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Pakistan admits 'helping' Kashmir militancy
Today's Headlines
Headline Comments [Views]
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Africa Horn
Sudan warns against supplying troops for Darfur
SUDAN stepped up opposition to a United Nations peacekeeping mission for Darfur, warning that it would consider any country's pledge to supply police or troops to a UN force "a hostile act" and a "prelude to an invasion".

...warning that it would consider any country's pledge to supply police or troops to a UN force "a hostile act" and a "prelude to an invasion".
The Sudanese statement follows a letter from the UN urging scores of governments to commit troops to a Darfur mission. Khartoum reiterated its "total rejection" of an August 31 Security Council resolution which approved a UN force of about 20,000 with the authority to use "all necessary means" to help restore calm in Darfur .

“'They are trying to intimidate troop-contributing countries,' the US ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, said.”
In response to the Sudanese statement, the US convened an emergency session of the Security Council on Thursday, accusing Sudan of defying the will of the 15-nation body. "They are trying to intimidate troop-contributing countries," the US ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, said. "Obviously, if no one volunteers to contribute forces to the Darfur mission [there won't be one], regardless of what Security Council does."

Mr Bolton tried to rally council support for a statement deploring Sudan's attempt at intimidation as the Bush Administration moved to increase international pressure on Sudan to allow UN peacekeepers into Darfur. The US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, on a tour of the Middle East, also urged Arab leaders to persuade Khartoum to let the UN intervene in the violence in Darfur. President George Bush's special envoy for Sudan, Andrew Natsios, met the UN Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, on Thursday.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I recommend that we send some troops because contibuting manpower to a UN Peacekeeping Force will fulfill my deep desire to invade a country of starving people that hate each other.
Posted by: Super Hose || 10/07/2006 1:23 Comments || Top||

#2  Lol, SH.

There's a commercial running on local TV which says that only a "strong UN force" can stop the slaughter in Darfur. Then, in a masterful example of total cognitive dissonance, it demands President Bush act immediately. Since I'm an RBer, it gives me major whiplash, but I doubt that Joe Avg even notices. OWG.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 2:45 Comments || Top||

#3  Khartoum needs a JDAM wakeup just for being belligerent 3rd world Arab tin-pot dictators. Call it delayed reaction for hosting Bin Laden in the 90's or the Darfur genocide pre-war bombing, whatever. I just get tired of loudmouths who can't back it up.
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 9:09 Comments || Top||

#4  Let's not send troops, let's send aid! Air-deliver several thousand bags of wet cement over Khartoum, especially the government sector. Drop another $80,000 in aid money (all pennies) over the same city from a B-52 at 45,000 feet. After all, we really do need to help these unfortunate people out of their misery, don't we?
Posted by: Old Patriot || 10/07/2006 14:40 Comments || Top||

#5  Mr .com if you're going to watch TeeVee news and Read Rantburg you gotta have a Haghn Device, this slows the brain velocity towards the bony parts of em hed skull. Recommended. Also impressers the wymn when you dons your safety measure.
Posted by: Shipman || 10/07/2006 17:25 Comments || Top||

#6  Bony parts - that would be the majority, some would say... Available on eBay, I presume, Mr Ship?
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 21:10 Comments || Top||

#7  Another "Iran" case where blowing away all of the various forms of competing leadership cannot have any possible downside.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 23:48 Comments || Top||


US gives Kenya six boats to fight terrorism
MOMBASA, Kenya - The United States government on Friday gave the Kenyan Navy six boats to patrol its coastline and help combat “insecurity and terrorism”.

“This is timely in view of the heightened concerns by Kenya about the potential exploitation of the Kenyan coast by criminal groups and terrorists,” US Ambassador Michael Rennenberger said in the Kenyan port city of Mombasa. “The project valued at $3 million is a major initiative to help the government of Kenya combat insecurity and terrorism.”
And I'm guessing that we're including training and some advisors.
Security experts say Kenya’s porous borders and coastline could be exploited by militants posing a threat to US interests and looking for a gateway into the continent through Kenya. Kenya has already witnessed a number of attacks -- the 1998 Al Qaeda bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania and an attack at a coastal resort four years later.

Kenya’s Defense Minister Njenga Karume said the east African government was worried about instability in Somalia. “These are worrying trends that may greatly affect trade and even damage Kenya’s tourism and shipping industries,” he said. “We are thankful to the US government for carrying out ... and further offering maritime training courses which go into promoting skills in counter-terrorism activities.”

The United States and Kenya have a common security interest in Somalia, where Islamist forces have been battling a transitional government.
Posted by: Steve White || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Give them John F'n Kerry to command those swift boats
Posted by: Captain America || 10/07/2006 13:29 Comments || Top||


Islamic Courts form islamic administration in Kismayo
(SomaliNet) The council of Islamic Courts (CIC) in Kismayo port city, southern Somalia has set up on Friday an Islamic administration for Lower Juba region after days of meetings with local clan elders – the authority is coming under control of Islamic Courts.

The new administration consist of chairman, deputy chairman and army commander with seaport and airport managers. These people were selected from inhabitants, Islamist official said. Ahmed Sheik Mohamed known as (Ahmed Madobe) was nominated for the ruler of Lower Juba region of Islamic Courts, while his deputy was picked up for Abdi Fitah Moalim Ali. The new Islamic authority has also up to seven departments including education and health.
Posted by: Steve White || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Britain
Welcome to Londonistan
Melanie Phillips reviews recent stories about the government, British jihadis and the rest of the citizenry. Some nuggets:
I must be dreaming. Jack Straw of all people has broken the great taboo by daring to challenge the wearing of the Islamic full-face veil in Britain and ignited a hitherto suppressed public debate? Overnight, the man has become a national and international hero. Radio and TV stations report that messages of passionate support have been pouring in from all over the world – with a significant number coming from British Muslims.

Others, however, responded in the predictable way, sometimes without realising the hole they were digging for themselves. Sheik Ibrahim Nogra of the Muslim Council of Britain, for example, said:

{"} Does Mr Straw mean that people should give up certain cultural and religious customs and practices simply because a vast majority of the country do not share them? That is calling for assimilation. That is saying that one culture or one way of life is superior to another.{"}

Well, actually the point about being British is that, if your minority values conflict with those of the majority, the latter do take precedence. That’s what citizenship is all about. So in his outrage, Mr Nogra gives the game away.


About the British Muslim policeman who refused to be assigned to guard an Israeli diplomatic facility, and the resulting uproar over official mismanagement:
it appears that the Met {=the London Police Department} has an established policy of excusing an officer from service on ‘moral grounds’ — which in itself is extraordinary — because, as the Guardian reported, in the wake of the Sun story a panic-stricken Met Commissioner ordered a ‘rethink’ of that very policy...the police are in serious difficulty over the whole issue of how to deal with Islamic extremism, towards which they have adopted a policy of strategic appeasement.
Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 || 10/07/2006 18:18 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Islam has thrown a wrench in our sockets ..being both a religion and a politcal movement. I have heard the religious debate... ad nauseum. The politcal debate not so much. It is essentially a theocratic movement
This type of threat has happened before , correct?

Not a loaded question. But weren't the "thinkers of the time " say 1700's aware of this?

It seems to me not much is made (which should be made) of politcial Islam? And I can't beleive there wasn't a soultion to that type of politics in the past?

Seems to me, Islam should be argued on the terms of it's poltical outcome and it's not. It's argued on who will be most upset

Dunno

Posted by: Dunno || 10/07/2006 20:31 Comments || Top||

#2  British Muslim policeman who refused to be assigned to guard an Israeli diplomatic facility
this is more than outrageous. This makes me assume then that this same officer of the law wouldn't protect an Israeli person in any situation. This so called police officer needs to be kicked out.
How dare he be excused, how dare he be able to choose instead of protecting everyone. Who's paying his salary. Fuckwits.
Posted by: Jan || 10/07/2006 23:28 Comments || Top||

#3  It seems to me not much is made (which should be made) of politcial Islam?

Wittingly or not, Dunno, you have made the pivotal point.

Islam is a political ideology masquerading as a religious faith. Few, if any, of our politicians have been willing to confront Muslims on how they march under false colors. Islam wants the entire world to be subjugated under sharia law. That is not a church, it is a government. This theocratic idology needs to be treated like any other subversive doctrine and its adherents must be faced with internment, deportation, expulsion or arrest.

Whatever benefit of the doubt, sympathy or understanding Muslims once may have deserved has evaporated over five long years of heated anti-Western rhetoric and endless atrocities. They must be returned to their Islamic utopias so that all of them can enjoy the bliss that is hand-cutting and head-chopping sharia law.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 23:44 Comments || Top||


China-Japan-Koreas
World races to defuse North Korean nuclear crisis
A NORTH Korean nuclear test, perhaps as early as today or tomorrow, has electrified the United States and other regional powers as they scramble for a way to deal with the danger.
“We discussed the possibility that the test would occur this weekend," said Japan's Vice-Foreign-Minister, Shotaro Yachi...
"We discussed the possibility that the test would occur this weekend," said Japan's Vice-Foreign-Minister, Shotaro Yachi, after meeting the US deputy national security adviser, Jack Crouch, in Washington.

UN Security Council nations were expected to adopt a joint statement late yesterday urging North Korea to abandon plan to test a nuclear bomb as the next UN chief, South Korea's Foreign Minister, Ban Ki-moon, said he was ready for a diplomatic mission to Pyongyang.
“But the expected UN Security Council text, which does not explicitly threaten sanctions, is likely to be weaker than the US and Japan had requested...”
But the expected UN Security Council text, which does not explicitly threaten sanctions, is likely to be weaker than the US and Japan had requested, amid disagreement over how to rein in the communist state.

And Australia's stand on North Korea has been criticised as "very sad, even pathetic" by Professor Peter Hayes, the Australian-based director of the Nautilus Institute for Security and Sustainability, a foreign policy think tank. Canberra had become too extreme and too beholden to the US, and it could have disastrous consequences if North Korea decided to bomb "soft targets who are allies", Professor Hayes said. "We have a big coastline and we can't monitor all approaches to Australia; and if the North Koreans are at war with the United States, who will they threaten with their weapons?"

The Prime Minister, John Howard, explained Australia's position on radio in Perth yesterday: "We are strongly opposed to North Korea developing a nuclear capacity, we favour resolving these issues through the six-party talks. We've joined everybody else in condemning the recent statement by North Korea."
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [5 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "...Canberra had become too extreme and too beholden to the US, and it could have disastrous consequences if North Korea decided to bomb "soft targets who are allies",

I think the good doctors has been taste-tesing the specimen trays. There are six players at the card table. Kim ain't going to shoot a spectator even if Australia is our buddy.

As for the "Race" to defuse the NK Nuclear Crisis, I don't see much racing. Then again maybe we are watching the Special Olympics.

As far as I'm concerned, Id on't know why we should sweat whether Kim blows up a tunnel or not.
Posted by: Super Hose || 10/07/2006 1:38 Comments || Top||

#2  As far as I'm concerned, Id on't know why we should sweat whether Kim blows up a tunnel or not.

Any successful test will give Kim much needed credibility in proliferating even more of the nuclear hardware that he markets. We must not allow this to happen. Rogue regimes will flock to his doorstep if he has proven nuclear technology.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 3:35 Comments || Top||

#3  We should abstain on any UNSC resolution now. It will be ineffective and should not have the imprimature of our support.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 10/07/2006 6:29 Comments || Top||

#4  ...Fox Online is reporting that shots have been fired on the DMZ. Here we go...

Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski || 10/07/2006 8:28 Comments || Top||

#5  why?
Posted by: anon || 10/07/2006 10:12 Comments || Top||

#6  Let me guess. Annan is going to use express mail to send his sternly worded letter right?

Special Olympics is right.
Posted by: CrazyFool || 10/07/2006 11:20 Comments || Top||

#7  anon - From this story, 5 NorKies crossed the border and the Skors fired warning shots to runn 'em back across... I think it's sort of the Korean equivalent of counting coup.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 12:06 Comments || Top||

#8  I'm sure that all the world's skumbag regimes already have blank purchace orders with Kim. A successful test will force will send dimplomats scurrying and will have no positive effect for NK. After the test we will have a perfect excuse to blockade his weapons and drug exports shutting down his reamining flow of currency. Bring it on.
Posted by: Super Hose || 10/07/2006 12:29 Comments || Top||

#9  counting coup. Had to look that one up.

Counting coup was a battle practice of Native Americans of the Great Plains. A nonviolent demonstration of bravery, it consisted of touching an enemy warrior, with the hand or with a coup stick, incurring a risk of injury or death should the warrior respond violently, then running away unharmed. The phrase "counting coup" can also refer to the recounting of stories about battle exploits.

The term is of French origin from the verb couper, which means literally to cut, hit or strike. The expression can be seen as referring to "counting strikes".

Coups were recorded by notches in the coup stick or feathers in the headress of a warrior
Posted by: anon || 10/07/2006 12:29 Comments || Top||

#10  Last Tag anon!
Posted by: Shipman || 10/07/2006 17:27 Comments || Top||

#11  Anon - Ship just tapped you for coup, heh. Gotta tap back...
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 21:13 Comments || Top||


Korea on its own as China pulls out
NORTH Korea can have a future or it can have nuclear weapons but "it cannot have both", the US said, as staunch ally China warned "no one is going to protect" the regime should it go ahead with atomic tests.
“staunch ally China warned "no one is going to protect" the regime should it go ahead with atomic tests...”


Beijing's ominous caution breaks a longstanding policy of avoiding criticism of Pyongyang, and leaves the Stalinist state without the support of its sole powerful friend. "I think if North Koreans do have the nuclear test, I think that they have to realise that they will face serious consequences," China's UN ambassador, Wang Guangya, said.

The rebuke spells trouble for North Korea, which faces a relatively united front against its nuclear aspirations, in sharp contrast to the fractured reaction to a series of missile tests in July. At that time, China accused Japan of overreacting in calling for sanctions.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [3 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I can only imagine that someone spelled it out to China how North Korea going nuclear meant a nuclear Japan and Taiwan. If this is the case, I can only hope that Kim goes right ahead with his test. His psychological profile points directly to such an ill-advised move.

We desperately need Japan and Taiwan to have atomic bombs. Normally, I would not be for further proliferation of nuclear weapons but both of these Asian countries have demonstrated good stewardship of their militaries and of the democratic process. Japan has been a little bit squiffy about proliferating dual-use technology, think Toshiba's milling machines being sent to Russia for propeller machining, but the overall necessity of curtailing China's expansionist tendencies overrides such concerns.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 0:19 Comments || Top||

#2  His psychological profile points directly to such an ill-advised move.

His chemical profile might point to it, too. I wonder if anyone has a hair sample of his to check for lead poisoning. Hard to believe someone could be so daft, but there he is. Anybody got any ideas how he thinks he's going to feed what's left of his people if he pulls this stunt?
Posted by: gorb || 10/07/2006 0:44 Comments || Top||

#3  China's CMC-Generals are reportedly extens studying Russia's AIRBORNE FORCES + MOBILE RR Units. Since OPER IRAGI FREEDOM, they have allegedly intensified their scrutinies.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 10/07/2006 1:18 Comments || Top||

#4  Anybody got any ideas how he thinks he's going to feed what's left of his people if he pulls this stunt?

do you think he cares? He's assuming a Nuke test will put him on the BIG stage, possibly a UNSC seat. Daffy idiot, but he's consistent
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 1:19 Comments || Top||

#5  Is TAIWAN watching, + READY FOR ANYTHING???
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 10/07/2006 1:30 Comments || Top||

#6  Let them blow up their tunnel.
Posted by: Super Hose || 10/07/2006 1:47 Comments || Top||

#7  Anybody got any ideas how he thinks he's going to feed what's left of his people if he pulls this stunt?

I hear that the tree bark is approaching perfect ripeness.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 1:49 Comments || Top||

#8  Damn, Zenster, OUCH!
Posted by: mac || 10/07/2006 2:18 Comments || Top||

#9  Too late. It's pregnant.
Posted by: Thoth || 10/07/2006 2:37 Comments || Top||

#10  Kimmie's like the test rat that can choose to press level A and get a food pellet, or press lever B and get a woodie.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 2:48 Comments || Top||

#11  Kimmie is safe to assume nothing will be done. It is difficult to see how any one would be a net gainer by taking action against Kimmie.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 10/07/2006 6:22 Comments || Top||

#12  A North Korea expert in China, the North's closest ally, said only the removal of American economic sanctions against Pyongyang could dissuade the country from carrying out a nuclear test.

"North Korea has already made a decision to carry out a test," said Li Dunqiu, of China's State Council Development Research Center, a Cabinet-level think tank. But "if the U.S. removes sanctions ... then tensions can be eased. Otherwise launching a nuclear test is unavoidable for North Korea."

The United States imposed economic restrictions on North Korea last year to punish it for alleged counterfeiting and money laundering.


Looks like the Macao bank thing is really hurting them. Hurting them so much that they're getting desperate.
Posted by: gromky || 10/07/2006 8:46 Comments || Top||

#13  You swar mosquitos BEFORE they bite.
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 10/07/2006 8:50 Comments || Top||

#14  Ok, ok! You can have your trains back! Now will you be my buddy again?
Posted by: Kim Jong Il || 10/07/2006 9:02 Comments || Top||

#15 
Kimmie is safe to assume nothing will be done. It is difficult to see how any one would be a net gainer by taking action against Kimmie.

That is something we have to change. Kim's All Night Boom Boom Shop has way too much business as it is. Allowing him to conduct a nuclear test will be the equivalent of okaying a parking lot sale to all and sundry rogue regimes.

But "if the U.S. removes sanctions ... then tensions can be eased.

Oh ho! Blackmail! I wondered what that smell was.

You swar mosquitos BEFORE they bite.

Word, Redneck Jim.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 10:16 Comments || Top||

#16  I have long considered an interesting possibility here. The US could make a deal with China. If the Norks step over the line, the US wouldn't police them up, with great destruction, the Chinese would.

Here's the logic. All the Nork weaponry is pointed South, and the Chinese have all the air and ground forces to sweep the place overnight. Much less danger of the Norks getting a nuke missile off, or annihilating Seoul.

Okay, so China conquers Nork, and sets up a temporary puppet government. What next?

Under Chinese and US auspices, both Koreas begin serious, timetabled discussion on reunification.

First of all, out of the deal, the Chinese get a Korea that loves them, a major trading partner, and a nation set up like Hong Kong that already does things "the Chinese way", so is no threat. China makes lots of billions of dollars out of the deal.

For its part, the US can pull its military out of the peninsula. With neutrality rules in place, it keeps Korea as a major trading partner, too. It no longer has to fret about Norks missiles and nukes. We save billions of dollars every year.

Even the Norks win big in the deal. They get to eat for once.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 10/07/2006 13:16 Comments || Top||

#17  Great scenario, Anonymoose, would be good for everybody bar kimmie if it turned out that way.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 10/07/2006 13:20 Comments || Top||

#18  Sorry Moose, SKors will never go along. Even if the scenario plays out as you say and the SKors escape damage in the war, they'll never agree to foot the bill for reconstruction.
Posted by: Steve White || 10/07/2006 14:46 Comments || Top||

#19  The Chinese don't want to see Kimmie fall for the same reason. They don't want a flood of refugees even greater than what they have now. I wouldn't be surprised if the Chinese preference is for the Norks to start a nulear war so they can just clean the place with Enhanced Radiation Weapons and then let Chinese immigrants push down to the 49th parallel.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 10/07/2006 14:51 Comments || Top||

#20  Yep, paying their own money out is the one thing worse than nuclear war to the SKors.
Posted by: bigjim-ky || 10/07/2006 14:55 Comments || Top||

#21  Bad Thoth! Bad, to your hovel!
Posted by: Shipman || 10/07/2006 17:29 Comments || Top||

#22  I don't see the People's Republic of China having any qualms about exterminating all future refugees from N. Korea, should they get to cause problems.
Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 || 10/07/2006 17:31 Comments || Top||

#23  NS: The Chinese don't want to see Kimmie fall for the same reason. They don't want a flood of refugees even greater than what they have now.

China doesn't provide aid for refugees. If they find work, they eat. If not? They die, and the local morgue cremates their cadavers. China has 1.3 billion people, 30% of whom don't speak Mandarin - the national language. North Korean refugees will blend in just fine with north eastern China's several million-strong Korean ethnic minority.

NS: I wouldn't be surprised if the Chinese preference is for the Norks to start a nulear war so they can just clean the place with Enhanced Radiation Weapons and then let Chinese immigrants push down to the 49th parallel.

North Korea is China's pet Doberman. Everything that North Korea does, it does with China's permission. If China really wanted to stop Kim, they could just shut off his fuel - his generals would shoot him overnight to get the oil flowing again. Kim is merely China's handpuppet, nothing more - and all of the Chinese "analysts" are parroting the Chinese party line (as they are required to, being Party members and government employees), not providing analysis.
Posted by: Zhang Fei || 10/07/2006 18:54 Comments || Top||

#24  A: I have long considered an interesting possibility here. The US could make a deal with China. If the Norks step over the line, the US wouldn't police them up, with great destruction, the Chinese would.

Here's the logic. All the Nork weaponry is pointed South, and the Chinese have all the air and ground forces to sweep the place overnight. Much less danger of the Norks getting a nuke missile off, or annihilating Seoul.


I think the Chinese are just posturing. Within moments of US airstrikes, you are going to hear the Chinese warning Uncle Sam about Chinese intervention to defend their Korean "brothers". Fact is that China doesn't need to invade to remove Kim.

And an invasion would cost billions of dollars, and run the risk of getting the South Koreans involved. The ROK's don't have a problem with North Koreans, but they really have a problem with Chinese troops in North Korea. Korean nationalism involves a feeling of ethnic solidarity with the North Koreans, a feeling of racial solidarity with the Chinese (which doesn't extend to the Japanese, of course) and a traditional xenophobia against people neither Korean nor yellow (hence the anti-Americanism). Once China enters North Korea, it joins Japan on the shit list, and the possibility of a South Korean counter-invasion is extremely high - I would expect North and South Korean forces to coordinate a move north to counter the Chinese armies. A Chinese invasion of North Korea wouldn't be like America's Vietnam War - it would be like China's Korean War - a horrendously expensive, high-casualty disaster for the Chinese military that led to decades of debt to the Soviet Union for equipment purchased on credit.
Posted by: Zhang Fei || 10/07/2006 19:11 Comments || Top||

#25  The bottom line here is that if we want China to stop North Korea from exploding a nuke, we need to make China an offer it can't refuse. The 27% Schumer tariff on Chinese goods might concentrate Chinese minds a little. Every time the Chinese balk, we could double that tariff. When the Chinese economy starts recording double digit negative growth instead of double digit positive growth, the Chinese government will start to see reason - or at least appear to do so. And Kim will start to behave himself.
Posted by: Zhang Fei || 10/07/2006 19:21 Comments || Top||

#26  A Nork collapse with significant refugees to China would get a bit more publicity than other refugee episodes. I suspect the Chinese would prefer not to be bothered by inquiring minds.

China does not wish to control Kim or NoKor, it wishes to be rid of him and it and to capture SoKor as it did Hong Kong. That is the only reason to keep troops there, distasteful as that may be.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 10/07/2006 19:23 Comments || Top||

#27  NS: A Nork collapse with significant refugees to China would get a bit more publicity than other refugee episodes. I suspect the Chinese would prefer not to be bothered by inquiring minds.

A few points. One, China doesn't give journalists the freedom to publish what they want to publish. The tiny handful of Chinese journalists who break the rules are routinely given long jail terms for revealing state secrets, even when they work for the New York Times.

Two, China has a population of 1.3 billion people, and while underemployment (on the several acre plots of land that constitute most Chinese farms) is a problem, starvation is not. China can absorb the entire North Korean population (20 million) without breaking a sweat. Just one example - cities in the booming coastal areas of southern China have absorbed a hundred million migrants from other regions, many of whom do not even speak Mandarin, China's lingua franca - which means that they would be just like an Appalachian hillbilly stranded in Poland - or a North Korean stranded in China.

Three, China isn't much concerned about bad publicity. Think about how it's harvesting organs from FLG practitioners. (Hey - I've just thought of a new use for North Korean refugees - organ donors). And if China is brutal enough, North Koreans aren't going to want to move to China - i.e. China won't have a refugee problem.

NS: China does not wish to control Kim or NoKor, it wishes to be rid of him and it and to capture SoKor as it did Hong Kong. That is the only reason to keep troops there, distasteful as that may be.

China already controls Kim and North Korea - it supplies - for free - the fuel oil that keeps North Korea lit and warm, and the food (again, for free) that keeps the leadership fed. All China has to do is shut off the free stuff, and Kim will be killed by his generals in an effort to get the free stuff flowing again. As long as China continues to give North Korea enough free stuff to keep the leadership fed and warm, nobody else can do much about North Korea. This is why China has always had to be involved in talks involving North Korea, and why these talks have always failed. Because North Korea is China's Rottweiler, and China's not going to stop feeding it.
Posted by: Zhang Fei || 10/07/2006 20:00 Comments || Top||

#28  ZF: Just one example - cities in the booming coastal areas of southern China have absorbed a hundred million migrants from other regions, many of whom do not even speak Mandarin, China's lingua franca - which means that they would be just like an Appalachian hillbilly stranded in Poland - or a North Korean stranded in China.

Or an illegal alien from Mexico working a construction site. Look at it this way - we have absorbed perhaps 15 million illegal aliens from Latin America, we provide them all kinds of free social services that strain our tax revenues, our economic growth rate is about 4% and we only have a population of 300 million. But the Chinese are going to have problems absorbing 20 million people from North Korea - its entire population - despite providing no free social services to out of area immigrants, having a double digit economic growth rate and a population base of 1.3 billion? This is nothing more than Chinese government propaganda to convince gullible foreigners that China has a stake in reining Kim in and that Kim isn't China's handpuppet.
Posted by: Zhang Fei || 10/07/2006 20:09 Comments || Top||

#29  The bottom line here is that if we want China to stop North Korea from exploding a nuke, we need to make China an offer it can't refuse. The 27% Schumer tariff on Chinese goods might concentrate Chinese minds a little. Every time the Chinese balk, we could double that tariff. When the Chinese economy starts recording double digit negative growth instead of double digit positive growth, the Chinese government will start to see reason - or at least appear to do so. And Kim will start to behave himself.

Word, ZF.

China already controls Kim and North Korea - it supplies - for free - the fuel oil that keeps North Korea lit and warm, and the food (again, for free) that keeps the leadership fed. All China has to do is shut off the free stuff, and Kim will be killed by his generals in an effort to get the free stuff flowing again. As long as China continues to give North Korea enough free stuff to keep the leadership fed and warm, nobody else can do much about North Korea. This is why China has always had to be involved in talks involving North Korea, and why these talks have always failed. Because North Korea is China's Rottweiler, and China's not going to stop feeding it.

Word, again, ZF. As it always has been, China is the real problem. All else is window dressing.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 21:02 Comments || Top||

#30  Yep, agree, Zen - ZF thumped the crux dead-on.

If China isn't playing PR this time, then shit won't happen and poofy will have to climb down. If it's just more of the shifting triangulation component of their so-called foreign policy, then shit be a-commin. Sad that it won't fall on China until after others have paid for their arrogance.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 21:16 Comments || Top||


North Korea's Kim rallies hundreds of top brass as UN prepares censure
North Korean leader Kim Jong Il rallied hundreds of top military commanders as world powers pushed for a U.N. censure of his government amid mounting speculation the North was preparing to detonate an atomic bomb. Media reports have speculated a nuclear test could come Sunday, the anniversary of Kim's appointment as head of the Korean Workers' Party in 1997. Japan said it was stepping up monitoring of North Korea in light of the speculation.

“Officers greeted him with rousing cheers of 'Fight at the cost of our lives!'”
With tensions rising, North Korea's Kim met his top brass and urged them to bolster the nation's defenses, the North's official Korean Central News Agency said. Officers greeted him with rousing cheers of "Fight at the cost of our lives!" North Korean state television aired still shots of the bouffant-haired leader waving to an assembled crowd of about 500 olive-suited officers in dress caps. Kim later posed for a group photo with his commanders in front of Pyongyang's sprawling mausoleum for his father and national founder, Kim Il Sung.

The meeting was the reclusive leader's first reported appearance in three weeks and the first since Tuesday when his government shocked the world by announcing plans to test a nuclear device on its way to building an arsenal of atomic weapons. It was unclear when the rally took place, or how many attended, but it could show that Kim is trying to polish his credentials with the country's cherished military at a time when international pressure is mounting on Pyongyang.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "I have gathered all of you here today to tell you about my latest enlightened vision. We are going to do something so colossally stupid that half of our gloriously starving population will end up dying so that the other half will have barely enough food to survive if the eat me."
Posted by: gorb || 10/07/2006 1:12 Comments || Top||

#2  And then one of them said, "Let's make some money for Kim Il Sun. Off to the forest to collect the mushrooms."

And another added, "Then we can engage in an hour of self criticism."
Posted by: Super Hose || 10/07/2006 1:58 Comments || Top||

#3  Kim Jon Il to his people:

Eat me.
Posted by: anon || 10/07/2006 2:15 Comments || Top||

#4  Want to bet that not a single person in that picture up there has a loaded weapon on him? Kim specifically forbids live ammunition at any military exercise that he attends.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 3:19 Comments || Top||

#5  “Officers greeted him with rousing cheers of 'Fight at the cost of our lives!'

Translation, "Cheer or Die"
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 10/07/2006 8:55 Comments || Top||

#6  "I didn't get a "Harumph" out of that guy"

"I'm watching you"
Gov LePetomane
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 10/07/2006 8:58 Comments || Top||

#7  love those little jumpsuits he wears. You just know he sleeps in jammies with the foots on em.
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 9:35 Comments || Top||

#8  And the trap door on the aft, Frank, LOL!
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 10/07/2006 12:42 Comments || Top||

#9  He must get those suits off Ebay, I bet there hasn't been one made new in 20 years.
Posted by: bigjim-ky || 10/07/2006 14:59 Comments || Top||

#10  Men, men, men, men
men, men, men, men.
Posted by: Shipman || 10/07/2006 17:31 Comments || Top||


North Korea slams US 'war on terror'
COMMUNIST North Korea today slammed the US "war on terror" as a pretext for aggression against anti-imperialist independent nations.
The North, which declared on Tuesday it planned a nuclear test to deter US aggression, said a speech by President George W. Bush on the fifth anniversary of September 11 reflected "the US criminal intention to escalate the 'anti-terrorism war' worldwide.”

It described the anti-terror war as “an escalation of war of aggression and state-sponsored terrorism to eliminate anti-imperialist independent countries from the world.”
The commentary in the ruling party newspaper Rodong Sinmun was carried by the Korean Central News Agency. It described the anti-terror war as “an escalation of war of aggression and state-sponsored terrorism to eliminate anti-imperialist independent countries from the world”.

“The American political mode and lifestyle cannot be accepted by other countries ... the US sacrifices those countries for its 'war on terrorism', taking issue with their exercises of sovereign rights...”
“The American political mode and lifestyle cannot be accepted by other countries ... the US sacrifices those countries for its 'war on terrorism', taking issue with their exercises of sovereign rights,” it said. “This is unlawful high-handed practices and brigandish state-sponsored terrorism.” The commentary warned that “anyone can fall victim to the US 'war on terrorism' unless one heightens vigilance against it.” The North's Foreign Ministry cited what it called US nuclear threats against it as well as sanctions in announcing the test at an unspecified date.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Norky Boy Kim I'm Ill must have gotten out of the wrong side of the bed. Either that, or he's eagerly awaiting TEAM AMERICA, THE SEQUEL!
Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden || 10/07/2006 9:15 Comments || Top||


U.N. warns North Korea against nuke test
That ought to do it.
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council on Friday urged North Korea not to carry out a planned nuclear-weapon test and warned Pyongyang of unspecified consequences if it did.

The warning, in a formal statement adopted unanimously, came three days after North Korea's announced it planned its first underground nuclear test, saying its hand had been forced by a U.S. "threat of nuclear war and sanctions."

U.S. officials have said the reclusive state might detonate a device as early as this weekend, and a Chinese source said Pyongyang planned to carry out the test deep inside an abandoned mine.

A nuclear test would "jeopardize peace, stability and security in the region and beyond" and "bring universal condemnation by the international community," said the Security Council statement, read at a formal meeting by Japan's U.N. Ambassador Kenzo Oshima, this month's council president. It warned North Korea that a nuclear test would lead to further unspecified Security Council action "consistent with its responsibility under the Charter of the United Nations."
Oh boy! Another sternly-worded resolution!
Japan, which has satellites that can monitor North Korea's actions, and the United States had wanted a stronger statement threatening punitive action. The Security Council has already imposed an embargo -- on July 15 -- on dangerous weapons and related materials going or leaving North Korea.

"We think the main point is that North Korea should understand how strongly the United States and other council members feel that they should not test this nuclear device," U.S. Ambassador John Bolton told reporters. "And if they do test it, it will be a very different world a day after the test."
Posted by: Steve White || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Bark, little doggie.
Posted by: Cheanter Thugum4248 || 10/07/2006 2:44 Comments || Top||

#2  Watch it, CL4248, he'll pee on your shoe.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 2:51 Comments || Top||

#3  And that's taken as a major threat in circles like the UN where everyone wears Guccis.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 3:28 Comments || Top||


Down Under
'Slipping' Hicks rejects consular staff
THE mental health of Australian terror suspect David Hicks has deteriorated further and he is now unwilling to speak with consular officials, his Australian lawyer has said. Adelaide lawyer David McLeod has said Mr Hicks, being held at the US facility at Guantanamo Bay, has just met with his military lawyer Major Michael Mori who has reported that his physical and mental conditions have "slipped".

“Hicks is overweight because of his poor diet and lack of exercise and is having trouble with his eyesight.”
Mr McLeod has said Mr Hicks is overweight because of his poor diet and lack of exercise and is having trouble with his eyesight. Mentally, Mr Hicks has become suspicious of those who have claimed to represent his interests and recently has refused to speak to the visiting Australian consul for the first time. "Major Mori is finding David increasingly reluctant to interact, not because he doesn't want to but because he is finding it socially difficult to do so," Mr McLeod has said. "Major Mori's best description of David is that he is slipping."

“Hicks has been in US custody at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba for almost five years...”
Mr McLeod has made the comments at a rally in Adelaide in support of Mr Hicks, who has been in US custody at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba for almost five years. He has said it is time the Government accepted the fact that Mr Hicks has effectively served a five-year sentence in tough conditions and it is appropriate to release him to Australia, effectively on parole.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  ummm...no.
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 1:20 Comments || Top||

#2  like he wasn't crazy to begin with.
Posted by: anon || 10/07/2006 1:57 Comments || Top||

#3  Do you really want him back?
Posted by: Super Hose || 10/07/2006 2:25 Comments || Top||

#4  Mr Hicks is overweight because of his poor diet

Shouldn't Mohammed Dawood be fasting at the moment
or has the all the fun gone out of becoming a brainwashed muslim terrorist ?
Posted by: Classer || 10/07/2006 6:36 Comments || Top||

#5  Awwwwww, too bad. He depressed because pops didn't win Father of the Year?
Posted by: tu3031 || 10/07/2006 10:09 Comments || Top||

#6  "Over The Edge", a timeless story of the little people, as told by rich Hollywood stars...
Posted by: Gleamp Thuns4298 || 10/07/2006 21:40 Comments || Top||


Europe
Jihad Watch : UK Muslims vandalize house to be rented by soldiers
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 10/07/2006 15:02 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  They were yesterday forced to look elsewhere to live - after top brass warned them against inflaming racial tensions near the Queen's Windsor Castle home...

So you can spill your blood resisting the jihad in Afghanistan, but you're being taught to surrender at home?

Posted by: Mark Z || 10/07/2006 17:09 Comments || Top||

#2  No. 10 distanced itself from Straw's statement on the mozzie veil, as well.

Add this two events together and observe how idiotarian the appeasenik left has screwed up England. This seems to ooze from every aspect of English life. Utterly appalling!
Posted by: Duh! || 10/07/2006 17:19 Comments || Top||

#3  I think Britain has lost her way badly, perhaps fatally. This story, the Muslim who harrangued a wounded soldier ... and the closing of military hospitals, forcing soldiers dealing with post-combat problems to mix with civilian patients .... it does not bode well for the UK choosing to retain its culture and identity.

We are the Hollow Men

wrote the born-American / became-British poet T. S. Eliot 80 years ago. And he knew the emptiness of a certain class in the culture he was embracing very well.

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
...
Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;
...
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.


I wish it weren't so and it need not be so. But I do not see much stirring that would preclude it.

Churchill inspired / harrangued / bullied Britain to go past the despair of the post-WWI upper class, to fight the Nazis in WWII. Where is his equivalent today? And how many would follow?
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 17:25 Comments || Top||

#4  until Ken Livingstone is beaten to death with Korans, things won't change - the dearming of the populace has contributed to a degeneration of spinal support. When will our cousins awake? I'm stocking ammo now. They could power small neighborhoods by the spinning in Churchill's grave. F*&king cowards. WAKE THE F*&K UP!
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 17:36 Comments || Top||

#5  Churchill inspired / harrangued / bullied Britain to go past the despair of the post-WWI upper class, to fight the Nazis in WWII.

Britain was dying before WWI, as documented by Geroge Dangerfield in The Strange Death of Liberal England. Churchill simply beat a final triumph out of her by avoiding defeat. It was the truth of this that made him so upset by the fictional protrayal of this in the Archer's Life and Death of Colonel Blimp. With the issuance of the Beveridge Report, in the same year as the issuance of Blimp, it was gone.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 10/07/2006 18:43 Comments || Top||

#6  Churchill inspired / harrangued / bullied Britain to go past the despair of the post-WWI upper class, to fight the Nazis in WWII. Where is his equivalent today?

Languishing in Sydney's Parklea jail, accused of being a major drug dealer.
Posted by: tipper || 10/07/2006 20:18 Comments || Top||

#7  That's not his equivalent. ;-(
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 20:34 Comments || Top||

#8  I'm feeling very depressed now. It is clear to me now that war can not be avoided - no matter what happens now. The inds of war are blowing, the dialog is changing and this one isn't going to be about a few bombing runs or 2000 deaths over the course of years. This will be full on war with the brutality and slaughter that humans have conducted since time began. We had the chance and once again the appeaseniks wasted it. I guess every generation gets their war. It's all such a stupid waste. I'm feeling down.
Posted by: anon || 10/07/2006 21:17 Comments || Top||

#9  It's all such a stupid waste.

Yes - a waste of lives, of money, of possibilities. But war isn't the worst of the possible outcomes.
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 21:24 Comments || Top||

#10  Commiserating here, anon.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 21:24 Comments || Top||

#11  War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. -- John Stuart Mill

Mill was right, but he wrote before the age of nuclear weapons, of mass slaughter in the millions rather than the hundreds and thousands.

anon, I do not happily embrace what may be coming either. I wish, I wish we could wake up those in the West who are determined not to deal with this threat while it can be dealt with short of such violence. I haven't given up all hope, but there are days when I come close.
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 21:26 Comments || Top||

#12  Overlapped, lotp. Indeed, the essential thing are worth fighting for, despite the Stalinism masquerading for liberalism (or progressivism, as a5089 wisely differentiates) mantra to the contrary.

I don't recall who said it here (NS?), but I agree that the UK may be the first to fall.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 21:28 Comments || Top||

#13  Ironic that you quote an Englishman who got it. A century at current rates of change certainly contains a LOT of contextual changes.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 21:30 Comments || Top||

#14  Oooooh, you cheat, lotp - editing your existing posts! FOUL!!! ;-)
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 21:31 Comments || Top||

#15  thanks.
Posted by: anon || 10/07/2006 21:37 Comments || Top||

#16  And now you've made them disappear.

Oh sure! Okay then, I believe you!
/Barbie

Lol.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 21:51 Comments || Top||

#17  Shshhhh, .com. You're breaking comsec LOL
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 21:53 Comments || Top||

#18  Mumm's the woid. ;-|
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 21:57 Comments || Top||

#19  The canary in the mineshaft will be Iran.

If we have the courage to cripple Iran's quest for nuclear fire, then there may be hope, for America at least.

If the international community permits Iran accession to atomic weapons, then any resolution of this matter will most likely require limited or total nuclear war. In light of how ill-prepared for nuclear war the vast bulk of Muslim-majority countries are, it will be pretty much one-sided and catastrophic.

Yes - a waste of lives, of money, of possibilities. But war isn't the worst of the possible outcomes.

If we have any brains it will be a waste of their lives, of their money and of their possible outcomes.

More than anything. They will have brought it upon themselves. We are now past the point of "silence is consent". We have arrived at the point where, "To be silent is to lie". Islam continues to sell us the Big Lie of it being The Religion of Peace [spit]. We are learning to know better. Iran will teach us for once and all.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 22:00 Comments || Top||

#20  How about having that "British Muslim policeman" do his duty here.
How is it that folks are so damn blind.
Just unfuckingbelievable.
Posted by: Jan || 10/07/2006 23:42 Comments || Top||


Vlaams Belang steps closer to victory
And lefty and official Belgium gets a case of the vapors as "far right" party climbs in the polls...
Posted by: Seafarious || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Much like France's Vichy collaboration with the Nazis, their drive to facilitate Eurabia will help spawn another of Europe's famous charnel houses. Vlaams Belang is a wrong but predictable response in the face of mounting Islamic domination. Europe's career bureaucrats simply cannot disengage their obsession with multiculturalism for long enough to regain perspective. The great unwashed will do it for them and nuance will be in short supply when this happens.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 2:03 Comments || Top||

#2  Too many people forget what the history of Europe was before the imposed peace of US dominance after WWII. The Europeans had fought a world war before the 20th century, and much of it took place in North America : the French and Indian War. England and France went at each other's throats, and pulled every one of their colonies into the mix. The Europeans have a talent for slaughter and may well discover it again, before too long if the Muslims are not careful.
Posted by: Shieldwolf || 10/07/2006 3:42 Comments || Top||

#3  And before the French & Indian war, the Hundred Years War.
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 6:05 Comments || Top||

#4  It appears those who have forgotten are soon to be reminded.

btw, isn't this the 535th anniversary of that other opportunity for an epic motion picture, the Battle of Lepanto? That would make a great movie.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 10/07/2006 6:15 Comments || Top||

#5  And let's not forget the best religious war of yurpean histry, the Thirty Years War. That's the one this next episode should resemble the most. In all respects.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 10/07/2006 6:17 Comments || Top||

#6  I expect the democratic European Union to abide by Peoples' choice.
Posted by: gromgoru || 10/07/2006 10:05 Comments || Top||

#7  The EU lost a hell of a lot of cred when it basically outlawed that rightist Austrian party a while back. That united many of the rightist parties throughout Europe, who have since found common cause in lots of things.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 10/07/2006 11:26 Comments || Top||

#8  Nimble Spemble, yea, the shoe resembles. It may even start with a defenestration of multiculti church reps.
Posted by: twobyfour || 10/07/2006 13:31 Comments || Top||

#9  As a service to our younger readers who were not taught history in school, here is a short history of wars in "enlightened" Europe. We'll leave out the early years and jump right to 1377:

The Hundred Years' War was a conflict between England and France, lasting 116 years from 1337 to 1453. It was fought primarily over claims by the English kings to the French throne and was punctuated by several brief periods of peace and two lasting ones before it finally ended in the expulsion of the English from France. Thus, the war was in fact a series of conflicts and is commonly divided into three or four phases: the Edwardian War (1337-1360), the Caroline War (1369-1389), the Lancastrian War (1415-1429), and the slow decline of English fortunes after the appearance of Joan of Arc. The term "Hundred Years' War" was given afterward.

The Seven Years' War (1754 and 1756–1763), some of the theatres of which are called the Pomeranian War and the French and Indian War , was a war in the mid-18th century that enveloped both European and colonial theatres. The war was described by Winston Churchill as the first world war, as it was the first conflict in human history to be fought around the globe, though all of the combatants were either European nations or their overseas colonies. The war involved all major powers of Europe: Prussia, Great Britain (with British Colonies in North America, the British East India Company, and Ireland), and Hanover were pitted against Austria, France (with New France and the French East India Company), the Russian Empire, Sweden, and Saxony. Spain and Portugal were later drawn into the conflict, while a force from the neutral United Provinces of the Netherlands was attacked in India.

The American Revolution was a political movement that in 1776 created a new nation, the United States of America, ending British control. The British resisted and the American Revolutionary War, (1775-1783) resulted in American victory. The victory at the Battle of Saratoga encouraged the French to officially enter the war, as Benjamin Franklin negotiated a permanent military alliance in early 1778. Later Spain (in 1779) and the Dutch became allies of the French, leaving Britain to fight a major war alone without major allies. The American theatre thus became only one front in Britain's war.

The French Revolution (1789–1799) was a pivotal period in the history of French, European and Western civilization. During this time, republicanism replaced the absolute monarchy in France, and the country's Roman Catholic Church was forced to undergo a radical restructuring. While France would oscillate among republic, empire, and monarchy for 75 years after the First Republic fell to a coup d'état, the Revolution is widely seen as a major turning point in the history of Western democracy—from the age of absolutism and aristocracy, to the age of the citizenry as the dominant political force. While France would oscillate among republic, empire, and monarchy for 75 years after the First Republic fell to a coup d'état, the Revolution is widely seen as a major turning point in the history of Western democracy—from the age of absolutism and aristocracy, to the age of the citizenry as the dominant political force.

The politics of the period inevitably drove France towards war with Austria and its allies. The King, the Feuillants and the Girondins specifically wanted to wage war. The King (and many Feuillants with him) expected war would increase his personal popularity; he also foresaw an opportunity to exploit any defeat: either result would make him stronger. The Girondins wanted to export the Revolution throughout Europe. Only some of the radical Jacobins opposed war, preferring to consolidate and expand the revolution at home. The Austrian emperor Leopold II, brother of Marie Antoinette, may have wished to avoid war, but he died on 1 March 1792. France declared war on Austria (20 April 1792) and Prussia joined on the Austrian side a few weeks later. The French Revolutionary Wars had begun. After early skirmishes went badly for France, the first significant military engagement of the war occurred with the Franco-Prussian Battle of Valmy (20 September 1792). Although heavy rain prevented a conclusive resolution, the French artillery proved its superiority. However, by this time, France stood in turmoil and the monarchy had effectively become a thing of the past.

The Napoleonic Wars, a series of global conflicts fought during Napoleon Bonaparte's rule over France (1799 - 1815), formed to some extent an extension of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789 and continued during the régime of the Second French Empire of 1852 - 1870. These wars revolutionized European armies and artillery, as well as military systems, and took place on a scale never before seen, mainly due to the application of modern mass conscription. French power rose quickly, conquering most of Europe; the fall also took place rapidly, beginning with the disastrous invasion of Russia (1812), and Napoleon's empire ultimately suffered complete military defeat, resulting in the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy in France in 1814 and 1815.
No consensus exists as to when the French Revolutionary Wars ended and when the Napoleonic Wars began; one possible watershed-date occurred when Bonaparte seized power in France (9 November 1799). Other versions put the period of warfare between 1799 and 1802 in the context of the French Revolutionary Wars, and set the Napoleonic Wars' beginning at the outbreak of war between the United Kingdom and France in 1803, following the brief peace concluded at Amiens in 1802. The Napoleonic Wars ended on 20 November 1815, following Napoleon's final defeat at Waterloo and the Second Treaty of Paris. Collectively, the nearly continuous period of warfare from April 20, 1792, until November 20, 1815, sometimes (though rarely these days) bears the name of the "Great French War".

The Crimean War lasted from 28 March 1853 until 1 April 1856 and was fought between Imperial Russia on one side and an alliance of the Great Britain, France, the Kingdom of Sardinia, and the Ottoman Empire on the other. The majority of the conflict took place on the Crimean peninsula in the Black Sea, with military conflicts also occurring in western Turkey, the Baltic Sea region and in the Pacific Ocean. The war is generally seen as the first modern conflict and "introduced technical changes which affected the future course of warfare."

World War I (abbreviated WWI), also known as the First World War, the Great War and "The War to End All Wars" was a global military conflict that took place mostly in Europe between 1914 and 1918. It was a total war which left millions dead and shaped the modern world. The Allied Powers, led by France, Russia, the United Kingdom, Italy, and later the United States, defeated the Central Powers: Austria-Hungary, Germany, Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire.
Much of the fighting in World War I took place along the Western Front, within a system of opposing manned trenches and fortifications (separated by a "no man's land") running from the North Sea to the border of Switzerland. On the Eastern Front, the vast eastern plains and limited rail network prevented a trench warfare stalemate from developing, although the scale of the conflict was just as large. Hostilities also occurred on and under the sea and — for the first time — from the air. More than nine million soldiers died on the various battlefields, and millions more civilians suffered. The war caused the disintegration of four empires: the Austro-Hungarian, German, Ottoman, and Russian. Germany lost its overseas empire, and states such as Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia were created, or recreated, as was the case with Poland. World War I created a decisive break with the old world order that had emerged after the Napoleonic Wars, which was modified by the mid-19th century’s nationalistic revolutions. The results of World War I would be important factors in the development of World War II 21 years later.

The Russian Revolution of 1917 was a series of political events in Russia, which, after the elimination of the Russian autocracy system, and the Provisional Government (Duma), resulted in the establishment of the Soviet power under the control of the Bolshevik party. This eventually led to the establishment of the Soviet Union, which lasted until its dissolution in 1991.

The Spanish Civil War, which lasted from July 17, 1936 to April 1, 1939, was a conflict in which the Nationalists, led by General Francisco Franco, defeated the Loyalists or Republicans of the Second Spanish Republic. The Loyalists (also known as the Republicans) received weapons and volunteers from the Soviet Union, the international Communist movement, and the International Brigades, while the Nationalists (or Francoists) received weapons and soldiers from Italy and Germany and logistical support from Portugal. While the war lasted only about three years, the political situation had already been violent for several years before. The number of casualties is disputed; estimates generally suggest that between 300,000 and 1 million people were killed. Many of these deaths resulted from mass killings perpetrated on both sides. The war started with military uprisings throughout Spain and its colonies.

World War II, or the Second World War, was a worldwide conflict fought between the Allied Powers and the Axis Powers, from 1939 until 1945. It was the largest armed conflict the world has ever seen, and remains one of the most significant events in all of human history. World War II involved military forces from over seventy nations; air, land and sea battles spanning much of the globe; and resulted in the death of over sixty million people. The war was brought to an end in 1945 with the Allies victorious.

Facts complied from Wikipedia.
Posted by: Steve || 10/07/2006 15:04 Comments || Top||

#10  You left out the 30 years war, which AFAIK gave birth to the modern notion of Nation-State, now being destroyed right in front of our eyes.
There's also the 80 years war, which ended up with Dutch Republic free to invent modern capitalism.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 10/07/2006 17:33 Comments || Top||

#11  Btw, Europe has had wars, yes? And what? What is your point (no offense intended)?

Problem is, you see today's Europe, either in terminal decadence phase (some kind of civilizational senility), or in the grip of an ultimately nihilist utopia (the "EUssr" and its a-historical new man, and its joint-venture with the arabo-muslim world), and you somehow think it's a frozen moment in eternity, allowing you to judge us from the distant past to the distant future ("see, they were always bad").

I don't know if we'll die as a civilization or european (ethnic sense) continent, or if we'll survive and keep on going, but one thing is certain : this present situation will not last forever, the "enlightened" EUtopia will not last. We're not out of History, even if we have to become a giant Yugoslavia.

PS : again, do remember that almost 50% of your voting population wanted the candidate whose party promises the USA to follow the Eutopia. And, what, 90% of your entertainement and media Elites are "enlightened" too... so, mock europe if you wish, but you're not immune, you're just less far in the death curve, so for the West's sake, you'd better win that culture war.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 10/07/2006 17:43 Comments || Top||

#12  Actually, Anonymous5089, they are agreeing with you that the current trend in Europe can't stand.

It's your "Euro-elites" that are indeed clueless, just like Kerry and Co., but that doesn't mean that the average citizen on either side of the Atlantic isn't becoming more aware of the realities of militant Islam.
Posted by: Ernest Brown || 10/07/2006 18:46 Comments || Top||

#13  so, mock europe if you wish, but you're not immune, you're just less far in the death curve, so for the West's sake, you'd better win that culture war.

Yes, on both counts.
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 19:23 Comments || Top||


EU and US in new passenger data deal
The US and the European Union have struck a new deal for sharing transatlantic airline passenger data. The new interim agreement replaces a 2004 deal ruled illegal for technical reasons by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in May. The agreement followed a transatlantic video conference lasting at least seven hours. EU justice ministers will meet later on Friday to discuss and back the deal. Negotiations were primarily over which information will be shared with the American counter-terrorist organisations such as the FBI or the CIA.

Negotiations collapsed last week, creating a legal vacuum where airlines risked losing landing rights in the US if they did not supply the data or legal action in the EU if they did. The deal involves 34 pieces of data about passengers flying from Europe to US destinations, including addresses, telephone numbers and credit card numbers. The data — including passengers' names, addresses and credit card details — must be transferred to US authorities within 15 minutes of a US-bound flight's departure.

EU Justice Commissioner Franco Frattini said new mechanisms had been agreed to distribute data from airlines to the US, the BBC reported. US officials will now only be able to access data by having information "pushed" from airline computer systems. Previously the US could "pull" data from the systems whenever it was needed. The new accord will expire at the end of July 2007 and negotiations over a permanent deal will start in November.
Posted by: Seafarious || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I'm not sure why we would need to haggle about our safety. Americans certainly have some right to fly into America. For others they can follow the rules or stay home.
Posted by: Super Hose || 10/07/2006 1:10 Comments || Top||

#2  This seems pretty easy to deal with. The passengers on any flight that doesn't "push" it's data to us on time gets the third degree when they arrive. 24 hour delay in baggage handling, etc. The word will get out on which arilines are not cooperating.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 10/07/2006 6:25 Comments || Top||

#3  tourism is a large income source for the EU economies - think of all teh euros those nasty Americans spend over there. Hate for that to stop, assholes. Course everyone could take the train or car....whoops
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 8:50 Comments || Top||

#4  They abide by our rules or they don't fly. We do not want questionable people on manifests to have to deal with here on our shores. The data requested should be reasonable, so we can use it to screen for potential terrorists. Erecting walls of hundreds of thousands of bureaucrats does not necessarily make you safe. The smart thinking factor is important, too.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 10/07/2006 12:48 Comments || Top||


Danish TV plays blasphemous video
Denmark’s national TV2 channel broadcast on Friday excerpts from a blasphemous video made by members of an extreme-right party. Filmed in August,
“The video shows young adherents of the Danish People’s Party mocking the Prophet Muhammad (PTUI) during a summer party...”
the video shows young adherents of the Danish People’s Party mocking the Prophet Muhammad (PTUI PBUH) during a summer party. The images were shown only fleetingly on TV2.

The editor-in-chief of the television station, Lars Bennike, emphasised that the purpose of “showing the short video sequence was not at all to show the drawings or the antics of the youths” in the DPP.
The president of the DPP Youth, Kenneth Kristensen, who did not participate in the party, criticised their behaviour as “inconvenient”.
“Our decision to broadcast this sequence was only due to the fact that the president of the youth branch of the party had distanced himself from this gathering,” he said. A member of the party’s youth wing, Martin Rosengaard Knudsen, also a member of the artists’ group called “Defending Denmark”, filmed the video. The president of the DPP Youth, Kenneth Kristensen, who did not participate in the party, criticised their behaviour as “inconvenient”. “It is not my kind of humour, and things would not have happened like that had I been present,” he told the Nyhedsavisen newspaper, a daily free sheet.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I guess "Leave it to Beaver Mohammed" is over?
Posted by: Captain America || 10/07/2006 1:03 Comments || Top||

#2  I wonder what they would think of the fact that Team America - World Police seems to be showing on one of the Showtime channels almost continuously.
Posted by: Super Hose || 10/07/2006 1:18 Comments || Top||

#3  Mmmm, blasphemy.
Posted by: SteveS || 10/07/2006 10:06 Comments || Top||

#4  Nothing beats a nice pice o' ... blasphemy.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 11:44 Comments || Top||

#5  There are two things that could have been shown to provoke different reactions. The first would be something that would "offend" Moslems and get them out into the street in protest. The second would be to depict Moslems being booted for whatever. This would be to elicet whines that they were being persecuted.

By choosing the former, they probably intend that the Moslems protest and make trouble, which would be good for them, the right wing party.
Posted by: Anonymoose || 10/07/2006 12:59 Comments || Top||


Fifth Column
Anti-war protesters gather in New York, bash Bush
Thousands of protesters clogged streets around the United States to protest the war in Iraq and the Bush administration. Organized by the group World Can't Wait, the march in New York started at the United Nations headquarters in midtown Manhattan. It was one of about 200 protests staged around the country by the activist group. In Washington, protesters held up yellow police tape along a three-block stretch of Pennsylvania Avenue near the White House.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Er...

http://worldcantwait.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2944&Itemid=220

These guys are kinda' confused...not a word about what warships were dispatched, where they were dispatched to, what they were tasked to do, or even what warships were sent - a couple paragraphs about Ellsberg, the Pentagon Papers, the '60s, and bringing down the "Bush Regime" though...

Must be the acute case of BDS.

I feel strangely unclean now...

Posted by: FOTSGreg || 10/07/2006 0:17 Comments || Top||

#2  Must be the acute case of BDS.

looks more like senility to me.
Posted by: anon || 10/07/2006 0:20 Comments || Top||

#3  BDS or senility? You be the judge


/
Posted by: anon || 10/07/2006 0:35 Comments || Top||

#4  Nice pics. Are they all there to score smoke to treat their Alzheimers?
Posted by: tu3031 || 10/07/2006 10:12 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Pelosi says she would drain GOP 'swamp'
The Dhimmi Swamp would be maintained for its ecological importance since it is the only known vector for several species of creatures.
Franklin Roosevelt had his first hundred days.
Oooh, how dramatic.
House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi is thinking 100 hours, time enough, she says, to begin to "drain the swamp" after more than a decade of Republican rule.
She has a "plan".
As in the first 100 hours the House meets after Democrats — in her fondest wish — win control in the Nov. 7 midterm elections and Pelosi takes the gavel as the first Madam Speaker in history.
Wow, you mean she'll give up the bullwhip?
Day One: Put new rules in place to "break the link between lobbyists and legislation."
This evokes a howl of giggles. I'm thinking it means she'll change her phone number.
Day Two: Enact all the recommendations made by the commission that investigated the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Note she doesn't say which "commission", lol.
Time remaining until 100 hours: Raise the minimum wage to $7.25 an hour, maybe in one step. Cut the interest rate on student loans in half. Allow the government to negotiate directly with the pharmaceutical companies for lower drug prices for Medicare patients.
Not Big Gov't, nay, we're talking Hufreakinmongous Gov't - and proud of it! Socialism here we come!
Broaden the types of stem cell research allowed with federal funds — "I hope with a veto-proof majority," she added in an Associated Press interview Thursday.
I think it's clear she's not up to speed on the efficacy of stem cell therapies...
All the days after that: "Pay as you go," meaning no increasing the deficit, whether the issue is middle class tax relief, health care or some other priority.
Great Frickin' Lie #1?
To do that, she said, Bush-era tax cuts would have to be rolled back for those above "a certain level." She mentioned annual incomes of $250,000 or $300,000 a year and higher, and said tax rates for those individuals might revert to those of the Clinton era. Details will have to be worked out, she emphasized.
Yep. Are you hard working and successful in life? Then we'll fuck you. Hard. Ayn Rand weeps, spins.
"We believe in the marketplace," Pelosi said of Democrats, then drew a contrast with Republicans. "They have only rewarded wealth, not work."
Except for the marketplace of the voting booth and legitimate registered voters.
"We must share the benefits of our wealth" beyond the privileged few, she added.
And we'll decide who gets it, of course, in a "special" session in William Jefferson's basement.
Pelosi, 66, has been a leader of the House Democrats since 2002. But her political apprenticeship dates to childhood, when her father was mayor of Baltimore.
She's never had a real job. It's a family tradition.
Now, her political base is about as liberal as it gets, San Francisco. It's a fact that Republicans love to emphasize to voters who might want to visit, but not feel comfortable living there.
It's like a whole 'nuther country.
Republicans find her an attractive political target, and recently said she would try to "cut-and-run" from Iraq while "launching bitter partisan investigations" of the Bush administration, possibly including impeachment hearings.
As has been stated by several of the DhimmiDonk "leaders".
A grandmother five times over, Pelosi pops chocolates, shuns coffee and flashes her wit. Asked what offices should would occupy if in the Capitol if she becomes speaker, she laughed. "I'll have any suite I want."
The trappings of power and those who know how to wield it.
She would, too.
Lol. Duh.
"If the election were held today we'd be successful," Pelosi predicted, claiming that her party's prospects are expanding as the campaign enters its final month. "So many other races are emerging right now," she said.
But it won't be today. It will be in a few weeks. We'll see. We may even weep. But not today, Nancy.
Democrats must gain 15 seats to regain the majority they lost in 1994, and have candidates in competitive races for 30 or so Republican-held seats, according to strategists in both parties. By contrast, only about a handful of Democratic-controlled seats appear ripe for possible Republican takeover.
Wait for it - the experts are often wrong (cuz they're often paid "consultants") and the polls are notorious for bias.
Democrats have a pamphlet that lists all their promises and have run through several slogans in the past year or so as they test campaign messages. In recent days, Pelosi said, their prospects have improved by the discovery that former Republican Rep. Mark Foley (news, bio, voting record) of Florida had sent sexually explicit computer messages to teenage male pages.
Kinda like judge shopping, only less sincere.
Not long before sitting down for a lunchtime interview, she turned down a suggestion from Speaker Dennis Hastert that they jointly appoint former FBI Director Louie Freeh to recommend improvements in the page program.
Cooperate? What do you take me for, a citizen?
"That was about protecting their majority" rather than the pages, she said dismissively.
We smell blood in the water...
Instead, she wants to put Hastert and other Republicans under oath and make them say what they knew of Foley's actions, when they learned it and what they did to stop him.
Yet she has refused to go under oath herself.
The potential for political gain is clear to her.
Blood. I smell blood!
"It's an opportunity for growth among women" for the Democrats, she said. "They don't always vote and this could be a motivation."
Issue Shopping.
With married women, in particular, it's a huge issue, she added.
Sale!
Among older voters, too.

"If there's an ethical issue, seniors take a hike" and abandon politicians they blame, she said.

"If we hold onto seniors we win the election."
Yep, seniors are easy, just promise them lots of shit - and let 'em die off while it languishes in committee.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  drain the swamp, seems I've heard that line b-4
Posted by: Captain America || 10/07/2006 1:01 Comments || Top||

#2  DemoLefties win the Congress in 2006 then Der Waffen SovietReich StaatWeldFrau POTUS = COPOTUS Hillary in 2008 > USA under OWG + anti-Amer Amer Communism-Socialism + US-BASED UNO PEACEKEEPING = INVASION/OCCUPATION ARMY 2015-2020, as per the Left's own timeline.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 10/07/2006 1:23 Comments || Top||

#3  It's not a swamp - it's wet land.
Posted by: Super Hose || 10/07/2006 1:50 Comments || Top||

#4  It's not a swamp - it's wet land lol! Now that's beating them at their own game. I guess they will just have to live with the smarmy mess - but then, they seem to like doing that.
Posted by: anon || 10/07/2006 1:54 Comments || Top||

#5  Pelosi makes me want to puke, but then so do most other Democrats. We're headed for another Civil War except this time it will be Spanish Civil War style. The Right will win this time, too, and Pelosi will probably end up in France just like the Spanish Commies did.
Posted by: mac || 10/07/2006 2:23 Comments || Top||

#6  If the "Spanish" variant comes into play, France will get nuked if it takes in any of the fleeing scumbags, as will any other country offering them refuge. If the US does ever split like that, the result will be slaughter and mayhem of biblical proportions, due to the social pressures and tensions that have built up over the years.
Posted by: Shieldwolf || 10/07/2006 3:38 Comments || Top||

#7  All the days after that: "Pay as you go," meaning no increasing the deficit, whether the issue is middle class tax relief, health care or some other priority.

.com correctly called this passage a lie, and it is also worth noting how deftly the writer expresses Pelosi's intent on raising taxes by calling a tax increase the issue of "middle class tax relief...."

BTW this writer has been accussed a lot of left wing bias in his reportage, and it show with this feature.
Posted by: badanov || 10/07/2006 4:14 Comments || Top||

#8  Crushing the Muhammadan motherfuckers shooting at our husbands is a "huge issue with married women" too, ya commie skank.
Posted by: exJAG || 10/07/2006 8:28 Comments || Top||

#9  Pelosi says she would drain GOP 'swamp'

Forgot the old adage about being Ass-Deep in Aligators, didn't you.
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 10/07/2006 9:05 Comments || Top||

#10  Don't hold back exJAG. Tell me how you really feel :)
Posted by: GORT || 10/07/2006 9:31 Comments || Top||

#11  re: the icky GOP swamp thingy

1) I promise to designate all Homo Bath Houses as American Historical treasures.

Posted by: Nancy Pelosi || 10/07/2006 10:03 Comments || Top||

#12  Raise the minimum wage... Cut the interest rate ... Allow the government...

Hey, what about my pony?
Posted by: SteveS || 10/07/2006 11:58 Comments || Top||

#13  I never called it a swamp, but, Pelosi can start out by draining mine.
Posted by: wxjames || 10/07/2006 13:03 Comments || Top||

#14  Nancy...Are you going to drain the Kennedy's with you? You can let any of them drive.
Posted by: anymouse || 10/07/2006 13:18 Comments || Top||

#15  There won't be any Civil War. If you look at the 2004 election map of the US (by county), even the blue states have small islands of blue in a sea of red. The blue islands are cities. If the LLLs ever try to secede, we'll be able to just starve them out. (Don't forget, the military is 85% red)

Al
Posted by: Frozen Al || 10/07/2006 13:50 Comments || Top||

#16  Seriously, GORT. I am not my gender, ethnicity, or demographic. But Dems reject the individual, and see only vote-bots defined by abstract socioeconomic data. That's how leftists treat us as college students, as "news consumers," and as citizens. Piss. Me. Off. Anyone who votes for holier-than-thou petty tyrant shitbags like these deserves a sharp kick in the nads.
Posted by: exJAG || 10/07/2006 13:56 Comments || Top||

#17  If the LLLs ever try to secede, we'll be able to just starve them out. (Don't forget, the military is 85% red)

If there ever is a civil war in the US it won't be just Red vs Blue. The Blues will get plenty help from outside. Think about it. It's your enemies' wet dream.
Posted by: Bob || 10/07/2006 14:45 Comments || Top||

#18  Anyone who votes for holier-than-thou petty tyrant shitbags like these deserves a sharp kick in the nads.

Can we assume that you'll be following that up with a strongly worded letter?

Posted by: Ricky bin Ricardo (Abu Babaloo) || 10/07/2006 17:39 Comments || Top||

#19  If there ever is a civil war in the US it won't be just Red vs Blue. The Blues will get plenty help from outside. Think about it. It's your enemies' wet dream.

They already are getting such aid, in the form of money, press support and other help. If this goes to open violence, the floodgates will indeed open I suspect. And I am not at all sure the authorities will use force to end it while they still are able to do so.

We have what? 5000 linear miles of undefended borders?
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 17:43 Comments || Top||

#20  Feeling pessimistic, Ms. Lotp?
Right now, I have tv in the background, with lci all-night live coverage the "nuits blanches" parisian bobo festival, from the heavily islamized "Goutte d'or" Paris area.
Leitmotiv of this festival is, you guessed it, the "métissage" (interbreeding, in the cultural sense here), with arab and african "modern artists" presenting their performances on this very topic one after the other... and in the commercial, what is the Mozart CD we're offered? "Mozart the egyptian", Ie Mozart arranged middle-east style.
I'm not very upbeat too. I'll switch to Cartoon Network, watching Bugs Bunny or Johnny Bravo in english will cheer me up.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 10/07/2006 17:52 Comments || Top||

#21  It's a shame when something that once was pretty good dies. It's time to bury the carcass, and the maggots feeding on it. The REAL Democratic party is dead. In its place is the most socialistic, dictatorial piece of crap ever seen in the United States. I think I'll make another hundred darts for my crossbow - I think I'll need 'em.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 10/07/2006 17:59 Comments || Top||

#22  But Dems reject the individual, and see only vote-bots defined by abstract socioeconomic data. That's how leftists treat us as college students, as "news consumers," and as citizens. Piss. Me. Off.

x-Jag, don't forget body counts and the coffin photos the donks have an affinity for. Hell, let's not consider the mission, right donks?
Posted by: Captain America || 10/07/2006 18:10 Comments || Top||

#23  wow - that's highbrow - I'm listening to Greenday, AudioSlave and Neil Young
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 18:21 Comments || Top||

#24  Feeling pessimistic, Ms. Lotp?

Not entirely, no.

But I do think the point is valid that if a civil war breaks out in the US, the left will have millions of bodies swarming our borders to help, and other countries may well provide tacit if not overt aid to them as well.
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 18:23 Comments || Top||

#25  a swarm? I think not. Not a live one
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 18:26 Comments || Top||

#26  I take that back. Yes, I am pessimistic.

Despite the size of the Muslim world, the West could deal with the Islmofascists easily if there were any real will to do so.

It is the lack of that will in so many that has me pessimistic.

RE: domestic politics,

her political apprenticeship dates to childhood, when her father was mayor of Baltimore.


Not exactly a shining beacon of civic rectitude, the Bal'mer city government. I didn't know of her connection before but it explains a lot about her attitudes and actions.

Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 18:27 Comments || Top||

#27  a swarm? I think not. Not a live one

A Dem-controlled government would come down on the side of preventing you/us from preventing the swarm, I think.

Ack. I need to go exercise or something and not dwell on the election possibilities for the moment.

I'm not a registered Republican, but I am hoping and praying that the Dems do not seize control of Congress this year. I haven't felt this strongly about an election in decades.
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 18:29 Comments || Top||

#28  the originator of civilian-enforcement at the border was the mid 90's effort here in San Diego: "Light Up The Night". Multitudes of citizens fed up with the inaction of the Fed Gov't on the border drove their vehicles and with their headlights, illuminated the flood coming across. This shamed the Feds and local BP's to take it seriously enough. We need to keep this oversight up. Dem or Rep, it's a permanent election issue for the next 50 yrs. "how do you stand, Congressman/Senator, and what about 'these' votes?"
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 19:00 Comments || Top||

#29  Rest easy. It's not going to happen. It's just that the MSM wants it to happen so badky that they spend all their time convincing us it will. And it seems as if they are right whenb that's all we hear day in day out. But those who vote will be voting trunk again this year. Not that they deserve the power; but only that not enough voting Americans are stupid enough to elect donks instead.

Low unemployment, falling gas prices, falling deficit, global warming over. What are the positive issues the donks will win on? None, as Pelosi's rant reveals.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 10/07/2006 19:16 Comments || Top||

#30  Watch out for them alligators, honey.
Posted by: Gleamp Thuns4298 || 10/07/2006 21:38 Comments || Top||

#31  "if civil war breaks out in the US"

This time, the South will win.
Posted by: Poison Reverse || 10/07/2006 21:43 Comments || Top||

#32  Wow. This is a great plan. All this great stuff and the government pays for it all! Not me!
I must be as stupid as Nancy Pelosi thinks I am...
Posted by: tu3031 || 10/07/2006 22:22 Comments || Top||

#33  Cadaverous. Preditory. Unctuous.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 22:36 Comments || Top||

#34  Predatory.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 22:37 Comments || Top||


Further unraveling of the October Surprise™
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I suspect that pore Foley is a repressed homosexual, as Sully would suggest
Posted by: Captain America || 10/07/2006 1:05 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
India, Israel to setup Electronic Warfare Joint Venture
India and Israel are to setup a joint venture to develop advanced electronic warfare (EW) systems for their air forces' fighter aircraft.

The proposed joint venture, the creation of which would cost around $100 million, is expected to get a go-ahead shortly with a signed deal between India's Defence Avionics Research Establishment (DARE), Bangalore and the Elisra Group, Bene Beraq, Israel.

Seventy percent of the venture will be funded by DARE, which is part of the state run Defence Research and Development Organization, with Elisra Group paying the remaining 30 percent.

A senior DARE scientist said the proposed venture will likely get off the ground by the end of 2006 at DARE facilities in Bangalore. Elisra will develop approach warning systems, while DARE will develop cooling systems, electromagnetic interference and electromagnetic susceptibility systems, as well as system integration in the aircraft.

The program is to be fully operational in three years.

The scientist said this venture will see an advanced EW system called 'Mayawi' developed for India's Tejas Light Combat Aircraft and the F-35 Joint Strike Fighters that Israel plans to buy from the United States.

The EW system will feature advanced RADAR warning, RADAR jamming, and electronic combat and self defense systems. It will also have an Integrated Defensive Electronic Radio Frequency Countermeasures system to help protect the aircraft against RADAR guided missiles.

Its Advanced Threat Infrared Countermeasures will protect the aircraft against heat seeking missiles, and be paired with Common Missile Warning System.

"We are collaborating with Indian agencies for a number of defence programs, but, as per company policy we do not discuss specific programs", said an Elisra executive. The executive added that DARE was s4lected as a partner after trying several other defence partners around the world.

A senior Defence Ministry (Indian) official said India wants to forge alliances with Israeli companies to develop a variety of high-end defence technologies as a continuation of the growing Indo-Israel defence cooperation.

Elisra, notably, has helped DARE in the past to develop an EW system, called 'Tempest' for the MiG 21 Bison fighter upgrade program. EW systems from Elisra are also being supplied for licensed production in India for 140 Sukhoi Su 30 MKI aircraft at the HAL (Hindustan Aeronautics Limited) production center in Bangalore.
Posted by: john || 10/07/2006 09:24 || Comments || Link || [8 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Somebody pass Perv a roll of toilet paper.
Posted by: gromgoru || 10/07/2006 10:09 Comments || Top||

#2  Somebody pass Perv a roll of toilet paper.

Like pages from his book?
Posted by: Captain America || 10/07/2006 13:35 Comments || Top||

#3  Land of 'em Pure don't need no stinking electronic warfare.
Posted by: Shipman || 10/07/2006 17:38 Comments || Top||


Pakistan admits 'helping' Kashmir militancy
Pakistan has admitted that it might have “helped” insurgency in Jammu and Kashmir at “some time”, but claimed it was now trying its best to prevent militant infiltrations into India, according to a report in the Press Trust of India. “Jihad, insurgency or whatever you want to call it in Kashmir ... yes, Pakistan may have helped the jihad at some time, but it was not started by us, and now we are trying our best to stop people from crossing,” the report quoted Pakistani Ambassador to the US Mahmud Ali Durrani as saying.
“To the best of my knowledge LeT is a banned organisation. They are no more in Pakistan.”
Asked what Pakistan was doing to stop terrorist outfits like the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) from crossing into Jammu and Kashmir, he said, “To the best of my knowledge LeT is a banned organisation. They are no more in Pakistan.”

“Durrani brushed aside as “grossly overstated” the notion that in the event of another military coup, jihadists and extremists would come to the fore.”
He, however, said that the LeT had money collection boxes in markets of Rawalpindi even two years ago. “There were these hundreds and thousands of these boxes. That is finished and LeT does not have the luxury of those funds,” he said in the report. “We are trying our very best. There is no serious cross-border movement today in Kashmir,” Durrani claimed. “Both parties (India and Pakistan) have responsibilities. If we can’t hypothetically stop every guy from crossing over, the other side has a responsibility too, therefore it is a joint issue. It has been addressed,” he said. Durrani brushed aside as “grossly overstated” the notion that in the event of another military coup, jihadists and extremists would come to the fore.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [13 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Perv and his supporters are the only Pakistani force keeping Osama bin Laden (or worse) from running the country. Be glad it's not a democracy.
Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 || 10/07/2006 17:35 Comments || Top||


Peace deal to help curb Talibanisation
President Pervez Musharraf on Friday said the peace deal with the tribal elders was not a withdrawal from the war on terror but was part of a holistic approach in fighting terrorism and curbing Talibanisation.
“The agreement with the tribal elders does not, in anyway, show slack on the part of the government to root out the menaces of terrorism and extremism...”
“The agreement with the tribal elders does not, in anyway, show slack on the part of the government to root out the menaces of terrorism and extremism,” the president said while chairing a high-level meeting. The president directed follow-up actions to ensure the speedy development of the tribal region and the welfare of the people.

“He said it was made clear in the agreement that the government would not allow any terrorist activities in the tribal area or across the border in Afghanistan”
The meeting to review the progress of and situation in north Waziristan after the recently concluded agreement was also attended by Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz. NWFP Governor Ali Muhammad Jan Orakzai, Interior Minister Aftab Ahmad Khan Sherpao, Information Minister Muhammad Ali Durrani, Vice Chief of Army Staff General Ahsan Saleem Hayat and senior officials were also present.

The president said the peace agreement was in no way a compromise with militants but had rather been signed to marginalise them. He said it was made clear in the agreement that the government would not allow any terrorist activities in the tribal area or across the border in Afghanistan.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [3 views] Top|| File under:


Mumbai blast evidence shared with US
India has shared evidence with the US about Pakistan's alleged involvement in the July 11 Mumbai blasts. "We had discussions" on evidence and other aspects of the incident, US Ambassador to India David C Mulford told reporters while responding to questions on the serial blasts. The discussions were held after Mumbai police stated that investigation into the terror attacks had revealed involvement of Pakistan, PTI reported. He, however, refused to go into specifics. Mulford said the US and India were together in fight against terrorism and that Washington had offered its services in investigations into the Mumbai bombings, particularly in forensic examinations. “We are working with the Indian government,” he said.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [4 views] Top|| File under:


Pakistan asks UK to extradite Marree brothers
Pakistan has asked the British government to extradite Mir Ghazan Marree and Harbyar Marree, sons of Baloch nationalist leader Nawab Kher Bux Murree, Aaj television reported on Friday.

Ghazan and Harbyar have been accused of founding and funding the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), the channel reported. Ghazan is also wanted in the Justice Nawaz Bux Marree killing case. Both Ghazan and Harbyar were in the Dubai government's custody when Nawab Akbar Bugti was killed on August 26, the channel said, adding that both brothers were later released, and they flew to England on August 28.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [5 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "and the wind... cries.... Marree"

Jimi
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 1:28 Comments || Top||

#2  Trying to mop up the Baloch leadership's gene pool, are they?
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 1:51 Comments || Top||


Pakistan must do more on Taleban: US senator
KABUL - Pakistan has to do more to control its border with Afghanistan and stop Taleban insurgents organising in Pakistan where Al Qaeda leaders are also present, a US senator said on Friday. US Senator Jack Reed said Pakistan had made an ”extraordinary contribution” to the success of Operation Enduring Freedom, the US-led Afghan operation against the Taleban and their allies launched five years ago on Saturday.

“But going forward, there has to be a much more aggressive effort to control the border and prevent any suggestion that Taleban elements can freely associate and organise themselves within Pakistan,” Reed, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told a news conference. “Also, I don’t think we can lose sight of the fact there still appears to be Al Qaeda leadership elements in Pakistan and that, for us, is a continuing and constant effort to identify and pre-empt these elements,” said Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat.
I'm impressed; this is a useful, bipartisan statement from a Democrat. Don't see that much these days.
Posted by: Steve White || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [4 views] Top|| File under:

#1  trying to build donk street creds
Posted by: Captain America || 10/07/2006 1:08 Comments || Top||

#2  except he had "Turban" Durbin with him as well...
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 1:29 Comments || Top||


EU parliament head urges India to sign non-proliferation treaty
NEW DELHI, India - The president of the European Parliament on Friday urged India to sign the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, a move he said would make it easier for trade with Europe in civil nuclear technology. “We are quite concerned about proliferation,” Josep Borrell told reporters in New Delhi at the end of a seven-day visit to India.

“Of course, India and Iran are completely apart” but the European Parliament has passed a resolution asking New Delhi to sign the non-proliferation treaty, he added. “If India had signed the non-proliferation treaty cooperation would have a better framework ... our civil cooperation will be much more efficient,” he said. “Everything would be easier if India were part of this treaty.”
"And we'd make lots of money," he added softly.
India, which conducted nuclear tests in 1974 and 1998, has consistently refused to sign the treaty, calling it discriminatory.

In March, India and the United States clinched an agreement under which New Delhi would get access to previously forbidden civilian nuclear technology. India, in return, has agreed to separate its civilian and military nuclear facilities and put the former under international safeguards.
Which puts us in the driver's seat for helping the Indians develop their civilian nuclear industry. You have to think that the Euros will come around to the U.S. view on this since if they don't they'll be shut out of one of the larger developing markets for nuclear energy.
Posted by: Steve White || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [5 views] Top|| File under:

#1  France is already lining up for contracts.. EU position be damned..

Posted by: john || 10/07/2006 9:19 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Kurds show signs of seceding from Iraq
SULAIMANIYAH, Iraq - With violence bloodying Iraq, Kurds in the peaceful north have been showing signs of going their own way, raising their own flag and even hinting they could secede in a dispute over oil wealth — moves that have alarmed Shiites and Sunnis.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's visit to Kurdistan on Friday underlined American worries that Kurds may be pushing too hard too soon for autonomy powers at a time of increasing sectarian tensions.

Kurds insist they are only using the autonomous powers given to them by the constitution passed last year that laid down a federal system in Iraq. But many of those powers — particularly the division of oil wealth — remain vague.

Some Shiites are also pressing for their own autonomous region in the south, but even mere talk of federalism — amid a wave of Shiite-Sunni violence that has killed thousands this year — has raised fears of the country falling apart.

"I warn those who back federal regions," a top Sunni Arab cleric, Harith al-Obeidi, said in his prayer sermon Friday in a Baghdad mosque. "They should think about security in Baghdad before claiming that federalism will provide security for the regions. ... Federalism in its current form will lead to the division of Iraq."

Sunnis in particular worry that a breakup of the country will create strong Shiite and Kurdish regions in the south and north — where Iraq's oil wealth is concentrated — and leave Sunnis in an impoverished central zone with no resources.

Backing for independence has always been strong in the autonomous zone in Iraq's northernmost three provinces, where the majority of the country's 5 million Kurds live. They have enjoyed self-rule since 1991.

While much of the rest of Iraq has been torn by violence, Kurdistan has remained largely at peace. Sunni and Shiite Arabs who want to enter Kurdistan must go through elaborate permit procedures — still, many have flocked there seeking jobs in one of Iraq's few areas that see significant private investment.

Kurdistan's president, Massoud Barzani, sparked an outcry last month when he ordered all Iraqi flags removed from government buildings in the region and replaced with the Kurdistan flag — a green, red and white tricolor with a yellow sun.

The Kurdish flags remain in place, and Barzani refuses to raise the Iraqi one — a holdover from the rule of Saddam Hussein, who persecuted the minority Kurds and Iraq's Shiite majority — until a new national flag is created representing all of the country's communities.

Kurdish oil deals have also raised concerns in Baghdad. The Kurdistan government signed a series of agreements with foreign companies to develop new oil fields this year. Over the summer, a Canadian-Turkish consortium drilled a test well in the area of Taq Taq, between Sulaimaniyah and Irbil.

Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani said the central government would review contracts signed separately by the Kurdistan government — drawing a sharp warning from the region's prime minister, who said if Baghdad moves in on Kurdish deals it would fuel independence sentiment.

"The people of Kurdistan chose to be in a voluntary union with Iraq on the basis of the constitution," Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani said in a statement issued Sept. 28. "If Baghdad ministers refuse to abide by that constitution, the people of Kurdistan reserve the right to reconsider our choice."

At a news conference with Rice in the Kurdish city of Irbil, Barzani underlined that Kurdistan, "like any other nation, has the right to self-determination." However, he said he is committed to a "federal, democratic and pluralistic Iraq."

For her part, Rice told Barzani, "I appreciate also your important participation in the process of national reconciliation."

Kurdish officials insisted they would move ahead with developing their oil sector, arguing the constitution gives them the right to do so.

"We will continue in exploring the oil resources in Kurdistan in accordance with articles in the constitution that allow each region to exploit its resources," Kamal Kirkoukli, deputy president of the Kurdistan parliament, told The Associated Press.

But the constitution remains vague on sharing oil wealth. It calls for a fair distribution, but also gives regions a hand in developing new oil fields. Parliament has been debating legislation on dividing oil wealth, but has yet to pass a law.

Kirkoukli and other Kurdish officials dismissed worries of the Kurds pressing a bid to secede.

"This is nothing new. ... They always accuse the Kurds that they want to break up Iraq," said Saadi Ahmed Pira, the Irbil chief of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, one of the region's two main parties. "Today in the Iraqi government, there are strange voices of Arab chauvinism and they mirror the ideas of the previous Saddam government."

"The Kurds' decision not to withdraw from Iraq is not for the sake of the Sunnis," he said. "In the current political situation, the Kurds have chosen to live in a united federal Iraq."

Posted by: GolfBravoUSMC || 10/07/2006 17:57 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The only reason I can think of why they won't break off is because the US ask them not to.
Posted by: djohn66 || 10/07/2006 19:40 Comments || Top||

#2  There are some practical issues for an independent Kurdish state. For one thing, it would provoke a strong pushback from Turkey, and whatever pushback Syria and Iran could generate -- these countries have Kurdish minorities and they will want to be sure those minorities don't break away to join into a larger Kurdistan.

It matters, because Kurdistan would be landlocked and therefore dependent on is neighbors for getting oil out and other supplies in. Plus being a relatively small country bordered on ALL sides by hostile neighbors .... sucks, to say the least.
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 19:47 Comments || Top||

#3  Oil = Money

Money talks - Bullshit Walks!

If their is a Buck to be made Syria and Turkey will find an accomodation. Both need Oil and both have empty trans-shipment pipelines from Iraq.
Posted by: GolfBravoUSMC || 10/07/2006 20:30 Comments || Top||

#4  True enough. But don't underestimate how serious Turkey's military is about holding onto their Kurdish territories.
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 20:36 Comments || Top||

#5  Or that the thought hasn't occured to them that they could add Iraqi Kurdistan onto the bits they already occupy and get the oil while cutting the "middlemen" out of the equation.
Posted by: Abdominal Snowman || 10/07/2006 20:46 Comments || Top||

#6  Yup. And, they control the flow of water from the rivers.

Back in the early 90s I met a senior Turkish minister who was quite open about the fact that in the middle east, water can trump oil as the basis for power.
Posted by: lotp || 10/07/2006 20:55 Comments || Top||

#7  interesting discussion. I think that the Kurds will stay with Iraq. There are many benefits to being in a federation rather than alone. They will probably work out an arrangement for more independent rule. Our states were originally seperate entities. But I would expect from them something more like the EU should have been. The reasons to stick together are many for them and if they do, they will all be stronger and better because it will force a sort of secular rule. But so far their culture doesn't show much of a propensity to realize the benefits of working together. So who knows.
Posted by: anon || 10/07/2006 21:02 Comments || Top||

#8  If Iran is taken down, then all bets are off - I still like a chunk of northern Syria for that Med port - none of the givens today will have quite the same flavor... except maybe Turkey, it'll still be a back-stabbing schizo paranoid undeserving of any of the support it currently receives from the US (e.g. EU membership). The Generals are certainly a nuanced bunch of assholes.

The Kurds are playing the game with the wise skill of a people who've been screwed by almost everyone on the planet.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 21:22 Comments || Top||

#9  Condoleezza Rice's visit to Kurdistan on Friday underlined American worries that Kurds may be pushing too hard too soon for autonomy powers

The Kurds will take a couple more years to consolidate their hold over the provinces containing Mosul and Kirkuk (doubling the size of Kurdistan and massively increasing their oil reserves). They know this and I suspect the point of this autonomy talk is to goad the Shiias into their own autonomous region.
Posted by: phil_b || 10/07/2006 23:30 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Top Hamas official: Shalit to be freed during Ramadan
Captured IDF soldier Cpl. Gilad Shalit will be released during the month of Ramadan, in the next three weeks," estimated Ahmed Youssef, political adviser to Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh on Friday morning.
“A Nazareth newspaper reported that Hamas leaders in Damascus had set a new condition for the release of Shalit: Israel must allow Khaled Mashaal and other key Hamas figures to return to the Gaza Strip”
Meanwhile, a Nazareth newspaper reported Friday that Hamas leaders in Damascus had set a new condition for the release of Shalit - Israel must allow Khaled Mashaal and other key Hamas figures to return to the Gaza Strip.
That actually sounds like a real good idea to me. It'd put them right there, up close and personal, well within Apache range...
The Hamas leadership in Syria has agreed on principle to release Shalit in exchange for 1,000 Palestinian prisoners, according to a report that in the Arab-Israeli newspaper A-Sinara. The report, which was based on senior Arab and Palestinian sources, said the organization's leaders in Damascus would be willing to free Shalit, recognize Israel, and acknowledge previous agreements if their conditions were met. Israeli sources have yet to confirm the report.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Israel makes bigger and bigger heros out of the Paleo leadership by releasing more and more prisoners for each kidnapee. They need to make kidnapping a losing proposition for the Paleos. They also need to make it clear totheir soldiers that it doesn't pay to be captured or to get into a position where capture is the best alternative. I suspect there's a reason why we had so few POWs in GWII, and it's not just luck.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble || 10/07/2006 6:38 Comments || Top||

#2  This is all bullshit. There's no story here. None of this is going to happen.
Posted by: wxjames || 10/07/2006 13:09 Comments || Top||


Hamas calls for anti-Abbas rallies
Hamas has urged its supporters in the Gaza Strip to demonstrate on Friday in favor of the Islamic movement and against attempts by Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas to undermine the Hamas-led government. Meanwhile, sources close to Abbas said Thursday that he was planning to travel to the Gaza Strip in the next few days for additional talks with Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh on the formation of a unity government.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Get ready for some more good old blood-letting. The Pal Civil War continues its forward march.
Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden || 10/07/2006 21:01 Comments || Top||


Abbas Tells US PA Will Recognize Israel, Says Opposite on PA TV
Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas said this week he would 'fire Hamas' if the terror group won't recognize Israel,
“I do not demand of Hamas nor any other to recognize Israel, but from the government that works with Israelis in day to day life, yes...”
but sang a different tune on PA TV.

Abbas convinced U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that he is sincere in his commitment to force the PA government to formally acknowledge the Jewish State’s right to exist, said the Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) Thursday. On PA TV, however, Abbas said “It is not required of Hamas, or of Fatah, or of the Popular Front to recognize Israel.” Abbas is the head of the Fatah party and terror organization, which is currently the minority faction in the PA legislature. “I do not demand of Hamas nor any other to recognize Israel,” said Abbas in Arabic, “but from the government that works with Israelis in day to day life, yes.”
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [3 views] Top|| File under:

#1  This asshole sat at Arafat's knee for a little too long. Time to cap his ass and let them find a replacement. Abbas is of zero use to the peace process.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 0:36 Comments || Top||

#2  "let him know we know that old Arafat trick...."

/Memri.org
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 9:22 Comments || Top||

#3  Abbas convinced U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice

Oi, vey.
Posted by: gromgoru || 10/07/2006 10:21 Comments || Top||

#4  Pessimist. Don't believe everything you read, K? It'll do wonders for those ulcers.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 10:24 Comments || Top||

#5  "Abbas Tells US PA Will Recognize Israel, Says Opposite on PA TV"

There's probably a transliteration problem in the Arabic language. The words "recognize Israel" doesn't have a direct translation between English and Arabic.

[/verydeepgetboots]
Posted by: Poison Reverse || 10/07/2006 21:53 Comments || Top||

#6  Who are you? Arafat reincarnate?
Posted by: newc || 10/07/2006 23:54 Comments || Top||

#7  I thought he was killt DEAD. Like 3 or four times. He was Smited.
Posted by: newc || 10/07/2006 23:55 Comments || Top||


We will not recognise Israel: Haniya
GAZA CITY - Prime minister Ismail Haniya said on Friday that his Hamas movement would not recognise Israel but would accept a long-term truce in exchange for an independent Palestinian state with the 1967 borders.
“We will not recognise Israel. We are for the creation of a Palestinian state on the territories occupied in 1967 with Jerusalem as its capital in exchange for a truce but not recognition of Israel, which would amount to renouncing the land of our ancestors...”
“We will not recognise Israel, we will not recognise Israel, we will not recognise Israel,” Haniya thundered in a speech before tens of thousands of Hamas dupes rubes maroons fools splodydopes supporters rallying in support of his embattled Palestinian terrorist government. “We are for the creation of a Palestinian state on the territories occupied (by Israel) in 1967 with Jerusalem as its capital in exchange for a truce but not recognition of Israel, which would amount to renouncing the land of our ancestors,” he added.
In other words, he wants a two-step solution: first get a state on the '67 lands, and then, kill all the Joooz and take the rest of the land. That's known as a 'pragmatic' Paleo.
He also rejected the “diktats” imposed by the four international sponsors of the Middle East peace process. “We reject foreign interference in the affairs of the Palestinian people and the diktats of the quartet,” Haniya said.
"But we do want their money!"
Posted by: Steve White || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  No recognition of Israel: no money. The Quartet must stand fast on this issue or be prepared to watch another decade and billions more dollars swirl down the Palestinian toilet.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 0:50 Comments || Top||

#2  Candy gram for Haniya, Candy gram for Haniya....kaboom...can you recognize me now?
Posted by: Captain America || 10/07/2006 1:11 Comments || Top||

#3  Don't renounce violence and don't recognize Israel and don't keep your agreements.

All things Isreali should be cut off - jobs, money, food, fuel, electricity, water, health-care. Everything. Everything from the Satans too. Not a dime. Not a single dime.

We no longer wish to recongize "paleostine". No more "foreign interference". Die asshats.
Posted by: Thinemp Whimble2412 || 10/07/2006 10:09 Comments || Top||

#4  In other words, he wants a two-step solution: first get a state on the '67 lands, and then, kill all the Joooz and take the rest of the land. That's known as a 'pragmatic' Paleo.

My mind is blurry, but IIRC, that was the essence of the "2 States plan" designed in accord with the European Community (cf. Eurabia pact requirements) in Venice, back in 1980 I think.
Thus, the 1993 Oslo agreement was nothing short of a complete arab strategical victory, since it gave coherence to the whole "national liberation struggle" scheme they created with the soviets.
Posted by: anonymous5089 || 10/07/2006 10:16 Comments || Top||

#5  You know, at some point, we in the West admit that we are no longer interested in watching the Palestinians and their antics and just change the channel.
Posted by: RWV || 10/07/2006 12:28 Comments || Top||

#6  DAMN, I wish we still had a couple of battleships with 16-inch guns. A little "battleship diplomacy", with say, the Iowa and the Missouri lining up opposite the Gaza Strip, with a couple of cruisers and destroyers as escort. Just start tossing 16-inch shells into the Strip every three minutes. Tell HamAss that the shelling will stop as soon as Hamass surrenders - unconditionally - to the Israelis. And stand by that statement - no waffling, no "negotiations", no pity or "humanity" - just "boom", "Boom", "BOOM", every three minutes.
Posted by: Old Patriot || 10/07/2006 18:12 Comments || Top||

#7  #6 DAMN, I wish we still had a couple of battleships with 16-inch guns. A little "battleship diplomacy", with say, the Iowa and the Missouri lining up opposite the Gaza Strip, with a couple of cruisers and destroyers as escort. Just start tossing 16-inch shells into the Strip every three minutes. Tell HamAss that the shelling will stop as soon as Hamass surrenders - unconditionally - to the Israelis. And stand by that statement - no waffling, no "negotiations", no pity or "humanity" - just "boom", "Boom", "BOOM", every three minutes.

Old Patriot: That's how we used to do it, back in the days of my father and real men like you.

Today, the very word and concept of victory is treated as unseemingly as Tom Foley at a children's pajama party.
Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden || 10/07/2006 21:10 Comments || Top||

#8  Make that Mark Foley ... I had another disgraced Foley in mind.
Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden || 10/07/2006 21:13 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
Secret peace plan for Thailand's south
THAILAND'S military rulers are examining a secret peace proposal with Islamic insurgent groups in Thailand's troubled southern provinces, where violence has cost more than 1700 lives since 2004. Mahathir Mohamed, the rambunctious former prime minister of Malaysia, has revealed that he has mediated the peace proposal over 14 months of secret dialogue between Islamic insurgent leaders and Thai generals on Langkawi island and in Kuala Lumpur. He handed the process over to Thai and Malaysian officials in August.

The peace process in southern Thailand is further advanced than previously admitted, with the proposal signed by all the major insurgent groups to end the violence that has racked the three southern provinces. Although the Thai Government has changed since the proposal was drafted, Thailand's military was always more involved in the process than the Thaksin Shinawatra government. The coup leader, General Sonthi Boonyaratglin, appears committed to addressing the turmoil in the south - he cited it as one reason for grabbing power.

In an exclusive interview with the Herald, Dr Mahathir spoke for the first time about the peace plan. Significantly, there is no demand from the insurgents for independence or even autonomy, or for the local Malay language to be made an official second language in the provinces of Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat. The plan calls for an end to injustice, and focuses on the need for economic development, better educational opportunities and greater Muslim representation - up to 50 per cent - in provincial government administration. It also calls for a blanket amnesty for insurgents, the optional use of Malay in schools, and a regional body with which people can register complaints. In return, the rebels will cease all violence and surrender all arms.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  >>>
We don't mind we are Thai citizens but we are Malay.
>>>

Wanna bet this means we want sharia? Oh, we do not object to being called Thai, but we want our own system of laws=dhimmitude for Buddhists in south.

Possibly I am just cynical.
Posted by: Hupailing Ebbuns2352 || 10/07/2006 4:48 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Nasrallah rejects letters for soldiers
Hizbullah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah forbade senior Hizbullah officials last week to accept letters for kidnapped IDF reservists Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev.
“We won't take the letters for the Israelis, because doing so could be seen as proof of their fate - whether they're alive or dead. We won't give out any information at this point...”
According to a report published Friday in Yediot Aharonot, the letters had been given to Red Cross representatives along with four letters written by Hizbullah prisoners in Israeli custody. The latter were accepted by Hizbullah leader Nabil Kauk. "We won't take the letters for the Israelis, because doing so could be seen as proof of their fate - whether they're alive or dead. We won't give out any information at this point," a senior Hizbullah official said.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [6 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Killing this turd would solve so many problems. His is a prime mover and not easily replaced. Israel really needs to punch this sick fuck's ticket. I dare any of you who watched the "Obsession" video to tell me that this guy's public rantings didn't remind you exactly of Adolph Hitler.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 0:25 Comments || Top||

#2  I don't think you understand how leadership works in the Arab world Zen. An Arab leader is just somebody who runs at the head of a mob---shouting the loudest, and hoping not to be trampled.
Posted by: gromgoru || 10/07/2006 10:14 Comments || Top||

#3  Where's the ICRC thingy? Outrage? UNHRC? AI?

*crickets*

Joooo-hating agenda-driven lying MFers
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 12:34 Comments || Top||

#4  Yeah, what Frank said. *spit*

And what a genius bargaining position: Let's dicker over this horse but you can't see if it's live or dead.
Posted by: SteveS || 10/07/2006 19:59 Comments || Top||

#5  Once again, Zenster, Israel and Olmert had the chance about a few weeks ago when Nasrallah appeared on a stage before some 300,000 Hebo supporters.

The current Israeli leaderships lack balls, plain and simple. They could have smeared this asshat with a high altitude airstrike.
Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden || 10/07/2006 21:06 Comments || Top||

#6  Once again, Zenster, Israel and Olmert had the chance about a few weeks ago when Nasrallah appeared on a stage before some 300,000 Hebo supporters.

Evidently, you don't remember me having posted that they should've struck then.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 21:12 Comments || Top||

#7  I missed that one. Sorry,
Posted by: Lancasters Over Dresden || 10/07/2006 21:24 Comments || Top||

#8  No harm, no foul, LOD.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 23:51 Comments || Top||


Russia: Threats of force on Iran are unacceptable
Russia's deputy foreign minister, Alexander Alekseyev, said Friday that his country and China consider threats to use force on Iran "unacceptable." Ultimatums threatening sanctions on the Islamic Republic over its nuclear program are "counterproductive," Alekseyev said.
Posted by: Fred || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [5 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Why do you find them unacceptable Alekseyev?
Just saying unacceptable is not enough.

Posted by: 3dc || 10/07/2006 0:09 Comments || Top||

#2  Russia can go piss up a rope. Every single thing they do usually amounts to nothing more than pouring gasoline on the fire.
Posted by: Zenster || 10/07/2006 0:31 Comments || Top||

#3  Putie, again making his intentions known. Recall how joyful everyone was a few years ago when it was declared that we had "crushed" the Soviet Union? That there was a "peace dividend" to be reveled in. That we could basically disband the military, since it wouldn't be needed in the future utopia ? Har ! The bear may have been wounded, but he crawled to his den and has now regained strenth. A healthy bear is a very dangerous bear. Especially if he's a grizzly, like our "good friend" Putie.
Posted by: SpecOp35 || 10/07/2006 11:46 Comments || Top||

#4  How I would love to see Russia bite it again. Such hope and potential - betrayed and squandered.
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 11:52 Comments || Top||

#5  I think we've sealed the fate of Russia for a long time. From Latvia/Estonia, to Old Yugoslavia, to Ukraine and Georgia, not to mention the Stans and Chechnia they will not be putting any Soviet Union back together for a long time, if ever. That's what all the friction is about, that's why they try to hamstring us every chance they get. They had grand designs of putting the old Union back together and comming back in a big way. But that isn't going to happen now.
Posted by: bigjim-ky || 10/07/2006 15:07 Comments || Top||

#6  It's just a matter of time before the Siberian part of Russia becomes the northern regions of China. Russia is collapsing as a force among nations, but it will do a great deal of damage as it goes down, because of its natural resources and nuclear weapons.
Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 || 10/07/2006 17:41 Comments || Top||

#7  OK, so threats of force are out. How about some *real* force?
Posted by: SteveS || 10/07/2006 20:00 Comments || Top||


Terror Networks
Al Qaida's new generation unknown to U.S. intelligence
Posted by: .com || 10/07/2006 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Meanwhile, Pakistan has learned that the Al Qaida leader involved in the plot to blow up jetliners flying from London to the Untied States is hiding in northeastern Afghanistan and has been moving between Nuristan and Konar provinces bordering Pakistan.

I spot a pattern here, the bad guz are always over on the other side of the border

Oohhh, scary ghost qaidas juz in time for halloween.

Posted by: Captain America || 10/07/2006 1:15 Comments || Top||

#2  lotta hand-wringing cuz we don't know all the names of the "C" team. Young punks who've arisen through attrition of the hierarchy. BTW - wonder if "islamic writer Uways Bradley" is related to John R. Bradley, well known publicist writer bitch for the arabs
Posted by: Frank G || 10/07/2006 9:04 Comments || Top||

#3  They always assume that intelligence gathering is "fresh". They forget it is cumulative. We discovered a long time ago that most of the troublemakers come from the same families, and we have studiously compiled family trees and DNA.

We also know that much of the strength of terrorist organizations is in their networking. And just so happens about a decade ago, software was developed for police agencies that integrates and collates a huge number of criminals, crimes, MOs, associations, evidence, etc.

And this advanced database makes it very hard for anyone but a total lone wolf terrorist to not be identified. Every meeting with someone on the database, every purchase of supplies connected to an event, money transfers, every phone message intercept...
Posted by: Anonymoose || 10/07/2006 12:55 Comments || Top||



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Two weeks of WOT
Sat 2006-10-07
  Pakistan admits 'helping' Kashmir militancy
Fri 2006-10-06
  Islamists set up central Islamic court in Mogadishu
Thu 2006-10-05
  Fatah Threatens to Murder Hamas Leaders
Wed 2006-10-04
  Pa. man charged with trying to help al-Qaida attack refineries
Tue 2006-10-03
  Hamas Closes Paleogovernment
Mon 2006-10-02
  Ex-ISI officials may be helping Taliban
Sun 2006-10-01
  PKK declare unilateral ceasefire
Sat 2006-09-30
  NKors digging tunnel for nuke test
Fri 2006-09-29
  Al Qaeda In Iraq: 4,000 Insurgents Dead
Thu 2006-09-28
  Taliban set up office in Miranshah
Wed 2006-09-27
  Insurgent Leader Captured in Iraq
Tue 2006-09-26
  Somali Islamists seize Kismayo
Mon 2006-09-25
  Omar al-Farouq killed in Basra crossfire©
Sun 2006-09-24
  Norway detains Pak, two others
Sat 2006-09-23
  'Bin Laden is dead' claim French secret service


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