Geopolitical Worries Send Oil Above 143 Dollars

By Robert Cookson, The Financial Times

Oil surged to a new record above 143 dollars a barrel on Monday as the dollar fell and worries about Iranian supply deepened.

Nymex August West Texas Intermediate rose $3.25 to $143.50 a barrel as the US dollar, in which oil is priced, weakened to a three-week low against the euro. Brent crude rose $3.38 a barrel to $143.69.

The commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards warned at the weekend that Iran would impose controls on shipping in the Gulf oil route if his country was attacked.

“Any confrontation between Iran and non-regional countries would surely be extended to oil which would definitely lead to a huge increase in prices,” Mohammad-Ali Jafari told the state-owned Jam-e Jam newspaper.

The Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula, accounts for about 40 per cent of the world’s traded oil flows. Worries about an attack on Iran have intensified this month after reports that Israel had practised such a strike in the eastern Mediterranean.

Oil prices have jumped more than 40 percent this year and is heading for its biggest six-month gain since 1999 as investors seek to protect themselves against rising inflation and falling corporate earnings.

The falling value of the dollar has also boosted oil prices. On Monday the dollar fell to $1.5804 against the euro, the highest level in three weeks. The euro has gained 14 per cent against the US currency in the last year.

Last week Chakib Khelil, president of Opec, warned that oil prices could soon rise to $170 a barrel.

Meanwhile, copper prices rose as miners in Peru, the world’s second-largest copper producer, went on strike. Peru’s largest federation of mining unions said a nationwide strike had started, though it was not immediately clear what effect the action would have on production.

London Metal Exchange copper for delivery in three months rose $44 to $8590, taking its gains since the start of the year to 29 per cent.

Armageddon Britain

Earlier this week the Government's terrorism adviser, Lord Carlile QC, warned there was 'real anxiety' that private jets might be used as 'vehicle bombs' in terrorist attacks on Britain. But what form would such attacks take? Best-selling thriller writer Tom Cain, whose latest book centres on just such a plot, has talked to defence experts, academics, military personnel, atomic scientists and civil servants to create a chilling picture of what might happen . . .

Armageddon Britain: A detailed insight into how a terrorist attack on Britain could happen any day without warning

By Tom Cain. As published in Daily Mail Online.

The order came from the mountains of North Waziristan, the bleak, lawless tribal area of Pakistan which borders Afghanistan, where the leaders of Al Qaeda have spent the past five years hiding, rebuilding and planning their next atrocities.

It was given by the leader, known to his followers as The Sheik - a tall, slender figure with long beard and soft brown eyes - whose ruthless tactics had become known, and feared, the whole world over.

The plan was made possible by the 40kg of enriched, weapons-grade uranium 235 that The Sheik's most trusted associates had bought, at a cost of $150 million, with the profits of the opium trade that was flourishing once more.

As for the origins of 'the cargo', there was dispute even among the best-informed rumour-mongers of Waziristan.

Some said the uranium had come from the Iranian nuclear plant at Natanz. Others believed it was from North Korea, or even dissident elements in the Russian Federation.

Whatever the source, though, the outcome was the same.

The 'real and imminent' threat to which Mohammed al Baradei, chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency, had alerted the world in June 2004, had finally come true.

Al Qaeda had acquired the means, and the technical know-how, to build a crude, simple, but brutally effective nuclear bomb.

And now they intended to deliver it.

Before the bomb had even been completed, rumours of its existence had reached MI6, and been considered, analysed and then dismissed.

This was to prove a catastrophically foolhardy decision, but it was not an irrational one.

Rumours of rogue nukes had been doing the rounds for almost 20 years since the breakup of the old Soviet Union. Yet no bomb had ever been uncovered, let alone detonated.

For policy makers, forced to work with limited resources, the key consideration was the balance of probability.

And the most probable scenarios, in terms of attacks on the UK mainland, involved disaffected British citizens, using conventional weapons, delivered by groundbased vehicles.

Lord Carlile, the Government's terrorism adviser, might warn of the threat from the air, but the professionals were not convinced.

A rogue pilot would require military-level skills of high-speed, low-level flying to reach any high-profile target in British airspace.

A truck, on the other hand, was a far more reliable delivery platform. It could be driven direct to its target without anyone being any the wiser. But what if the attacker did not wish to be anonymous?

What if - as on 9/11 - global visibility was the whole point of the exercise? The attack on Britain, when it came, would be very visible indeed.

Anyone with £10million to spare can go online and buy a one or two-year-old Cessna Citation X, the fastest nonmilitary aircraft in the world, nearly capable of reaching the speed of sound.

Older models can be found for sale for as little as £5million - with only a few clicks on a computer mouse.

So it was that a respectable Jordanian businessman bought a five-year-old Citation for a little over £7million.

He immediately sold it on to an equally respectable Egyptian, whose connection to Al Qaeda dated back more than a decade, when - undetected by the authorities - he had been a member of its brother organisation, Egyptian Islamic Jihad.

No security checks were made at any stage of the purchase.

Buying an aeroplane is no different to buying a car in that respect. In the UK, the seller and buyer simply have to inform the Civil Aviation Authority of the transfer of ownership.

There is a 30-day time-limit within which that information must be provided. A man with a plane, and lethal intent, can do an awful lot of damage in those 30 days.

It is technically possible to turn an executive jet into an aircraft capable of dropping a bomb.

A hydraulically operated hatch in the belly of the plane, hinged at the front to minimise drag, would not be difficult to install.

Al Qaeda had no need of bomb hatches, however, for The Sheik had a far simpler, more reliable means of getting his bomb to its target: a man willing to die.

The suicide pilot was a former Iraqi Air Force officer, radicalised by extremist Sunni Muslim preachers and then filled with bitter hatred for Britain by the deaths of his wife and children during a firefight between British Army troops and insurgent militiamen in Basra.

The twin towers of the World Trade Center burning on September 11 - now a chief terror adviser has revealed that the risk of it happening again is now even more real.

The pilot would be accompanied by a co-pilot and passenger, purportedly a wealthy Saudi oil trader.

He was, in fact, a weapons technician, a follower of Al Qaeda who had trained under the rogue Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan, there to nursemaid the bomb he had helped create.

As for the nuke itself, it was the most basic form of 'gun-barrel' design. The 40kg of enriched uranium had been divided into two large slugs, placed at either end of a metal tube.

When triggered, one of the slugs would be fired by conventional explosives down the tube like a bullet, straight at the other slug.

A ring of another metal, beryllium, wrapped around the far end of the barrel, would reflect and concentrate the force of the impact, creating the critical mass required for a nuclear explosion.

This bomb was a puny weapon, by nuclear standards. Its blast was a mere kiloton - equivalent to 1,000 tons of TNT - less than one-tenth of the power unleashed on Hiroshima in August 1945.

Yet it would still destroy almost all buildings, vehicles and their occupants in a 600-yard radius, and cause further damage and casualties for up to two miles in every direction.

The nuclear fall-out spread by the blast could then render wide areas uninhabitable for years, and cause potentially fatal damage to any human who breathed it in.

As with the attacks on New York on September 11, 2001, a target was chosen to cause maximum panic and publicity.

Initially, the Canary Wharf Tower had been selected. But The Sheik had considered it too similar to New York's Twin Towers. Why mimic previous successes?

He wanted something different, something even closer to the heart of the British establishment.

His choice? The Houses of Parliament. That single kiloton would devastate Britain politically, financially and psychologically, bringing an infidel nation to its knees before the power of The Sheik's perverted distortion of Islam.

The bomb was smuggled over the borders of Pakistan, into Tajikistan. At an airport near the Tajik capital of Dushanbe, it was loaded onto the waiting Citation.

On a Wednesday morning at 9.30am, local time, the plane took off, routed to Farnborough airport, south-west of London, with a refuelling stop at Cannes Mandelieu in the South of France.

Both airports specialise in private aviation, and anyone is entitled to request a landing, if a slot is available. The formalities are negligible.

It is obligatory to inform UK Customs of any arrival from abroad.

But as long as both plane and pilot are properly licensed there are no further security checks.

Once a landing slot has been confirmed, the pilot is simply given a designated flight path to follow. It is scarcely any more difficult than driving a car across Europe.

At a cruising speed of 625mph, the flight to Cannes took a mere five hours, arriving shortly before 11.30am, Central European Time.

The plane spent just half an hour on the ground, refuelling.

The passengers did not disembark, so there was no need for a Customs inspection.

The bomb lay undisturbed at the rear of the passenger compartment, sitting in a wooden crate about 4ft long.

By noon, local time, 11am in the UK, the plane was en route for Farnborough, 600 miles away.

Forty minutes into the flight, the weapons technician checked the bomb one final time. It appeared to be in perfect working order.

He prayed he would have the courage to depress the trigger when the time came, thereby causing his own annihilation, and that of the entire political class of the United Kingdom.

Security chiefs believe that the Houses of Parliament would be one of the main targets for terrorist bombers.

The Queen was in residence at Buckingham Palace. Less than a mile away from Westminster, she and her servants would probably perish along with everyone else, including the 400 or so MPs who were making their way into the Commons chamber for Prime Minister's Questions.

The London Area Control Centre at Swanwick, Hants, handles almost two million flights a year over southern England.

Air traffic controllers were beginning the routine process of bringing the Citation in to land at Farnborough, along its assigned flight path.

As it crossed the South Coast of England, the plane descended and slowed as expected.

But then, 20 miles out of Farnborough, it veered north-east, heading directly towards London.

The Citation dipped down to 5,000ft. Then it began picking up speed.

The airspace over London and its airports forms a restricted zone that covers much of South-East England.

No airplane may enter it unless authorised to do so by air traffic control. Any unauthorised entry, or deviation from a designated flight path, leads to immediate action.

So it was that one of the controllers at Swanwick, tracking the Citation through the identification code which every aircraft transmits, radioed the pilot and ordered him to return to his prescribed flightpath.

There was no response. The controller tried again. Still no reply. So he followed the protocol laid down for intrusions into the restricted zone.

Just as the leader of the Opposition rose in the House to ask his first question, a call was made from Swanwick to RAF Coningsby, in Lincolnshire: 'We've got a QRA situation.'

The letters stand for Quick Reaction Alert. The RAF officer did not wait for any further explanation. By the time the Prime Minister had begun his reply, the officer had given the order to scramble.

The account of how Britain could react to a terrorist bomb says that the Queen could well be in residence at Buckingham Palace if it happened.

Three minutes later, a pair of 'Eurofighter' Typhoon jets from 3 (Fighter) Squadron were blasting into the air, climbing at more than 1,000ft a second before setting their course to cover the 134 miles south to London.

And now the race began. Flying at a top speed of 1,400 mph, the fighters had to intercept the intruder. Had the pilot made a mistake? Was there a technical problem on the plane? Or was something more sinister afoot? No one knew the answer to that.

British bureaucracy often moves at a pace that makes snails look like racing cheetahs. But not now.

Messages were sped to the Ministry of Defence, Home and Foreign Offices, intelligence services and the Prime Minister's office in a well-rehearsed drill.

Barely a minute had passed before the PM's chief of staff came bursting into the Commons, ignoring the garbled Glaswegian admonishments from the Speaker's chair, and rushed to his master.

The Prime Minister frowned in concentration as he took in what his aide was telling him, muttered a few words of reply and then, with a brief apology, hurried towards the exit.

As he went, he grabbed a mobile phone. He was about to make the biggest decision of his political life. And he had less than five minutes in which to make it.

In the Citation, the atmosphere had changed from one of expectancy and confidence to gut-wrenching tension.

The pilot was following the A3 dual carriageway that runs north into London. His course thus bisected the airspace between Heathrow and Gatwick.

As he crossed the M25, travelling at 500mph, he pressed the intercom and spoke to the men in the passenger compartment.

'Three minutes to target. Good luck, my brothers, and may the mercy and blessing of God be with you.'

In the RAF Typhoons, the atmosphere was just as tense. They were still 60 miles north of central London.

By now, the fighters' datafusion systems, by far the most advanced of any aircraft anywhere, had acquired the target and were providing the pilots with a detailed, three-dimensional picture of the crowded skies around them.

Their role was officially defined as follows: 'To detect, deter or destroy any aircraft intending to attack any target within the UK.'

All they needed was an order. And that had to come from the top.

The Prime Minister was not a man to make hasty decisions. He liked to consider an issue from every angle, to brood over its political implications.

Now though, as he sat in his armoured Jaguar XJ V8 being whisked away to a bomb shelter deep below Whitehall - an urgent matter of business, his officials were assuring the media, but nothing to get worked up about - he had to make up his mind in an instant.

The advice from the intelligence services was ambiguous. Yes, they had been passed information that Al Qaeda was planning a nuclear attack on the West, and this might be it.

But they were dealing with unconfirmed rumour. They had no proof either way.

The diplomats of the Foreign Office, steeped in decades of languid appeasement, naturally counselled caution.

Any hostile moves against an Egyptian-owned jet would be seen as an act of war in the Arab world, inflaming Muslim opinion still further against the UK.

Now the voice of the squadron leader commanding the Typhoons crackled over the line. 'Target in range. Awaiting orders.'

The Typhoons carried AIM-120 AMRAAM missiles, capable of locking onto and destroying a target more than 40 miles away.

That distance was closing by the second. Soon, they would switch to the short-range AIM-132 ASRAAM, designed for close-quarters combat.

The Citation's pilot had practised his approach countless times on computer simulators.

He raced over the suburbs of south-west London, dropping all the time, until he hit the River Thames and banked hard to the right, bringing the plane round to follow the line of the river all the way to his target.

Top-class military pilots, aided by an array of computer systems, are able to fly at virtual ground level at speeds in excess of 400mph.

An executive jet, however, is not designed for low-level flying, and the pilot had nothing to help him find his target but his eyes. Even at 200mph, he was stretching his abilities to the limit.

'What should I do?' The Prime Minister's question was aimed at Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, who, as Chief of the Defence Staff, was the professional head of the British Armed Forces.

Before he could answer, another message came through from the Typhoons.

'We have visual contact. My God, he's coming right at you! Request permission to fire.'

They were so close, racing over the bridges that spanned the Thames. A plaintive call came from the terrified man with the nuclear trigger in his hand, a single word: 'When?'

'Wait,' snapped the pilot. 'Just a few seconds more.'

The Air Chief Marshal thought for less than five seconds. Not so many years ago, the very thought of destroying a civilian aircraft over a major city would have been inconceivable.

But 9/11 had changed everything. Both military men and civilians now understood what such a plane could do.

It was thus a balance between the lives of a handful of likely terrorists, and a mass of innocent civilians. And that was no choice at all.

'Give the order, Sir,' he said. 'Do it,' said the Prime Minister.

'Now!' screamed the terrorist pilot, as he flung his plane into its final death dive.

The sudden movement took the weapons technician by surprise. For a moment, his sweat-soaked palms lost their grip of the bomb control.

It slipped on to his lap. He reached down to retrieve it, and at that precise moment the 10kg warheads of two AIM-132 missiles slammed into the Citation, blowing it apart in mid-air and destroying the bomb before it could be detonated.

The bulk of the plane's shattered fuselage and wings plunged into the river between Lambeth and Westminster bridges, just yards from Parliament.

Yet many razor-sharp fragments, some several feet across, crashed into the bridges and the buildings on both sides of the river, including St Thomas's Hospital.

A dozen people were killed and more than 100 injured, but a far greater catastrophe had been averted.

The bomb was destroyed before it could detonate, and the slugs of uranium 235, which emits only relatively low levels of radiation in its normal state, disappeared beneath the water, leaving no trace behind them.

Footage of the high-speed chase between the RAF Typhoons and the renegade executive jet had been captured on countless videocams and mobile phones. The first clips were on YouTube within minutes.

The major TV channels switched to round-the-clock news coverage, playing and replaying the footage again and again, interviewing anyone with an opinion to give or an axe to grind.

At first, the public accepted the official account, that a terrorist attack had been foiled. Slowly, however, the mood turned.

Al Qaeda immediately denied any involvement and The Sheik insisted, on a grainy, low-quality video, that the plane was part of a secret plot by the enemies of Islam to justify the West's increasingly desperate military actions in Afghanistan and the Middle East.

Absurd as it was, the conspiracy theory nonetheless gained widespread credence. As riots began across the Middle East and the first cars began to burn on the streets of Bradford, many insisted that we British, not our imagined enemies, were truly to blame.

Nor did the beleaguered Prime Minister gain any credit at home for having averted catastrophe.

After all, wasn't it his party whose follies in Iraq had made Britain more vulnerable to such attacks? His government fell before the year was out.

Royal Navy divers recovered the uranium shortly after 1am on the night after the crash. The public were never informed that the plane had, indeed, been carrying a nuclear bomb. Well, it wouldn't do to spread alarm, nor reveal just how close Britain had come to catastrophe. Would it?

~ ~ ~

Tom Cain's new thriller, The Survivor, will be published by Bantam Press on July 28.

O.K. Iran, Here's the Deal

Bureau of International Security and Nonproliferation

Washington, DC

June 16, 2008

Updated P5+1 Package

On 14-15 June 2008, EU High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy Javier Solana, accompanied by the Political Directors of China, France, Germany, Russia, and the United Kingdom, presented Iran with an updated package of incentives on behalf of the P5+1 (China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States). This package was delivered to several Iranian officials, including: Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki; Iran's lead nuclear negotiator, Saeed Jalili; and, the Speaker of the Majles, Ali Larijani.

Through delivery of the package, the members of the P5+1 renew our commitment to a diplomatic solution to the Iranian nuclear issue through the dual-track strategy of both offering negotiations once Iran suspends its proliferation sensitive nuclear activities while increasing the pressure on Iran to comply with its international obligations through a range of targeted sanctions measures. We also demonstrate our continued support for the Iranian people and their legitimate aspirations for technological advancement and economic development.

The updated P5+1 package builds on the structure established in the previous offer, which the P5+1 presented to Iran in June 2006. In doing so, the package promises far-reaching benefits to the Iranian nation and people. In sum, these include:

• Cooperation in support of Iran's peaceful use of nuclear energy through the provision of technological and financial assistance, support for Iran's construction of state-of-the-art light water reactors and guaranteed nuclear fuel supply, and cooperation in spent fuel and radioactive waste management;
• Economic engagement, especially support for Iran's participation in the World Trade Organization, and increased direct investment in and trade with Iran;
• Development of Iran's conventional energy infrastructure;
• Assistance with Iran's agricultural development;
• Cooperation with Iran in transportation, civil aviation, environmental, emergency response, and educational fields; and
• Dialogue on political and regional security issues.

Iran's leaders claim to want civilian nuclear power. The members of the P5+1 will make this goal a reality if Iran accepts the cooperation offered. Moreover, that cooperation will open the way to a more productive economy and greater prosperity for all Iranians. The United States reiterates its long-standing willingness to engage Iran in direct negotiations, as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has stated, "on any issue, any time, any place," provided Iran suspends its uranium enrichment-related and reprocessing activities.

Such suspension is required for negotiations to take place in an atmosphere of mutual confidence. We urge Iran to take this step without further delay.

~ ~ ~

From My Cold, Dead Hands

''A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.''

The Supreme Court struck down the District of Columbia's 32-year-old ban on handguns today, saying that Americans have a right to own guns for self defense and hunting, the first major decision on the Second Amendment since its ratification in 1791.

Pictured Above: NRA President Charlton Heston holds a gun aloft as he tells the crowd "I'll give up my gun when you take it from my cold, dead hands" at the 129th Annual Meeting and Exhibit in Charlotte, North Carolina, Saturday, May 20, 2000. (MCT)

The Cobra Strikes

[This is what happens when a nation makes "peace" with terrorists. From Al Jazeera this morning.]

Abducted Pakistani elders 'killed'

The bodies of 22 tribal elders have been found in Pakistan's northwestern tribal region a day after they were captured by pro-Taliban fighters.

The bodies were found on Wednesday near Jandola, a town adjoining the South Waziristan tribal district where loyalists of Baitullah Mehsud, commander of the Pakistani Taliban, have fought pro-government tribesmen.

"According to our information 22 bodies of peace committee members have been found in Kiriwam village," Barkatullah Marwat, a district administration official, said.

A peace committee is a body of tribal elders and tribesmen working with the government to tackle pro-Taliban sentiment in the regions bordering Afghanistan.

"Some of the dead were shot and some had their throats slit," Marwat said.

During clashes earlier this week in Jandola, Taliban fighters captured about 27 people belonging to the peace committee and local tribal elders, he said.

Security officials said that the men's hands were tied behind their backs and the corpses left in a drain by a roadside.

'Reign of terror'

A spokesman for the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan controlled by Mehsud, told the AFP news agency that it had carried out the killings and would soon decide the fate of another eight men.

"The men we killed were involved in thefts and robbery and had unleashed a reign of terror on the people. They were being patronised by the government," Maulvi Omar said.

"The government should not intervene in the current situation, otherwise peace talks would be seriously undermined."

Fighting between supporters of a pro-government tribal elder, called Turkistan Bitani, and fighters belonging to Mehsud's tribe broke out on Monday after rockets were fired at the home of a peace committee member.

Pro-Taliban gains

Kamal Hyder, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Islamabad, said the attacks came as pro-Taliban forces continue to tighten their grip in the region, espcially in the Northwest Frontier Province (NWFP).

"A lot of analysts believe that Peshawar is being surrounded by pro-Taliban factions. That is why the interior minister went there and warned people that the government could launch an operation in the Northwest Frontier Province."

Pakistan's military put the overall death toll from the violence at nine, and said that the Taliban fighters had withdrawn from Jandola.

"There is absolutely nothing now in Jandola. A total of nine people have been killed in fighting between tribes," Major General Athar Abbas, Pakistan's chief military spokesman, said.

But residents told the AFP news agency that the situation in Jandola was still tense and armed fighters were still present. All shops were closed down and roads were deserted, they said.

Pakistan's government began peace talks with Mehsud, who is based in the South Waziristan tribal region, after defeating supporters of Pervez Musharraf, the president, in elections in February.

Pakistan's border regions have been the scene of fighting between troops and pro-Taliban fighters since the fall of the movement in neighbouring Afghanistan in 2001.

There have also been several outbreaks of violence between the area's Pashtun tribes.

Wish You Were Here

View from Ladera’s Villa G, St. Lucia. Named #1 Hotel in the World by Condé Nast Traveler readers. All photos: PRNewsFoto.

The Grand America Hotel receives AAA Five Diamond award for the second consecutive year (photo of the Grand America Lobby Lounge).

Fontainebleau Resort, Miami, Florida.

New York City's Roosevelt Hotel lobby.

The Fairmont Scottsdale Princess.

Cabo Azul Resort & Spa Turns Up The Heat in Los Cabos.

~ ~ ~

Dear Readers, I will be on "vacation" (throwing lead) until I return. No kidding. If you don't hear from me after 20 days, mail that letter I sent you. Yes, kidding. I'll be back in about three weeks, but may drop in from time to time. Thanks for reading. ;) - covertress

CNO Visits Counterpart in Israel

HAIFA NAVAL BASE, Israel (June 21, 2008) Debarking the Eilat-class corvette INS Lahav (SAAR 502), Chief of Naval Operations (CNO), Adm. Gary Roughead salutes members of the Israeli Navy. Roughead is participating in a counterpart visit to continue strengthening and developing global maritime partnerships to increase maritime security. U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Tiffini M. Jones (Released)

CNO Visits Israel for Counterpart Visit

By Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class (SW) Rebekah Blowers, Chief of Naval Operations Public Affairs

TEL AVIV, Israel (NNS) -- Chief of Naval Operations (CNO), Adm. Gary Roughead is visiting Israel from June 21-24 at the invitation of Israeli Navy Commander, Vice Adm. Eli Marum, to strengthen and further develop global maritime partnerships and increase maritime security.

CNO toured Haifa and Ashdod Naval Bases where he got underway on INS Lahav, an Eilat-class corvette; went aboard the Israeli Dolphin-class submarine, INS Tukuma; and met with Israeli Navy and Ministry of Defense officials. Roughead said closer ties and cooperation are mutually beneficial to both navies.

"This is my first visit to Israel, and I've found it to be extremely worthwhile, productive and enjoyable both professionally and personally," Roughead said. "This is an important visit because of the close relationship between our nations and our navies."

CNO stressed the significance of Israel as an important partner to maintaining regional maritime security and achieving key objectives of the cooperative maritime strategy.

"It is important for us to discuss the views we have on maintaining security and safety of our world's oceans and the sea lanes of communication that are important to the prosperity of our countries," said Roughead.

Although this is Roughead's first visit to Israel since becoming Chief of Naval Operations in September 2007, this is the third occasion in which he's had substantive meetings with Marum. Roughead said he looks forward to future visits with the Israeli Navy, as well as other maritime partners throughout the world. Roughead believes that many countries in the region, including Israel, share common interests in combating piracy, promoting stability and securing the maritime domain.

For more news from Chief of Naval Operations, visit http://www.navy.mil/local/cno/.

Dedicated to Barack...

Models on the catwalk for Versace Spring/Summer 2009 collection during the Milan Fashion Week. (Zuma)

[activate (non-government funded) gay-dar now]

~ ~ ~

Dedicated to Barack...

Calling Barack Obama "the man of the moment," Donatella Versace dedicated her Spring-Summer 2009 collection to presidential hopeful Obama, creating a style she said was designed for "a relaxed man who doesn't need to flex muscles to show he has power."

~ ~ ~

I'm visualizing Barack in that lavender/white sweater... ;P

[ding, ding, ding]

George Carlin

Photo: Mike Fisher, Chicago Tribune.

Comedian George Carlin Passes Away

Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television. Those words, uttered by Carlin during a 1972 show in Milwaukee made him "a footnote in American legal history, which I'm perversely kind of proud of," he told The Associated Press earlier this year. Carlin's use of these seven words resulted in a 1978 Supreme Court case which upheld the government's authority to sanction stations for broadcasting offensive language during hours when children might be listening.

George Carlin passed away on Sunday of heart failure at 71. His honesty and humor will be sorely missed.

George Carlin - Seven Words [NSFW language]

George Carlin - on Death [NSFW language]

George Carlin - on Religion [NSFW language]

Tom Moe

Columbus, Ohio USA June 19, 2008 -- Veteran Tom Moe of Lancaster, Ohio poses beside a cardboard bust of presidential candidate John McCain created from an old photo of McCain during his service as a Naval aviator. The bust was located inside a regional campaign office.

Moe, an F4 pilot during the Vietnam War, was shot down in 1968 and imprisoned in Hanoi where he endured harsh treatment and became acquainted with another prisoner--John McCain.

Moe was asked to explain his support of John McCain's candidacy. He answered by harkening back to his years of captivity. He described looking through a hole in the door of his cell and watching McCain being returned to a cell across from his. He said, "I think of that now, watching him come back from beatings and torture. He knew I'd be looking at him. He'd look over at the door and give a big thumbs up, no matter how beaten he was. The message was, they're not going to get us down. I look back at that, and I know personally of his strength.... Here' a guy with the qualities that can get the job done."

Moe is a chairman of Ohio Veterans for McCain. He posed for this photo during an official opening of a regional office for the John McCain for President Campaign.

~ ~ ~

Pure Torture
By Tom Moe

I was hiding under a log. Doing my best to masquerade as North Vietnam terrain, I'd pulled branches on top of me, smeared mud on my face, and arranged leaves and other foliage to stick out of my clothes. I was 20 miles behind enemy lines, having parachuted out of my F-4C fighter aircraft when a weapon malfunction blew it, along with my wingman, to bits. So far my terrain act was working; a group of North Vietnamese soldiers had passed, unaware of my presence, within six feet of me.

I'd heard on my survival radio that two other pilots had been rescued on the day of our mishap. Now, after three days in the cold and rainy jungle, I knew planes were on their way for me. It looked like a question of who would find me first.

I was eventually betrayed by a small hole in my camouflage through which I poked my radio antenna. Within seconds a zillion rifles were pointed straight at my head. Thus began a month-long, 100-mile journey to the "Hanoi Hilton" to begin my five years as a prisoner of war -- where I would get to know pain on a personal basis.

North Vietnamese policy was that POWs were war criminals, a policy that supposedly justified brutal treatment and total control. That control was reflected by a list of regulations posted in each cell. Rule number one was the catchall: "Criminals will strictly follow all regulations or be severely punished."

The scenario was quite simple. An interrogator would tell you to do something, like give out military information. When, predictably, you would refuse, you were told you had violated the regulations and had to be punished. The word "punish" still evokes in me a slight feeling of nausea since it meant, at the very least, beatings that would last several days and nights. Punishment ultimately meant torture, and to torture was to extract submissiveness. I found you could be tortured for accusing them of using torture.

Torture is methodically applied pain to produce a wearing effect -- to make you submit. Usually the pain would reach a level just short of stopping vital functions, although it could continue even after one lost consciousness.

Its preliminary stages could start with something as simple as being sat on a stool, dressed in long pajamas (in summer) or just shorts (in the winter). The summer jungle air was suffocating; the damp, cold winter air was penetrating. After a while, you became a lump of huddled misery, sitting in the heat or biting cold. During a single session I sat on a stool in the same position 24 hours a day for 10 straight days.

Sometimes the guards would tie you to the stool with your wrists strapped to your ankles, but usually you were left untied and told not to move, only being allowed to get up to visit the putrid waste bucket in the corner. And the guards were always nearby. If you moved a muscle, they'd pummel you with their fists and gun butts until they tired. I don't remember sleeping during these periods -- just pain and the interminable passage of time.

After I spent days being worn down, interrogators would enter the scene, curiously almost a welcome break from "stool time." Tired and numb, many of us prisoners at first would give name, rank, and serial number -- like you see in the movies. But this is fool's play and contrary to our military training, because this open belligerency would earn some pretty tough knocks. To survive you had to get your mind going and overcome the tendency to react with your emotions. You had to fight through the haze of fatigue to recall the specialized training, and it worked. Although the interrogations and torture rarely lightened up, with the resistance techniques we were taught we were able to avoid giving any useful or classified information.

I was fortunate because, as a young lieutenant fresh out of pilot training on my first assignment, I didn't know anything of real worth. The senior officers were really under the gun. If the enemy wanted something and knew you knew it, they would stop at nothing to get it. Thus we were trained to be clever, an actor, under stress.

What I was not prepared for were the effects of solitary confinement. For the first nine months of my captivity, and sporadically later, I didn't see, hear or talk to another American. Although physical pain was inflicted on me deliberately and effectively, I would discover what an incredible burden mental pain would add to my suffering, how a dark fog slowly could creep over my consciousness, trying to rob me of my remaining power of reasoning. I saw that the mind could convince life itself to slip away through the beckoning black hole that pain created. I learned how vital it was to keep the mind as sharp as possible.

This was necessary to get through interrogations and also for survival. If you didn't keep your mind clear, the "V," as we called the North Vietnamese, would crush you through a steady dose of pain that eroded mind and body like a vicious chemical.

The body is first to give up. You cannot keep yourself from passing out, throwing up, screaming. I discovered that the more the body convulsed involuntarily, the more I could observe it as though it belonged to someone else. I found I could intellectualize pain, which allowed me to take a quantum leap in my tolerance of it. Sometimes, though, the problem was staying in touch with reality enough to keep alive. Detaching oneself too much has an insidious narcotic effect that invades one's reason and dulls normal danger signals. This is probably the way nature helps us die without being all tensed up.

I walked a psychic tightrope between too much pain and too much mental retreat from reality. That meant fighting back against the siren lure of pain-free death. Sometimes I knew I needed to feel pain. Pain could keep my senses sharp, my contact with reality stronger. I recalled the saying, "Pain purifies." This may not be entirely sensible, but it was curiously relevant then. Sometimes I would try to observe the pain process and translate the feeling into some sort of metaphysical experience -- something interesting to contemplate, something detached. Sometimes when the pain got to be too much for the physical side of me, nature would take over and I would simply pass out.

I based my mental retreats not on fantasy but on real things. I designed and built homes, about 10 of them -- some dream houses, others more practical. First I made a floor plan, then the exterior, and then I would build them in my mind nail by nail, down to the most minute detail. I'd design it, lay the cement, put up the two-by-fours, drive each nail, and even saw each board -- slowly. If it progressed too fast, I would envision a bad cut on a board and resaw it.

I made lists. I made a list of every country I could think of, then every capital. I even made a list of all the candy bars I could think of. I tried to think of everything I had ever learned; once I reviewed everything I'd learned about trees. Sometimes I'd derive mathematical formulas, spending hours in the process. I could get completely wrapped up in this, completely escaping into my mind. With mental exercise came resolve -- if I could help it, this was not going to be the place where I cashed it in.

Isolation lasted about nine months, until I was moved to another prisoner of war camp in Hanoi. There I got a roommate, Myron Donald from Moravia, New York. For more than a year we lived together in a windowless concrete bunker we called the Gunshed. During that time Myron would save my life.

It was a hot box, the Gunshed, so hot we could hardly breathe. It was so stifling that just to breathe we often lay by a small slit under the door through which our jailers slid food.

The food itself was used against us like everything else. It usually consisted of watery green soup (we called it weeds) and a chunk of tasteless bread. The soup was delivered boiling hot in the summer and stone cold in the winter. When it was hot we couldn't take a mouthful, since eating raises the body metabolism and thus body heat. If the guards didn't return too quickly, we would let the food sit until dark and the room temperature had slacked off to, maybe, 110 degrees.

We perspired so much our skin became waterlogged, looking like pale cheese, a crumbling coat of slimy flesh often festering with rash and fungus. Horribly dehydrated, we got only two little teapots of putrid water a day, and we used some of it to dampen our faces and wash off the crumbling skin. On top of this, mosquitoes were thick, their wings creating a constant chorus, and the room stank of the waste bucket. Rat droppings seasoned the food along with razor blades, glass, stones and pieces of wire. Actually some of this unexpected booty came in handy.

After about a year of captivity when, oddly, I was getting accustomed to the harshness, my journey took me down an even darker path. The situation developed slowly. First I was told I might win an early release if I would cooperate and meet with some visiting delegations -- anti-war groups or radical Hollywood personalities -- and tell them I had been treated well. I refused these special favors and at any rate would not participate in their propaganda. When they kept pressuring me, I went on a hunger strike -- an emaciated prisoner would not make good propaganda I reasoned. This got me off the go-home-early list but angered my jailers if only because I was not submissive. Thus began the really hard stuff.

Things started with long sessions of standing immobile around the clock; next I was put on my knees for three, four, six hours at a time. This went on for days. It was the first phase, sort of a limbering-up session to wear me out and take the edge off my powers of reasoning. Then I was told to write a war-crimes confession, saying I was sorry I'd participated in the war. When I refused, I got to serve as a stress reliever for about 20 guards -- each took his turn beating me to a pulp. They pounded me for six or eight hours. By then I was getting pretty shaky. Then they got serious. I was introduced to a bowl of water, some filthy rags and a steel rod. The guards stuffed a rag in my mouth with the rod, then, after putting another rag over my face, they slowly poured the water on it until all I was breathing was water vapor. I could feel my lungs going tight with fluid and felt like I was drowning. I thrashed in panic as darkness took over. As I passed out, thinking I was dying, I remember thanking God that we had made a stand against this kind of society.

When my senses returned I discovered I had been blindfolded and trussed into the "pretzel" position. Thick leg irons shackled my ankles, my wrists were tied behind me, and a rope bound my elbows just above the joints. The guards tightened the bindings by putting their feet against my arms and pulling the ropes until they couldn't pull any harder. Then they tied my wrists to my ankles and jammed a 10-foot pole between my back and elbows. After a few hours the leg irons began to press heavily on my shins and feet like a vise. The ropes strangled my flesh, causing searing pain and making my arms go numb and slowly turn black.

In the middle of the night, one of the less hostile guards, whom we called Mark, sneaked in and loosened the ropes a little. If he hadn't, I'm sure I would have lost both arms. In this case I would have vanished with the other badly injured POWs who never were repatriated.

After a few hours, the guards came back and jerked up on the pole, lifting me up and down by my elbows then slamming me to the floor on my face or backward on my head. This went on through the early morning hours.

At dawn two Vietnamese officers casually strolled in. I told them they might kill me, but I still wasn't interested in their propaganda. They laughed and calmly said, "It's easy to die but hard to live, and we'll show you just how hard it is to live."

Indeed the pain got to the point where I truly wanted to die. My mind games weren't sufficient to help me manage any more pain. I tried screaming to relieve the stress until the grimy rag was stuffed back into my mouth. I tried doing anything to take my mind away from what was happening, but I couldn't. My prayers became desperate gasps. The only solution was to stop living, but what can you do when you're tied up? You can't will your heart to stop beating.

After about a week I finally told the guards I'd write the confession. I had to get out of the ropes, collect my thoughts, and perhaps muster a bit more strength to still do nothing or at least moderate what would happen. My hosts knew exactly what I was thinking and simply said, "It's too late." They brought in a guard who sported the only leather boots I ever saw in North Vietnam. I don't know what they told him, but he looked like he wanted to kill me. He looked insane, his eyes wide open, and he practically jumped up and down when they turned him loose on me.

From my point of view, what went on next didn't last long. He began by kicking me in the back with all the strength he could exert. After this first savage kick, just one kick, I knew I'd been badly injured, maybe mortally. The pain was grave, more of a deep sickening feeling. My mind floated free of my body as if I were a spectator, not a participant. I was beyond pain.

Sometime the next day the guards untied me, and I sprawled on the bloody floor, red fluid oozed out of every opening in my body. I had no strength to sit or stand; I just sort of unrolled. In spite of my sorry state, I did not want to look undignified, so I tried to get up. I managed to crawl to a corner and sit leaning against the wall, trying desperately to gather my thoughts.

We spent the next three days working on the war-crimes confession, but the guards would wave whatever I wrote in my face and scream that it wasn't satisfactory. Were they seeing through my innuendos and double meanings? I could feel myself starting to panic as I could feel my last remaining defenses slipping.

The demands increased now to a taped confession. Somehow I still found the strength to refuse -- perhaps a little bit too resolutely, because they reverted to the hard stuff again. I was having trouble remembering those precious resistance techniques I had been taught so many light years ago. I started making a tape, pushing my sluggish brain to come up with ideas to show acceptable submissiveness to my wards yet useless for propaganda. My attempts were not convincing, so the torture continued. I told myself just to make it one more day, and then just one more. ... Anyone trained in such affairs knows that constant torture can make captives reach a point where they can't maintain mental equilibrium, and my captors knew it too. They could break me, and I was becoming frantic, fearing my strength would not last.

Then, they stopped -- just like that. Some weeks had gone by, and perhaps they had other business. Maybe they figured I might not make it. Although they had murdered prisoners, I believe most of my colleagues who died were accidentally tortured to death. The North Vietnamese knew they could not win the war militarily, but they might succeed if they garnered world sympathy. It would be difficult for them to look good if too many POWs "died in captivity." But I came pretty close, as did many of my mates.

My immediate challenge was to recover from the kidney and chest injuries from that wild night of "kick the Yankee." My entire body was bloated, my eye sockets two puffy slits. You could stick your finger into me up to your knuckle and pull it out leaving a hole that would slowly fill with fluid. Myron didn't recognize me at first when I was thrown back in our cell. He set my broken ribs with his fingertips and used our shirts to bind my chest. Occasionally the ribs would click out of place, and he would reset them. But it didn't take long after I was on the mend for the torture sessions to resume.

As I grew more and more weary, I had to cope with one of the most corrosive elements of the human spirit -- hate. Hate is a terrible distraction, a horribly destructive human enterprise. Hate invades the consciousness when the mind's reasoning power fades. Hate is a way we assign blame for our plight when our faith weakens and our resolve becomes clouded. Pain intensifies hate, making us want to strike out at something.

I stumbled into this blackness and, with vivid flashes of bitter invectives, cursed everything I had held sacred. I bathed in self-pity and resolved all my sufferings with the most wicked solutions. Although I drew some strength from hate, I finally realized I was drawing it from the devil. I journeyed into the lowest point in my life. And then I was truly exhausted.

I "came to" after a particularly horrific torture session, alone, lying on a stone floor, more naked than clothed, bruised, filthy, gaunt, and panting in little puppy breaths. I felt surprisingly free of pain and acutely aware of every inch of my surroundings. I knew I wasn't very healthy, and I was startled at how my body looked like a bag of leftover chicken bones.

My knees looked huge compared to the rest of my scrawny legs. Lying on my side, I could place a fist between my thighs and touch only air. But I didn't hurt anywhere. I thought maybe I was dead. I thought about many, many things as I lay there almost motionless for days. I prayed and prayed and prayed. ...

Finally the cell door peephole quietly opened and an eyeball squinted into the darkness. Then it was gone. A few minutes later the heavy wooden door opened with a clanging of keys and sliding bolts. An enamel plate skittered across the floor and halted just short of my slowly blinking eyes. On it was a mound of raw salt crystals piled on top of some rice. "The salt is for beriberi," the voice said, and the door banged shut.

I thought for a moment: Does he mean the salt will give me beriberi or prevent it? I chuckled to myself. My feeble attempt at humor was an elixir. Even though I would spend several more years as a guest of Uncle Ho, I knew I was over the hump. Humor, faith and mental focus would allow me to endure. I felt human, mentally whole and refreshed.

Maybe there is something to that old saying about pain purifying, but I would not prescribe the treatment.

~ ~ ~

Captured in North Vietnam in January 1968, Thomas Moe was released in 1973. Two years later he earned a master's degree from Notre Dame, where he eventually served as professor of aerospace studies and commander of the Air Force ROTC program. He retired from the Air Force in fall 1995. (From: Notre Dame Magazine; printed January 1996.)

Our Time Is Up

Our Time Is Up - YouTube link

A therapist discovers he has six weeks to live and gets brutally honest. Oscar Nominated for Best Live Action Short Film for the 78th Academy Awards. Written and directed by Rob Pearlstein.

Muslims Demonstrate in London Today

Muslims Demonstrate in London Today - YouTube link

Abu Izzadeen

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A photograph of Abu Izzadeen, heckling Home Secretary John Reid on 20 September 2006 - (BBC video link).

The leader of today's demonstration in London, Abu Izzadeen (Arabic: ابو عز الدين‎, Abū ‘Izz ad-Dīn), born as Trevor Brooks (18 April 1976), is a spokesman for Al Ghurabaa, a Muslim organization banned under the Terrorism Act 2006 for the glorification of terrorism, that operated in the United Kingdom. Abu Izzadeen was arrested because of these films placed on an internet site. The police also arrested five others during the same raid. He was convicted on charges of terrorist fund-raising and inciting terrorism overseas on 17th April 2008.

Tankers

Oil Tanker at Al-Basrah Offshore Oil Terminal in Umm Qasr, Persian Gulf. Photo: U.S. Navy. All images from GAO.

U. S. energy needs rest heavily on ship-based imports. Tankers bring 55 percent of the nation’s crude oil supply, as well as liquefied gases and refined products like jet fuel.

These energy commodities require different handling methods, and as a result, various kinds of tankers have been built to accommodate them.

An LNG carrier is designed for transporting LNG at minus 260 degrees Fahrenheit, when gas liquefies and shrinks drastically in volume. The cargo is transported in special tanks insulated to minimize evaporation. LNG carriers are up to 1,000 feet long and have a draft (depth below the water line) of 40 feet when fully loaded.

The global LNG fleet is expected to double from 200 in 2006 to over 400 by 2010. According to industry reports, the existing fleet has completed more than 33,000 voyages without a substantial spill.

Oil tankers are more numerous and vary greatly in size. Tankers transporting crude oil from the Middle East generally consist of Very Large Crude Carriers, which typically carry more than 2 million barrels of oil per voyage. These ships are over 1,000 feet long, nearly 200 feet wide, and have a draft of over 65 feet (pictured above).

These ships are too big for most U.S. ports and must transfer their loads to smaller tankers (a process called lightering) or unload at an offshore terminal.

At present, the United States has only one such offshore terminal—the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port (LOOP). LOOP, the only U.S. deepwater oil port that can handle fully loaded Very Large Crude Carriers, is located 18 miles off the Louisiana coast and currently handles about 10 percent of U.S. crude oil imports.

Most tankers transporting cargos from the Caribbean and South America, by contrast, are smaller than Very Large Crude Carriers and can enter U.S. ports directly.

~

Tanker with Insert of Double Hull. - Click to enlarge image.

The Oil Pollution Act of 1990 requires that all tankers built after 1994 coming to the United States must have double hulls—that is, a two-layered hull to help prevent spills resulting from a collision or grounding.

~

According to the Energy Information Administration, the United States consumes more than 20 million barrels of petroleum every day. Of that amount, over 65 percent comes from foreign sources.

The top suppliers of crude oil and petroleum products to the United States in 2005 were Canada, Mexico, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, and Nigeria—each supplying over 1 million barrels of petroleum per day.

Top Exporters of Petroleum to the United States in 2005 (Millions of barrels per day.)

Iraq, Algeria, Angola, Russia, and the United Kingdom are also major energy suppliers with daily imports to the United States of up to 500,000 barrels per day. These top 10 energy suppliers accounted for approximately 75 percent of all U.S. petroleum imports in 2005.

All petroleum imports to the United States from those countries arrive on tankers, except those from Canada.

~

Tanker Limburg after Terrorist Attack near Yemen.

Attacks overseas show that tankers face several major types of threats that, if carried out domestically, could have serious consequences. Overseas, terrorists have demonstrated the ability to carry out at least three main types of threats.

First—and overall of greatest concern to officials the GAO spoke with—is a suicide attack, such as the 2002 suicide boat attack on the tanker Limburg off the coast of Yemen. This attack killed 1 person, injured 17, and spilled 90,000 barrels of oil.

A second major type of threat, known as a "standoff attack," uses a rocket or other weapon launched at a sufficient distance to allow the attackers to evade defensive fire.

A third type of threat is an armed assault. For example, well-armed bands have used small boats to attack tankers, loading facilities, and oil workers.

Many other types of potential attacks exist, such as internal crew conspiracies and collisions with other vessels piloted by terrorists.

To date, no such attacks have occurred on tankers in U.S. waters or on loading facilities in U.S. ports, and intelligence officials report there is currently no specific credible threat to tankers or terminals on the domestic front.

Nonetheless, these successful attacks abroad, the expressed desire by terrorists to target U.S. economic interests, and the potential outcome of a terrorist attack on a tanker have led Congress and the Administration to conclude that protective efforts are warranted.

A successful attack on an energy commodity tanker could have substantial public safety, environmental, and economic consequences.

Public safety and environmental consequences of an attack vary by commodity.

For instance, highly combustible commodities like LNG and LPG have the potential to catch fire, or in a more unlikely scenario—if they are trapped in a confined space such as under a dock—explode, posing a threat to public safety.

Crude oil and heavy petroleum products remain in the environment after they are spilled and must be removed, potentially causing significant environmental damage.

Finally, the economic consequences of a major attack could include a temporary price spike reflecting fears of further attacks, and supply disruptions associated with delays of shipments if major transit routes, key facilities, or key ports are closed.

The loss of one cargo of an energy commodity might not have a significant, sustained price impact. However, if an attack results in port closures for multiple days or weeks, price responses and higher costs could mean losses in economic welfare to consumers, businesses, and government amounting to billions of dollars.

Navies of various countries, including the United States, are patrolling threatened waters, such as the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Aden, due to attacks on ships, including tankers, and port facilities.

Much security remains to be implemented.

~ ~ ~

Source: Report to Congressional Requesters, United States Government Accountability Office (GAO). MARITIME SECURITY: Federal Efforts Needed to Address Challenges in Preventing and Responding to Terrorist Attacks on Energy Commodity Tankers. (PDF 4.77 MB)

Surveillance Cameras

from dilbert.com - h/t Schneier on Security

Click to enlarge image.

Charlie Wilson's War

Based on a True Story...

Charlie Wilson: You're no James Bond.

Gust Avrakotos: You're no Thomas Jefferson, either. Let's call it even.

"Good-Time Charlie" Wilson, a flawed and fun-loving Congressman from the piney woods of East Texas, deftly operates the levers of power to funnel money and weapons to the Mujahedin of Afghanistan following the Soviet invasion of their country in late 1979. Charlie finds assistance in the oddest of places -- a renegade CIA agent (Gust Avrakotos) whose outsider status and womanizing ways endears him to Wilson; a Houston socialite (Joanne Herring) who leads Wilson to the cause; the willing Pakistani dictator (General Zia-ul-Haq) fascinated by the socialite; the Israelis who modify and manufacture Soviet weapons to maintain the wink-and-nudge illusion of American neutrality; and the women (the original Charlie's Angels.)

Based on the story that is so true and engaging that artistic liberties are not needed, even if they are taken in the film.

George Crile, author, with Charlie Wilson in Afghanistan.

Charlie Wilson's War: The Extraordinary Story of the Largest Covert Operation in History

"These things happened. They were glorious and they changed the world... and then we fucked up the endgame." - Charlie Wilson

Charlie Wilson's War - trailer

Gust Is Pissed - scene [NSFW language]

"My loyalty?! For twenty-four years people have been trying to kill me. People who know how. Now, do you think that's because my Dad was a Greek soda pop maker? Or do you think it's because I'm an American spy?!" - Gust Avrakotos

~ ~ ~

Philip Seymour Hoffman, who plays Gust Avrakotos, was nominated for an Oscar - Best Performance for an Actor in a Supporting Role. He certainly deserved it.

Overall, I found Charlie Wilson's War the most captivating film I have seen in a long time; it comes with my highest recommendation. - c

50: The New 20

At 50, Sharon Stone is the new Face of Damiani

Damiani, recipient of an unprecedented eighteen Diamond International Awards -- the "Oscars of the Jewelry World" -- proved that Damiani is truly a girl's best friend at tonight's press event revealing Sharon Stone, an iconic figure of Hollywood glamour as the new face of Damiani.

Damiani campaigns have always featured women with strong personalities and natural beauty. This is a unique campaign, one of great impact as Sharon Stone perfectly interprets the house's style -- her beauty is accented by her wearing jewels from Damiani's most important collections. Renowned photographer Solve Sundsbo who shot the campaign on March 20th in Los Angeles, succeeded masterfully in capturing the essence of Sharon Stone as well as the brilliance and elegance of Damiani's jewels.

Silvia Damiani and Sharon Stone

Photos: PRNewsFoto - Click to enlarge images.

Obama's Private Campaign Contributions

Photo from News Sophisticate blog.

Thx, G.

Just Another Obama Supporter

Sen. Barack Obama Rally with Oprah, HyVee Hall, Saturday, Dec. 8, 2007. Photo by Joe Crimmings.

Frankly, and I know I speak for more than one Republican, I'm getting a little sick and tired of Obama smear stories. For heaven sakes, there are so many! We get it. He's not "our guy." However, when Barack Hussein Obama II receives a glowing endorsement like this one, well, good news is just hard to pass up without sharing. ;) - c

~ ~ ~

Following are excerpts from a public address delivered by Libyan Leader Mu'ammar Al-Qadhafi marking the anniversary of the U.S. air raid on Libya. The address aired on Al-Jazeera TV on June 11, 2008. From MEMRI.org

video link

Mu'ammar Al-Qadhafi: It has been proven that there is no democracy in [the U.S.]. Rather, it is a dictatorship no different than the dictatorships of Hitler, Napoleon, Mussolini, Genghis Khan, Alexander the Great, and the rest of the tyrants. In the days of crazy Reagan, the American president issued a presidential order to launch a war against Libya, for example, a presidential order to besiege Libya, a presidential order to boycott Libya, and so on. Is this a democracy or a dictatorship?

[...]

There are elections in America now. Along came a black citizen of Kenyan African origins, a Muslim, who had studied in an Islamic school in Indonesia. His name is Obama. All the people in the Arab and Islamic world and in Africa applauded this man. They welcomed him and prayed for him and for his success, and they may have even been involved in legitimate contribution campaigns to enable him to win the American presidency. But we were taken by surprise when our African Kenyan brother, who is an American national, made statements that shocked all his supporters in the Arab world, in Africa, and in the Islamic world. We hope that this is merely an elections "clearance sale," as they say in Egypt – in other words, merely an elections lie. As you know, this is the farce of elections – a person lies and lies to people, just so that they will vote for him, and afterwards, when they say to him: "You promised this and that," he says: "No, this was just elections propaganda." This is the farce of democracy for you. He says: "This was propaganda, and you thought I was being serious. I was fooling you to get your votes."

Allah willing, it will turn out that this was merely elections propaganda. Obama said he would turn Jerusalem into the eternal capital of the Israelis. This indicates that our brother Obama is ignorant of international politics, and is not familiar with the Middle East conflict.

[...]

We thought he would say: "I have decided that if I win, I will monitor the Dimona nuclear plant, and the other WMDs in Israeli's possession." We expected him to make such a decision. He undoubtedly had this in mind. When he talked about Iran and its nuclear program, he undoubtedly had Dimona in mind. But when he was thinking about Dimona, he undoubtedly had the fate of former president Kennedy on his mind as well. Kennedy decided to monitor the Dimona nuclear plant. He insisted on doing so, in order to determine whether or not it produces nuclear weapons. The Israelis refused, but he insisted. This crisis was resolved with the resignation of Ben-Gurion. He resigned so he would not have to agree to the monitoring of the Dimona plant, and he gave the green light for the killing of Kennedy. Kennedy was killed because he insisted on the monitoring of the Dimona plant. This image was undoubtedly on Obama's mind. He undoubtedly wanted to talk about this, but decided not to.

[...]

We expected him to say: "If I win, I will implement the one-state solution – the "Isratine" which appears in Qadhafi's White Book." This idea constitutes the final, deep-rooted, and historic solution. It is impossible to establish two midget-states in this area. What kind of country is only 15 km deep? The so-called Israel is only 15 km deep. What kind of a country is this?

There are five million Palestinians there. We expected Obama to say: "I've decided to return millions of Palestinian refugees to the land of Palestine, from which they were expelled in 1948 and 1967." This is the "change" that the peoples applaud, the change that the American people – and the black people in America – want.

We expected him to say: "I will strive for the independence and unity of the Kurdish nation. This nation must take its place under the sun in the Middle East." The Kurdish nation is torn apart, tormented, and persecuted, and is colonized by everyone. He should have supported it, instead of supporting the collaborators, while sacrificing the future of the Kurdish nation. This is "change."

[...]

The thing we fear most is that the black man suffers from an inferiority complex. This is dangerous. If our brother Obama feels that because he is black he doesn't have the right to rule America, this would be a disaster, because such a feeling would make him behave whiter than the white, and go to an extreme in his persecution and degradation of the blacks.

[...]

We say to him: Brother, the whites and blacks in America are equal. They are all immigrants. America belongs neither to the whites nor to the blacks. America belongs to its original inhabitants, the Indians. Both the whites and the blacks immigrated to America, and so they are equal, and Obama has the right to hold his head high, and say: "I am a partner in America. This is my land as much as it is yours. If it is not my land, it is not yours either. It is the land of the Indians. You are immigrants, and so are we."

[...]

We still hope that this black man will take pride in his African and Islamic identity, and in his faith, and that [he will know] that he has rights in America, and that he will change America from evil to good, and that America will establish relations that will serve it well with other peoples, especially the Arabs.

~ ~ ~

A Toast: To John McCain. May he channel more than a bit of our "crazy Reagan."

Inside the Taliban Prison Break

An Afghan policeman looks through the debris of the entrance of the Kandahar prison in southern Afghanistan after a prison break June 14, 2008. Photo: Reuters/Ismail Sameem.

The Destruction of Sarposa

By Fred Burton and Scott Stewart, Stratfor.com

Friday June 13 turned out to be an unlucky day for the guards at Sarposa prison in Kandahar, Afghanistan. At approximately 9:20 p.m. local time, some 30 Taliban insurgents launched a complex and highly coordinated attack on the facility. The operation freed all 1,100 inmates incarcerated there, including a reported 350 to 400 Taliban militants. The attack also resulted in the deaths of several guards — reports on the actual number vary between six and 15.

The assault reportedly began with the detonation of a massive vehicle-borne improvised explosive device (VBIED) at the prison’s main gate. The suicide device reportedly was concealed inside a tanker truck and, according to a Taliban spokesman, contained 1,800 kilograms of explosive material. The powerful device shattered the prison’s front gate and guardhouse, causing substantial damage to shops and other buildings in the neighborhood.

Either shortly after or at the same time as the attack on the main gate, a second suicide bomber approached the back gate of the compound on foot and detonated his device, breaching the gate and neutralizing the guards. A Taliban assault team armed with machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) and small arms then stormed the prison. According to some eyewitness reports, many of the attackers entered the prison on motorcycles — a form of transport frequently used by the Taliban to move personnel. Some fighters reportedly engaged the surviving guards while others broke open the cell doors.

Inside Sarposa. Photo ctv.ca

The prisoners were then rushed through the gate to a caravan of waiting vehicles staged by the Taliban to transport them to safety. In recent days, the Taliban have taken over several villages in the Arghandab district, located just northwest of the city of Kandahar, where they reportedly laid mines, destroyed bridges and prepared fighting positions in the area. At least some of the Taliban fighters participating in these recent activities are possible Sarposa escapees.

Many observers have expressed shock over the storming of Sarposa prison. But the attack — and its success — is not at all surprising when viewed in the context of historical operations undertaken to free jihadist prisoners in Afghanistan and elsewhere and given conditions on the ground in the Kandahar area, the general preparedness of Afghan security elements and the construction and location of this particular prison.

A Focus on Prisoners

Jihadists have long placed a high importance on their imprisoned comrades. This emphasis became publicly evident by the number of statements and threats generated following the arrest of Sheikh Omar Abdul-Rahman (the “Blind Sheikh”) in New York in 1993. However, even prior to his arrest, Abdul-Rahman and his followers had discussed plans for a different prison break. They considered several possible approaches, one of which was a truck bomb attack combined with an armed assault, to rescue El Sayyid Nosair from Attica State Prison in New York. The group had even conducted detailed surveillance of the facility. Nosair was serving a sentence in Attica after being convicted on weapons charges relating to the assassination of Rabbi Meir Kahane. Although convicted of assault and firearms possession, Nosair was acquitted of the murder charges.

The jihadist emphasis on colleagues in captivity has continued to the present day. In addition to propaganda decrying the captivity of their comrades, jihadists have also conducted a number of operations to free imprisoned colleagues, such as the December 1999 hijacking of Indian Airlines flight 814, which eventually ended up in Kandahar after short stops in Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates. More recently, Taliban forces have kidnapped foreigners and held them in exchange for their imprisoned comrades.

In February 2006, hundreds of Taliban and al-Qaeda prisoners rioted at Pol-e-Charkhi prison in Afghanistan. After a night of gunfire there were a dozen dead, more than 50 wounded, and 80 women held hostage and raped. From theodoresworld.net.

In April 2005, al Qaeda in Iraq militants under the command of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi launched a remarkably similar attack against the Abu Ghraib prison west of Baghdad. Like the Sarposa incident, the attack on Abu Ghraib included a suicide VBIED attack against the prison’s main gate followed by an attempt to storm the prison by an assault team. In the Abu Ghraib case, the initial VBIED attack was unable to reach or breach the prison’s gate, and the assault team was prevented from entering the facility. However, the assault team displayed a great deal of determination and continued the attack on the prison for several hours before finally being repelled. The al Qaeda assault team suffered heavy casualties, but not before wounding 18 U.S. servicemen and 12 prisoners during the protracted battle.

In addition to armed assaults, there have also been many clandestine attempts to free jihadist prisoners from captivity. Several of these attempts have involved tunnels, such as in the February 2006 jailbreak in Sanaa, Yemen, or the October 2003 break from Sarposa prison in Kandahar in which 41 Taliban prisoners, including the brother of the Taliban defense minister, escaped through a tunnel. High-profile jihadists have also managed to escape from prisons in places as diverse as Pakistan and Singapore.

Escapes are not confined to prisons with sand cell floors, poorly trained personnel or revolving doors and complicit prison guards, as it would seem in the case of Yemeni prisons. In addition to the Singapore incident, militants have also escaped from U.S.- and British-run prisons in Iraq. In Afghanistan, four high-profile al Qaeda militants escaped from a U.S. detention facility at the Bagram Air Base outside Kabul. The escapees, dubbed the “Bagram Four,” included Abu Yahya al-Libi, a charismatic and credentialed al Qaeda theologian who has since become one of the organization’s main spokesmen.

The shrine of Baba Wali (commonly known as Baba Saab) in the Arghandab area, on the outskirts of Kandahar City in Afghanistan. Photo: PRTkand. Click to enlarge image.

Location, Location, Location

Like in real estate sales, in insurgency and counterinsurgency operations, location is vital — and Kandahar is quite an interesting location. While Kabul is the capital of Afghanistan, Kandahar has been the spiritual and physical capital of the Taliban. Even when the Taliban controlled most of Afghanistan and assumed control of the government, their real headquarters remained in Kandahar, the place where they first emerged as a force in Afghan politics and where their leader Mullah Omar resided. Osama bin Laden also resided in Kandahar with many of his al Qaeda followers. Although the Taliban and al Qaeda militants were quickly forced to flee the city following the U.S. invasion in October 2001, much of the population in the area has remained ideologically committed to the Taliban, and we have long considered Kandahar city and province to be Taliban strongholds. From the perspective of the Afghan government and coalition forces, Kandahar is very much hostile territory.

This attack against Saraposa prison was well-planned and executed with a great deal of precision. The location of the attack, Kandahar, allowed the Taliban to play on their home field and provided advantages they have lacked when conducting operations in places such as Kabul. Even though not all of the residents in the Kandahar area support the Taliban, most fear them and do not believe that coalition forces can protect them from Taliban retribution. Therefore, even people who are not strong Taliban supporters would be grudgingly willing to assist them rather than risk reprisals.

This base of contacts and ideological supporters in Kandahar made it easy for the Taliban to conduct surveillance on sites such as the Sarposa prison, and is also very helpful in the logistical aspects of planning and executing attacks there. Smuggling the Taliban assault team into the city, along with their weapons and a large VBIED, was undoubtedly accomplished with the aid of these sympathizers, as was the escape of the released prisoners.

In the end, this home-field advantage allowed the Taliban to launch their attack without detection and gain the crucial element of tactical surprise. It also allowed them to get all of their elements into the fight at the right time, something they were unable to accomplish in the April 27 attack in Kabul.

Recent construction in Kandahar City, Afghanistan, includes 20,000 modern-style family homes as well as parks, shopping centers, mosques, schools and community buildings. Most residents living in this gated-community are Afghan returnees from abroad. Photo: PRTkand. Click to enlarge image.

Another factor leading to the success of the Sarposa attack was the nature of the facility itself and the guards in charge of its integrity. The prison was very old and its mud brick and rock-and-mortar construction was not designed to withstand a serious military attack. Even with some of the recent upgrades to its guard towers, the facility was incapable of withstanding the explosion of an 1,800 kilogram VBIED in close proximity to its front gate. In fact, few facilities in the United States could withstand such an attack, but U.S. facilities typically have concentric rings of security that must be breached in order to get to the main gate. The Sarposa prison is located right on the street and did not have much room to provide standoff space or for such concentric rings.

There are reports that the attack on the prison was coordinated with the prisoners on the inside via a cell phone. This is not beyond the realm of possibility, as the smuggling of cell phones into prisons is a problem faced by authorities in many countries, including the United States.

During the Village Medical Outreach, the village elder, Guloojan (left) along with other key leaders met with members of the U.S. forces to discuss the significance of providing medical and humanitarian assistance to the Alizay Kulay village in Afghanistan, July 13, 2007. Photo: U.S. Navy Lt. Cmdr. Steven Parks.

While the guards at Sarposa prison had reportedly received guidance from Canadian corrections officials, they had neither the training nor the weaponry to withstand the type of assault the Taliban launched against them. Prison guards are not trained or equipped to serve as combat troops. We have not seen reliable reports on the number of guards who fled, survived or perhaps called in sick the night of the attack. The commander of the prison reportedly has been placed in custody and is under investigation, though Afghan officials assert that this move is merely standard procedure. In any such case, the possibility of collusion on the part of the guards must be considered.

The vulnerability of the Sarposa facility and the limitations of the guards defending it is further highlighted when compared with a similarly executed but unsuccessful attack. On March 3, the Taliban launched an attack against a compound housing a better-prepared force of NATO and Afghan troops in Khost. In the March incident, the VBIED was engaged before it could get close to the gate. While two NATO soldiers were killed in the assault, the remaining troops were able to repel the attackers before they could overrun the complex.

Although Sarposa is the largest prison in southern Afghanistan, due its relative lack of security, most high-value Taliban prisoners are kept at Afghanistan’s main prison, Pol-e-Charkhi in Kabul, or at the U.S. detention facility at Bagram. However, even those facilities are not in the best condition, as evidenced by the escape of the Bagram four and violent jihadist-fomented riots and escapes at Pol-e-Charkhi.

U.S. Army Col. R. Stephen Williams, the commander of the 207th Infantry Brigade, stands with local leaders in the Kandahar province of Afghanistan May 15, 2007, as they accept the keys to the 64th tractor distributed as part of Task Force Grizzly's farm implement donation project to support farmers in the local area. Photo: U.S. Army Capt. Vanessa R. Bowman. Click to enlarge image.

The United States has long recognized the vulnerability of Afghan prisons, including its own facility at Bagram. It has reportedly paid more than $20 million to add a high-security wing at the Pol-e-Charkhi facility.

Last month, Afghan lawmakers strenuously objected when a Pentagon spokesman announced a plan to replace the deteriorating facility at Bagram, which currently holds some 630 al Qaeda and Taliban prisoners, with a new facility capable of holding 1,100 prisoners. At the time, Afghans called the plan an illegal affront to the country’s sovereignty. It will be interesting to see if the tone of the debate changes after the destruction of Sarposa.

Online Dating is Like a Box of Chocolates

You never know what you're gonna get.

Hi. My name is Ben and I'm a hotel manager.

Aliases: Shay Albaz, Hen Ben-Haim, Chen Ben Chaiim, Chen Ben-Chaiim, Haim Hen Ben

Hen Ben Haim is wanted for allegedly perpetrating an online auction fraud scheme that netted more than $40,000. In 2000, Haim opened multiple accounts with the site, using false names, and built positive feedback by selling some items legitimately. He then held more than 500 auctions on property he either did not own or had no intention of delivering. On December 19, 2000, Haim was charged with eight counts of mail fraud and a federal arrest warrant was issued by the United States District Court, Central District of California.

Hi. My name is Maria and I'm a bank teller.

Aliases: Ewa Maria Malczewska, Ela Malczewska

On September 19, 1997, Eva Maria Malczewski was arrested on a complaint based on allegations that she had embezzled a large sum of money from a bank in Arlington, Texas, where she had worked as a teller. The money was stolen between February 10 and June 6, 1997. Malczewski was indicted on sixteen counts of bank embezzlement on October 15, 1997.

Hi. My name is Steve and I'm a doctor.

Aliases: Steven Moos, M.D., Dr. Steven Gabriel Moos, M.D.

Steven Gabriel Moos is wanted for his alleged participation in medical fraud. Moos was a general practice physician who specialized in the area of "lifestyle" medicine in Tigard, Oregon. He used his practice for the sale of treatments through the Internet, mail orders, and via his office. Between July 1, 2002, and July 10, 2002, the United States Customs Service in San Francisco, California, intercepted and seized a total of five packages sent from China and addressed to Moos. Among the contents of the packages was a chemical active ingredient which was a misbranded and adulterated drug, as well as an unapproved new drug as defined by the Food Drug and Cosmetic Act. Additionally, the packages did not contain the required health and safety warnings, nor adequate instructions for use.

A federal arrest warrant charging Moos with four counts related to medical fraud was issued on June 3, 2004, in the United States District Court, District of Oregon, Portland, Oregon. On July 9, 2004, the Oregon Board of Medical Examiners revoked Moos' medical license.

Hi. My name is Yolanda and I'm a bookkeeper.

Aliases: Yolanda T. Ricaforte, "Yolly"

Yolanda Tolentino Ricaforte is wanted for her alleged involvement in an illegal gambling operation which began in approximately 1998 in the Republic of the Philippines. Ricaforte and an accomplice allegedly were co-conspirators with former Philippine President, Joseph Ejercito Estrada, who collected tens of millions of dollars in illegal gambling payoffs during his 31 months in office. For approximately two years, Ricaforte allegedly audited the collection and disbursement of the illegal payoffs to Estrada, and kept a ledger in which the individuals making payments to Estrada were given aliases. Ricaforte is also accused of opening several bank accounts in her name, which were used to deposit the illegal payoffs. Her accomplice allegedly funneled the payoffs and other unrelated illegal kickbacks to Estrada.

~ ~ ~

To my knowledge, the criminals mentioned above were not found to be listed with any online dating service. This post is just a reminder -- not all crime is violent. Read more about these and other white collar criminals currently wanted by the FBI.

White Collar Crimes - FBI's Most Wanted

Tip the FBI Online - FBI Tips and Public Leads

Voyeur

PRNewsFoto/BBDO New York

Click image to enlarge.

Life, Death and Everything in Between

BBDO's HBO Voyeur Takes 'Promotion' Grand Prix at the Cannes International

Voyeur is the most buzzed about ad campaign at Cannes.

Crossing all mediums and categories, HBO's "Voyeur" is a building-sized peep show that incorporates out-of-home, on-demand, interactive, mobile and print.

The HBO Voyeur campaign was honored with everything from the AICP "Next" award for Best New Media idea, Best of Show Design and four Gold Pencils at the One Show, Best of Show at the outdoor OBIE awards, and Gold Clios for "Best Integrated" and "Content and Contact," to a WEBBY award for digital excellence, Yellow Pencils for "Integrated" and "Broadcast Innovation" at the D&AD Show in the UK, and the O'Toole Box for "Best New Media" idea from the 4A's.

"There's nothing like winning at Cannes. The competition is fearsome, it really means something," said David Lubars, Chairman and Chief Creative Officer, BBDO North America.

Voyeur - video link (recommended in full screen)

(even better ->) Experience more in hi-def at HBOVoyeur.com

Bombs Away

Illustration by Darren Thompson. Photos by AP except where noted.

Why The US Policy Isn't Working - And Iran Will Get Nuclear Weapons

By Amir Taheri for the New York Post

"Hit us and we shall hit you ten times harder!" This is how General Muhammad-Ali Jaafari, the newly appointed commander-in-chief of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) has responded to speculation about a possible attack by the United States and/or Israel on Iran's nuclear installations.

Jaafari replaced General Yahya Safavi last year after the latter made a speech in which he implicitly warned the mullahs that Iran's military was not ready for war against far more powerful enemies.

Those familiar with Iranian military capabilities know that it is Safavi's sober assessment, and not Jaafari's bluster, that reflects the true situation.

The problem is that Jaafari can make his claim because he, and his political masters in Tehran, are convinced there would be no military action against their regime.

In 2005, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the then newly-minted President of the Islamic Republic and darling of the IRGC, unveiled a strategy based on the assumption that once George W. Bush is out of the White House, the United States would bite the bullet and accept a nuclear-armed Islamic Republic as "regional superpower" in the Middle East.

Two events convinced Ahmadinejad that his strategy was correct:

• The first came in May 2006 when the Bush administration, then at the nadir of its unpopularity because of the situation in Iraq, joined the line of supplicant Europeans begging Tehran to negotiate a deal.

  That unexpected shift in Washington's policy produced the opposite effect.

  Far from persuading Ahamdinejad that this was a good time to defuse the situation, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's attempt at nuance and multilateral diplomacy convinced Tehran that the Americans had blinked.

• The second event that confirmed Ahmadinejad's belief that "America cannot do a damn thing" came with last year's National Intelligence Estimate (NIE). Using a language of obfuscation, the NIE claimed that Tehran had abandoned key aspects of its nuclear programm in 2003. The NIE undermined the whole case brought by the International Atomic Energy Agency against the Islamic Republic.

  Whatever one might say about Ahmadinejad, one thing is certain: he plays an open hand. He is convinced that the US does not have the stomach for a fight and that Bush is the last American president to even dream of pre-emptive war.

  He thinks the dominant mood in the US, and the West in general, is one of pre-emptive surrender.

Ahmadinejad may well be right: there is not going to be any war against the Islamic Republic.

Here is why: as soon as there are tangible moves, not just threats, leaked through The New Yorker's investigative reporters, that could threaten the existence of its Khomeinist regime, Tehran will announce a temporary suspension of its uranium enrichment program in accordance with three United Nations' Security Council resolutions.

Such an announcement will instantly defuse the situation, break the diplomatic coalition created by Bush, and, possibly, even inspire Nancy Pelosi to praise Ahmadinejad as a man of peace. To launch a war against Iran in such a situation would become politically impossible, even if John McCain is president.

A temporary suspension would not undermine Iran's plans to build a "nuclear surge capacity" - that is to say producing all that is needed for making atomic warheads without actually manufacturing bombs. Iranians, inspired by 3,000 years of history, know the value of patience. They are not in a hurry. They know that weaving a Persian carpet sometimes takes years.

In 2003, Iran did announce a suspension of its uranium program. Now, however, we know that even during that suspension, Tehran was working on other aspects of its nuclear project.

This time, the regime might accept another temporary suspension only if its own survival is at stake.

Taking measures that might hurt the people of Iran won't do the trick. The mullahs are as concerned about the welfare of their people as Saddam Hussein was about that of the Iraqis and Robert Mugabe is of the Zimbabweans. Sanctions already imposed by the UN make life more difficult for the average Iranian but have little effect on the regime.

This means that the Islamic Republic will not, indeed cannot, offer any concessions unless faced with the prospect of regime change.

Ahmadinejad has said as much, albeit in different words.

He has castigated his predecessor Muhammad Khatami for accepting suspension in 2003 when the regime was not in danger. Khatami says he did so because at the time, shortly after the fall of Saddam Hussein in Iraq, he feared that the Americans might make a right turn and march on Tehran as well.

In other words, it was fear of regime change that persuaded the mullahs to accept suspension five years ago. As soon as that fear was gone and Bush appeared to be headed for a political lynching in his own country, the program was resumed at an even faster pace.

The way Western politicians talk about it, one gets the impression that the Iranian nuclear issue is a quirk of the mullahs that could be fixed with the threat of sticks and promise of carrots. It is not.

The Iranian nuclear issue has three layers.

The first concerns the power struggle in Tehran. Ahmadinejad has built his macho image on this issue. If he backs down he will be politically dead.

The second layer concerns the regime's strategy for hegemony in the Middle East. The Islamic Republic needs tactical "nuclear parity" to guarantee it won't be attacked with nuclear weapons as it proceeds to drive the Americans out of the Middle East, help destroy Israel as a Jewish state, and impose Khomeinism on the Arabs in the name of Islamic unity.

The third layer concerns the regime's ambitions, spelled out by Ahmadinejad and others, to create an international coalition to challenge the global system dominated by the United States.

Ahmadinejad has already promised anti-American regimes in Latin America "full support and protection" against the "Great Satan" in Washington. Iran is already laying the foundations for an armaments industry in Venezuela. One day a nuclear-armed Islamic Republic may extend its nuclear umbrella to Venezuela, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Paraguay, Ecuador and, why not, even Cuba.

The Islamic Republic has been at war against the United States and the international system it leads for almost 30 years. This has been a low intensity war because the US and its allies have shied away from full-scale confrontation. The US has shown it has lots of power but not the courage to use even a fraction of it. The Islamic Republic's power, on the other hand, is "tiny," as Senator Barack Obama has noted. But the mullahs have been prepared to use that "tiny" power in full, with already devastating effects.

The issue is not how to avoid war with the Islamic Republic. It is how to end a war that has been going on for almost 30 years.

As in all wars there are three ways to end this one: surrender, make a deal, or win.

~ ~ ~

Amir Taheri's new book The Persian Night: Iran Under the Khomeinist Revolution will be published in the autumn. Taheri is also the author of another recently popular article "Jailed for Outing the Mullah Mafia".

Iran's Fashion Police

Photos dated 12 June 2006 and 23 April 2007 - from Iranian web site derafsh.com

We Got the Beat

Click image to enlarge and animate.

A moving echocardiogram depicts a 3-D view of a beating human heart. Viewed from the apex, with the apical part of the ventricles removed, the mitral valve is clearly visible. To the left are two standard two-dimensional views. Image by Norwegian nurse/sonographer Kjetil Lenes.

It Pays to Advertise Online

Actual screen clip from Times of India online.

Yes, that date is correct. I'm bringing you tomorrow's news today! ;) - c

Aliens Abduct Tiger Cubs

Click image to enlarge.

Dolphins and tigers and aliens, oh my!

The Mirage Welcomes Tiger Cubs to Siegfried & Roy's Secret Garden & Dolphin Habitat. PRNewsFoto/MGM MIRAGE/Siegfried & Roy.

Welcome to Costco, I Love You

Research Findings Identify Retailers to Whom U.S. Consumers Feel Most Loyal

Loyalty marketing consultant and publisher COLLOQUY today unveiled its national Retail Loyalty Index, ranking Costco as U.S. consumers' choice for loyalty in the Grocery, Personal Care and Mass Merchant categories, and Macy's as the Department Store leader.

Click image to enlarge.

Across five geographical regions, Northeast, Southeast, Midwest, Southwest and Northwest, Costco was the national winner in the Grocery category. The warehouse club was the first choice of consumers in two regions, the Southwest and Southeast. Publix was a close runner up and H-E-B followed.

Costco also was consumers' loyalty favorite among Personal Care retailers, winning three regions and placing in the top three in the other two. Wal-Mart was the runner-up in this category, suggesting that consumers are more price conscious in this sector than others. The highest-rated stand-alone pharmacist in this category was Rite-Aid.

Of the department stores doing business in all five geographical regions, Macy's can claim the most loyal shoppers, with Wal-Mart finishing as a strong runner-up, and Target and JCPenney finishing in a tie.

In the Mass Merchant category, the discount club Costco garnered most loyalty from bargain hunters nationwide. Target was runner up, followed by Wal-Mart.

Among the various retail categories, consumers are most loyal to grocery stores, where purchases are tied closely to home and family life. Shoppers attach emotional resonance to this category, despite the importance of low prices.

~ ~ ~

Idiocracy - Welcome to Costco

Border Security Test Results: F-

U.S. - Mexico border fence, San Diego, California. AP photo.

Border Security: Summary of Covert Tests and Security Assessments 2003-2007 for the Senate Committee on Finance, May 16, 2008.

Highlights (PDF) Full Report (PDF, 27 pages)

From January 2003 to September 2007, the U.S. Government Accountibility Office testified before the Committee on three occasions to describe security vulnerabilities that terrorists could exploit to enter the country.

GAO's first two testimonies focused on covert testing at ports of entry--the air, sea, and land locations where international travelers can legally enter the United States. In its third testimony, GAO focused on limited security assessments of unmanned and unmonitored border areas between land ports of entry.

GAO was asked to summarize the results of covert testing and assessment work for these three testimonies. This report discusses the results of testing at land, sea, and air ports of entry; however, the majority of GAO's work was focused on land ports of entry.

The unmanned and unmonitored border areas GAO assessed were defined as locations where the government does not maintain a manned presence 24 hours per day or where there was no apparent monitoring equipment in place. GAO assessed a nonrepresentative selection of these locations and did not attempt to evaluate all potential U.S. border security vulnerabilities.

Further, GAO's work was limited in scope and cannot be projected to represent systemic weaknesses. In response to this report, the Department of Homeland Security provided a written update on numerous border protection efforts it has taken to enhance border security since 2003. GAO did not attempt to verify the information provided by DHS, but has included the response in this report.

Michael Teige, took this panoramic shot of the end of the border fence that separates the U.S. and Mexico at the extreme SW corner of the U.S. The U.S. side is largely devoid of people due the combination that it is a national park and to the clear warnings of extreme polluted water. It is possible that the Mexican side does not have similar warnings of polluted water due to the large number of families using the beach and swimming. Full resolution‎ 8,899 × 1,899 pixels, file size: 7.89 MB.

GAO investigators identified numerous border security vulnerabilities, both at ports of entry and at unmanned and unmonitored land border locations between the ports of entry.

In testing ports of entry, undercover investigators carried counterfeit drivers' licenses, birth certificates, employee identification cards, and other documents, presented themselves at ports of entry and sought admittance to the United States dozens of times. They arrived in rental cars, on foot, by boat, and by airplane.

They attempted to enter in four states on the northern border (Washington, New York, Michigan, and Idaho), three states on the southern border (California, Arizona, and Texas), and two other states requiring international air travel (Florida and Virginia).

In nearly every case, government inspectors accepted oral assertions and counterfeit identification provided by GAO investigators as proof of U.S. citizenship and allowed them to enter the country.

In total, undercover investigators made 42 crossings with a 93 percent success rate.

On several occasions, while entering by foot from Mexico and by boat from Canada, investigators were not even asked to show identification.

For example, at one border crossing in Texas in 2006, an undercover investigator attempted to show a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officer his counterfeit driver's license, but the officer said, "That's fine, you can go" without looking at it.

As a result of these tests, GAO concluded that terrorists could use counterfeit identification to pass through most of the tested ports of entry with little chance of being detected.

In its most recent work, GAO shifted its focus from ports of entry and primarily performed limited security assessments of unmanned and unmonitored areas between ports of entry.

The names of the states GAO visited for this limited security assessment have been withheld at the request of CBP. In four states along the U.S.-Canada border, GAO found state roads that were very close to the border that CBP did not appear to monitor. In three states, the proximity of the road to the border allowed investigators to cross undetected, successfully simulating the cross-border movement of radioactive materials or other contraband into the United States from Canada.

For example, in one apparently unmanned, unmonitored area on the northern border, the U.S. Border Patrol was alerted to GAO's activities through the tip of an alert citizen. However, the responding U.S. Border Patrol agents were not able to locate the investigators and their simulated contraband.

Also on the northern border, GAO investigators located several ports of entry in one state on the northern border that had posted daytime hours and were unmanned overnight. Investigators observed that surveillance equipment was in operation, but that the only preventive measure to stop an individual from crossing the border into the United States was a barrier across the road that could be driven around.

"Road Trip '98: 3000 Miles Through The Southwest United States" from hudsucker.com

GAO also identified potential security vulnerabilities on federally managed lands adjacent to the U.S.-Mexico border.

GAO concluded that CBP faces significant challenges on the northern border, and that:

a determined cross-border violator would likely be able to bring radioactive materials or other contraband undetected into the United States by crossing the U.S.-Canada border at any of the assessed locations.

~

For those who don't tackle the entire 27 page report, I don't want you to miss this video.

Video simulating the transport of radioactive material and other contraband across northern and southern U.S. borders at unmanned or unmonitored locations.

Note: The clip has no sound.

Border Crossings - link

Updating a Classic Cartoon

Click to enlarge image - by Jeff Danziger

On the Second Amendment, Don’t Believe Obama!

When the NRA first released this story, they highlighted a key issue for many voters, the right to keep and bear arms. Now, republished with citations, Barack Obama's positions with regard to your Second Ammendment rights are more clear than ever.

On the Second Amendment, Don’t Believe Obama! Print PDF version

The presidential primary season is finally over, and it is now time for gun owners to take a careful look at just where apparent nominee Barack Obama stands on issues related to the Second Amendment. During the primaries, Obama tried to hide behind vague statements of support for “sportsmen” or unfounded claims of general support for the right to keep and bear arms.

But his real record, based on votes taken, political associations, and long standing positions, shows that Barack Obama is a serious threat to Second Amendment liberties. Don’t listen to his campaign rhetoric! Look instead to what he has said and done during his entire political career.

FACT: Barack Obama voted to allow reckless lawsuits designed to bankrupt the firearms industry.[1]

FACT: Barack Obama wants to re-impose the failed and discredited Clinton Gun Ban.[2]

FACT: Barack Obama voted to ban almost all rifle ammunition commonly used for hunting and sport shooting.[3]

FACT: Barack Obama has endorsed a complete ban on handgun ownership.[2]

FACT: Barack Obama supports local gun bans in Chicago, Washington, D.C., and other cities.[4]

FACT: Barack Obama voted to uphold local gun bans and the criminal prosecution of people who use firearms in self-defense.[5]

FACT: Barack Obama supports gun owner licensing and gun registration.[6]

FACT: Barack Obama refused to sign a friend-of-the-court Brief in support of individual Second Amendment rights in the Heller case.

FACT: Barack Obama opposes Right to Carry laws.[7]

FACT: Barack Obama was a member of the Board of Directors of the Joyce Foundation, the leading source of funds for anti-gun organizations and “research.”[8]

FACT: Barack Obama supported a proposal to ban gun stores within 5 miles of a school or park, which would eliminate almost every gun store in America.[9]

FACT: Barack Obama voted not to notify gun owners when the state of Illinois did records searches on them.[10]

FACT: Barack Obama voted against a measure to lower the Firearms Owners Identification card age minimum from 21 to 18, a measure designed to assist young people in the military.[11]

FACT: Barack Obama favors a ban on standard capacity magazines.[12]

FACT: Barack Obama supports mandatory micro-stamping.[13]

FACT: Barack Obama supports mandatory waiting periods.[2]

FACT: Barack Obama supports repeal of the Tiahrt Amendment, which prohibits information on gun traces collected by the BATFE from being used in reckless lawsuits against firearm dealers and manufacturers.[14]

FACT: Barack Obama supports one-gun-a-month sales restrictions.[9]

FACT: Barack Obama supports a ban on inexpensive handguns.[9]

FACT: Barack Obama supports a ban on the resale of police issued firearms, even if the money is going to police departments for replacement equipment.[9]

FACT: Barack Obama supports mandatory firearm training requirements for all gun owners and a ban on gun ownership for persons under the age of 21.[9]

1. United States Senate, S. 397, vote number 219, July 2, 2005. (http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&session=1&vote=00219)

2. Independent Voters of Illinois/Independent Precinct Organization general candidate questionnaire, Sept. 9, 1996. The responses on this survey were described in “Obama had greater role on liberal survey,” Politico, March 31, 20087. (http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0308/9269.html)

3. United States Senate, S. 397, vote number 217, Kennedy amendment July 2, 2005. (http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&session=1&vote=00217)

4. David Wright, Ursula Fahy and Sunlen Miller, "Obama: 'Common Sense Regulation' On Gun Owners' Rights," ABC News' "Political Radar" Blog, http://blogs.abcnews.com, 2/15/08. (http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2008/02/obama-common-se.html)

5. Illinois Senate, March 25, 2004 SB 2165, vote 20.

6. “Fact Check: No News In Obama's Consistent Record.” Obama ’08, December 11, 2007. (http://www.barackobama.com/factcheck/2007/12/11/fact_check_no_news_in_obamas_c.php)

7. “Candidates' gun control positions may figure in Pa. vote,” Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Wednesday, April 2, 2008, and "Keyes, Obama Are Far Apart On Guns," Chicago Tribune, 9/15/04. (http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/s_560181.html)

8. 1998 Joyce Foundation Annual Report, p. 7. (http://www.joycefdn.org/pdf/98_AnnualReport.pdf)

9. “Obama and Gun Control,” The Volokh Conspiracy, taken from the Chicago Defender, Dec. 13, 1999. (http://www.volokh.com/posts/1203389334.shtml)

10. Illinois Senate, May 5, 2002, SB 1936 Con., vote 26.

11. Illinois Senate, March 25, 2003, SB 2163, vote 18.

12. “Clinton, Edwards, Obama on gun control,” Radio Iowa, Sunday, April 22, 2007. (http://learfield.typepad.com/radioiowa/2007/04/clinton_edwards.html)

13. Chicago Tribune blogs, “Barack Obama: NIU Shootings call for action,” February 15, 2008, (http://blogs.trb.com/news/politics/blog/2008/02/barack_obama_comments_on_shoot.html)

14. Barack Obama campaign website: “As president, Barack Obama would repeal the Tiahrt Amendment . . .” (http://www.barackobama.com/issues/urbanpolicy/#crime-and-law-enforcement.)

Copyright 2008, National Rifle Association of America, Institute for Legislative Action. This may be reproduced. It may not be reproduced for commercial purposes.

Bomb Tech Training

(Bomb technician counts down; three...two...one...)

[Sounds of explosions in the distance]

Narrator
More than 200 FBI bomb technicians and weapons of mass destruction coordinators converged on Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada this spring for a crash course on improvised explosive devices.

The four-day training in March was part a national initiative by the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security to train bomb squads and emergency responders on emerging explosive threats.

A demonstration—opened to the media—showed the various materials that are used to make improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, and their effects when they detonate.

Bomb Technician (demonstrating dynamite)
...You'll notice the end of it is what is called a rosette crimp.

Narrator
As cameras trained on the distant desert scrub, agents blew up small objects using plastic explosives, dynamite and a novel type of explosive material called Detasheet, which looks like rubbery linoleum but packs a wallop.

Bomb Technician (demonstrating Detasheet plastic explosive, and C4)
...This is military Detasheet, this is much less quantity of explosive than you've been hearing so far, but this is really hot stuff!

This is the way military C4 comes, if you've never seen it before now you have, and I'll pass this around...

Narrator
The demonstration progressed to larger explosions using an ammonium nitrate, fuel-oil mixture—the same materials used to blow up the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.

As media watched from a distance, agents detonated 50 pounds of ammonium nitrate mixture to destroy a car.

[Sounds of explosions in the distance]

Another car was blown up with 100 pounds of ammonium nitrate.

Then agents detonated a van with 250 pounds of the explosives. The blast sent a plume into the air and left behind a massive crater and wide field of burning debris.

The FBI’s Assistant Director of the Weapons of Mass Destruction Directorate, Vahid Majidi, has called the training initiative a force-multiplier in the FBI’s efforts to train bomb squads.

The hope is that more emergency responders—and sellers of materials that can go into making bombs—will better understand how terrorists might use IEDs in an attack.

Bomb Technician
...so we were essentially able using home-made parts to manufacture the kind of improvised shape charge for use in an anti-personnel situation the way we'd see used against our troops.

The Phrase "Allah Akbar"

The phrase "Allāhu Akbar" (God is Great) is recited by Muslims in numerous situations. For example, when they are happy or wish to express approval, when an animal is slaughtered in a halaal fashion, when they want to praise a speaker, during battles, and even times of extreme stress or euphoria.

Who knew there were penalties for saying it wrong?

Well, well, well... A World Record

Transocean Inc. has announced that the Transocean jackup GSF Rig 127 set a world record for the longest extended-reach well ever drilled at 40,320 feet (12,289 meters) MD (measured depth) with a 35,770-foot (10,902-meter) horizontal section. The well was drilled offshore Qatar in 36 days and incident-free. The new record of 7.6 miles is also the first well in the history of offshore drilling that exceeds 40,000 feet (12,191 meters). The well surpasses by approximately 2,000 feet the prior extended-reach record of 38,322 feet (11,680 meters) MD set by another drilling contractor with a land rig drilling at Sakhalin Island earlier this year.

Transocean Inc. is the world's largest offshore drilling contractor and the leading provider of drilling management services worldwide. With a fleet of 138 mobile offshore drilling units plus nine announced ultra-deepwater newbuild units, the company's fleet is considered one of the most modern and versatile in the world due to its emphasis on technically demanding segments of the offshore drilling business. The company owns or operates a contract drilling fleet of 39 High-Specification Floaters (Ultra-Deepwater, Deepwater and Harsh-Environment semisubmersibles and drillships), 29 Midwater Floaters, 10 High-Specification Jackups, 56 Standard Jackups and other assets utilized in the support of offshore drilling activities worldwide.

19th Century Sailor Speak by Mark Twain

Mark Twain (1835-1910), ca. 1882. Engraving by T. Cole from a portrait by Abbot Thayer. The Century Magazine, September 1882.

Scenes in Honolulu -- No. 9 Sad Accident

From The Log of Mystic Seaport, Volume 43, Number 3 (Fall 1991): 66-69.

". . . it warn't no use; he'd everything drawing and I had considerable sternway, and he just struck me a little abaft the beam, and down I went head on, and skunned my elbow!"

In March 1866, Samuel Langhorne Clemens arrived in Honolulu aboard the steamship Ajax. At age 31, Clemens had already had a varied career, and was now embarked on a new one under the pen name Mark Twain.

Born in Missouri, the son of an eternally optimistic land speculator, Clemens spent most of his childhood in Hannibal, Missouri, along the Mississippi River. Apprenticed to a printer, he became a voracious reader and began to contribute pieces to the newspaper edited by his older brother. He also traveled through the East, supporting himself as a journeyman printer. Although he had little formal education, he became a student of the Mississippi River and its people, and apprenticed himself to a steamboat pilot in 1857. The Civil War ended his river career.

After sampling military life, Clemens went west to Nevada as his brother's secretary. He settled at Virginia City in the Washoe mining district, where he failed as a miner but succeeded as a reporter for the local newspaper. Styling himself Mark Twain (two fathoms to the river pilot), he wrote with a broad, biting, and topical wit that appealed to frontier readers. In 1864 he moved on to California where, influenced by the style of Artemus Ward and Bret Harte, he continued to write. When his "Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" was published in newspapers throughout the country in 1865, he became a local celebrity.

The urbane Sacramento Daily Union added him to its flock of roving correspondents and sent him to the Sandwich Islands in 1866. One of his missions was to determine why Honolulu was more successful than San Francisco as a whaling port. Among his fellow passengers aboard the Ajax were three New London whaling captains, James Smith, William H. Phillips, and Asa W. Fish, whose gruff humor and distinctive language fascinated Twain. In his second letter, published in the 17 April 1866 issue of the Daily Union, Twain recorded Captain Phillips's upbraiding of him when he made a bad play at euchre: "Ger-reat Scotland! what in the nation you dumpin' that blubber at such a time as this for? Rip! I knowed it! took with a nine spot! royals, stuns'ls -everything, gone to smash, and nobody euchred!"

In an attempt to capture the whalers' characteristic style of speaking, as well as to delineate the rampant exploitation in the whaling industry, Twain composed the following letter, which was published in the Daily Union on 22 May 1866. As well as being an only slightly exaggerated parody and indictment of the whaling industry, it is an early example of the style that Twain would perfect in his later works, which have since become classics of American literature.

"The wharf--gauging oil", by David H. Strother, depicts a New Bedford whaling wharf covered with casks of whale oil. The men in the foreground gauge the size of casks and measure the quantity of oil within--from which the agents could calculate "leaking and shrinkage" to their advantage. Harper's New Monthly Magazine, June 1860.

Honolulu, April 1866

I have just met an estimable lady--Mrs. Captain Jollopson, whose husband (with her assistance) commands the whaling bark Lucretia Wilkerson--and she said:

"Oh, I've never had such a time of it! I'm clean out of luck, I do believe. The wind's been dead ahead with me all this day. It appears to me that I can't do no way but that it comes out wrong. First, I turned out this morning and says I, 'Here's a go--eight bells and no duff yet! I just know it's going to blow great guns for me to-day.' And so it's come out. Start fair, sail fair; otherwise, just the reverse. Well, I hove on my dress and cleared for the market, and took the big basket, which I don't do when I'm alone, because I'm on the short lay when it comes to eating; but when the old man's in port, it's different, you know, and I go fixed when I recruit for him--never come back in ballast then, because he's on the long lay, and it's expensive too; you can depend on it, his leakage and shrinkage shows up on his home bills when he goes out of port, and it's all on account of recruiting, too--though he says it's on account of toggery for me, which is a likely yarn, when I can't even buy a set of new halliards for my bonnet but he growls, and what few slops I do have I've got to smuggle 'em; and yet, bless you, if we were to ship 'em the freight on mine wouldn't pay primage on his--but where was I? Oh, yes--I hove on my dress and hove down toward the market, and while I was laying off and on before the Post Office, here comes a shipkeeper round the corner three sheets in the wind and his dead-lights stove in, and I see by the way he was bulling that if he didn't sheer off and shorten sail he'd foul my larboard stuns'l-boom, which I had my basket on--because, you see, he'd been among his friends having a bit of a gam, and had got about one fid too much aboard, and his judgment had fetched away in the meantime, and so he steered bad, and was making latitude all the time when he ought to been making longitude, and here he was to wind'ard of me, but making so much leeway that - well, you see how it was. I backed off fast as I could, and sung out to him to port his helm, but it warn't no use; he'd everything drawing and I had considerable sternway, and he just struck me a little abaft the beam, and down I went, head on, and skunned my elbow!" I said, "Bless my life!" And she said, "Well you may say it! My! such a jolt! It started everything. It's worse'n being pulled! I shouldn't wonder if I'd have to be hove down--" and then she spread her hand alongside of her mouth and sung out, "Susy, ahoy!" to another woman, who rounded to to wait for her, and the two fell off before the wind and sailed away together.

"Returning in tow," David H. Strother's caricature of a Martha's Vineyard couple could represent a seagoing pair. Harper's New Monthly Magazine, September 1860.

Translation:

Eight bells stands for the closing of a watch--two to an hour, four hours to a watch, six watches in a day--on board ship.

Duff is Jack Tar's dessert--a sort of dough, with dried apples or something of the kind in it on extra occasions.

Cleared for the market--A ship "clears" for her voyage when she takes out her papers at the Custom-house.

Short lay and long lay--These phrases are confined to the whaling interest. Neither the officers nor men get any wages on a whaleship, but receive, instead, a proportion of all the bone and oil taken; Jack usually gets about the one-hundred-and-twentieth part of all the "catch" (or profits of the voyage), for his share, and this is called a "long lay"; the Captain generally gets a tenth, twelfth or fourteenth, which is a "short lay," and the other officers in proportion. Some Captains also have perquisites besides their "lay"--a dollar or more on every barrel of the "catch," over a certain number. The luckiest Captain of the lot made $50,000 last season. Very good for a few months work. When a ship is ready to sail and must suddenly supply the place of some seaman who has fallen sick, candidates will take advantage of the circumstances and demand as short a "lay" as a second mate's to ship as the last man and complete the crew. I am informed (but I do not believe it), that this is termed the "Lay of the Last Minstrel."

Recruit--The whaling voyage to the North Seas occupies about seven months; then the vessel returns to Honolulu, tranships her oil to the States, refits and goes over to the coast of California about November or December, to put in her idle time catching hump-back whales or devilfish [California grey whales], returning here along in March and April to "recruit"--that is, procure vegetables, and especially potatoes, which are a protective against scurvy, and give the men a few days run on shore, and then off for the north again as early in the Spring as possible. Those vessels which do not consider the coast fishing profitable, because of the "stoving" of boats by the savage hump-backs and the consequent loss of men and material, go to "west'ard," as they term going down to the line after sperm whales; and when they have finished this "between season," they go over and "recruit" at Japan, and from thence proceed directly north.

Leakage and Shrinkage--When a whaler returns here with her cargo, the United States Consul estimates its probable value in the East, and buys the interests of the officers and men on behalf of the owners of the ship, and pays for the same in gold. To secure the shipowner against loss, a bill of contingencies is brought against poor Jack by the Consul (leakage and shrinkage being among the items), which reduces the profits of his long voyage about one-half or two-thirds. For instance, take the case of the whaling bark ________ last year. The Consul considered oil to be worth between one dollar and seventy-five cents and two dollars a gallon (in greenbacks) in the States; he put it down at one dollar and seventy-five cents to be on the safe side, and then reduced as follows:

First--Premium to be paid for money, and difference between gold and paper--so much. (Jack must be paid in gold.)

Second--An allowance of eight per cent. for probable leakage and shrinkage of the oil on its homeward voyage.

Third--Freight on the homeward voyage paid by Jack.

Fourth--Interest and insurance on the cargo hence to the States--paid by Jack.

Fifth--Commission of the owner at home (21/2 per cent.) for selling the cargo--paid by Jack.

And after all these reductions, what do you suppose the Consul paid Jack for his one hundred and twentieth "lay" in a cargo of oil worth over $1.75 a gallon at home? He paid him seventy-four cents a gallon. As a general thing, the ship-owner at home makes a princely profit out of this "gouging' of the sailor-man; but instances have occurred--rarely, however--where the price set by the Consul here was so much above the real value of the oil at home, that all the gouging was not sufficient to save the ship-owner from loss.

Home Bills--It makes no difference how much money a sailor brings into port, he is soon head over heels in debt. In order to secure his services on a voyage, the ship is obliged to assume this indebtedness. The item is entered against Jack on the ship's books at the home port in the East as his "home bill." If the voyage proves lucky, the ship gets even on Jack's home bill by subtracting it from his "lay"; but if she takes no oil she must pay the bill anyhow, and is "out and injured," of course. These "home bills" are first assumed by one of the professional "sharks" in New Bedford and New London who furnish crews to ships; say Jack owes fifty dollars; the shark enters his name for a voyage, assumes his debt, advances him a dollar or so for a farewell spree, and takes his note for $150; and the ship-owner agrees to cash it at the end of six months. Ships have left port responsible for $5,000 home bills, lost four or five men by desertion, been to great trouble and expense to supply other men, and then had no luck and failed to catch a single whale.

Slops- Improvident Jack is apt to leave port short of jackets, trowsers, shirts, tobacco, pipes, letterpaper, and so forth and so on. The ship takes a large quantity of these things along, and supplies them to him at extremely healthy prices, so that sometimes, after a long, unlucky voyage, no wages and heavy home bills and bills for "slops," Jack will return to port very considerably in debt to the ship, and the ship must stand the loss, for an unprofitable voyage squares all such accounts. In squaring up a voyage before the Consul, the ship Captain piles up the slop bills as high as he can get them, though it does not put a single cent in his own pocket; he forgets, in his enthusiasm for his owner's interest, that while he is gouging Jack for the benefit of "the firm," the firm are gouging himself, and Jack too, by the system of Consular assessment I have mentioned above. The captain says to the Consul:

"Put down three pair of boots on this man's slop bill." Jack--"But I didn't have but one pair, Sir." Captain- "Belay! Don't talk back; you might have had 'em if you'd a' wanted 'em. And put him down for eleven pair of socks." Jack--"But I only had two pair, sir." Captain--"Well, ______it, is that any o'my fault? Warn't they there for anybody that wanted 'em? And set him down for two ream of letter paper." Jack--"Why, I never writ a letter whilst I was gone, Sir."

Captain--"Hold your yop! Do you cal'late for me to be responsible for all your dam foolishness? You might have had four ream, if you'd wanted it. And set on ten per cent. for other truck, which I don't recollect what it was."

And so Jack is gouged by the Captain, for the owner's exclusive benefit, and both are fleeced by that same owner with strict impartiality. Perhaps the Captain's "lay" will go East to be sold, and "the firm" will sell at a dollar and a half and then report to him that the market had fallen and they only got a dollar for it. Thus ungrateful are they to the Captain who gouged the seaman on his "slops" for their sole benefit.

Primage--This term obtains in most seaports. No man can tell now what gave it birth, for it is very ancient, and its origin is long ago forgotten. It is a tax of five per cent on a ship's freight bills, and in old times went to her captain. In our day, however, it goes to the ship-owner with the other freight money (although it forms a separate item in the freight bill), or is turned over to the agent who procured a cargo for a vessel, as his commission. When you engage for the shipment of a lot of freight, you make no mention of this five per cent. primage, but you perfectly understand that it will be added, and you must pay it; therefore, when you are ostensibly shipping at twenty cents, you are really shipping at twenty-one.

Laying off and on--A sailor phrase sufficiently well understood by landsmen to need no explanation.

"Captain West" of Holmes's Hole (Vineyard Haven), Martha's Vineyard, a seafaring type sketched by David H. Strother. Harper's New Monthly Magazine, September 1860.

Ship-keeper--A man who stands guard on a whaler and takes care of the ship when the boats and the crew are off after whales.

Bulling--A term usually applied to the chafing of vessels together when riding at anchor in harbors subject to chopping swells. Some whalers say that one reason why they avoid San Francisco is that this "bulling" process in our Bay is more damaging to their vessels, frequently, than a long voyage.

Gam--The whaleman's phrase for gossip--very common here.

Fid--The whaleman's term for our "smile"--drink. A fid is an instrument which the sailor uses when he splices the main brace on board ship.

Fetched away--A nautical phrase signifying to break loose from fastenings in a storm--such as the fetching away of furniture, rigging, etc.

Skunned--After examining various authors I have discovered that this is a provincial distortion of our word "skinned."

Pulled--A term signifying the arraigning of a ship's officers before the Courts by the crew to answer for alleged cruelties practiced upon them on the high seas--such as the "pulling" of captains and mates by the crews of the Mercury, the White Swallow, the Great Republic, etc., in the San Francisco Courts. Here is another reason why, out of the eighty-seven American whaleships that will fish in the North seas this Summer [1866], only about sixteen will venture to touch at San Francisco either going or coming: they find it safer and cheaper to rendezvous and procure supplies here, and save 4,200 miles extra sailing, than to start from, and return to, San Francisco and run the chance of getting "pulled." Honolulu would not amount to anything at all without her whaling trade, and so Jack cannot "pull" his Captain here--no matter what his grievance was, he could not easily get it before these Courts; the lawyer who ventured to take his case would stand a fair chance of being run out of town by the enraged community. But the whaler-man says, "You drop into 'Frisco and great Neptune! your men'll pull you before you get your anchor down--and there you are for three months, on expenses, waiting on them Courts; and they'll go in and swear to the infernalest pack of lies, and the jury'll believe every word of it, and the judge'll read you a sermon that'll take the hair off your head, and then he'll take and jam you into a jail. Oh, no; it don't pay a whaleship to stop at San Francisco."

Hove down--In ports where there are no docks, damaged vessels are hauled out and "hove down" on their sides when repairs to their bottoms are required.

By this time, if you will go back and read the first paragraphs of this letter you may be able to understand them.

Every section of our western hemisphere seems supplied with a system of technicalities, etiquette, and slang, peculiar to itself. The above chapter is intended to give you a somewhat exaggerated idea of the technicalities of conversation in Honolulu--bred from the great whaling interest which centers here, and naturally infused into the vocabulary of the place. Your favorite California similes were bred from the technicalities of surface mining; those of Washoe come from the profound depths of the "main lead," and those of the Honoluluian were born of whalebone, blubber, and the traffic of the seas. Perhaps no single individual would use more than two or three of the nautical and whaling phrases I have quoted, in any one conversation, but you might hear all of them in the course of a week, if you talked with a good many people.

And etiquette varies according to one's surroundings. In the mining camps of California, when a friend tenders you a "smile" or invites you to take a "blister," it is etiquette to say, "Here's hoping your dirt'll pan out gay." In Washoe, when you are requested to "put in a blast," or invited to take "your regular pison," etiquette admonishes you to touch glasses and say, "Here's hoping you'll strike it rich in the lower level." And in Honolulu, when your friend the whaler asks you to take a "fid" with him, it is simple etiquette to say, "Here's eighteen hundred barrels, old salt!" But, "Drink hearty!" is universal. That is the orthodox reply, the world over.

In San Francisco sometimes, if you offend a man, he proposes to take his coat off, and inquires, "Are you on it?" If you are, you can take your coat off, too. In Virginia City, in former times, the insulted party, if he were a true man, would lay his hand gently on his six-shooter and say, "Are you heeled?" But in Honolulu, if Smith offends Jones, Jones asks (with a rising inflection on the last word, which is excessively aggravating), "How much do you weigh?" Smith replies, "Sixteen hundred and forty pound--and you?" "Two ton to a dot, at a quarter past eleven this forenoon -- peel yourself; you're my blubber!". . . .

~ ~ ~

Fitz Hugh Lane, 1804-1865, Ship Starlight, c. 1860, Oil on canvas.

Fred Burton Discusses GHOST

Fred Burton discusses his new book GHOST.

Burton talks about his days with the DSS, the terrorist journal he kept and key terrorist players, including Ramzi Yousef (mastermind of the 1993 WTC bombing), whom Burton was personally involved in apprehending.

~ ~ ~

For new readers -- The first two chapters of GHOST: Confessions of a Counterterrorism Agent

1. The Buried Bodies
2. Down the Rabbit Hole

Colombia Still Likes Tomatoes!

Two youngsters enjoy diving in tomatoes during the "IV Tomatina Colombiana" festival on June 1, 2008, in Sutamarchan, department of Boyaca, Colombia. According to the organizers 10 tons of tomatoes were thrown by the participants. AFP photo: Mauricio Duenas.

Psychology of Intelligence Analysis

Psychology of Intelligence Analysis by Richards J. Heuer, Jr.

Author's Preface:

This volume pulls together and republishes, with some editing, updating, and additions, articles written during 1978-86 for internal use within the CIA Directorate of Intelligence. Four of the articles also appeared in the Intelligence Community journal Studies in Intelligence during that time frame. The information is relatively timeless and still relevant to the never-ending quest for better analysis.

The articles are based on reviewing cognitive psychology literature concerning how people process information to make judgments on incomplete and ambiguous information. I selected the experiments and findings that seem most relevant to intelligence analysis and most in need of communication to intelligence analysts. I then translated the technical reports into language that intelligence analysts can understand and interpreted the relevance of these findings to the problems intelligence analysts face.

The result is a compromise that may not be wholly satisfactory to either research psychologists or intelligence analysts. Cognitive psychologists and decision analysts may complain of oversimplification, while the non-psychologist reader may have to absorb some new terminology. Unfortunately, mental processes are so complex that discussion of them does require some specialized vocabulary. Intelligence analysts who have read and thought seriously about the nature of their craft should have no difficulty with this book. Those who are plowing virgin ground may require serious effort.

I wish to thank all those who contributed comments and suggestions on the draft of this book: Jack Davis (who also wrote the Introduction); four former Directorate of Intelligence (DI) analysts whose names cannot be cited here; my current colleague, Prof. Theodore Sarbin; and my editor at the CIA's Center for the Study of Intelligence, Hank Appelbaum. All made many substantive and editorial suggestions that helped greatly to make this a better book.

Psychology of Intelligence Analysis - PDF 1.9 MB -or- read chapter by chapter online at the CIA library.

Great Moments in Presidential Speeches

Great Moments in Presidential Speeches

The Axis of Weevils: (Part 3 of 3) Issues of Concern

"Current and Projected National Security Threats to the United States"

Excerpt from the statement (PDF 203 Kb) by Lieutenant General Michael D. Maples, U.S. Army Director, Defense Intelligence Agency, before the Committee on Armed Services, United States Senate, on Wednesday, February 27, 2008. (Unclassified)

Transnational Issues of Concern

WMD and Delivery Systems

The proliferation and potential use of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) against U.S. forces, the American people, our allies and interests remains a grave, enduring and evolving threat.

Non-state terrorist networks continue to seek this capability while nation-states expand their WMD capabilities and the survivability, accuracy and range of the associated delivery systems.

Since mid-2006, several U.N. Security Council Resolutions have authorized sanctions against Iranian and North Korean nuclear and ballistic missile programs. While these actions have impeded some acquisition and support efforts, they have not stopped the programs themselves. Further frustrating sanction efforts is the inconsistent interpretation and enforcement of the resolutions by several key nations.

Motivated by economic and strategic interests, entities in China and North Korea continue to supply technologies, components and raw materials in support of WMD and missile programs, especially across the Middle East and South Asia.

Such technology transfers have lasting consequences. China’s provision of solid-propellant missile technology more than 15 years ago helped Pakistan develop the Hatf-VI/Shaheen II medium-range and Hatf-II/Abdali short-range ballistic missiles. Other examples include an agreement between China and Turkey regarding a short range ballistic missile (SRBM), Beijing’s active marketing of their latest developmental SRBM, the P12; and Egyptian SCUD production from North Korea.

While some of these transferred items are proscribed under various WMD-related control regimes, many others are dual-use with legitimate industrial applications. Examples include: multi-axis computer numerically controlled machine tools that have applications in nuclear and missile programs, but are also commonly used throughout legitimate industry. Specialty metals such as 7000-series aluminum used in nuclear and missile programs is also commonly used in aircraft and other industries.

Since 1999, Russia has adopted stronger export control laws and amended its criminal code to permit stricter punishment for illegal WMD-related exports. Similarly, China has also moved to enact export control laws to restrict proliferation of WMD-related materials. However, both have been inconsistent in applying these regulations, particularly regarding the sale of dual-use technology. When prompted, both Russia and China have been responsive to the United States and other countries and halted some questionable transactions.

Non-governmental entities and individual entrepreneurs also remain a great concern. These organizations and the proliferation networks (front companies, shippers, facilitators) they tie into are often able to sidestep or outpace international detection and export control regimes. By regularly changing the names of the front companies they use, exploiting locations in countries with more permissive environments or lax enforcement and avoiding international financial institutions, these organizations are able to continue supplying WMD and ballistic missile programs to countries of concern.

Most state programs now emphasize self-sufficiency to reduce reliance upon external suppliers which also limits their vulnerability to detection and interdiction.

For example, Iranian weapon makers advertise their ability to manufacture guidance and control components, such as dynamically tuned gyros. Instead of importing ballistic missile systems, Tehran now produces the SCUD B and C, Shahab-3 and Fateh-110 even though it still depends on outside sources for many of the related dual-use raw materials and components.

While these indigenous capabilities are not always a good substitute for foreign imports, particularly for more advanced technologies, they prove adequate in many cases.

Consequently, as some countries forego imports in favor of indigenous WMD-related production, they position themselves anew as potential “secondary proliferators.” One example is North Korea’s proliferation of ballistic missile systems based on Soviet designed SCUD missiles they acquired in the 1980s.

Even though most advanced nations cooperate against WMD proliferation, a number of trends beyond direct government control still fuel the threat. They include commercial scientific advances, the availability of relevant dual-use studies and information, scientists’ enthusiasm for sharing their research and the availability of dual-use training and education.

Overall, the threat posed by ballistic missile delivery systems is likely to continue increasing while growing more complex over the next decade. Current trends indicate that adversary ballistic missile systems, with advanced liquid- or solid-propellant propulsion systems, are becoming more flexible, mobile, survivable, reliable and accurate while also presenting longer ranges. Pre-launch survivability is also likely to increase as potential adversaries strengthen their denial and deception measures and increasingly base their missiles on mobile sea- and land-based platforms. Adversary nations are increasingly adopting technical and operational countermeasures to defeat missile defenses. For example, China, Iran and North Korea exercise near simultaneous salvo firings from multiple locations to defeat these defenses.

Space and Counter-Space

The growing distribution of space-related knowledge and technology largely through commercial uses is helping other nations acquire space and space-related capabilities, including some with direct military applications.

Because most space technologies have both civilian and military uses, this trend is providing some countries and non-state groups with new or more capable communications, reconnaissance, navigation and targeting capabilities. Insurgents in Iraq, for example, have been captured in possession of commercial satellite imagery available on the Internet.

Russia and China remain the top military space and counterspace states of concern. China successfully tested an anti-satellite (ASAT) missile in January 2007. Some countries have already deployed systems with inherent ASAT capabilities, such as satellite-tracking and laser range-finding devices.

China, Russia, Germany, India, Israel, Japan, South Korea and Sweden seek improved space object tracking and kinetic or directed energy weapons capabilities. However, these technologies are costly and most countries that want them are not expected to buy them soon. China is developing technology that could eventually be used to counter vital U.S. space-based navigation, communication and intelligence collection capabilities.

Other states and non-state groups pursue more limited and asymmetric responses that do not require large financial investments or a sophisticated industrial base. These methods include: denial and deception, electronic warfare or signal jamming and physical attacks on ground-based space assets.

Computer Network Threats

The U.S. information infrastructure, which includes telecommunications, computer networks and systems and the data that resides on them, is critical to most aspects of modern life in the United States. Russia and China pose the most experienced, well-resourced and capable computer network operations (CNO) threats to the United States, but they are not the only foreign entities that do. Other nations and non-state terrorist and criminal groups are also developing and refining their abilities to exploit and attack computer networks in support of their peacetime and wartime military, intelligence or criminal goals.

The scope and sophistication of malicious CNO targeting against U.S. networks has steadily increased over the last five years. This is of particular concern because of the pronounced military advantages that the United States has traditionally derived from information networks. Potential adversaries that cannot compete head-on against the United States may view CNO as a preferred asymmetric strategy to exploit our weakness while minimizing or degrading our traditional strengths.

China became the largest exporter of information technology in 2004, surpassing the United States and the European Union. Current trends suggest that China will soon become a major supplier to the United States. Overseas production provides opportunities for hostile actors to access targeted systems by exploiting the supply chain at its origin.

Russia and China have the technical, educational and operational ability to conduct CNO against targeted networks. Russia remains the most capable cyber-threat to the United States. Several high-ranking Russian military officials have promoted CNO’s potential against future adversaries. Since 2005 China has been incorporating offensive CNO into their military exercises, primarily in first strikes against enemy networks. Recent hacking activities emanating from China underscore concerns about Beijing’s potential hostile CNO intelligence collection activities.

Underground Facilities

Potential adversaries are going underground to deny the United States an important military advantage it has held for decades: precision-strike from the air.

Hardened and deeply buried targets (HDBTs) protect the leadership and military assets that current and potential adversaries value most. They include: command and control functions, WMD and associated delivery systems and WMD research and development (R&D). HDBTs often feature strong physical security, modern air defenses and networked communications.

The rising importance of hardened and deeply buried targets to potential adversaries grows each year. Whether those nations are rogue, major, or emerging powers, they increasingly protect their important military and security assets underground. This is most true for nations that support terrorism and whose potential possession of WMD makes these facilities a special concern. Recent and rapid advances in commercially available Western tunneling technology helps these nations and non-state actors build underground sanctuaries that are effectively immune to the kinds of precision-strike weapons used by the U.S. in the 1991 Persian Gulf War.

In the 2006 conflict in Lebanon, Hizballah complicated Israeli targeting by using HDBTs to store weapons, conduct operations and launch rockets.

Major elements of Tehran’s nuclear program are protected and concealed within hardened and tunneled underground facilities. As potential adversaries improve their ability to build underground facilities, the United States will find it harder to destroy these targets successfully with conventional penetrating munitions.

Advanced and Improved Weapons

Improvised munitions and highly-accurate long-range guided weapons help non-state actors inflict losses against technologically superior opponents at a relatively low cost and with little training.

These weapons can produce operational and even strategic-level effects beyond the battlefield when used to their maximum effect at the tactical level and publicized through the media or Internet. This provides terrorist and insurgent groups with a magnified politico-military potential that exceeds their historical norm.

For example, Hizballah inflicted significant Israeli casualties and challenged Israeli ground operations and plans while using scores of advanced anti-tank guided missiles against Israeli ground troops and armored vehicles during the summer 2006 South Lebanon conflict. Hizballah also heavily damaged an Israeli warship with an anti-ship cruise missile, a military capability once limited to nation-states and that Hizballah was not known to possess prior to the conflict.

Very advanced and portable anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles are increasingly available to non-state groups through uncontrolled exports, falsified end-user statements, gray market transfers, ransacked armories and/or direct supply from sympathetic regimes. MANPADS were recovered in the Horn of Africa during 2007. These weapons can be used in ambush and sniper attacks against high-value and lightly-defended targets such as political facilities, vehicles and aircraft.

The threat posed by improvised and suicide weapons, such as those used in Iraq and Afghanistan lies in the relatively low technological barrier to their construction, the relative ease in acquiring or manufacturing their ingredients and the growing availability of information about how to build and deploy them. The variety and sophistication of improvised explosive devices is largely limited only by the ingenuity of those who design, build and emplace them.

Non-State Actors

When available in combination, advanced weapons, sophisticated information technologies, ungoverned spaces and external sponsorship give non-nation-state criminal or terrorist groups the chance to develop credible military, intelligence and counter-intelligence capabilities once limited to nation-states.

Largely unencumbered by traditional internal and external governance responsibilities aside from attending to their own supporters, these groups can operate beyond the reach of traditional statecraft tools such as economic and diplomatic sanctions.

The premier example is Lebanese Hizballah, a terrorist group functioning as a state within a state in South Lebanon. While the group runs substantial and diverse social, cultural, economic and political programs, it also fields significant and growing military, intelligence and counter-intelligence capabilities, as it demonstrated in 2006 against Israel.

While ideology and political goals drive non-state actors such as Lebanese Hizballah, crime is a motivating factor for others. The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) presents formidable intelligence capabilities and the group has access to hundreds of millions of dollars from drug trafficking, extortion and kidnapping.

Such non-state actors pose a significant threat to the United States mainly because they are less responsive to traditional statecraft tools. Additionally, when they serve as proxies, these groups allow sponsor nations to conduct deniable terrorist, covert action or intelligence activities.

As the proliferation of weapon and information technology accelerates, non-state actors will have more opportunities to develop very capable conventional and asymmetric military, intelligence and counter-intelligence abilities, perhaps matching or even exceeding those of some advanced nations, including U.S. allies. This could further destabilize regions critical to U.S. interests.

Health Security

Infectious diseases can undermine U.S. national security and international economic stability. Pandemic influenza remains a major threat, with H5N1 avian influenza lurking in animal populations as a potential human pandemic strain. Reluctance by China and Indonesia to share avian influenza samples with international health authorities limits our ability to track changes in this dangerous virus. Drug-resistant pathogens, such as tuberculosis, also pose significant threats and are amplified in some regions by HIV co-infection. New international health regulations may increase visibility of these threats; however, lack of laboratory capacity and intentional under-reporting will continue to hamper efforts to control disease outbreaks.

Crime

Terrorist and insurgent groups that engage in commercial or criminal activity can achieve more autonomy and resilience than groups that rely mainly upon external donations. By sustaining themselves with locally-derived criminal and commercial proceeds, terrorist and insurgent groups can limit some of the constraints and vulnerabilities associated with external donor relationships.

Conversely, criminality can have corrosive and divisive effects on terrorist cadres’ internal cohesion, ideological commitment and discipline.

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) generates substantial income from the illegal drug trade, weapons smuggling, extortion and kidnapping. Lebanese Hizballah receives some funds from associates who profit from the drug trade. Some terrorist and insurgent groups in Iraq sustain themselves with funds generated from kidnapping, smuggling, oil theft, fraud and extortion. The Taliban also derive substantial operating resources from kidnappings and their involvement in Afghanistan’s opium production.

Final Thoughts

The very complex environment in which the U.S operates today is full of risk and threats, but also opportunities to influence and shape positive outcomes.

Our allies and potential adversaries are not set to static courses, but instead adapt and react quite quickly to changes in our common environment.

While combat operations against transnational terrorists continue, other potential threats endure and evolve. Today’s current focus against the terrorist threat does not foreclose the possibility that conflict among major, nation-states could intersect vital U.S. interests. Additionally, aspiring or ascending nation-state adversaries could present direct military challenges to vital U.S. interests with little or no warning.

As such, defense intelligence must remain able to provide timely and actionable intelligence across the entire threat spectrum to policymakers and decision-makers at all levels so they can maximize our nation’s opportunities while minimizing its risks.

In conjunction with the broader Intelligence Community, we have important structural and procedural reforms underway within DIA and across the defense intelligence enterprise. We are strengthening collection while also expanding information sharing across intelligence disciplines, agencies and with our closest allies.

In particular, we are improving the number and quality of our defense Human Intelligence (HUMINT) collectors, which prove most valuable against the hardest targets. We are standardizing the rigorous training for HUMINT collectors within DIA and across the defense intelligence enterprise while also improving their collaboration with the National Clandestine Service.

At the same time, DIA is attracting additional employees with critical language skills in areas of special interest with expanded financial incentives.

We are also reaching new levels of cooperation with our allies in analysis. There is stronger recognition today that no single agency or country possesses all the analytic depth needed to solve our toughest intelligence and military challenges.

To strengthen defense intelligence support to customers at all levels, we established the Defense Intelligence Operations Coordination Center (DIOCC) in October 2007. The DIOCC provides us the ability to focus our intelligence collection resources on the intelligence priorities of the Department of Defense and the Nation. Operating with the National Intelligence Coordination Center (NIC-C), we have the potential to integrate and synchronize national, defense and homeland intelligence operations and requirements.

Tying much of this together is the Department of Defense Intelligence Information System (DoDIIS) which provides a secure information backbone for the flow of classified knowledge to the U.S. and allied defense intelligence communities.

As a combat support agency, DIA is focusing even more intently on providing our regional Combatant Commanders with the intelligence they need to be successful in both combat and global shaping operations.

We continue to invest in our intelligence professionals through the establishment of performance standards and training programs that enhance their professional capabilities.

During this period of change and in the years ahead, your continuing support is vital. On behalf of the men and women of DIA and across the defense intelligence enterprise, thank you for your continuing confidence.

Our personnel are very proud of what they do. They are honored to have the opportunity to work on behalf of the American people. It is a privilege for me to serve with them and to have this opportunity to share their work with you today.

Thank you -- and I would be pleased to answer your questions at this time. [end statement]

~ ~ ~

Previously:

• The Axis of Weevils: (Part 1 of 3) Current Operations
• The Axis of Weevils: (Part 2 of 3) TheThreat

~ ~ ~

"Weevils Wobble But They Don’t Fall Down" from the "Veronica Mars" TV series (2004-2007) Season 3.

The Axis of Weevils: (Part 2 of 3) The Threat

"Current and Projected National Security Threats to the United States"

Exerpt from the statement (PDF 203 Kb) by Lieutenant General Michael D. Maples, U.S. Army Director, Defense Intelligence Agency, before the Committee on Armed Services, United States Senate, on Wednesday, February 27, 2008. (Unclassified)

Transnational Terrorist Threat

Still the most significant terrorist threat to U.S. interests worldwide, al-Qaida remains committed to using violence to displace Western influences across the Islamic world with its own interpretation of Islamic rule.

During 2007, al-Qaida expanded its support to the Afghan insurgency, continued to plan, support and direct transnational attacks against the West from its safe-haven inside Pakistan’s ungoverned regions while also expanding the threat it poses to Pakistan itself.

We know from the past that al-Qaida is interested in recruiting operatives who can travel easily and without drawing scrutiny from security services. As such, Europe could be used as a platform from which to launch attacks against the United States.

Al-Qaida continues efforts to obtain chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear capabilities. In September 2006, Al-Qaida-in-Iraq leader Abu Ayyub al-Masri publicly called upon scientists to help the terrorist group develop such weapons. These efforts will likely persist.

Al-Qaida’s threat to Pakistan itself grew in 2007, marked explicitly by Usama bin Ladin’s September appeal that Pakistanis rise up against President Musharraf. This is broadly consistent with previous assassination attempts against Musharraf and previous calls from other senior al-Qaida members such as Ayman al-Zawahiri. Al-Qaida may step up attacks across Pakistan to accelerate and exploit internal instability with likely targets also including U.S. and Western interests.

Usama bin Ladin issued six statements between September and December 2007, his first public statements since July 2006 and first live video since October 2004. The spate of statements by the group’s leaders, including Ayman al-Zawahiri, signals their continued health and control over the movement despite their isolation. The messages are designed to encourage donors, enlist recruits, maintain control over the movement and discourage the West.

Al-Qaida has consistently recovered from senior leadership losses. Despite the deaths and capture of key figures, mid-level operatives rise to advance plans and operations. Al-Zawahiri and Abu Yahya al-Libi have issued statements throughout the year, but from late April to early June, several others issued statements in rapid succession, each emphasizing various themes to different audiences. They included al-Zawahiri, Abu al-Yazid, Adam Gadahn and Abu Yahya al-Libi. This array of speakers is likely meant to signal to internal and external audiences that al-Qaida’s viability transcends bin Ladin and al-Zawahiri.

Abu Musaab Abdul Wadud (pictured) is the leader of The Algerian Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) who pledged their allegiance to Al Qaeda in 2006. Photo: Pat Dollard website.

Al-Qaida pursued partnerships in 2007 with compatible regional terrorist groups to extend the organization’s financial and operational reach while also seeking to portray a sense of momentum under the al-Qaida brand.

In November 2007, al-Zawahiri announced a merger between the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) and al-Qaida, following the 2006 merger with the Algerian Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC).

Al-Qaida selects regional terrorist groups for “franchises” based upon their religious and ideological beliefs, capabilities and adherence to al-Qaida’s global agenda. Al-Qaida uses such mergers to foster public perceptions of its worldwide influence, pursue its transnational agenda and to strike U.S. and Western interests in new areas.

Regional groups believe such mergers enhance their status and strengthen their ability to recruit and raise funds. However, such mergers require most regional groups to subordinate their local agendas to al-Qaida’s global aspirations, which can spark internal friction. A regional group’s mistakes can also tarnish the al-Qaida brand, as al-Qaida-in-Iraq demonstrated in 2006-2007 when it failed to rally the Sunni Arab population to its banner and instead sparked violent tribal opposition in al-Anbar and beyond.

As these mergers multiply, the threat to U.S. and Western interests may increase as new franchises adopt al-Qaida’s targeting priorities, namely Western interests. For example, following its 2006 merger, the GSPC -- renamed al-Qaida in the Lands of the Islamic Maghreb – increased its focus on targeting Western interests.

Al-Qaida’s mergers with the GSPC and LIFG demonstrate its effort to expand into Africa. Lebanon may be another region ripe for al-Qaida expansion.

East Africa al-Qaida and an increasing number of associated Somali extremists operating across the largely lawless territory of Somalia continue to pose the greatest threat to U.S. and Western interests across the region.

Since Ethiopia’s late 2006 intervention in Somalia, anti-government militants, remnants of the Council of Islamic Courts and Somali extremists associated with the East Africa al-Qaida have regrouped mainly in Mogadishu. They conduct assassinations, bombings and suicide attacks against the Somali government, Ethiopian troops and the African Union Mission in Somalia. While regional counterterrorism operations have killed or captured some key operatives, local al-Qaida and their associates still operate with relative freedom.

Following the February 12th killing of Hizballah terrorist leader Imad Mughniyah, Hizballah publicly threatened Israel and reprisal attacks against Israeli and/or Jewish interests are likely. Hizballah has a near global reach and previously has demonstrated a retaliatory capability with attacks in Buenos Aires during the 1990’s. If Hizballah perceives significant U.S. involvement, attacks against U.S. interests are also likely.

Nations and Regions of Interest

Iranian soldiers march during a military parade in Tehran, April 18, 2007. The military parade to commemorate National Army Day was held outside the mausoleum of the late founder of Islamic republic, Ayatollah Khomeini in Tehran. Photo: People's Daily website.

Iran

Iran’s military is designed principally to defend against external threats from larger, more modern adversaries such as the United States and threats posed by internal opponents. However, Iran could conduct limited offensive operations with its ballistic missile and naval forces.

Diplomacy, economic leverage and active sponsorship of terrorist and paramilitary groups are the tools Tehran uses to drive its aggressive foreign policy. In particular, Tehran uses terrorism to pressure or intimidate other countries. More broadly, it serves as a strategic deterrent. Tehran assesses that its use of terrorism provides benefits with few costs and risks largely because it believes it successfully conceals its involvement in such tactics. Iran continues to provide lethal aid to Iraqi Shi’a militants and Afghan insurgents while simultaneously providing weapons, training and money to Lebanese Hizballah, its strategic partner.

In recent years, weapons that are unique to the IRGC-QF and Lebanese Hizballah have been used by Iraqi Shi’a militants in anti-Coalition attacks, especially EFPs. Coalition forces have also recovered Iranian-made munitions, including EFPs, in Afghanistan.

Within the country’s borders, modernization of Iran’s conventional military inventory has traditionally favored naval and air defense forces over ground and air units.

Ongoing naval modernization is focused on asymmetric equipment such as fast missile patrol boats as well as anti-ship cruise missiles and naval mines. Iran recently launched an additional mini-sub and started an additional product line for the MOWJ corvette. Iranian broadcasts claim that Iranian UAVs have monitored U.S. aircraft carrier operations in the Persian Gulf.

Since early 2007, Iran has begun to invest heavily in advanced air defenses, reversing decades of neglect in this arena. Iran began taking delivery of the advanced SA-15 tactical surface-to-air missile systems and in December 2007 announced it will acquire the strategic, long-range SA-20. Iran’s procurement of modern SAMs with automated command, control and communications systems will improve its ability to protect senior leadership and key nuclear and industrial facilities.

While not investing in major new ground systems since at least early 2005, Iran is building an asymmetric capability to counter more advanced, adversary ground forces, including through enhancements to its Basij volunteer forces, which would play a large role in an asymmetric fight.

Regular Iranian ballistic missile training continues throughout the country. Iran continues to develop and acquire ballistic missiles that can hit Israel and central Europe, including Iranian claims of an extended-range variant of the Shahab-3 and a new 2,000-km medium range ballistic missile (MRBM) called the Ashura. Beyond the steady growth in its missile and rocket inventories, Iran has boosted the lethality and effectiveness of existing systems with accuracy improvements and new sub-munition payloads.

We judge that Iran halted its nuclear weaponization and covert uranium conversion and enrichment-related work in 2003, but we assess that Tehran at a minimum is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons. Iran continues to develop its enrichment program in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions. Iran is producing uranium enrichment feed material at Esfahan, claims to be enriching uranium in 3,000 centrifuges at Natanz and is working on more advanced centrifuges. It also continues to build a heavy water reactor at Arak which will be capable of producing plutonium that could be processed for use in a weapon.

Tehran continues to seek dual-use biotechnical materials, equipment and expertise which have legitimate uses, but also could enable ongoing biological warfare efforts. We assess that Tehran maintains dual-use facilities intended to produce chemical warfare agents in times of need and conducts research that may have offensive applications.

North Korean military. Photo: Radio Free Europe website.

North Korea

North Korea’s main goals are to preserve its current system of government while improving its economic situation, albeit at a pace it believes will not threaten internal stability. Pyongyang does not view its nuclear weapons, improved relations with the United States and a large active duty force of about 1.2 million as mutually exclusive. Rather they are the means Pyongyang uses to realize its goals.

North Korea’s large, forward-positioned, but poorly-equipped and poorly-trained military is not well-suited to initiate major military operations against the Republic of Korea (ROK). The long-range artillery the North has positioned very near the DMZ is complimented by a substantial mobile ballistic missile force with an array of warhead options to include WMD that can strike U.S. forces and our allies in the ROK and Japan. The North relies upon these capabilities to ensure its sovereignty and independence.

Development of the Taepo Dong 2, which has the potential to reach the continental United States with a nuclear payload, continues despite a failed July 2006 test launch. North Korea also continues work on an intermediate range ballistic missile.

Although North Korea has halted and disabled portions of its nuclear program, we do not know the conditions under which Pyongyang would entirely abandon its nuclear weapons capability. It could have stockpiled several nuclear weapons from plutonium produced at Yongbyon and it likely sought a uranium enrichment capability for nuclear weapons. It may also have proliferated nuclear weapons-related technology abroad. North Korea may be able to successfully mate a nuclear warhead to a mobile ballistic missile.

North Korea has had a longstanding chemical warfare program and we believe North Korea’s chemical warfare capabilities probably included the ability to produce bulk quantities of nerve, blister, choking and blood agents. We believe that Pyongyang possesses a sizeable stockpile of agents. North Korea has yet to accede to the Chemical Weapons Convention and is not a member of the Australia Group.

North Korea possesses a biotechnical infrastructure that could support the production of biological warfare agents. North Korea continues to research bacterial and viral biological agents that could support an offensive biological warfare program. This biological infrastructure combined with its weapons industry give North Korea a potentially robust biological warfare capability.

North Korea is stable and leadership succession, should it occur due to Kim’s sudden death, is more likely to be smooth than not. Should the Six-Party Talks break down, the North is likely to respond with resumed production of fissile material at Yongbyon while also increasing rhetoric intended to encourage a return to dialogue on the North’s terms. In such a scenario, additional missile or nuclear tests could occur.

Peoples Liberation Army soldiers parade before the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Tiananmen Square. Photo: Adrian Bradshaw / EPA.

China

China is strengthening its ability to conduct military operations along its periphery on its own terms. It is building and fielding sophisticated weapon systems and testing new doctrines that it believes will allow it to prevail in regional conflicts and also counter traditional U.S. military advantages.

The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is building its own sophisticated aircraft, surface combatants, submarines and weapon systems while still buying others overseas. For example, China is integrating Russian-produced KILO-class submarines and SOVREMENNY-class destroyers into the navy as well as S-300 PMU2 surface-to-air missiles and Su-27 aircraft into the air force. China has developed and begun to deploy indigenous SAM systems which, together with SAMs imported from Russia, provide Beijing with a modern, layered, ground-based air defense capability to defend important assets. China bought four S-300 PMU-2 (SA-20) air defense battalions and intends to buy four more. This increases its engagement range out to 200 km. China is developing a layered maritime capability with medium–range anti-ship ballistic missiles, submarines, maritime strike aircraft and surface combatants armed with increasingly sophisticated anti-ship cruise missiles.

The PLA has achieved moderate success in introducing these new weapons. Additional integration probably will accelerate as the PLA explores the full potential of new weapons.

China is looking beyond a potential Taiwan contingency and is pursuing capabilities needed to become a major regional power. The navy already operates a large surface and an increasingly modern submarine fleet and may be seeking to operate an aircraft carrier. The air force is developing an extended-range, land-attack cruise-missile-capable bomber. However, China must still integrate new doctrinal concepts and it also lacks the overseas bases needed for extended operations. Although China may not achieve a true regional power-projection capability in the next decade, it most likely will increase maritime patrols of disputed oil fields and its Exclusive Economic Zone.

China’s space and counterspace capabilities have significant implications for U.S. space-based communications, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance operations in a Taiwan Strait contingency and beyond. Beijing operates communications, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, navigation and Earth resource systems with military applications and will continue to field more advanced satellites through the next decade. In addition to the direct ascent anti-satellite (ASAT) program successfully tested in January 2007, China also is developing jammers and kinetic and directed-energy weapons for ASAT missions. Citing its manned and lunar space programs, China is improving its ability to track and identify satellites -- a prerequisite for anti-satellite attacks.

Moving away from its historical reliance upon mass conscription, China is trying to build a more professional military workforce – one able to engage successfully in modern warfare. The PLA seeks to rejuvenate its officer corps, strengthen military education, reform its non-commissioned officer corps, improve military quality of life and combat corruption. However, the PLA still appears to be encumbered by centralized control and a lingering mistrust of individual initiative.

China is developing missiles of all ranges. The CSS-10 Mod-X-2 (DF-31A) intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) can strike the continental United States and is joining China’s operational inventory along with the less-capable DF-31. Other future ICBMs could include some with multiple, independently-targeted reentry vehicles (MIRVs). Development continues on the conventional DF-21 (CSS-5) medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM) variants which can hold U.S. regional assets at risk.

China’s deployed missile inventory includes nuclear-armed intercontinental, intermediate and medium-range ballistic missiles, conventional medium- and short-range ballistic missiles and cruise missiles. China’s nuclear force is becoming more survivable with the deployment of DF-31 and DF-31A road-mobile ICBMs and the eventual deployment of the JL-2 submarine launched ballistic missile. China currently has less than 50 ICBMs capable of targeting the United States; however the number of ICBM warheads capable of reaching the United States could more than double in the next 15 years, especially if MIRVs are employed. China has also fielded over 1000 CSS-6 and CSS-7 conventional short-range ballistic missiles opposite Taiwan. It also is developing more capable conventional missiles able to range U.S. and allied military installations in the region. Chinese conventional missile upgrades may include maneuvering reentry vehicles with multiple constellation, satellite-aided navigation and terminal guidance.

China’s nuclear weapon stockpile likely will grow over the next 10 years as new ballistic missiles are activated and older ones are upgraded. China likely has produced enough weapon-grade fissile material to meet its needs for the immediate future. In addition, China likely retains the capability to produce biological and chemical weapons.

Growing capabilities in counter-space, cyber warfare, electronic warfare and long-range precision strike could help China achieve strategic surprise. Nevertheless, China’s security strategy emphasizes strategic defense, which integrates diplomacy, economics and information with conventional military operations. If Beijing adheres to this strategy, we will have indications of Beijing’s concerns along with warning of imminent crises.

While Chinese security strategy favors the defense, its operational doctrine does emphasize seizing the initiative through offensive action, including possible preemptive action. China does not view an offensive operational doctrine within the context of a strategic defense as contradictory.

China’s total military-related spending for 2007 could be as much as $85 to $125 billion. China has made marginal improvements in military budget transparency, but the PLA’s disclosed budget still does not include large costs for strategic forces, foreign acquisitions, military-related research and development and paramilitary forces. China’s accounting opacity reflects a lack of institutional capacity as well as an unwillingness to comply with international standards for reporting military spending. China also remains reluctant to share details about its growing ASAT capabilities.

China maintains an active presence in the South and East China Seas. Chinese operations in the South China Sea (covering areas such as the Spratly and Paracel islands) include reconnaissance patrols, training and island defense, air defense and service support exercises. China also has conducted operations in the East China Sea area, including patrols to protect its maritime interests and claimed oil and gas resources.

Russian soldiers march through Moscow's Red Square, Monday, May 9, 2005, during a parade commemorating the 60th Anniversary of the end of World War II. White House photo by Eric Draper.

Russia

Russia is trying to re-establish a degree of military power that it believes is commensurate with its renewed economic strength and general political confidence. Perceived Western encroachment into its claimed areas of interest and Islamic or insurgent threats along its periphery are driving Russia’s current military activities and modernization efforts.

Russia’s widely publicized strategic missile launches, increased long-range aviation flights and Kuznetsov carrier strike group deployment are meant to signal Moscow’s continued global reach and relevance to domestic and international audiences.

Russia has made a major commitment of almost 5 trillion rubles to its 2007-2015 budget to develop and build new conventional and nuclear weapon systems, with Moscow’s priority on maintenance and modernization of the latter.

Development and production of advanced strategic weapons such as the SS-27/TOPOL-M ICBM and the Bulava-30 Submarine Launched Ballistic Missile (SLBM) continues. In April, Russia rolled out the first Dolgorukiy-class ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) designed to carry the Bulava-30 SLBM which continues testing despite several publicized failures.

Russia is developing a new Iskander weapon system that will incorporate the SS-26/STONE short-range ballistic missile and a cruise missile. Both missile systems share common launch equipment, command and control infrastructure and can engage multiple targets in near real-time. In the future, other weapons may be incorporated into the Iskander weapons complex such as artillery and multiple rocket launchers.

Russia announced it had deployed three more Topol-M (SS-27) road-mobile ICBMs in December 2007 at Teykovo, in addition to the three Topol-Ms already on alert there since December 2006. Russian officials said they also deployed four more SS-27s in silos at Tatishchevo, increasing the total to 48. Russian media reports say Russia flight-tested its developmental RS-24, a MIRVed version of the Topol-M, twice in 2007 and it expects to deploy it in 2009 after several more tests. Russia claims the MIRVed Topol-M can penetrate any missile defense.

Russia retains a relatively large stockpile of non-strategic nuclear warheads. Nuclear weapons or material diversion remains a concern despite increased security measures. Some nuclear facilities and research reactors remain vulnerable to internal theft, sabotage or a well-executed terrorist attack. Since the early 1990s, Russian scientists familiar with Moscow’s chemical weapons development program have been publicizing information on chemical agents designed to circumvent international arms control agreements and to defeat Western detection and protection measures. Such work may be continuing today.

Russia may consider using chemical or even biological agents in counterterrorism situations as demonstrated by its use of chemical incapacitants to resolve the Dubrovka Theater hostage situation in 2002.

Russian conventional force capabilities continue to also grow, albeit at a measured pace. Readiness improvements are seen primarily among the conventional “permanently ready forces” (PRF). Russia has increased training and readiness levels in these units above the lowest points of the mid-1990s. However, Russia is finding it hard to improve training quality and modernize equipment while also increasing recruitment and retention rates for the volunteers needed in the PRF and the non-commissioned officer cadre.

Russia unilaterally suspended participation with the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) Treaty in late 2007 after claiming that the agreement was outdated and biased. Moscow seeks to pressure NATO members to ratify the adapted CFE treaty. Russia’s refusal to abide by treaty equipment limits, provide required treaty data or accept or conduct inspections undermines trust and will make it harder to monitor key European security issues.

Russia opposes closer integration of former Soviet countries with the West and wants to continue its presence in the so-called “frozen conflict” areas. Peacekeeping forces in the Georgian separatist areas of Abkhazia and South Ossetia and other military forces in Moldova continue to be a major source of friction between Russia and respective national governments.

Russia signed more than $10 billion in arms sales agreements in 2007, marking a second consecutive year of high sales. Russia recently signed large contracts with several countries, including Algeria, India, Iran, Syria, Venezuela and Vietnam while new agreements with China have declined. Pending sales include advanced weapons such as MiG-29M and Su-30MK multi-role fighter aircraft, GEPARD and KRIVAK-class frigates, KILO-class submarines, BMP-3 armored infantry fighting vehicles, T-90 main battle tanks and advanced surface-to-air missile systems.

Russia will continue to produce advanced fighter aircraft for export to countries such as Venezuela, Algeria, India and Malaysia while also seeking additional warplane sales to South America and Middle East. Moscow also continues to aggressively market its air defense systems, ballistic missile systems and related automated command and control systems to Iran, China, Syria and other countries.

Syrian soldiers march in front of their senior military leaders during a farewell ceremony held at the al-Rayaq military airport in Lebanon, 25 miles east of the Syrian-Lebanese border. Photo: AP.

Syria

Syria is trying to balance a complex mix of objectives throughout the region, particularly in Lebanon and Iraq.

Damascus seeks improved relations with the Iraqi government while at the same time it still harbors Iraqis with ties to insurgents and other oppositionists in Iraq.

Syria also seeks to strengthen its influence in Lebanon through its continuing support to Hizballah and other pro-Syrian allies. Its primary goal there is to ensure the selection of a president and cabinet that will accommodate Syrian interests in Lebanon. With significant influence over the Lebanese government, Syria may be able to stymie the United Nations’ investigation into former Lebanese Prime Minister Hariri’s assassination. More broadly, Syria wants to protect its interests in any Israeli-Lebanese peace deal and in wider Middle East diplomatic efforts.

Internally, Syria is trying to counter domestic Islamic extremists. And in response to Western pressure, Damascus does block some foreign terrorist movements from Syria into Iraq.

With regard to its external defense, Syria was impressed by Hizballah’s combat performance against Israel in 2006 and likely will try to incorporate the terrorist group’s small-unit tactics into its own military doctrine. In particular, it is trying to emulate Hizballah’s successful and aggressive use of anti-tank guided missiles (ATGMs). While its military remains in a defensive posture and inferior to Israel’s forces, Syria is upgrading its missile, rocket, antitank, aircraft and air defense inventories. It reportedly has contracted for thousands of additional Russian ATGMs. Syria is investing in anti-tank guided missiles as a weapon of choice against Israeli armor and seeks the most capable missiles available. Press reports indicate that Syria may give advanced anti-tank missiles to Hizballah. Syrian military training in 2007 focused on blocking an Israeli invasion and reportedly included increased urban and guerilla warfare training.

Syrian contracts with Russia may also include new MiG-31 and MiG-29M/M2 fighter aircraft and 96K6 Pantsyr-S1E self-propelled short-range gun and missile air-defense systems. Media reports indicate that Syria successfully launched an improved version of its SCUD D ballistic missile in 2007; one with greater accuracy and which is more difficult to intercept.

Syria’s chemical warfare program is well established with a stockpile of nerve agent, which it can deliver by aircraft or ballistic missiles. During the past several years, Damascus has continued to seek chemical warfare-related precursors and expertise from foreign sources. Syria has the facilities and the expertise to domestically produce, store and deliver chemical warfare. Syria will continue to improve its chemical warfare for the foreseeable future to counter regional adversaries.

Syria also has a program to develop select biological agents as weapons. The program is judged to be in the research and development stage, with Syria’s biotechnical infrastructure capable of supporting limited biological agent development. However, Syria is not known to have successfully weaponized biological agents in an effective delivery system.

Syria’s ballistic missile inventory is designed to offset shortfalls in the country’s conventional forces. It includes older Russian built SS-21 missiles as well as SCUD B, SCUD C and SCUD D missiles. Syria continues to flight test ballistic missiles which it views as a strategic deterrent against Israel.

HAMAS' military. Photo: Heaven Awaits website.

Levant

The Levant remains tense with the potential for renewed conflict. Israel, Hizballah and Syria are internalizing lessons learned from the summer 2006 conflict in preparation for a subsequent round. While none appear to want fighting to resume now, they all view its likelihood over the medium term. The period of high tension between Israel and Syria during the summer of 2007 has subsided. Nevertheless, Israel remains concerned over Syria’s military posture. Similarly, Syria fears an Israeli attack.

Senior Israel Defense Forces (IDF) leaders are driving an intense effort to fix shortcomings in readiness, training, logistics and combined arms operations identified following the summer 2006 war.

Iran and Syria jointly continue to support anti-Israel terrorist and militant groups in Lebanon and the Palestinian territories. However, the alliance between secular Arab Syria and theocratic Persian Iran is not a natural one. And, it may erode if Syria is accommodated significantly in any diplomatic agreement with Israel.

HAMAS’ rise to power in the Gaza Strip, the split in the Palestinian Authority and the ongoing rivalry between HAMAS and Fatah complicate Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking efforts. Continued attacks on Israel from the Gaza Strip increase the chances of major Israeli military action there.

Since taking control of the Gaza Strip in June 2007, HAMAS has been readying itself for an expected Israeli attack by adopting tactics similar to those Hizballah used successfully against Israel in Lebanon during 2006. Israel believes HAMAS has smuggled into the Gaza Strip, mainly through tunnels to Egypt, large quantities of arms and munitions which likely include dozens to hundreds of Soviet-era anti-tank missiles and possibly man-portable air defense systems. The military wing of HAMAS appears intent on transforming itself from a guerilla or terrorist force into a military-style organization like Hizballah.

The Lebanese military’s defeat of Fatah al-Islam militants in 2007 strengthened that national institution amidst growing instability. However, the persistent political impasse over the presidency and cabinet, the rearming of militias and Syria’s effort to maintain its influence in Lebanon are significant destabilizing influences.

Al-Qaida and other Islamist terrorist groups have tried to develop support and operate in Lebanon and the Palestinian territories.

Pakistani military. Photo: Misfire! website.

Pakistan

While Pakistan continues to strengthen its conventional and strategic forces, there is growing recognition of the need for more effective counter-insurgency and counter-terrorism capabilities against the extremist threat across the Federally Administered Tribal Area (FATA) and Northwest Frontier Province (NWFP).

This new focus, however, is unlikely to displace India as Pakistan’s perceived traditional, preeminent threat over the near term.

Islamabad has adopted a military, political, administrative and economic strategy focused on the FATA. Pakistan has added more border posts, begun counter-insurgency training, fenced portions of the border and seeks to obtain counter-insurgency equipment while also expanding paramilitary forces.

Pakistan lacks the transport and attack helicopters and upgraded communication gear needed to prosecute more effective and sophisticated counter-insurgency operations. Much of the Pakistani army also lacks the knowledge and language skills required to successfully operate across the tribal frontier’s complicated cultural terrain. While Frontier Corps troops understand the culture and region better and speak the local language, they have even less equipment and less training than the military.

Although efforts to improve these deficiencies are underway, it will take three to five years before results can be expected on the battlefield.

Recent skirmishes in Swat, NWFP, indicate that when police stand and fight, they can counter militant attacks. Because the militants are unable to sustain attacks in the face of a military response, they often muster enough forces to overwhelm paramilitary and police units and then generally break contact before the military is able to engage them.

So far, Pakistani military operations in the FATA have not fundamentally damaged al-Qaida’s position in the region. The tribal areas remain largely ungovernable and, as such, they will continue to provide vital sanctuary to al-Qaida, the Taliban and regional extremism more broadly.

Al-Qaida exploits this permissive operating environment to support the Afghan insurgency while also planning attacks against the U.S and Western interests worldwide. Together with militant groups, al-Qaida uses this sanctuary to train and recruit operatives, disseminate propaganda and obtain equipment and supplies. And they consider Pakistan’s army and other Pakistani government interests as legitimate targets. Former Prime Minister Bhutto’s assassination underscores the threat’s severity and reach.

On matters of external defense, Pakistan seeks to maintain stability and a balance of power across the region through continued improvements to its nuclear and conventional forces.

Pakistan continues to develop its nuclear infrastructure, expand nuclear weapon stockpiles and seek more advanced warheads and delivery systems. We presently have confidence in Pakistan’s ability to safeguard its nuclear weapons, though vulnerabilities exist.

Strategic rivalry with India continues to drive Pakistan’s development of an expanding array of delivery systems, with recent and growing emphasis on cruise missiles. Likely as a way of countering India’s emerging anti-ballistic missile capabilities, Islamabad is building cruise missiles such as the Hatf-VII/Babur for ground-launch and the Hatf-VIII/Ra’ad for air-launch. Pakistan may pursue other launch platforms and missions for these missiles.

Meanwhile, Pakistan continues to develop the Hatf-II/Abdali short-range and the Hatf-VI/Shaheen II medium-range ballistic missiles. These will join a missile inventory that already includes nuclear- and conventionally-armed short- and medium-range ballistic missiles. While Islamabad has shown no interest in developing inter-continental ballistic missiles, Sino-Pakistani space cooperation will likely give Islamabad access to the requisite technologies.

Pakistan is modernizing conventional forces with aircraft from the United States, Chinese frigates and fighters and possibly German submarines.

Responding to media reports speculating on U.S. unilateral military action inside Pakistan’s borders, Pakistani representatives have stated that any unauthorized military strike by Coalition forces on Pakistani soil would be considered an “enemy act.” Nevertheless, Islamabad welcomes intelligence sharing, technical cooperation and equipment and armaments in support of its counterterrorism and counterinsurgency missions.

Sheikh Zayed presiding over the summit of the Gulf Cooperation Council. Photo: United Arab Emirates, Ministry of State for Cabinet Affairs.

Arabian Gulf

Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states remained stable despite increased reports of terrorist activity in the region during 2007. Saudi Arabia continues aggressive counterterrorism efforts while other Gulf Arab states are pursuing modest improvements of their own.

GCC states remain wary of Tehran’s intentions towards Iraq, the Levant and among Gulf Shi’a, but most are unwilling publicly to confront Iran’s regional interference or nuclear potential. Gulf leaders prefer diplomatic solutions to these issues, fearing that Iran could launch retaliatory strikes, cause economic disruption or interfere in their internal affairs if it is confronted with military force.

While GCC countries have individually sought to improve their defensive capabilities, they have had less success in integrating their military capabilities. An example is the unsuccessful effort to establish an integrated air defense system.

Gulf leaders believe that catastrophic sectarian civil war in Iraq would likely follow an abrupt withdrawal of U.S. forces. Most harbor reservations about Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s ability to represent all Iraqi factions and make progress toward national unity. Also, they are highly suspicious of Iran’s influence over the current Iraqi government.

Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF). Photo: Ryan Anson.

Southeast Asia

The Jemaah Islamiyah (JI) and Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) are the terrorist groups that pose the greatest threat to U.S. interests in Southeast Asia. The JI, which is based mainly in Indonesia, works regionally with other Islamic extremist and separatist groups, including with the ASG, to achieve its goal of establishing a global caliphate.

In Indonesia, elite counterterrorist police units arrested the JI leader and a senior operative in June 2007; although other senior operatives remain at large. While JI has not carried out a large-scale attack in Indonesia since the 2005 attack in Bali, raids by Indonesian authorities revealed caches of weapons and explosives -- clear signs that the group maintains the interest and capability to conduct attacks.

Elsewhere in Indonesia, the government continues to successfully advance the August 2005 peace accord that ended the 29-year separatist conflict in the Aceh province, with a former rebel leader elected governor during Aceh’s provincial elections in December 2006. Still, sustained attention and cooperation remain necessary to prevent backsliding, particularly given reintegration and economic challenges. Sporadic separatist violence in Indonesia’s Papua province and low-level insurgency in Sulawesi pose no serious security threats.

The Philippine government has successfully sustained a ceasefire in its Muslim south with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), reaching an agreement with the MILF in November 2007 on territorial land boundaries for an expanded Muslim autonomous region. However, a comprehensive peace accord has remained elusive. Absent the resolution of the final obstacles, there is the risk of resumed fighting. While Philippine counterterrorism efforts have disrupted some attacks, ASG and other terrorists retain the capability to conduct operations.

Thailand also continues to struggle with entrenched Muslim separatist unrest in its southern-most provinces, presenting a major challenge for the recently installed democratic government in Bangkok. An estimated 2,700 people have been killed in near-daily assassinations and bomb attacks since the previous spike in violence, which occurred in 2004. Increased military operations in the South since last summer have failed to significantly impact the rate of insurgent attacks.

While the insurgency is indigenous, some local Muslim extremists proclaim their solidarity with “oppressed” Muslims worldwide. Successive Thai governments have failed to reduce insurgent violence in the South and address insurgent grievances. Despite Bangkok’s increased efforts to crack down on insurgent activity, continued high-profile attacks underscore rebel resiliency. The military, which remains the dominant actor on Bangkok's policy vis-a-vis the South, will have to improve its efforts to win "hearts and minds" if underlying Muslim dissatisfaction is to be resolved entirely.

Somali government soldiers stand guard on the southern outskirts of Mogadishu, August 12, 2007. Somalia's military have arrested two men over the killings of two prominent Somali journalists, the interim government said on Sunday. Photo: Reuters.

Africa

The United States faces no major military threat in Africa, although there are serious challenges to our interests.

In Nigeria, militants threaten Western oil interests by attacking oil facilities, kidnapping workers and disrupting production. The government seeks a peaceful solution, but no agreement has been reached yet and the militants themselves are divided.

Continuing post-election violence in Kenya underscores the fragility of the region’s democratic institutions. The stakes are high in Kenya as it is a key U.S. ally against transnational terrorism and East Africa’s major economic power.

In Sudan, humanitarian concerns in Darfur continue to escalate. The government and rebels remain at odds, despite efforts to negotiate a peaceful solution. International efforts to deploy an enlarged peacekeeping force have yet to be realized. Elsewhere in Sudan, tensions are rising over delays in implementing the North-South peace agreement.

Tensions between Ethiopia and Eritrea persist, threatening a renewal of war between the two countries over a disputed border region.

Cuban military. Photo: armyrecognition.com.

Latin America

While the United States presently faces no major military threats or challenges across Latin America, a number of concerns endure.

Despite his defeat in the recent referendum, Venezuelan President Chavez continues efforts to expand his power and confront U.S. regional influence. His government has expressed a desire to buy submarines, transport aircraft and an air defense system. Venezuela has already purchased advanced fighters, attack helicopters and assault rifles.

Colombian counter-insurgency operations have degraded Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia field units and operations and led to increased desertions. Drug trafficking organizations cooperatively ship cocaine worldwide in an effort to maintain their dominant position as global suppliers.

While Bolivia’s Morales continues to consolidate power with Venezuelan and Cuban help, continued opposition efforts to derail his draft constitution and calls for regional autonomy likely will challenge and perhaps destabilize his government.

The broad support that acting Cuban President Raul Castro receives from the military, security services and the Communist Party will likely enable him to maintain stability, security and his own position following Fidel Castro’s announced exit.

Raul has displayed a preference for making decisions over the years in a collegial fashion. This suggests that the leadership group’s consensus will inform policymaking. The Cuban military’s support for Raul Castro shows no signs of reversing.

Propped up with Ethiopian troops, Somalia’s transitional government remains shaky and threatened by Islamist and clan insurgents. If the government collapses, warlords and others with terrorist affiliations are likely to refill the vacuum.

Maritime pirates. Photo: International Herald Tribune.

Ungoverned Regions

Ungoverned – or Under-Governed – areas are territories beyond any sovereign nation’s control and, as such, lie outside the reach of traditional tools of statecraft. They often serve as training and recruitment safe havens for terrorist groups, insurgents, maritime pirates, criminal networks, gray/black market arms merchants or drug traffickers. Populations within ungoverned areas serve as fertile recruiting grounds for such non-state terrorist or criminal networks.

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Previously:

• The Axis of Weevils: (Part 1 of 3) Current Operations

Continued:

• The Axis of Weevils: (Part 3 of 3) Issues of Concern

~ ~ ~

The Lesser of Two Weevils audio clip from Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World and folk music by The Weevils.

The Axis of Weevils: (Part 1 of 3) Current Operations

"Current and Projected National Security Threats to the United States"

Exerpt from the statement (PDF 203 Kb) by Lieutenant General Michael D. Maples, U.S. Army Director, Defense Intelligence Agency, before the Committee on Armed Services, United States Senate, on Wednesday, February 27, 2008. (Unclassified)

Good afternoon Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member McCain and distinguished members of this committee. Thank you for this opportunity to testify on current and projected threats to the United States.

My testimony today reflects the work of thousands of collectors, analysts and support personnel, many of whom are deployed worldwide and often to dangerous and remote locations. They take great pride in providing the very best military intelligence to a broad range of customers, including the President of the United States, Congress, the Secretary of Defense, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the U.S. Combatant Commands, allies and our servicemen and women in combat.

Whether defense intelligence is informing national policy or enabling command decisions, we remain acutely aware at all times that lives depend upon on the accuracy, speed and thoroughness of our work. On behalf of the civilian and military men and women of DIA and across the defense intelligence enterprise, thank you for your support.

My testimony begins with an assessment of today’s global strategic environment, followed by trends and developments in Iraq and Afghanistan. I will also discuss today’s global terrorist threat before addressing countries, regions and transnational issues of special interest.

Global Strategic Environment

The United States is presently operating within an unusually complex environment marked by an accelerating operational pace and a broad spectrum of potential threats. That spectrum is bounded on one side by traditional nation-state regional powers within recognized borders and armed with large military inventories and on the other by non-state terrorist or criminal networks operating in the gaps and seams between nations, cultures, laws and belief systems.

The environment includes ongoing combat operations, ascending and aspiring regional powers, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD), evolving alliances, competition for resources and ideological conflicts that are fueling novel challenges to the established order in regions of vital interest to the United States.

While the United States still projects a dominant influence across the world’s military and security landscape, other nation-states and non-state actors are aggressively seeking advantage.

Today’s unprecedented access to information gives individuals and events the potential for a real-time, unfiltered worldwide audience which can influence global leadership and popular perceptions. This can compress time available for decision-making and the considerations that historically have been addressed separately at the tactical, operational and strategic levels of conflict.

This uncertain and dynamic environment also fosters the conditions that can simultaneously enable and mask strategic surprise, whether initiated by design or miscalculation.

In this setting, DIA collects and analyzes intelligence against a broad range of highly dissimilar potential threats and adversaries. While our priority today is to provide the best intelligence in support of current military operations, we continue to meet our additional, broader responsibilities.

Current Operations

Iraqi soldier proudly displays his purple voting finger. Photo: New Republic Website.

Iraq

A number of trends across Iraq turned more positive for the Coalition and Iraqi government in 2007, though none are yet irreversible.

Overall violence across the country has declined to the lowest level since April 2005 and violence against Coalition forces is at the lowest level since March 2004. This is largely the combined result of Coalition and Iraqi operations, tribal security initiatives, Concerned Local Citizen groups and accommodations with former insurgents.

Muqtada Al-Sadr’s “freeze” order helped lower violence levels in Baghdad and southern Iraq, although some Iranian-supported Jaysh al-Mahdi elements still target Coalition and Iraqi forces, Sunni civilians and competing Shi’a groups.

Al-Qaida-in-Iraq (AQI) and other active Sunni Arab insurgents moved most of their operations to more permissive Northern provinces where they are trying to exploit Arab fears of Kurdish expansionism and related territorial disputes.

Al-Qaida-in Iraq (AQI). Photo: Reuters.

AQI remains the most active terrorist group in Iraq. It continues to target the Iraqi government and Coalition Forces while also trying to reignite sectarian violence. Successful Coalition and ISF targeting of AQI leaders, the widespread emergence of local security groups through the Sahawa or Awakening movement, Coalition support for local security initiatives and accommodation with former insurgents have significantly reduced the ability of AQI and other irreconcilable insurgent groups to operate in central and western Iraq. In response, AQI is targeting anti-AQI Concerned Local Citizen (CLC), or “Sons of Iraq” local security groups in Anbar, Diyala and other provinces. AQI remains able to launch high-profile attacks. With its continued commitment to external attack planning, AQI also remains a threat beyond Iraq.

Sunni insurgent groups remain active at lower levels throughout central and northern Iraq. Some align with larger groups such as the 1920 Revolution Brigades, but most operate at a more local level.

RAMADI, IRAQ - Iraqi Sunni tribal leader Sheikh Abdel Sattar speaks at the Ramadi Reconstruction Conference organized between the U.S. military and tribal leaders January 10, 2007 in Anbar province, Ramadi, Iraq. U.S. President George W. Bush is expected to announce Wednesday night that he will send an additional 20,000 troops to Iraq, with possibly more than 2,000 more Marines destined for Anbar province. Sheikh Sattar, leader of the anti-Al-Qaeda coalition, Sawah Al-Anbar, is working closely with American forces in a bid to stabilize Ramadi, where U.S. troops have suffered some of the highest casualty rates in Iraq. Photo: John Moore/Getty Images.

Tribal opposition grew out of frustration with AQI’s terrorist tactics against Sunni civilians and AQI encroachment upon traditional tribal authorities and economic activities. In response, some former insurgents joined the ranks of the tribal “awakening” movements in many areas. This cooperation is generally localized and rooted in the many intertwining family, tribal and neighborhood ties between insurgents and tribes. Once they feel the threat from AQI has ended, the tribes and other reconciled Sunni groups may reconsider these alliances of convenience if they continue to feel politically disenfranchised and do not receive the economic, infrastructure and other benefits from cooperation with the Coalition and the Government of Iraq (GOI) and/or believe their security is threatened. Recent passage of the Provincial Powers law, which requires provincial elections to be held by October 2008, is likely to help defuse growing inter-tribal disputes in western Iraq.

Sunni Arab relations with Coalition Forces have greatly improved, as have those between local Sunni security groups and the GOI despite lingering mutual mistrust. Greater stability has enabled reconstruction and the central government has recently shown more willingness to fund projects in Sunni-majority areas. Tribal awakening movements and other Concerned Local Citizen local security groups want many of their members to be accepted into the formal Iraqi Security Forces or receive other government and civilian jobs. In the near term, Sunni Arabs are likely to continue cooperating with Coalition Forces, at least partly to pressure Iraq’s government to increase Sunni representation across the government and security forces and gain a greater share of resources. Some Sunni Arab groups now favor a continued U.S. troop presence primarily as a way to counter Iranian influence, although others remain opposed to a continued Coalition presence.

A Shi'a muslim beats his head as he celebrates a religious festival seldom allowed by Sadaam Hussein's regime. The men were marching to commemorate the death of Imam Hussein, cousin of the prophet Mohammed. Shi'a muslims are in the majority in Iraq but were repressed by Sadaam Hussein's regime. The celebration traditionally begins in February and lasts for 40 days. Under Sadaam Hussein's regime they were seldom allowed public celebrations. Photo: David Leeson/The Dallas Morning News.

During 2007, Shi’a parties and militants increasingly fought at the local and national levels for political and security dominance, particularly over southern Iraq’s religious and economic spoils. Despite the Sadrist freeze, the intra-Shi’a conflict will likely continue and could intensify in the run-up to provincial elections, the Coalition drawdown, the transfer of additional provinces to Iraqi control and the federalism debate.

Shi’a parties in the government generally support the Coalition, but want more autonomy and a bi-lateral security agreement with the United States. The Sadrists still strongly oppose the Coalition’s presence. The Iraqi Shi’a religious authority (Marja’iyah) supports Sunni-Shi’a reconciliation and the Iraqi Government.

Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) fighters. Photo: Mustafa Ozer.

Expanding Kurdish influence across northern Iraq’s disputed territories is fueling ethnic tensions and violence between Kurds and Arabs. The Kurds will leverage their political and military strength to ensure that disputed areas come under Kurdish control. They seek to accomplish this through the Article 140 referendum process and by placing Kurdish forces in key locations. Increased Kurdish economic development, resulting from regional laws passed without Baghdad’s approval or blessing may exacerbate the ethnic divide.

Turkey has attempted to disrupt and degrade cross-border Kurdish terrorist activity with some limited artillery, air-strikes and ground operations into northern Iraq. Ankara has indicated an intent to conduct additional operations against the Kurdish People’s Congress, or KGK (previously called the PKK) in response to the perceived threat. A sustained, large-scale Turkish operation could jeopardize stability in northern Iraq.

Iran continues to provide money, weapons and training, often through the IRGC-QF, to some Iraqi Shi’a militants despite pledges by senior Iranian officials to stop such support. The weapons include very deadly Explosively Formed Penetrators (EFPs) with radio-controlled, remote arming and sophisticated passive infrared detonators, mortars, rockets, rocket-propelled grenades and launchers, small arms ammunition and explosives.

An Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps poster. Photo: Trends Magazine.

The IRGC-QF is part of the Iranian government. It covertly trains, funds and arms Iraqi insurgents and militias. It also offers strategic and operational guidance aimed at undermining Iraqi stability. Approximately 12,000 Iraqi Shi’a operatives that had been exiled to Iran entered Iraq at the start of the war in 2003. The IRGC-QF’s partner, Lebanese Hizballah, has trained Iraqi insurgents in Iraq, Iran and Lebanon. Lebanese Hizballah provides insurgents with the tactics and technology to conduct kidnappings, small unit tactical operations and employ sophisticated improvised explosive devices, among the lessons learned from that group’s operations in southern Lebanon.

One of the signature weapons of this war is the Improvised Explosive Device (IED), which can be employed in a variety of ways. Efforts to defeat these weapons and the networks that design, build, emplace and fund them draw persistent counter-responses. The steady flow of new IED technologies and highly creative emplacement and employment methods underscore the enemy’s ability to adapt and react quickly and efficiently.

Iraqi army soldiers wait in line to vote along with other Iraqi security forces in Hayji, Iraq, Dec. 12, 2005. On Dec. 15, Iraqi citizens will elect their first permanent parliamentary government, which will lead the new democracy for the next four years. Iraqi security forces vote early so that they can provide security during the general election. Photo: U.S. Air Force by Tech. Sgt. Andy Dunaway.

The Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) improved their overall capabilities in 2007. While the ISF is increasingly leading counterinsurgency operations, the force still depends upon Coalition combat service support. Iraq’s army has grown substantially with the addition of two more divisions, the decision to fill out other divisions and a new policy permitting combat units to man 120-percent over authorized levels. ISF numbers have grown partly due to more successful recruitment among recently engaged Sunni tribal leaders and former regime commissioned and non-commissioned officers. This also is increasing Sunni Arab representation in the ISF. Today, there are approximately 450,000 trained members of the ISF including army, local and national police, border enforcement, and air force, navy and special operations forces. The ISF inventory includes more than 350 armored personnel carriers, 3,000 cargo trucks, 150 tanks, 25 helicopters, 15 fixed-wing aircraft, three transport aircraft and 30 patrol boats.

However, the ISF still suffers from a lack of trained, qualified and experienced leaders at the tactical level. This fosters a climate in which individuals remain vulnerable to improper political and criminal influence. Iraq’s army is trying to increase the number and quality of its leaders. And a new military justice system will help enforce the rule of law. That will help security forces win popular recognition as the legitimate guarantor of Iraq’s security.

The flow of foreign terrorists into Iraq and the number of associated suicide attacks have declined. The Saudi grand mufti’s 1 October condemnation of foreign terrorists and Usama Bin Ladin’s December 2007 message in which he spoke of mistakes in Iraq could weaken AQI’s appeal to foreign recruits. At the same time, the nations where foreign fighters originate or transit have increased their counter-terrorism efforts, especially targeting foreign fighter transport networks.

Taliban militants like these have beheaded a grandmother and her grandson. File Photo: The Daily Mail.

Afghanistan

Although the Taliban cannot conduct sustained conventional operations, it has increased attacks every year since 2002. Violence in 2007 grew by thirty-three percent over levels in 2006. Statistics also show twenty-one percent increases in suicide bombings and the use of improvised explosive devices and a forty-seven percent increase in small arms attacks. Some of these trends reflect the International Security Assistance Force’s (ISAF) increased engagements in expanded operational areas.

Through violence and intimidation, the Taliban-led insurgency continues to undermine the development of a stable Afghanistan. While the insurgency remains concentrated in the Pashtun dominated south and east, it expanded in 2007 to some western areas that lack an effective security and government presence.

The Taliban play to an international audience through press releases, videos and the Internet, sometimes with al-Qaida’s support. The Taliban lost several key commanders in 2007. However, they can sustain operations with steady access to local Pashtun and some foreign fighters. Al-Qaida’s presence in Afghanistan is increasing to levels unseen since 2001-2002. Al-Qaida supports the Afghan insurgency with personnel, training and resources, particularly in Afghanistan’s south and east.

These Korean missionaries were kidnapped from a bus in Afghanistan. Photo: The Daily Mail.

Insurgents in Afghanistan have expanded their use of some tactics and techniques that have proven effective in Iraq, such as kidnappings, suicide attacks and the occasional use of EFPs, demonstrating the adaptive nature of the threat. They also still cross the porous Afghan-Pakistani border despite pledges by local tribal groups to the Pakistani government that they would remove foreign fighters from their midst while also preventing insurgent border transits.

Iran seeks to expand its influence in Afghanistan, mainly along its eastern border, while challenging the coalition’s presence and influence in Afghanistan. Tehran advances its goals through legitimate business and humanitarian efforts along with weapon shipments that include EFPs, rocket propelled grenades, mortars, rockets, small arms ammunition and explosives.

KABUL, Afghanistan , Aug. 23, 2004 - Members of the Police Technical Assistance Teams from the Parwan and Jalalabad Provincial Reconstruction Teams help train the Afghan National Police in modern police tactics such as riot control, convoy security and dignitary protection. The 58th Military Police Company Soldiers from Schofield Barracks, Hawaii, are part of Combined Joint Task Force 76's Task Force Thunder assigned to help stand up the ANPs Rapid Action Division. The ANP Rapid Action Division will serve as a quick reaction force ahead of the Oct. 9 presidential elections in Afghanistan. U.S. Army Photo by Sgt. 1st Class Darren D. Heusel, 105th Mobile Public Affairs Detachment.

Afghanistan’s army and police forces are growing slowly and unevenly both in numbers and effectiveness. The Afghan army has made progress by fielding eleven of fourteen projected infantry brigades. A third of Afghanistan’s combat arms battalions can lead combat operations, albeit with Coalition support. In contrast, Afghan National Police (ANP) forces still require considerable training and Coalition support to fulfill their mission. The Afghan National Army (ANA) has grown from 31,000 to approximately 49,000 over the last year. The ANP has grown from 56,000 to 75,000 over the same period and is expected to grow to 82,000 by the end of this year. Recent polls show that the Afghan people generally view the army as one of the most trusted Afghan institutions. However, the Afghan government continues to struggle against violence, corruption, narcotics and foreigners opposed to a unified and strong Afghanistan.

NATO member nations continue to negotiate how to achieve counter-insurgency goals in Afghanistan. Differences exist over manning levels and the relative utility of hard and soft methods, such as use of force, reconstruction and reconciliation programs. Budget constraints and competing global deployments will limit some allies from contributing more personnel and equipment to the ISAF which now includes approximately 42,000 troops from all 26 NATO and some non-NATO nations. NATO allies engaged in combat operations in Afghanistan have performed well, but low domestic support for ISAF among some allied nations will limit their willingness to engage in more direct combat due to concerns over potential casualties.

Opium capital of the world: Men working in a poppy field in eastern Afghanistan, April 2007. Photo: Reuters /Ahmad Masood.

The Afghan government is likely to progress slowly even with NATO and ISAF’s continued help. Afghanistan will remain vulnerable to insurgent violence, the narcotics trade, foreign influences and disruptive political maneuvering ahead of the 2009 Afghan presidential election.

Afghan popular discontent will endure in areas where corruption persists, select Pashtun tribes remain disenfranchised, the promise of reconstruction is not kept and in areas with poor security. The Taliban insurgency and foreign terrorists will continue to attack the Afghan government’s resolve and the international community’s commitment to build a stable Afghanistan.

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Continued:

• The Axis of Weevils: (Part 2 of 3) The Threat
• The Axis of Weevils: (Part 3 of 3) Issues of Concern

~ ~ ~

"Do you not know, that in the service one must always choose the lesser of two weevils?" - Capt. Jack Aubrey, from Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

Lucky Charms

The Candidates' Lucky Charms

Photos 1,3: Brooks Kraft / Corbis for TIME. Photo 2: Christopher Morris / VII for TIME. All are White House photos of the day from the White House Photo Blog.

Amongst the things that Barack Obama carries for good luck are a bracelet belonging to a soldier deployed in Iraq, a gambler’s lucky chit, a tiny monkey god and a tiny Madonna and child.

"People give Ms. Clinton lucky items all the time on the campaign trail," said a Clinton spokesman. "Recently, for example, she's received a lucky coin, a lucky handkerchief that a woman in Texas gave to her that she sometimes keeps in her pocket, and a lucky bracelet that a woman in Ohio gave her that she wears every day. She keeps all of them."

In addition to a lucky penny, John McCain carries a lucky nickel, and a lucky rubber band, which he wears around his wrist. He also has a lucky sweater and a lucky hotel room in New Hampshire.

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To read more about lucky charms, visit The Lucky W Amulet Archive, a folkloric resource that contains hundreds of interlinked pages describing and illustrating amulets, talismans, lucky charms, and good luck pieces from all around the world and from all eras of history.

UFOs

An image taken from the video shot by Stan Romanek appears to show a head peeping above a windowsill. (Special to the Post)

By Dennis Miller

Speaking of aliens, why are Americans so reluctant to welcome anybody from Mexico and so enamored, witness the grosses for Independence Day, of the idea of encountering creatures from another planet?

Now, I don't want to get off on a rant here, but it seems like nowadays you can't throw a rock without hitting somebody . . . who'll claim it was a UFO. As life on this planet swirls in an ever-increasing speed down the crapper, is it any wonder that we've become more and more fixated with this notion of life elsewhere?

It all began in the 50s when we saw an astronomical increase in the number of UFO sightings. In fact, before 1947 there were next to no reports of UFOs. Is it just a coincidence that everyone began to see flying saucers about the same time everyone began seeing Communists? World War II was over and we needed something new to fear.

Here is a picture of the Roswell alien crash site. There are claims that our government learned a lot of information and technology, which isn't surprising since the aliens had a CD. From Machine.net.

In 1947 something crashed in Roswell, New Mexico. Some believe four aliens were discovered at the sight and that their remains, as well as the flying saucer, are being held in an Air Force installation 100 miles north of Las Vegas in an area known as Area 51. UFO-ologists insist that the four aliens and manager, Brian Epstein, accidentally crashed their own flying saucer. Yeah, because they can travel 350 million light years dodging black holes, asteroids and comets, but those New Mexico telephone wires are a real bitch! I think two of the four aliens might have survived the wreck, escaped from Area 51 and made it to Vegas where they have been doing nine shows a week under the name Siegfried and Roy!

Now, true believers say that Area 51 is definitely hiding something because if you go there, they won't let you in and they won't tell you what they have there. You know why that is? Because it's a fucking military installation, all right! What, do you think that if you go to Areas 1 through 50 you're gonna get a Chardonnay and some gouda? No, you're not! You're gonna get turned away faster than Roger Clinton trying to get backstage at a Marilyn Manson concert!

Alien autopsy scene from "Roswell: The Naked Truth Revealed!"

Now some believe that there is an authentic film of an autopsy on one of the Roswell aliens. I saw the film on Fox. I believe it was sandwiched between a very special "Martin" and a special "Party of Five." And, I thought the autopsy was as authentic as a piece of total bullshit can be. By the way, you know what they found at the autopsy? Traces of O.J.'s blood.

Now, in addition to the Area 51 freaks, there are those who legitimize the existence of aliens vis-á-vis the appearance of crop patterns that resemble the symbol that Prince uses as his name etched into an okra field outside of Mount Pilot. All right, occasionally bizarre patterns can be seen if you and Mike, the crop duster who dated Bee Benadara's lesbian daughter, Bobby Jo, fly over the fields out back of the Shady Rest. Some say it's a landing marker for aliens; I say it's Uncle Joe with an IV drip of grain alcohol and a Weedwacker.

Another core-ingredient of UFO studies is the abduction by aliens. Under hypnosis the abductees recollections all share the same characteristics; long stretches of time unaccounted for, strange bruises on the body, a suspicion of sexual violation. Is it just me or does alien abduction sound amazingly like spring break?

Listen, it's a natural tendency to look skyward for the next shiny thing to answer our prayers. That's why people flock to UFO conventions; in the hope that when the inevitable mass landing does happen the star gods will first want to get in touch with the mentally unstable among us.

A group of Star Trek fans dressed as Andorian Zhen pose for a photo on the third day of the Star Trek convention in Las Vegas, Nevada. Robyn Beck / AFP/Getty Images.

The purist defining event of the UFO culture has got to be the Star Trek convention. Not since the Pope and Cardinal O'Connor spoke to a symposium of nuns catered by the Amish has so little sexual experience been assembled in one room.

Hey look, I'd be the first one to tell you I would welcome aliens, because quite frankly, I'm running out of people to despise on this planet.

Despite the barnacles of cynicism which resolutely encrust my hull, I do believe that there is life other than ours somewhere other than Earth. I just don't think they're coming here! I don't know who they are or what they drive, but I assume that they, like I, stick to the tenet that the less you have to do with your neighbors, the better off it is for everyone involved.

To an extraterrestrial, Planet Earth at best would be like the Vince Lombardi rest stop along the Jersey Turnpike. Chances are they stop off here once to try to stretch their tiny, gray limbs, pick up a nut log and take a leak out of one of their 47 penises. But, on the off-chance that there are super-advanced alien beings out there tonight interpreting this signal: First of all, thank you for watching. And now, I want you to listen up, Caldar of Ramoula-Five! When you do come here and abduct one of us, invariably, might I add, one of us from a rural address, please... Stay out of our asses, okay! There's nothing in our asses that will help you and your dying planet! Life is tough enough out there in Grow Country without you proctonauts downing a couple cases of Zima and getting your moon rocks off checking on Jethro's oil, okay.

Of course, that's just my opinion. I could be wrong.

Max Baer AKA Jethro from The Beverly Hillbillies. From Kid Sopris.

Right-to-Carry 2008

"Diagram of a handgun." Photoshopped by Hindleyite.

Right-to-Carry 2008

There are 40 Right-to-Carry states. Thirty-six have “shall issue” laws, requiring that carry permits be issued to applicants who meet uniform standards established by the state legislature. Three have fairly-administered discretionary-issue carry permit systems. One, Vermont, respects the right to carry without a permit. Alaska, one of the “shall issue” states, has its permit system for the purpose of permit-reciprocity with other states, and also adopted a no-permit-required law in 2003.

• There are 10 non-RTC states. Eight have restrictively-administered discretionary-issue systems. Only two—Illinois and Wisconsin—have no permit system and prohibit carrying.

• The newest RTC states: In 2006, Nebraska’s RTC law was signed by Gov. Dave Heineman (R); Kansas’ Senate and House overrode Gov. Kathleen Sebelius’ (D) veto of an RTC bill by votes of 30-10 and 91-33, respectively; and the Ohio Senate and House overrode then-Gov. Bob Taft’s (R) veto of a bill that improves the state’s 2004 RTC law, by votes of 21-12 and 71-21, respectively.

Click on map for larger graphic.

• Other recent RTC initiatives: In January 2006, Wisconsin’s Senate voted 23-10 to override Gov. Jim Doyle’s (D) veto of RTC; the Assembly fell two votes short, voting 64-34. In January 2004, Ohio then-Gov. Bob Taft (R) signed RTC into law and New Mexico’s Supreme Court upheld a 2003 RTC law. Colorado, Minnesota and Missouri adopted RTC in 2003, the latter by overriding Gov. Bob Holden’s (D) veto.

• The right to self-defense is a fundamental right. The U.S. constitution, the constitutions of 44 states, common law, and the laws of all 50 states recognize the right to use arms in self-defense. RTC laws respect the right to self-defense by allowing individuals to carry firearms for protection.

• More RTC, less crime: Violent crime rates since 2003 have been lower than anytime since the mid-1970s.[1] Since 1991, 23 states have adopted RTC, the number of privately-owned guns has risen by nearly 70 million,[2] and violent crime is down 38%. In 2006, the most recent year for which complete data are available, RTC states had lower violent crime rates, on average, compared to the rest of the country (total violent crime by 26%; murder, 31%; robbery, 50%; and aggravated assault, 15%).[3]

• RTC and crime trends: Studying crime trends in every county in the U.S., John Lott and David Mustard found, “allowing citizens to carry concealed weapons deters violent crimes and it appears to produce no increase in accidental deaths. If those states which did not have Right to Carry concealed gun provisions had adopted them in 1992, approximately 1,570 murders; 4,177 rapes; and over 60,000 aggravated assaults would have been avoided yearly....[W]hen state concealed handgun laws went into effect in a county, murders fell by 8.5 percent, and rapes and aggravated assaults fell by 5 and 7 percent.”[4]

• RTC a success in every state: Former Colorado Asst. Atty. Gen. David Kopel has written, “Whenever a state legislature first considers a concealed carry bill, opponents typically warn of horrible consequences....But within a year of passage, the issue usually drops off the news media’s radar screen, while gun-control advocates in the legislature conclude that the law wasn’t so bad after all.”[5] A article on Michigan’s RTC law noted, “Concerns that permit holders would lose their tempers in traffic accidents have been unfounded. Worries about risks to police officers have also proved unfounded....National surveys of police show they support concealed handgun laws by a 3-1 margin....There is also not a single academic study that claims Right to Carry laws have increased state crime rates. The debate among academics has been over how large the benefits have been.”[6]

• RTC permit-holders are more law-abiding than the rest of the public. For example, Florida, which has issued more carry permits than any state has issued 1.36 million permits, but revoked only 165 (0.01%) due to gun crimes by permit-holders.[7]

Background: Before 1987, there were 10 RTC states. Indiana, Maine, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota and Washington had “shall issue” permit laws. Alabama and Connecticut had fairly-administered discretionary-issue systems. Georgia’s “shall issue” law was interpreted as discretionary in some jurisdictions. Vermont allowed carrying without a permit. Other states had restrictively-administered discretionary-issue carry permit systems or prohibited carrying.

In 1987, Florida enacted a “shall issue” law that has become the model for other states. Anti-gun groups, politicians and news media people predicted vigilante justice and “Wild West” shootouts on every corner. But through 1992, Florida’s murder rate decreased 23%, while the U.S. rate rose 9%; thereafter, murder decreased both nationally and in Florida.[8] Then-Florida Licensing Division Director, John Russi, noted, “Florida’s concealed weapon law has been very successful. All major law enforcement groups supported the original legislation....[S]ome of the opponents of concealed weapon legislation in 1987 now admit the program has not created the problems many predicted.”[9] In a 1995 letter to state officials, Dept. of Law Enforcement Commissioner James T. Moore wrote, “From a law enforcement perspective, the licensing process has not resulted in problems.”

• 29 states have adopted RTC since 1987. Of these, 21 previously prohibited carrying and had no carry permit system; nine (indicated with an asterisk, below) had restrictively-administered discretionary-issue systems. 1989: Oregon, Penna. (Phila. included in 1995), and West Virginia (in Georgia a judicial ruling enforced “shall issue” statewide); 1990: Idaho and Mississippi; 1991: Montana; 1994: Alaska, Arizona, Tennessee and Wyoming; 1995: Arkansas, Nevada*, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah* and Virginia*; 1996: Kentucky, Louisiana* and South Carolina*; 2001: Michigan*; 2003: Colorado*; Iowa* (by fairly administering its discretionary-issue system), New Mexico, Minnesota* and Missouri; 2004: Ohio; 2006: Kansas, Nebraska.

Citizens can defend themselves. Analyzing National Crime Victimization Survey data, criminologist Gary Kleck found, “robbery and assault victims who used a gun to resist were less likely to be attacked or to suffer an injury than those who used any other methods of self-protection or those who did not resist at all.”[10] In the 1990s, Kleck and Marc Gertz found that guns were used for self-protection about 2.5 million times annually.[11] The late Marvin E. Wolfgang, self-described as “as strong a gun-control advocate as can be found among the criminologists in this country,” who wanted to “eliminate all guns from the civilian population and maybe even from the police,” said, “The methodological soundness of the current Kleck and Gertz study is clear. I cannot further debate it. . . . I cannot fault their methodology.”[12] A study for the Dept. of Justice found that 34% of felons had been “scared off, shot at, wounded or captured by an armed victim,” and 40% of felons have not committed crimes, fearing potential victims were armed.[13]

The right to self-defense has been recognized for centuries. Cicero said 2,000 years ago, “If our lives are endangered by plots or violence or armed robbers or enemies, any and every method of protecting ourselves is morally right;” English jurist Sir William Blackstone observed that the English Bill of Rights recognized “the right of having and using arms for self-preservation and defense” as intended “to protect and maintain inviolate the three great and primary rights,” the first of which is “personal security.”[14] Sir Michael Foster, judge of the Court of King’s Bench, wrote in the 18th century, “The right of self-defense. . . is founded in the law of nature, and is not, nor can be, superseded by any law of society.”[15]

The Supreme Court, in U.S. v. Cruikshank (1876), recognized that the right to arms is an individual right, stating that it “is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence.” In Beard v. U.S. (1895), the court approved the common-law rule that a person “may repel force by force” in self-defense, and concluded that when attacked a person “was entitled to stand his ground and meet any attack made upon him with a deadly weapon, in such a way and with such force” as needed to prevent “great bodily injury or death.” The laws of all states and the constitutions of 44 states recognize the right to armed self-defense. In the Gun Control Act (1968) and Firearms Owners’ Protection Act (1986), Congress stated that it did not intend to “place any undue or unnecessary Federal restrictions or burdens on law-abiding citizens with respect to the acquisition, possession, or use of firearms appropriate to . . . personal protection, or any other lawful activity.”

Police aren’t required to protect you. In Warren v. District of Columbia (1981), the D.C. Court of Appeals ruled, “official police personnel and the government employing them are not generally liable to victims of criminal acts for failure to provide adequate police protection. . . a government and its agents are under no general duty to provide public services, such as police protection, to any particular citizen.” In Bowers v. DeVito (1982), the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals ruled, “[T]here is no constitutional right to be protected by the state against being murdered by criminals or madmen.”

National RTC reciprocity: H.R. 226, by Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.), proposes a federal law, that any person with a valid state-issued carry permit may carry in any other state, as follows: In a state that issues carry permits, its laws would apply. In states that don’t issue permits, a federal standard would permit carrying in places other than police stations; courthouses; public polling places; meetings of state, county, or municipal governing bodies; schools; passenger areas of airports; etc.

Nonsense from Brady Campaign (formerly Handgun Control, Inc.): Sarah Brady: “the only reason for guns in civilian hands is for sporting purposes;” former HCI Chair, the late Pete Shields: “put up no defense - give them what they want;” Brady Center’s Dennis Henigan: self-defense is “not a federally guaranteed constitutional right.”[16] In Jan. 1999, HCI claimed that between 1992-1997 violent crime declined less in RTC states than in other states.[17] (HCI previously claimed RTC caused crime to rise.) HCI erred in categorizing 31 states as having RTC during the period, since only 17 of the 31 had RTC in 1992. HCI calculated crime trends from 1992 to under-represent the impact of RTC laws; by 1992 many states had RTC for many years and already experienced decreases in crime. HCI misclassified Alabama and Connecticut as “restrictive” states, doing so because crime had decreased in both. HCI credited restrictive laws for crime decreasing in some states, but states that have restrictive carry laws have had them for many years, and crime did not begin declining in those states until the 1990s, and did so due to factors unrelated to guns.

Nonsense from Violence Policy Center: In 1995, VPC claimed Florida’s RTC law “puts guns into the hands of criminals.”[18] The claim was false, since the law permits a person to carry, not acquire, a firearm. VPC claimed “criminals do apply for concealed carry licenses,” without noting that such applications are rejected. Contradicting itself, VPC noted that criminals had requested that their rejected applications be reconsidered. “To set the record straight,” Florida Secy. of State, Sandra B. Mortham, said, “As of November 30, 1995, the Department had denied 723 applications due to criminal history. The fact that these 723 individuals did not receive a license clearly indicates that the process is working.” She added, “the majority of concealed weapon or firearm licensees are honest, law-abiding citizens exercising their right to be armed for the purpose of lawful self-defense.”[19] In 2001, VPC claimed there are more women murdered with handguns than criminals killed by in self-defense.[20] The value of handguns for self-defense is not measured by how many criminals are killed, however. More important is how often people use handguns to prevent crimes and how often criminals do not attack for fear the potential victim is armed. Also, VPC undercounted the number of criminals killed in self-defense by counting only those noted in police reports, thus excluding defensive homicides later determined to have been appropriate.

McDowell math: In March 1995, anti-gun researcher David McDowell claimed that gun homicide rates increased in Miami, Jacksonville and Tampa after Florida’s 1987 RTC law.[21] But homicide rates fell 10%, 18% and 20%, respectively, in those metro areas from 1987 until 1993, the most recent data at the time.[22] To show an increase, McDowell calculated Jacksonville and Tampa trends from the early 1970s, when rates were lower than in 1993, but calculated Miami’s from 1983, since rates before 1983 were higher and their inclusion would show that the rate had decreased. None of McDowell’s homicides was committed by a carry permit holder, and he did not indicate which homicides had occurred in situations where a permit would have been required to carry a gun. McDowell has also claimed that D.C.’s murder rate decreased after its 1977 handgun ban. In fact, the rate tripled after the ban.[23]

The 43:1 claim: Based upon a small study of King’s County (Seattle), Washington, gun control supporters claim a gun in the home is “43 times more likely” to be used to kill a family member than a criminal.[24] To reach that ratio, self-defense firearms uses are grossly undercounted by counting only cases in which criminals were killed. Most often, when guns are used to defend against criminals, the criminals are only scared off, captured or wounded. Kleck has called the 43:1 ratio and its variants “the most nonsensical statistic in the gun control debate.”[25]

Notes:

1. BJS (http://bjsdata.ojp.usdoj.gov/dataonline/)) and FBI (www.fbi.gov/ucr/05cius/offenses/violent_crime/index.html).

2. BATF, “Firearms Commerce in the United States 2001/2002” (http://www.atf.gov/pub/index.htm#Firearms).

3. Note 1, FBI.

4. Lott, “Crime, Deterrence, and Right To Carry Concealed Handguns,” 1996.

5. David Kopel, “The Untold Triumph of Concealed-Carry Permits,” Policy Review, July-Aug. 1996, p. 9.

6. “Should Michigan keep new concealed weapon law? Don’t believe gun foe scare tactics,” Detroit News, 1/14/01.

7. Florida Division of Licensing, Monthly Statistical Report (http://licgweb.doacs.state.fl.us/stats/cw_monthly.html).

8. Note 1, BJS.

9. Testimony before the Michigan House of Representatives Judiciary Committee, 12/5/95

10. Targeting Guns, Aldine de Gruyter, 1997, p. 171.

11. “Armed Resistance to Crime: The Prevalence and Nature of Self-Defense With a Gun,” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, Fall 1995, pp. 150-187.

12. “A Tribute to a View That I Have Opposed,” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, Fall 1995, pp. 188-192.

13. J. Wright and P. Rossi, Armed and Considered Dangerous: A Survey of Felons and Their Firearms, 1986, p. 155.

14. Stephen P. Halbrook, That Every Man Be Armed, The Independent Institute, 1994, pp. 17, 54.

15. Dowlut, Knoop, “State Constitutions and The Right to Keep and Bear Arms,” Okla. City Univ. Law Review, 1982, p. 183.

16. Brady: Tom Jackson, “Keeping the battle alive,” Tampa Tribune, 10/21/93; Shields, Guns Don’t Die - People Do, N.Y.: Arbor House, 1981; Henigan: USA Today, 11/20/91.

17. Handgun Control, Inc., “Concealed Truth.” (www.bradycampaign.org/facts/research/?page=conctruth&menu=gvr).

18. “Concealed Carry: The Criminal’s Companion.”

19. St. Petersburg Times, 1/11/96.

20. “A Deadly Myth: Women, Handguns, and Self-Defense.”

21. “Easing Concealed Firearm Laws: Effects on Homicide in Three States.”

22. Note 1, BJS, and FBI, annual Crime in the United States reports.

23. Ibid.

24. A. L. Kellermann, “Protection or Peril?: An Analysis of Firearm-Related Deaths in the Home,” New England Journal of Medicine, 1986.

25. Note 11, pp. 177-178.

Posted: 5/6/2008 12:00:00 AM

Copyright 2008, National Rifle Association of America, Institute for Legislative Action. This may be reproduced. It may not be reproduced for commercial purposes.

The stars at night, Are big and bright...

Photo: Tyler Hicks/The New York Times

...Deep in the heart of Afghanistan.

Marines worked through the night in Garmser to gain ground against the retreating Taliban. The Helmand Province shares a border with Pakistan, and the Taliban and drug traffickers have long used refugee camps across the border as a sanctuary from American firepower.

Related article: U.S. Reports Gains Against Taliban Fighters

Related pictures: Routing the Taliban - slideshow

Russia's Glowing Past: The Semipalatinsk Nuclear Test Site

Located about 100km away from city 'Kurchatov' or Semipalatinsk-21, these “Testing Towers", where loaded with equipment and fully furnished. Click to enlarge. From Yuriev.tv

Kazakhstan is a vast country stretching over an area greater than the size of Western Europe. It is also home to the largest ex-Soviet nuclear testing facility which covers an area of approximately 18,500 km2. From 1949 until 1989, 456 nuclear test explosions were carried out, the majority of which were completed underground.

The Semipalatinsk Test Site (STS) has been contaminated with neutron-induced radioactivity and fallout radionuclides. Radionuclide release as a consequence of the testing or radiation dispersions weapons also occurred. Previously unattainable information on the levels of radioactive contamination was eventually released to international experts in 1993 who were given access to the site.

The various facilities grouped inside the Semipalatinsk Test Site.

Today, the government of Kazakhstan encourages cooperation and collaboration between Kazakh and international scientists to assess the radiological risk to local populations at the STS. The International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA) is coordinating projects at the site and the United Nations General Assembly passed a number of resolutions including one that calls the international community to unite to find a viable solution to the ecological and environmental problems at the Semipalatinsk Test Site.

Certain defence agencies have concerns that some radionuclide deposits on this largely unprotected site could present a serious threat if they were to fall into the hands of terrorist groups.

Operation First Lightning, the first Soviet atomic test.

In 2002, NATO sponsored a project to examine levels of contamination of an area of about 600 km2 of the test site close to the village of Sarzhal. The results which were obtained in 2002 showed that contrary to expectation, the site was not highly contaminated, and concluded that there was no significant radiological hazard to the farmers and the Sarzhal residents that use it for agriculture. These results were passed to the government of Kazakhstan.

The highest priority now remains to investigate the remaining areas of the STS, particularly those sites which could be exploited for agriculture or mining of minerals such as gold. A second NATO project was undertaken to measure radioactivity on an area of approximately 800 km2 in the northern part of the test site that is farmed by Kazakh families and workers from local villages.

Nuclear Lake 'Balapan' or 'Chagan'. This lake is about 2000 ft deep. Locals used to catch fish here, but these fish would electrocute the fishermen, and then it was said the fish began climbing out of the water… Click to enlarge. From Yuriev.tv

Again, the site has proved to be less contaminated than expected – except in areas used to test radiological weapons – making this task difficult. However, the project has provided valuable information concerning the risk presented to both the international community and to local farm families by the residues produced by the testing of radiological weapons.

In 2007, at the end of the project, a final report was produced detailing the results and was made available to key Kazakh agencies and Government stakeholders. A well-equipped monitoring team was established at the Kazakh Institute of Radiation Safety and Ecology and is continuing the work at the STS, and other former-Soviet nuclear test sites within Kazakhstan. The project has also established the al-Farabi Kazakh National University as a regional centre for training radiochemists and radioecologists.

On March 22, 2007, Professor Mukash Burkitbayev of Kazakhstan and Professor Nick Priest of the United Kingdom received the 2007 NATO Science Prize for their cooperative project assessing radioactive contamination at the nuclear test site at Semipalatinsk, Kazakhstan.

The Prize? A €10,000 grant to each of the winners to support their further research. Congratulations gentlemen. Keep up the good work.

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Missile Defense: European and American Perspectives

Excerpt from a speech given by John C. Rood, U.S. Acting Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security, May 5, 2008.

Threat

The security challenge facing the Alliance from weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles continues to evolve and grow more concerning. At one time, ballistic missiles belonged to an elite club of nations. In the last 30 years, however, the number of states possessing ballistic missiles has increased from 9 in 1972 to more than two dozen today. Ballistic missiles have been used in a range of conflicts since that time such as the Iran-Iraq war, the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, the first Gulf War, and the most recent conflict with Iraq.

The trend today is toward missiles of increasing range and sophistication. The countries pursuing these capabilities include some of the world’s least responsible states -- states which sponsor terrorism and seek to coerce their neighbors. And in the last couple of years, we have seen the emergence these capabilities in the hands of a non-state actor, Hezbollah, which used rockets and ballistic missiles in the 2006 conflict with Israel and continues to arm itself today with even greater capabilities due to assistance from Iran and Syria. As French President Sarkozy said on March 21, 2008,

“Today we must all be mindful of the fact that the nuclear missiles of even distant powers can reach Europe in less than half an hour. Currently only the Great Powers have such means. But other countries, in Asia and the Middle East, are vigorously developing ballistic capabilities. I am thinking in particular of Iran. Iran is increasing the range of its missiles, while grave suspicions surround its nuclear program. It is indeed Europe’s security that is at stake.”

Iran’s activities have indeed been particularly concerning. As the Director of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, LTG Maples said in testimony to the U.S. Congress earlier this year,

“Iran continues to develop and acquire ballistic missiles that can hit Israel and central Europe, including Iranian claims of an extended-range variant of the Shahab-3 and a new 2,000 km medium-range ballistic missile called the Ashura. Beyond the steady growth in its missile and rocket inventories, Iran has boosted the lethality and effectiveness of existing systems with accuracy improvements and new sub-munition payloads.”

The ballistic missile threat is something that has been examined and debated extensively at NATO in recent years, with exchanges of intelligence information and analysis by Allies. I’m pleased that as a result of these exchanges that we now have an agreed NATO threat assessment. As NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Schefer summed up nicely after the April 19, 2007 North Atlantic Council meeting, “…there is absolutely shared threat perception between the Allies. Allies all agree that there is a threat from ballistic missiles. Full stop.” I would also point out that this shared assessment of the missile threat was also recognized in the communiqué from the Bucharest summit.

Security Strategy

Since the dawn of the “missile age,” these weapons have altered our thinking about effective defense strategies. As President John F. Kennedy observed on October 22, 1962, “We no longer live in a world where only the actual firing of weapons represents a sufficient challenge to a nation’s security to constitute maximum peril.”

What Kennedy was alluding to is the coercive power that comes from long-range missiles and other strategic weapons when there is no effective defense or counter-measure. In the bipolar world that existed during the Cold War, NATO relied upon the prospect of massive retaliation with nuclear weapons to deter the major threat we faced then from a Soviet land invasion in the heart of Europe or a missile attack. Yet the global landscape has changed dramatically since that time. In today’s new security environment, effective deterrence must rely upon more than the grim prospect of retaliation with the most destructive weapons invented by man.

Missile defenses strengthen deterrence. The presence of such defenses undermines the ability of potential adversaries to seek to coerce NATO states. Missile defenses also make it far less likely that our adversaries will ever use missiles during a conflict, since such a missile attack could be defeated. And, even after a successful missile defense engagement, NATO would retain our full capabilities to respond with counter-strikes.

North Korean Taipo Dong Missile Complex, IKONOS satellite image collected 15-Jun-2006. 3002 x 3002 - 3261k. Click to enlarge.

Missile defenses are an important means to promote stability in today’s security environment. This principle was demonstrated in the summer of 2006 when North Korea began preparations to launch its Taepo Dong 2 ICBM. We did not know North Korea’s intentions or the payload atop this missile. But we thought North Korea’s leader wanted a crisis. Serious defense experts such as President Clinton’s Secretary of Defense William Perry wrote that the risk was so large that the United States should conduct a pre-emptive military attack on the launch site to destroy the Taepo Dong 2 ICBM. Yet I can tell you that we in the Bush Administration never seriously considered such a course of action because we had another option. Instead of moving forces to the region to give ourselves the option of a pre-emptive attack or to be poised to strike in retaliation, which would have escalated the situation, instead we activated our missile defense system for the first time, putting the system on alert with crews manning it 24 hours a day. This allowed us to stabilize the situation, instead of contributing to the crisis.

Growth of Missile Defense

In light of the security environment and the advances in technology that have made effective defenses possible, we have seen significant growth in the number of countries pursuing missile defenses. A growing number of countries are in varying stages of pursuing missile defense efforts that range from hosting or deploying missile defense systems, conducting R&D, to the early stages of conducting architecture and requirements analysis. These countries include Australia, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, Taiwan, the U.S., and the United Kingdom. And I would note that Russia clearly believes in the value of missile defense as demonstrated by the fact that it continues to maintain the Moscow ABM system and to field systems like the S-300 and S-400 (pictured here.)

Within NATO, several member states are engaged in missile defense efforts that rage from hosting key facilities on their territory, pursuing joint research and development programs, participating in missile defense exercises and simulations, or fielding their own capabilities. For example, the United States, Germany, and the Netherlands are deploying the Patriot PAC-3 system (pictured below.) Germany, Italy, and the United States are jointly developing a new missile defense system called MEADS. And, of course, in addition to the radars in the U.S. missile defense system hosted by the UK and on Denmark’s territory in Greenland, we have been engaged in negotiations with the Czech Republic and Poland to place a radar and interceptors on their soil.

We are very pleased with the outcome of NATO’s Bucharest Summit. At this meeting the Heads of State and Government agreed on a communiqué in which NATO clearly recognizes:

• Missile proliferation poses an increasing threat;
• Missile defenses are an important part of an effective response to this threat;
• That the U.S. proposed facilities in the Czech Republic and Poland would make a substantial contribution to the protection of NATO Allies, thus endorsing our efforts in this regard; and
• That the Alliance should examine ways to expand protection for Allies.

This summit was a watershed event for missile defense and NATO efforts in this regard. But we did not get here overnight. First, this would not have been possible if President Bush had not made the decision that the United States would withdraw from the 1972 ABM Treaty. That outdated treaty would have prohibited the defense of Allies from missile attack as we have proposed to do with the deployment of a radar in the Czech Republic and interceptors in Poland.

Moving beyond the ABM Treaty was consistent with President Bush’s decision to drop the “N” from “NMD” or national missile defense to make clear that we intended to pursue missile defenses to protect both the United States and our allies from missile attack. History has shown us the importance of linking our security to that of our allies. As President Dwight Eisenhower said in 1957, “American alone and isolated cannot assure even its own security. We must be joined by the capability and resolution of nations that have proved themselves dependable defenders of freedom. Isolation from them invites war.”

We have also seen a steady forward progression by the Alliance in recent years on missile defense culminating in the Bucharest summit communiqué. We clearly did not get to the Bucharest summit communiqué overnight. To touch on some of the highlights:

• In 1999, NATO’s Strategic Concept recognized the need for missile defense to counter nuclear, biological, and chemical threats.
• From 2001-2003, NATO conducted two feasibility studies on theater missile defense involving two independent contractor teams.
• In 2002, at the NATO Summit in Prague, the Alliance agreed to examine options for protecting Alliance territory and populations against ballistic missiles of all ranges, and tasked a feasibility study.
• In March 2005, NATO’s North Atlantic Council approved establishment of the Active Layered Theater Ballistic Missile Defense (ALTBMD) program, thereby taking NATO’s first step towards building a capability to defend its forces and other high value assets against ballistic missile attack.
• In May 2006, NATO’s follow-on feasibility study was delivered to the North Atlantic Council. The study concluded that missile defense protection of territory and populations was technically feasible.
• In November 2006, at the Riga Summit, NATO welcomed completion of the missile defense feasibility study initiated by the 2002 Prague Summit Declaration and tasked continued work, including an update on missile threat developments.

Trans-Atlantic Next Steps

So with Bucharest behind us, what does the trans-Atlantic community need to do now? Clearly, NATO needs to maintain the momentum coming out of Bucharest. This includes completing the overdue Riga taskings on missile defense. These study efforts will support the development of options for a NATO missile defense architecture to extend coverage to all Allied territory and populations not otherwise covered by the U.S. system.

While we have completed negotiations with the Czech Government on an agreement to place a missile defense radar here in the Czech Republic, we still have several steps to complete. First the agreement will be formally signed by Ministers in the near term. Secondly, we expect to complete negotiations on an accompanying Status of Forces Agreement with the Czech Republic shortly that is necessary for establishment of the radar on Czech soil. And of course, the Czech Parliament must act later this year.

Regarding deployment of interceptors in Poland, I remain optimistic that we can successfully conclude negotiations with the Polish Government as well, although there are still some important issues yet to be resolved in that negotiation.

The negotiations we have held with Poland and the Czech Republic have brought about strong complaints from Russia. In response, the U.S. has sought to allay Russian concerns, by engaging in the most extensive and far-reaching dialogue of its kind. We have made clear that the missile defenses we hope to deploy in Europe are not directed at Russia and have shown technical analysis explaining why 10 interceptors in Poland and a radar in the Czech Republic are not a threat to the thousands of strategic nuclear warheads and hundreds of ICBMs that Russia possesses (pictured here.)

In this process, we have learned a great deal about Russia’s concerns. As part of this dialogue, the United States has also offered far-reaching proposals on missile defense cooperation. Our thought has been that missile defense cooperation is the best confidence building measure that we could offer, which is why last April the U.S. offered to cooperate with Russia across the full spectrum of missile defense activities. Since then, we have gone further, offering the prospect of a joint regional missile defense architecture between Russia, the United States, and NATO.

The United States has also developed ideas for transparency and confidence building measures to try to allow Russia to develop greater trust that the system is not aimed at them. This has included measures like reciprocal exchanges of liaison officers that could conduct monitoring and inspections at facilities in the Czech Republic, Poland, Russia, and the United States, as well as information exchanges and technical measures. In the process, we have closely coordinated with the Czech and Polish Governments, while making clear that any arrangement would need to be approved by these governments. The bottom line is that the Czech and Polish government will have the final say on what occurs in their countries, including any potential activities by Russian or American personnel.

We are pleased that we are making some progress in this regard with Russia. At the recent meeting in Sochi between President Bush and President Putin, a Strategic Framework Declaration was released in which Russia agreed that the transparency and confidence-building measures, if agreed and implemented, “will be important and useful in assuaging Russian concerns.” I plan to meet again in the next few weeks with my Russian counterpart, Deputy Foreign Minister Kislyak to further develop these measures.

President Bush with Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek of the Czech Republic in Prague. Photo: Mandel Ngan/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images.

Conclusion

The missile defense efforts we have undertaken to protect NATO forces and populations demonstrate that we are responding to existing and future challenges to international peace and security. It takes determination and leadership to accomplish these tasks and I’m pleased to say that the Czech Government has demonstrated both.

As President Bush said on February 27 following his meeting with Czech Prime Minister Topolanek, “…Our job as leaders is to deal with the issues of the day, but also deal with the issues of tomorrow in a way that yields a peaceful world. And that’s what we’re doing.”

Are You a Democrat, Republican or Southern Republican?

Are you a Democrat, Republican or Southern Republican?

Here is a little test that will help you to decide:

You're walking down a deserted street with your wife and two small children. Suddenly, an Islamic terrorist with a huge knife comes around the corner, locks eyes with you, screams obscenities, praises Allah, raises the knife, and charges at you. You are carrying a Kimber 1911 (.45 pistol) and you are an expert shot.

You have mere seconds before he reaches you and your family.

What do you do?

Democrat's Answer:

Well, that's not enough information to answer the question!

Does the man look poor? Or oppressed?

Have I ever done anything to him that would inspire him to attack?

Could we run away?

What does my wife think?

What about the kids?

Could I possibly swing the gun like a club and knock the knife out of his hand?

What does the law say about this situation?

Does the Kimber have appropriate safety built into it?

Why am I carrying a loaded gun anyway, and what kind of message does this send to society and to my children?

Is it possible he'd be happy with just killing me?

Does he definitely want to kill me, or would he be content just to wound me?

If I were to grab his knees and hold on, could my family get away while he was stabbing me?

Should I call 9-1-1?

Why is this street so deserted?

We need to raise taxes, have a paint and weed day and make this a happier, healthier street that would discourage such behavior.

This is all so confusing! I need to debate this with some friends for few days and try to come to a consensus.

Republican's Answer:

BANG!

Southern Republican's Answer:

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! click.....(sounds of reloading.)

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! click.

Daughter: "Nice grouping, Daddy!

GHOST: Confessions of a Counterterrorism Agent, Chapter 2

This is the second chapter of Fred Burton’s new book, GHOST: Confessions of a Counterterrorism Agent. Burton is vice president for counterterrorism and corporate security at Stratfor. He is the former deputy chief of the Diplomatic Security Service, the Department of State’s counterterrorism division.

Chapter One: The Buried Bodies

Chapter Two: Down the Rabbit Hole

“CT03.” That’s what the outside of one oversized brown file folder says. It was written with a black Magic Marker in spiky hand lettering. I untie the folder and open it up. Sitting inside are more legal-sized green file folders. They’re worn and ragged and look decades old. Each one has a label. I sort through them looking at the subheadings: “Intelligence,” “Unsolved Leads,” “Unanswered Questions,” “Witness Statements.” In the back is another one marked “Evidence.”

My cop instinct leads me to pull out the evidence folder first. It seems awfully thin. When I open it up, I find only a single sealed plastic bag. On the outside it reads, “Department of State—Evidence—SRG.” I assume those are Gleason’s initials. I lift it up and examine its contents. Whatever is inside looks like a dried-up mushroom.

“What is this?” I ask myself softly.

Gleason overhears me and replies, “An ear.”

First day on the job, and I’m holding a human body part. The Alice in Wonderland experience is complete. I’ve gone down the rabbit hole.

I continue to hold the ear. Miss Manners doesn’t cover this sort of scenario. What should I say? How should I react? I’ll wing it.

“So, did you cut this off a suspect?” I ask Gleason.

He is not amused. He just looks at me with a You have no idea what you’ve gotten yourself into here sort of expression. Then he goes back to scribbling on more paperwork. Almost as an afterthought he says, “That’s what’s left of the suicide bomber.”

Suicide bomber? As in kamikaze? I better start at the beginning. I tuck the ear away and pull out the first file. The sheaf of papers becomes my gateway to the world we Americans don’t want to know about. I read the stilted words, mesmerized by the meaning behind them.

April 18, 1983. Beirut was chaos—it is even worse now. The city, once known for its Westernized and cosmopolitan atmosphere, had long since become a battleground. As the various factions dueled for control, spooks and terrorists played a game of cat and mouse amid the ruins. On April 18, the anniversary of Paul Revere’s ride, the terrorists scored their first decisive victory against the United States.

At 1300 hours local time, a van passed through a security checkpoint and drove up to the front of the embassy. The driver parked under a portico, then detonated the two thousand pounds of explosives stuffed into the back.

Now I understand why there is only an ear left.

The explosion tore apart the entire front of the U.S. Embassy, killing sixty-three people and wounding a hundred more. I vaguely remember hearing about it on the news three years ago. I never heard who carried out the attack.

What possesses a man to blow himself up while murdering scores of innocents at the same time? What is the motivation? I suspect those are questions I’ll be wrestling with for a long time.

The attack was orchestrated by Islamic Jihad, which has been in the news a lot lately. The “Intelligence” folder has plenty on Islamic Jihad, and before lunch I learn that it is really just a name. The real player is Hezbollah, and the power behind that name is Iran.

The Iranians blew up our embassy in Beirut. Hezbollah—controlled, directed, and supported by Iranian intelligence—provided the foot soldiers for the attack.

How was this not an act of war?

I sit back and take a breath, then I press on. The witness statements are the worst. The grim, bloody retelling of broken bodies, the rubble, the misery—even the formal, objective language used in these documents can’t conceal the trauma of this attack. It was the worst one ever against a U.S. embassy. Nothing in our history compares to it. That much is clear to me just from the initial reading.

I delve further, flipping through well-worn pages, many of which were written by Gleason himself. One thing begins to stand out. The timing of the attack was peculiar. As it happened, the CIA’s entire Middle East contingent was hunkered down in a meeting room toward the front of the embassy. When the bomb exploded, the CIA’s Near East director, Robert Ames, and seven other CIA officers were killed.

Was the CIA meeting compromised? I open the “Unanswered Questions” file. There’s no evidence to show that Hezbollah knew of the meeting. Then again, with all the foreign nationals working in the embassy, it is quite possible that word of the meeting had been leaked. This question is a loose end, one of many stemming from the attack.

Coincidence or cunning? In the Dark World, our instructors told us, there are no coincidences. Nor will all the puzzle pieces ever fall into place. The best you can do is assemble what you have and try to divine the rest. This first file reinforces that training lesson.

Just before lunch, Gleason tells us the combination for the big blue door. “Don’t write it down. Just memorize it,” he says. Then he gives us the combinations to the safes under our desks. I hadn’t noticed mine until he mentioned it. They are for storing top-secret files we’re using. Every time we leave the office, the material on our desk needs to be locked up in these safes or returned to the dead bodies cabinets.

With those combination numbers rattling around in my head, I decide to take a short break. I head for the restroom out in the hallway on the other side of the big blue door. When I get there, Mullen is just coming out. As he slides through the doorway, he grimaces at me and mentions, “Gleason told me the Weather Underground blew this bathroom up back in ’75. Took out three entire offices.”

I’m working at ground zero of a terrorist attack. I hurry into the restroom as Mullen starts spinning the combo lock on the big blue door. I make a mental note not to spend too much time in this place—just in case.

Back in the office a few minutes later, I find Gleason eating and smoking at his desk. He manages to multitask in ways I’ve never seen before. He alternates stuffing a sandwich into his mouth between puffs on his smoke while writing notes on a cable. Periodically, he grabs a phone and barks at somebody in that foreign language of his.

I sit back down and begin reading again. Gleason asks, “Have you opened those two cases yet?”

“No, I’m still studying the files you gave me.”

“Beirut One or Two?”

“One.”

Gleason grunts and goes back to work.

There was a second attack in Beirut. I close the April 18, 1983, case folder and untie the other one Gleason had given me when I first came in. Sure enough, a year after the first bombing, Islamic Jihad scored another big victory against us. Already, Hezbollah and the Iranians had crippled our military effort in Beirut with another suicide bomb attack, this one aimed at the marine barracks near the airport. That was in October 1983. Two hundred and forty-one marines died in that attack. The destruction prompted the Reagan administration to pull our troops out of Lebanon. Hezbollah: 2, United States: 0.

A year later, Hezbollah hit the American embassy annex in northeast Beirut. This was where our diplomatic staff had been operating. Although the fixed-site security had been beefed up, another Hezbollah suicide bomber managed to breach the outer perimeter. This time the guards unloaded their weapons at the speeding vehicle, but the suicide bomber still managed to reach his target and detonate himself.

Twenty-four people, including two Americans, died. Hezbollah: 3, United States: 0.

Each of these cases is so complex that every file leads to more reading. I feel like I’m peeling an onion. Each layer reveals more layers, more information that I will have to know for my new life. I discover that Hezbollah’s tactics derived from the true pioneers of terror: Black September. Known as BSO, or Black September Organization, in the files, these fanatical Palestinians assassinated eleven members of the Israeli Olympic team in Munich back in 1972.

Gleason tells me, “To understand terrorism today, you must understand Black September.”

I put down the Beirut I and II files and delve deeper into the dead bodies cabinets. I find thick folders devoted just to Black September and its evil genius, the erudite, impeccably dressed mass murderer known as the Red Prince. The Red Prince was the archterrorist, the mastermind behind countless hijackings, bombings, and assassinations. He liked to keep things simple and used brute force whenever possible.

Gleason’s right. Hezbollah is only the latest iteration of terror. Same with all the other alphabet-soup terror groups. They are only evolutions on BSO’s heyday in the 1970s.

I start taking notes. I find some three-by-five index cards and return to the Beirut I file to start jotting down the basics of the attack. Suicide bomber. The van breached all the outer security and was able to get right next to the main embassy building. This was vital to the success of the attack. Had the outer security perimeter stopped the van, the damage would have been minimized.

I underline a lesson here. I have no idea what I’m doing, but it just appears to me to be common sense. Stand-off distance.

I grab another index card and write out the basic facts and lessons learned. Again, the outer security ring was obviously deficient. Was I even supposed to be noticing these thi