Monday, July 31, 2006

Sistani Warns U.S. Not To "Hinder" Cease Fire In Lebanon

This could be the beginning of the end for the U.S. endeavor in Iraq:

Iraq's top Shiite cleric demanded an immediate cease-fire in Lebanon, warning Sunday that the Muslim world will "not forgive" nations that stand in the way of stopping the fighting.

Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani issued the call following the Israeli airstrike that killed at least 56 Lebanese, mostly women and children, in the village of Qana. It was the deadliest attack in nearly three weeks of fighting.

"Islamic nations will not forgive the entities that hinder a cease-fire," al-Sistani said in a clear reference to the United States.


"It is not possible to stand helpless in front of this Israeli aggression on Lebanon," he added. "If an immediate cease-fire in this Israeli aggression is not imposed, dire consequences will befall the region."

As we have long discussed here, if Sistani turns the Shiites in Iraq against the occupiers, it will be "game over" for the United States' nation-building experiment in that beleaguered country.

Sunday, July 30, 2006

Sectarian Differences In Lebanon Being Transcended By Crisis

The Lebanese people -- suffering hundreds of civilian deaths from Israeli attacks -- are not reacting to the pressure in the way that was expected by the architects of the air war.

Lebanese citizens, including the Maronite Christians and Sunnis, instead of condemning Hezbollah for causing the pain that they are enduring, are increasingly supporting the Shiite political-military force that drove the Israelis out of their country in 2000.

Lebanon's politics are often oversimplistically broken down by its religious sects. They do create the outlines of public opinion, and the leaders themselves sometimes command blind loyalty. But within each grouping, there is still a great deal of diversity that transcends religious loyalties....

Followers of Christian leader Michel Aoun have been some of the most active in providing aid to displaced Shiite Muslims, coordinating with Hezbollah's own relief efforts. Across the country, nonsectarian grass-roots groups have mobilized to provide help in shows of national unity.

In cities such as Sidon, Sunni clerics have urged a jihad, or holy war, that goes beyond Hezbollah in confronting Israel, and recoil at what they see as the overly close ties of the community's leadership to the United States. "Fighting is the natural state of relations with the Zionist enemy until it is wiped out," declares a banner in a Sunni neighborhood in Sidon. There, one of the most radical of the Sunni groups, often at odds with Hezbollah, has deployed 500 activists to help resettle 8,000 displaced Shiites.

What many Americans (including U.S. government officials) do not know is that Hezbollah less like a Hamas-type Islamic fundamentalist group, but is closer to a nationalist group with goals similar to nationalist groups everywhere.

There are even Christian members of Hezbollah. I bet President Bush doesn't know that.

America's Muslim "allies" -- the Sunni states Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia --are becoming more active with a novel pan-Muslim approach.

The United States' Arab allies -- Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt -- initially blamed Hezbollah for the violence, calling its seizure of the soldiers miscalculated adventures. But a high civilian death toll, widespread destruction in Lebanon and strong popular support for Hezbollah have forced a shift in their stance....

Saudi Arabia dispatched its top diplomats to Washington to press for a cease-fire, and when that failed, issued a strongly worded statement warning of the possibility of a wider regional conflict if Israel refused to exchange Arab land for peace and relations with Arab states.

On Tuesday, the Saudi king pledged $1.5 billion to support Lebanon's economy and fund rebuilding efforts.

Jordan sent a field hospital and medical supplies to Beirut this week, and its monarch, King Abdullah, has said he would "employ all of Jordan's capabilities to reach a cease-fire" and reduce the suffering caused by the "continued Israeli aggression.

Hezbollah, emerging as the new champion of the Palestinians, has managed, for the most part, to close sectarian ranks and win the support of Sunni majorities in most Arab countries.

An energized pan-Muslim movement would be an ominous development for the United States. The only loyalty any of these countries have toward the U.S. comes from the largesse that we bestow upon Egypt and Jordan, and the business relationship with the Saudis.

The domestic political considerations of these regimes (keeping the "Arab street" pacified) will always take precedence if push comes to shove.

And with events in the region deteriorating daily, push is quickly coming to shove.

The coming week will be crucial to defusing the crisis, and with Israel reportedly needing another "two weeks" of American political cover, a timely diplomatic solution is not looking likely.

Friday, July 28, 2006

Peter W. Galbraith On The Iraq War

Peter W. Galbraith, a former U.S. ambassador, reviews four new books on the Iraq war, and begins with an anecdote of his own experience in country at the beginning of the war:

I arrived in Baghdad on April 14, 2003, as a news consultant to the ABC investigative team led by veteran correspondent Brian Ross. Before the war, Brian had broadcast a profile of Uday and one of his first stops in Baghdad was at Uday's riverside residence. In the basement of the partially looted house, Bob Baer, another ABC news consultant, made an astounding discovery, the personnel files of the Saddam Fedayeen. We were amazed that the military had not inspected or secured such an obvious location and Ross made that point in his exclusive ABC news report. ABC had no further use for the files; but they had obvious value for the US military, containing as they did the names and addresses of the main resistance to the American occupation. I had thought Ross's story would arouse some interest from the Pentagon but there was no reaction. I then called Paul Wolfowitz's office to see if I could discreetly hand them over to the military. (I was still a professor at the National War College -- and therefore an employee of the Defense Department -- and wanted to help.) Although we were staying in the Ishtar Sheraton, a hotel guarded by US troops, the deputy secretary of defense could not arrange to pick up these documents before I had to leave the city.

In the three weeks that followed Baghdad's fall, I was able to go unchallenged into sites of enormous intelligence value, including the Foreign Ministry, Uday's house, and a wiretap center right across Firdos Square from the Sheraton. All three had many sensitive documents but even weeks after the takeover, the only people to take an interest in these document caches were looters, squatters (who burned wiretap transcripts for lighting), journalists, Baathists, Iraqi factions looking for dirt on political rivals, and (possibly) agents of countries hostile to the United States. Neither the Pentagon nor the CIA had a workable plan to safeguard and exploit the vast quantities of intelligence that were available for the taking in Iraq's capital. That information might have provided insight into terrorism -- the Foreign Ministry documents included names of jihadists who had come into Iraq before the war -- and the incipient insurgency.

As we now know, Donald Rumsfeld's Pentagon had no plan to secure any part of Baghdad. It allowed looters to destroy Iraq's governmental infrastructure and to steal thousands of tons of high explosives, weapons, and radioactive materials. And it had no coherent plan for Iraq's postwar governance.

Rumsfeld gets much of the well-deserved blame for the major mistakes made early in the ill-fated endeavor:

In late 2001, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld convened a meeting in his Pentagon office to discuss the military campaign beyond Afghanistan. Lieutenant General Greg Newbold, the deputy for the Joint Chiefs of Staff responsible for operations, outlined OPLAN 1003-98, the contingency plan for invading Iraq.

As Newbold outlined the plan, which called for as many as 500,000 troops, it was clear that Rumsfeld was growing increasingly irritated. For Rumsfeld, the plan required too many troops and supplies and took far too long to execute. It was, Rumsfeld said, the product of old thinking and the embodiment of everything that was wrong with the military.

[The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard B.] Myers asked Rumsfeld how many troops he thought might be needed. The defense secretary said in exasperation that he did not see why more than 125,000 troops would be required and even that was probably too many. Rumsfeld's reaction was dutifully passed to the United States Central Command.


Men who had put their lives on the line in combat were mostly unwilling to put their careers on the line to speak out against a plan based on numbers pulled out of the air by a cranky sixty-nine-year-old.

Convinced of his own brilliance, Rumsfeld freely substituted his often hastily formed opinions for the considered judgments of his military professionals. He placed in the most senior positions compliant yes-men, like Myers, and punished those who questioned his casually formed judgments. He enjoyed belittling his subordinates. The day before the September 11 attacks, Rumsfeld told a Pentagon meeting that the Defense Department bureaucracy "disrupts the defense of the United States and places the lives of men and women in uniform at risk." His aides followed the same approach: Steve Cambone, Rumsfeld's closest aide, "jested that Rumsfeld thought the Army's problems could be solved by lining up fifty of its generals in the Pentagon and gunning them down."

Thursday, July 27, 2006

CRS Report Warns Of Problems Ahead From Conflict Between Israel And Hezbollah

The U.S. standing in the way of a cease-fire in the Israel-Hezbollah battle could lead to nasty consequences for a lot of people.

Bad as it is, the Lebanon conflict could widen and worsen the longer it goes on, U.S. congressional analysts warn in an in-depth analysis of the crisis.

Open war between Israel and Syria will grow more likely, and Lebanon's old civil-war rivalries might re-ignite, the Congressional Research Service writes. Oil prices could spike, and the U.S. homeland will have to guard against new terror threats, says the report "Israel-Hamas-Hezbollah: The Current Conflict."(pdf)

The 41-page document, to be updated periodically as events unfold, is a briefing paper for Congress members and staff on the 2-week-old war that exploded with waves of Israeli air attacks on Lebanon and Hezbollah rocket salvos falling on Israel after the Shiite Muslim militia killed three Israeli soldiers and seized two others in a cross-border raid.

More than 400 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in Lebanon thus far, and more than 40 Israelis have died, mostly soldiers.

The nonstop Israeli air and artillery bombardment appears not to have significantly reduced the arsenal of the Syrian-supported Hezbollah, since on Wednesday the Lebanese guerrillas fired one of their heaviest barrages yet, 119 rockets, into northern Israel. Syria's apparent continued resupply of Hezbollah could prove a flash point in the coming days or weeks, the congressional analysts warn.

Bamford On Neo-Con Skullduggery

Intelligence expert James Bamford takes a timely look at machinations involving the neo-con desire to expand the Lebanon war to Syria and especially--Iran.

For years, the National Security Agency had possessed the codes used by Iran to encrypt its diplomatic messages, enabling the U.S. government to eavesdrop on virtually every communication between Tehran and its embassies. After the U.S. invaded Baghdad, the NSA used the codes to listen in on details of Iran's covert operations inside Iraq. But in 2004, the agency intercepted a series of urgent messages from the Iranian embassy in Baghdad. Intelligence officials at the embassy had discovered the massive security breach -- tipped off by someone familiar with the U.S. code-breaking operation.

The blow to intelligence-gathering could not have come at a worse time. The Bush administration suspected that the Shiite government in Iran was aiding Shiite insurgents in Iraq, who were killing U.S. soldiers. The administration was also worried that Tehran was secretly developing nuclear weapons. Now, crucial intelligence that might have shed light on those operations had been cut off, potentially endangering American lives.

On May 20th, shortly after the discovery of the leak, Iraqi police backed by American soldiers raided (ally of American neo-cons, Ahmed) Chalabi's home and offices in Baghdad. The FBI suspected that Chalabi, a Shiite who had a luxurious villa in Tehran and was close to senior Iranian officials, was actually working as a spy for the Shiite government of Iran. Getting the U.S. to invade Iraq was apparently part of a plan to install a pro-Iranian Shiite government in Baghdad, with Chalabi in charge. The bureau also suspected that Chalabi's intelligence chief had furnished Iran with highly classified information on U.S. troop movements, top-secret communications, plans of the provisional government and other closely guarded material on U.S. operations in Iraq. On the night of the raid, The CBS Evening News carried an exclusive report by correspondent Lesley Stahl that the U.S. government had "rock-solid" evidence that Chalabi had been passing extremely sensitive intelligence to Iran -- evidence so sensitive that it could "get Americans killed."

The revelation shocked (convicted leaker of classified U.S. documents to the Israel lobby, Lawrence) Franklin and other members of (Rumsfeld aide, Douglas) Feith's office. If true, the allegations meant that they had just launched a war to put into power an agent of their mortal enemy, Iran. Their man -- the dissident leader who sat behind the first lady in the president's box during the State of the Union address in which Bush prepared the country for war -- appeared to have been working for Iran all along.

Franklin needed to control the damage, and fast. He was one of the very few in the government who knew that it was the NSA code-breaking information that Chalabi was suspected of passing to Iran, and that there was absolute proof that Chalabi had met with a covert Iranian agent involved in operations against the U.S. To protect those in the Pentagon working for regime change in Tehran, Franklin needed to get out a simple message: We didn't know about Chalabi's secret dealings with Iran.

Franklin decided to leak the information to a friendly contact in the media: Adam Ciralsky, a CBS producer who had been fired from the CIA, allegedly for his close ties to Israel. On May 21st, the day after CBS broadcast its exclusive report on Chalabi, Franklin phoned Ciralsky and fed him the information. As the two men talked, eavesdroppers at the FBI's Washington field office recorded the conversation.

That night, Stahl followed up her original report with "new details" -- the information leaked earlier that day by Franklin. She began, however, by making clear that she would not divulge the most explosive detail of all: the fact that Chalabi had wrecked the NSA's ability to eavesdrop on Iran. "Senior intelligence officials were stressing today that the information Ahmed Chalabi is alleged to have passed on to Iran is so seriously sensitive that the result of full disclosure would be highly damaging to U.S. security," Stahl said. "Because of that, we are not reporting the details of what exactly Chalabi is said to have compromised, at the request of U.S. officials at the highest levels. The information involves secrets that were held by only a handful of very senior intelligence officials." Thanks to the pressure from the administration, the public was prevented from learning the most damaging aspect of Chalabi's treachery.

Soon after the broadcast, David Szady's team at the FBI decided to wrap up its investigation before Franklin leaked any more information. Agents quietly confronted Franklin with the taped phone call and pressured him to cooperate in a sting operation directed at AIPAC (the American Israel Public Affairs Committee -- America's Pro-Israel Lobby) and members of Feith's team in the Pentagon. Franklin, facing a long prison sentence, agreed. On August 4th, 2005, Rosen and Weissman were indicted, and on January 20th, 2006, Franklin, who had earlier pleaded guilty, was sentenced to twelve years and seven months in prison. In an attempt to reduce his sentence, he agreed to testify against the former AIPAC officials. The case is set to go to trial this fall. (...)

The administration's National Security Strategy -- the official policy document that sets out U.S. strategic priorities -- now calls Iran the "single country" that most threatens U.S. interests.

The shift in official policy has thrilled former members of the (neo-con) cabal. To them, the war in Lebanon represents the final step in their plan to turn Iran into the next Iraq. (Michael) Ledeen, writing in the National Review on July 13th, could hardly restrain himself. "Faster, please," he urged the White House, arguing that the war should now be taken over by the U.S. military and expanded across the entire region. "The only way we are going to win this war is to bring down those regimes in Tehran and Damascus, and they are not going to fall as a result of fighting between their terrorist proxies in Gaza and Lebanon on the one hand, and Israel on the other. Only the United States can accomplish it," he concluded. "There is no other way."

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

Israeli Strike On U.N. Outpost Intentional, Annan Says

There has got to be a logical motivation for Israel to have done the following:

An Israeli airstrike hit a United Nations post in southern Lebanon late Tuesday, killing four international observers, hours after Prime Minister Ehud Olmert agreed to lift Israel's 14-day blockade of Lebanon for shipments of humanitarian aid to reach the swelling ranks of displaced Lebanese civilians.

U.N. officials said an aerial shell struck an observer post in the hilltop town of Khiyam, and rescue teams reached the site soon after to search for survivors in the rubble. Milos Strugar, a senior adviser for the mission, known by the acronym UNIFIL, said the four observers inside the post had taken cover in bunkers after 14 Israeli airstrikes landed nearby throughout the afternoon.

In a statement, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan said he was "shocked and deeply distressed by the apparently deliberate targeting" of the "clearly marked U.N. post at Khiyam." Annan said Olmert had given him "personal assurances" that U.N. posts would not be targeted, adding that the UNIFIL commander had been in "repeated contact with Israeli officers throughout the day on Tuesday, stressing the need to protect that particular U.N. position from attack."

There are two possible reasons that Israel hit the UNIFIL position.

One: That the IDF is preparing to do something in the vicinity of Khiyam that they would prefer not to have U.N. observers witness.

And/or Two: That Israel is trying to make international participation in any buffer force now being negotiated for South Lebanon an even more undesirable prospect for countries considering taking part.

Tuesday, July 25, 2006

This Duck Won't Quack

A concise description of how the United States found itself up shit's creek without a paddle in Iraq:

An after-action review from the Third Infantry Division underscores the Pentagon’s paucity of postwar planning, stating that “there was no guidance for restoring order in Baghdad, creating an interim government, hiring government and essential services employees, and ensuring that the judicial system was operational.” And an end-of-tour report by a colonel assigned to the Coalition Provisional Authority memorably summarized his office’s work as “pasting feathers together, hoping for a duck.”

Monday, July 24, 2006

Saudis Want U.S. To Restrain Israel

So much for the talking point that the other major Middle East countries are tacitly backing the U.S. approach of sitting back and letting Israel settle the score with Hezbollah.

Over the past couple of days, much has been made of the silence of Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia on the issue of the Israeli overreaction against Lebanon.

Administration apologists pointed to the Sunni/Shia schism as the reason why our less than democratic "friends" in the region have not objected, even diplomatically, to the pain being inflicted upon their fellow Muslims.

Yesterday, our important "ally" Saudi Arabia made their opinion known at the highest level:

The Saudi foreign minister personally urged President Bush yesterday to intervene to stop the violence in Lebanon, the most direct sign of mounting frustration among key Arab states with what they see as a hands-off U.S. posture toward Israeli strikes against Hezbollah.

In an Oval Office meeting yesterday afternoon, Prince Saud al-Faisal said, he delivered a letter to Bush from Saudi King Abdullah asking for U.S. help in arranging an immediate cease-fire, a stance U.S. officials have repeatedly rejected on the grounds that it is premature. U.S. officials would not comment directly on the request, saying only that the two sides discussed the humanitarian situation, reconstruction and how to end the violence.

This morning's detour by Secretary of State Rice to Beirut was likely motivated, at least in part, by a new found wish to appear more evenhanded in our diplomatic approach to the crisis.

The Saudi request for a cease-fire promised to further complicate an already difficult diplomatic mission for Rice, who departed for meetings in Israel and Italy last night after joining Bush in conferring with the Saudi delegation. The United States had been hoping to enlist moderate Arab allies in an effort to pressure Syria and Iran to rein in Hezbollah, but the Saudi move yesterday seemed to cloud that initiative. (...)

One senior European diplomat said the Saudis were also concerned that the package they expect the United States to present to European and Arab allies in Rome this week will be too heavily anti-Iran and anti-Syria.

Also, Jordan is said to be concerned about the mostly Shiite refugees from the Iraq war who now reside in their nation. There are approximately a million Iraqis in Jordan who probably are not too happy with the events in Lebanon. Jordan does not want to appear to be overly acquiescent towards the accommodating attitude being shown by the U.S. toward Israel.

A major potential threat at this juncture is the Shiite majority in occupied Iraq. If Ayatollah Sistani decides that the suffering of his Shiite brothers in Lebanon has reached an intolerable point, he can easily turn his amenable followers against the U.S. occupation. If the vulnerable American logistical lines from Kuwait were to be disrupted by the Shiites who dominate the South of Iraq, the U.S. endeavor there would be brought to a rapid (unsuccessful) conclusion.

Saturday, July 22, 2006

Iraq To Syria WMD Transfer Shown To Be Mythical

The hard core denialists who continue to support the administration's WMD rationale for going to war with Iraq have lost another talking point.

After the specter of Iraq's active WMD programs was proved to be illusory, warmongering apologists have been making the claim that Saddam transferred his WMD to Syria. This was a claim that was impossible for observers to refute at the time due to the frosty relationship between Syria and the United States.

One country, however, would have made it their business to get to the truth of the matter.

This country is considered to have the best intelligence of anyone on the capabilities and intentions of its enemies in the Middle East.

The country, of course, is Israel.

The Baskervillian hound that is not barking in this case is the complete lack of reports of Israeli civilians donning their ubiquitous gas masks when they have sought refuge in bomb shelters from the rocket attacks of Hezbollah.

Syria and Iran are being touted as being behind the actions of Hezbollah.

Unlike in the opening days of both the 1991 and 2003 U.S. attacks on Iraq, the Israeli government has not instructed their citizens to make use of their protections (safe rooms, gas masks, etc.) against WMD.

This means that Israel does not believe that Iraq transferred its WMD to Syria.

QED

Friday, July 21, 2006

State Secrets Privilege Wont Fly On ATT/NSA Case, Judge Rules

The government's attempted use of the state secrets privilege has been rejected in the first civil challenge to the NSA extra-legal warrantless eavesdropping program.

In a landmark ruling Thursday, a federal judge forcefully refused to dismiss a civil liberties group's lawsuit against AT&T for its alleged complicity in widespread warrantless government surveillance, despite the government's argument that the suit could reveal state secrets -- a rarely used claim that nearly always terminates a lawsuit.

In a 72-page written ruling (.pdf), U.S. District Court Chief Judge Vaughn Walker rejected the government's argument that merely allowing the case to proceed would cause critical harm to U.S. national security.

The decision marks a significant victory for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and puts a rare limitation on the reach of the president's "state secrets privilege" to sweep alleged illegal government activities under the cloak of national security. (...)

"Dismissing this case at the outset would sacrifice liberty for no apparent enhancement of security," Walker wrote. (...)

Under Thursday's ruling, the lawsuit will continue, allowing the San Francisco-based EFF to begin obtaining documents through discovery from AT&T.

In a legally unprecedented move, the judge also wants to appoint an outside expert with a high-level clearance who can review such evidence to evaluate whether its release would compromise national security.

Walker also denied AT&T's motions to dismiss the case on the grounds that the plaintiffs can't prove they were monitored by the program, and that the company can't be sued for helping the government in good faith. (...)

In addition to denying the government's motion to dismiss, Walker's decision also allows AT&T to reveal whether or not the U.S. attorney general provided the company with a letter directing it to cooperate in wiretapping its customers, which could provide the company with a defense against the EFF's lawsuit under federal wiretapping law.

"If the government's public disclosures have been truthful, revealing whether AT&T has received a certification to assist in monitoring communication content should not reveal any new information that would assist a terrorist and adversely affect national security," Walker wrote. "And if the government has not been truthful, the state secrets privilege should not serve as a shield for its false public statements." (...)

Recognizing that his ruling would be controversial, the judge is allowing both AT&T and the government to immediately appeal his ruling to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The case is Hepting v. AT&T Corp.

Thursday, July 20, 2006

Iraqi PM Denounces Israeli Overreaction, GOP Lawmakers Distance Selves From Bush's Iraq Policy

This will only surprise people who mistakenly believe that the U.S. intervention in Iraq was a good idea.

Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki of Iraq on Wednesday forcefully denounced the Israeli attacks on Lebanon, marking a sharp break with President Bush's position and highlighting the growing power of a Shiite Muslim identity across the Middle East.
"The Israeli attacks and airstrikes are completely destroying Lebanon's infrastructure," Mr. Maliki said at an afternoon news conference inside the fortified Green Zone, which houses the American Embassy and the seat of the Iraqi government. "I condemn these aggressions and call on the Arab League foreign ministers' meeting in Cairo to take quick action to stop these aggressions. We call on the world to take quick stands to stop the Israeli aggression."

The American Embassy did not provide an immediate response.

No kidding. Maliki is the same person who Bush met with and publicly endorsed in Baghdad last month.

Meanwhile, some Republicans (albeit not the hardcore denialists-yet) are beginning to put some room between themselves and the Bush administration over the quagmire in Iraq.

Faced with almost daily reports of sectarian carnage in Iraq, congressional Republicans are shifting their message on the war from speaking optimistically of progress to acknowledging the difficulty of the mission and pointing up mistakes in planning and execution.

Rep. Christopher Shays (Conn.) is using his House Government Reform subcommittee on national security to vent criticism of the White House's war strategy and new estimates of the monetary cost of the war. Rep. Gil Gutknecht (Minn.), once a strong supporter of the war, returned from Iraq this week declaring that conditions in Baghdad were far worse "than we'd been led to believe" and urging that troop withdrawals begin immediately. (...)

The shift is subtle, but Republican lawmakers acknowledge that it is no longer tenable to say the news media are ignoring the good news in Iraq and painting an unfair picture of the war. In the first half of this year, 4,338 Iraqi civilians died violent deaths, according to a new report by the U.N. Assistance Mission for Iraq. Last month alone, 3,149 civilians were killed -- an average of more than 100 a day.

"It's like after Katrina, when the secretary of homeland security was saying all those people weren't really stranded when we were all watching it on TV," said Rep. Patrick T. McHenry (R-N.C.). "I still hear about that. We can't look like we won't face reality."

Said Gutknecht: "Essentially what the White House is saying is 'Stay the course, stay the course.' I don't think that course is politically sustainable." (...)

Republicans and some conservative Democrats who have backed the president's call to stay the course are finding it increasingly difficult to square their generally optimistic rhetoric with the grim situation on the ground in Baghdad and other cities. (...)

"The Iraq issue is the lens through which people are looking at the federal government," said Rep. Charles W. Dent (Pa.), another swing-district Republican. "That is the issue to most people. There's no question about that."

To pretend the war is resolving itself nicely is no longer an option, he said.

Wednesday, July 19, 2006

In For A Dime, In For A Dollar

Everything is falling into place perfectly:

In blunt language, President Bush yesterday endorsed Israel's campaign to cripple or eliminate Hezbollah, charged that Syria is trying to reassert control of Lebanon, and called for the isolation of Iran. (...)

(T)he administration is scrambling to develop a strategy to deal with the crisis. Despite unity at the G-8, U.S. officials said that a lot of ideas have been offered without details or feasibility assessments.

"What we have to do before we launch anyone at a target is understand the mission," a senior U.S. official said.

The Bush administration has failed to understand any of its political-military missions since at least late 2002, why bother to start now?

The idea that Israel will be able to militarily defeat Hezbollah--which is well-practiced in guerilla warfare--strikes professionals as something less than plausible:

Some U.S. and European military and intelligence officials said yesterday that they were puzzled by Israel's strategy and concerned that its goals are unrealistic or too ambitious.

Israel has "target packages" but no viable long-term strategy, a senior U.S. official said, speaking anonymously because he was criticizing an ally. There is limited reason to believe that either Hezbollah or Hamas can be compelled to give up their Israeli prisoners or end the attacks.

Others questioned the impact on the Lebanese government and the very military force Israel hopes will eventually take over the areas now under Hezbollah's control.

"Won't Israeli military actions have the effect of decreasing the already limited capacities of the Lebanese government?" asked retired Army Col. Andrew Bacevich, who teaches at Boston University. "Going after Hezbollah makes sense, but I just don't understand the rationale for the campaign as it is being conducted."

Israel calling for the Lebanese army to step up and displace Hezbollah in South Lebanon while simultaneously striking Lebanese military bases from the air is disingenuous in the extreme.

In Kfar Chima, a Lebanese army base took a direct hit as troops rushed to bomb shelters, killing at least 11 Lebanese soldiers and wounding 35, the military said. Black fires stained nearby cinder-block tenements, and charred, twisted fenders, engine blocks and debris were scattered along the highway overlooking the base.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has said that Israel wants the Lebanese army to deploy to the border, now under the effective control of Hezbollah, but on several occasions, Israeli aircraft have targeted Lebanese military installations.

Security professionals are convinced that the military track by Israel will need to be supplanted by a political track:

(Michael Oren, a senior fellow at the Shalem Center, an academic research organization), who was with one of the first Israeli army units to enter Beirut in the 1982 Lebanon invasion, said Hezbollah's longer-range arsenal signals that "the whole notion of territorial depth is losing meaning. Clearly the issue here is a political and diplomatic solution. There is no military solution."

"In order to get rid of rockets, you have to occupy the territory," said Zeev Schiff, the longtime military affairs correspondent for the Israeli daily Haaretz who co-wrote the definitive account of the Lebanon war. "If you took south Lebanon, you might solve the short-range rockets. Then, people will tell you, Hezbollah will just find longer-range missiles. So do you occupy northern Lebanon? So it goes."

The U.S. plans to send Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to the region, but there are some practical limitations (mostly self-inflicted):

"Since she cannot speak to Hezbollah, she cannot speak to Hamas, she cannot speak to the Syrians, she cannot speak to the Iranians, that leaves only Israel and, what, Lebanon?" Agence France-Presse reporter Sylvie Lanteaume asked Assistant Secretary of State Sean McCormack . "She cannot go to Lebanon if there is no cease-fire, and you don't call [for] a cease-fire. So what is she going to do there?"

"We're going to keep you up to date on her itinerary and the timing of her travel, Sylvie," McCormack said.

Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Americans Being Forced To Sign Blank Promissary Notes To Be Evacuated From Lebanon

Americans who have been stranded in war-torn Lebanon have been grumbling for several days about the delay by the U.S. government in arranging for their evacuation.

European countries have been getting their citizens out more promptly.

It turns out that the evacuation of Americans--unlike the Europeans--is to be a remunerative operation.

Unlike the US, the British government is not charging its citizens for the evacuation. Americans in Beirut are complaining that they have been asked to sign forms agreeing in advance to pay unspecified sums to cover the cost of their evacuation. Some said they had been told they will not be allowed to use their passports again until they pay.

One of the prospective evacuees said on CBS Radio that he will be sending the bill to Israel.

It is likely that the delay in arranging transport for the stranded Americans was to allow time for a U.S. government contractor to sub-out the leasing of an appropriate cruise ship in order to turn a fast buck amidst the chaos of the hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah.

Milo Minderbinder would have done the same thing.

Monday, July 17, 2006

Media's Support For Israel Intended To Convince Americans That Wider War Is Necessary

There is some dispute in the American media over who is to blame for the escalation of events on the Israel-Lebanon border.

Some would say that the American people are being propagandized.

Two op-ed pieces in today's Washington Post perfectly lay out the battle lines in this skirmish in the information war.

Here is Sebastian Mallaby's take on what happened:

Lebanon-based Hezbollah terrorists shower rockets on Northern Israel and carry out a raid that inflicts eight deaths and two abductions. Israel justifiably responds by bombing the headquarters of the Hezbollah leader, but it also rains fire on Beirut's airport, roads and apartment towers, destroying the props of a new and hopeful Lebanon.

Mallaby indicates here that Israel acted militarily only after Hezbollah rained missiles down on Israel and attacked on the ground.

It didn't happen that way.

Fawaz A. Gerges describes the events in a more accurate order:

The latest round of fighting erupted when Hezbollah, or Party of God, a Shiite resistance group (the United States considers Hezbollah a terrorist organization), infiltrated the Lebanese-Israeli border and attacked an Israeli military post. Hezbollah fighters killed three Israeli soldiers and captured two.

Israel retaliated by attacking Lebanon's civilian infrastructure, including airports, bridges, seaports, electrical and water plants, communications centers, highways and other targets. It also imposed a full blockade on Lebanon by air, land and sea and sealed it from the rest of the world. More than 100 Lebanese civilians have died, and the numbers are increasing by the hour. Hezbollah struck back by firing rockets deep into northern Israel, hitting the port of Haifa and killing and wounding dozens of civilians and soldiers.

These two op-ed pieces adjoined each other on the same page. The Post here encourages the reader to select the version of the facts that best suits one's outlook.

Strict adherence to the truth is optional these days. Israel's disproportional response to the capture of the two soldiers has to be portrayed as justified.

Otherwise, the American people will not as readily support taking the war to Syria and Iran.

Saturday, July 15, 2006

Intentional Provocation?

Israel's disproportional response to Hezbollah's capture of two Israeli soldiers on the border of Lebanon is looking more and more like a deliberate attempt to inflame the Muslim world, especially Iran.

The Israeli goal of having the United States deal militarily with Iran had been increasingly unfeasible due to the quagmire in Iraq and the U.S. joining the Europeans in seeking a diplomatic solution to the Iranian nuclear question.

Something needed to be done.

Israel has been the victim of countless attacks against their civilians over the years. Interesting is the timing of the response this time to an attack upon, not civilians, but uniformed soldiers.

The media in the United States is now repeating the questionable claim that Syria and Iran have "ordered" the Hezbollah actions on Israel's northern border. That's like saying that the U.S. -- the longtime supporter of Israel -- "ordered" Israel to unleash its fury upon Lebanon.

Another claim is that Hezbollah is attempting to take the Israeli prisoners to Iran.

Anything to ratchet up the American people to support any action Israel finds necessary.

The heavy emphasis upon Israeli casualties and downplaying of the larger number of Lebanese civilians killed and wounded is another tell as to the deeper agenda in this crisis.

President Bush's refusal to speak directly to Israeli President Olmert and our insistence upon "not telling Israel how to defend their country" is yet another giveaway. The United States has repeatedly over the years gotten Israel on the horn and instructed them to cut the counterproductive shit. Not this time, despite the (probably inaccurate) reports that Secretary of State Rice urged Israeli restraint and was told to "back off."

It is certainly not in the interests of the United States to have the Lebanese government, one of the two posterboys for Bush's democratization of the Middle-East (Iraq being the other), fall due to the Israeli attacks upon their infrastructure.

The neo-cons in power in Washington have interests that do not entirely coincide with the national interests of the United States. They are the ones who will make the most out of the current crisis involving Israel and its neighbors.

Watch for information operations that present compelling rationales for the necessity of widening the war to Syria and/or Iran.

With the midterm elections coming up, the timing couldn't be any better.

Friday, July 14, 2006

Specter Goes To Bat Again For National Security State

Sen. Arlen "Magic Bullet" Specter, in his fifth decade of defending the prerogatives of the national security state, has come through big time for the Bush administration.

A deal negotiated between the White House and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) came with conditions. Bush is insisting that Congress first give him new leeway in some areas of surveillance and that all lawsuits challenging his eavesdropping policy be funneled to a Washington-based intelligence court that operates in secret.

Following the Supreme Court Hamdan ruling, the implications of which eliminated the two legal rationales (AUMF and Article II) the administration had relied entirely upon in claiming that the extra-legal warrantless NSA domestic spying programs were legal, Bush really needs legislative cover. Marty Lederman points to many problems with the Specter bill, one of which is:

5. Just in case any individuals were actually to challenge the legality of particular surveillance, the Specter bill would permit the AG to transfer all such cases to the FISA court if the AG swears under oath that our national security would be harmed by keeping the case in ordinary courts. In the FISA court proceedings, the court would not be able to require disclosure of any "national security information" to anyone. And get this: The FISA court and FISA Court of Review "may dismiss a challenge to the legality of an electronic surveillance program for any reason." (Because it's Thursday? Or the judge doesn't like the looks of you? Can you imagine the conversation in the Vice President's Office on this one? "OK guys. We've eliminated FISA. Resurrected unlimited Executive power even after Hamdan. Made Specter's beloved 'FISA Court review' voluntary and pursuant to a standard that amounts to nothing. Shifted all litigation challenging our conduct to the FISA court, where all the evidence is off limits to the plaintiffs. Anyone else got anything they've been wanting? Come on, use your imagination . . . ." "Hey, I've got an idea!: Let's give the FISA courts the power to dismiss challenges to the Executive branch for any reason." "Yeah, that's the ticket!")

The administration's flagrant evasion of FISA needs to be brought to the Supreme Court, not covered up by an acquiescent Republican-controlled congress.

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

DHS Determines Unspecified "Beach at End of a Street" To Be Likely Terror Target

Chickenshit nation is revealed in all it's glory:

It reads like a tally of terrorist targets that a child might have written: Old MacDonald's Petting Zoo, the Amish Country Popcorn factory, the Mule Day Parade, the Sweetwater Flea Market and an unspecified "Beach at End of a Street."

But the inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security, in a report released Tuesday, found that the list was not child's play: all these "unusual or out-of-place" sites "whose criticality is not readily apparent" are inexplicably included in the federal antiterrorism database.

The National Asset Database, as it is known, is so flawed, the inspector general found, that as of January, Indiana, with 8,591 potential terrorist targets, had 50 percent more listed sites than New York (5,687) and more than twice as many as California (3,212), ranking the state the most target-rich place in the nation.

The database is used by the Homeland Security Department to help divvy up the hundreds of millions of dollars in antiterrorism grants each year, including the program announced in May that cut money to New York City and Washington by 40 percent, while significantly increasing spending for cities including Louisville, Ky., and Omaha....

In addition to the petting zoo, in Woodville, Ala., and the Mule Day Parade in Columbia, Tenn., the auditors questioned many entries, including "Nix's Check Cashing," "Mall at Sears," "Ice Cream Parlor," "Tackle Shop," "Donut Shop," "Anti-Cruelty Society" and "Bean Fest." ...

"The presence of large numbers of out-of-place assets taints the credibility of the data," the report says.

Tuesday, July 11, 2006

Pentagon To Now Treat All Detainees In Accordance With Geneva Conventions

Any normal country would have been doing this all along.

In a sweeping change of policy, the Pentagon has decided that it will treat all detainees in compliance with the minimum standards spelled out in the Geneva conventions, a senior defense official said today.

The new policy comes on the heels of a Supreme Court ruling last month invalidating a system of military tribunals the Pentagon had created to try suspected terrorists, and just before Congress takes up the question of a replacement system in a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing today.

As part of its decision, the court found that a key provision of the Geneva conventions, known as Common Article 3, did apply to terror suspects, contradicting the position taken by the Bush administration.

The White House has now made it official:

The decision, announced by White House spokesman Tony Snow this morning, according to wire service reports, comes in the wake of a landmark June Supreme Court ruling rejecting the administration's persistent argument that the Geneva Conventions did not apply....

Prior to the Supreme Court's 5-3 decision in the case of Guantanamo detainee Salim Hamdan, the government had argued that while it was observing the principles of the Geneva Conventions, they did not apply as a matter of law to those it terms "enemy combatants" because they are not under the command of a government signatory to the Conventions.

The court rejected that position, saying Common Article 3 applied to those seized as part of a conflict within the borders of any signatory nation, such as Afghanistan, whether or not they are under the command of a government.

Monday, July 10, 2006

SAIC May Have Exceeded It's Competence

If The Peter Principle can be applied to corporations, then SAIC may be a prime example.

In 1997, William Black, a decorated NSA manager who spent almost 40 years at the agency, retired and became a vice president at SAIC. According to Black's official NSA biography, his expertise lay in "building new organizations and creating new ways of doing business."

In the late 1990s, that's just what SAIC was hoping to do. The company hired Black "for the sole purpose of soliciting NSA business," said Matthew Aid, an intelligence historian who is writing a three-volume history of the agency.

In March 1999, Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden became the NSA's director. Almost immediately, talk began circulating publicly about a massive contract to outsource the agency's data centers, personal computers, telecommunications, and other administrative systems under a program known as "Groundbreaker." SAIC didn't plan to compete for a lead spot in the contract but indicated that it would pursue subcontracting opportunities.

The company would not stay in supporting roles for long, however. Amid the first hints of Groundbreaker, the NSA began another program, called "Trailblazer," to manage its enormous daily catch of intelligence. In 2000, Hayden called Black back to the agency to be his second-in-command.

Two years later SAIC won the Trailblazer contract; Black was in charge of managing the program. "SAIC had made its living acting as a subcontractor on a lot of NSA contracts," Aid said. "Then, under Bill Black, they got promoted to the big leagues." ...

For big projects like the NSA's Trailblazer, a company needs to have depth of experience in managing many different pieces of business and integrating them into a whole. If that was something SAIC truly lacked, it would show.

Trailblazer was an abysmal failure. After more than $1.2 billion in development costs, the agency and SAIC have practically nothing to show for their efforts and have effectively abandoned years of work. The effort "has resulted in little more than detailed schematic drawings filling almost an entire wall," according to The Baltimore Sun, which published an exhaustive account of the Trailblazer fiasco, and SAIC's role in it, in January.

Ultimately, the entrepreneurial idea shop appears to have gotten in over its head. SAIC "did not provide enough people with the technical or management skills to produce such a sophisticated system" and "did not say no when the NSA made unrealistic demands," The Sun reported, citing numerous intelligence and industry officials.

Trailblazer was not SAIC's only setback. It tried in vain to build an electronic case-management system, known as the "Virtual Case File," for the FBI. After what observers and participants described as frequent management failures and a lack of organization -- at the bureau and at the company -- the program was scrapped last year. The FBI had spent more than $100 million.

SAIC was also tapped in 2003, after the invasion of Iraq, to set up a U.S.-friendly television network in Baghdad, which officials hoped to use for messages and stories about reconstruction. SAIC was supposed to train local journalists and set up a newspaper, but the work fell apart amid criticism that the company was producing an amateurish product that did little to get word of U.S. efforts to the Iraqi public.

The Pentagon replaced SAIC in January 2004 with another contractor. "They were clueless as to how to run a media network," (ex-chief U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq--David) Kay said. "It was horribly directed. It shouldn't have been done."

All large companies eventually hit obstacles, some of which are more spectacular than others. But when contractors fail, it's usually not because of a lack of experience in a given area. SAIC's case is troubling, observers say, because it arguably shouldn't have gotten some jobs in the first place.

Sunday, July 09, 2006

Medical Personnel Enabled Prisoner Abuse In "War On Terror"

A new study indicates that medical personnel assigned to Guantanamo and to the U.S. military prison system in Iraq and Afghanistan have been used to facilitate abuse of prisoners.

Dr. Steven H. Miles writes in today's Washington Post:

Based on my review of tens of thousands of pages of declassified government documents, congressional testimony, press accounts and reports by human rights organizations, the answer is clear: Many armed forces physicians, nurses and medics have been passive and active partners in the systematic neglect and abuse of prisoners. At facilities in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the United States often failed to provide prisoners with minimally adequate medical and health systems. Some physicians and psychologists provided information that was used to determine the harshness of physically and psychologically abusive interrogations, which were then monitored by health professionals. Some doctors responsible for the medical records of detainees omitted evidence of abuse from their official reports. Medical personnel who knew of this system of neglect, abuse and torture remained silent....

In November 2002, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld appointed a working group to develop an interrogation policy for the prison at Guantanamo Bay. Upon receiving the working group's reports, Rumsfeld approved techniques such as isolation, interrogation for 20 hours, deprivation of light and sound and the use of loud sounds, as well as "manipulation of the detainees' emotions and weaknesses."

But his April 2003 directive also proposed three roles for medical professionals in interrogations. First, "the use of isolation as an interrogation technique requires detailed implementation instructions, including . . . medical and psychological review." Second, application of such interrogation methods was contingent on the detainee being "medically and operationally evaluated as suitable." Third, the interrogations required "the presence or availability of qualified medical personnel." ...

In December 2002, Rumsfeld empowered Guantanamo Bay interrogators to deny a prisoner's "medical visits of a non-emergent nature." Although he later revoked the order on advice of legal counsel, the practice of punitive denial of treatment apparently continued throughout the prison system.

In Iraq, Army investigators reviewed a video showing a prisoner with bound wrists lying on the ground near a checkpoint. Entry and exit gunshot wounds are visible. While the soldiers discuss whether to summon medical care, one soldier tells the moaning prisoner to "shut up" and kicks him in the face or upper chest, according to the report of an Army criminal investigation. A soldier who was present during the videotaping later joked that they "weren't in any hurry to call the medics," adding that he "thought the dude eventually died." ...

An FBI memo tells of a prisoner, arrested in Afghanistan, who was denied treatment for a gunshot wound and was tortured for at least three days before being taken to a hospital.

The above examples are only two of many detailed in the article.

Dr. Miles concludes that the medical complicity in the U.S. runs facilities is akin to the methods used in Argentina and Chile's "Dirty Wars" of the 1970's.

"(T)he torture physicians of Argentina and Chile simply went to work in the prisons. They did what was asked of them and did not report what they saw."

Hoekstra Told Bush That Keeping Some Intelligence Programs From Congress May Be Illegal

Rep. Peter Hoekstra, the Republican head of the House Intelligence Committee, discovered some spy programs that had been kept secret from the appropriate congressional panels. Hoekstra--a strong ally of the White House--was concerned enough that he warned President Bush by letter that this may amount to a violation of law.

The letter from Representative Peter Hoekstra of Michigan ... did not specify the intelligence activities that he believed had been hidden from Congress.

But Mr. Hoekstra, who was briefed on and supported the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance program and the Treasury Department's tracking of international banking transactions, clearly was referring to programs that have not been publicly revealed...

A copy of the four-page letter dated May 18, which has not been previously disclosed, was obtained by The New York Times.

"I have learned of some alleged intelligence community activities about which our committee has not been briefed," Mr. Hoesktra wrote. "If these allegations are true, they may represent a breach of responsibility by the administration, a violation of the law, and, just as importantly, a direct affront to me and the members of this committee who have so ardently supported efforts to collect information on our enemies."

He added: "The U.S. Congress simply should not have to play Twenty Questions to get the information that it deserves under our Constitution." ...

A spokesman for Mr. Hoekstra, Jamal D. Ware, said he could not discuss the activities allegedly withheld from Congress. But he said that Mr. Hoekstra remained adamant that no intelligence programs could be hidden from oversight committees....

Mr. Hoekstra's blunt letter is evidence of a rift between the White House and House Republican leaders over the administration's perceived indifference to Congressional oversight and input on intelligence matters. Mr. Hoekstra wrote that he had shared his complaints with House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, Republican of Illinois, and that the speaker "concurs with my concerns." ...

"I think the executive branch has been insufficiently forthcoming on a number of important programs," Representative Heather A. Wilson, Republican of New Mexico, said in an interview. She would not discuss any programs on which the committee had not been briefed, but she said that in the Bush administration, "there's a presumption that if they don't tell anybody, a problem may get better or it will solve itself." ...

American intelligence agencies routinely conduct many secret programs, but under the National Security Act, the agencies are required to keep the Congressional intelligence committees "fully and currently informed of all intelligence activities." Even in the case of especially sensitive covert actions, the law requires briefings for at least the leaders from both parties of the committees and the House and Senate....

(T)he assertion that other intelligence activities had been hidden from Congress is particularly surprising coming from Mr. Hoekstra, who defended the administration's limited briefings on the N.S.A. program against Democratic criticism.

Hoekstra's Letter to Bush (pdf)

One really has to wonder what kind of secret programs could be underway which could be so egregious that even Rep. Hoekstra would find them objectionable.

Saturday, July 08, 2006

Gen. Casey Receives Bargewell Report On Haditha Killings

The report by Major General Eldon A. Bargewell on the killings of civilians by marines at Haditha has been delivered (with additions by Lt. Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli) to Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top commander in Iraq.

A U.S. military report passed to the commander in Iraq on Friday found Marine officers failed to respond properly to conflicting reports of the killings of up to 24 Iraqi civilians in Haditha last year, an official said...

A separate murder inquiry is looking at the conduct of the Marines present on the ground during the events of November 19.

The report submitted to General George Casey found failings in the "command environment" of the 2nd Marine Division after evidence appeared that 15 of those killed did not die in a bomb attack as the unit said in a statement a day after the events...

The report is ... principally an administrative review of the procedures following the killings -- notably how far they were deliberately covered up -- and is unlikely to lead to criminal proceedings. A separate criminal investigation is under way that officials say is likely to lead to murder charges...

The military official said it was Chiarelli's goal to make public the report's findings as soon as possible, possibly over the next week, with the goal of "full and total disclosure."

With criminal inquiries continuing, elements of the report would be censored for publication, but the essence of its findings would be made available.

(Note: The Washington Post says Sunday that only a redacted version of Chiarelli's "Findings and Recommendations" will be released to the public, not a censored version of the Bargewell report.)

The probe is one of a series into alleged misconduct by U.S. troops in Iraq. The Haditha case in particular has drawn comparisons with the 1968 My Lai massacre in Vietnam.

The Marine Corps has instructed commanders to retain documents related to the killing of Iraqi civilians both in Haditha and Hamdania, both in western Anbar province, because Congress will likely hold hearings and request the information, according to a memo obtained by Reuters.

The July 6 memo instructs all commanders to retain and preserve documents and e-mail messages related to those incidents, "their planning, execution and subsequent reporting and any documents referring to any aspect of them."

"The alleged events at Haditha and Hamdania have generated intense interest both in the media and Congress," the memo stated. "We can reasonably anticipate that Congress will hold hearings regarding those events and will request the production of records that pertain to them."

Friday, July 07, 2006

Pentagon Turning Blind Eye To Neo-Nazis and Skinheads Who Enlist , Report Says

The U.S. military has been increasingly resourceful in finding recruits who are willing to go into combat to administer the policies of the Bush administration.

A decade after the Pentagon declared a zero-tolerance policy for racist hate groups, recruiting shortfalls caused by the war in Iraq have allowed "large numbers of neo-Nazis and skinhead extremists" to infiltrate the military, according to a watchdog organization.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks racist and right-wing militia groups, estimated that the numbers could run into the thousands, citing interviews with Defense Department investigators and reports and postings on racist Web sites and magazines.

"We've got Aryan Nations graffiti in Baghdad," the group quoted a Defense Department investigator as saying in a report to be posted today on its Web site, www.splcenter.org. "That's a problem." ...

The report said that neo-Nazi groups like the National Alliance, whose founder, William Pierce, wrote "The Turner Diaries," the novel that was the inspiration and blueprint for Timothy J. McVeigh's bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building, sought to enroll followers in the Army to get training for a race war.

The groups are being abetted, the report said, by pressure on recruiters, particularly for the Army, to meet quotas that are more difficult to reach because of the growing unpopularity of the war in Iraq.

The report quotes Scott Barfield, a Defense Department investigator, saying, "Recruiters are knowingly allowing neo-Nazis and white supremacists to join the armed forces, and commanders don't remove them from the military even after we positively identify them as extremists or gang members."

Mr. Barfield said Army recruiters struggled last year to meet goals. "They don't want to make a big deal again about neo-Nazis in the military," he said, "because then parents who are already worried about their kids signing up and dying in Iraq are going to be even more reluctant about their kids enlisting if they feel they'll be exposed to gangs and white supremacists."

The 1996 crackdown on extremists came after revelations that Mr. McVeigh had espoused far-right ideas when he was in the Army and recruited two fellow soldiers to aid his bomb plot. Those revelations were followed by a furor that developed when three white paratroopers were convicted of the random slaying of a black couple in order to win tattoos and 19 others were discharged for participating in neo-Nazi activities...

(T)he report said Mr. Barfield, who is based at Fort Lewis, Wash., had said that he had provided evidence on 320 extremists there in the past year, but that only two had been discharged. He also said there was an online network of neo-Nazis...

An article in the National Alliance magazine Resistance urged skinheads to join the Army and insist on being assigned to light infantry units.

Thursday, July 06, 2006

Cyber Czar Position Still Unfilled

The Department of Homeland Security hasn't bothered to fill the congressionally mandated position of cyber security "czar."

(Homeland Security Department Secretary Michael) Chertoff made the announcement as part of a six-point agenda July 13, 2005, which identified elevating the position to an assistant Cabinet-level post as part of an overall strategy to "ensure that the department's policies, operations, and structures are aligned in the best way to address the potential threats -- both present and future."

That position remains unfilled.

A concerted push to appoint a single person in charge of national cyber security recovery began in Congress two years ago.

As part of a House cyber security subcommittee that was dissolved after the 108th Congress, Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., helped draft and pass House legislation to create a cyber security czar with real power in Homeland Security.

Recently, Lofgren said the House inserted language in a bill to restructure the Federal Emergency Management Agency, requiring President Bush to nominate someone to the cyber czar job within 90 days.

"Nothing was getting done, and no one was paying attention," Lofgren said. "As a result, very little has happened to reduce our vulnerabilities."

Adding to the pressure is the release of a year-long study this week by the Business Roundtable.

"What we concluded is if there were a major cyber disruption, our nation would not be able to restore or rebuild the Internet," said Tita Freeman, director of communications for the group. "Our CEOs feel that the Internet is vital to the exchange of information that's vital to our nation's economic security and to our security in general."

Lofgren said having a cyber security czar who has a seat at the table during Cabinet meetings is critical for effective rebuilding of the Internet.

Paul Kurtz, executive director the Cyber Security Industry Alliance, agrees.

While Andy Purdy has been the acting director of the DHS National Cyber Security Division, Congress members and industry groups question whether he has the power or the background to handle the recovery of the Internet in a disaster...

"The department is incompetent," Lofgren said. "When you say no one is home (at Homeland Security) it's not a joke."

Richard Clarke, a former cyber-security adviser to presidents Bush and Clinton, said it is critical that Bush nominate a cyber security czar for Homeland Security.

"I think it's huge," he said. "I've talked to people in the private sector who say the federal government isn't serious about security because they haven't filled these positions. They talk a good game about cyber security, but they aren't serious about it."

The Homeland Security press office did not return phone calls seeking comment.

Wednesday, July 05, 2006

Bush's Foreign Political Allies On Iraq Dropping Away

The political leaders of the "coalition of the willing" that gave a modicum of international cover to the U.S. endeavor in Iraq have been dwindling away. Most have been forced to face the backlash from their voters whose opinions regarding the wisdom of the war did not match that of their elected chief officials.

Most of the leaders who defied criticism at home to stand with him (Bush) on Iraq are no longer players on the world stage, or are on their way out. And it was a small band of brothers to begin with.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair has said he'll step down before the next national election and is coming under increasing pressure from his own party to do it sooner. Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi paid a farewell visit to the United States last week. He is leaving office in September.

Italy's Silvio Berlusconi resigned in early May after his party's election losses. Spain's Jose Maria Aznar was earlier forced out of office, the first casualty of supporting Bush on Iraq...

That leaves (Australian Prime Minister) Howard. Australia has around 1,320 troops in Iraq and the Middle East and Howard has repeatedly said Australia will remain in Iraq for as long as its troops are needed -- or until the Iraqi government asks them to withdraw -- despite widespread public opposition in Australia to the war.

Newer leaders, particularly those in Europe, have seen the political penalties paid by those who stood too close to Bush -- and have been more reluctant to embrace him so openly. One exception is German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who has visited the White House twice this year. She and Bush seemed to hit it off, even though they had some differences. Bush, en route to a summit of world leaders in Russia this month, will stop to see the old East Germany where Merkel grew up.

Goodwill that flowed to the United States right after the Sept. 11 attacks has long been offset by growing opposition to the war in Iraq and to Bush's foreign policy leadership, polls show.

A May poll by the Pew Research Center shows Bush's ratings and confidence in him to do the right thing on foreign affairs to be slipping ever lower in Europe -- even at a time of growing apparent consensus with European allies on efforts to restrict the nuclear programs of Iran and North Korea.

"Clearly the U.S. presence in Iraq is a drag on the image of the United States. It is cited more often than the current Iranian government as a threat to regional stability and world peace by many people in these countries," said Pew director Andrew Kohut.

Tuesday, July 04, 2006

CIA Closes Bin-Laden Unit

First, the U.S. blundered the capture of the surrounded Osama Bin-Laden at Tora-Bora by relying upon untrustworthy warlords to do the dirty work.

Then, crucial special forces resources were siphoned away from the hunt for Bin-Laden in Afghanistan to prepare for the ill-conceived invasion of Iraq.

Now, the CIA station that has been tracking Bin-Laden for a decade has been disbanded.

The Central Intelligence Agency has closed a unit that for a decade had the mission of hunting Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants, intelligence officials confirmed Monday...

The decision is a milestone for the agency, which formed the unit before Osama bin Laden became a household name and bolstered its ranks after the Sept. 11 attacks, when President Bush pledged to bring Mr. bin Laden to justice "dead or alive." ...

Michael Scheuer, a former senior C.I.A. official who was the first head of the unit, said the move reflected a view within the agency that Mr. bin Laden was no longer the threat he once was.

Mr. Scheuer said that view was mistaken.

"This will clearly denigrate our operations against Al Qaeda," he said. "These days at the agency, bin Laden and Al Qaeda appear to be treated merely as first among equals."

In recent years, the war in Iraq has stretched the resources of the intelligence agencies and the Pentagon, generating new priorities for American officials. For instance, much of the military's counterterrorism units, like the Army's Delta Force, had been redirected from the hunt for Mr. bin Laden to the search for Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was killed last month in Iraq.

Established in 1996, when Mr. bin Laden's calls for global jihad were a source of increasing concern for officials in Washington, Alec Station operated in a similar fashion to that of other agency stations around the globe.

The two dozen staff members who worked at the station, which was named after Mr. Scheuer's son and was housed in leased offices near agency headquarters in northern Virginia, issued regular cables to the agency about Mr. bin Laden's growing abilities and his desire to strike American targets throughout the world.

In his book "Ghost Wars," which chronicles the agency's efforts to hunt Mr. bin Laden in the years before the Sept. 11 attacks, Steve Coll wrote that some inside the agency likened Alec Station to a cult that became obsessed with Al Qaeda.

"The bin Laden unit's analysts were so intense about their work that they made some of their C.I.A. colleagues uncomfortable," Mr. Coll wrote. Members of Alec Station "called themselves 'the Manson Family' because they had acquired a reputation for crazed alarmism about the rising Al Qaeda threat."

The U.S. took it's eyes of the ball vis a vis Bin-Laden in order to focus first upon Saddam, then Zarqawi. It works to the advantage of certain elements in the government to have the poster boy for Islamic terrorism remain free to justify the permanent national security state.

Monday, July 03, 2006

Military Brass Clashing With Administration Over Iran

A new piece by Seymour Hersh in the New Yorker claims that the U.S. military brass is disagreeing with Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and the Bush administration over the civilians' desire for war with Iran at any cost.

According to Hersh, the military is angry with the cavalier approach that the White House took towards the "threat" allegedly posed by Saddam Hussein's Iraq, and do not want to see the blundering extended to neighboring Iran.

The senior officers in the Pentagon do not dispute the President's contention that Iran intends to eventually build a bomb, but they are frustrated by the intelligence gaps. A former senior intelligence official told me that people in the Pentagon were asking, "What's the evidence? We've got a million tentacles out there, overt and covert, and these guys--the Iranians--have been working on this for eighteen years, and we have nothing? We're coming up with jack shit"...

A senior military official told me, "Even if we knew where the Iranian enriched uranium was--and we don't--we don't know where world opinion would stand. The issue is whether it's a clear and present danger. If you're a military planner, you try to weigh options. What is the capability of the Iranian response, and the likelihood of a punitive response--like cutting off oil shipments? What would that cost us?" Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his senior aides "really think they can do this on the cheap, and they underestimate the capability of the adversary," he said.

Rumsfeld--as the senior U.S. civilian defense official--properly should have control over the uniformed military. The brass has no problem with this, however it is the arrogance with which Rumsfeld expresses his often mistaken opinions that irritates the professional military.

The discord over Iran can, in part, be ascribed to Rumsfeld's testy relationship with the generals. They see him as high-handed and unwilling to accept responsibility for what has gone wrong in Iraq. A former Bush Administration official described a recent meeting between Rumsfeld and four-star generals and admirals at a military commanders' conference, on a base outside Washington, that, he was told, went badly. The commanders later told General Pace that "they didn't come here to be lectured by the Defense Secretary. They wanted to tell Rumsfeld what their concerns were." A few of the officers attended a subsequent meeting between Pace and Rumsfeld, and were unhappy, the former official said, when "Pace did not repeat any of their complaints. There was disappointment about Pace." The retired four-star general also described the commanders' conference as "very fractious." He added, "We've got twenty-five hundred dead, people running all over the world doing stupid things, and officers outside the Beltway asking, 'What the hell is going on?' "

Rumsfeld has a natural ally in the administration:

"Rumsfeld and Cheney are the pushers on this--they don't want to repeat the mistake of doing too little," the government consultant with ties to Pentagon civilians told me. "The lesson they took from Iraq is that there should have been more troops on the ground--an impossibility in Iran", because of the overextension of American forces in Iraq--"so the air war in Iran will be one of overwhelming force."

The diplomatic approaches toward Iran with our European and United Nations colleagues may have limited utility according to Hersh:

Several current and former officials I spoke to expressed doubt that President Bush would settle for a negotiated resolution of the nuclear crisis. A former high-level Pentagon civilian official, who still deals with sensitive issues for the government, said that Bush remains confident in his military decisions. The President and others in the Administration often invoke Winston Churchill, both privately and in public, as an example of a politician who, in his own time, was punished in the polls but was rewarded by history for rejecting appeasement. In one speech, Bush said, Churchill "seemed like a Texan to me. He wasn't afraid of public-opinion polls. . . . He charged ahead, and the world is better for it."

As usual with American policy in the Middle East, there is the hidden hand.

Israeli intelligence, however, has also failed to provide specific evidence about secret sites in Iran, according to current and former military and intelligence officials. In May, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert visited Washington and, addressing a joint session of Congress, said that Iran "stands on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons" that would pose "an existential threat" to Israel...But at a secret intelligence exchange that took place at the Pentagon during the visit, the Pentagon consultant said, "what the Israelis provided fell way short" of what would be needed to publicly justify preventive action...

The issue of what to do, and when, seems far from resolved inside the Israeli government. Martin Indyk, a former U.S. Ambassador to Israel, who is now the director of the Brookings Institution's Saban Center for Middle East Policy, told me, "Israel would like to see diplomacy succeed, but they're worried that in the meantime Iran will cross a threshold of nuclear know-how--and they're worried about an American military attack not working. They assume they'll be struck first in retaliation by Iran." Indyk added, "At the end of the day, the United States can live with Iranian, Pakistani, and Indian nuclear bombs--but for Israel there's no Mutual Assured Destruction. If they have to live with an Iranian bomb, there will be a great deal of anxiety in Israel, and a lot of tension between Israel and Iran, and between Israel and the U.S."

The officials that spoke to Hersh wanted to get across the point that all is not well at the top of the defense establishment, the military holds a more realistic viewpoint than the administration, and that action in Iran is looming.

If the talks do break down, and the Administration decides on military action, the generals will, of course, follow their orders; the American military remains loyal to the concept of civilian control. But some officers have been pushing for what they call the "middle way," which the Pentagon consultant described as "a mix of options that require a number of Special Forces teams and air cover to protect them to send into Iran to grab the evidence so the world will know what Iran is doing." He added that, unlike Rumsfeld, he and others who support this approach were under no illusion that it could bring about regime change. The goal, he said, was to resolve the Iranian nuclear crisis.

Sunday, July 02, 2006

Misunderstanding Led To U.S. Aid To Somali Warlords

My June 8 piece The Law Of Unintended Consequences In Somalia discussed the backlash that was created in Somalia when the CIA backed a coalition of warlords against an Islamist faction. To make a long story short, the U.S. support for the warlords early this year rallied the population to the Islamist side. The capital of Somalia fell to the Islamists last month.

Today there is a report that details a misunderstanding that led to the influx of U.S. aid to the Somali warlords.

Visiting U.S. intelligence officers on the ground mistook a skirmish between two clans over a parcel of property near the Mogadishu airport for an attack upon the officers themselves, and responded by arranging weapons deliveries to the warlords.

(W)hen the gunfire rang out, the sources said, the U.S. officials wrongly concluded that they were under attack by Islamic terrorists and abruptly fled. It was a provocation, U.S. officials later told Somalis, that demanded a muscular response.

In the weeks that followed this little-known incident, which U.S. officials have refused to confirm or deny, the United States expanded its role in Somalia to levels not seen since it abandoned the country in 1994. The Americans helped organize a group of secular warlords into an "anti-terror coalition" and provided them with a large, steady diet of cash.

The warlords, feared and hated by many Somalis, bragged about the money as they armed themselves as never before.

The infusion of cash upset a fragile balance between the two sides -- but not in the direction the Americans had hoped.

By March, the warlords were under siege. By June 6, they had fled. And by June 24, Hassan Dahir Aweys, a militant Islamic leader hostile to Western democracy and reputed to have ties to al-Qaeda, had taken control of Mogadishu. Late last week, Osama bin Laden boasted of successes there in an audiotape that singled out Somalia as a front in his war against Americans...

American analysts ... said that by giving cash to the warlords the United States triggered events that quickly moved beyond its control, producing a setback likely to hurt not only Somalis but also the U.S. war on terrorism.

"U.S. support for the warlords hit Mogadishu like a stick in the hornet's nest," said John Prendergast, an Africa analyst with the International Crisis Group, a research organization, speaking recently from Chad, where he was traveling. "It was totally the law of unintended consequences in the extreme."

You heard it here first, folks.

Saturday, July 01, 2006

Capture and Mutilation Of U.S. Soldiers Possibly Reprisal

A soldier from the same unit that suffered the capture and mutilation of two soldiers and the combat death of another in an ambush two weeks ago has come forward with allegations of the rape of an Iraqi woman and the murders of members of her family that occurred in March.

The U.S. Army is investigating allegations that American soldiers raped and killed a woman and killed three of her family members in a town south of Baghdad, then reported the incident as an insurgent attack, a military official said Friday.

The alleged crimes occurred in March in the insurgent hotbed of Mahmudiyah. The four soldiers involved, from the 502nd Infantry Regiment, attempted to burn the family's home to the ground and blamed insurgents for the carnage, according to a military official familiar with the investigation, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was providing details not released publicly...

Maj. Gen James D. Thurman, commander of the Army's 4th Infantry Division, to which the 502nd is attached, ordered the investigation into the killings more than a week ago, according to a terse statement released by the military Friday. A preliminary inquiry "found sufficient information existed to recommend a criminal investigation into the incident," the statement said.

(T)he prospect that soldiers may have committed rape could make the Mahmudiyah allegations particularly incendiary. Charges that U.S. forces have killed civilians come as little shock to many Iraqis, but sex crimes -- especially those perpetrated against Muslim women by someone outside the faith -- can generate greater outrage in the Islamic world. The 2004 Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal inflamed passions in large part because of the sexual humiliations detainees suffered...

The AP, whose reporter was embedded with the 502nd in early June, also reported Friday that at least one soldier had confessed to involvement in the alleged crimes and was motivated to come forward when his fellow soldiers were kidnapped and murdered.

The unusual degree of savagery shown by the Iraqi insurgents towards their captives in the Yusufiya case is leading some analysts to conclude that the incident was a reprisal for the rape and murders of the family.