Blood and Oil

By Victor Davis Hanson, Real Clear Politics.com With the gruesome killing of former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko, Vladimir Putin's Russia stands accused of poisoning yet another critic.Meanwhile, Syria continues to mastermind the murders of Lebanese democrats. Israeli-free Gaza is as violent as ever. Hezbollah is busy replenishing its stock of Iranian missiles. The theocracy in Iran keeps promising an end to Israel. Venezuela's Hugo Chavez is slowly strangling democracy in Latin America in a manner that an impoverished Fidel Castro never could.And then, of course, there's Afghanistan and Iraq. It's easy to think that all of this violent instability across the globe is unconnected. But, in fact, in one way or another, oil and its huge profits are at the bottom of a lot of it.Islamic jihadists, fed from petrodollar wealth of the Middle East, have the cash to arm and plan operations from Baghdad and Kabul to Madrid and London. Thanks to oil, unhinged leaders like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Iran and Chavez in Venezuela can stay in power (and demand the world's attention) despite policies that ultimately harm their people, ruin their economies and imperil their neighbors.Russia, meanwhile, is essentially threatening Eastern Europe with energy cutbacks and reviving the old Soviet nuclear and arms industries. It's stirring up an already volatile Middle East by selling radical Islamists everything from nuclear reactors to high-tech anti-tank guns. President Bush may have seen, as he attests, something reassuring in the heart of President Putin. But Russia's new oil riches offer a fast track back to superpower status -- which we're already seeing them use to silence critics at home and abroad.Furthermore, the global thirst for oil distorts interstate relations. Take the case of China. Its amoral foreign policy is aimed mostly at securing petroleum. Because Beijing is involved in long-term oil deals with Sudan, it's reluctant to join the West in pressuring the corrupt Sudanese government to cease the genocide in Darfur. (Of course, the West, beholden to China for economic reasons, is in turn reluctant to pressure China.) Similarly, China worries far more about getting its hands on Iran's oil than stopping its nuclear proliferation.The U.S. is often subject to the same blackmail. Take away its need for imported oil and American officials long ago would have ceased visiting Saudi Arabia -- a monarchy based on sharia law and the cash nexus for Islamist madrassas and Wahhabi terrorism. Rather than appeasing a few hundred sheiks in the Gulf, American presidents -- both Democratic and Republican -- might have instead worried more about the poor millions slaughtered in Chad, Darfur, Ethiopia and Rwanda. High-priced oil also warps the entire world's limited attention span. We hear daily about Israeli "occupation" in the Middle East because the oil-rich patrons of the Palestinians have sent their terrorists ample subsidies and in the past leveled oil embargoes to punish those sympathetic to Israel. Yet millions more people the world over have also lost land. We don't televise daily refugees from, say, Tibet or Cyprus, since their patrons have no ability to shut down global commerce.The distortions caused by abrupt influxes of oil wealth have nearly turned upside down the once traditional and tribal Middle East. Sudden oil revenues prop up inefficient state-run economies, while ensuring that profits go to the few. Without democracy and free markets, the majority of impoverished Arabs lack access to their nation's treasure -- and blame foreigners for dealing only with their own elite who control the oil spigots and purse strings.What money that does trickle down has been used for conspicuous consumption, not national investment -- as monarchs and dictators import consumer toys to pacify the disenchanted. In other societies, modernity came at a measured pace, but in the Middle East nomads and peasants have skipped the telegraph and headed straight to the camera cell phone. Of course, the poor "Arab street," tuned into satellite TV, blames the postmodern West for titillating its newfound appetites.To remedy this mess, a good start would be to lower our own oil consumption, expand American production and diversify our energy sources with solar, nuclear and ethanol power and coal gasification. Only by taking these steps can America -- the most desperate of all oilaholics -- collapse the world price and thus erode the assets of our adversaries.With a divided U.S. government and a slight dip in world prices, there is a window of opportunity. Democrats can ask for more mandated conservation and alternate energy; in exchange, Republicans can bargain for more drilling and nuclear power.In World War II, an energy-independent United States bombed the oil fields of the Third Reich to stop Hitler's killing. Today a wartime but energy-hungry America is daily enriching our worst enemies. Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and author, most recently, of "A War Like No Other: How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War." You can reach him by e-mailing author@victorhanson.com.

Pacific subs take new role in war on terror

By Richard Halloran THE WASHINGTON TIMES November 28, 2006 PEARL HARBOR, Hawaii -- A navigation chart under plate glass atop the desk of Rear Adm. Joseph Walsh, the commander of U.S. submarines in the Pacific, reveals a great deal about how the submarine force's mission has changed. It maps the waters from Japan and Korea down the coast of China and through the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea to Indonesia in Southeast Asia. That littoral defines the operating area for most of the Pacific fleet?s 25 attack submarines; in coming months, two newly assigned submarines armed with guided missiles are also scheduled to operate in those waters. Not long ago, that chart would have had a wide-angle focus on the deep blue waters of the Pacific as Adm. Walsh's fastattack boats searched for Soviet submarines and warships during the Cold War. Now the Russian Pacific fleet, lacking operating funds, is mostly rusting at anchor. Today, Adm. Walsh says, the primary targets of American submarines are terrorists, particularly those in Southeast Asia. "The submarine," he contends, "is the perfect platform for the war on terror." The admiral, after 29 years in what submariners call the "Silent Service," did not discuss specific operations. Officers at the Pacific Command and the Special Operations Command, also with headquarters in Hawaii, have pointed to the island chains stretching across the Sulu and Celebes seas as routes along which terrorists have traveled from training camps in the Philippines to targets in Malaysia and Indonesia. Submarines have two attributes that make them effective against terrorists -- stealth and persistence. Unlike surface ships, submarines can stay concealed in the sea, rising to periscope depth to take pictures, listen to electronic transmissions and collect other intelligence. Unlike the airplanes or satellites that pass over a target, submarines can stay on station for weeks or months. The fastattack submarines, in addition to traditional torpedoes, are armed with 12 cruise missiles with conventional warheads. The submarines can also land six-man special operations teams to collect intelligence or conduct raids, then return to pick up the teams. The Pacific submarine fleet has had so many missions assigned to it recently that it no longer sends submarines to the Persian Gulf or Arabian Sea to support the war in Iraq. That duty has been turned over to the Atlantic fleet. During the next five years, about eight submarines will be reassigned to the Pacific fleet from the Atlantic, meaning the Pacific command will account for about 60 percent of the combined fleet. Two will be the USS Seawolf and USS Connecticut, the most advanced boats in the fleet. The home ports to which they will be assigned have not been decided yet, said a spokesman for the Pacific submarine command. The newest addition to the Pacific fleet is the USS Ohio, which has been converted from a ballistic missile submarine to a boat armed with 154 Tomahawk cruise missiles that can be fired covertly one at a time or many in a salvo. When launched near land, the cruise missiles can duck under a radar screen to hit targets before an adversary can react or they can loiter over a target shortly before striking. A second guided missile boat, the USS Florida, is expected to operate with the Pacific fleet in 2008. Each of these boats has a dual crew, called Blue and Gold, to enable them to stay at sea for long periods. The crews will swap places every three months, usually in Guam, the U.S. territory in the western Pacific that is being built into a large naval, air and Marine base. The new cruise missile carriers have also been configured to carry 100 special operations troops with their weapons and equipment. Ohio has been equipped with a delivery system to put the commandos ashore and retrieve them and with a command center in which the commander of an operation could direct operations ashore. For a special operations campaign, for instance, Ohio could land 10 teams several miles apart along a coast and the commander of the campaign could communicate with them all from the submarine. Ohio is currently in Hawaii for several months of training with special operations forces before deploying to the western Pacific next year.

Hezbollah Said to Help Shiite Army in Iraq

By MICHAEL R. GORDON and DEXTER FILKINS New York Times WASHINGTON, Nov. 27 — A senior American intelligence official said Monday that the Iranian-backed group Hezbollah had been training members of the Mahdi Army, the Iraqi Shiite militia led by Moktada al-Sadr. The official said that 1,000 to 2,000 fighters from the Mahdi Army and other Shiite militias had been trained by Hezbollah in Lebanon. A small number of Hezbollah operatives have also visited Iraq to help with training, the official said.Iran has facilitated the link between Hezbollah and the Shiite militias in Iraq, the official said. Syrian officials have also cooperated, though there is debate about whether it has the blessing of the senior leaders in Syria. The intelligence official spoke on condition of anonymity under rules set by his agency, and discussed Iran’s role in response to questions from a reporter. The interview occurred at a time of intense debate over whether the United States should enlist Iran’s help in stabilizing Iraq. The Iraq Study Group, directed by James A. Baker III, a former Republican secretary of state, and Lee H. Hamilton, a former Democratic lawmaker, is expected to call for direct talks with Tehran. The claim about Hezbollah’s role in training Shiite militias could strengthen the hand of those in the Bush administration who oppose a major new diplomatic involvement with Iran. The new American account is consistent with a claim made in Iraq this summer by a mid-level Mahdi commander, who said his militia had sent 300 fighters to Lebanon, ostensibly to fight alongside Hezbollah. “They are the best-trained fighters in the Mahdi Army,” he said, speaking on condition of anonymity. The specific assertions about Iran’s role went beyond those made publicly by senior American officials, though Gen. Michael V. Hayden, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, did tell Congress this month that “the Iranian hand is stoking violence” in Iraq. The American intelligence on Hezbollah was based on human sources, electronic means and interviews with detainees captured in Iraq. American officials say the Iranians have also provided direct support to Shiite militias in Iraq, including explosives and trigger devices for roadside bombs, and training for several thousand fighters, mostly in Iran. The training is carried out by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and the Ministry of Intelligence and Security, they say. In Congressional testimony this month, General Hayden said he was initially skeptical of reports of Iran’s role but changed his mind after reviewing intelligence reports.“I’ll admit personally,” he said at one point in the hearing, “that I have come late to this conclusion, but I have all the zeal of a convert as to the ill effect that the Iranians are having on the situation in Iraq.” Lt. Gen. Michael D. Maples, the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, offered a similar assessment in his testimony.Neither General Hayden nor General Maples described Hezbollah’s role during the hearing. In the interview on Monday, the senior intelligence official was asked for further details about the purported Iranian role. “They have been a link to Lebanese Hezbollah and have helped facilitate Hezbollah training inside of Iraq, but more importantly Jaish al-Mahdi members going to Lebanon,” the official said, describing Iran’s role and using the Arabic name for the Mahdi Army. The official said the Hezbollah training had been conducted with the knowledge of Mr. Sadr, the most influential Shiite cleric. While Iran wants a stable Iraq, the official said, it sees an advantage in “managed instability in the near term” to bog down the American military and defeat the Bush administration’s objectives in the region.“There seems to have been a strategic decision taken sometime over late winter or early spring by Damascus, Tehran, along with their partners in Lebanese Hezbollah, to provide more support to Sadr to increase pressure on the U.S.,” the American intelligence official said.Some Middle East experts were skeptical about the assessment of Hezbollah’s training role. “That sound to me a little bit strained,” said Flynt Leverett, a senior fellow at the New America Foundation and a Middle East expert formerly on the National Security Council staff. “I have a hard time thinking it is a really significant piece of what we are seeing play out on the ground with the various Shiite militia forces.” But other specialists found the assessment plausible. “I think it is plausible because Hezbollah is the best in the business, and it enhances their position with Iran, Syria and Iraq,” said Judith Kipper, of the Council on Foreign Relations. The Mahdi Army and other militia fighters traveled to Lebanon in groups of 15 and 20 and some were present during the fighting between Hezbollah and Israel this summer, though there was no indication they had taken part in the fighting, the American intelligence official said. Asked what the militia members had learned, the official replied, “Weapons, bomb-making, intelligence, assassinations, the gambit of skill sets.”There is intelligence that indicates that Iran shipped machine tools to Lebanon that could be used to make “shaped charges,” sophisticated explosive devices designed to penetrate armor, American officials have said. But it is not known how the equipment was in fact used. The officials said that because the Iraqi militia members went through Syrian territory, at least some Syrian officials were complicit. There are also reports of meetings between Imad Mugniyah, a senior Hezbollah member; Ghassem Soleimani of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards; and Syrian representatives to discuss ways of stepping up the pressure on the United States in Iraq.The mid-level Mahdi commander interviewed this summer said the group sent to Lebanon was called the Ali al-Hadi Brigade, named for one of two imams buried at the Askariya Mosque in Samarra. The bombing of that shrine in February unleashed the fury of Shiite militias and accelerated sectarian violence.According to the Mahdi commander, the brigade was organized and dispatched by a senior Mahdi officer known as Abu Mujtaba. It went by bus to Syria in July, and was then led across the border into Lebanon, he said. He said the fighters were from Diwaniya and Basra, as well as from the Shiite neighborhoods of Shoala and Sadr City in Baghdad.“They travel as normal people from Iraq to Syria,” one of the militiamen said. “Once they get to Syria, fighters in Syria take them in.” Among American officials, concern over the purported Iranian, Syrian or Hezbollah role grew recently when an advanced antitank weapon, an RPG-29, was used against an American M-1 tank in Iraq.“The first time we saw it was not in Iraq,” Gen. John P. Abizaid, the head of the United States Central Command, told reporters in September. “We saw it in Lebanon. So to me, No. 1, it indicates an Iranian connection.”American intelligence officials said the source of the weapon was still unclear. General Abizaid also said it was hard to pin down some details of relationships between armed factions in the Middle East, adding: “There are clearly links between Hezbollah training people in Iran to operate in Lebanon and also training people in Iran that are Shia splinter groups that could operate against us in Iraq These linkages exist, but it is very, very hard to pin down with precision.”

The War on Terror's Newest Combatant

November 27, 2006 By J.R. Dunn American Thinker Things are getting positively biblical in the War on Terror’s African front. According to Agence France Presse, Ethiopia is about to attack the Somali Islamists single-handed, on their own hook, and with assistance from nobody. On Thursday Prime Minister Meles Zenawi told the Ethiopian parliament that the Islamists represented “a clear threat to Ethiopia” and that the government had “completed the preparations” for full-scale war. The Islamists, who triggered the crisis by declaring Jihad on the Ethiopians, have (of all possible moves) turned to the United States for mediation. The interesting thing here is the fact that Ethiopia, though one of the remotest and most isolated nations on earth (it was considered a candidate for the mythical lost kingdom of Presser John during the late medieval period), played a serious role in both of the long wars of the 20th century – the battles against fascism and communism.In 1935 Mussolini invaded Ethiopia in order to fulfill his grandiose vision of a modern Roman empire, along with avenging the 1895 defeat at Adowa, where the Ethiopians annihilated an invading Italian army. With the help of poison gas and carpet bombing, he succeeded in a swift campaign that scattered Ethiopia’s peasant army and forced Emperor Haile Selassie to flee the country. Nearly forty years later Ethiopia became the first of many nations to fall to communism’s final surge of conquest when in 1974 the government was overthrown by a Marxist clique led by army officer Mengistu Mariam. The emperor, by then a very old man, was murdered in his bed. The regime went on to kill another million and a half Ethiopians over the next decade.In neither case did the world at large do much of anything in response. In 1935, the League of Nations expelled Italy, but no more. In 1974, the world neither noticed nor cared.But in both cases, Ethiopia was a harbinger of coming defeat for the ideologies. Mussolini, until 1935, was widely considered a great man, his fascism a kind of magic formula for solving the problems of a modern economy. After Ethiopia, he was an international pariah, left with nowhere to turn but Hitler’s Germany. When war came, Ethiopia was in 1940 the first nation liberated from fascism.In the 1970s, the takeover of Ethiopia marked the start of the dramatic expansion of communist influence that led in turn to overextension and collapse. The Soviets wasted massive amounts of resources fighting wars and propping up regimes across southern and central Africa, Central America, and Asia. When the West rebounded in the 1980s, the Soviets were caught short, and never did recover before the historical curtain fell in 1989. There’s no telling how the current crisis will work out. Ethiopia won a previous war against Somalia in 1978, but that was with large-scale Soviet assistance. They are going it alone this time. The Islamists are little more than bandits, not likely to stand up against any kind of organized force. But, as the U.S. has reason to know, they are also masters of insurgency warfare. We can hope the Ethiopians don’t get themselves embroiled in an endless low-level conflict they can neither win nor – Somalia being right next door – retreat from.But there’s something that resonates about this little conflict. It’s not simply another hopeless and savage African war. Ethiopia, youngest of democracies, is under its ancient name of Abyssinia, the oldest Christian state. And Haile Selassie’s sobriquet, as the last Christian emperor, was “the Lion of Judah”. And now, with the West under siege, with the center not holding, with all giving way to appeasement, and surrender, and “realism”, the soldiers of the ancient kingdom are girding themselves to do battle with the interloper. They may well see off the Islamists the same as they did the fascists and communists. War is fought not only on the battlefield, but in the realm of the symbolic as well. What is unfolding in the Horn of Africa today may, on that level, be far more crucial than anyone would guess.

It's the Tribunal, Stupid!

From Anton Effendi, a great analyst of Lebanon in his blog "Across the Bay": "One has to give it to Syria's deputy foreign minister, the despicable Faysal Mekdad, for his candor! For those who don't remember, Faysal Mekdad was the lovely Baathist pitbull who, when the international tribunal was first requested by the Lebanese government (yes, funny coincidence that) after Assad's thugs murdered Gebran Tueni, expressed his lovely sentiments in all candor to an Arab diplomat at the UN during a closed-door council session (I covered this story and its aftermath back then):"So now every time that a dog dies in Beirut there will be an international investigation?" So the "Dog Whisperer" is back, his "honesty" intact. In another closed session today, Mekdad reportedly made the following rather telling remark to his select (by invitation only) audience members:"Syria will not accept to present any of its citizens before an international court because we are confident in our own judiciary." He contrasted Syria's "honest and independent judiciary" (more on that below) to the "collapsed judiciary" of other countries where the UN set up international courts, "like Sierra Leone and Yugoslavia." Consequently, Syria would not accept to hand over any Syrian to an international court. For "if any Syrian citizen is involved in this crime -- although Syria is 100% innocent -- then he is a criminal who would be punished like any other criminal, by the just Syrian judiciary."He added that forming an international tribunal, "would place Syria under political pressure": "When a tribunal arrives before the investigation reach any results, then the tribunal will be able to summon any person and the country would be placed under political pressure, and Syria would be condemned before public opinion even if it was judicially exonerated."Furthermore, he told his audience, Syria's international lawyers have assured Syria that they were "100% confident of Syria's innocence"! Naturally!He then invented his own interpretation of Brammertz's report, saying that Brammertz pointed to other possibilities, like "internal Lebanese forces, or other hired killers, or Arab parties, or [Islamic] extremists." And then Mekdad proposed that Brammertz's "professional" reports -- or his own delusional reading thereof -- be taught at Syrian universities! Oh and he made sure to reiterate his government's support for Hezbollah's Hassan Nasrallah, whose latest speech (in which he called the Lebanese government "the government of [US Ambassador Jeffrey] Feltman" and labeled them agents of Israel and America that need to be toppled), Mekdad said "expresses our position." He also repeated Syria's support for the toppling of the current government, all with the typical bitchy condescension towards Lebanon and the Lebanese.Now, a word about that Syrian "independent" judiciary. It was recently blasted by Syrian dissidents Michel Kilo and Anwar Bunni, both languishing in jail by order of Bashar Assad (for more on them and their colleagues, check The Syria Monitor). Kilo dissected the blatant (and routine) abuse of the joke known as the Syrian judiciary by the regime and its security apparatus. A judge had recently approved Kilo's release on bail to await trial, but direct interference from a "prominent figure from the first rank of the Syrian regime" reversed the order, and kept Kilo in jail. Earlier, Kilo was slandered by a regime-hired pen (and some say, mistress of Maher Assad, Bashar's brother) who accused him of receiving money from Lebanese anti-Syrian minister Marwan Hamade (whom the Syrians tried to kill before they killed Hariri, and whose case will be covered by the intl. tribunal) in order to "finance terrorist activity" in Syria. Kilo and his jailed comrades wanted to sue that hired pen and the state-run newspaper that published her piece. Again, a telephone call from Maher Assad's office (er, "a prominent figure from the first rank of the regime") made sure the case was thrown out. So yes, what was the UN thinking establishing an intl. tribunal!? Besides, there will not be any such petty interferences in this case. As Bashar Assad has made abundantly clear, any Syrian found to be involved in the Hariri assassination (aside from him, his brother, his brother-in-law, and any high-ranking official of course) will be treated like a traitor, and, therefore, killed! Case closed! You gotta love the thugs of the Syrian regime, from Bashar down to the lowest functionary, like that caricature-thug, Imad Moustapha. But Mekdad's comments seem to validate Walid Jumblat's remark earlier today: "Only the tribunal will deter the killer in Damascus. Bashar is scared. That is why he opted for killing to avoid punishment."

Lebanese minister assassinated in attack on convoy

This is tragic news, Gemayel was a hero of the anti-Syrian resistance. Clearly Hizbullah, Iran and Syria are on the march and trying to retake Lebanon. And we do nothing. Tue Nov 21, 2006 2:25 PM GMT BEIRUT (Reuters) - Lebanon's Industry Minister Pierre Gemayel was assassinated near Beirut on Tuesday, security sources said.They said gunmen opened fire as his convoy drove through the Christian Sin el-Fil neighbourhood. Gemayel was rushed to hospital where he later died of his wounds.Lebanon is in the throes of a political storm pitting the anti-Syrian ruling majority against the pro-Damascus opposition. The political tension threatens to spill into street confrontations.Lebanon's Prime Minister Fouad Siniora said on Tuesday his depleted cabinet was legitimate despite the resignation of six pro-Syrian ministers, and warned that any anti-government protests could turn violent. Pro-Syrian Hezbollah and its allies are preparing to take to the streets to topple Siniora's government, which they accuse of being allied with the United States, arguing that it has lost its legitimacy since Shi'ite Muslims are no longer represented.The depleted cabinet last week approved draft U.N. statutes for a tribunal to try the killers of ex-premier Rafik al-Hariri despite the resignation of six pro-Syrian ministers.Many Lebanese blame Syria for the killing of Hariri in a suicide truck bombing last year. Damascus denies involvement. A U.N. commission investigating the assassination has implicated senior Lebanese and Syrian security officials.

President Bush visits Vietnam for first time..

Bush compares U.S. wars in Vietnam, Iraq By JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writer President Bush, on his first visit to a country where America lost a two-decade-long fight against communism, said Friday the Vietnam War's lesson for today's confounding Iraq conflict is that freedom takes time to trump hatred.Embracing a former enemy that remains communist but is allowing capitalism to surge, Bush opened a four-day stay here that was fueling an already raging debate over his war policy. Democrats who won control of Congress say last week's elections validate their call for U.S. troops to start coming home soon, while Bush argues — as he did again Friday — for patience with a mission he says can't be ended until Iraq can remain stable on its own.A baby boomer who came of age during the turbulent Vietnam era and spent the war stateside as a member of the Texas Air National Guard, the president called himself amazed by the sights of the one-time war capital. He pronounced it hopeful that the United States and Vietnam have reconciled differences after a war that ended 31 years ago when the Washington-backed regime in Saigon fell."My first reaction is history has a long march to it, and societies change and relationships can constantly be altered to the good," Bush said after speeding past signs of both poverty and the commerce produced by Asia's fastest-growing economy.The president said there was much to be learned from the divisive Vietnam War — the longest conflict in U.S. history — as his administration contemplates new strategies for the increasingly difficult war in Iraq, now in its fourth year. But his critics see parallels with Vietnam — a determined insurgency and a death toll that has drained public support — that spell danger for dragging out U.S. involvement in Iraq. "It's just going to take a long period of time for the ideology that is hopeful — and that is an ideology of freedom — to overcome an ideology of hate," Bush said after having lunch at his lakeside hotel with Australian Prime Minister John Howard, whose country has been one of America's strongest allies in Iraq, Vietnam and other conflicts."We'll succeed," Bush added, "unless we quit."In a day of meetings with Vietnamese leaders, the Vietnam-Iraq comparisons gave way to a focus on areas of cooperation. Those include continuing military-to-military links, work on AIDS and bird flu, trade, and cooperation on information about more than 1,300 U.S. military personnel still unaccounted for from the Vietnam War.Bush was visiting the U.S. military's Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command here on Saturday.He met in succession with Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet at the bright orange presidential palace, with Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung next door, and with the country's most powerful leader, Communist Party chief Nong Duc Manh, at the ruling party headquarters across the street. Each time, he and his hosts sat under a large bronze bust of Ho Chi Minh, the victorious North's revolutionary communist leader. Nong said the president had "opened a new page in the relationship."In the evening, Bush was feted at a state banquet."For decades, you had been torn apart by war," Bush said, toasting his hosts. "Today the Vietnamese people are at peace and seeing the benefits of reform."The president's welcome by the public was much less enthusiastic than the rock-star treatment afforded President Clinton when he came in 2000. Happy crowds thronged Clinton, who normalized relations with Vietnam. But Bush encountered a country where many with long memories deeply disapprove of the U.S. invasion of Iraq — even as they yearn for continued economic progress to stamp out still-rampant poverty.With all traffic halted, many Hanoi residents gaped at his long motorcade from their motorbikes. Other clusters of onlookers gathered before storefronts, a few waving but most merely looking on impassively. Huynh Tuyet, 71, a North Vietnamese veteran who had his hand blown off fighting the Americans, recalled his own lesson."Even though the Americans were more powerful with all their massive weapons, the main factor in war is the people," he said. "The Vietnamese people were very determined. We would not give up. That's why we won." Vietnamese officials eager for their country to take its turn in the global spotlight expressed disappointment that the president arrived without his expected gift — congressional approval of a new pact normalizing trade relations with Vietnam. Surprising the White House, Congress failed to pass the bill this week as expected, leaving U.S. officials trying to explain to the Vietnamese that it would be sure to go through next month. The visit was a delicate balancing act for Bush. He was trying to improve relations with a crucial Asian economic force and to urge Vietnam to make further steps toward political, economic and social reforms — even as his mere presence conferred special status on a communist government. Inside the sprawling Communist Party headquarters, the president gently pressed his hosts on the need for greater political and religious freedoms. He was reinforcing this point Sunday with a visit to a Hanoi church, similar to a stop he made last year on a trip to communist China. After remaining in Hanoi for a massive summit of 21 Pacific Rim leaders, Bush was traveling on Monday to Ho Chi Minh City, formerly Saigon and the country's economic heart, where he was showcasing Vietnam's booming economy with a visit to its stock exchange and discussions with business leaders. He was also going to a medical institute there that focuses on bird flu and AIDS research and taking in a cultural performance at a local museum. On the sidelines of the summit, Bush was drawing on his powers of personal diplomacy in one-on-one meeting with Russia's Vladimir Putin, China's Hu Jintao, Japan's Shinzo Abe and South Korea's Roh Moo-hyun.

Iran tried to swap guns for Somali uranium

By David Blair, Africa Correspondent London Telegraph Last Updated: 1:29am GMT 16/11/2006 Plutonium find 'is evidence of Iran going ahead with nuclear plan' Iran tried to obtain uranium from Somalia in return for supplying weapons to the anarchic country's Islamist movement, according to the United Nations.The Supreme Council of Islamic Courts is believed to control the uranium-rich areas of Somalia A report given to the Security Council today finds that Iran is one of seven countries breaking a UN arms embargo by providing weapons to the Islamic radicals who control most of southern and central Somalia, including the capital, Mogadishu. Three illegal arms shipments from Teheran are detailed in the 86-page report. One consignment which reached Somalia in July included 1,000 machine guns, 45 surface-to-air missiles, M-79 rocket launchers and land mines.After the arrival of this shipment, the UN says that Iran promised the Islamists further weapons – but only in return for uranium, presumably for use in Teheran's nuclear programme. Two Iranians were sent to Mogadishu in order to negotiate this deal. Somalia's recoverable uranium deposits are modest, totalling about 6,600 tonnes, compared with 326,000 tonnes in Canada, the world's biggest producer. But Somalia collapsed into anarchy 15 years ago when its central government was destroyed. The Islamist movement, styling itself the Supreme Council of Islamic Courts, is now believed to control the areas where uranium is present.Iran appears to be trying to win the right to exploit these deposits, which could then be shipped to Teheran through Mogadishu's large port.The Islamists captured the city in June and have extended their hold over southern Somalia. Their only rival is the country's ramshackle official government, based in the ruined town of Baidoa.Eritrea is the biggest supplier of weapons to the Islamists, according to the UN. Although Eritrea is not a Muslim country, it is locked in confrontation with Ethiopia over a disputed border. Eritrea hopes to place pressure on its larger neighbour by building the Islamists into a major regional power.

Iran 'is training the next al-Qa'eda leaders'

By Con Coughlin London Daily Telegraph Last Updated: 1:58am GMT 15/11/2006 Iran plotting to groom bin Laden's successor Uranium detected in Iranian waste dump Iran is seeking to take control of Osama bin Laden's al-Qa'eda terror network by encouraging it to promote officials known to be friendly to Teheran, The Daily Telegraph can reveal.According to recent reports received by Western intelligence agencies, the Iranians are training senior al-Qa'eda operatives in Teheran to take over the organisation when bin Laden is no longer leader.Rumours have been circulating about the state of his health for several months. Bin Laden, 49, who is known to suffer from kidney problems that require regular dialysis, has not appeared in one of his videotapes for more than two years, prompting speculation that he is dead. A leaked report from the French intelligence service, the DGSE, in September suggested bin Laden, who has a $25 million price on his head, had died of typhoid earlier this year.Even if he is still alive, intelligence officials are working on the assumption that his ability to control the organisation has been severely diminished, and that most of the day-to-day running is being undertaken by Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden's Egyptian-born number two.Iran has always maintained close relations with al-Qa'eda, even though the Shia Muslim state is known to have many ideological and strategic differences with the terror group's Sunni leadership. Western intelligence officials now believe that Iran is trying to cultivate a new generation of al-Qa'eda leaders who will be prepared to work closely with Teheran when they eventually take control.Recent intelligence reports from Iran suggest the Iranians are particularly keen to promote Saif-al-Adel, a notorious al-Qa'eda operative who is wanted in the United States for his alleged role in training several of the September 11 hijackers.Al-Adel, 46, a former colonel in Egypt's special forces who joined al-Qa'eda after fighting with the Mujahideen against Soviet forces in Afghanistan in the 1980s, was named in the FBI's list of 22 most wanted terrorists that was issued after the September 11 attacks. He is also alleged to have been involved in the deaths of 18 US soldiers in Somalia in 1993 and the truck bomb attacks on the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. Al-Adel has, technically, been living under house arrest in Teheran since fleeing to Iran in late 2001 with hundreds of other al-Qa'eda fighters following the US-led coalition's invasion of Afghanistan.For the past five years he has been living in a Revolutionary Guards guest house in Teheran together with Saad and Mohammed bin Laden, two of the al-Qa'eda leader's sons.Until 2003, al-Adel acted as bin Laden's security chief and since his arrival in Iran he is understood to have struck up a close personal relationship with several prominent Revolutionary Guards commanders. The Iranians are now exerting pressure on al-Qa'eda's leadership to make al-Adel the organisation's number three which, given bin Laden's poor state of health, would effectively make him number two. This would put him in a strong position to take control of the entire al-Qa'eda network in the event of Zawahiri being killed or being unable to continue running the group."This is an important power play by the Iranians and the prospect of al-Qa'eda and Iran forging a close alliance is truly terrifying," said a senior Western intelligence official. "They have had their differences in the past, but with the survival of both Iran and al-Qa'eda now at stake they realise it is in both their interests to have closer ties." Iran's attempts to forge closer links with al-Qa'eda are understood to have been ordered by President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, who believes Iran and al-Qa'eda share similar aims — destroying the influence of America and its allies in the wider Middle East. Mr Ahmedinejad is also keen to strengthen the alliance in case Iran is subjected to United Nations sanctions over its refusal to halt its nuclear enrichment programme, which many Western governments believe is being undertaken as part of a clandestine nuclear weapons programme.If al-Qa'eda is agreeable to appointing al-Adel and other al-Qa'eda figures currently based in Iran to senior positions, the Iranians have agreed to provide training facilities and equipment. Links between Iran and al-Qa'eda date back to the early 1990s, when bin Laden was based in Sudan. According to the US 9/11 Commission report, Iran's Revolutionary Guards helped to train al-Qa'eda fighters, and the Iranians were suspected of helping al-Qa'eda to carry out the truck bomb attacks against an American military base in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, in June 1996 that killed 19 US servicemen.The growing links are being viewed with profound alarm in Western intelligence circles. Iran has a long history of sponsoring terror groups. The Revolutionary Guards were primarily responsible for setting up, financing, training and equipping Hizbollah, the radical Lebanese militia that now stands accused of plotting to overthrow the Lebanese government and seize power.Any increase in Iran's influence over al-Qa'eda could have potentially devastating consequences for international security. Al-Qa'eda has made no secret of its desire to acquire weapons of mass destruction — including "dirty" nuclear bombs.Intelligence experts believe that Iran will soon have the capacity to develop its own nuclear weapons and Teheran is also known to have developed a highly effective chemical weapons programme."We are looking at a Doomsday scenario here where al-Qa'eda finally fulfils its ultimate goal of acquiring weapons of mass destruction," said a senior Western intelligence official. "And unlike other terror groups, al-Qa'eda is perfectly willing to use them."

Naval deployments to Persian Gulf..

By Michel Chossudovsky www.globalresearch.com There is a massive concentration of US naval power in the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Sea. Two US naval strike groups are deployed: USS Enterprise, and USS Iwo Jima Expeditionary Strike Group. The naval strike groups have been assigned to fighting the "global war on terrorism." Concurrent with this concentration of US Naval power, the US is also involved in military exercises in the Persian Gulf, which consists in "interdicting ships in the Gulf carrying weapons of mass destruction and missiles" The exercise is taking place as the United States and other major powers are considering sanctions including possible interdiction of ships on North Korea, following a reported nuclear test, and on Iran, which has defied a U.N. Security Council mandate to stop enriching uranium. The exercise, set for Oct. 31, is the 25th to be organized under the U.S.-led 66-member Proliferation Security Initiative and the first to be based in the Gulf near Bahrain, across from Iran, the officials said. A senior U.S. official insisted the exercise is not aimed specifically at Iran, although it reinforces a U.S. strategy aimed at strengthening America’s ties with states in the Gulf, where Tehran and Washington are competing for influence" (Defense News, http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?F=2171176&C=mideast) Tehran considers the US sponsored war games in the Persian Gulf, off the Iranian coastline as a provocation, which is intended to trigger a potential crisis and a situation of direct confrontation between US and Iranian naval forces in the Persian Gulf:"Reports say the US-led naval exercises based near Bahrain will practise intercepting and searching ships carrying weapons of mass destruction and missiles. Iran's official news agency IRNA quoted an unnamed foreign ministry official as describing the military manoeuvres as dangerous and suspicious. Reports say the US-led naval exercises based near Bahrain will practise intercepting and searching ships carrying weapons of mass destruction and missiles. The Iranian foreign ministry official said the US-led exercises were not in line with the security and stability of the region. Instead, they are aimed at fomenting crises, he said." (quoted in BBC, 23 October 2006) USS Boxer Expeditionary Strike Group (ESG 5) to arrive in Arabian Sea The USS Boxer (LHD 4), --which is the flagship for the Boxer Expeditionary Strike Group (ESG 5)-- which left Singapore on October 16, is scheduled to join the two other naval strikes groups. ESG 5 is comprised of USS Boxer, Bunker Hill, USS Dubuque (LPD 8), USS Comstock (LSD 45), USS Benfold (DDG 65), and USS Howard (DDG 83). ESG 5 also includes PHIBRON 5, the 15th MEU, Coast Guard Cutter Midgett (WHEC 726).“We are about to enter a part of the world that can be very dangerous,” said Chief Aviation Ordnanceman (AW/SW) Jacques Beaver, Boxer’s flight deck ordnance chief. “We must be flexible and prepared to defend ourselves from any threats.” Boxer has been preparing for the weapons upload for two months by completing required maintenance and electronic pre-checks. Checks ensure that the ship’s missile and launching systems are up to standard and safe to load with live ordnance. “It has taken a lot of hard work for our people to get this done,” said Chief Fire Controlman (SW) William Lewis, combat systems, fire control division’s leading chief petty officer. “You cannot measure the importance of having these defenses guarding the lives of the Sailors and Marines in this strike group.” BOXESG is comprised of USS Boxer (LHD 4), USS Bunker Hill (CG 52), USS Dubuque (LPD 8), USS Comstock (LSD 45), USS Benfold (DDG 65) and USS Howard (DDG 83). The strike group also includes Amphibious Squadron 5, the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit, Coast Guard Cutter Midgett (WHEC 726) and Canadian Frigate HMCS Ottawa (FFH 341). BOXESG is currently conducting operations in support of the global war on terrorism while transiting to the Arabian Gulf." (http://www.c7f.navy.mil/news/2006/october/3.htm)

France tests new long-range missile

Thu Nov 9, 2006 BISCARROSSE, France (Reuters) - France test-fired a new generation of intercontinental ballistic missiles for the first time on Thursday and said the launch was a success.The M51 missile -- which is designed to carry a nuclear payload -- has a range of 6,000 km (3,726 miles), 50 percent further than that of the missile currently in service."French Defense Minister Michele Alliot-Marie expresses her great satisfaction after the success of the first experimental flight of the M51 strategic missile carried out, as always, without a warhead," the Defense Ministry said in a statement.Developed by European aerospace giant EADS, the M51 will also be able to carry a heavier load than the M45 it will replace, and be armed with up to six warheads.It was fired from the CELM test site at Biscarrosse, about 70 km from the southwestern city of Bordeaux, eyewitnesses at the launch site said.The missile rose straight into the sky with a low roar before arching westwards over the Atlantic Ocean, leaving a trail of white smoke in its wake. A heavy police presence was in place around the missile testing center to prevent disruption of the launch by environmentalist groups.

Saddam Hussein's Day of Justice

An Exclusive Dispatch From Baghdad: PJM in Baghdad November 5, 2006 4:26 AM Pajamas Media Baghdad editors Mohammed and Omar Fadhil, of Iraq The Model, write their first impressions after Saddam Hussein’s death sentence was delivered. I was overwhelmed with joy and relief as I watched the criminals being read their verdicts. For the first time in our region tyrants are being punished for their crimes through a court of law. Until this moment and while I’m typing these words I’m still receiving words of congratulations in emails, phone calls and text messages from friends inside and outside the country. These were our only means to share our happiness because of the curfew that limits our movement. This is the day for Saddam’s lovers to weep and I expect their shock and grieve to be huge. They had always thought their master was immortal so let them live in their disappointment while we live for our future. This is a day not only for Iraqis but a historic day for the whole region; today new basis for dealing between rulers and peoples are found.No one is above the law anymore. I was particularly pleased by the way Judge Raouf Rasheed handled the session; he was reading the court’s decision and at the same time chastising members of the current government for their misbehavior and threatened to throw them in custody regardless of their ranks! We are living a new era where there’s much hope despite the difficulties…our sacrifices have a noble cause, that is to build a new model that obviously terrifies other tyrants. I believe it wasn’t Saddam alone who was shaking and shouting in hysteria when the verdict was read; I can see hysteria takes over all of Saddam’s followers and apologists. Today we had turned a page that was full of pain and ugly crimes that were committed by the same criminals who were shaking in the hands of Iraq’s new justice. We were among the first to bring Saddam’s crimes in Dujail to the surface in this blog almost three years ago even before cases were chosen or a tribunal was formed.I did that because one of my friends was a direct victim of that crime when he was thrown in prison in the middle of the desert when he was only 7 years old along with his mother and a younger sister and lost 30 members of his extended family over the years of that tragedy. Some people back then questioned the credibility of my friend’s story and couldn’t believe the crimes of Saddam were that cruel and inhuman. But today that the truth is out there for the whole world to see, the criminals stand small and shaking while the families of the victims stand proud seeing justice served. Right now volleys of bullets ring not far from where I sit, some are fired to express joy while others are fired in a desperate expression of denial but I have no doubt who is going to prevail. Although the road is long but we are walking forward and will not look back. I salute the honorable special tribunal that challenged threats and risks and insisted on keeping up the work until the end, and today it brought back the pride of the land that wrote the world’s first laws. I salute the witnesses who risked their lives to reveal the truth and expose the crimes of the dictator. I salute the brave men and women of the coalition who came to this land and made this day possible. Congratulations to all my Iraqi brothers and sisters on this glorious day.

Eighth Air Force to become new Cyber Command

8th Air Force to become new cyber command (U.S. Air Force graphic) by Staff Sgt. C. Todd Lopez Air Force Print News 11/3/2006 - WASHINGTON (AFPN) -- During a media conference here Nov. 2, Secretary of the Air Force Michael W. Wynne said the 8th Air Force would become the new Air Force Cyberspace Command. "I am announcing the steps the Air Force is taking towards establishing an Air Force Cyberspace Command," the secretary said. "The new Cyberspace Command is designated as the 8th Air Force... under the leadership of (Lt. Gen. Robert J. "Bob" Elder Jr.) He will develop the force by reaching across all Air Force commands to draw appropriate leaders and appropriate personnel." Secretary Wynne said the 67th Network Warfare Wing, now under 8th Air Force, and other elements already within the 8th, would provide "the center of mass" for the nascent Cyberspace Command. The secretary also said Air Combat Command, Air Force Space Command and Air Force Materiel Command are working to develop the new Cyberspace Command, while Air Force personnel specialists are working to develop educational plans and career paths for those Airmen that will work within the new command. "The aim is to develop a major command that stands alongside Air Force Space Command and Air Combat Command as the provider of forces that the President, combatant commanders and the American people can rely on for preserving the freedom of access and commerce, in air, space and now cyberspace," Secretary Wynne said. Air Force leaders will begin detailed planning for the new Cyberspace Command Nov. 16 at the Cyber Summit. During the summit, Air Force leaders will chart a way ahead for the Air Force's role in cyberspace, also called the cyber domain.

Iran Test-Fires Longer Range Missile

Nov 2, 4:28 PM (ET)By NASSER KARIMI TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran test-fired dozens of missiles, including the Shahab-3 that can reach Israel, in military maneuvers Thursday that it said were aimed at putting a stop to the role of world powers in the Persian Gulf region.The show of strength came as Iran remains locked in dispute with the West over its nuclear program, which Washington says is geared to producing atomic weapons but Tehran says is only for generating electricity. The maneuvers came three days after U.S.-led warships finished naval exercises in the Gulf that Iran branded as "adventurist." State television reported that several kinds of missiles were tested, and broadcast footage of them being fired from mobile launchers. "We want to show our deterrent and defensive power to trans-regional enemies, and we hope they will understand the message," the head of the Revolutionary Guards, Gen. Yahya Rahim Safavi, said in a clear reference to the United States, Britain and France, who were among the six nations that took part in the Gulf maneuvers earlier this week. Iranian state radio said: "The maneuver is aimed at providing security in the region without the intervention of trans-regional powers, which are trying to justify their presence by portraying the region as convulsive." In Israel, Infrastructure Minister Binyamin Ben-Eliezer said he was not surprised by the missile tests, and warned that to leave Iran unchecked would pose a risk to the world."Iran is following a direct line after North Korea. Therefore this problem is not Israel's but that of the entire world," Ben-Eliezer said, referring to North Korea's recent nuclear test and its frequent launches of long-range missiles. Asked about Iran's tests, White House deputy press secretary Tony Fratto said, "I don't have any independent verification on that." Iran's Shahab-3 missile, which can carrying a nuclear warhead and is said to have a range of more than 1,250 miles, is believed to be based on a North Korean missile design, although Iran denies this. The Iranian missile tests "should bother not only Israel. It should bother the Arab countries, Islamic countries, the Gulf region, North Africa and Europe. We are always warning the world about this phenomenon called Iran," Ben-Eliezer said. Iran already has held three large-scale military exercises this year. It often uses maneuvers to test weapons developed by its arms industry. Safavi, whose elite Revolutionary Guards conducted the missile tests, said the maneuvers that began Thursday, named "Great Prophet," would take place in the Gulf, the Sea of Oman and several provinces of Iran. He did not specify how many troops were involved. State TV reported that among the rockets fired was the Shahab-2, which has a warhead that can distribute 1,400 bomblets at the same time. State radio quoted the air force chief of the Revolutionary Guards, Gen. Hossein Salami, as saying: "A large number of advanced missiles, different in range, warhead and kind, were successfully test fired at the same time." The U.N. Security Council is considered imposing sanctions on Iran, which has ignored demands that it cease uranium enrichment, a process that can produce the fuel for nuclear reactors or material for bombs. Iran insists it does not seek to produce nuclear weapons, but only to produce its own nuclear fuel.The U.S.-led maneuvers that finished Monday focused on surveillance, with warships tracking a ship suspected of carrying components of illegal weapons. The nations that took part were Australia, Bahrain, Britain, France, Italy and the United States.

Pentagon transformation for the 21st Century

From Mario Loyola in the Corner: "The transformation of a nation's military is the rarest of historical accomplishments — vested interests almost always win, leading the nation into the great danger of increasing vulnerability. As Rumsfeld likes to say, "weakness is provocative," and as the Russians learned in World War I and the French in World War II, an untransformed military can look good on paper and prove worthless on the field of battle. In this case, the vested interests are angry at Rumsfeld because they have lost so many battles in their effort to cling to a military capable of defeating a Soviet Union that no longer exists. Rumsfeld understands what his critics don't—as Charles de Gaulle said, no institution lasts unless it is constantly renewed. People howl that the military is now overstretched because he failed to plan the postwar peace. But by my count, there are at least 10 combat brigades (in addition to those already deployed around the world) ready to roll at any given time — on the order of 100,000 troops — enough for a campaign of massive proportions in addition to what we are doing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Many experts then wail that these units are "not ready" because many or most are reporting at the C-3 and C-4 levels of readiness (the lowest ones) because of the Iraq war's drain on resources. What people need to understand about the readiness targets is that they are the Rumsfeld's military's futuristic assessment of what would ideally be needed for any of the 39 combat brigades of the U.S. military to enter any of the currently conceivable combat scenarios with their entire wish list — which means all the uparmored Humvees they would need in a theaterwide counterinsurgency environment AND all the artillery they would need in a big mass-on-mass engagement with another army AND all the maneuver forces it would need for massive mobility under fire. The units reporting at C-3 and C-4 many not have the latest and most high-tech equipment in the numbers they want—there might be more casualties and more collateral damage—but they have all the equipment they need to go into combat today and fight and win with overwhelming power. What Rumsfeld has created is a fully modular, rotational "total force" that achieves division-size effects with brigade-size formations, is vastly more lethal, agile, and integrated than what we had before, and has spread its capabilities across a spectrum of possible challenges. That's how Rumsfeld has helped the country prepare for a future of unknown unknowns. We saw the results in the rapidity with which the U.S. military responded to the Indian Ocean tsunami, orchestrating almost over night one of the largest humanitarian relief operations in history. This saved countless tens of thousands from thirst, disease, and starvation in the critical early weeks after the disaster. It was totally unexpected — but we were ready. In my opinion, we will have reasons to thank Rumsfeld many decades into the future. And as invariably happens in history, people will quite forget what folks thought of Rumsfeld in his own time—especially those who did not understand what they were looking at and had essentially had nothing to say.

Picture is worth a thousand words...

Go Army!!

Our troops can understand the news?!!

www.drudgereport.com/kerry One of the best things about the US military is its sense of humor. I laugh all the time whenever around my fellow Airmen or Soldiers- because they have wry wit and are genuinely nice and good people. When you think about the quickness of this response from half a world away, you realize why we have the best armed forces in the world. HOOAH Army!!