arena.
All of this is in keeping with the five-stage plan posted on the Internet in March 2005 by Al Qaeda's main military strategist, Mohammed Makkawi, who described the third stage thus: "expand the [Iraqi] conflict throughout the region and engage the US in a long war of attrition ... create a jihad Triangle of Horror starting in Afghanistan, running through Iran and Southern Iraq then via southern Turkey and south Lebanon to Syria."
Al Qaeda's project, meanwhile, is one of destructive anarchy with the aim of removing the US and corrupt dictatorships from the region in order to clear the way for its ultimate goal: uniting the Muslim world under one Islamic leader, or caliph.
Al Qaeda has become a major player in the Middle East, having been virtually wiped out in Afghanistan after 9/11. This is entirely because of the US invasion of Iraq, which provided Zarqawi's fledgling mujahideen with a new haven and training ground, and inflamed the jihadi spirit in thousands of young men who flock to join him every week.
It is possible that Zarqawi has overestimated the cohesive effect of the sectarian conflict among the various Sunni factions in the present insurgency. The eventual loyalty of the large Baathist element in the insurgency is another unknown.
However, a regenerated Al Qaeda is flourishing and expanding. With its new horizontal structure, it has loosely affiliated "branches" in several regions including Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, and Europe. It now represents a real threat to both oil production and Israel, the twin pillars of America's foreign policy.
Iraq has become a magnet for radicalism as it heads toward fragmentation. The situation for the US military is increasingly dangerous. America is already engaged in a confrontation with Iran over its nuclear program; if this escalates, as seems increasingly likely, the nearly 140,000 US soldiers in Iraq will become hostages at the mercy of their present allies, the Iran-backed Shiite militia, and their current enemies, the Sunni insurgent groups and Al Qaeda. The risk for the US has to be that those who are divided on sectarian grounds in Iraq will briefly pause in their destruction of each other to turn on a new, common enemy.
For Al Qaeda, everything is going entirely according to plan.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006
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ROP Baghdad: A Sunni extremist leader captured south of Baghdad confessed to killing hundreds of Shiite Muslims in recent months, police said. Mohammad Al Janabi was captured and detained along with five other "dangerous terrorists" in Jaraf Al Sakr, an insurgent stronghold known as the Triangle of Death. Police Lt. Col. Falah Al Mohammedawi said Al Janabi confessed to killing at least 400 people.
The following video is an interview with 3 Americans..
former Palestinian terrorists who now preach peace. The first person interviewed here is Walid Shoebat. Walid really pisses terrorists and their ass kissing supporters off, because he really shames them and their culture:
India's National Security Adviser MK Narayanan has indicated the Line of Control (LoC) that divides Jammu and Kashmir between India and Pakistan could form the basis for a lasting solution to the Kashmir problem. New Delhi has always maintained that the entire state of Jammu and Kashmir, including the part under Pakistani control, is an integral part of India, and Narayanan's comments marked a departure from this position.
In a wide-ranging interview with the CNN-IBN news channel aired on Sunday, Narayanan referred to the resolution of the Kashmir dispute and said: "It may not be easy. The point really is, I presume, that if finally you have to reach an agreement there must be certain amount of give and take.
"I suppose when people talk in terms of Line of Control it is saying that: 'All right, what has been the actual ground position in the last so many years?' That may be the starting point for an exercise to any changes that you might like to make."
But Narayanan said Pakistan did not seem serious about finding a solution to the Kashmir problem and that India was confused by the suggestions emanating from Islamabad. "Pakistani suggestions will not lead us forward," he maintained.
Have they ever?
Narayanan admitted that Indians could be becoming a part of the Pakistani-sponsored jehadi movement in the country. "There is a very distinct attempt to alter the mix, if I may say so. We do find, here and there, individuals who are Indians who are getting involved in these (terrorist) offences," he said. "Almost all of them are sort of inveigled into going across. Sometimes it is Bangkok that is the port from which they go and sometimes it is West Asia. By and large, they are Pakistani connections," he said.
Since the Paks have no direct way of fighting with India without getting stomped, they have to find indirect ways. That includes terrorism within India.
Even so, Narayanan did not rule out a dialogue with Pakistan-based United Jehad Council chairman Syed Salahuddin.
Narayanan also spoke about the India-China border dispute and said leaders of both countries were "ready to go forward", even as New Delhi and Beijing would "have to consider giving up their respective claims" related to the disputed border. Narayanan, who is India's special representative for talks with China on the border dispute, said: "The last round of Indo-China talks were quite a big step forward.
"The leaders of both the countries are ready to go forward on the boundary dispute. India and China will have to consider giving up their respective claims."
An interesting statement: settling the border could lead to some thaw between the two countries, though it wouldn't change the overall strategic position of both.
He was also confident of the US Congress ratifying the civilian nuclear deal struck with India during the visit of President George W Bush this month, saying "we are optimistic".
"(Under Secretary of State) Nicholas Burns spoke to (our) foreign secretary and he admitted that it is a difficult task, but we are making good progress," Narayanan said. "We are optimistic and I think that it is good for the country and good for the world at large. And despite the fact that there are a large number of doubters all over, we have got a good deal," he asserted.
Holding that the nuclear deal would not dent India's nuclear capability, Narayanan made it clear that New Delhi will not consider new conditions for the pact.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/20/2006
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India and China will have to consider giving up their respective claims."
Here is where there will be political problems in India with any settlement.
India doesn't claim Chinese territory. What it claims is territory that was Indian until the 1962 war with China when it was taken.
Chinese claim parts of three Indian states. They also don't recognize the accession of Sikkim to the Indian Union.
So India will be giving up claim to territory that was seized in 1962 in return for China giving up claim to territory historically part of the British Raj and now part of the Indian Union.
There is no give and take here. China just takes. Only India Gives.
Posted by: john ||
03/20/2006 10:44
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Days after introduction of a bill in American Congress seeking its approval for implementation of the Indo-US nuclear deal, Pakistan has said there should be a package for both neighbours and not country-specific pacts on a subject as critical as nuclear technology, in the interest of balance of power in South Asia.
They're making the assumption that a balance of power in South Asia is on our agenda. They haven't caught on yet...
"We do understand and appreciate the under-pinnings of the US' de-hyphenated policy in South Asia, but this should not be leaning so heavily on one side," Pakistani Ambassador to Washington Jehangir Karamat said in a statement, reacting to the bill which was introduced in the US Senate and House of Representatives on Thursday.
De-hyphenated? What the heck is that?
Dunno, but it sounds painful.
President Pervez Musharraf has said that "our security policy is no longer India-centric. He has also emphasised minimum deterrence as a pillar of our policy, and has said, that we do not want an arms race with India," Karamat maintained.
Since they can't afford one.
How's it feel, being left in the dust?
"Pakistan, is of course, committed to democracy - but, its policies are supporting the development of the political, social and economic institutions.
Pakland is, of course, committed to democracy, not to individual freedom. People can vote every couple weeks if they want to, but if the holy men run things they might as well go bowling. I don't think we're any more in favor of lip-service democracy than we are of bloody-handed dictators.
"The military will take its rightful place, once this process is complete; because right now, it is the major driver for institutional development," Karamat said in the statement issued to Pakistani journalists.
It has been for many years now. That's how you ended up with a country that should be institutionalized.
Or dismembered.
"We cannot have internal chaos, and we need US policy to help and support us in this process. This is not the time for an imbalance in the region," he said.
Fuggitaboutit, we're not helping you with the bomb.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/20/2006
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Unidentified men on Sunday fired upon three men picnicking in Balochistan's Pir Ghaib area. Two men were killed and one has been critically injured. Government spokesman Raziq Bugti said that the assailants had interrogated the men before shooting them. The militants ascertained whether they were Punjabis and then shot them, he said. "Innocent people should not be targeted by anyone having a grudge against the government," he added. "All circles should condemn the attack."
Also, unidentified men attacked a Frontier Corps checkpoint in Karmo Wadh, near Sibi. No casualty was reported. FC personnel retaliated and are searching for the men, said sources. Bugti said that he had no information about the incident.
Later, APP reported that unidentified men killed tribal elder Haji Abdul Quddus Khan Sanjrani in Girdi Jangal. Sources said that Haji Sanjrani was sitting in a hotel in Girdi Jangal bazaar when the men fired upon him. His body was given to his family after an autopsy.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2006
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Pack a picnic basket and your bikini Bridgitte, Visit Pakistan Year is coming up.
Posted by: ed ||
03/20/2006 0:41
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There are over 6,000 women and juvenile girls in various jails throughout the country, 4,621 of whom are the victims of discriminatory laws including the Hudood Ordinance, said a Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) report on the state of women. The HRCP said that there had been no decrease in honour killings despite the anti-honour killing law passed in 2004. Instead, the number of women murdered had increased in the year 2005 as compared to the previous year, it added.
The National Commission on Status of Women (NCSW) said that 50 percent of government-run shelter house Darul Aman inmates were implicated in Hudood cases. "The commission had suggested that the law be repealed. However, the proposal had now been pending before the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) for several months," said a NCSW member. Almost 80 percent of the total women jailed are facing charges under the Hudood Ordinance.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Where's the outrage, or public outpourings of righteous indignation, from the ACLU or NOW, or are they too busy having lunch with Mother Cindy and "Damn It, Janet" Sarandon, planning to free "occupied" NYC and Tiffany's from Dubya???
#2
I keep saying that the way to end this nonsense in a hurry is for women there to be presented with the *concept* of making violence. Most males collapse like a house of cards when a woman gets violent--even the threat of violence cows most men.
If even a small handful of women behaved this way, and the word got around that it was *possible*, it would change everything. The few would have to be brave, as they could be severely abused or even killed. But it would change their entire nation.
A religious policeman criticizes their dress, so they grab a blunt or sharp object and hit him, no comment, no argument, no warning. One of their brothers slaps her, so she stabs him in the hand.
Some judge throws a woman in jail on some Sharia charge, he can't go near a woman without fearing for his life, or at least to get a stab wound in the abdomen.
Again, very, very few women actually need to do things like this for a sea change to happen. In some cases, even the *rumor* that women are doing such things will significantly change attitudes.
These are men who are raised to already hate and fear women, and to try and dominate them. If the women refuse to be dominated, most men just don't have the chutzpah to try and force the issue, so will slink away like a spanked dog.
#3
i wish it were as possible as you make it sound. But it would lead to wholesale slaughter.
The courts are against them. Sharia is against them.
Change of this sort neeeds to come from outside the culture - or at least provide a cushion for the action within. The alternative is piles of orphans and dead female children.
Hate to poke back at you, but the uprise must come from men. Sharia is a dangerous place for women. Massive death killing "upstarts" is already a given.
#4
6000 women jailed for being raped or committing adultery. Gee, I wonder who they were having sex with? No men in those 6000 cases?
TW2412-you have a point about the risk of lots of women being killed for starting to be "uppity", but I think resistance really DOES have to come from women-otherwise, there won't be
buy-in by "eastern" men that women will no longer accept mistreatment. Change would merely be seen as a western imposition (which in a sense it is, but is nevertheless necessary).
But you're right in the sense that resistance currently has no cultural foothold there. I think where decent, fairminded men from outside the culture could help is by continuing to speak out on behalf of the women, as so many men on rantburg and other media do. I think the tide will turn by those women accessing ideas never encountered before-via radio programs, via words of leaders like Wafa Sultan and Hirsi Ali, etc, who speak out against female servitude and mistreatment, via words of everyday western women who speak as these eastern women have never heard the like of before. Women in the east have strong oral tradition-we need to find ways to get them talking to each other, in groups, as women. "Did you hear about what a woman named Hirsi Ali said?" Word of mouth is extremely powerful, especially in these types of societies. When they sense that they are part of a community of women fighting together, they are more likely to find courage to face the terrible risks of doing so. I guess maybe it's something like the solidarity, loyalty and courage that comes to men in the horrors of war.
And JM-that same old argument? I'm a feminist, and I'm right here, speaking out against these abuses of women.
DOHA - Qatar is to try to reverse the Arab brain drain that has seen thousands of experts leave the region by bringing together expatriate Arab scientists at annual forums starting in April. The meetings will be held at Education City, an academic complex on the edge of Doha, which hosts branches of prestigious US colleges and has the objective of promoting scientific and technological research.
More than 15,000 Arab physicians left their countries to go abroad between 1998 and 2000, according to a study by the UN Development Program (UNDP).
Arab academics and scientists are often faced with a lack of adequate job opportunities at home, combined with a lack of public or private funding for research and development. Not only do industrialised nations, usually the United States or in Europe, offer better research opportunities, they also offer much higher salaries.
And we don't beat the stuffing out of the women. For example.
As a result, 200 Arab scientists have been invited to the first gathering, slated for April 24-26, to formulate a clear and civilized approach ... designed to repatriate or benefit from Arab brains abroad, said Saif Ali Al Hajari, vice-president of the Qatar Foundation which runs Education City.
The Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development, described as a non-governmental, non-profit organisation, was set up in 1995 by the wife of Qatars emir, Shaikha Mozah bint Nasser Al Misned. Education City, launched in October 2003, hosts top tier US academic institutions, including Virginia Commonwealth University, Texas A and M University, and Weill Cornell Medical College, and a branch of the renowned New York school. A scientific and technological park within the city has attracted such household names as Microsoft, which has set up a research unit there, as have European aircraft maker Airbus, oil giants Total and Shell, and General Motors, the worlds leading car maker.
By bringing together Arab scientists currently living abroad, the Qatar Foundation wants them to take part in promoting a culture of scientific research in the Arab world while giving them an opportunity to carry out their scientific projects, Hajari said.
Their input would also help Education City provide a sound education to new generations, he told AFP. By entering into such a strategic partnership, Arab scientists will help us better draft our budgets, identify our needs in terms of infrastructure equipment, and even adapt legislation to take into consideration their intellectual copyrights, Hajari said.
Unless they are reassured in terms of legislation, Qatar will not be able to attract them, said Hajari, adding that his foundation was not necessarily seeking the physical repatriation of Arab scientists. We have no objection to cooperating with a scientist who prefers to go on living in a foreign country, he said.
"Yes, he could be ... useful."
Hajari said Qatar Foundation also plans to invite to each forum Nobel prize laureates from different countries and fields who would help the scientists think of the future of scientific research and technological development in the Arab world.
Qatar Foundation is in the process of setting up a fund for scientific research, Hajari said without giving figures. Qatar Foundations financial policy relies on bank deposits invested in accordance with Islamic law and whose dividends are used to fund projects, he said, noting that the Qatari rulers wife had offered an eight-billion-dollar grant to a university and research hospital currently under construction at Education City.
The city is negotiating the opening of branches of French and US universities, the former to teach public administration and the latter journalism.
Yup, renowned experts there: the French are really good at 'public administration', witness their own government, and you just can't beat the NYT for journalism. I have a small idea: how about teaching engineering, computer science, math, biology, marketing and economics?
Posted by: Steve White ||
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Basically, all they need to do is make a complete 180 degree turn and emerge from the dark ages. Somehow I don't see this being the next Singapore.
At least two policemen were killed and four others are missing after an hour-long clash with dozens of suspected Taliban fighters in southern Afghanistan, officials said on Sunday. Two suspected Taliban fighters were also killed in the fighting in the Maiwand district of Kandahar province late Saturday, said Yousuf Stanezai, the interior ministry spokesman. "Four policemen are missing. We've no news on their fate," he said.
The fighting erupted after dozens of rebels stormed a checkpoint in the restive district, where the hardliners are especially active. A local police commander who asked not to be named said police, with reinforcements from the provincial capital Kandahar, had launched a hunt for the attackers who are believed to be hiding in the mountains. Maiwand was the scene of a bomb blast on Friday in which nine policemen were killed. The Taliban claimed the attack. The policemen were escorting the bodies of four Albanians who had been kidnapped and killed by Taliban fighters.
Posted by: Fred ||
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President Alexander Lukashenko on Sunday called US President George W. Bush "the premier terrorist on our planet". Lukashenko made the comment after casting his ballot in the presidential election in which he is seeking to extend his 12-year tenure and which the United States has repeatedly criticised as being conducted under repressive conditions. Bush has referred to Belarus as Europe's last dictatorship, while Lukashenko claims the West and the United States in particular aims to unseat him.
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
Alex can expect a visit from Cindy Sheehan and Harry Belefonte any day now.
#3
What are all these poor moonbats and dictators gonna do when Bush leaves office? They might have to think to get a new whipping boy! Oh the humanity!!!
She is the female figurehead of what she hopes will become a new Iranian revolution. Now, after almost 25 years in exile, the world is beginning to beat a path to her door. Maryam Rajavi wants those who visit her near Paris to know what sort of regime Iran's mullahs are running.
As the leader of the largest exiled Iranian opposition group, she talks angrily of the 15-year-old boy flogged to death for eating during Ramadan, and the girl of 13 buried up to her neck and stoned for a similarly trivial "crime".
When she describes the punishments meted out by Iran's rulers, a picture of the limp bodies of two hanged men suspended from a crane is projected onto a screen. She waves a large bound book that, she says, contains the names of 21,676 people who have died resisting the clerical regime. Another 120,000 people have been executed since the mullahs took power in 1979, she claims. Now Iran's rulers are trying to develop a nuclear weapon.
"We have always said that a viper cannot give birth to a dove, but nobody believed us," she told the Sunday Telegraph. "Only a fraction of the true nature of this regime, which is a brutal dictatorship of religious fanaticism, has come to public attention."
British MPs, lawyers and human rights campaigners are among those who have recently travelled to hear Mrs Rajavi, 52, hold court on behalf of the National Council for Resistance for Iran (NCRI). Yet while some see her as the best hope to lead a moderate Islamic government in Teheran, others are more cautious. Washington, the British Government and the European Union all regard the organisation's military wing as a terrorist group. Mrs Rajavi has been described as a self-serving zealot, and the head of a personality cult.
She combats criticism with smiles, regular repetition of the words "freedom and democracy", and the claim that the clerics in Teheran are deliberately trying to slur the opposition group. "Terrorists, then cult," she said. "They're trying to substitute one for another. As we disprove them, they find another name."
Mrs Rajavi is everything the mullahs fear and loathe - a former revolutionary student turned opposition leader who has been a thorn in the side of the Iranian government. She talks moderate Islam, against their religious fanaticism, and is anxious to present the NCRI as tolerant, progressive and reasonable.
As one of six children of a middle-class Iranian family under the Shah's regime, she was a 22-year-old metallurgy student at Teheran University when her elder brother was jailed. Shortly afterwards, she says, her older sister was executed for political activism. Mrs Rajavi joined the Mujahideen-e Khalq (People's Holy Warriors, also known as the MEK) - a student association that mixed Islam and Marxism, and violently opposed the Shah.
Mrs Rajavi married a fellow revolutionary and had two children but divorced to wed the Mujahideen leader, Massoud Rajavi. Yet her hopes for the 1979 Iranian revolution turned to disillusionment. "Very quickly we witnessed the mullahs hijacking the freedom of the people," she said. "We had to start a new push, against Islamic fundamentalism."
So she sounds like a frustrated Marxist.
In 1982, her younger sister, Masoumeh, 22 and eight months pregnant, died under torture by Ayatollah Khomeini's regime, Mrs Rajavi left Iran for France. Now she presides over the NCRI's heavily protected headquarters in Auvers-sur-Oise, 20 miles north-west of Paris. She and up to 100 supporters pursue the overthrow of the clerical regime and installation of an NCRI government, with her as leader, until free elections.
Mrs Rajavi's followers are so devoted that, in 2003, after she was detained for a fortnight by French police on suspicion of terrorism, two set fire to themselves and died. More damaging is the terrorist label slapped on the organisation's military wing by the US State Department in 1994, and subsequently by Britain, and the European Union, after deadly attacks by the group around the world. Last week, visiting British members of the Parliamentary Committee for Iran Freedom said it was time for the Government, and the EU, to remove the "unjust tag".
Mrs Rajavi says Western governments must end their "dangerous appeasement" of Iran's regime and recognise the worth of her group, the first to reveal Iran's secret uranium enrichment programme in 2002. The mullahs appear to fear her. "They are afraid of freedom and democracy, and of women who stand up for their rights," she said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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Everything Rajavi and her MEK buddies say needs to be taken with a whole shaker of salt. The MEK beliefs concerning her and her husband border on deification (Mao-esque cults of personality at the very least) and putting them in charge of Iran would only serve to replace an Islamic Republic with a People's Republic - not much of an improvement, IMO. Remember, they shilled for Saddam and served as his toadies for more than 20 years - they deserve no pity and are certainly worthy of no alliance with the US against the mad mullahs.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
03/20/2006 5:11
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Their info seems to be good. Their politics are screwed. Communism sucks and commies are vipers they are not trust worthy and belong on the Terror list.
Posted by: SPoD ||
03/20/2006 6:09
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The Rajavis are welcome to pour gasoline on themselves and light it. The MEK not only supported taking the 1979 US Embassy hostages, but were responsible for killing several US military and civilian personnel in the 1970's. Their only redeeming feature is that after their fallout with the mullahs, the MEK were able to kill quite a few of them.
Posted by: ed ||
03/20/2006 8:09
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"...regard the organisation's military wing as a terrorist group..."
What ever name they want to be called, they ALL have blood up to their armpits
The National Liberation Army of Iran
The People's Mujahedin of Iran (PMOI)
National Council of Resistance (NCR)
National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)
Muslim Iranian Student's Society
My question is, now that MEK recieved Geneva Convention "Protected" status does that allow for some of the State Dept.'s 75 million to go their way?
#5
" would only serve to replace an Islamic Republic with a People's Republic - not much of an improvement, IMO"
Then I take it youre NOT one of the people who thinks the mullahs are irrational, and incapable of being deterred? The fact is that we HAVE managed Mutual Assured Deterrence situations with Marxist-Leninist regimes before, and while they will subsidize terror as a weapon, they can at least be deterred on that as well.
In any case, Leninism isnt real strong in the region, unlike Islamism, and so would have less potential appeal beyond Irans borders. In fact it probably would have less appeal WITHIN Irans borders than Khomeinism does - I think theyd have a hard time actually controlling the country.
#6
I dunno....an Iranian female figurehead would an excellent alternative to the Mad Mullahs. Maybe the US should court her away from the negative French influence, and I would hope she could see the true nature of the Maoist/Commie regimes. Functioning democracies have checks and balances, and the people must agree to be governed. Exchanging one tyranny for another is no longer acceptable with stakes this high.
#7
DD: Remember, they shilled for Saddam and served as his toadies for more than 20 years - they deserve no pity and are certainly worthy of no alliance with the US against the mad mullahs.
We allied with Uncle Joe Stalin against the Nazis and Chairman Mao against the Soviets. People who have problems with alliances of common interest are stuck in the paradigm of permanent alliances like NATO. Most alliances in history have been ad hoc ones. We don't have to - and generally don't - give our alliance partners everything they want. We supported the Tibetan guerrillas right until the demands of the Cold War led to Nixon's rapprochement with China. Then we dropped the Tibetans like a hot coal. We had good relations with the Chinese until we realized that they were trying to replace us in the Pacific. That's the way it goes - it's known as getting one barbarian to fight another.
#8
Danielle: Functioning democracies have checks and balances, and the people must agree to be governed. Exchanging one tyranny for another is no longer acceptable with stakes this high.
I am of the classic realist view that when large groups of Iranians slaughter each other, and the body count starts running up, it is not necessarily to the disadvantage of these United States. Especially if we can make it happen without a single American soldier having to risk his life occupying an inch of Iranian soil. Fact is that civil war will weaken the Iranian state, and that is all to the good.
Defense officials expressed restrained optimism on Sunday after the Palestinian Authority agreed to open the Kerem Shalom crossing - but only to goods coming from Egypt, not from Israel.
Kerem Shalom is a three-way crossing at the southern tip of the Gaza Strip which connects Israel, Egypt and Gaza.
Israeli, PA, US, EU and Egyptian officials met Sunday afternoon at US Ambassador Richard Jones's residence in Herzliya Pituah to look for a compromise over the crossing points issue that would allow the passage of badly needed food into Gaza.
The meeting came amid reports that the food situation in Gaza was becoming desperate.
The PA has been demanding the reopening of the Karni crossing, something Israel has refused to do because of a number of warnings that terrorist attacks would occur if the passage were opened. Western diplomatic officials said that the PA believed Israel's refusal to open up Karni, and its insistence in opening up Kerem Shalom instead, had less to do with security needs and more to do with an interest in getting out of the customs envelope agreement with the PA.
The 1994 Paris Protocols created a single customs union between Israel and the PA which allowed goods to move between them tax-free. The accord harmonized the tax structure of Israel and the PA and provided for PA goods to be exported under the same conditions and in the same ships and airplanes as Israeli goods.
Undoing this envelope would have a devastating impact on the PA economy and is a possible lever Israel could use to combat a Hamas-led PA government that does not recognize Israel, renounce terrorism or accept previously signed agreements.
Defense Ministry officials were scheduled to meet with their PA counterparts on Monday at the Kerem Shalom crossing to prepare for its planned opening later in the day. Officials estimated that the PA's refusal to accept goods from Israel was motivated by "political considerations" and was an attempt to "hurt Israel." Before the meeting at Jones's residence, the PA adamantly refused to allow anything through the Kerem Shalom crossing.
Maj.-Gen. (res.) Amos Gilad, director of the Defense Ministry's Political Military Bureau, warned the PA at Sunday's meeting that Egypt was only capable of transferring 20 percent of the amount of goods Israel could transfer daily into the Gaza Strip. "We warned them, but they were firm in their refusal," one official said.
Security officials warned against reopening Karni on Sunday, citing severe security alerts as the reason for the terminal's continued closure. The defense establishment, officials said, had obtained intelligence information regarding several terror cells planning attacks against the terminal.
Karni had become a primary target for terror groups, officials explained, since it was the only place where Israelis were stationed near the Gaza Strip. The warnings included tunnels terrorists were digging near Karni or plans to infiltrate a bomb into the terminal.
"Gaza is sealed and they can't succeed in infiltrating Israel, so they try to hit us at Karni," one official explained.
The PA rejected claims of terror alerts near Karni, which it said was Gaza's "oxygen pipe," and accused Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz of closing the terminal for political purposes. Kerem Shalom, they said, was meant to serve as a pedestrian crossing and was unsuitable for the transfer of goods.
"There are no terror alerts at Karni," said Salim Abu Safiyyah, head of the PA Terminal and Border Security Department. "We dug around the terminal and did not find anything. This is all about politics."
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) issued a report Sunday stating that as a result of the extended closure of Karni "most bakeries in the Gaza Strip today are closed, because wheat flour stocks have finished. Bread is the staple food for 1.3 million Palestinians in Gaza. There are long lines of people outside the few bakeries that still have limited stocks of bread and the bakeries are rationing bread to those waiting."
According to the report, the usual 30- to 60-day wheat stock kept in Gaza had been exhausted, and "other basic food commodities are in extremely short supply, including dairy products and fruit. Rice and sugar are selling at more than twice their normal price and are also very difficult to find in stores."
The OCHA report blamed the closing of Karni for the crisis, and said that Kerem Shalom did not have the capacity to deal with the amount of wheat that needed to be shipped into Gaza.
#1
This is a smart move by the Israelis. No goods are moving so no tax revenue collected and remitted to the Paleos. And they can still play the ending of the tax union card sometime in the future.
#2
The OCHA report blamed the closing of Karni for the crisis, and said that Kerem Shalom did not have the capacity to deal with the amount of wheat that needed to be shipped into Gaza.
#3
Very simple folks: renounce violence, recognize Israel and stick to agreements. Very logical demands to ensure survival and growth. Not complicated or expensive or requiring any expenditure of sweat - just sane and civilized.
Or die - steaming in your own sweaty ignorance and blindness.
#4
The Paleos are finding out just how much it sucks when you have no cards to play and everyone knows it. There is no way that Gaza can be self-sufficient. Why are no Paleos trying to be relocated to the West Bank. Gaza, absent the few Israeli greenhouses already destroyed produces nothing but terrorists and welfare recipients. When the welfare pipe closes, they are well and truly without hope.
A paramilitary trooper was killed and six others wounded on Sunday when suspected Islamic rebels threw a grenade at an Indian security patrol in Indian held Kashmir, police said. The attack took place in Sopore, 50 kilometres north of Srinagar as a Border Security Force (BSF) unit patrolled a busy intersection, a police spokesman said.
Posted by: Fred ||
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A ten-year-old boy was killed and another child injured in an explosion near a police station in Mardan City, reported APNA channel on Sunday. The channel said the boys had picked up a grenade from a nearby garbage dump and it exploded. The grenade was thrown mistakenly into the dump while police officials were removing ammunition from confiscated illegal weapons store, the channel quoted a police officer as saying.
Posted by: Fred ||
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Remember: Separate the paper from the metal, and the inert ordnance from the live.
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A Turkish lobbying group said it has filed a criminal complaint against a German newspaper for printing a series of Danish cartoons lampooning the Prophet Mohammed last month.
It said the complaint was filed with prosecutors in the northern city of Cologne, charging daily Die Welt with violating Germany's criminal code by printing 12 cartoons of Islam's Prophet on Feb. 1 despite global unrest sparked by their initial appearance in a Danish paper.
While freedom of the press is guaranteed by the German Constitution, the country's law forbids public insults against religious societies, beliefs and groups that support specific world views.
"It is not the point of a free press to insult the religious sensibilities of nearly 3 million Muslims in Germany with provocations of this kind," said Abdullah Emil, general secretary of the Union of European Turkish Democrats (UETD).
Guenther Feld, a public prosecutor in Cologne, where the UETD is based, confirmed having received the complaint and said he would study it.
Even if the prosecutors decided to formally press charges, Feld told Reuters it was unclear whether it would be handled in Cologne or Hamburg, where the daily's owner, German newspaper publisher Axel Springer, is based.
Axel Springer's spokeswoman, Silvie Rundel, said there were currently no official legal complaints, or complaints by the German media watchdog, pending against Die Welt.
Last Wednesday Denmark's own public prosecutor decided not to press charges against a newspaper for allegedly violating Denmark's blasphemy law by printing the 12 drawings of the Prophet Mohammed that triggered widespread Muslim anger.
The caricatures, later reprinted in other countries, provoked protests among Muslims, who believe it is blasphemous to depict the prophet. At least 50 people were killed in protests in the Middle East and Asia, three Danish embassies were attacked and many Muslims boycotted Danish goods.
Last month a German court convicted a businessman of insulting Islam by printing the word "Koran" on toilet paper and offering it to mosques. He was given a one-year jail sentence, suspended for five years, and ordered to complete 300 hours of community service.
#2
"While freedom of the press is guaranteed by the German Constitution, the country's law forbids public insults against religious societies, beliefs and groups that support specific world views."
What about the UN Charter that declares the Freedom of Religion as an essential aspect of Human Rights?
Way to go here:
Germany: the Koran reported to the Police !!!
http://hexagonews.blogspot.com/
Better sooner than later in facing up to the obvious.
#3
"It is not the point of a free press to insult the religious sensibilities of nearly 3 million Muslims in Germany with provocations of this kind," said Abdullah Emil, general secretary of the Union of European Turkish Democrats (UETD).
It is the responsiblity of the press to report religious ignorance, violence, intolerance, abusivness, slaughter and calls for genocide.
Still with the freaking cartoons. Need something similar, but bigger to really ratchet up the highlighting of what Islam really means.
#5
Need something similar, but bigger to really ratchet up the highlighting of what Islam really means.
A little birdie tells me this ought to do it:
(If you liked the cartoons, you're gonna love this ...)
New 'Allah' doc ready to raise a ruckus
Dubowski vows to screen pic in every Muslim nation
Sandi Dubowski, who won the Teddy gay and lesbian award in 2001 for his controversial doc "Trembling Before G-d," may cause an even bigger stir with "In the Name of Allah," which explores the struggles of homosexual Muslims.
Gay Indian Muslim helmer Parvez Sharma is directing the pic, which looks at gay, lesbian, and transgender Muslims across the Muslim and Western worlds.
You can already hear turbans around the world spinning up to full after-burner overdrive. I look forward to a whole new sh!tload of tramplings and economy crippling demonstrations. He||, just the movie's title should be enough to get things rolling.
Ganomukti and Jatiya Sampad Rakkha Sammilito Andolon (GJSRSA) Saturday demanded immediate end to all intelligence activities of FBI in the country, reports UNB. GJSRSA's demand came from a meeting held at the office of Sramajibi Mukti Andolon.
Who?
They said the US government has withdrawn its Peace Corps members from Bangladesh fearing militant attacks, but their intelligence agency Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is "exploding bombs" here in the name of collecting clues to bomb attacks.
That's pretty whacked out, but then again this is Bangladesh.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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BEIJING - A 30-member North Korean delegation, led by a brother-in-law of leader Kim Jong-il, has arrived in China to tour economic facilities, diplomatic sources said yesterday. The chief of the delegation, Jang Song-taek, flew to Beijing Saturday aboard a North Korean Koyro Air plane and stayed one night at the Shangri-La Hotel, diplomatic sources in Beijing said.
The North Korean delegation is to visit economic zones in Shenzen, Guangzhou and other southern Chinese cities where leader Kim toured during his trip to China in January, the sources said.
Kim's trip to China spawned speculation that communist North Korea planned a set of economic reform measures modeled after China's. A detailed itinerary for the North Korean delegation was not immediately available.
In recent weeks, Jang, the first deputy chief of the powerful Workers' Party's Central Committee, was also at the center of media attention when he was reportedly reinstated after disappearing from public view for two years. Jang, once dubbed North Korea's No. 2 man, was believed to have been under house arrest as the result of a secrecy-shrouded power struggle.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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Hmmmm, reading between the lines I get the feeling that China has told NorK
"Build an Infrastructure to support yourself, we're tired of give, give, give, and it's going to be cut off."
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/20/2006 11:37
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Put it another way.
"Here now, pay attention while we teach you how to fish?
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/20/2006 11:49
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Please -- there's no way any Turk will ever admit what happened.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/20/2006 7:17
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The Turks believe the documentary evidence to be slim, as indeed it apparently is. They probably hope to impeach what few documents do exist. We will then be faced with the tree falling in the forest conundrum. But just because there are no unimpeachable documents does not mean it didn't happen.
Jamat-ul-Dawa's leader Ameer Abu Hanif, had been suffering from bullet injuries, died at a Lahore hospital on Sunday. Hanif and his four colleagues had been on their way to Muridke from Sheikhupura, a few days ago, when unidentified armed assailants tried to kidnap them in the precincts of Sadar Muridke Police. The assailants open fired on Abu Hanif when he tried to resist. An FIR has been registered by police as investigation continue.
Golly. One of the head holy men from Jamaat ud-Dawa. Wotta shame. I am so broken up.
Posted by: Fred ||
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abu Hanif has up and left us by way of the slo lead path.
A moderate earthquake measuring 5 on the Richter scale jolted Islamabad and parts of NWFP on Sunday but there were no immediate reports of damage, officials said. "It was a moderate intensity earthquake," said the chief of the Seismological Department Chaudhry Qamaruz Zaman. He said it was an aftershock of the massive October 8 quake that killed more than 73,000 people in the country. The shocks were felt at 7:49am in Islamabad and in Balakot and also in Mansehra and Swat districts, the officials said. The epicentre was 200 kilometres northeast of Peshawar. Two low intensity aftershocks, measuring 4.0 and 4.1, were felt later at 8:18am and 8:21am respectively, officials said.
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I like "Flattened under concrete" I've seen their construction first hand and close up, very weak.
(Father was a Civil Engineer, some 'larnin rubbed off.)
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/20/2006 12:37
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Afghan police have seized 200 kilograms (440 pounds) of heroin from a truck in the southern province of Zabul and detained its driver and helper, a senior police officer said Sunday. The heroin was concealed in a truck loaded with salt and heading to the nearby city of Kandahar on Saturday, said provincial police chief Mohammad Nabi Mullahkhil. The truck driver and his assistant were detained and nearly 200 kilograms of heroin seized, he said. Kandahar lies on a transit route for Afghan drugs being shipped to neighboring Pakistan. Afghanistan provides more than 90 percent of the heroin consumed in Europe. The US-backed government of Afghan president Hamid Karzai has called for a "jihad" or holy war against narcotics.
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"I just siezed 200 kilos of smack, and boy AM I SLEEPY!"
Greek Cyprus' Justice Ministry said it would refuse to cooperate with future U.S. human rights reports, saying a State Department assessment issued this month smacked of bias. The boycott would only concern questionnaires from the United States related to the compilation of reports, but it demonstrated the depth of feeling in Greek Cyprus towards the United States.
Relations with Washington have cooled markedly in recent years because of a perceived bias in Greek Cyprus that the United States has towards Turkey.
To the anger of Greek Cyprus, the U.S. State Department recently said that trade with Turkish Cypriots, living isolated in the northern part of the island, is legal. Greek Cypriots oppose any direct trade between the Turkish Cypriots and the outside world, saying this would mean de facto recognition of the Turkish Cypriot state.
Turkey is pressing both the United States and the European Union for the lifting of the isolation of Turkish Cypriots.
The Greek Cypriot administration has indicated that it would not accept the United States or Britain acting as mediators in fresh talks over the future of Cyprus, questioning their honesty as mediators.
The State Department's annual human rights report often draws complaints and derision from several states it cites for rights violations, and China issues its own report detailing allegations of violations in the United States.
The same report, released earlier this month, has criticized Turkey for continuing torture and abuse by members of the security forces and said the government continued to limit freedom of expression in some cases. Turkish officials have so far not commented on the report's conclusions.
In the Greek Cypriot case, the U.S. report said police abuse, violations of asylum-seekers' rights, violence against women and people and trafficking were problems; however, the Greek Cypriot Justice Ministry said the authorities' views were totally ignored when compiling the report.
"We will not answer any of their questions (in the future) unless we get clear assurances they will be objective and take into account the facts," said Justice and Public Order Minister Doros Theodorou.
Theodorou said the report made sweeping and unsubstantiated accusations. "It is clear that the State Department report refers to general accusations and in some cases, without any proof whatsoever," he said.
In parts, the rights report was largely drawn from domestic media reports and said the country was both a destination and transit point for persons trafficked for sexual exploitation. Authorities, it said, "were aware of and generally tolerated the situation."
"The impression the report leaves is that its contents were already predetermined. Under such circumstances, I fail to see why we should in future answer the questionnaires sent out by the U.S. Embassy," said Theodorou.
Reports of the trafficking of women have existed for years. Johns Hopkins University in the United States issued an assessment last year saying that the prostitution industry, which relies on trafficking, generated an estimated $85 million per year in Cyprus, an island of less than 1 million people.
#2
I give this rant/seethe a 2. Tedious, petulant, no refutation of local reports that the joint is nothing more than a huge cut-rate bordello, no catchy slogan, no dire threats (tm), no curses.
It's not even worth asking if he wants feta with his whine.
Get some caffeine and try again, Doros. Might try burning a copy of the report, or trying to flush it down the loo next time for a nice visual, ok?
Minsk - Thousands of protesters thronged the main square of the Belarusian capital on Sunday in defiance of a government ban, refusing to recognize a presidential vote that appeared all but certain to give the iron-fisted incumbent a third term. The protesters chanted "Long Live Belarus!" and the name of the main opposition candidate, Alexander Milinkevich. Some waved a national flag that Lukashenko banned in favor of a Soviet-style replacement, while others waved European Union flags.
"We demand new, honest elections," Milinkevich told the crowd. "This was a complete farce."
Lukashenko won 88.5 percent of the vote compared to 3.8 percent for Milenkevich, central election commission secretary Nikolai Lozovik said, with 22.3 percent of ballots counted. The results virtually guaranteed a third term for the authoritarian leader who has ruled the republic since 1994.
Milinkevich and another opposition candidate, Alexander Kozulin, called on the crowd, which began thinning under a heavy snow, to return to the square Monday evening signaling they would try to hold a sustained protest of the sort that brought down long-lived regimes in former Soviet republics including Ukraine and Georgia. Much more at the link. Good luck, Belarus.
Hat tip: Poliblog, which has a picture.
More than 1,500 people gathered around a statue of 19th century liberation hero Simon Bolivar on Sunday and posed nude for a pretentious U.S. artist famous for his photos of naked crowds in public spaces. The fact that he's considered a "hero" goes far to explain why Latin America has been such a mess the past 200 years.
Spencer Tunick organized the Caracas photo shoot along downtown Avenida Bolivar, a frequent spot for political rallies by supporters of President Hugo Chavez. Surrounded by dozens of reporters and onlookers, the participants cracked jokes, shouted cheers for Tunick and struck poses for the press. "I worked very, very hard and the people were extremely, extremely, extremely weird exuberant," Tunick said after the shoot. "It's a new experience. And beyond the disinhibition of taking off clothes, this also involves art," said Jerry Lino, 30, who took part in the event. "One never feels naked." Having someone's sweaty buns inches from your face sounds like a great way to spend the afternoon.
All those honkers help one get through it...
More than 7,800 people had signed up, but only between 1,500 and 2,000 showed up. The rest had sobered up.
Bolivar looms large in the fevered rhetoric of Chavez. The populist president-for-life says he is leading a communist leftist "Bolivarian Revolution" to universalize end poverty in the South American nation.
#1
You know, I wouldn't go so far as to blame Bolivar for all the BS that Chavez sprouts, in spite of the fact that Chavez calls himself a "Bolivarian."
It's sort of like Slick Willy calling himself a Jeffersonian, if you know what I mean.
Posted by: Phil ||
03/20/2006 0:36
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Ol' Simon set the precedent of the military stepping in to "save" the state during a political crisis, leading pretty much directly to every murderous junta to afflict South America for the last century at least.
SEOUL, March 18 -- Hundreds of elderly South Korean farmers are facing forcible eviction from their land to allow the expansion of a U.S. military base near Seoul, according to the human rights group Amnesty International.
Some of the farmers -- mainly in their sixties and seventies -- suffered bloodied noses during clashes with riot police earlier this month, and several human rights activists were detained, the London-based group said in a statement posted on its Web site Friday.
Police had come to evict the farmers from their homes in Daechuri village in Pyongtaek, 50 miles south of the capital, it said. "I will stay and I will die here" if the government attempts to evict the farmers, Kim Ji Tae, the village chief, said during a candlelight vigil in a school in Daechuri.
Of 210 families, Kim said, 20 had left their land and about 80 would eventually leave the village. The remaining families will stay on their land, he said. "Most of these villagers are very old, and it is distressing to hear of force being used against them," Rajiv Narayan, an East Asia researcher at Amnesty, said in the statement.
Ahn Jung Hoon, a South Korean Defense Ministry spokesman, declined to comment, saying he had not seen the Amnesty statement. David Oten, spokesman for the U.S. military in South Korea, also declined comment.
In December, South Korea's Land Expropriation Committee approved the seizure of the village so the U.S. military could expand Camp Humphreys and move its command from the current headquarters at Yongsan Garrison in central Seoul.
Amnesty International urged the government to release those detained in the clashes and to meet with the evicted farmers to discuss compensation, noting that the financial settlements offered were insufficient to replace their properties. "Any eviction on the current terms would leave the farmers in an extremely vulnerable position with few opportunities to make a living," Narayan said. The government "should ensure the villagers are not left homeless and give them reasonable compensation and alternative farming land close to their new homes."
Making sure the farmers are compensated fairly is reasonable. But if they don't want us in their country, no problem.
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Wid nukes or conventional weapons, the NOrkies have Seoul in their sights, moreso iff ISRAEL this year 2006 ends up fulfilling its promise to use any steps necessary to unilater stop Iran from dev nukes, iff no other nation(s) will.
#2
Without evidence of "Americans are not welcome here" sentiment in the actual incident, I can't say that I don't understand where the farmers are coming from. Can you say "eminent domain"?
Posted by: Edward Yee ||
03/20/2006 1:34
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#4
Let's see, move the command from their pretty painted rock compound living the embassy life in Seoul...or drain some paddies around Anjung-ne to build a headquarters, hmmm. Somethings up.
These guys will get jobs washing American cars. Why are they crying.
#5
What's up was the S Koreans wanted the only undeveloped prime downtown real estate left in Seoul. Yongsan's 1 square mile is probably worth billions $. Think Central Park, only more expensive.
If the SK gov is so inclined, there is plenty Won left over to make the land owners rich, but many old people who grew up on that land want to live out the rest of their lives there.
Posted by: ed ||
03/20/2006 8:20
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#6
Ok, let the Older people have it, let's come home. :)
#7
I stopped reading when the name Amnesty International was cited. Only the MSM uses them as a credible source.
Posted by: Captain America ||
03/20/2006 10:25
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I note the pointed implication that the "Clashes" were with American Troops, without actualy saying anything about the people the farmers were really clashing with.
Bet our Troopies were not involved at all, sounds like the SKOR Police were the bashers and the farmers the bashees.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
03/20/2006 11:43
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#9
Back in 1988 the Korean government approached the US Army in Yongson about moving the Headquarters elsewhere, out of the downtown of the capital. I could see where you'd like a foreign army not to be entrenched in your capital. We were sort of put of the last time the British did that in our capital. The US Command said certainly, but you have to provide suitable quarters elsewhere. So, here we are 18 years later. It not like this has been a rush deal.
Tehran, Iran, Mar. 19 Eight freedom-fighters people were killed during a gun-battle with Irans paramilitary police in the eastern province of Khorassan Razavi, state television reported on Sunday. The eight freedom-fighters rebels were killed after armed clashes broke out in the border town of Taybad, the report quoted Brigadier General Radan, the commander of State Security Forces in the province, as having said.
Details were sketchy but the report said that the incident took place near the Sorkh well in the town and that all eight rebels who were involved in the clashes were killed. They had entered to create "liberty" insecurity and "freedom" trouble, the report said, without identifying them further.
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See, we shouldn't have gone in there and deposed the mullahs. Now Iran is on the brink of civil war as violence increases as a result of sectarian strife blah blah blah.
Posted by: Matt ||
03/20/2006 11:30
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Five North Koreans have defected to South Korea by boat, crossing the tense sea border off the peninsula's east coast, military officials said yesterday. The group, a couple in their 30s and their two children, aged 2 and 8, and a 26-year-old man whom investigators identified as a friend of the family, crossed the border late Saturday in a small wooden barge, which was intercepted by the South Korean Coast Guard.
The defectors told the sailors they wanted to defect, and were seeking asylum in the South, Yonhap news agency said, quoting investigators. "I decided to defect in January, as I had longed for the Southern society since I learned about South Korea's development after listening to the radio when I was in the army (from 1986-1994)," the husband, 37, only identified by his surname Lee, was quoted as telling investigators.
The investigators said the group left the North Korean port of Tongchon Friday after reporting to authorities they would go fishing. A portable gas burner, a hammer and a plastic bottle of mineral water were found in the barge.
About 1,380 North Koreans fled their impoverished country to the South last year, 1,894 in 2004 and 1,139 in 2003.
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And TV was showing the original SOLYENT GREEN last night too, espec the "green wafer/cracker factory prod line scene - BTW, whatever happened to RETURN OF SOLYENT GREEN???
#2
But that can't be right! According to Jimmy Carter, North Korea is a paradise where the "people were very friendly and open." Pyongyang, is a "bustling city," where customers "pack the department stores," which looked like "Wal-Mart in Americus, Georgia."
/sarcasam
Posted by: Mike ||
03/20/2006 6:43
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Mike, are those quotes for real? It wouldn't surprise me in the least. With Jimmuh, it's hard to tell reality from Scrappleface.
A top commander of U.S. forces expressed doubt Sunday that negotiations between the United States and Iran over Iraq would help bring peace and stability in the Middle East. "I don't have a lot of confidence that these will turn out to be productive, but I could be wrong," said Gen. George W. Casey, the top commander in Iraq. "They're playing, I think, a very delicate balancing act," he said of Iran. "On the one hand, they want a stable neighbor. On the other hand, I don't believe they want to see us succeed here."
Casey said on "Fox News Sunday" he didn't have much faith in the talks but that it was a "political call." Any negotiations should involve the Iraqis' use of "improvised explosive device technology" against coalition forces that he says are coming from Iran. "That needs to stop," Casey said.
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DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan (AP) - Suspected Islamic militants set off three bombs Sunday, one of which exploded near a police van and killed seven people in northwestern Pakistan, officials said. The two other bombs damaged walls of a police station and a government building.
A powerful roadside bomb blew up the police vehicle while it was on patrol in Dera Ismail Khan, a city in northwestern Pakistan about 180 miles southwest of the capital, Islamabad, local police official Dar Ali Khattak said. Three policemen, three paramilitary police and a passer-by were killed in the explosion on a road in the city's Kotli Imam neighborhood, Khattak said. Four other bystanders - two women and two men - were injured, he said.
About four hours later, a bomb exploded near the scene of the first one, cracking a wall at a nearby government building but injuring no one, another police official, Khuda Dad Mahsud, said.
At about 8 p.m., a third bomb went off outside a police station in the heart of Dera Ismail Khan, damaging its main wall but causing no casualties, Khattak said. No one claimed responsibility for the explosions, but Khattak blamed Islamic militants from a neighboring tribal region.
Dera Ismail Khan is near the South Wazoo Waziristan primitive tribal region where Islamic terrorists militants are correctly believed to be skulking about hiding. The cowardly fighters have been identified blamed for cowardly attacks on security forces.
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The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) on Sunday stated that former prime minister Nawaz Sharif had never met Osama bin Laden. In a press statement, PML-N Secretary General Siddique-ul-Farooq said that the PML-N leader had neither held a meeting with the Al Qaeda chief, nor did they discuss political cooperation.
Reacting to a recent statement by MMA President Qazi Hussain Ahmed, that said that bin Laden wanted Sharif to become prime minister, the PML-N secretary general said that that might be a personal opinion of the Al Qaeda chief. He said that since Sharif never met one of the most-wanted men on earth, there was no question of him asking for his support. He said that Sharif believed in the power of the electorate and would be elected prime minister again.
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That's not what Khalid Khawaja the former official with Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) had to say.
If Hamas representatives come to Brussels to participate in an EU parliamentary gathering at the end of the month they will "not be let into the building," European officials have informed their counterparts in Jerusalem.
The Jerusalem Post reported Friday that one of the five Palestinian Legislative Council members due to attend the EU's Euro-Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly (EMPA) is Mahmoud Ahmad al-Ramahi, a Ramallah anesthesiologist and the PLC's secretary-general who, although not a Hamas member, was No. 8 on the organization's Change and Reform List.
Israeli diplomatic sources said that Israel has not entered into detailed talks with the EU about what would happen if someone on the Hamas-list, but not a Hamas member, showed up for the meeting - a type of dilemma Israel is bound to face with increasing frequency as technocrats without a clear organizational affiliation take lead positions in the Hamas-led PA government.
EU sources told the Post that since Ramahi was on Hamas's list, but not clearly a Hamas-member, they would let him attend the meeting. The EU has not officially articulated its policy on this matter.
EMPA is the "parliamentary dimension" of the Euro- Mediterranean Partnership, also known as the Barcelona Process. Established in 2003, EMPA brings together for discussions 240 parliamentarians, half representing EU member states, and half from the EU's Mediterranean partners (Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey and the Palestinian Authority).
Israeli diplomatic sources said that this body was governed by EU regulations which have Hamas listed as a terrorist organization, and as such would be unable to include Hamas members in its deliberations.
In a related matter, Israel is working through diplomatic channels to get the Council of Europe's Parliamentary Assembly to rescind an invitation to a Hamas member to its next session in Strasbourg, France, next month.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said Israel "strongly regretted" that the Parliamentary Assembly's Middle East subcommittee had extended an invitation to a Hamas member.
"This is a slap in the face to the very principle upon which the Council of Europe is based, namely democracy, human rights and the rule of law," Regev said.
"Europe itself has characterized Hamas as a terrorist organization, and this giving legitimacy to Hamas stands in stark contradiction to the position adopted by the Quartet, of which both Europe and Russia are full members," he said.
The Quartet has set three benchmarks, which Hamas must meet in order to gain international legitimacy: recognizing Israel, renouncing terrorism, and accepting previously signed agreements.
By inviting Hamas members, Regev said, the Council of Europe was "doing nothing positive whatsoever." Rather, he said, this move was "giving legitimacy to an unreformed Hamas and strengthening the current extreme positions of the organization." While EMPA is an EU body, the Council of Europe has no institutional connection to the EU.
#1
why the salt, exactly? J Post is a pretty reliable paper, for the most part - and while its based on anon sources, it doesnt seem that unlikely to me.
ABU DHABI -- The United States is planning a major naval exercise in May to test its response to any Iranian naval blockade of the Straits of Hormuz. Iran has been conducting exercises aimed at blocking Gulf shipping. Officials said the exercise would replicate an Iranian effort to mine the straits and send boats packed with explosives into U.S. warships. "We believe this would be the leading method of an Iranian attack against Western shipping," an official said.
What would we do without experts?
Officials said Iran has been training to quickly block the straits in an effort to torpedo the world oil market. In late 2005, Iran was said to have conducted an air and naval exercise to test plans to halt Gulf shipping.
The U.S. naval exercise, entitled Arabian Gauntlet, has been scheduled for May 2006. Officials said the exercise would be held with Western states and expected to include at least one navy from the Gulf Cooperation Council.
UAE? Oman? Qatar? Bahrain?
The Iranian opposition said Teheran has established an underground emergency command center to direct a naval blockade of the straits. The National Council of Resistance of Iran said the command center has been linked to government ministries and security forces by a series of tunnels. "Iran's leaders are clearly preparing for a confrontation by going underground," Alireza Jafarzadeh, a leading Iranian opposition figure, said.
Officials said the Iranians have drafted plans to send a swarm of fast attack craft to blow up U.S. warships. They said the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps's navy has already conducted such an exercise.
That's not going to go well for them; a small fast attack boat against a DDG that's primed and ready is no contest.
Another Iranian option, officials said, was the use of cruise and ballistic missiles against Arab oil facilities in the region. They said that over the last year, the IRGC has drafted plans to deploy new weapons designed to strike naval and ground targets throughout the Gulf. "When these systems become fully operational, they will significantly enhance Iran's defensive capabilities and ability to deny access to the Persian Gulf through the Strait of Hormuz," Defence Intelligence Agency director Michael Maples told the Senate Armed Services Committee in February.
Until the launch sites are blown up, along with the tech support and the leadership.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/20/2006
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#1
"swarm of fast attack craft" against US warships -we all know how successful that was, from Reagan to Saddam to Somali pirates.
#2
I don't know...the suicide swarm sounds like a pretty good idea to me. How do you destroy a carrier with 100 SM2 missiles to protect it? Fire 101 cruise missiles.
#3
Most likely the swarm of attack craft would be a few suicide boat bombs amidst a whole mess of 'legitimate' trade or fishing craft, all looking about the same. That way even if the attack fails, the attackers win the PR battle because in stopping the attack the US will have killed a lot of 'innocent' people. Heads, I win; tails, you lose, from the anti-American perspective, because they control the public perception.
#5
I suspect their concept is to have built many small concrete caves near the strait, where endless numbers of small rubber craft, each with a bomb, can be launched quickly at once. Three men, one to steer, one to man the bomb, and one to fire an AK wildly at anybody on deck, hoping to supress fires from crewmen on deck.
The concept is to accept 98% losses for 2% hits in massed Kamakazi attacks. They only attack over short distances. Their mission is both to sink or disable any US ship they can, *and*, hopefully to scuttle *any* ship in the Strait.
http://tinyurl.com/pnh2l
Now, looking at the Strait of Hormuz, there are points from land less than 20 miles from the shipping lanes. Rigid rubber boats can on average travel at 30-50 knots, or 35-60 mph.
However, if hostilities haven't yet been declared, there are Iranian waters almost flush with the shipping channels. There is no reason they could not create an effective blockade of the Strait to commercial shipping with just rubber boats. Menacing without attacking.
Few commercial shipping companies, or their underwriters, would risk running such a blockade.
This being said, there are some possibilities here, if you are willing to have terrible losses.
#10
I guess the question is whether Iran's leadership is rational from a strategic perspective. We know they are not from a religious perspective.
Iran can certainly stir things up in Iraq, mess with shipping in the Straits and attack US bases and Arab oil infrastructure so as to harm the world economy. But wouldn't doing so lead to open season on Iran? Even the Euros will be in favor of destroying the mullocracy if they mess up the euro economy, which has less margin to play with than the US?
I ask because I've seen a lot of speculation that they will not wait for us to make the first move.
If they wait to do this stuff in response to a US bombing campaign vs. the nuke sites we may have already hit their naval capabilities and will already be in 'open season' mode with respect to the Mullahs.
#11
P3 orions loaded with mk 20 rockeyes would keep em at bay, this whole fishing boat and dingy attack seems so dumb its remarkable! i think mines are a big danger but even then not that bad. My idea is to simly take over the closest peice of Iranian land to the straights of hormuz, lets see if they can launch sht whilst having a division sized force - or maybe a corps sized force if you could get it onto there. would really throw a spanner in the works for em. So many ways for us to hit them and do them damage yet there power projection capibilities are terribly incabable of striking coalition forces homebases and cities - unless they use terroist methods of course but even then the cumlative affects of an Iranian offensive on coalition home soil would be next to nothing i'd imagine. I can imagine it now - we bomb the fck outa them - destroy there military and goverment and yet asshat media know-nothings will say we lost cos one suicide bomber got through to our homelands. se thats the big problem - even if we thrash the fck outa them the media will spin it all into a quagmire and illegal war bullsht and then we lose.
#12
No, ShepUK, we win. The MSM spin is irrelevant compared to Iranian nukes and/or an Iranian attack on world oil. They cannot have either opportunity.
I forsee additional US ships arriving for the "exercise" in late April and a preemptive attack almost immediately thereafter.
#16
Wasn't there a fear of Iran obtaining nuclear mines on DEBKA awhile back? They could cause some damage, but it would certainly unite the rest of the world against them. The fact that they are suicidal nuts with no regard for others means I hope the EU wakes up to the imminent threat before it's too late.
#17
Other considerations would be the rubber boat floatilla at night, their new model Gulf submarine hoping to stick a torpedo in under the cover of the floatilla, some concealed Silkworms on shore.
"Hot mining", or trying to lay mines during an attack on a fleet already present, or something as cheap as laying cable suspended by floats, hoping to catch an ship unaware and snarl its propellers.
The SOBs might even try to sneak in a few shore batteries, most likely a bunch of SCUDs on expendable launchers, along with a few higher quality missiles--possibly even a nuke.
#18
I'm starting to understand that the *pirate* attack this weekend was s'posed to be a suicide maneuver to probe USN defenses, and that we ought to have drowned the lot of them.
#20
Danielle: I was a big proponent of the idea of their using a nuclear mine. It is vital to their concept of operations to take out or neutralize at least one US carrier fleet. However, the obvious drawback is nuclear retaliation.
So their emphasis would have to be use, but to somehow get enough deniability so that the international community, that is, the other nuclear powers, would intervene and demand that the US not counterattack with nukes.
One technique would be to hijack a commercial cruise ship of a third country, while pretending to be al-Qaeda, and put the bomb on board. Then, while sending all sorts of distress messages, and calling for assistance, take the ship at full speed towards the fleet, with the idea of getting it close enough for the bomb to severely damage or destroy the carrier. Guesstimate within 5 miles for a 15kt bomb.
This would most likely be done in concert to several other activities, such as scuttling a ship in the Suez Canal, to keep out the US Atlantic fleet, and only when the other Pacific fleets were very far away.
They could also coordinate with the Norks to provoke a major naval incident that would attract the US Pacific fleets away from the Arabian Sea.
As far as they are concerned, the best outcome would be a cheap shot like this, that *didn't* result in war, but would deeply injure the US and cause much opposition (led by you know who) to the US being in the Middle East at all.
#21
The MSM spin is irrelevant compared to Iranian nukes and/or an Iranian attack on world oil. They cannot have either opportunity.
This remains the bottom line. It is why I have given my commitment to support or defend any unilateral action taken by Bush with respect to neutralizing Iran.
If it was an airburst like Able (21) KT the target would need to be much closer than 5 miles for serious damage... But a Baker like shot also 21 KT but 90 feet underwater - 5 miles would be about right. Radioactive contamination would be much the worst aspect.
#27
Three men on each craft, sure, but don't forget a couple of cute children in each one, all holding baby rabbits.
And baby deer, with their mothers.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
03/20/2006 13:30
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#28
Possible target areas: The Meditteranean, either near Turkey or Port Said, heavy ship tourism areas (maybe with Israel in the downwind hazard area); the Red Sea, anywhere from the Suez South, between Egypt and Saudi, or Eritrea and Saudi, with less traffic; the Gulf of Aden, near Somalia in an area known for piracy, this would be more a cargo ship rather than a cruise ship or ferry.
Their target ship they would want to be as new and fast as possible, European registry would be a big plus, as they figure Americans would be less likely to fire on Europeans. It would have to be commandeered quickly, with all crew and passengers killed before it could give a radio distress. That would require insiders in the crew.
It would have to be on a long voyage that would take it near the fleet in the first place, in restrictive waters to allow it in close even before the deception began.
As much as it sounds like a 'B' movie, the act is solely to close the distance with the carrier. For this they may claim hostages have been taken, and ask for hostage rescue--anything delay and to get closer.
Finally, when the jig is up, they figure the ship can be severely damaged and still close the gap, so they will take a lot of fires before they are disabled, fighting for the last few meters of distance.
#29
'Moose, I like your train of thought and am glad that you are on our side. Rubber boats will have less RCS that a metallic one so a night time approach or other mischief making would likely go un detected. I think that the easiest way to shut down the Straits is to hijack and then scuttle a tanker. Not a lot of crew to defend it and by the time help arrived, it is quite likely that it would have arrived at a suitable choke point. Or even an Iranian-flagged merchantman would restrict the waterways. I don't think we have a lot of time left to dither and play 'what-if' games, because the MMs are gonna do something stupid.
#31
wow yeah one of those suckers really would boom i bet, interesting side point on tankers, not sure which issue but an old air forces monthly i have lying around somewhere i need to find has a piece about attacks on tankers during the Iran Iraq war, apparently tankers can take amazing amounts of damage as the oil would simply soak up the impact from exocets that were used (by raqi's i think) . A very very tough job indeed to sink a very large tanker or super tanker.Perhaps of no relevence to this but there you go lol. I'm thinking the best way to stop thier navy is to smash to bits all of thier ports and navy stuff, after a couple of days thier navy will be inoperable.
#34
. . . apparently tankers can take amazing amounts of damage . . .
True in WWII as well, so long as they're not carrying something volatile like refined gasoline. Tankers are subdivided into bunches and bunches of water-tight (oil-tight) compartments, and have the pumps to do counterflooding.
Posted by: Mike ||
03/20/2006 15:15
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#35
Actually the best defense against small boats would be A-10s and Apache helicopters, with F/A-18 top cover. The A-10 is more than fast enough to catch anything missed in the first pass. Hellfire and 25MM cannon fire will sink anything short of a frigate. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that we stationed a few dozen of each in Oman. We've had basing privileges there for a couple of decades at a military airfield just south of the capital.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
03/20/2006 15:40
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#36
USN, ret.: A short time ago, a very old USN, ret. had a lovely suggestion to me as to how to deal with a flotilla attack of that sort:
5" guns firing WP with proximity fuses.
Some people have no sense of humor about these things. I still feel a tad queasy just thinking about it.
Wasn't he a destroyer captain in WW2 whose ship fought off a bunch of kamikaze attacks?
Posted by: Phil ||
03/20/2006 16:02
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#38
One technique would be to hijack a commercial cruise ship of a third country, while pretending to be al-Qaeda, and put the bomb on board. Then, while sending all sorts of distress messages, and calling for assistance, take the ship at full speed towards the fleet, with the idea of getting it close enough for the bomb to severely damage or destroy the carrier. Guesstimate within 5 miles for a 15kt bomb.
Remember that the USN conducted tests right after WW2 with warships at anchor and within the blast zone.
See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Crossroads
The danger of an underwater nuclear detonation is real, but it has to be essentially right underneath the target fleet. I'm not at all convinced that the Iranians have the sophistication to build a 20-kt+ device, deploy it to a specific point to catch a USNfleet, and then detonate it right underneath the fleet as it passes by.
The USN isn't stupid about this sort of thing you know.
As to hijacking a cruise ship and then sailing it into a USN fleet concentration only the dumbest admiral on the planet would fall for something like that and USN admirals didn;t get to be admirals by being stupid or allowing the fleets under their command to be mousetrapped like this.
#39
you know everyone this is a most interesting subject, everyone has there own ideas and ideal ways of dealing with em - im begining to lean tward not even letting them get close in the first place by having smaller boats - i dunno what class but similer size but like a big coastgaurd sized ship is - what about 1000 tones or whatever? anyway have them as pickets out on the flanks and use them essentially as sea borne forward air controlers to call in air power. another thought - back in nam didnt gunships have them sensors that detect engines on them, engines from ground vehicles that was then but could that be adapted for seaborne use? got a funny feeling it was called black crow but do not take that as a sure thing.what about a big fck off net towed by a C5 or 747 and just scoop em all up and go home with the haul. Pirate fishing.
#40
ShepUK, you may be thinking of the "Black Crows." It is an organization of America's original stealth pioneers. They were the ones who would toss out sackfulls of aluminum foil confetti to jam enemy radar.
How interesting! While searching on this topic, I think I hit what you're referring to:
Black Crow [USA]: This equipment detects the ignition systems of piston engines.
Fitted to AC-130 gunships.
http://www.hazegray.org/faq/acr1.htm
The cyclical nature and spark gap output of a common internal combustion engine should stick out like a sore thumb in the RF spectrum.
Rear Admiral Gordon Pai'ea Chung-Hoon was born on July 25, 1910, in Honolulu, Hawaii. The second youngest of five Chung-Hoon children, he attended the U.S. Naval Academy and graduated in May 1934. While at the Naval Academy, he was a valued member of the Navy Football team.
Rear Admiral Chung-Hoon is a recipient of the Navy Cross and Silver Star for conspicuous gallantry and extraordinary heroism as commanding officer of USS Sigsbee (DD 502) from May 1944 to October 1945. In the spring of 1945, Sigsbee assisted in the destruction of 20 enemy planes while screening a carrier strike force off the Japanese island of Kyushu. On April 14, 1945, while on radar picket station off Okinawa, a kamikaze crashed into Sigsbee, reducing her starboard engine to five knots and knocking out the ship's port engine and steering control. Despite the damage, Admiral Chung-Hoon, then a Commander, valiantly kept his anti-aircraft batteries delivering "prolonged and effective fire" against the continuing enemy air attack while simultaneously directing the damage control efforts that allowed Sigsbee to make port under her own power.
Posted by: Mike ||
03/20/2006 17:54
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#44
He sounds like a real american hero, Mike. Thanks!
#45
Oh, for a minute there I thought we were posting about "U.S. In Exercise Battle with Iran for Control of Persian Gulf". Foolish me.
Mike -- thanks for sharing this feat of valor and bravery. A true hero.
Posted by: Captain America ||
03/20/2006 19:07
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#46
FOTSGreg: ordinarily yes, however the eastern Med is crawling with passenger shipping, and in certain areas, such as the ports of southern Turkey and the northern mouth of the Suez canal at Port Said, there's bound to be unavoidable concentrations of US Naval, commercial and passenger shipping.
Likewise, the Bab el Mandeb waterway, which connects the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden is a potential trouble spot. With possible hostile support from bad guyz in Yemen or Somalia.
A low-tech way to get a nuke detonation "directly below" a fleet would be to have the nuke connected by a cable to a ship many miles away that would trigger detonation. The ship could drop the nuke, then reel out the cable to far outside the fleet's alert zone, then drop anchor and wait.
I suppose you might go so far as to encase the nuke in concrete to shield it from magnetometers and radiacmeters, but that's a technical point.
However, unlike the cruise ship, this does not give even the slightest plausible deniability to the Iranians, so while it might be more effective tactically, strategically they would prefer to blame it on al-Qaeda, and get away scott free.
A missile was fired into a Shia holy city Sunday as hundreds of thousands gathered for a major religious holiday, raising fears of civil war on the third anniversary of America's war on Iraq. The 122 millimetre Grad missile, one of three fired at the southern shrine city of Karbala, caused no casualties but came as a sea of Shia pilgrims gathered to commemorate the death of Imam Hussein (RA), Prophet Mohammed's (may his drip clear up peace be upon him) grandson, Governor Aqil Khazali told a news conference.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2006
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#1
Ugh, Grads are heavy ordinance. That could have done a hell of a lot of damage if it hit a pilgrim-crowded square. Lucky for us it's Russian manufacture & thus about as accurate as "celebratory gunfire".
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
03/20/2006 16:42
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Vice President Dick Cheney said Sunday that Iraq is not in the midst of a civil war, but instead described the violence as a desperate tactic by terrorists in the country to stop the move to democracy. "What we've seen is a serious effort by them to foment a civil war," Cheney said in an interview on "Face the Nation" on CBS on the third anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. "But I don't think they've been successful."
Cheney said he disagrees with Iraq's former interim prime minister, Ayad Allawi, who said in an interview Sunday that the increasing attacks across his country can only be described as a civil war. Cheney said he did not think optimistic statements that he has made about the war have contributed to Americans' skepticism about the war. For instance, the vice president predicted that invading U.S. troops would be greeted as liberators and then said 10 months ago that the insurgency is in its last throes, even though violence still rages. Cheney said the optimistic statements "were basically accurate, reflect reality."
He said most Americans have a negative perception of Iraq because they keep seeing daily violence in the news instead of the progress being made toward democracy. "There is a constant sort of perception, if you will, that's created because what's newsworthy in the car bomb in Baghdad," he said. "It's not all the work that went on that day in 15 other provinces."
If it bleeds, it leads.
Posted by: Steve White ||
03/20/2006
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#1
Iraq is NOT in Civil War - however, I personally believe both Iraqi Sunnis and neutralist Shias know Iran's Mullahs want Empire, not just nukes, and that Radical-controlled Iran is fanatical enough to induce a US-West vs. Russia-China confrontation iff the Mullahs don't get their way. Iran having nukes and "major/super-power" status will undoubtedly invite the democratic Muslim nations to have arsenals of their own, initially at least to counter Iran. The dominoes fall from there. Let us also remember the Israelis have said they will unilater stop Iran iff the rest of the world won't. FOR AMERICA, IT MEANS THAT EITHER IRAN BE APPEASED, OR AMERICA RISK PC NEW 9-11's/ NUKE HIROSHIMAS, INCLUD ANY WMD USE TO TAKE OUT DUBYA AND WASHINGTON, IN PC MSM-VERIFIED RETALIATION OR "REACTION" FOR ANY US-LED ACTION(S)TO STOP IRAN. Right up the Clinton and anti-US Dems notebook - the Dems will either save the world from MSM-verified US-induced/caused Nuclear "BRINKMANSHIP", andor POTUS Hillary-Gore-Kerry-Dean will lead becuz they weirdly and mysteriously survived the new GOP-caused pre-Holocaust limited national holocaust known as Amer Hiroshima(s). America "volunteers" = "forced" to give up its sovereignty, government and endowments to OWG and anti-American American Socialism [theme from DRAGNET follows]!?
#6
'There is a constant sort of perception, if you will, that's created because what's newsworthy in the car bomb in Baghdad," he said. "It's not all the work that went on that day in 15 other provinces."'
Baghdad prov has close to 20% of the population of Iraq, IIRC. It has a large proportion of the economy, and is the seat of govt. And yes, its were the worlds press looks at Iraq. I mean cmon, we've been there three years. It should be clear by now that if we dont secure Baghdad, we aint won this thing, with all due respect to the good work the USMC has done in Anbar.
Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah claimed here on Sunday that Osama Bin Laden, Ayman Zawahiri and Mulla Omar are all together and in Pakistan, where other Al Qaeda figures have been found and apprehended. Asked by CNN where Osama Bin Laden is, Abdullah replied that according to his country's intelligence, the Al Qaeda leader is "outside Afghanistan and he might be in the same place where other members of Al Qaeda have been arrested." He added that Ayman Zawahiri was also in the same place where Bin Laden was. Asked pointblank if he was in Pakistan, the foreign minister replied that it was "more likely." To the question where Mulla Omar was, he replied that all these "friends" should be found together.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/20/2006
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yup, about 20 klicks northwest of Quetta. Third madrassa on the right after the gas station. The one with the six-foot thick concrete enclosure.
RASHIDIYEH - Fatahs chief in Lebanon said on Sunday his Palestinian faction would round up weapons from refugee camps amid growing calls for militias in the country to be disbanded. We have decided to collect all the weapons we possess, including individual arms, and put them in secure places (inside the camps), in accordance with the wishes of the inter-Lebanese dialogue conference, said Sultan Abul Aynain.
I like this; makes the job of an American or Israeli F-16 much easier.
There are believed to be 380,000 Palestinians living in Lebanon, many of them in dire conditions in 12 refugee camps.
Kept that way by the UNRWA and their fellow Arabs.
Parliamentary speaker Nabih Berri said on Tuesday that participants in the inter-Lebanese talks supported disarming Palestinians outside the camps in six months and the state re-establishing its authority on all Lebanese territory.
Which would be a first, and wouldn't have happened without George, Condi and Jaques.
A September 2004 UN Security Council Resolution calls on Lebanon to assert sovereignty on all its territory and disarm all militias, including armed Palestinian factions and the armed wing of Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah.
Aynain also reasserted the authority of the Palestine Liberation Organisation -- of which Fatah is the largest faction -- as the only legitimate representative of Palestinians in Lebanon. The PLO does not include Palestinian Islamist groups such as Hamas, which trounced Fatah in Januarys elections, or pro-Syrian groups such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command, which has been involved in a number of shooting incidents outside Palestinian camps.
They'll try to hold their weapons out, likely in the Bekaa, or held in trust by their Syrian overlords.
Posted by: Steve White ||
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#1
Why do I forsee large "disturbances" in the camp's future?
#3
I was under the impression that the various factions are about equal in terms of weaponry and numbers of cousins to call on. The collection process should prove even more interesting than everyday life in the camps.
Via Bros. Judd and Mary Landrieu: The Republican-led push to open part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling is back on Congress table, after the Senate included that provision in its $2.8 trillion budget bill.
Democrats were unable to block the provision after one of their own, Sen. Mary Landrieu, supported the budget bill, which passed 51-49 on Thursday. The Louisiana Democrat sided with Republicans after winning concessions to help her hurricane-damaged state of Louisiana and rest of the Gulf Coast.... --SNIP--
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.
In the period before the Iraq war, Saddam Hussein's foreign minister 
Police and intelligence officers are poring over documents seized in a fresh round of counter-terrorism raids in New South Wales. The action is part of the ongoing Operation Pendennis, which has resulted in multiple terrorism-related arrests and charges in Sydney and Melbourne since November last year.
Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi said Saddam Hussein should still be considered Iraq's legal president and the current government illegitimate as it was elected under an occupation regime. 
The 2006 hurricane season will be more active than normal and could bring a devastating storm to the U.S. Northeast, private forecaster AccuWeather said on Monday. The outlook comes after the most costly hurricane season on record in 2005, with storms crippling New Orleans and other parts of the U.S. Gulf Coast and briefly knocking out a quarter of domestic fuel production.
BAGHDAD - Every day, more violence. And more uncertainty for Iraqis than they have ever known, as they mark three years since American troops invaded. The wave of optimism that once buoyed Iraqis after the fall of Saddam Hussein is now being marked as yet another casualty of the bombs and murders that are part of daily life here. But even as Iraq slides toward full-scale civil war, Iraqi analysts are trying to envision a way out of a vicious insurgency, political deadlock, and sectarian bloodshed.
Criminal killed in 'shootout'
The banned Islamic outfit Jamaatul Mujahidden chief Shaikh Abdur Rahman, during his second-term interrogation, on Sunday said they had hired some local goons to carry out the August 17 blasts to hide the identities of their operatives from lawmen.(The New Age BD) He was arrested from a house in Sylhet in the morning on March 2. He has been giving important information on the countrywide series of blasts on August 17, 2005, said sources in the task force, a combine of intelligence agencies and the Rapid Action Battalion.
A judge ousted a key Syrian al-Qaida suspect from his courtroom Monday for contempt of court after he refused to stand up on the opening day of his trial for allegedly masterminding deadly bombings in Turkey. 
A man is being held by German police after walking into a petrol station with his wife's severed head in a bag. 
In a move that shouldn't be a shock to anyone, 
The Bamiyan Buddhas in Afghanistan were destroyed by the Taliban with the help of Pakistani and Saudi engineers. According to an account published here on Saturday, a local Afghan told the makers of a Swiss documentary on the giant statues which had stood there, carved in the side of a mountain for hundreds of years, had been destroyed by engineers from Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. The dynamiting of the statues took place in March 2001. Swiss documentary filmmaker Christian Frei, who has made several documentaries that have won praise at various international film festivals, shot The Giant Buddhas in Afghanistan. The film is due to be shown at the National Gallery of Art in Washington on 26 March.
The bloodiest of the five confrontations Monday took place at Gaza's government compound. Three dozen 
The U.S. intelligence community has quietly concluded that 
THE Vatican has begun moves to rehabilitate the Crusaders by sponsoring a conference at the weekend that portrays the Crusades as wars fought with the noble aim of regaining the Holy Land for Christianity. The Crusades are seen by many Muslims as acts of violence that have underpinned Western aggression towards the Arab world ever since. Followers of Osama bin Laden claim to be taking part in a latter-day jihad against the Jews and Crusaders.
Fewer than 100 Islamist rebels have surrendered under an Algerian amnesty and at least 700 remain at large fighting for a purist Islamic state, the interior minister said on Saturday.
From being the most odious Chechen field commander and principal enemy of Russia, Shamil Basayev is increasingly turning into a figure who is somehow unreal. It is now several years since the Russian special services began their hunt for him.
COVENTRY-BORN 
Suspected militants have blown up the transmission tower of 
Pakistani security agencies have arrested a key al-Qaeda member during a raid in its southern city of Quetta. An intelligence source on condition of anonymity told Pajhwok Afghan News the detained 
Baghdad: A Sunni extremist leader captured south of Baghdad confessed to killing hundreds of Shiite Muslims in recent months, police said. 
Days after introduction of a bill in American Congress seeking its approval for implementation of the Indo-US nuclear deal, Pakistan has said there should be a package for both neighbours and not country-specific pacts on a subject as critical as nuclear technology, in the interest of balance of power in South Asia. 
Unidentified men on Sunday fired upon three men picnicking in Balochistan's Pir Ghaib area. Two men were killed and one has been critically injured. Government spokesman Raziq Bugti said that the assailants had interrogated the men before shooting them. The militants ascertained whether they were Punjabis and then shot them, he said. "Innocent people should not be targeted by anyone having a grudge against the government," he added. "All circles should condemn the attack." 
There are over 6,000 women and juvenile girls in various jails throughout the country, 4,621 of whom are the victims of discriminatory laws including the Hudood Ordinance, said a Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) report on the state of women. The HRCP said that there had been no decrease in honour killings despite the anti-honour killing law passed in 2004. Instead, the number of women murdered had increased in the year 2005 as compared to the previous year, it added.
DOHA - Qatar is to try to reverse the Arab brain drain that has seen thousands of experts leave the region by bringing together expatriate Arab scientists at annual forums starting in April. The meetings will be held at Education City, an academic complex on the edge of Doha, which hosts branches of prestigious US colleges and has the objective of promoting scientific and technological research.
At least two policemen were killed and four others are missing after an hour-long clash with dozens of suspected Taliban fighters in southern Afghanistan, officials said on Sunday. Two suspected Taliban fighters were also killed in the fighting in the Maiwand district of Kandahar province late Saturday, said Yousuf Stanezai, the interior ministry spokesman. "Four policemen are missing. We've no news on their fate," he said.
President Alexander Lukashenko on Sunday called US President George W. Bush "the premier terrorist on our planet". Lukashenko made the comment after casting his ballot in the presidential election in which he is seeking to extend his 12-year tenure and which the United States has repeatedly criticised as being conducted under repressive conditions. Bush has referred to Belarus as Europe's last dictatorship, while Lukashenko claims the West and the United States in particular aims to unseat him.
A Turkish lobbying group said it has filed a criminal complaint against a German newspaper for printing a series of Danish cartoons lampooning the Prophet Mohammed last month. 
Ganomukti and Jatiya Sampad Rakkha Sammilito Andolon (GJSRSA) Saturday demanded immediate end to all intelligence activities of FBI in the country, reports UNB. GJSRSA's demand came from a meeting held at the office of Sramajibi Mukti Andolon.
BEIJING - A 30-member North Korean delegation, led by a brother-in-law of leader Kim Jong-il, has arrived in China to tour economic facilities, diplomatic sources said yesterday. The chief of the delegation, 
Jamat-ul-Dawa's leader 
A moderate earthquake measuring 5 on the Richter scale jolted Islamabad and parts of NWFP on Sunday but there were no immediate reports of damage, officials said. "It was a moderate intensity earthquake," said the chief of the Seismological Department Chaudhry Qamaruz Zaman. He said it was an aftershock of the massive October 8 quake that killed more than 73,000 people in the country. The shocks were felt at 7:49am in Islamabad and in Balakot and also in Mansehra and Swat districts, the officials said. The epicentre was 200 kilometres northeast of Peshawar. Two low intensity aftershocks, measuring 4.0 and 4.1, were felt later at 8:18am and 8:21am respectively, officials said.
Afghan police have seized 200 kilograms (440 pounds) of heroin from a truck in the southern province of Zabul and detained its driver and helper, a senior police officer said Sunday. The heroin was concealed in a truck loaded with salt and heading to the nearby city of Kandahar on Saturday, said provincial police chief Mohammad Nabi Mullahkhil. The truck driver and his assistant were detained and nearly 200 kilograms of heroin seized, he said. Kandahar lies on a transit route for Afghan drugs being shipped to neighboring Pakistan. Afghanistan provides more than 90 percent of the heroin consumed in Europe. The US-backed government of Afghan president Hamid Karzai has called for a "jihad" or holy war against narcotics.
Greek Cyprus' Justice Ministry said it would refuse to cooperate with future U.S. human rights reports, saying a State Department assessment issued this month smacked of bias. The boycott would only concern questionnaires from the United States related to the compilation of reports, but it demonstrated the depth of feeling in Greek Cyprus towards the United States. 
Minsk - Thousands of protesters thronged the main square of the Belarusian capital on Sunday in defiance of a government ban, refusing to recognize a presidential vote that appeared all but certain to give the iron-fisted incumbent a third term. The protesters chanted "Long Live Belarus!" and the name of the main opposition candidate, 
SEOUL, March 18 -- Hundreds of elderly South Korean farmers are facing forcible eviction from their land to allow the expansion of a U.S. military base near Seoul, according to the human rights group Amnesty International.
Tehran, Iran, Mar. 19 Eight 
Five North Koreans have defected to South Korea by boat, crossing the tense sea border off the peninsula's east coast, military officials said yesterday. The group, a couple in their 30s and their two children, aged 2 and 8, and a 26-year-old man whom investigators identified as a friend of the family, crossed the border late Saturday in a small wooden barge, which was intercepted by the South Korean Coast Guard.
A top commander of U.S. forces expressed doubt Sunday that negotiations between the United States and Iran over Iraq would help bring peace and stability in the Middle East. "I don't have a lot of confidence that these will turn out to be productive, but I could be wrong," said Gen. 
DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan (AP) - Suspected Islamic militants set off three bombs Sunday, one of which exploded near a police van and killed seven people in northwestern Pakistan, officials said. The two other bombs damaged walls of a police station and a government building.
The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) on Sunday stated that former prime minister Nawaz Sharif had never met Osama bin Laden. In a press statement, PML-N Secretary General Siddique-ul-Farooq said that the PML-N leader had neither held a meeting with the Al Qaeda chief, nor did they discuss political cooperation.
If Hamas representatives come to Brussels to participate in an EU parliamentary gathering at the end of the month they will "not be let into the building," European officials have informed their counterparts in Jerusalem. 
A missile was fired into a Shia holy city Sunday as hundreds of thousands gathered for a major religious holiday, raising fears of civil war on the third anniversary of America's war on Iraq. The 122 millimetre Grad missile, one of three fired at the southern shrine city of Karbala, caused no casualties but came as a sea of Shia pilgrims gathered to commemorate the death of Imam Hussein (RA), Prophet Mohammed's (
Vice President Dick Cheney said Sunday that Iraq is not in the midst of a civil war, but instead described the violence as a desperate tactic by terrorists in the country to stop the move to democracy. "What we've seen is a serious effort by them to foment a civil war," Cheney said in an interview on "Face the Nation" on CBS on the third anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. "But I don't think they've been successful."
Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah claimed here on Sunday that Osama Bin Laden, Ayman Zawahiri and Mulla Omar are all together and in Pakistan, where other Al Qaeda figures have been found and apprehended. Asked by CNN where Osama Bin Laden is, Abdullah replied that according to his country's intelligence, the Al Qaeda leader is "outside Afghanistan and he might be in the same place where other members of Al Qaeda have been arrested." He added that Ayman Zawahiri was also in the same place where Bin Laden was. Asked pointblank if he was in Pakistan, the foreign minister replied that it was "more likely." To the question where Mulla Omar was, he replied that all these "friends" should be found together.
RASHIDIYEH - Fatahs chief in Lebanon said on Sunday his Palestinian faction would round up weapons from refugee camps amid growing calls for militias in the country to be disbanded. We have decided to collect all the weapons we possess, including individual arms, and put them in secure places (inside the camps), in accordance with the wishes of the inter-Lebanese dialogue conference, said Sultan Abul Aynain.
The Republican-led push to open part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling is back on Congress table, after the Senate included that provision in its $2.8 trillion budget bill.
