Supporting our Troops and Airmen

Ah, another "patriotic" American who actually admits the truth of the matter. If you don't support the mission, if you are calling for "withdrawal" (i.e. defeat and retreat), then you really do NOT support our military forces: http://adamash.blogspot.com/2007/01/adams-blogbox-why-support-our-troops.html#comments Adam's blogbox: why “support our troops” is a crock Come with me to a gathering of the faithful. A gathering of Congress, say. Democrats and Republicans as far as the eye can see. Bickering, posturing, name-calling. Then one of them utters this phrase: “support our troops.” What happens? Suddenly, the sound of a heavenly choir is heard. All hands on deck are placed automatically on all hearts. The assembled eyes cast their assembled gaze heavenwards. In their minds’ eyes, Democrats and Republicans alike fall to their collective knees and bow their collective heads as if God Himself deigned to speak to them. A look of the utmost piety bonds them all in a holy consensus of bipartisanship, hammered by angels into hoops of steel. What a total crock. “Support our troops” has got to be the most cynical use of language since a serpent told Eve that an apple would be good for her digestion.I’m happy to say that as a proud patriot, I don’t “support our troops.” At all. Ever. Not in the slightest. Not with a single cell in my body. Not, that is to say, in the accepted use of the term. I believe the only way to support our troops is to keep them back home with their loved ones, where they can have a life like the rest of us. I’m happy to pay for their livelihoods via my taxes when they stay home, because I think every country needs a deterrent force. In other words, our troops are our first line of self-defense, there to discourage others from attacking us by their mere stay-at-home presence (like a never-to-be-used nuclear deterrence).However, when our troops are used to attack others, I don’t support them at all. Because what is really going on? I’m not being asked to support them to have a good life. No, I’m being asked to support them getting themselves killed. And for what? For some dubious political agenda.Let me explain the difference between supporting our troops for real and “supporting our troops” for BS.Take World War Two. This was a war where the allies had to defend themselves against an unholy threat, the Nazis under Hitler, who attacked first. That’s how you know someone is a threat: they attack you or your friends. If I had been alive then, I would’ve had no problem supporting our troops. In fact, I would’ve become one of them.Vietnam and Iraq are a different story. They’re examples of political agendas that are further removed from defending our country than Paris Hilton is removed from Gandhi. They’re attacks on nations nowhere near us, and nowhere near a threat to us. I have never seen a threatening Vietnamese or Iraqi in my neighborhood, and I live in New York, where you get all sorts.When Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama or John McCain or Rudy Giuliani or my best friend tells me I should “support our troops,” or that they “support our troops,” I want to draw them over my lap and spank them with the Constitution of the United States till they cry uncle and promise never to “support our troops” again when our troops are fighting for Big Oil or god knows what in some foreign land.Hillary and Barack and John and Rudy are being pious hypocrites who should burn in hell every time one of our troops is killed or wounded. They should have their tongues torn out and eaten by cannibals. Shame on them. The inference is that now that our troops are in harm’s way, it’s our duty to supply them with funds and body armor and whatnot to help them survive the terrible position they’re in. I call BS on that. The way to support them is to get them the hell out of there. Don’t support them with funds. Starve them of funds so they can’t fight anymore, and so their leaders have no option but to bring them home, which they should never have left in the first place. “Support our troops” is a species of sloganeering made up to replace rational thought. It sits on top of a big heap of claptrap phrase-making, which includes “taking the fight to the enemy,” “culture of corruption,” “war on terror,” (a biggie), “war on drugs,” “fighting the terrorists over there so we don’t have to fight them here,” “ownership society,” etc. You know, polspeak. Orwellian propaganda. The opposite of common sense.When a pious Democrat says, “support our troops,” he or she wants to say, I don’t support our president but I support our troops. The implication is that unlike our president, our troops are innocent, and that supporting their innocence proves that this pious Democrat is a good patriot for whom you should vote. What a cynical use of the plight of our troops to boost a politician’s self-righteousness. (Off-topic but interesting: since our military code says no US soldier is obliged to execute an inappropriate order from a superior, a case can be made that being ordered to go kill Iraqis is not all that moral, which means the innocence of our troops is open to debate. Then again, a better case might be made that our troops are being duped.) When a Republican who backs Bush (not many of them left) says, “support our troops,” he’s trying to insinuate that those who attack the policy aren’t supporting American kids trying to stay alive. It’s total BS. It actually masks a flat-out betrayal of our troops. Of course, Bush is the Betrayer-In-Chief of our troops. You don’t send kids to get killed for BS reasons and then ask everyone to support them. Bush is really saying, “support me.” Translation: “support my failure.” It’s like a kid killing his parents and asking for mercy because he’s an orphan. “Support our troops” is a species of sickening piety. It’s the good liberal trying to claim he or she is all for our soldiers but against what they’re fighting for, a kind of personality-splitting madness. It’s the crazy warmonger’s excuse to continue warmongering. I imagine some US general dying in Iraq like a latter-day Kurtz out of Conrad’s “The Heart of Darkness”, but instead of his last words being “the horror, the horror,” he moans “the piety, the piety.” This pious monstrosity about our sacred duty to “support our troops” must be unmasked for the cynical hypocrisy it is. Because what lies behind it? Over 600,000 Iraqis dead. Women and children blown to smithereens with your tax dollars. 3,050 US troops dead. Thousands of them crippled, brain-damaged, faces blown off, armless, legless, traumatized for no good reason (unless you think oil is a good reason) and by now, worst of all, simply to save US face. Kids sacrificed so the feelings of the worst President in history won’t get hurt. If you want to support that, go ahead, “support our troops.” Put your hand on your heart while you do it. Enjoy your piety. Support their continuing death, maiming and trauma. But I absolutely, completely and totally refuse to “support our troops.”

Iran's Role in Iraq Will Be Exposed

BY ELI LAKE - URL: http://www.nysun.com/article/47544 WASHINGTON — New evidence of Iran's role in Iraq will be made in Baghdad by the chief spokesman for the multinational forces in Iraq, Major General William Caldwell. The Directorate of National Intelligence worked over the weekend to clear new intelligence and information that sources inside the intelligence community said would implicate Iran in deliberately sending particularly lethal improvised explosives to terrorists to kill coalition soldiers.The intelligence community is currently debating whether to make the new evidence, which it plans to declassify, available on the Internet.The plan to present the evidence will coincide with a presentation this week by Ambassador Khalilzad to the press detailing the charges against Iranian operatives affiliated with the country's Quds Force arrested in the last six weeks in three raids. The decision to go public with new evidence on Iran's role in fomenting Iraq's civil war and in working with terrorists killing American soldiers marks a change in strategy for the Bush administration, which has until now provided scant evidence to the public about Iran's role in the Iraq conflict. Since the president unveiled his new war strategy on January 10, leading Democrats have challenged claims of Iran's role and intentions in the Iraq war.For example, Senator Rockefeller, the chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, told the New York Times following the president's speech that he believed it was "Iraq all over again," suggesting the administration was manufacturing or politicizing intelligence to start a war with Iran. More recently, the chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Rep. Reyes, a Democrat from Texas, has said he was going to review the administration's claim that Iran was manufacturing the improvised explosive devices. What intelligence will be declassified, intelligence sources said yesterday, was still being debated. For example, American analysts in the last year have been able to trace serial numbers found on explosive devices used as makeshift roadside bombs back to factories in Iran, linking the Mahdi Army as well as Sunni jihadist groups like Ansar al-Sunna. But all of these details may not be publicly disclosed if such a disclosure would tip off Iran's intelligence services as to how America's intelligence services collect information inside Iran.The protection of sources and methods is only one concern, however, for the directorate of national intelligence. Another issue is political. Some of the intelligence collected in the last six weeks from raids of Iranian outposts implicates the Islamic Republic in funding Sunni jihadists. Making this information public could jeopardize the political standing of some of America's allies that have also forged alliances with Iran out of political necessity. Another factor in the debate is deep disagreements about whether Iran's state apparatus is behind the Quds force, or whether it and the revolutionary guard in general do not reflect the policy of Iran's supreme leader and the rest of the regime. Many Iran analysts argue that there are multiple nodes of power in Tehran, often working at cross-purposes. This view dominated the Clinton administration, which sought to engage the former Iranian president, Mohammed Khatami and his fellow reformers, but not the state's more hard-line leadership represented in the intelligence and security services.

Branch franchise no more, terror has a head office

Greg Sheridan, Foreign editor- The Australian January 27, 2007 AL-QA'IDA is back. The most dangerous and globally effective terrorist organisation the world has known has staged a quiet but stunning comeback.It is no longer adequate to talk of it as a franchise or an ideological or public relations organisation, or as an inspiration for global terror. It is all of those things but it has re-established itself as a global, operational organisation, with strong logistical, training and operational capabilities and a coherent and intact leadership. Al-Qa'ida has indeed suffered a lot of losses since the seminal terror attacks in the US of September 11, 2001. But as many Western leaders have pointed out, the war on terror is destined to be a long war, a trans-generational struggle. Al-Qa'ida has shown an unexpected organisational resilience and is back in business big time. Australians should understand just what this means for them. Every year since 2001 al-Qa'ida and its affiliates have attempted a big attack on Australia and Australians overseas. Some, such as the Bali bombings of 2002, have killed large numbers of Australians. All of the attacks planned for Australia itself have so far been thwarted. But it is as likely as anything can be that there will be further big attempts against Australia. One day one of them will succeed. All of this is made much more likely by al-Qa'ida's revival. Last week both The Economist and The New Republic ran extensive reports on al-Qa'ida's return. These two well-connected magazines are merely among the first public reflections of what is now a wide consensus among Western intelligence - al-Qa'ida is definitively back. It is not an unmixed picture - al-Qa'ida recently suffered an important reverse in Somalia, and it has suffered further damage in Southeast Asia, but its gains outweigh its losses in the past six months. On a conservative estimate, al-Qa'ida has made significant gains in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, parts of Africa and parts of Europe. It continues to be strong in numerous Middle East locations. Its central leadership, almost certainly located in northern Pakistan or possibly southern Afghanistan, remains secure and effective. The worst news for the West in the war on terror has been the re-emergence of al-Qa'ida in Pakistan and Afghanistan. In mid-2005 Pakistan's dictator, Pervez Musharraf, boasted that al-Qa'ida no longer existed in Pakistan. It was a fraudulent and hollow boast even then. Today, it looks ridiculous. Pakistan remains both the enigma, and the ultimate danger, in the war on terror. In Waziristan and other tribal areas near the Afghan border, the Pakistani army has virtually conceded defeat in its attempt to gain control over its own territory. Instead it has ceded control to tribal leaders and is relying on their agreement to keep al-Qa'ida out of its territory. This has been the single most important factor in al-Qa'ida's global resurgence, for these tribal leaders have a traditionally close relationship with the Taliban, which was itself substantially created by Pakistani intelligence. But, as US al-Qa'ida expert Peter Bergen notes in The New Republic, the Taliban and al-Qa'ida have now virtually merged. Taliban leaders talk openly of taking instruction from al-Qa'ida. As Bergen points out, the al-Qa'ida sanctuaries in Pakistan and Afghanistan today are not as extensive as those they enjoyed in Afghanistan before the US-led invasion. But al-Qa'ida has adapted its tactics and operational methodology to make maximum use of its new freedom of movement. This is having a direct effect on European terrorism and no doubt will eventually play out in Australia. From about 2004 to the first half of 2006, many Western analysts spoke of al-Qa'ida as a franchise movement or an inspiration, rather than a direct organiser of Western terrorism. It now turns out that much of this analysis was at least partly mistaken. Mohammad Sidique Khan, the leader of the 2005 London Tube bombings, went to Pakistan twice, once in 2003 and once in 2004. He received training in bomb-making. Terrorist acts are vastly more likely to succeed if the leaders have had direct training in bomb-making and allied skills. Despite what the proponents of distance learning might tell you, it's much harder to acquire these skills purely on the internet. Similarly, it further transpires that al-Qa'ida itself had a direct hand in the Madrid train bombings in 2004. A substantial number of terrorist recruits in Europe may be home grown but they are, in quite detailed fashion, following al-Qa'ida orders and receiving al-Qa'ida training. Al-Qa'ida training camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan are much smaller than they were in Afghanistan when it was ruled by the Taliban. But they are no less effective. They might house 20, or fewer, perhaps a dozen, trainees at a time. As such they are impossible to detect by satellite or other electronic surveillance, but they are every bit as deadly in their consequences. Meanwhile the Taliban is also resurgent in southern Afghanistan and this a fundamental benefit to al-Qa'ida. Again Pakistan's unfathomable ambiguity is at the heart of al-Qa'ida's success. The Pakistani authorities did capture or kill a number of important al-Qa'ida leaders after 9/11. But they never brought in a single significant Taliban leader. They never wholly gave up their investment in the Taliban. But now the Taliban is subservient to al-Qa'ida and sees itself as part of al-Qa'ida organisationally and ideologically. Elsewhere, al-Qa'ida has made profoundly important organisational gains. The Algerian terrorist outfit, the Group for Call and Combat, has recently pledged its complete loyalty to al-Qa'ida. The tremendous confusion, disarray, civil strife and weak governance throughout Africa, with its vast Muslim population, has proved a fertile recruiting ground for al-Qa'ida. It has suffered a big reverse in Somalia. There the highly effective US Joint Task Force - Horn of Africa was critical in enabling the Ethiopians to chase a pro-al-Qa'ida government out of Mogadishu. This small US force relied on, and enabled, a regional ally to achieve a strategic objective and many in the US military believe this could be a model for future operations. But of course no one would contemplate Somalia's future with confidence. At the same time, it is wrong to underestimate al-Qa'ida in Iraq. It is true that the central dynamic of violence in Iraq is sectarian conflict between Sunni and Shia. But al-Qa'ida in Iraq remains a key factor within the Sunni community, and is still the main channel for foreign jihadis getting involved in Iraq. A US failure in Iraq would very likely lead to much greater freedom of movement and organisation for al-Qa'ida there. One reverse al-Qa'ida has suffered is that one its deadliest Southeast Asian affiliates, the Abu Sayyaf Group, is under real pressure in the southern Philippines because of the assistance the US (and in some limited fashion Australia) has given to the armed forces of The Philippines. So there are pluses and minuses, but globally, it's a disturbing picture.

Iran is at war with us whether we admit it or not

Is Iran providing devices that help insurgents detonate IEDs in Iraq? WEB EXCLUSIVE By Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball Newsweek Updated: 7:51 p.m. ET Jan 24, 2007 Jan. 24, 2007 - Why is the Bush administration escalating its accusations that Iran is backing Shiite extremists inside Iraq? One reason: mounting intelligence indicating Tehran has been supplying insurgents with electronic sensors that trigger roadside bombs used against U.S. troops. The devices in question—which cost as little as $1 a piece—are called "passive infrared" sensors or detectors. They are commonly used to turn on lights or burglar alarms when someone or something passes in front of them. Over the past year, U.S. forces in Iraq have repeatedly fallen victim to sophisticated homemade bombs—known as IEDs, or improvised explosive devices—which are often rigged with passive infrared sensors. Recent reports from U.S. intelligence agencies show that Iranian agents or brokers have ordered the devices in bulk from manufacturers in the Far East, said one U.S. counterterrorism official, who asked not to be identified discussing sensitive matters. Bruce Riedel, a senior intelligence official who retired from the CIA only two months ago, told NEWSWEEK he too was aware of reports that serial numbers of sensors retrieved from IEDs in Iraq have been traced to orders from Iran placed with infrared-sensor manufacturers in Taiwan and Japan. (Riedel is now an analyst with the Saban Center at the Brookings Institution.) The infrared devices are particularly deadly as triggers for homemade bombs. Unlike cell phones, radio-control systems or garage-door openers—some of the other devices that have been used by Iraqi insurgents to trigger IEDs—the infrared devices do not emit a signal that can be detected before they go off. As a result, it is particularly difficult for U.S. forces to locate and defuse IEDs rigged with such triggers. The presence of the infrared sensors is not the only intelligence pointing to an Iranian role in the construction of IEDs. Some recovered bombs closely match IED designs known to have been used by the Lebanese Shiite movement Hizbullah—another group that relies heavily on Iranian arms and money. A current counterterrorism official says that bombmaking videos believed to have been prepared in Iran have been recovered from insurgents in Iraq. Similar or identical tutorials have also been recovered from Hizbullah, the counterterrorism official said. The videodiscs contain instructions on how to build homemade bombs with “shaped charges” (known in military jargon as EFPs, or explosive formed projectiles)—particularly deadly devices capable of penetrating tank armor. These, too, are known to have been used by Hizbullah. U.S. officials say they believe the supply of equipment and components to insurgents inside Iraq is being arranged in Iran by the Al-Quds brigades. This group is an offshoot of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, a national militia organization charged with protecting Iran’s theocratic government from counterrevolutionary forces. The corps is believed to operate under the direct authority of Iran’s outspoken and controversial president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who himself originally rose to prominence as a member of the organization. Christine DeVries, a spokeswoman for a special Defense Department task force assigned to track IEDs in Iraq, declined to talk about any intelligence linking IEDs to Iran. She said the task force never speaks in public about “what we’re seeing the enemy do,” though she added that U.S. forces are dealing with “an adaptive enemy, who uses everything at his disposal.” In recent weeks, the Bush administration, along with the government of British Prime Minister Tony Blair, has made increasingly dramatic assertions about Iranian interference in Iraq—alleging the existence of a pipeline that flows between Iran and Shia extremists who have been implicated in attacks on U.S. troops. In testimony last week before the Senate Intelligence Committee, CIA Director Michael Hayden focused in particular on the presence of the explosive formed projectiles. "They are being used against our forces. They are capable of defeating some of our heaviest armor, and incident for incident cause significantly more casualties than any other improvised explosive devices do, and they are provided to Shia militia." But officials have not publicly discussed the link between Iran's purchase of infrared sensors and the use of the sensors in the assembly of roadside bombs in Iraq—a connection that potentially makes the administration's allegations stronger. Current and former intelligence officials also cautioned that Iranian involvement in the insurgency should not be overstated. They noted, for example, that most IED attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq are launched by Sunni insurgents rather than the Shia elements most directly backed by Iran. One senior U.S. intelligence official, speaking recently to a group of reporters on condition of anonymity, acknowledged that only a “small percentage”" of IEDs found in Iraq show signs of possible Iranian origin, though the official indicated that because of their more sophisticated design, the Iranian-linked IEDs tend to be more deadly than Sunni homemade bombs. Some congressional Democrats have also expressed concern that the administration was overstating the Iranian connection in the same way that Bush and his aides did in the run-up to the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Through a spokesman, the new chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Silvestre Reyes, told NEWSWEEK that he intended to look into the intelligence behind administration claims about Iranian IED supplies. “Senior administration officials, including the president himself, have said publicly that Iran has sent IEDs into Iraq,” Reyes said, adding: “I will be closely examining the intelligence that underlies those claims.” Nevertheless, intelligence officials contacted by NEWSWEEK insist that Iranian interference in Iraq appears significant. U.S. intelligence officials say they are aware of staging points—sometimes upgraded in unofficial accounts to "training camps"—in Iran, Syria and Lebanon that are used by insurgents traveling in and out of Iraq. Intelligence agencies believe that supplies, such as the sensors, are shipped from these locations. One U.S. official said that the staging posts do not necessarily stay in the same location for long, which would greatly complicate any efforts by U.S. secret military units or intelligence teams to shut them down. Another U.S. official said that information about one such staging area in Syria is well known. But the details about what goes on there—and information about the extent to which civilians are present at the site—are murky. Any U.S. move against them could cause unwanted civilian casualties and a major confrontation with Syria. U.S. officials believe supplies and personnel are moved across the Iraqi border from Iran via "ratlines"—intelligence jargon for smuggling routes—which, in some cases, are fairly well-documented by intelligence reporting. However, those same routes are also used by large numbers of Iranian pilgrims who travel to and from sacred Shia shrines inside Iraq. This can make it difficult, if not impossible, for U.S. forces to crack down on Iranian aid to insurgents because it is impossible to tell pilgrims from Iranian government operatives. U.S. officials note that all the major Iraqi Shiite parties, including Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s, have strong historical ties to Iran; some of the groups even operated from Tehran during Saddam Hussein's dictatorship. An Iranian outpost in the Kurdish town of Erbil, which was recently the target of a controversial U.S. military raid, has been known for the last 10 years as an Iranian intelligence base, a former official said. And one of the biggest open secrets in Iraq is the identity of the station chief of Iranian intelligence. According to former CIA official Riedel, he is one of the "most important figures in Baghdad." But this person operates from the Iranian Embassy, almost certainly under cover of diplomatic immunity. While his identity is known to intelligence agencies and his activities may be watched, there is little if anything—short of a violation of diplomatic conventions that could amount to an act of war—that U.S. forces can do to shut him down.

Heat-beaming weapon ready by 2010

From correspondents in Moody Air Force Base January 25, 2007 08:58am THE US Defence Department today unveiled what it called a revolutionary heat-beaming weapon that could be used to control mobs or repel foes in conflicts like Iraq and Afghanistan.The so-called Active Denial System creates an intense burning sensation causing people to run for cover, but no lasting harm, officials said."This is a breakthrough technology that's going to give our forces a capability they don't now have," Theodore Barna, an assistant deputy undersecretary of defence for advanced systems and concepts, said."We expect the services to add it to their tool kit. And that could happen as early as 2010." The weapon, mounted on a Humvee vehicle, uses a large rectangular dish antenna to direct an invisible beam toward a target. It includes a high-voltage power unit and beam-generating equipment and is effective at more than 500 metres.Existing counter-personnel systems designed not to kill - including bean bag munitions and rubber bullets - work at little more than "rock-throwing distances," said Marine Colonel Kirk Hymes, director of the Pentagon's Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate. In increasingly complex military operations, the technology provided a much-needed alternative to just going from "shouting to shooting," said Colonel Hymes, who is responsible for the weapon's five-year, $US60 million advanced development. Variations of the system could help in peacetime and wartime missions, including crowd control and mob dispersal, checkpoint security and port protection, officials said. It could also help in conflicts like Iraq and Afghanistan.Raytheon Co, which has worked to develop the technology, has built a prototype called Silent Guardian, that it hopes to sell in the United States and abroad in what could become a multibillion market. The weapon was shown off publicly for the first time at Moody Air Force Base in Georgia, where it has been undergoing operational tests by the 820th Security Forces Group, which protects US Air Force assets.The directorate invited reporters to be zapped as part of what its spokeswoman, Marine Major Sarah Fullwood, called an effort to "demystify" the technology at issue. At a distance of several football fields, the sensation from the exposure was like a blast from a very hot oven, too painful to bear without scrambling for cover. The burning sensation is achieved by high-power energy waves that heat the skin to 54 degrees Celsius. The pain ended as soon as the target jumped from the line of fire.Documents given out during the demonstration said more than 10,000 people had been exposed to the weapon since testing began more than 12 years ago. They said there had been no injuries requiring medical attention during the five-year advanced development program.

Iran's Revolutionary guards start wargames

From correspondents in Tehran January 23, 2007 04:36am IRAN'S Revolutionary Guards launched war-games in central Iran today and said they would test two models of home-made missiles, state radio reported. The war-games come at a time of rising tension between the West and Iran. Western capitals say Tehran's nuclear program is aimed at producing nuclear weapons but Tehran adamantly denies this charge. "In the four-day long missile war-games in Garmsar area, the Zelzal-1 and Fajr-5 missiles will be tested," state radio quoted a Guards spokesman saying. Garmsar is a small city located 100km southeast of Tehran, adjacent to the unpopulated Garmsar desert. The Guards have in the past demonstrated and test fired many Iranian-made missiles. The report said Zelzal-1 had a range of more than 350km and Fajr-5 could hit targets more than 70km away but some military experts say the Zelzal-1 has a shorter range. State radio said the Revolutionary Guards ground force units would start arming and firing the missiles today. Iran has staged several war-games in the past year, including firing some of its long-range Shahab-3 missiles, which Iran says have a range of 2000km, putting Israel or US bases in the Gulf in range. The war-games have been seen by military experts as muscle flexing, aimed at showing off Iran's capabilities in the face of pressure from the United States. The United States said it wants a diplomatic solution to the nuclear standoff, but refused to rule out military action if diplomacy fails.

Collapsing Venezuela

With the new addition of Venezuela to the Iran/North Korea/Syria Axis of Evil, we can only hope that Chavez runs his country into the ground before they continue to wage successful war against the United States. By Richard W. Rahn- THE WASHINGTON TIMES If Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez deliberately intended to sabotage his nation's economy, he would be hard-pressed to do anything different from what he is now doing to his country. It has been widely reported that Mr. Chavez has been increasingly taking control of the oil, telecommunications and energy sectors, as well as the media. What has not been reported is the full extent of the corruption in Venezuela and how this ultimately will destroy the economy. The financial scandal taking place is far bigger than Enron, and may ultimately even exceed the U.N. "oil-for-food" scandal, the biggest financial disgrace of all time. Venezuela has had a rapidly growing economy for the last few years, due to high oil prices, but the house of cards is about to collapse. The former Venezuelan representative to Transparency International, Gustavo Coronel, has documented how much of this corruption has taken place in a report published by the Cato Institute's Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity. Forty years ago, Venezuela had become a functioning democracy and was experiencing solid economic growth, but beginning in the mid-1970s corruption increased. Partially as a result, Hugo Chavez was elected president in December 1998 on an anti-corruption platform. In the years since, Mr. Chavez has been dismantling the independent political institutions and sharply reducing transparency. He has also stripped the Central Bank of its independence and misappropriated much of its reserves. Some of the funds have been used to buy billions of dollars of Argentine bonds, to buy influence in Argentina. That country has not been able to sell bonds in the international markets since its 2001 default because Argentina still has not come to an agreement with its private creditors, despite having extensive and growing foreign exchange reserves. The Argentine bonds were then sold by the Venezuelan government to cooperative local banks at artificial rates as a way to get rid of the bonds. Venezuela established exchange controls several years ago to try to reduce capital flight, which immediately resulted in a parallel (black or free market) market, giving Venezuela two different exchange rates (the official and the black or free market rate). The government uses the existence of these two rates to reward "friendly" banks and "intermediaries" (some of whom are known terrorists). Since 2004, the Venezuelan Central Bank has transferred about $22.5 billion to accounts abroad by the Chavez government, and about $12 billion of that remains unaccounted for. It has also been reported that the gold reserves have been removed from the Central Bank. Mr. Chavez has also set up a "development bank," which operates without transparency. As the Chavez government takes over more and more of private industry, it also ceases reporting on the financial results of those industries, such as the state-owned oil company, which operates Citgo in the U.S. Mr. Chavez announced this month he will take over the privately owned telecommunications and power companies, and we can expect that shortly after he does so his government will also stop reporting their finances. Increasingly, Mr. Chavez uses the massive oil revenues the country receives, as well as other government revenues, as his own private piggy bank. Where has all the money gone? It has gone to buy foreign political influence and loyalties in places like Cuba, Bolivia, Nicaragua and even the United States (notably to subsidize some New England fuel oil consumers through a company controlled by members of the Kennedy family). The money has gone to buy weapons from Russia, Spain and elsewhere, endearing those countries to Mr. Chavez. The money has gone to local cronies for inflated infrastructure and economic development projects and to buy the loyalty of government officials and supporters, including judges. The Venezuelan economy will collapse, despite massive oil revenues because we know socialist economies perform poorly. While the rest of the world has been moving away from socialism for the last quarter-century for good reason, Venezuela is becoming socialist. We know governmental use of central banks to basically print money to cover expenditures results in rising inflation and eventually monetary meltdown. Venezuela no longer has an independent central bank, and inflation is already up to 17 percent and rapidly rising. We know countries thrive with economic freedom but decline without it, and Venezuela is now down to 126 out of 130 nations in the 2006 Economic Freedom of the World the most rapid decline ever (in 1995 it was No. 75). And, finally, we know that when a state becomes totally corrupt an economic collapse always follows. Mr. Chavez and his cronies had already been spending far more than they were taking in before the recent drop in oil prices. Without a big jump back up to $70 a barrel or more for oil, the Venezuelans will be increasingly squeezed, and you can bet the blood from the innocent Venezuelan people will be drained long before those on the take from Mr. Chavez agree to have their looting stopped.

Main Aide of Muqtada Al-Sadr Arrested

Jan 19, 8:26 AM (ET) By KIM GAMEL BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - U.S. and Iraqi forces arrested one of Muqtada al-Sadr's top aides Friday in Baghdad, his office said, as pressure increased on the radical Shiite cleric's militia ahead of a planned security crackdown in the capital.Al-Sadr said in an interview with an Italian newspaper published Friday that the crackdown had already begun and that 400 of his men had been arrested. La Repubblica also quoted him as saying he fears for his life and stays constantly on the move.The raid came as Defense Secretary Robert Gates began his second trip to Iraq in less than a month, arriving in the southern city of Basra to consult with British and other allied commanders.Sheik Abdul-Hadi al-Darraji, al-Sadr's media director in Baghdad, was captured and his personal guard was killed, according to another senior al-Sadr aide."We strongly condemn this cowardly act," said Sheik Abdul-Zahra al-Suweiadi.The U.S. military said special Iraqi army forces operating with coalition advisers captured a high-level, illegal armed group leader in Baladiyat, an eastern neighborhood near al-Sadr's stronghold. It did not identify the detainee, but said two other suspects were detained by Iraqi forces for further questioning.Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has pledged to crack down on Shiite militias as well as Sunni insurgents in a planned security operation. His reluctance to confront the Mahdi Army of al-Sadr, his political backer, has led to the failure of previous efforts to stem sectarian violence in Baghdad.In the interview with La Repubblica, al-Sadr said his militias would not fight back during the Muslim holy month of Muharram, saying it was against the faith to kill at that time. "Let them kill us. For a true believer there is no better moment than this to die: Heaven is ensured," he was quoted as saying. "After Muharram, we'll see." The Muharram starts Friday for Sunnis and Saturday for Shiites.Al-Sadr said he is being targeted."For this reason, I have moved my family to a secure location. I even have had a will drawn up, and I move continuously in a way that only few can know where I am," he was quoted as saying by Repubblica.Militia commanders have said the Shiite prime minister has stopped protecting the fighters under pressure from Washington and have described pinpoint raids in which at least five top commanders of similar standing were captured or killed in recent months.The U.S. military accused the main suspect captured Friday of having ties with the commanders of so-called death squads, which have been blamed for many of the killings that have left dozens of bodies, often showing signs of torture, on the streets of Baghdad.The suspect was detained "based on credible intelligence that he is the leader of illegal armed group punishment committee activity, involving the organized kidnapping, torture and murder of Iraqi civilians," according to the military statement.It also said he was reportedly involved in the assassination of numerous Iraqi security forces and government officials."The suspect allegedly leads various illegal armed group operations and is affiliated with illegal armed group cells targeting Iraqi civilians for sectarian attacks and violence," the statement read, adding he was believed to be affiliated with Baghdad death squad commanders, including Abu Diraa, a Shiite militia leader who has gained a reputation for his brutality. Al-Suweiadi did not give more details, but another official in al-Sadr's office said al-Darraji was captured during a 2 a.m. raid on a mosque in Baladiyat, less than a mile from a U.S. base.The official and an Iraqi police officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of security concerns, also said one of the mosque's guards was killed in a firefight during the raid that damaged the mosque walls, while four other people who were with the sheik were arrested.Abdul-Razzaq al-Nidawi, an al-Sadr aide in the Shiite holy city of Najaf, demanded that al-Darraji and other detainees from the cleric's movement, be released and called for demonstrations after the weekly Friday prayer services."America is playing with fire and our patience is beginning to fade," he said. "This savage barbarian act will not pass peacefully." Gates, who met earlier with the leaders of Saudi Arabia and Qatar, said they had expressed concern about whether al-Maliki can deliver on his promises to rein in the violence and "quite frankly, these are reservations that have been expressed in Washington, and we will be watching."Highlighting the challenges, a rocket struck a British military base late Thursday in Basra, wounding six soldiers, spokeswoman Capt. Katie Brown said, hours before Gates arrived.British military spokesman Maj. Chris Ormond-King told reporters that no "hard evidence" had been obtained of Iranian arms, money or weapons technology entering southern Iraq, but he added, "As a gut feeling we know there is Iranian influence" here. The predominantly Shiite Muslim areas of southern Iraq have historic ties to Iran, which is a predominantly Shiite nation.The Bush administration has accused Iran of meddling in Iraqi affairs and contributing technology and bomb-making materials for insurgents to use against U.S. and Iraqi security forces. Ormond-King, also said it was possible that Basra province, which includes the city of the same name, could be turned over to full Iraqi government control by this spring. He said there is no firm timetable. Basra is Iraq's second-largest city after Baghdad.Britain, which has the largest troop contingent among the U.S. allies, with about 7,000 soldiers in the Basra area, is planning to withdraw a large portion of them this year.A roadside bomb killed one U.S. soldier and wounded three others in an attack against a patrol that was escorting a convoy in northwestern Baghdad, the military said Friday.U.S. and Iraqi forces are gearing up for a major neighborhood-by-neighborhood sweep to quell the spiraling violence in the capital. At least 3,030 members of the U.S. military have died since the Iraq war started in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. Associated Press writers Qais al-Bashir and Bassem Mroue in Baghdad contributed to this report.

Lockheed Martin surface to air defensive shield

New Skyshield system destroys enemy missiles with cloud of tungsten submunitions TEL AVIV — Lockheed Martin is developing its Skyshield air defense system for protection against missiles and rockets. The development is focused on an interceptor that forms a cloud of submunitions to destroy incoming enemy projectiles. In the company's latest newsletter, Lockheed Martin reported the development of a surface-to-air munition to destroy incoming short-range rockets, artillery shells and mortars. The December 2006 Newsline newsletter reported that in static tests the munitions were successful in penetrating and exploding the warhead of Kassam-class, short-range missiles and Katyusha-class rockets of the type that have been aimed at Israel in recent months. "The test rockets were precise copies of the original," the company said.Skyshield, also designed to destroy enemy helicopters and unmanned aerial vehicles, involves two 35-mm cannons and tracking radar. The radar can detect and track small projectiles.The system can fire 1,000 radar-guided shells per minute, the company said. The warhead is called Advanced Hit Efficiency and Destruction. Each AHEAD shell contains 152 submunitions made of tungsten, capable of penetrating an incoming missile, rocket or mortar shell. Lockheed Martin said the bomblets emitted toward their target form a lethal cloud that either destroys the incoming missile or diverts its path. The company said Skyshield does not produce collateral damage."The small tungsten projectiles lose their speed quite quickly when they pass the target, and in their final speed the components do not harm people," the newsletter said.Lockheed Martin has used an unidentified special material for the AHEAD shell designed to penetrate incoming projectiles. The company has proposed delivery of the first enhanced Skyshield to Israel this year. The system reportedly costs around $15 million.

Moscow and Beijing eye space weapons

By Bill Gertz-THE WASHINGTON TIMES Published January 17, 2007 China and Russia are developing space weapons and are among several nations working on systems to threaten U.S. satellites with lasers or missiles, says the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency. In Senate testimony last week, Army Lt. Gen. Michael Maples for the first time raised Pentagon concerns about secret Chinese and Russian space weapons programs. "Russia and China continue to be the primary states of concern regarding military space and counterspace programs," Gen. Maples said at the annual threat briefing of the Senate intelligence committee. Gen. Maples said that "several countries continue to develop capabilities that have the potential to threaten U.S. space assets, and some have already deployed systems with inherent anti-satellite capabilities, such as satellite-tracking laser range-finding devices and nuclear-armed ballistic missiles." Other countries are working on improving space-object tracking and "kinetic or directed energy weapons capabilities." Gen. Maples did not discuss the reported testing of a Chinese anti-satellite laser against a U.S. satellite, which triggered high-level Bush administration worries about Beijing's growing space-weapons program. U.S. officials said details about the Chinese anti-satellite laser shot remain classified so as not to alert China about U.S. knowledge of what intelligence officials say may have been a test shot of an anti-satellite weapon. China has developed several types of ground-based lasers with Russian and Israeli technology, U.S. officials have said. Russia developed anti-satellite weapons during the Cold War, and U.S. officials think the Russian military is continuing work on the weapons, which include both anti-satellite missiles and ground-based lasers. Both Russia and China deny that they are building space weapons and have sought to curb U.S. space defenses through a proposed international ban on weapons in space. The Air Force in 2004 deployed the 76th Space Control Squadron, which can disrupt or knock out foreign satellites using electronic jammers from the ground. Nations other than Russia and China that have space capabilities in key areas also "will acquire military and commercial space-based assets," Gen. Maples said. "Increasing levels of international cooperation, along with the growing number of commercial space consortia, is allowing the proliferation of advanced satellite technologies and knowledge of space systems operations to become available to nations lacking a domestic space capability," he said. Gen. Maples said that building space weapons is "financially taxing" and that "most countries assessed to be pursuing these capabilities are not expected to acquire them within the next few years." He warned, however, that less-developed states and "nonstate entities" also "are pursuing more limited and asymmetric approaches that do not require excessive financial resources or a high-tech industrial base."

Allies beef up naval forces in Gulf to face iran

Luckily the English still have a small Navy, from the news it looks like they will not have one for much longer. Until the West starts to recognize the true threat, we are all at great risk. Richard Beeston, Diplomatic Editor, London Guardian Britain is joining an American military campaign to blunt Iranian influence in Iraq and the Gulf. In a move likely to heighten tension in an already volatile part of the world, US forces have been ordered to detain Iranian agents in Iraq and to strengthen substantially America’s military presence in the Gulf. Two Royal Navy minehunters have arrived in the Gulf to reinforce a naval frigate on patrol in the area. “We are going after their [Iran’s] networks in Iraq,” Zalmay Khalilzad, the outgoing US Ambassador to Baghdad, said. The aim was to change the behaviour of the Islamic regime in Tehran, he added. Robert Gates, the US Defence Secretary, accused Tehran of “very negative behaviour”. Twice in the past few weeks US forces have detained Iranian officials in Iraq, first in Baghdad and last week in the northern city of Arbil. America has accused the Iranians of supporting militant Iraqi groups. Iran insists has insisted that all those detained were performing normal diplomatic duties. Although Mr Gates was recently an advocate of opening dialogue with Iran, as recommended by the Iraq Study Group, he told a Nato meeting yesterday that now is not the time to talk. Tehran’s behaviour justified America’s decision to beef up its presence. “We are simply reaffirming that statement of the importance of the Gulf region to the United States and our determination to be an ongoing strong presence in the area for a long time into the future,” said Mr Gates. The USS Dwight D. Eisenhower aircraft carrier group entered the Gulf in December. It will be joined by the USS John C. Stennis carrier group. This is the first time since the invasion of Iraq four years ago that the US has deployed two carrier strike groups in the Gulf at one time. In addition, President Bush has ordered the deployment of an air defence battalion equipped with Patriot missile batteries to protect America’s Gulf Arab allies from possible air attack from Iran. Britain’s contribution is two minehunters HMS Blyth and HMS Ramsey, which will remain in the Gulf for an unusually-long two-year mission to keep shipping routes open in the event that Iran attempts to block oil exports. The White House has insisted that it has no plans to take military action against Iran. But Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State, described the build up as an evolving strategy to confront Iran’s “destabilising behaviour”. Dr Ali Ansari, an Iranian expert at the University of St Andrews, said that the escalation could have serious consequences. “There is a distinct possibility that the current cold war could turn hot,” he said. “This is an accidental war waiting to happen. Even with the best will in the world crises are not easily managed. Before you know it you can lose control of the situation.” In spite of Iran’s defiant stand, there were reports yesterday that Tehran wanted to ease tensions with Washington. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and President Ahmadinejad reportedly sent a letter to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia asking him to relay a goodwill message to Dr Rice, who arrived in Riyadh last night. The US military build-up is seen as an attempt by Washington to ease concerns among its traditional Arab allies in the region, like Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan, whose leaders have spoken out repeatedly against the danger of Iran extending its influence across the Middle East. The Iranians and their Shia Muslim allies are regarded as the main beneficiaries of the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. In Lebanon Iran’s proxy, Hezbollah, has emerged as the most powerful military force in the country. The Arab Gulf states are also concerned that Iran will try to foment unrest among their large Shia populations. Of greater concern is Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Yesterday Tehran announced that it was stepping up its uranium enrichment programme, which many fear could be a cover for producing highly enriched uranium, the fissile material needed to build an atomic bomb. Last month the United Nations Security Council called on Iran to halt its enrichment work and imposed limited sanctions against Tehran. The Iranians said that they were pressing ahead with the programme and planned to have more than 3,000 centrifuges to enrich uranium at the heavily fortified plant at Natanz in central Iran. Referring to Iran’s refusal to accept repeated international calls to stop elements of its nuclear programme, Mr Gates said: “My view is that when the Iranians are prepared to play a constructive role in dealing with some of these problems, then there might be opportunities for engagement.”

WIN FOR THE TROOPS

MORE SOLDIERS, MORE MARINES January 12, 2007 -- Ralph Peters New York Post YESTERDAY, Defense Secretary Robert Gates made it clear that we've finally got a Pentagon chief who understands the global threats we face and the enduring need for more grunts. In a press conference with the secretary of State and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Gates announced that the administration will seek a permanent increase of 92,000 soldiers and Marines. At last. Upping Army numbers by 65,000 troops and the Marine Corps by 27,000 is the best news for our national defense in 20 years. Vitally, the increases will concentrate on providing more combat forces - those who serve at the forward edge of the fight. To his further credit, Gates listened to the military about the smart way to grow the force: First, the temporary increases now in effect would become permanent; thereafter, the Army and Marines would increase by 7,000 personnel per year. This measured pace allows the services to methodically train, equip and integrate new recruits while standing up additional combat battalions and brigades. Given the current pressures on our under-strength ground forces, it's tempting to beef up the numbers more rapidly - but "you want it bad, you'll get it bad." It's essential that we don't compromise our unmatched standards of professionalism and that units don't have to scrounge for equipment as they head off for war. The proposed end-strength increase is a big victory for the common soldier or Marine - quietly disdained by Washington bigwigs - over the defense-industry aristocrats who push platinum-plated junk on the Pentagon to subsidize their fifth or sixth retirement homes. To someone who's watched the corruption, Capitol Hill shenanigans and culture of lies in defense procurement for decades, it's a great feeling to see real support for G.I. Joe (that guy John Kerry dismissed as so stupid he ended up in Iraq). And Secretary Gates went even further. Tearing up the destructive Rumsfeld-era rule book, he announced a common-sense policy for mobilizing reserve-component units. The bonds between soldiers and Marines at the small-unit level are critical to morale and combat effectiveness. Yet, in recent years, units around the country were pulled apart in ad hoc attempts to flesh out ill-planned deployments. Men and women who'd trained together were thrust into war beside relative strangers. Now units will maintain their home-station integrity and go to war together. Initially, this will mean the early remobilization of some individuals as their units are called up, but it will be far more humane in the long run - making life more predictable for our citizen-soldiers and assuring them that, following one-year mobilizations, they really will be guaranteed at least five full years back in their communities. Congress also should fully fund re-equipping those Reserve and National Guard units, whose inventories - never full - have been picked to pieces during our current conflicts. It's up to Congress to stop the phony gushing about how its members all "support our troops." Put some cash on the barrelhead, Madame Speaker: Fund this vital increase in troop strength promptly. But wait: According to Leftie, those cradle-robbing recruiters won't be able to find enough young patriots to expand the force without a draft. And who wants to serve in uniform, dude? Gates addressed that, too. It was a fine thing to watch our defense secretary announce with visible pride that all of our armed services exceeded their recruiting goals for December - with especially strong enlistment numbers for the Army and Marines. In 2003, we went to war in Iraq with a flawed plan rigged to show that technology alone could win future wars and that "wasteful" soldiers and Marines could be given the boot. Didn't turn out that way, did it? Ralph Peters' latest book is "Never Quit The Fight."

Welcome victory in the war on terror

By Con Coughlin 12:01am GMT 10/01/2007 UK Independent When it comes to prosecuting the worldwide campaign against al-Qa'eda, whether it is in the rugged mountains of Afghanistan or the inhospitable desert terrain of Somalia, the most important virtue a commander can possess is patience.Tracking an elusive enemy such as Osama bin Laden's terror organisation is no easy task. While al-Qa'eda's main priority is to carry out spectacular terror attacks such as the September 11 bombings or the 1998 deadly suicide bomb attacks against the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the organisation invests just as much effort in ensuring that its key operatives escape detection.This would explain why, after five years of unstinting effort by the US-led military coalition across a truly global stage, Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri, the main pillars of the al-Qa'eda leadership, remain at large, as do many of those responsible for many of the other atrocities that have been committed in the name of militant Islam, whether in Africa or London.But just because the foe remains elusive does not mean that the pursuer should lose hope. In the ever-shifting battleground that is the global war on terror, rare moments of opportunity appear when the foe is suddenly forced to break cover and make a run for it. That is when the canny commander moves in for the kill, using his overwhelming military superiority to ensure the enemy has no means of escape. Given the remoteness of the target attacked on Sunday by a US Special Forces AC-130 gunship, it could be several weeks before American commanders will be able to confirm the casualty account from Sunday's surgical strike. But having waited nearly five years for an opportunity to target the most deadly al-Qa'eda terror cell operating on the African continent, American commanders were last night quietly confident that they had struck a major blow against the organisation's operational effectiveness."We have been waiting for a moment like this for a long time," said an officer working with the American military's Joint Combined Task Force in the Horn of Africa, which is based at Djibouti. "We've been tracking these guys for years. So when you get a break like we did on Sunday, you've got to move fast and fierce." Which is what the AC-130, with its 105mm rapid-fire cannons, achieved when it attacked a convoy of al-Qa'eda remnants that was spotted fleeing to southern Somalia after being ejected from Mogadishu by the Ethiopian army.Initial reports suggest that Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, the mastermind of the Nairobi and Dar es Salaam embassy bombings, was killed in the raid, together with several other key al-Qa'eda figures. But more importantly for the Americans, and all those other countries, such as Britain, that are deeply involved in the global terror war, the very fact that al-Qa'eda terrorists and their Somali allies have been forced to undertake a hasty retreat from the Somali capital represents a significant victory in the coalition's attempts to keep the curse of militant Islam at bay.At the end of last year, it looked as if Somalia had every chance of going the same way as Afghanistan under the Taliban in the late 1990s, with a group of radical Muslim clerics threatening to overthrow the legitimate government, take over the entire country and subject it to a brutal interpretation of sharia law. Irrespective of whether the Union of Islamic Courts, which briefly seized control of Mogadishu at the end of last year, is affiliated with bin Laden's organisation, it made no secret of the fact that it was providing succour to a number of key al-Qa'eda operatives – including Mohammed – who were wanted by the Americans for the Kenya and Tanzania attacks, as well as an abortive attempt in 2002 to shoot down an Israeli jet taking off from the Kenyan tourist resort of Mombasa. The prospect of a radical, pro-al-Qa'eda, Islamic state being established in east Africa was the nightmare scenario that American commanders had sought to avoid ever since they established their 2,500-strong foothold in the Horn of Africa in the immediate aftermath of the September 11 attacks. But how to prevent this from happening was another matter entirely. The American military's consciousness still bears the scars of its last attempt at military intervention in Somalia, in October 1993, when 18 American soldiers were killed after a Black Hawk helicopter was shot down during a gun battle with Somali militiamen (bin Laden himself claimed credit for teaching the Somalis how to shoot down a helicopter).On this occasion, however, American blushes have been spared by the impressive job that the Ethiopian armed forces – which are trained and equipped by Washington – have achieved in driving the Islamic Courts out of Mogadishu and restoring some semblance of stability to what is arguably the world's most lawless city. Most Africans, like most Americans, are deeply inimical to the creation of pro-al-Qa'eda, Islamic fundamentalist regimes that pose a threat to their security and liberty.Consequently, a rare combination of African steadfastness and raw American power has won an important victory on this new battlefront in the war on terror, thereby frustrating attempts by Islamic militants to seize control of a strategically important country, and denying refuge to the instigators and perpetrators of acts of evil.Sunday's events in Somalia lend credence to the warning the late President Ronald Reagan gave a previous generation of Islamic terrorists: you can run, but you can't hide.

U.S. Airstrikes in Somalia targets embassy bombers

MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) — Two U.S. airstrikes in Somalia killed large numbers of Islamic extremists, government officials and witnesses said Tuesday. The targets were suspects in the bombings of two U.S. embassies in East Africa in 1998. STORY: Somali president arrives in capital for first time in 40 years. The attacks, by an AC-130 gunship, came after the terror suspects were spotted hiding on a remote island on the southern tip of Somalia, close to the Kenyan border, Somali officials said. The island and a site 155 miles north were hit. It was the first overt military action by the U.S. in Somalia since the 1990s and the legacy of a botched intervention — known as "Black Hawk Down" — that left 18 U.S. servicemen dead. The U.S. military said Tuesday it had sent an aircraft carrier to join three other U.S. warships conducting anti-terror operations off the Somali coast. U.S. warships have been seeking to capture al-Qaeda members thought to be fleeing Somalia after Ethiopia invaded Dec. 24 in support of the government and have begun flying intelligence-gathering missions over Somalia.President Abdullahi Yusuf told journalists in the capital, Mogadishu, that the U.S. "has a right to bombard terrorist suspects who attacked its embassies in Kenya and Tanzania." Monday, Yusuf had entered the restive capital for the first time since his election.Deputy Prime Minister Hussein Aideed told The Associated Press the U.S. had "our full support for the attacks."But others in the capital said the attacks would only increase anti-American sentiment in the largely Muslim country."U.S. involvement in the fighting in our country is completely wrong," said Sahro Ahmed, a 37-year-old mother of five. Already, many people in predominantly Muslim Somalia had resented the presence of troops from neighboring Ethiopia, which has a large Christian population and has fought two brutal wars with Somalia, most recently in 1977.Ethiopia forces had invaded Somalia to prevent an Islamic movement from ousting the weak, internationally recognized government from its lone stronghold in the west of the country. The U.S. and Ethiopia both accuse the Islamic group of harboring extremists, among them al-Qaeda suspects.Ethiopian troops, tanks and warplanes took just 10 days to drive the Islamic group from the capital, Mogadishu, and other key towns.President Yusuf said the leaders of the Islamic movement "would not be forgiven" and that talks between the two rival sides were not an option.One U.S. attack took place on Monday afternoon on Badmadow island. The area is known as Ras Kamboni and is suspected to be a terror training base. Ethiopian and Somali troops had over the last days cornered the main Islamic force in Ras Kamboni, with U.S. warships patrolling off shore and the Kenyan military guarding the border to watch for fleeing militants. Witnesses said at least four civilians were killed in another attack 30 miles east of Afmadow town, including a small boy. The claims could not be independently verified."My 4-year-old boy was killed in the strike," Mohamed Mahmud Burale told the AP by telephone. "We also heard 14 massive explosions." The AC-130, a four engine turboprop-driven aircraft, is armed with 40 mm cannon that fire 120 rounds per minute and a 105 mm cannon, normally a field artillery weapon. The plane's latest version, the AC-130U, known as "Spooky," also carries Gatling gun-type 20 mm cannon. The gunships were designed primarily for battlefield use to place saturated fire on massed troops. "We don't know how many people were killed in the attack but we understand there were a lot of casualties," government spokesman Abdirahman Dinari said. "Most were Islamic fighters." U.S. officials said after the Sept. 11 attacks that extremists with ties to al-Qaeda operated a training camp at Ras Kamboni and al-Qaeda members are believed to have visited it. The alleged mastermind of the embassy bombings in East Africa, Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, escaped to Ras Kamboni, according to testimony from one of the convicted bombers. Mohammed is believed to be the leader of the al-Qaeda East Africa cell.Leaders of the Islamic movement have vowed from their hideouts to launch an Iraq-style guerrilla war in Somalia, and al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden's deputy has called on militants to carry out suicide attacks on the Ethiopian troops. Somalia has not had an effective central government since clan-based warlords toppled dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991 and then turned on each other, sinking the Horn of Africa nation of 7 million people into chaos. At least 13 attempts at government have failed since then. The current government was established in 2004 with U.N. backing. European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana said he told U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Monday that a U.N. peacekeeping force may be needed to guarantee security and stability in Somalia. He said Ugandan forces may be the first deployed to replace Ethiopian troops. Jendayi Frazer, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for Africa, said Sunday that the United States would use its diplomatic and financial resources to support the government. The U.S. has pledged $40 million in political, humanitarian and peacekeeping assistance. The African Union has begun planning for a peacekeeping force, and Uganda has promised at least 1,000 soldiers. Frazer has said she hopes the first troops will begin arriving in Mogadishu before the end of the month.

Islamic Jungle Hideout Near Capture in Somalia

By NASTEEX FARAH DAHIR, Associated Press Writer Monday, January 8, 2007 (01-08) 04:10 PST KISMAYO, Somalia (AP) -- A jungle hideout used by Islamic militants that is believed to be an al-Qaida base was on the verge of falling to Ethiopian and Somali troops, the defense minister said Monday.While a lawmaker had earlier told The Associated Press that the base was captured, Somalia's Defense Minister Col. Barre "Hirale" Aden Shire said troops had yet to enter it and that limited skirmishes were still ongoing, though troops were poised to take the base.Ethiopian soldiers, tanks and warplanes were involved in the two-day attack, a government military commander told the AP on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. Shire said there had been heavy fighting with high numbers of casualties."There are a lot of casualties from both sides," he said, declining to give details.Residents in the coastal seaport of Kismayo, some 90 miles northeast of Ras Kamboni, said they saw wounded Ethiopian soldiers being loaded onto military helicopters for evacuation. "I have seen about 50 injured Ethiopian troops being loaded onto a military chopper," said Farhiya Yusuf. She said 12 Ethiopian helicopters were stationed at the Kismayo airport.Somali officials said the Islamic movement's main force is bottled up at Ras Kamboni, the southernmost tip of the country, cut off from escape at sea by patrolling U.S. warships and across the Kenyan border by the Kenyan military.In Mogadishu, Somalia's president made his first visit to the capital since taking office in 2004. During the unannounced visit, President Abdullahi Yusuf was expected to meet with traditional Somali elders and stay at the former presidential palace that has been occupied by warlords for 15 years, government spokesman Abdirahman Dinari said.U.S. officials warned after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that extremists with ties to al-Qaida operated a training camp at Ras Kamboni and that al-Qaida members are believed to have visited it. Three al-Qaida suspects wanted in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa are believed to be leaders of the Islamic movement. The Islamists deny having any links to al-Qaida.Somalia's government had struggled to survive since forming with backing from the United Nations two years ago, and was under attack by the Islamic militia when Ethiopia's military intervened on Dec. 24 and turned the tide. But many in predominantly Muslim Somalia resent the presence of troops from neighboring Ethiopia, which has a large Christian population. The countries fought two brutal wars, the last in 1977.On Sunday, gunmen attacked Ethiopian troops, witnesses said, sparking a firefight in the second straight day of violence in the capital, Mogadishu.

To Win in Baghdad, Strike at Tehran

By Robert Tracinski, Real Clear Politics Blog January 4, 2007 As early as next week, President Bush is expected to give a major speech announcing a new strategy in Iraq. This is an excellent opportunity for the administration to announce a big strategic change that could dramatically improve America's prospects in Iraq. Unfortunately, however, no one has been discussing the one option that would actually have this effect. The president's current opportunity should not be underestimated. As weak as he seems, politically, President Bush has no real competition in setting policy for Iraq. Between the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays, the Iraq Study Group had its 15 minutes of fame and faded away without having any significant effect on the debate over the war. The Democrats who take control of Congress this month have no unified message on Iraq other than a vague, general defeatism, and they offer no definite plan for what America should do--except, of course, their usual plan to carp about whatever the administration does. So the president has the ability to retake the initiative, both politically and militarily. What will he do? An internal Pentagon review of the war, requested by Bush as part of his attempt to sidestep the Iraq Study Group, has considered three options: "go big," "go long," or "go home." Going big means dramatically increasing the number of US combat troops in Iraq, giving us the ability to further subdue Sunni areas like the Anbar Province and enabling us to crack down on the Shiite militias who are stoking Iraq's sectarian conflict. Going long means committing more resources to the long-term process of training Iraqi forces and building the stability of the Iraqi government. Going home means withdrawing US troops.We all know Bush isn't going to accept the third option. America is not going to go home. Going long might be a nice aspiration, but Bush has only two years left in office. He has no idea who his successor will be and what he (or she) will do. If he wants to succeed in Iraq, he has to do something now. So we can expect President Bush to go big, ordering a "surge" in US combat troops in Iraq. But there is another, far more effective option: go wide. Going wide means recognizing that Iraq is just one front in a regional war against an Islamist Axis centered in Iran--and we cannot win that war without confronting the enemy directly, outside of Iraq. Going wide means recognizing that the conflict in Iraq is fueled and magnified by the intervention of Iran and Syria. One of the reasons the Iraq Study Group report flopped was that its key recommendation--its one unique idea--was for America to negotiate with Iran and Syria in order to convince these countries to aid in the "stabilization" of Iraq. This proposal wasn't so much argued to death as it was laughed to death, because it is clear that Iran and Syria have done everything they can to de-stabilize Iraq, supporting both sides of the sectarian conflict there. It is obvious that both regimes have a profound interest in an American failure and retreat in Iraq. After all, if America can successfully use force to replace a hostile dictatorship with a free society, then the Iranian and Syrian regimes are doomed. So as a matter of elementary self-preservation, they have done everything they can to plunge Iraq into chaos, supporting guerrillas and militias on all sides of the sectarian conflict. Just today, a US official confirmed new evidence "that Iran is working closely with both the Shiite militias and Sunni Jihadist groups." Most ominously, Iran has brazenly provided training and weapons to the Shiite militias--who carry rifles straight off the assembly lines of Iranian weapons factories--and these militias have emerged in the last year as the greatest threat to US troops and to the Iraqi government. How can we quell the conflict in Iraq, further suppress the Sunni insurgents, and begin to dismantle the Shiite militias--if we don't to anything to stop those who are funding, training, and supporting these enemies? Just as we can't eliminate terrorism without confronting the states who sponsor terrorism, so we can't suppress the Sunni and Shiite insurgencies in Iraq without confronting the outside powers who support these insurgents. Every day, we see the disastrous results of fighting this war narrowly inside Iraq while ignoring the external forces that are helping to drive it. To fight one Shiite militia tied to Iran--Sadr's Mahdi Army--we have recently signaled our support for an Iraqi political coalition that includes another Shiite militia tied to Iran, Abdul Aziz al-Hakim's Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq and its Badr Brigades. And so it should be no surprise that a US military raid on Hakim's headquarters last week netted two Iranian diplomats and members of Iran's Revolutionary Guards--the outfit responsible for supporting global terrorism. That's what happens when we fight the symptoms in Iraq rather than fighting the disease. Going wide also means recognizing that more is at stake in this war than just the fate of Iraq. This is a war to determine who and what will dominate the Middle East. Will this vital region be dominated by a nuclear-armed Iran, working to spread Islamic fascism? Or will America be able to exert its military influence and political ideals in the region? This is a momentous question. But observe that the only major foreign-policy debate today is about what to do in Iraq. The anti-war left has not succeeded in inducing America to withdraw in defeat from the Middle East--not yet. But they have succeeded in narrowing our mental focus, inducing us to talk endlessly about what is happening inside Iraq, about whether or not we need more troops there, or whether we need to throw our support to a new political coalition within the Iraqi parliament, or whether we should put more emphasis on Anbar or Baghdad, and on and on--while we ignore the big picture of the Middle East. The big picture is Iran's attempt to establish itself as a regional superpower, spreading its system of religious totalitarianism and rule by terror across the Middle East. Iraq is one piece in this malignant mosaic--but it is only one piece. The Iranians seek to extend their control over the region by supporting Shiite Islamist militias in Iraq. But they are also trying to achieve their goal by propping up the Assad regime in Syria, by arming Hezbollah in Lebanon, by arming and funding Hamas in the Palestinian territories, by hosting Holocaust denial conferences in an attempt to justify a war to destroy Israel, by harboring fugitive al-Qaeda leaders, and by supporting terrorists and anti-American strongmen (such as Venezuela's Hugo Chavez) around the world. In this context, to try to win the war just by sending more troops to Baghdad is like trying to save a patient by removing a tumor in his lung--when the cancer has already metastasized through his entire body. A few of our leaders have put together the big picture. In a recent Washington Post op-ed, for example, Senator Lieberman warned that "while we are naturally focused on Iraq, a larger war is emerging. On one side are extremists and terrorists led and sponsored by Iran, on the other moderates and democrats supported by the United States." Similarly, President Bush warned us last year that "the Iranian regime has clear aims: they want to drive America out of the region, to destroy Israel, and to dominate the broader Middle East." But these leaders have so far avoided advocating the use of military force against Iran. No one is willing to follow the implications of the big picture to the only rational conclusion: we are already in a regional war with Iran, and we need to start fighting it as a regional war. And the most effective place to fight that war is at its center, by targeting the Islamist regime in Tehran. Instead, our current policy is a bizarre, irrational holdover from the Cold War. In a New York Daily News op-ed, for example, Michael Rubin assures us that confronting Iran "need not mean military action." Instead, he advocates a policy of stronger words, from beefed up Radio Free Europe-style broadcasts to rhetoric such as the "Axis of Evil." His most telling recommendation is this one: "Just as Ronald Reagan championed striking shipyard workers in Poland in 1981, so too should Bush support independent Iranian trade unions." Rubin is advocating a strategy I have called Cold War II: fighting Iran the way we fought the Soviet Union, through indirect battles against insurgent proxies (the real parallel between Iraq and Vietnam) and through moral support for Iranian dissidents. But this is brinksmanship without a brink. The reason we had to fight the Soviets indirectly was because they had thousands of nuclear weapons aimed at us. There is no reason to fear such an escalation in a battle against Iran. In fact, the gruesome irony of today is that Iran may soon be able to threaten us with nuclear weapons--but only if we continue to act as if they already possessed a nuclear deterrent. The fact is that we are fighting the wrong war in the wrong place--though not in the way critics of that war complain. We are trying to fight a regional war by limiting ourselves to a local conflict--and we are fighting that war in Baghdad, when it has its source in Damascus and Tehran. There is only one way to correct this massive strategic blunder--and that is to go wide.

The Iranian who wants an Apocalypse

By Michael Burleigh UK Times Last Updated: 12:01am GMT 05/01/2007 One person we will be hearing much about in 2007 will be Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He's the hollow-eyed engineer and town planner (and former Revolutionary Guard) who in 2005 went from being Teheran's answer to Ken Livingstone to President of Iran. He's the fellow stringing along the international community while his scientists try to manufacture a nuclear bomb before America or Israel decides to degrade or destroy key experimental sites. He says appalling things with demented glee in his eyes. According to today's Spectator, Ahmadinejad may actually welcome such an attack, since this will "justify" a retaliatory strike against Israel with nuclear weapons acquired from the former Soviet Union. Certainly, Iran's dark role in arming Hizbollah, and even darker machinations in Iraq, suggest an almost wilful disregard for consequences. Who is Ahmadinejad? In some respects, he resembles those with whom he consorts to ramble on about American imperialism and the wretched of the earth: Hugo Chávez, Robert Mugabe and Fidel Castro. Actually, Ahmadinejad is subtly different: you have to grasp a fusion of apocalyptic piety and politics to get what he is about.Among the lesser-known godfathers of the 1979 Iranian Revolution was the French educated Ali Sharati, who died of a heart attack two years before Khomeni came to power. Sharati's story reminds us of the extent to which various "indigenous" radicalisms are indebted to intellectual contaminants from Western academe.Just as Pol Pot was a product of academic craziness imbibed at the Sorbonne, so Sharati was much taken with how Frantz Fanon and Jean-Paul Sartre tried to revive Marxism through talk of cathartic revolutionary violence and the return to the supposed purity of the pre-modern collective. Sharati incorporated these worldly concerns with the Shia longing for the return of the Twelfth Hidden Imam, who departed this earth in 874. The one cleric not to denounce Sharati as a heretic was Khomeni, himself responsible for the slogan "Islam is politics". Ahmadinejad is unique, not because of his pronouncements about Israel, which he wishes wiped off the face of the earth, but because he actively seeks to bring about an apocalyptic struggle between the righteous and the wicked to accelerate the return of the mahdi or Hidden Imam. One might think that the prospect of US or Israeli bombs raining down on Iran might sober this visionary. That would be a mistake. Khomeni actually incited war with Iraq in 1980, rejecting Saddam's offers of an armistice two years later. During the eight-year war, an enormous militia, called the Basij, was created under the aegis of the Revolutionary Guard. Boys aged 12 to 17 were dispatched against the Iraqi army, each armed with a plastic key to paradise, manufactured in bulk in Taiwan. A ghostly pale rider occasionally appeared, whose phosphorous-painted face was supposed to be that of the Hidden Imam, to urge these suicide waves on. Mowing these children down — and perhaps as many as 100,000 were killed — was so traumatic that even battle-hardened Iraqi veterans declined to fire. No Western-style commissions of inquiry have investigated these state-decreed mass suicides between 1980 and 1988. Instead, the Basji are celebrated, with the countenance of one 15-year-old suicide, who detonated himself against an Iraqi tank, evident in the watermark of 500 Rial bank notes. The Basji have become part of Iran's morality police, poking into cars to sniff out drinkers or women wearing cosmetics, and this time last year cutting off the tongue of Massoud Osanlou, a bus driver who led a transport strike. These youths have also been recruited into a putative army of 54,000 potential suicide bombers, or into university science faculties to bolster Iran's "national security". If Ahmadinejad and the Basji represent the apocalyptic strain in the Iranian Revolution, what of the so-called moderates, such as former president Hashemi Rafsanjani? Unfortunately, when Ahmadinejad uttered his nuclear threats against Israel, Rafsanjani remarked, "The application of an atomic bomb would not leave anything in Israel, but the same thing would just produce damage in the Muslim world", although he forbore to mention that the desired fate of Israel would be shared by much of Jordan, southern Lebanon and, above all, the Palestinians about whose plight Ahmadinejad and Rafsanjani are wont to emote. How the West responds to these threats is an unavoidable question. It is likely that, within 12 months, Iran's technicians will complete the nuclear cycle needed to produce weapons grade uranium. There are slight grounds for optimism. Because of Iran's Byzantine dual politico-religious power structures, Ahmadinejad is not in the same position as a Hitler or Saddam. Maybe wiser counsels will draw Iran back from the brink, if only because it would be a casualty of any war. That is why there is some point in exhausting every avenue of Western diplomacy. Given the lies told about WMD and Iraq, it may be that diplomacy will have to continue until Iran has tested a nuclear device, but before it achieves "weaponisation". That calculation excludes the possibility of Iran supplying terrorist organisations with materials to construct a "dirty bomb". There is widespread resentment among Iranian students about the regime's interference in university life, many of the protests focused on Ahmadinejad himself. Many middle-class Iranians are fed up with having their tastes for whisky or satellite television curbed by interfering clerics, in a country that, despite the morality police, has two million heroin addicts. So far the international community has passed "lite" sanctions, although whether these will deter German or Russian businessmen remains debateable. Stepped-up sanctions could deprive Iran of credit or damage Iran's already creaking oil refining capacity. Meanwhile, American warships will converge on the Persian Gulf while Israeli submarines practise firing missiles powerful enough to penetrate bunkers buried hundreds of feet underground. One person will have brought the world to that epochal pass: the serenely smiling Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

US Navy patrols Somalia's coast

US naval forces have deployed off the Somali coast to prevent leaders of defeated Islamist militias escaping. Kenya has also significantly tightened border security to stop an influx of fleeing fighters, as aid agencies called for help for genuine refugees. Uganda's president is travelling to Ethiopia to discuss forming an African force to stabilise the country. A two-week advance by Ethiopian troops swept the Islamist militias from areas they had controlled for six months. The militias - known as the Union of Islamic Courts - had brought a degree of stability to large areas of the formerly lawless country. But Ethiopia accuses them of al-Qaeda links, and sent heavily-armed troops into Somalia to back up forces loyal to the weak transitional government. Islamists say their retreat from the troops is tactical and have threatened to launch an insurgency. US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack confirmed the deployment of navy ships. "We would be concerned that no leaders who were members of the Islamic Courts which have ties to terrorist organisations including al-Qaeda are allowed to flee and leave Somalia," he said. Kenya has deployed tanks and helicopters on its border, as militias fleeing south clashed near the border with Somali and Ethiopian troops. Foreign Minister Raphael Tuju told a news conference that the border was closed, but government spokesman Alfred Mutua later told the BBC that legitimate refugees were being allowed entry. "We are conducting very thorough and rigorous security vetting to ensure that we don't get people coming in carrying weapons, people coming in who are Islamists," he said. "And so that is causing delays, but we are making sure that everyone who comes in as a refugee... we are driving them to a camp within Kenya which is run by the United Nations." Mr Mutua denied reports that 600 Somali refugees, mainly women and children, had been deported from the border transit camp at Liboi. A spokeswoman for the UN refugee agency UNHCR said they had been denied access to the camp by Kenyan authorities, but witnesses had reported Somalis being deported in government trucks. UNHCR head Antonio Guterres said in a statement that deserving Somali civilians should be entitled to seek asylum in Kenya. On Wednesday, Ethiopian and Somali government forces captured the border town of Doble, one of the final places held by the Islamist militias. Four thousands refugees were reported to be stranded in the area. Between 600 and 700 militia fighters fled the town on Tuesday night, a BBC correspondent said. Somali Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Ghedi has said that he believes the bulk of the fighting is over. Attention is now focusing on how to stabilise the country. After European members of the Somali Contact group met in Brussels, Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt called for peace talks. "There has to be a withdrawal of the Ethiopian forces. There has to be a political process, an inclusive political process in Somalia." Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni is due in Ethiopia on Thursday for talks on a possible African peacekeeping force for Somalia. He has already offered to commit 1,000 troops. The African Union commissioner for peace and security said he hoped African countries would contribute to a peacekeeping force. "I still hope that key AU members will be glad to associate their name and the name of their country in what I believe is the most important peace undertaking in the recent history of Africa," Said Djinnit told the BBC's Network Africa programme. Thursday is also the deadline for Somalis in the capital to hand in their weapons, but slow progress has been made so far.

Somalia tense after Islamists vanish

Ethiopian forces supporting the government have routed the Islamists, but are seen locally as occupiers. By Rob Crilly | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor MOGADISHU, SOMALIA – For six months Somalia's Islamists used freelance warlord Mohamed Qanyare Afrah's home as one of their bases as they took over much of the country. They used his many battlewagons and held meetings in his living room. Last week, they fled an onslaught led by troops from neighboring Ethiopia with Somalian government forces. Mr. Qanyare is grateful but only up to a point. "What I say is Ethiopia should not interfere in Somalian politics," he says. "They can stay as long as they are fighting Al Qaeda - that is a problem for the entire region. But if they try to become involved in our politics then we will oppose them." Ethiopia's preemptive offensive signals the opening of a new front in the global struggle against Islamist militants. And the speed of the Islamists' retreat is reminiscent of how insurgencies began in both Iraq and Afghanistan, say analysts. Now, victory may hinge upon whether warlords like Qanyare support occupying Ethiopian forces or the Islamists.For now Qanyare says his opposition to Ethiopians would be political.But his armored personnel carrier sits in silent threat outside his door. At his gate, a young boy holds a machine gun.And 50 of his "technicals" - pickup trucks mounted with heavy-caliber machine guns - sit around the corner from the whitewashed house, six miles from Somalia's capital, Mogadishu. Bitter rivalry with Ethiopia Ethiopian forces are not popular in this battle-scarred land. Many in Mogadishu see them as an invading force rather than a liberating power. This is due to a longstanding, bitter rivalry between Ethiopia - a country with a large Christian population - and mostly Muslim Somalia. The countries fought two wars in the last 45 years, and Somalia still lays claim to territories in Ethiopia.Diplomats want an international peacekeeping force to replace Ethiopian troops.But for now, Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi is reliant on Ethiopia's tanks and artillery to keep his fractious nation in line.They propelled his meager government forces across Somalia and into the capital, which the Islamists held for more than six months, raising fears that an African Taliban would seek to make the Horn of Africa a haven for Al Qaeda.Some analysts warn that Mr. Gedi is not doing enough to prepare for the Ethiopians' withdrawal - promised in a matter of weeks.They warn that without the Ethiopians, his feeble government will be left trying to fill a political vacuum that could let in the return of the warlords and clan militias who held Somalia in anarchy for 15 years - or even allow the Islamists to rise again. Already Mogadishu has returned to the fear and lawlessness it knew before the Union of Islamic Courts (UIC) imposed its version of order.Tuesday, Gedi told journalists his foreign allies would not leave before their work was done."The Ethiopians will leave when we have cleared our territory of terrorists and when we have pacified our capital," he said.That will take "a week, or weeks, or months, not more."So far he is pursuing a two-pronged strategy to promote peace.He has asked the African Union to send peacekeepers and has declared a three-day amnesty for gun owners to give up their firearms.There were no takers at the Villa Baidoa Tuesday - an old presidential villa designated as one of two collection centers."We haven't even taken a pistol," said a Somalian government soldier.In a city where AK-47s cost $150, most families and businesses rely on one for protection.Arabey Ma'Alim Abdulle, who coordinates security in the donkey-clogged streets that make up Bakaara market, says he only needed a torch and a nightstick when the Islamists were in power. Now he has no intention of giving up his gun.Matt Bryden, consultant to the International Crisis Group, says Gedi's government is following the wrong strategy. "It should be concentrating on winning over the Hawiye clan - the main support base for the [Islamists] - by bringing them into some sort of government of national reconciliation," he says."You have a state of confrontation between the Hawiye and the government and that's where a settlement has to be pursued," he said. "That means some sort of settlement that makes the Hawiye feel like they are part of the government."That would mean Gedi - himself a Hawiye but largely despised by his kinsmen as a weak and ineffectual leader - losing his position, which is not on the table, added Mr. Bryden.Ethiopian troops keep a low profile Tuesday, Somalia's Ethiopian guardians kept a low profile in Mogadishu. Two tanks guarded the airport runway and a contingent of soldiers was at the port. The main Ethiopian firepower is based in Afgooye, about 10 miles from Mogadishu, or has followed the Islamists south.In the south, they managed to rout the Islamist forces, forcing them out of their main stronghold of Kismayo. From there the Islamists have disappeared into the forests of Ras Kaambooni, close to the Kenyan border.Hussein Aideed, deputy prime minister, admits the government now faces a tough challenge. "To clear [the Islamists] will take a long time. It will not be days this time, but maybe three or four months," he says.Meanwhile, in parts of Mogadishu, Somalis are reverting to the lives they lived before Islamic law was imposed. Western music has returned to the Global Dancehall, where Somalis welcomed the new year.When the Islamists were in control, staff were forced to play traditional music and keep the volume down.Still, freedom to party won't erase the worries Somalis have about a return to anarchy now that the Islamists are gone. "As a businessman, I want stability," shouts Mustafa Haji Abdullahi, the 22-year-old chief operating officer of Telcom Somalia, above a blaring hit by US rapper 50 Cent. "I'm already back to paying bribes."Now everyone is waiting to see whether the government can consolidate its position or whether it would disintegrate under the pressure of Somalia's bloody history."All it would take is for one Ethiopian soldier to make a mistake, to shoot someone, to be accused of rape, and then it is all over," says Mr. Abdullahi. "We would be in for another 16 years of mayhem."

Somalian Forces Pursue Islamic Militants

Tuesday January 2, 2007 10:01 AM By MOHAMED OLAD HASSAN Associated Press Writer MOGADISHU, Somalia (AP) - Government forces pursued a militant Islamic movement into a rugged, forested corner of Somalia on Tuesday, as Kenyan troops sealed their border and reported that 10 foreigners already had been arrested. Diplomats from the region were working to arrange the speedy deployment of African peacekeepers to help the interim government establish its authority in the country, which has known only anarchy for 15 years. A three-day period also began Tuesday for Somalis to voluntarily surrender their arms to government-designated points. Ethiopian troops reported that at one such point in the capital, Mogadishu, no one had handed in any weapons in the morning. As the last remaining stronghold of the Islamic group - the port of Kismayo - was overrun by government troops backed by Ethiopian tanks and MiG fighter jets, the net began closing on suspected al-Qaida fighters believed to be sheltered by the hard-line group. Defense Minister Col. Barre ``Hirale'' Aden Shire, speaking in Kismayo Tuesday, said that young men who fought with the Islamic militants are ``pardoned'' and could join Somalia's national army. ``You have heard a lot of times that the transitional government is weak,'' Shire told thousands of Kismayo residents gathered at Freedom Park in the town's center. ``But I will confirm you that the national army are in control of all regions in the country - east, center and south. They will restore security in the country.'' Neighboring Kenya vowed to seal its frontier to prevent any extremists, now wedged between the sea and the border, from escaping following the 13-day military offensive. Sea routes from southern Somalia were also being patrolled by the U.S. navy, hunting three al-Qaida suspects believed to be among the Islamic group and wanted for the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa. ``Kenya cannot be a haven for people who are not wanted by their lawful government,'' Kenyan government spokesman Alfred Mutua said in a statement on Monday. Anthony Kibuchi, the Kenyan provincial police commander on the border, said Monday that 10 foreigners were arrested Saturday when they tried to cross into Kenya. ``We are interrogating them and we will give more details about them as soon as possible,'' he said. Kibuchi refused to provide further details, but local media reported the eight of the men said they were from Eritrea, while two said they were Canadian. According to a U.N. report, Eritrea sent 2,000 troops to support the Islamic movement, while there have been reports of Somalis with Canadian citizenship joining the Islamic militia. The military advance was a stunning turnaround for Somalia's government, which just weeks ago could barely control one town - its base of Baidoa - while the Council of Islamic Courts controlled the capital and much of southern Somalia. But with the intervention of Ethiopia, which has one of Africa's largest armies, the Islamic group has been forced from Mogadishu and other key towns in the past 10 days. Its casualties run into the thousands, Ethiopia said. The group has promised to wage an Iraq-style guerrilla war if defeated, and a woman was killed Sunday in a mysterious blast in the capital. Government and Ethiopian troops were reportedly continuing to move south in pursuit of the remaining Islamic forces, residents said. Diplomats want the international peacekeeping force to replace the muscle of Ethiopia, a largely Christian country long despised in Muslim Somalia. Both countries have fought two wars, the last in 1977, and Somalia lays claim to territories in Ethiopia. Uganda said it has a battalion of 1,000 troops ready to deploy in a few days. Nigeria has also promised troops, Somali government spokesman Abdirahman Dinari said. Outside Villa Baidoa, one of the points in Mogadishu where people have been asked to deposit arms, Muhdin Sharif, 25, said he will never give up his weapons until the Ethiopians leave Somalia. ``We are fighting if we are forced to give up our weapons,'' Sharif said. He said that if Somalia has a government he can rely on he will happily give up his weapons. Somalia's interim government and its Ethiopian allies have long accused Islamic militias of harboring al-Qaida, and the U.S. government has said the 1998 bombers have become leaders in the Islamic movement in Africa. Islamic movement leaders deny having any links to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida terror network.