Hydrablog

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/washington/30blackwater.html
October 30, 2007
Immunity Deals Offered to Blackwater Guards
By DAVID JOHNSTON [bush white house] [state department] [private contractors] [efforts to bring them under the law] [blackwater and others] [followup] [****]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 29 — State Department investigators offered Blackwater USA security guards immunity during an inquiry into last month’s deadly shooting of 17 Iraqis in Baghdad — a potentially serious investigative misstep that could complicate efforts to prosecute the company’s employees involved in the episode, government officials said Monday.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/washington/30blackwater.html
October 30, 2007
Immunity Deals Offered to Blackwater Guards
By DAVID JOHNSTON [bush white house] [state department] [private contractors] [efforts to bring them under the law] [blackwater and others] [followup] [****]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 29 — State Department investigators offered Blackwater USA security guards immunity during an inquiry into last month’s deadly shooting of 17 Iraqis in Baghdad — a potentially serious investigative misstep that could complicate efforts to prosecute the company’s employees involved in the episode, government officials said Monday.
The State Department investigators from the agency’s investigative arm, the Bureau of Diplomatic Security, offered the immunity grants even though they did not have the authority to do so, [*****]the officials said. Prosecutors at the Justice Department, who do have such authority, had no advance knowledge of the arrangement, they added.
Most of the guards who took part in the Sept. 16 shooting were offered what officials described as limited-use immunity, which means that they were promised that they would not be prosecuted for anything they said in their interviews [******]with the authorities as long as their statements were true. The immunity offers were first reported Monday by The Associated Press.
The officials who spoke of the immunity deals have been briefed on the matter, but agreed to talk about the arrangement only on the condition of anonymity because they had not been authorized to discuss a continuing criminal investigation.
The precise legal status of the immunity offer is unclear. Those who have been offered immunity would seem likely to assert that their statements are legally protected, even as some government officials say that immunity was never officially sanctioned by the Justice Department.
Spokesmen for the State and Justice Departments would not comment on the matter. A State Department official said, “If there’s any truth to this story, then the decision was made without consultation with senior officials in Washington.” [******]
A spokeswoman for Blackwater, Anne E. Tyrrell, said, “It would be inappropriate for me to comment on the investigation.”
The immunity deals were an unwelcome surprise at the Justice Department, which was already grappling with the fundamental legal question of whether any prosecutions could take place involving American civilians in Iraq.
Blackwater employees and other civilian contractors cannot be tried in military courts, and it is unclear what American criminal laws might cover criminal acts committed in a war zone. Americans are immune from Iraqi law under a directive signed by the United States occupation authority in 2003 that has not been repealed by the Iraqi Parliament.
A State Department review panel sent to investigate the shootings concluded that there was no basis for holding non-Defense Department contractors accountable under United States law and urged Congress and the administration to address the problem.
The House overwhelmingly passed a bill this month that would make such contractors liable under a law known as the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act. [****] The Senate is considering a similar measure.
Some legal analysts have suggested that the Blackwater case could be prosecuted through the act, which allows the extension of federal law to civilians supporting military operations.
But trying a criminal case in federal court requires guarantees that no one has tampered with the evidence. Because a defendant has the right to cross-examine witnesses, foreign witnesses would have to be transported to the United States.
Several legal experts said evidence gathered by Iraqi investigators and turned over to the Americans, even within days, would probably be suspect.
Another law that may be applicable covers contractors in areas that could be defined as American territory, like a military base or the Green Zone. But the Blackwater security contractors in the Sept. 16 shootings were in neither place.
The government has transferred the investigation from the diplomatic service to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which has begun reinterviewing Blackwater employees without any grant of immunity in an effort to assemble independent evidence of possible wrongdoing.
Richard J. Griffin, the chief of the Bureau of Diplomatic Security, resigned last week, in a departure that appeared to be related to problems with his supervision of Blackwater contractors.
In addition, the Justice Department reassigned the investigation from prosecutors in the criminal division who had read the statements the State Department had taken under the offer of immunity to prosecutors in the national security division who had no knowledge of the statements.
Such a step is usually taken to preserve the government’s ability to argue later in court that any case it has brought was made independently and did not use information gathered under a promise that it would not be used in a criminal trial.
The episode began as a convoy carrying American diplomats and staffed by Blackwater guards approached Nisour Square in Baghdad at midday on a Sunday. A second Blackwater convoy, positioned on the crowded square in advance to control traffic, opened fire, killing 17 people and wounding 24. [**********]
Blackwater’s original statement on the shooting said the company’s guards had “acted lawfully and appropriately in response to a hostile attack,” and initial assertions by the State Department stated that the convoy had come under small-arms fire.
But subsequent accounts from witnesses and Iraqi investigators indicated that the convoy had not been attacked and that the Blackwater guards fired indiscriminately around the square. Americans soldiers investigating the scene afterward also found no evidence of an attack.
F.B.I. agents have been at the Blackwater compound in the Green Zone interviewing guards involved in the shooting.
Immunity is intended to protect the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination while still giving investigators the ability to gather evidence. Usually, people suspected of crimes are not given immunity and such grants are not made until after the probable are identified. Even then, prosecutors often face serious obstacles in bringing a prosecution in cases in which defendants have been immunized.
John M. Broder contributed reporting.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:23 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/washington/30torture.html
October 30, 2007
News Analysis
On Torture, 2 Messages and a High Political Cost
By SCOTT SHANE [bush white house] [first term] [nsc principals—statutory and ad hoc] [the over reaction to 9/11 and the repercussions therefrom] [potential pow abuse] [torture, black sites, gitmo, and so on] [followup] [America’s tarnished image] [how to calculate the costs?] [**************]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 29 — Six years after the Bush administration embraced harsh physical tactics for interrogating terrorism suspects, and two years after it reportedly dropped the most extreme of those techniques, the taint of torture clings to American counterterrorism efforts.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/washington/30torture.html
October 30, 2007
News Analysis
On Torture, 2 Messages and a High Political Cost
By SCOTT SHANE [bush white house] [first term] [nsc principals—statutory and ad hoc] [the over reaction to 9/11 and the repercussions therefrom] [potential pow abuse] [torture, black sites, gitmo, and so on] [followup] [America’s tarnished image] [how to calculate the costs?] [**************]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 29 — Six years after the Bush administration embraced harsh physical tactics for interrogating terrorism suspects, and two years after it reportedly dropped the most extreme of those techniques, the taint of torture clings to American counterterrorism efforts.
The administration has a standard answer to queries about its interrogation practices: 1) We do not torture, and 2) we will not say what we do, for fear of tipping off future prisoners. In effect, officials want Al Qaeda to believe that the United States does torture, while convincing the rest of the world that it does not. [********]
But that contradictory catechism is not holding up well under the battering that American interrogation policies have received from human rights organizations, European allies and increasingly skeptical members of Congress. [******]
The administration does not acknowledge scaling back the Central Intelligence Agency’s secret detention program, perhaps to avoid implying that earlier methods were immoral or illegal. President Bush has repeatedly defended what the administration calls “enhanced” interrogation methods, [*****]saying they have produced invaluable information on Al Qaeda. But the administration’s strategy has exacted an extraordinary political cost.
The nomination of Michael B. Mukasey as attorney general, once expected to sail through the Senate, has run into trouble as a result of his equivocation about waterboarding, or simulated drowning. Mr. Mukasey has refused to characterize the technique as torture, which would put him at odds with secret Justice Department legal opinions and could put intelligence officers in legal jeopardy.
At a House hearing last week, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice admitted that the United States had mishandled the case of Maher Arar, a Canadian engineer who was seized in New York in 2002 on suspicion of terrorism and shipped to Syria, [*****]where he was imprisoned and severely beaten.
But Ms. Rice refused to acknowledge the torture or to apologize to Mr. Arar, perhaps to avoid exposing to attack the policy of extraordinary rendition, in which the United States delivers suspects to other countries, including some that routinely use torture.
C.I.A. officers have been criminally charged in Italy and Germany in connection with rendition cases. The torture issue has complicated Americans’ standing in criticizing other countries.
At a House hearing on the crackdown on dissent in Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, where protest leaders have reportedly endured waterboarding, Jeremy Woodrum, a director of the United States Campaign for Burma, said American conduct was thrown back at him, testifying: “People say, ‘Why are you guys talking to us about this when you have the mess in your own backyard?’ ” [******]
Even inside the government, there are tensions. At the C.I.A., the director, Gen. Michael V. Hayden, has come under fire from Congress for ordering a review of the agency’s own inspector general, [*******] whose aggressive investigations of secret detention programs have raised hackles.
The moral debate over torture has seeped deeply into popular culture, from the black comedy of “The Daily Show” and its “senior interrogation correspondent” to the new movie “Rendition,” based loosely on Mr. Arar’s case. Candidates for president have repeatedly faced questions and exchanged barbs on the proper limits of interrogation.
Meanwhile, key members of Congress are raising questions about the future of the C.I.A.’s detention operation. Senator John D. Rockefeller IV, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in response to a question from The New York Times that it “has produced valuable intelligence, but the question is at what cost?”
Mr. Rockefeller, Democrat of West Virginia, whose committee has recently heard classified testimony about the noncoercive interrogation methods of the F.B.I. and the military, said he was not sure the C.I.A’s harsher approach was justified. [******]
“Unfortunately, the intelligence community has not yet made a convincing argument that a separate, secret program is indeed necessary,” he said. “The committee is engaged in answering these fundamental questions and fully intends to take action on the future of this program.” [******]
Even as the administration has maintained in secret Justice Department legal opinions that its harshest methods are legal, it has quietly but steadily backed away from them in practice.
Since last year, military interrogators have been bound by the new Army Field Manual, which prohibits all physical coercion.
The C.I.A. stopped using waterboarding by the end of 2005, [*****]former agency officials have said. Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence, said in July that prisoners were also now “not exposed to heat and cold,” [****]another technique previously used at the C.I.A.’s secret jails.
But administration officials seem loath to let potential prisoners know they have softened their interrogations. In his July remarks, Mr. McConnell suggested that Qaeda operatives had talked in part “because they believe these techniques might involve torture.” At the same time, “the United States does not engage in torture,” he said. “The president has been very clear about that.” [*******] [conundrum: what is the cost of signaling to jihadis that the U.S. employs torture if it doesn’t?] [***********]
In a PBS interview with Charlie Rose last week, General Hayden, the C.I.A. director, complained about negative press coverage of the agency’s interrogation practices. “What puzzles me is to why there seems to be this temptation, almost irresistible temptation, to take any story about us and move it into the darkest corner of the room,” General Hayden said.
Yet, illustrating the administration’s predicament, General Hayden did nothing to dispel the mystery about the agency’s “enhanced” interrogation tactics.
“What is ‘enhanced technique’?” Mr. Rose asked. “Is it something close to torture?”
The C.I.A. director said, “No,” adding, “I’m not going to talk about any specific techniques.”
Whether Congress will act remains uncertain. Congressional Democrats have cited interrogation policies in blocking the confirmations of John A. Rizzo as general counsel of the C.I.A. and Steven G. Bradbury, author of secret legal opinions on interrogation, as head of the Office of Legal Counsel at the Justice Department. Now Mr. Mukasey’s confirmation hangs in the balance.
Both the Senate and House Intelligence Committees have held closed hearings on the program. The only public glimpse — unclassified testimony recently released from a Sept. 25 Senate hearing — was a series of fierce attacks by human rights advocates, legal experts and a veteran interrogator on the effectiveness and morality of harsh interrogation.
Most Republicans, for now, are offering the administration conditional support. Senator Christopher S. Bond of Missouri, the vice chairman of the Intelligence Committee, said that he was concerned about the international reputation of the United States and that Congress “should continue to look at what other methods are effective.” [****]
But Mr. Bond said conversations with C.I.A. interrogators had convinced him that some legal but tough tactics could work on recalcitrant suspects. “Coercion has opened the dialogue,” he said.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:22 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/29/AR2007102902062.html
2007 Spying Said to Cost $50 Billion
Some Formerly Classified Figures Are to Be Disclosed Today
By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 30, 2007; A04 [bush administration] [post-IRTPA intelligence community] [something we should all hope is working] [intelligence is crucial for state and non-state actors] [if US ever to act pre-emptively, intelligence a must] [as I recall FY 2005 OR FY 2006 intelligence appropriation was FY 2005 OR FY 2006 intelligence appropriation was $44 billion] [in testimony and intelligence person accidentially spilled the beans] [now we see it’s increasing] [if using the money properly, this should be a non-issued] [but it also puts pressure on DNI and ODNI to use it properly—which it probably good] [$$$$$$$$$][***********]
The director of national intelligence will disclose today that national intelligence activities amounting to roughly 80 percent of all U.S. intelligence spending for the year cost more than $40 billion, [I think all but TIARA] [NIP, so on] [*****] according to sources on Capitol Hill and inside the administration.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/29/AR2007102902062.html
2007 Spying Said to Cost $50 Billion
Some Formerly Classified Figures Are to Be Disclosed Today
By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 30, 2007; A04 [bush administration] [post-IRTPA intelligence community] [something we should all hope is working] [intelligence is crucial for state and non-state actors] [if US ever to act pre-emptively, intelligence a must] [as I recall FY 2005 OR FY 2006 intelligence appropriation was FY 2005 OR FY 2006 intelligence appropriation was $44 billion] [in testimony and intelligence person accidentially spilled the beans] [now we see it’s increasing] [if using the money properly, this should be a non-issued] [but it also puts pressure on DNI and ODNI to use it properly—which it probably good] [$$$$$$$$$][***********]
The director of national intelligence will disclose today that national intelligence activities amounting to roughly 80 percent of all U.S. intelligence spending for the year cost more than $40 billion, [I think all but TIARA] [NIP, so on] [*****] according to sources on Capitol Hill and inside the administration.
The disclosure means that when military spending is added, aggregate U.S. intelligence spending for fiscal 2007 exceeded $50 billion, [******]according to these sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity [******] because the total remains classified.
Adm. Mike McConnell will announce that the fiscal 2007 national intelligence program figure, classified up to now, is being made public at the urging of the Sept. 11 commission and the insistence of Congress, which turned the commission's recommendation into law. The commission's plan was to have the president make the figure public each year.
While the budget figure released by McConnell excludes intelligence programs for the separate military services, it includes the budgets of the CIA, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the FBI's intelligence programs, the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research and the major Defense Department intelligence collection agencies.
The latter group includes the National Security Agency, which intercepts electronic communications; the National Reconnaissance Office, which builds and manages intelligence satellites; and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, which does image collection. They compose a major part of the $40 billion-plus national intelligence budget.
In October 1997, then-CIA Director George J. Tenet disclosed that $26.6 billion was the aggregate amount appropriated for intelligence and intelligence-related activities for fiscal year 1997. [*******] He said he saw no harm to national security in such a disclosure.
Tenet also released an aggregate amount for fiscal 1998. It was $26.7 billion, [****] or an increase of $100 million. Since that time, the overall intelligence budget has remained classified, despite several legal challenges to make the figure public.
At a public meeting in 2005, Mary Margaret Graham, the deputy director of national intelligence for collection, said the annual intelligence budget was $44 billion, [*****] including the budget for the military services. The figure was never officially confirmed.
At that time, Steven Aftergood, director of the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists, who had unsuccessfully sued to get the figure published, told reporters the Graham slip was "ironic," adding: "We sued the CIA four times for this kind of information and lost. You can't get it through legal channels."
In July, Aftergood told the House intelligence committee: "There is no single declassification action that would signal the end to obsolete classification practices as clearly and powerfully as declassification of the total annual intelligence budget."
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:22 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/middleeast/30briefs-yemen.html
October 30, 2007
World Briefing | Middle East
Yemen: U.S. Reconsiders Some Aid
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [bush white house] [nsc principals and beyond] [probably mostly state department] [responding to Yemen’s recent announcement that Badawi was freed] [he masterminded the U.S.S. Cole attack] [********]
The United States is reconsidering some aid to its Mideast ally Yemen after the reported release of Jamal Ahmed al-Badawi, a convicted leader of the bombing of the destroyer Cole in 2000 that killed 17 American sailors. The Millennium Challenge Corporation, the agency that distributes foreign aid based on track records for good government, canceled a ceremony tomorrow to inaugurate a $20.6 million grant to Yemen. [*****]The agency is “reviewing its relationship with Yemen,” an official said. Yemen’s embassy in Washington released a statement “clarifying” that Mr. Badawi was in custody. It did not address a Yemeni government official’s assertion last week that he had been released. Statements in Yemen on Sunday also said he was in government hands. None of the statements spelled out where or under what circumstances Mr. Badawi was being held, and American officials suggested he might just be under house arrest or other loose government control.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/middleeast/30briefs-yemen.html
October 30, 2007
World Briefing | Middle East
Yemen: U.S. Reconsiders Some Aid
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [bush white house] [nsc principals and beyond] [probably mostly state department] [responding to Yemen’s recent announcement that Badawi was freed] [he masterminded the U.S.S. Cole attack] [********]
The United States is reconsidering some aid to its Mideast ally Yemen after the reported release of Jamal Ahmed al-Badawi, a convicted leader of the bombing of the destroyer Cole in 2000 that killed 17 American sailors. The Millennium Challenge Corporation, the agency that distributes foreign aid based on track records for good government, canceled a ceremony tomorrow to inaugurate a $20.6 million grant to Yemen. [*****]The agency is “reviewing its relationship with Yemen,” an official said. Yemen’s embassy in Washington released a statement “clarifying” that Mr. Badawi was in custody. It did not address a Yemeni government official’s assertion last week that he had been released. Statements in Yemen on Sunday also said he was in government hands. None of the statements spelled out where or under what circumstances Mr. Badawi was being held, and American officials suggested he might just be under house arrest or other loose government control.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:21 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/washington/29blackwill.html
October 29, 2007
Backing an Iraqi Leader Again, This Time for a Fee
By ELISABETH BUMILLER [bush administration] [fomer NSC staffer, Robert Blackwill] [left after first W. term] [now in the business of making money lobbying for foreign govt] [he’s apparently complied with the law that makes said business unlawful for two years after employment] [another example of washington’s revolving door—and it happens in every administration] [******]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 28 — In the spring of 2004, Robert D. Blackwill, then the influential Iraq director on the National Security Council, pushed hard to make Ayad Allawi, a tough, secular Shiite with close ties to the Central Intelligence Agency, the interim prime minister of Iraq.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/washington/29blackwill.html
October 29, 2007
Backing an Iraqi Leader Again, This Time for a Fee
By ELISABETH BUMILLER [bush administration] [fomer NSC staffer, Robert Blackwill] [left after first W. term] [now in the business of making money lobbying for foreign govt] [he’s apparently complied with the law that makes said business unlawful for two years after employment] [another example of washington’s revolving door—and it happens in every administration] [******]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 28 — In the spring of 2004, Robert D. Blackwill, then the influential Iraq director on the National Security Council, pushed hard to make Ayad Allawi, a tough, secular Shiite with close ties to the Central Intelligence Agency, the interim prime minister of Iraq.
Mr. Blackwill’s efforts worked. For the next 10 months, until Mr. Allawi’s party lost in the Iraqi elections, he was the first prime minister of the newly sovereign nation — America’s man in Baghdad.
Now, a little more than three years later, Mr. Blackwill is back in the same business: pushing hard to make Mr. Allawi prime minister of Iraq again. But this time, Mr. Blackwill’s powerful lobbying firm, Barbour Griffith & Rogers, is receiving $300,000 from Mr. Allawi for his work.
In the nearly three years since he left the White House, Mr. Blackwill has built a thriving business lobbying for the foreign governments, officials and companies he knew as President Bush’s deputy national security adviser, as the United States ambassador to India and as a veteran of decades in government.
Among his clients are India, Serbia, Taiwan, the Kurdistan Regional Government, the Alfa Bank in Moscow and Thaksin Shinawatra, a former prime minister of Thailand and a billionaire communications tycoon who was ousted in a coup in 2006.
Since late 2005, lobbying disclosure reports at the Justice Department show that Mr. Blackwill helped bring in fees to Barbour Griffith & Rogers from foreign clients that total more than $11 million.
Mr. Blackwill’s story is hardly an unusual one in Washington, where foreign lobbying has been good business since at least the early 20th century. Edward von Kloberg III, once known in the capital as the lobbyist to dictators, represented Saddam Hussein, Nicolae Ceaucescu of Romania and Mobuto Sese Seko of the former Zaire. “Shame is for sissies,” Mr. von Kloberg liked to say.
More recently, Turkey has spent millions of dollars on public relations and prominent lobbyists, among them Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri, a former House majority leader and a Democrat, and former Representative Robert L. Livingston of Louisiana, a Republican.
But Mr. Blackwill stands out in a crowded field for his success and for his representation of countries and officials central to President Bush’s foreign policy.
“We have had a long-term relationship with the firm,” Qubad Talabani, the Washington representative of the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq, said in an e-mail message. The Regional Government, which has paid Barbour Griffith & Rogers $1.4 million since Mr. Blackwill joined the firm’s Kurdistan lobbying team in late 2005, is pushing for support in Washington of its oil contracts with foreign companies.
India, which has paid Barbour Griffith & Rogers $1.24 million since Mr. Blackwill began lobbying for it in late 2005, has hired him, among others, to push for a nuclear deal between the United States and India that has run into resistance in Congress and in the Indian Parliament.
On April 2, Justice Department filings show, Mr. Blackwill met on the issue of United States-India relations with R. Nicholas Burns, the under secretary of state for political affairs and the administration’s point man on the nuclear deal.
Mr. Blackwill’s firm has also had lobbying contracts, now expired, with the secular National Dialogue Party of Lebanon; the Confederation of Indian Industry; Dubai International Capital, the private equity firm of Dubai’s ruler, Sheik Muhammad bin Rashid al-Maktoum; and Eritrea, the nation in the Horn of Africa that the State Department has been threatening to designate a terrorist state for its support of Islamist rebels in Somalia.
Mr. Blackwill, who grew up on the Kansas plains and worked in the mid-1970s for Helmut Sonnenfeldt, the counselor to Henry Kissinger, then secretary of state, is known within the Bush administration for his intellect and irascibility. In India, his tough management style prompted complaints from embassy staff members and a review by the State Department’s inspector general.
In 2004, he was reprimanded by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, then the national security adviser, after he was accused of abusive behavior toward a State Department secretary when he discovered he did not have a seat on a flight. As the State Department described the incident, he angrily grabbed the arm of the secretary and demanded that she get him a seat. But Mr. Blackwill, who taught for 14 years at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard and has a wily, Kissinger-like ability to cut through layers of government, is also a gifted raconteur who mixes policy, politics and personality in his analysis of issues. [******]
Although Mr. Blackwill now works out of Barbour Griffith & Rogers’s luxurious Pennsylvania Avenue offices that look out toward the White House, his lobbying visits to former administration colleagues, when he often comes laden with information, are not so different from the conversations he had with them while he was in government, they say.
“We have a relationship,” said an administration official who has met with Mr. Blackwill since he joined Barbour Griffith & Rogers. “He’s a smart guy and he comes in and we just talk about foreign policy, and he gives you good advice.”
Justice Department filings show that on April 20, a lobbyist or lobbyists from Barbour Griffith & Rogers met to discuss Iraqi Kurdistan with Meghan O’Sullivan, who worked for Mr. Blackwill on the National Security Council staff and who assumed his position as Iraq director after Mr. Blackwill left the government.
Gordon D. Johndroe, a spokesman for the National Security Council staff, declined to say who had met with Ms. Sullivan. Ms. Sullivan, who has since left the government and is a fellow at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, declined to comment. Mr. Blackwill, who holds the title of president of Barbour Griffith & Rogers International, also declined to comment or to be interviewed for this article [*****].
Mr. Blackwill might have continued to lobby in relative peace for his foreign clients had it not been for Mr. Allawi, who retained Mr. Blackwill’s services on Aug. 20 and then said six days later on CNN that Barbour Griffith & Rogers had been hired “to help us advocate our views, the views of the nationalistic Iraqis, the nonsectarian Iraqis.”
Mr. Allawi also said that his $300,000 bill for six months of work by the firm was to be paid by a supporter whom he declined to name.
Mr. Allawi’s contract with Barbour Griffith & Rogers was first disclosed on IraqSlogger, a Web site devoted to Iraq news, but got more widespread attention after Mr. Allawi made his comments on television. The contract, filed with the Justice Department, states that “B.G.R. will provide strategic counsel and representation for and on behalf of Dr. Ayad Allawi before the U.S. government, Congress, media and others.”
The contract also states that Mr. Blackwill would lead the firm’s “core team of professionals” in representing Mr. Allawi.
Mr. Allawi, in an interview with Newsweek on Aug. 29, described Mr. Blackwill as a “dear friend” and said Mr. Blackwill was the one who had suggested to him over a recent lunch that Mr. Allawi hire the firm to represent his views in Washington.
Since then, Mr. Allawi has been publicly silent on the issue. “The B.G.R. story is not a good story for us,” Hadi Allawi, Mr. Allawi’s nephew and spokesman, said in a brief telephone conversation from London.
Mr. Allawi, who was severely wounded in 1978 when an agent of Saddam Hussein attacked him in his London bed with an ax, was also supported in 2003 for prime minister by L. Paul Bremer III, the former top American civilian administrator in Iraq.
Mr. Bremer, who had been an assistant to Mr. Kissinger at the State Department and had known Mr. Blackwill for more than 30 years, recommended Mr. Allawi to President Bush as his choice, and Mr. Blackwill’s choice, to be interim prime minister.
White House officials insist that Mr. Blackwill’s support of Mr. Allawi does not represent administration policy. “Robert Blackwill represents whatever clients are paying him,” said Mr. Johndroe, the National Security Council spokesman.
Although administration officials spent much of the summer criticizing the current Iraqi prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki — in August President Bush publicly acknowledged “a certain level of frustration” with the Iraqi government’s failure to unify its warring ethnic factions — the criticism has ceased. Administration officials say they see no viable alternative at this point to Mr. Maliki.
But that has not stopped Mr. Allawi, and Barbour Griffith & Rogers, from pressing his case. Shortly after the contract was signed, the lobbying firm blanketed Washington’s Congressional staff members and policy makers with e-mail messages on behalf of Mr. Allawi, describing Mr. Maliki’s government as a failure.
Michael O’Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said he was one of those who had received Mr. Allawi’s e-mail messages, most recently on Thursday.
“They’re not very subtle,” Mr. O’Hanlon said.
Kitty Bennett contributed reporting from Washington.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:20 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/29/AR2007102901473.html
Bush's Legacy of Cynicism
By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, October 30, 2007; A15 [oped] [columnist] [bush’s legacy] [*****]
When George W. Bush surveys his presidency, he will see two wars commenced and none concluded, Osama bin Laden still on the loose, American prestige at record lows throughout the world, a military both broken and abused, and a country that in large part thinks its government is a liar. Guinness World Records will need a chapter for Bush alone.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/29/AR2007102901473.html
Bush's Legacy of Cynicism
By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, October 30, 2007; A15 [oped] [columnist] [bush’s legacy] [*****]
When George W. Bush surveys his presidency, he will see two wars commenced and none concluded, Osama bin Laden still on the loose, American prestige at record lows throughout the world, a military both broken and abused, and a country that in large part thinks its government is a liar. Guinness World Records will need a chapter for Bush alone.
It is, though, that bit about lack of trust in government that may be the most important and intractable. [*****]The others are correctable. For Iraq, there is a solution -- or at least an ending. For the military, there is the cure of more money and the fading of memories. For bin Laden, there is mortality itself. As for Afghanistan, who knows what will happen, since that country is where Western expectations go to die.
But this business about the people's trust in its government is destructive stuff. We see it played out now with the Senate resolution labeling the al-Quds Force of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization. The resolution itself is a pretty straightforward affair, stating a compelling case that the al-Quds Force has interfered in Iraq and caused the deaths of Americans. Whatever you may feel about the war in Iraq, no one gets to kill Americans with impunity. [******]
As the resolution states, the American military has "evidence" -- the word is Gen. David Petraeus's -- of Iranian activity. "This is not intelligence," the general told Congress. "This is evidence, off computers that we captured, documents and so forth." Petraeus didn't get his stars for nothing. He knows the level of well-earned cynicism that the word "intelligence" now engenders in Congress. Evidence! He's talking evidence.
No matter. To a whole lot of people, Petraeus might as well have been talking dream interpretation. These people, most of them on the Democratic left, not only do not believe the evidence, they see the resolution as the old Bush administration rope-a-dope: the first step on the road to war with Iran. But Bush and Vice President Cheney don't need any resolution to make war -- "Resolution, resolution, I don't have to show you any stinkin' resolution," [lack trust] [*****] I imagine Cheney saying after seeing "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre" -- and what the Senate affirmed the world has known for some time: The Revolutionary Guard is itself a terrorist outfit.
Even back in the Clinton administration, officials had no doubt that the Revolutionary Guard funded and supplied Hezbollah. They knew when the money went in and when bonuses were awarded after a successful terrorist operation. What's more, Argentine prosecutors -- not anyone in the Bush administration -- hold Iran responsible for the 1994 bombing of a Jewish center in Buenos Aires that killed 85 people. Whether the Revolutionary Guard in particular was behind it, I do not know. But Iranian operations of this sort are in its portfolio.
More than a senseless war with Iran -- certainly premature at the moment -- I fear the sort of malaise that came over America after the Vietnam War or, more to the point, the defeatism-turned-cynicism that crippled Britain and France following World War I. Both nations had been mauled and were exhausted. Britain's intellectual elite celebrated their pacifism; they would fight for neither king nor country. France had effectively been defeated in World War I. It was a nation of amputees and widows.
The situation today is hardly as dramatic or desperate. Yet years of Bush exaggerations, of Cheney lies, of dots that somehow failed to connect and intelligence that was false or misleading, of wars that go nowhere, of overblown and juvenile rhetoric -- "Bring 'em on" -- have made cynics of us all. [******]That is the new realism.
But the true realism is that Iran is a menace -- potentially a great one -- and that its Revolutionary Guard is engaged in the dirty business of killing Americans and others. The fact that the Bush administration says so does not make it otherwise. [too true] [*****]
The Senate's resolution was a necessary step toward tightening sanctions on Iran -- a way to avoid war, not the overture to one. It was intended to send a message of resolve, but the message that went out showed instead that a good piece of America thinks that Bush is its prime enemy -- and Iran just another bee in his bonnet. This is the lamentable legacy of George W. Bush -- an abuse of trust that has weakened the country he swore to protect.
cohenr@washpost.com
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:19 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/29/AR2007102901849.html
The Waterboarding Dodge
Who's really to blame for Mr. Mukasey's evasions on torture?
Tuesday, October 30, 2007; A14 [editorial] [potential pow abuse and nominee judge Mukasey] [******]
IT'S A SAD day in America when the nominee for attorney general cannot flatly declare that waterboarding is unconstitutional. The interrogation technique simulates drowning and can cause excruciating mental and physical pain; it has been prosecuted in U.S. courts since the late 1800s and was regarded by every U.S. administration before this one as torture. Yet, when asked during his confirmation hearing whether waterboarding is unconstitutional, the best that former judge Michael B. Mukasey could muster was "if waterboarding is torture, torture is not constitutional." [********]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/29/AR2007102901849.html
The Waterboarding Dodge
Who's really to blame for Mr. Mukasey's evasions on torture?
Tuesday, October 30, 2007; A14 [editorial] [potential pow abuse and nominee judge Mukasey] [******]
IT'S A SAD day in America when the nominee for attorney general cannot flatly declare that waterboarding is unconstitutional. The interrogation technique simulates drowning and can cause excruciating mental and physical pain; it has been prosecuted in U.S. courts since the late 1800s and was regarded by every U.S. administration before this one as torture. Yet, when asked during his confirmation hearing whether waterboarding is unconstitutional, the best that former judge Michael B. Mukasey could muster was "if waterboarding is torture, torture is not constitutional." [********]
The fault for this evasion lies as much, if not more, with President Bush and Congress as it does with Mr. Mukasey. Mr. Bush authorized waterboarding in the past, most notably against al-Qaeda leader Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. If Mr. Mukasey now condemns the interrogation method as unconstitutional, he would probably be in conflict with Justice Department memoranda that implicitly endorse such techniques and that have been used by CIA interrogators and others to cloak their actions in legal legitimacy. The president could also be legally implicated for approving the method. [********]
Democratic senators are demanding that Mr. Mukasey declare waterboarding illegal before they will vote to confirm him. But Congress has failed to pass laws that explicitly ban waterboarding and other acts that constitute either torture or cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment, a lesser category of abuse also banned by international treaty. Instead, legislators have repeatedly agreed to definitions of inhumane treatment that have allowed the abuse of foreign detainees to continue.
If Democratic senators are serious about eliminating the use of waterboarding and other abusive interrogation techniques, they should seek to mandate that all questioning of foreign detainees be governed by the Army's interrogation field manual, which was recently updated. Top military officials, who have repeatedly argued that torture yields unreliable information and could expose U.S. soldiers to mistreatment, say the techniques contained in the field manual provide all the tools needed to obtain intelligence even from difficult subjects.
Mr. Mukasey may have a way out of his predicament. He could respond to the Senate's questions by saying that waterboarding should be judged as unacceptable under statutes passed by Congress since 2005, despite the loopholes those laws contain. [****] Though the administration has sought to preserve its prerogative to use waterboarding, the technique reportedly has not been employed since then. He also could renew his promise to review all Justice Department memos regarding detainee treatment and correct or eliminate those that don't comport with the law. Then the animus swirling around Capitol Hill and throughout the blogosphere toward the attorney general nominee could be redirected more properly: at an administration that condoned torture and a Congress that did too little to stop it.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:18 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/opinion/29terkel.html
October 29, 2007
Op-Ed Contributor
The Wiretap This Time
By STUDS TERKEL
Chicago [oped] [terkel on nsa warrant-less spying] [other TSPs] [********]
EARLIER this month, the Senate Intelligence Committee and the White House agreed to allow the executive branch to conduct dragnet interceptions of the electronic communications of people in the United States. They also agreed to “immunize” American telephone companies from lawsuits charging that after 9/11 some companies collaborated with the government to violate the Constitution and existing federal law. I am a plaintiff in one of those lawsuits, and I hope Congress thinks carefully before denying me, and millions of other Americans, our day in court.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/opinion/29terkel.html
October 29, 2007
Op-Ed Contributor
The Wiretap This Time
By STUDS TERKEL
Chicago [oped] [terkel on nsa warrant-less spying] [other TSPs] [********]
EARLIER this month, the Senate Intelligence Committee and the White House agreed to allow the executive branch to conduct dragnet interceptions of the electronic communications of people in the United States. They also agreed to “immunize” American telephone companies from lawsuits charging that after 9/11 some companies collaborated with the government to violate the Constitution and existing federal law. I am a plaintiff in one of those lawsuits, and I hope Congress thinks carefully before denying me, and millions of other Americans, our day in court.
During my lifetime, there has been a sea change in the way that politically active Americans view their relationship with government. In 1920, during my youth, I recall the Palmer raids in which more than 10,000 people were rounded up, most because they were members of particular labor unions or belonged to groups that advocated change in American domestic or foreign policy. Unrestrained surveillance was used to further the investigations leading to these detentions, and the Bureau of Investigation — the forerunner to the F.B.I. — eventually created a database on the activities of individuals. This activity continued through the Red Scare of the period.
In the 1950s, during the sad period known as the McCarthy era, one’s political beliefs again served as a rationale for government monitoring. Individual corporations and entire industries were coerced by government leaders into informing on individuals and barring their ability to earn a living.
I was among those blacklisted for my political beliefs. My crime? I had signed petitions. Lots of them. I had signed on in opposition to Jim Crow laws and poll taxes and in favor of rent control and pacifism. Because the petitions were thought to be Communist-inspired, I lost my ability to work in television and radio after refusing to say that I had been “duped” into signing my name to these causes.
By the 1960s, the inequities in civil rights and the debate over the Vietnam war spurred social justice movements. The government’s response? More surveillance. In the name of national security, the F.B.I. conducted warrantless wiretaps of political activists, journalists, former White House staff members and even a member of Congress. [******]
Then things changed. In 1975, the hearings led by Senator Frank Church of Idaho revealed the scope of government surveillance of private citizens and lawful organizations. As Americans saw the damage, they reached a consensus that this unrestrained surveillance had a corrosive impact on us all.
In 1978, with broad public support, Congress passed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which placed national security investigations, including wiretapping, under a system of warrants approved by a special court. [FISA was popular for a reason] [most wanted legitimate spying on America’s national-security threats abroad] [***] The law was not perfect, but as a result of its enactment and a series of subsequent federal laws, a generation of Americans has come to adulthood protected by a legal structure and a social compact making clear that government will not engage in unbridled, dragnet seizure of electronic communications.
The Bush administration, however, tore apart that carefully devised legal structure and social compact. To make matters worse, after its intrusive programs were exposed, the White House and the Senate Intelligence Committee proposed a bill that legitimized blanket wiretapping without individual warrants. The legislation directly conflicts with the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution, requiring the government to obtain a warrant before reading the e-mail messages or listening to the telephone calls of its citizens, and to state with particularity where it intends to search and what it expects to find. [******]
Compounding these wrongs, Congress is moving in a haphazard fashion to provide a “get out of jail free card” to the telephone companies that violated the rights of their subscribers. Some in Congress argue that this law-breaking is forgivable because it was done to help the government in a time of crisis. But it’s impossible for Congress to know the motivations of these companies or to know how the government will use the private information it received from them.
And it is not as though the telecommunications companies did not know that their actions were illegal. Judge Vaughn Walker of federal district court in San Francisco, appointed by President George H. W. Bush, noted that in an opinion in one of the immunity provision lawsuits the “very action in question has previously been held unlawful.”
I have observed and written about American life for some time. In truth, nothing much surprises me anymore. But I always feel uplifted by this: Given the facts and an opportunity to act, the body politic generally does the right thing. By revealing the truth in a public forum, the American people will have the facts to play their historic, heroic role in putting our nation back on the path toward freedom. That is why we deserve our day in court.
Studs Terkel is the author of the forthcoming “Touch and Go: A Memoir.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:17 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/opinion/29mon1.html
October 29, 2007
Editorial
Trash Talking World War III
[editorial] [bush’s recent comments] [rhetoric on WWIII] [Iran the cause] [*****]
America’s allies and increasingly the American public are playing a ghoulish guessing game: Will President Bush manage to leave office without starting a war with Iran? Mr. Bush is eagerly feeding those anxieties. [*****]This month he raised the threat of “World War III” if Iran even figures out how to make a nuclear weapon.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/opinion/29mon1.html
October 29, 2007
Editorial
Trash Talking World War III
[editorial] [bush’s recent comments] [rhetoric on WWIII] [Iran the cause] [*****]
America’s allies and increasingly the American public are playing a ghoulish guessing game: Will President Bush manage to leave office without starting a war with Iran? Mr. Bush is eagerly feeding those anxieties. [*****]This month he raised the threat of “World War III” if Iran even figures out how to make a nuclear weapon.
With a different White House, we might dismiss this as posturing — or bank on sanity to carry the day, or the warnings of exhausted generals or a defense secretary more rational than his predecessor. Not this crowd.
Four years after his pointless invasion of Iraq, President Bush still confuses bullying with grand strategy. He refuses to do the hard work of diplomacy — or even acknowledge the disastrous costs of his actions. [****]The Republican presidential candidates have apparently decided that the real commander in chief test is to see who can out-trash talk the White House on Iran.
The world should not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon, but there is no easy fix here, no daring surgical strike. [***]Consider Natanz, the underground site where Iran is defying the Security Council by spinning a few thousand centrifuges to produce nuclear fuel. American bombers could take it out, but what about the even more sophisticated centrifuges the administration accuses Iran of hiding? Beyond the disastrous diplomatic and economic costs, a bombing campaign is unlikely to set back Iran’s efforts for more than a few years. [******] [moreover, it may play right into the hands of hardline ayatollah faction in Iran and served to make the reformers rally behind ayatollah hardliners] [*********]
The neocons pushing an attack on Iran admit that a prolonged bombing campaign would be necessary and would likely only delay Iran’s program. But it is still worth it, they say, [*****] and if everybody gets lucky maybe the attacks will unleash that popular uprising against the mullahs they’ve been promising for years. [all evidence to the contrary] [and one would think that –iraq may have changed their minds on specious causalities] [***]
That is the same kind of rose-petal thinking that was used to sell Americans a fantasy about the invasion of Iraq. Large numbers of Iranians are fed up with their government’s corruption and repression and with being branded a pariah state. Rain down American bombs, however, and the mullahs and Iran’s Holocaust-denying president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, are more likely to be turned into national heroes than hung from lampposts. And that’s not even calculating the international fury or the additional mayhem Tehran could wreak in Iraq or what would happen to world oil prices.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is the other great hope (after Defense Secretary Robert Gates) for holding off a war. She still wants to give sanctions and diplomacy a chance. But, as with everything else she does, there’s nowhere near enough follow-through. If the stakes are really that high — and they are — then Ms. Rice and her boss must tell Moscow, Beijing and the Europeans that relations will be judged on whether they are willing to place a lot more pressure on Iran.
They also need to offer Iran a credible way back in from the cold — and clear rewards and security guarantees if it is willing to give up its nuclear ambitions. If it’s really that important — and we believe it is — then it’s time to send somebody higher ranking than the American ambassador in Baghdad to deliver the message.
For this to have any chance, Mr. Bush will have to tone down the rhetoric. Sure, a lot of these countries are letting greed cloud their judgment, when they balk at restricting trade with Iran. But it’s a lot easier to justify when they say they’re not giving the crazy American government an excuse for another war.
Maybe the country will get lucky and Mr. Bush will listen to the exhausted generals. [****]But this isn’t just about surviving the rest of his presidency. Fifteen more months of diplomatic drift will bring Iran 15 months closer to figuring out how to make a nuclear weapon.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:16 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/middleeast/30briefs-nuclear.html
October 30, 2007
World Briefing | Middle East
Egypt: Mubarak Revives Nuclear Program
By MICHAEL SLACKMAN [Egypt] [middle east; northern-horn Africa] [Egypt’s important role in region] [evidence of Egypt’s concern with Iran and other things] [worrisome: precisely why many of us thought it was not in Iran’s interest to appear to moving toward nukes] [followup] [who will be next?] [**********]
President Hosni Mubarak announced plans to build several nuclear reactors, another sign that Arab states are intent on following Iran’s lead in developing nuclear sites in the Middle East. [*****] Like Iran, Egypt says its program will have peaceful uses only. [which nobody believes] [and even Mubarak knows everybody knows is a lark] [*****] The United States said it would support Egypt’s effort. Egypt mothballed its nuclear program two decades ago, but last year the president’s son, Gamal Mubarak, called for the program to be restarted. The younger Mubarak is a leader within his father’s National Democratic Party, which has a monopoly on state power. President Mubarak, above, gave his speech before the party’s annual gathering, which begins Friday.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/middleeast/30briefs-nuclear.html
October 30, 2007
World Briefing | Middle East
Egypt: Mubarak Revives Nuclear Program
By MICHAEL SLACKMAN [Egypt] [middle east; northern-horn Africa] [Egypt’s important role in region] [evidence of Egypt’s concern with Iran and other things] [worrisome: precisely why many of us thought it was not in Iran’s interest to appear to moving toward nukes] [followup] [who will be next?] [**********]
President Hosni Mubarak announced plans to build several nuclear reactors, another sign that Arab states are intent on following Iran’s lead in developing nuclear sites in the Middle East. [*****] Like Iran, Egypt says its program will have peaceful uses only. [which nobody believes] [and even Mubarak knows everybody knows is a lark] [*****] The United States said it would support Egypt’s effort. Egypt mothballed its nuclear program two decades ago, but last year the president’s son, Gamal Mubarak, called for the program to be restarted. The younger Mubarak is a leader within his father’s National Democratic Party, which has a monopoly on state power. President Mubarak, above, gave his speech before the party’s annual gathering, which begins Friday.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:16 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/29/AR2007102900471.html
Suicide Bomber on Bike Kills 28 Iraqi Policemen
By Joshua Partlow
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, October 30, 2007; A11 [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges, as the U.S. continues moving chess pieces tactically with no particular strategy] [******] [ditto]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 29 -- The policemen had assembled for the morning roll call when the bicyclist pedaled into view.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/29/AR2007102900471.html
Suicide Bomber on Bike Kills 28 Iraqi Policemen
By Joshua Partlow
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, October 30, 2007; A11 [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges, as the U.S. continues moving chess pieces tactically with no particular strategy] [******] [ditto]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 29 -- The policemen had assembled for the morning roll call when the bicyclist pedaled into view.
He was wearing sweat pants and a black T-shirt, witnesses recalled, and some people knew enough to start running as he glided toward them.
"Suicide bomber! Suicide bomber!" people at the police headquarters shouted as the blast thundered across Baqubah, an embattled provincial capital north of Baghdad.
The explosion Monday killed at least 28 policemen and wounded 17 policemen and three Iraqi civilians, according to the U.S. military, making it the deadliest insurgent attack in Iraq in more than a month. The last mass-casualty attack struck Baqubah in late September, targeting a reconciliation meeting and killing at least 25 people.
"This attack is typical of al-Qaeda's barbaric and hateful ways -- targeting Iraqi Security Forces who have been working to secure Baqubah and enable progress," Col. David W. Sutherland, the U.S. military commander in Diyala province, said in a statement. The Sunni insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq has been responsible for many deadly attacks similar to Monday's bombing.
Many of those targeted in the bombing were recent police recruits. Across Iraq, the U.S. military has urged Iraqis, especially Sunnis, to join the police force in an effort to pull people away from the insurgency and to balance out the predominantly Shiite-run security forces. Such attacks can have a chilling effect on efforts to bolster the police force.
One police captain in Baqubah, Nayel al-Taie, vowed to honor the deaths of his colleagues and refused to be swayed by the attack. "I and my colleagues will continue to do our job and protect the stability and security of Iraq," he said.
Taie said he had just left the battalion headquarters when he heard the shouts that a suicide bomber was approaching. "I shouted out as loud as I could, 'Disperse! disperse!' but then the explosion happened," he said. Shrapnel dug into his right arm and back. His skin was burned.
He said that many of those wounded and killed were new recruits from two neighborhoods that were among the most violent until U.S. military reinforcements flooded into Baqubah earlier this year. Since then, al-Qaeda in Iraq's grip on the city has been greatly reduced.
The attack on Monday "shows the grudge this group holds against all Iraqis," he said.
An 11-year-old boy, Alaa Kassim Mohammed, was walking to school when he was hit. As he moaned in pain from his hospital bed, his father asked doctors if they were going to amputate his foot. "This suicide bomber wanted to attack those policemen because he thinks they are apostates, but what did he do wrong to deserve this? He is still 11 years old and he became a cripple," said his father, Kassim Mohammed, a security guard. "Is this Islam?"
Meanwhile, a spokesman for tribal leaders in Diyala province said all but one of 11 sheiks kidnapped in eastern Baghdad on Sunday had been freed. The spokesman for the mostly Shiite al-Salam Support Council, Hadi al-Anbaki, said a joint U.S. and Iraqi military operation on Monday had discovered the tribal leaders in the Shaab district of northeastern Baghdad. One of the men kidnapped, Haroon al-Muhammadawi, an imam in the al-Salam area of Diyala province, had been found dead the day before, Anbaki said.
The U.S. military accused Arkan Hasnawi, a former commander with the Mahdi Army militia, of responsibility for the kidnappings.
In a separate development, a mortar shell fell on a soccer field in the northern Iraqi city of Tikrit, killing two boys and wounding seven others, according to Iraqi police.
A U.S. Army one-star general was wounded by a roadside bomb north of Baghdad, Army officials said. Brig. Gen. Jeffrey J. Dorko, commander of the Gulf Region Division of the Army Corps of Engineers, sustained injuries when a bomb detonated near his convoy, operated by the private security contractor Erinys International, according to an Army news release.
The private security team evacuated Dorko and another soldier to a U.S. military hospital in the Green Zone, the release said. Dorko, in stable condition, was later evacuated to the Army hospital in Landstuhl, Germany, it said. It is highly unusual for a U.S. officer with the rank of general to be injured in Iraq, and none has been killed there, the officials said.
Staff writer Ann Scott Tyson in Washington, special correspondents Naseer Nouri in Baghdad and Muhanned Saif Aldin in Tikrit, and other Washington Post staff in Iraq contributed to this report.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:15 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/middleeast/30iraq.html
October 30, 2007
Suicide Bomber on Bike Kills 29 Iraqi Policemen
By ALISSA J. RUBIN [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges, as the U.S. continues moving chess pieces tactically with no particular strategy] [******]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 29 — Police training in the provincial capital of Baquba turned into a blood bath on Monday when a suicide bomber on a bicycle set off his explosive vest in the midst of policemen, killing 29, the local police said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/middleeast/30iraq.html
October 30, 2007
Suicide Bomber on Bike Kills 29 Iraqi Policemen
By ALISSA J. RUBIN [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges, as the U.S. continues moving chess pieces tactically with no particular strategy] [******]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 29 — Police training in the provincial capital of Baquba turned into a blood bath on Monday when a suicide bomber on a bicycle set off his explosive vest in the midst of policemen, killing 29, the local police said.
A suicide bomber killed seven people just north of Baghdad, and the United States military said a brigadier general had been wounded by a roadside bomb in northern Baghdad, according to The Associated Press. Brig. Gen. Jeffrey Dorko, the highest-ranking American officer to be hurt since the invasion in March 2003, was evacuated to Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. His wounds were not life-threatening, The A.P. said.
Taken together, the attacks highlighted the continuing instability in the vicinity of Iraq’s capital and were a reminder of how easily security in the city could disintegrate.
The blast in Baquba, the capital of Diyala Province, also wounded 19 people, including 7 policemen who were in critical condition and a woman and her baby, provincial authorities said. Most of the police officers killed and wounded were members of the recently formed emergency police brigade in Diyala.
Wisam Wahid al-Majmaie, a policeman who lives in the Ghatoon neighborhood of Baquba, said that a few minutes before the blast he had been relaxing with his colleagues. “I lost 12 friends who were with me having tea 30 minutes ago,” he said.
The attack was one of the deadliest on Iraqi security forces in several weeks. No group took immediate responsibility, but the episode suggested that Sunni Arab guerrillas, who as recently as last spring controlled Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, continue to be able to carry out devastating attacks.
American military officials said they had largely cleared Baquba of militants during operations this summer, when a large force of soldiers swept through the city. But it appears that despite those efforts the city remains unstable, as does much of the rest of the province, where sectarian killings, bombs and kidnappings occur daily. [****]
During the American and Iraqi offensive over the summer, many of the insurgents were able to flee north before the soldiers arrived, American officers said. Some Iraqis have expressed fears that when United States forces reduce their presence in Baquba, the militants will simply return.
Monday’s bombing in Baquba appeared to be part of a coordinated attack on the police force in the provincial capital. At about the same time as that attack, another suicide bomber attempted to strike the police station in Hibhib, on the northern side of the city, according to an American military official in the city. The attack failed because a policeman shot the suicide bomber. However, the coordinated assault suggests that the extremists are active again in the capital.
Diyala has become one of the most lethal places in Iraq for American soldiers, with 110 troops killed so far this year, according to Icasualties.org, an independent Web site that tracks deaths in Iraq. That figure is more than the total number of American troops killed in the province over the past four years. Diyala ranks third after Anbar Province and Baghdad in American casualties.
In Baghdad, the kidnapping of 10 tribal sheiks ended Monday when Interior Ministry commandos obtained the release of nine of them. One of the sheiks was killed shortly after he was kidnapped. The sheiks — three Sunnis and seven Shiites — had just met with officials from the office of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki when they were abducted. [********]
The American military said in a statement that the kidnappers were believed to be rogue elements of the Mahdi Army, the Shiite militia affiliated with the anti-American cleric Moktada al-Sadr. However, at Mr. Sadr’s request, many in the militia have laid down their weapons. The American military says those who have not done so are primarily criminals.
In Karbala, a center of Shiite worship and pilgrimage south of Baghdad, American forces transferred security responsibility to Iraqi forces on Monday. Karbala is the eighth province in which the American military has handed security responsibility to the Iraqis. The city and surrounding province are for the most part calm, but in late August there were clashes between Iraqi forces guarding the holy shrines and militiamen who said they were loyal to Mr. Sadr.
The other provinces that have responsibility for their own security are the three in Iraqi Kurdistan and four southern provinces — Najaf, Dhi Qar, Maysan and Muthanna. [the latter are Shiia] [****]
Richard A. Oppel Jr. contributed reporting from Baghdad, and Iraqi employees of The New York Times from Diyala, Karbala and Hilla.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:14 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/world/middleeast/31iran.html
October 31, 2007
Russian Envoy on Surprise Visit to Iran
By NAZILA FATHI [Iran] [wmd] [Russia] [of permanenet 5 in UN security council, both Russia and china have been somewhat reluctant to slam Iran] [both have substantial business interests at stake] [recently, however, the US-France-UK axis has gained momentum] [Russia appears to enjoy its role as provocateur] [********]
TEHRAN, Oct. 30 — The Russian foreign minister will make a surprise visit to Iran today to meet with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and discuss Iran’s nuclear program, Russian and Iranian news agencies reported.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/world/middleeast/31iran.html
October 31, 2007
Russian Envoy on Surprise Visit to Iran
By NAZILA FATHI [Iran] [wmd] [Russia] [of permanenet 5 in UN security council, both Russia and china have been somewhat reluctant to slam Iran] [both have substantial business interests at stake] [recently, however, the US-France-UK axis has gained momentum] [Russia appears to enjoy its role as provocateur] [********]
TEHRAN, Oct. 30 — The Russian foreign minister will make a surprise visit to Iran today to meet with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and discuss Iran’s nuclear program, Russian and Iranian news agencies reported.
Sergey V. Lavrov, who was on a visit in Kazakhstan in Central Asia, said he would make a working visit to Iran to meet Mr. Ahmadinejad in Tehran at 4 p.m. local time, the Interfax news agency reported.
In Moscow, a Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman, Mikhail Kamynin, said Mr. Lavrov would discuss Iran’s nuclear activities as well as bilateral ties, Interfax said.
“A number of issues connected to the situation around Iran’s nuclear program and a number of questions of bilateral questions will be discussed,” the news agency reported.
Mr. Lavrov’s visit comes two weeks after the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, made a landmark trip to Iran, the first Kremlin leader to travel there since 1943. He has insisted on a diplomatic solution to the international standoff over Iran’s nuclear program.
After Mr. Putin’s visit, Iran’s former chief nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, said the Russian president had delivered a proposal to Iran’s supreme religious leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the last word on state matters.
Neither the Iranians nor the Russians would disclose any details, but Mr. Larijani said it involved a new way to help resolve the nuclear standoff and the Iranian side was studying it.
State-run television and news agencies quoted Ayatollah Khamenei at the time as telling Mr. Putin, “We will think about what you said and about your proposal,” even as he added that Iran was “determined to provide our country’s need for nuclear energy.”
Mr. Larijani resigned over differences with Mr. Ahmadinejad last week.
Since then, the United States announced new unilateral sanctions on Iran, accusing its Revolutionary Guards of illegally spreading weapons of mass destruction.
Mr. Putin criticized the move. “Why worsen the situation by threatening sanctions and bring it to a dead end?” he asked, news agencies quoted him a saying. [******]
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:13 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/asia/30pakistan.html
October 30, 2007
News Analysis
Bhutto’s Return Brings Pakistani Politics to a Boil
By CARLOTTA GALL [Pakistan] [south asia] [Pakistan as the new Afghanistan] [hydra central] [Pakistan seemingly teetering on the brink] [islamists, tribals, and jihadis striking back] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [followup] [increasingly chaotic] [Bhutto’s return has raised the temperature] [*****]
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Oct. 29 — Home for just over a week, the opposition leader Benazir Bhutto has raised the temperature in Pakistan a hundredfold, stirring friend and foe alike as she rallies supporters, courts the news media and plunges back into the muck of Pakistan’s politics.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/asia/30pakistan.html
October 30, 2007
News Analysis
Bhutto’s Return Brings Pakistani Politics to a Boil
By CARLOTTA GALL [Pakistan] [south asia] [Pakistan as the new Afghanistan] [hydra central] [Pakistan seemingly teetering on the brink] [islamists, tribals, and jihadis striking back] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [followup] [increasingly chaotic] [Bhutto’s return has raised the temperature] [*****]
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Oct. 29 — Home for just over a week, the opposition leader Benazir Bhutto has raised the temperature in Pakistan a hundredfold, stirring friend and foe alike as she rallies supporters, courts the news media and plunges back into the muck of Pakistan’s politics.
Her arrival procession on Oct. 18 demonstrated the strength of her Pakistan Peoples Party, as did the quarter of a million loyal and enthusiastic supporters who went to Karachi to greet her. [***] [presumably Punjabi based mostly] [*****] But the bomb blasts, which killed 140 of them, showed her enemies to be equally fervent.
Since then, the charges and counter-charges hurled in both directions have shown that Ms. Bhutto — daughter of a famous politician executed by the military, twice prime minister before, and an exile for eight years to avoid corruption cases — “remains an intensely polarizing figure,” as Shafqat Mahmood, a former member of Parliament and a columnist, put it.
“The passion of Pakistan Peoples Party supporters, so visible in the crowd on that fateful day, saw the father and daughter reach highest offices in the land,” he wrote in The News, referring to the day of the bombings. “The hatred of their opponents resulted in the murder of Benazir’s father through a contrived judicial verdict, the death of her two brothers in dubious circumstances, and the dismissal of her governments without completing their tenure of office.” [*******]
That history is still being written. Using the news media unabashedly, Ms. Bhutto has been outspoken in particular against terrorism, saying things that few local politicians dare to against the religious and jihadi groups. She is the only politician in Pakistan saying loudly and clearly that suicide bombing is against the teaching of Islam.
She has also attacked conservatives in the government, including officials close to the president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, accusing them of aiding and abetting extremists, and supporting the bombers who attacked her.
She has raised a warning against her old enemy, Pakistan’s foremost intelligence agency, Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI, and officials from the era of Gen. Muhammad Zia ul-Haq, who deposed and hanged her father, [*****] Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, saying they are working against her.
She has not attacked General Musharraf, with whom she has reached a tentative political agreement to allow her back to rally the moderate vote in Pakistan, except to repeat the party’s standard position against military dictatorship. The understanding they have remains intact, an aide says.
It is the conservatives in his government and the ruling party, and some members of the intelligence services, that she sees as her most dangerous rivals in the coming parliamentary election campaign, and she began her attack on them even before arriving in Pakistan.
“Ms. Bhutto arrived, not carrying flowers but a bunch of accusations,” The Daily Times wrote in an editorial Sunday. “What has followed is a virulent verbal exchange.”
The return attacks have been swift and nasty. The chief minister of Sindh Province, Ms. Bhutto’s home province, warned that the rule of a woman would be a curse for Pakistan. [Sindhi comprise the working class, serfs, who supply labor to Punjabi feudal lords] [bhutto’s family from the feudal lord class] [*********]
Chaudhry Shujaat Hussein, leader of the Pakistan Muslim League, which backs General Musharraf but has opposed his deal with Ms. Bhutto, suggested that Ms. Bhutto herself could be behind the bomb blasts, as a ploy for sympathy.
Muhammad Ejaz ul-Haq, the minister for religious affairs and the son of the late military dictator, General Zia ul-Haq, blamed Ms. Bhutto for playing with people’s lives by not delaying her homecoming when she knew there were threats against her.
Such charges seem to fly in the face of the image that Ms. Bhutto studiously cultivated in her years abroad: that of a pro-Western democrat who can bring the people of Pakistan on board in the fight against terrorism.
But Ms. Bhutto’s image has quickly become muddied with her return.
Critics on television talk shows and in the newspapers have been fuming about the presidential ordinance, passed on the eve of her return, that granted Ms. Bhutto and others an amnesty from all pending corruption cases [*****] in return for their support for General Musharraf to serve another term.
Many citizens are also disgusted by the ordinance, which seems to give free license to any corrupt politician. So are members of the military, who see the army being sullied by association, all so General Musharraf can stay in power.
The famous cricketer turned politician, Imran Khan, and his ex-wife, the wealthy British socialite Jemima Khan, lambasted Ms. Bhutto in articles in the British press. Ms. Khan called Ms. Bhutto a “a kleptocrat in a Hermès scarf.” [********]
Ms. Bhutto’s return has also put murder on everyone’s lips again in Karachi. Of course, almost any Pakistani can recall the day her father was hanged [******] by the military government in 1979. But his is not the only killing that Ms. Bhutto’s return evokes.
Residents of Karachi retell the story of how Murtaza Bhutto, Benazir’s brother, was gunned down by the police, point out the spot where it happened just yards from his home, and recall how the police delayed taking him to a hospital and let him bleed in his seat.
Ms. Bhutto says it was the intelligence service that killed her brother. But many here point out that she was prime minister at the time, in 1996, and that her brother was challenging her for the leadership of the Pakistan Peoples Party.
Ms. Bhutto’s argument that the ISI is behind such attacks, including the bombing of her homecoming procession, sounds too conspiratorial for many. [****] But the deputy mayor of Karachi, Nasreen Jalil, who is from a rival political party, the Muttahida Quami Movement, said her allegations of ISI involvement were plausible. “We have seen such things in the past,” she said.
But especially scalding in her criticism has been Ms. Bhutto’s estranged niece, Fatima Bhutto, who holds Benazir Bhutto morally responsible for the death of Murtaza, her father. A 26-year-old newspaper columnist, Fatima lives in Karachi, and has been meeting with any journalist looking for a break from the crush at Benazir’s court.
Fatima Bhutto argues that hard-won progress in grass-roots democracy will be jeopardized by Benazir, who is giving democracy a bad name with her pro-American agenda. [******]
“She has put us all in danger of an Islamic backlash,” she said in a recent interview. “I do believe Benazir is the most dangerous thing to happen to this country.” [*****]
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:13 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/world/asia/31pakistan.html
October 31, 2007
Suicide Bomber Strikes Within a Mile of Musharraf
By SALMAN MASOOD and GRAHAM BOWLEY [Pakistan] [south asia] [Pakistan as the new Afghanistan] [hydra central] [Pakistan seemingly teetering on the brink] [islamists, tribals, and jihadis striking back] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [followup] [increasingly chaotic] [additional attempts on Musharraf] [*****]
RAWALPINDI, Pakistan, Oct. 30 — A young man blew himself up about one mile from the offices of Pakistan’s president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, in this garrison town near Islamabad, the capital, today, killing seven people including himself and wounding 14 others, [*******] according to police officials and the Interior Ministry.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/world/asia/31pakistan.html
October 31, 2007
Suicide Bomber Strikes Within a Mile of Musharraf
By SALMAN MASOOD and GRAHAM BOWLEY [Pakistan] [south asia] [Pakistan as the new Afghanistan] [hydra central] [Pakistan seemingly teetering on the brink] [islamists, tribals, and jihadis striking back] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [followup] [increasingly chaotic] [additional attempts on Musharraf] [*****]
RAWALPINDI, Pakistan, Oct. 30 — A young man blew himself up about one mile from the offices of Pakistan’s president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, in this garrison town near Islamabad, the capital, today, killing seven people including himself and wounding 14 others, [*******] according to police officials and the Interior Ministry.
General Musharraf was working in his office in Rawalpindi at the time of the attack, a spokesman for the president said. He often prefers to work out of his military office there, in the tightly guarded city that is home to the headquarters of Pakistan’s military. General Musharraf, an important ally of the United States in its campaign against terrorism, survived two assassination attempts here in 2003.
The president’s spokesman, Rashid Qureshi, denied that the president was a target of the attack and said the bomber was stopped well before he entered the security zone around the military compound. [******]
The suicide bomber, who was estimated to be between 19 and 23 years old, was on foot and tried to force himself past a police checkpoint when he was stopped by two officers, according to a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, Javed Iqbal Cheema. At least four policemen were among the dead.
The attack comes at a tense moment in Pakistan politics. On Oct. 18, as Benazir Bhutto, the opposition leader, was returning to Pakistan after eight years of self-exile, bomb blasts aimed at her procession through Karachi killed 140 of her supporters. [******]
Since then Ms. Bhutto has raised the temperature of the country’s politics even further. As she seeks to contest parliamentary elections, she has been outspoken in particular against terrorism, and against the religious and jihadi groups [******] rooted in Pakistan.
She has been in power-sharing negotiations with General Musharraf, who early this month was reelected president. However, constitutional challenges to his eligibility for that contest have yet to be decided by the Supreme Court, leaving him with an incomplete victory.
At the same time, General Musharraf’s authority has been challenged by growing unrest in tribal regions near the border with Afghanistan, where there have been a rising number of deadly attacks on military targets by militants sympathetic to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
The violence has also reached into the center of Islamabad and Rawalpindi. [******] [note: Islamabad essentially created out of scratch for central bureaucracy when Pakistan and India seperated] [Karachi and Lahore are historic cities] [****] Last month, powerful coordinated explosions set off by two suicide bombers in the heart of Rawalpindi killed at least 25 people, some from Pakistan’s intelligence agency, and wounded at least 68, according to government and military officials.
Earlier this month, four people were killed and five others injured when one of the three helicopters escorting the president on a visit to Kashmir crashed, but military officials ruled out the possibility of an assassination attempt, attributing the crash to a technical problem
In July, unidentified gunmen fired on General Musharraf’s plane as it took off from Rawalpindi as government forces laid siege to a mosque complex in nearby Islamabad, [*****] where Islamic militants were holed up. The general escaped unhurt.
Salman Masood reported from Rawalpindi, Pakistan, and Graham Bowley from New York.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:11 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/asia/30briefs-embassy.html
October 30, 2007
World Briefing | Asia
Azerbaijan: U.S. Embassy Shuts Over Threat
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Azerbijan] [central asia] [relatively infrequently mentioned as source of jihadis] [hydra] [however, Caspian sea areas were part of historic Caliphate] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [taken with other indicators, appears to point to upcoming period of jihad against West—U.S.-Europe] [*****]
A group of militant Islamists planned to attack the American Embassy and other government buildings in Baku, [****] the capital, using stolen military grenades and assault rifles, but were thwarted by security forces, officials said. The Security Ministry said the group had planned a “large-scale, horrifying terror attack” [*****] but did not provide details or say if any other weapons were involved. The State Department said it closed the embassy but would probably reopen it after tightening security. Britain’s embassy also suspended services.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/asia/30briefs-embassy.html
October 30, 2007
World Briefing | Asia
Azerbaijan: U.S. Embassy Shuts Over Threat
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Azerbijan] [central asia] [relatively infrequently mentioned as source of jihadis] [hydra] [however, Caspian sea areas were part of historic Caliphate] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [taken with other indicators, appears to point to upcoming period of jihad against West—U.S.-Europe] [*****]
A group of militant Islamists planned to attack the American Embassy and other government buildings in Baku, [****] the capital, using stolen military grenades and assault rifles, but were thwarted by security forces, officials said. The Security Ministry said the group had planned a “large-scale, horrifying terror attack” [*****] but did not provide details or say if any other weapons were involved. The State Department said it closed the embassy but would probably reopen it after tightening security. Britain’s embassy also suspended services.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:10 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/asia/30afghan.html
October 30, 2007
Foreign Fighters of Harsher Bent Bolster Taliban
By DAVID ROHDE [Pakistan] [Afghanistan] [tribal belts] [Pakistanas the new Afghanistan] [south asia] [Pakistan as the new Afghanistan] [hydra central] [Pakistan seemingly teetering on the brink] [islamists, tribals, and jihadis striking back] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [followup] [another possible attempt on Musharraf] [see today’s external for the effects Bhutto has had on Pakistan] [hastening ultimate conflagration?] [*****]
GARDEZ, Afghanistan — Afghan police officers working a highway checkpoint near here noticed something odd recently about a passenger in a red pickup truck. Though covered head to toe in a burqa, the traditional veil worn by Afghan women, she was unusually tall. When the police asked her questions, she refused to answer. [****]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/asia/30afghan.html
October 30, 2007
Foreign Fighters of Harsher Bent Bolster Taliban
By DAVID ROHDE [Pakistan] [Afghanistan] [tribal belts] [Pakistanas the new Afghanistan] [south asia] [Pakistan as the new Afghanistan] [hydra central] [Pakistan seemingly teetering on the brink] [islamists, tribals, and jihadis striking back] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [followup] [another possible attempt on Musharraf] [see today’s external for the effects Bhutto has had on Pakistan] [hastening ultimate conflagration?] [*****]
GARDEZ, Afghanistan — Afghan police officers working a highway checkpoint near here noticed something odd recently about a passenger in a red pickup truck. Though covered head to toe in a burqa, the traditional veil worn by Afghan women, she was unusually tall. When the police asked her questions, she refused to answer. [****]
When the veil was eventually removed, the police found not a woman at all, but Andre Vladimirovich Bataloff, a 27-year-old man from Siberia with a flowing red beard, pasty skin and piercing blue eyes. [**********] Inside the truck was 1,000 pounds of explosives.
Afghan and American officials say the Siberian intended to be a suicide bomber, one of several hundred foreign militants who have gravitated to the region to fight alongside the Taliban this year, [****] the largest influx since 2001. [why?] [is this indicative of another 2001?] [one would think he would have headed to Chechnya and/or environs] [this could be worrisome] [***********]
The foreign fighters are not only bolstering the ranks of the insurgency. They are more violent, uncontrollable and extreme [****] than even their locally bred allies, officials on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistan border warn.
They are also helping to change the face of the Taliban from a movement of hard-line Afghan religious students into a loose network that now includes a growing number of foreign militants [******] as well as disgruntled Afghans and drug traffickers.
Foreign fighters are coming from Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Chechnya, various Arab countries and perhaps also Turkey and western China, [and apparently Siberia] [**********] Afghan and American officials say.
Their growing numbers point to the worsening problem of lawlessness in Pakistan’s tribal areas, which they use as a base to train alongside militants from Al Qaeda who have carried out terrorist attacks in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Europe, [*******] according to Western diplomats.
“We’ve seen an unprecedented level of reports of foreign-fighter involvement,” [*****] said Maj. Gen. Bernard S. Champoux, deputy commander for security of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force. “They’ll threaten people if they don’t provide meals and support.”
In interviews in southern and eastern Afghanistan, local officials and village elders also reported having seen more foreigners fighting alongside the Taliban than in any year since the American-led invasion in 2001. [********]
In Afghanistan, the foreigners serve as mid-level commanders, and train and finance local fighters, according to Western analysts. In Pakistan’s tribal areas, they train suicide bombers, create roadside-bomb factories and have vastly increased the number of high-quality Taliban fund-raising and recruiting [*******] videos posted online.
Gauging the exact number of Taliban and foreign fighters in Afghanistan is difficult, Western officials and analysts say. At any given time, the Taliban can field up to 10,000 fighters, they said, but only 2,000 to 3,000 are highly motivated, full-time insurgents. [*****]
The rest are part-time fighters, young Afghan men who have been alienated by government corruption, who are angry at civilian deaths caused by American bombing raids, or who are simply in search of cash, they said. Five to 10 percent of full-time insurgents — roughly 100 to 300 combatants — are believed to be foreigners. [******]
Western diplomats say recent offers from the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, to negotiate with the Taliban are an effort to split local Taliban moderates and Afghans who might be brought back into the fold from the foreign extremists.
But that effort may face an increasing challenge as foreigners replace dozens of midlevel and senior Taliban who, Western officials say, have been killed by NATO and American forces.
At the same time, Western officials said the reliance on foreigners showed that the Taliban are running out of midlevel Afghan commanders. [*****] “That’s a sure-fire sign of desperation,” General Champoux said. [typical happy talk of commander on the ground] [it may be a sign of looming cataclysm] [and that should not be overlooked!] [********]
Seth Jones, an analyst with the Rand Corporation, was less sanguine, however, calling the arrival of more foreigners a dangerous development. [****] The tactics the foreigners have introduced, he said, are increasing Afghan and Western casualty rates.
“They play an incredibly important part in the insurgency,” Mr. Jones said. “They act as a force multiplier in improving their ability to kill Afghan and NATO forces.” [******]
Western officials said the foreigners are also increasingly financing younger Taliban leaders in Pakistan’s tribal areas who have closer ties to Al Qaeda, [****] like Sirajuddin Haqqani and Anwar ul-Haq Mujahed. The influence of older, more traditional Taliban leaders based in Quetta, Pakistan, is diminishing.
“We see more and more resources going to their fellow travelers,” said Christopher Alexander, the deputy special representative for the United Nations in Afghanistan. “The new Taliban commanders are younger and younger.”
In the southern provinces of Oruzgan, Kandahar and Helmand, Afghan villagers recently described two distinct groups of Taliban fighters. They said “local Taliban” allowed some development projects. But “foreign Taliban” — usually from Pakistan — threatened to kill anyone who cooperated with the Afghan government or foreign aid groups. [*********]
Hanif Atmar, the Afghan education minister, said threats from foreign Taliban have closed 40 percent of the schools in southern Afghanistan. [****] He said many local Taliban oppose the practice, but foreign Taliban use brutality and cash to their benefit.
“That makes our situation terribly complicated,” Mr. Atmar said. “Because they bring resources with them, their agenda takes precedence.”
Large groups of Pakistani militants operate in southern Afghanistan, according to Afghan officials. In the east, more Arab and Uzbek fighters are present. [****]
Mr. Bataloff, the Russian arrested in a burqa, insists he is a religious student who traveled to Pakistan last year to learn more about his new faith. [***] In an hourlong interview in an Afghan jail in Kabul, he said his interest in Islam blossomed three years ago when he was living in Siberia.
“First, I heard from TV, radio and newspapers about Islam,” he said in Russian. “I found Islam had a lot of good things, especially that Islam respects all prophets, including Jesus.”
But he declined to describe many details of his trip and grew angry when asked about his personal background. “Homicide and suicide is not allowed in any religion,” he said, when asked about the allegations against him. “Why are you asking me these questions?”
Mr. Bataloff said he grew up in Siberia, but would not identify his hometown or region. He said he could not remember the names of the Pakistanis he met or the two Afghan men who drove the pickup truck.
He said he decided to go to a predominantly Muslim country last fall to study Islam and learn about “the morals, the customs, the ethics and the literature.” He flew alone from Russia to Iran, he said, and met a Russian-speaking “guide” in the airport. [******]
After spending 10 days in Iran, he crossed into Pakistan and traveled to North Waziristan, a remote tribal area that is a longtime Taliban and Qaeda stronghold. There, he spent a year living and studying in a small mosque in Mir Ali. [************]
Pakistani security officials say the Islamic Jihad Union, [****] a terrorist group led by militants from Uzbekistan, operates a training camp in Mir Ali.
[In mid-October, in some of the heaviest fighting in four years, the Pakistani military said 50 foreign fighters were among 200 militants reported killed in three days of clashes around Mir Ali. The dead foreigners were said to include mostly Uzbeks and Tajiks, as well as some Arabs, the army said.]
Some of the suspects arrested in a failed bombing plot in Germany in September received training in the tribal areas, [*****] according to German officials. Several men involved in the July 2005 London transit bombings and a failed August 2006 London airliner plot did as well. [*********]
Mr. Bataloff said he met no foreign militants in his 10 months in the tribal areas. But American military officials said he had told interrogators that he had attended a terrorist training camp in North Waziristan. He said local militants forced him to go to the camp and taught him how to fire an AK-47 assault rifle, [******] the officials said.
“I didn’t have any specific teacher,” he said, when asked about Pakistanis he met there. “There were local people who knew the Koran.”
A second foreign prisoner produced by Afghan officials identified himself as Muhammad Kuzeubaev, a 23-year-old from Temirtau, Kazakhstan. Afghan officials said he was a bombmaker arrested in September in Badakhshan Province in northern Afghanistan.
In an interview, Mr. Kuzeubaev, who also spoke fluent Russian, said he was visiting Afghanistan as a tourist. “I was close to the border,” he said. “I thought I would go explore the country.”
In Badakhshan, he said, two Afghan men abducted him and demanded he join Al Qaeda. He agreed to do so fearing he would be killed, [****] he said. That night, the men showed him parts of a suicide vest and promised to take him to Pakistan for training.
“They showed me the explosives, the vest and grenade,” said Mr. Kuzeubaev. “The next day, they brought some kind of weapons.”
Two days later, Afghan police officers surrounded the house and arrested him, he said. Afghan interrogators beat him, chained him to a wall and prevented him from sleeping for four days, he said.
“They are saying, ‘You are the man who was making the vests,’ ” said Mr. Kuzeubaev. “But the ammunition and other explosives were not mine.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:09 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/world/middleeast/29mideast.html
October 29, 2007
Israel Restricts Gaza Crossing as Firing Persists
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Israel] [Palestine] [former Palestine] [border crossings between Gaza and Israel] [always, object of attacks] [******]
JERUSALEM, Oct. 28 — Israeli officials said Sunday that Israel had begun reducing fuel supplies to the Gaza Strip and had closed one of the two crossings through which food, medicine and other supplies pass into the area, in line with a recent government decision to impose sanctions in response to continued rocket fire from the Hamas-run territory.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/world/middleeast/29mideast.html
October 29, 2007
Israel Restricts Gaza Crossing as Firing Persists
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Israel] [Palestine] [former Palestine] [border crossings between Gaza and Israel] [always, object of attacks] [******]
JERUSALEM, Oct. 28 — Israeli officials said Sunday that Israel had begun reducing fuel supplies to the Gaza Strip and had closed one of the two crossings through which food, medicine and other supplies pass into the area, in line with a recent government decision to impose sanctions in response to continued rocket fire from the Hamas-run territory.
Shlomo Dror, a spokesman for the Coordinator of Activities in the Territories, the Israeli agency that oversees supplies to Gaza, said the plan was to reduce the amount of fuel by 5 percent to 11 percent. He said that the industrial fuel needed to operate the Gaza power plant would not be affected, but that cuts would be made in the supply of benzene, which is mostly for private use, and diesel, mostly used for public transportation and service vehicles such as ambulances.
Mr. Dror said the Sufa crossing to the north had been closed, leaving the Kerem Shalom crossing in the south as the only point of entry for goods.
The main commercial crossing on the Gaza-Israel border, Karni, has been closed since the militant Islamic group Hamas took over Gaza in June, routing Fatah forces, including the elite Presidential Guard, which had secured the Palestinian side of the border crossings, by agreement with Israel. The Rafah crossing on the Gaza-Egypt border has also been formally closed since June.
Israel, like the United States and the European Union, considers Hamas a terrorist organization and refuses to deal with it. Hamas does not recognize Israel’s right to exist, and its charter seeks Israel’s destruction.
As a result, only limited supplies of basic goods are allowed to enter the strip, and all exports of produce are prohibited.
With only Kerem Shalom functioning, the number of trucks of food and other goods entering Gaza will be reduced to roughly 55 trucks a day from 100 to 120, Mr. Dror said. “We will allow in the minimum amount of food and medicines necessary to avoid a humanitarian crisis,” he said.
Israel also supplies about two thirds of Gaza’s electricity, and has threatened limited cuts in response to the rocket fire. But Israeli officials said such a move was awaiting the approval of the attorney general after a petition by human rights groups to the Israeli Supreme Court.
Mr. Dror suggested that the electricity cuts would be symbolic. “We are talking about cutting 1 percent of the supply for 15 minutes at a time,” he said.
In Gaza, a Hamas leader, Mahmoud Zahar, said his group would “examine the effects” of the measures “on the ground, particularly in the spheres of health and education, and then we will act.” He would not be more specific, but said Hamas would work on its own plan.
Mojahed Salama, who leads the Palestinian Authority’s petroleum agency in Gaza, told news agencies that Sunday’s fuel imports showed a 40 percent to 50 percent cut in diesel and benzene supplies, and a 12 percent cut in fuel for Gaza’s power plant.
“We sent the supplying company the same daily requests, but they said they were sorry and that because of the new imposed sanctions, they could only send us a reduced quantity,” Mr. Salama told Reuters.
A spokesman for Dor Alon, the Israeli energy company that serves Gaza, said that it had “received instructions” from the Israeli Defense Ministry and that it was “acting according” to them. Mr. Dror said the amount of fuel entering Gaza would be measured over a week, not on a daily basis, so that if the full amount of benzene entered one day, less would enter the next day.
Shadi Yassin, a spokesman for the Israeli Coordination and Liaison Administration at the Gaza crossings, said that fuel for ambulances and other emergency services would be allowed in as necessary, and that care would be taken to maintain energy supplies to Gaza hospitals.
In September, the Israeli cabinet declared Gaza to be “hostile territory” in response to the rocket fire directed at Israel. On Thursday, Israel’s defense minister, Ehud Barak, approved the government plan to restrict fuel and electricity supplies.
An Israeli Army spokesman said more than 1,000 rockets and mortar shells were launched against Israel in the past four months. Several rockets landed in and around Sderot in the past week, causing damage but no casualties.
Hamas said it was not launching rockets at Israel, but acknowledged firing mortar shells at Israeli military positions, usually in response to Israeli actions. Most of the rockets are being fired at Israel by smaller groups like Islamic Jihad and the Popular Resistance Committees.
Israel holds Hamas, as the controlling authority in Gaza, responsible for the rocket and mortar fire, even if other militant groups are firing.
Mr. Dror said that if mortar shells were fired at the Kerem Shalom crossing, it would be closed immediately for the day, and that the effects would soon be felt in Gaza.
“We are sending a very clear signal to the Palestinians in Gaza that they had better start making their own arrangements” to look after their needs, he said, adding that the pressure might “move Hamas” from its current position of refusing to recognize Israel.
David Baker, an Israeli spokesman, said that “Israel will take the necessary steps to stop the continuous rocket fire,” which he called “untenable.”
Taghreed El-Khodary contributed reporting from Gaza.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:08 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/world/middleeast/29baradei.html
October 29, 2007
Soften the Talk on Iran, ElBaradei Urges U.S.
BY BRIAN KNOWLTON [UN] [IAEA] [dr. elBaradei] [on neocons recent bravado in USFP vis-à-vis UN] [*******]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 28 — Mohamed ElBaradei, the director of the International Atomic Energy Agency, urged the Bush administration on Sunday to soften its statements about Iran while maintaining diplomatic pressure to halt the nuclear enrichment that could lead to the production of a nuclear weapon.
But American lawmakers appearing on Sunday television talk programs were divided on whether efforts to influence Iran had been helped or hindered by the administration’s tough talk.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/world/middleeast/29baradei.html
October 29, 2007
Soften the Talk on Iran, ElBaradei Urges U.S.
BY BRIAN KNOWLTON [UN] [IAEA] [dr. elBaradei] [on neocons recent bravado in USFP vis-à-vis UN] [*******]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 28 — Mohamed ElBaradei, the director of the International Atomic Energy Agency, urged the Bush administration on Sunday to soften its statements about Iran while maintaining diplomatic pressure to halt the nuclear enrichment that could lead to the production of a nuclear weapon.
But American lawmakers appearing on Sunday television talk programs were divided on whether efforts to influence Iran had been helped or hindered by the administration’s tough talk.
“We cannot add fuel to the fire,” Dr. ElBaradei said on “Late Edition” on CNN. “I would hope we would stop spinning and hyping the Iranian issue.” He also expressed frustration about the Israeli bombing in September of a building in Syria that analysts say may have contained the beginnings of a North Korean-designed nuclear reactor.
“To bomb first and ask questions later,” he said, was decidedly unhelpful.
In an Oct. 17 news conference, Mr. Bush said President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran had “announced that he wants to destroy Israel,” referring to Mr. Ahmadinejad’s comments that Israel “will disappear soon.” Mr. Bush also said he had “told people that if you’re interested in avoiding World War III, it seems like you ought to be interested in preventing them from having the knowledge necessary to make a nuclear weapon.”
Some Republican lawmakers defended Mr. Bush’s approach to Iran.
“I think the president is dead right,” Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said when asked about the “World War III” comment on “Face the Nation” on CBS. “I think the president is justified in trying to wake up the world, wake up Russia, wake up the European nations.”
“We need to be more aggressive,” Mr. Graham said. “We don’t need to talk softly, we need to act boldly, because time is not on our side.”
But Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan, while calling for a “tighter rope” around Iran, said on the same program that it was crucial not to “just give Iran a propaganda weapon — don’t just give them a can of gasoline to pour onto the fire.”
“That’s what this hot rhetoric does when it’s just constantly repeated about World War III, or ‘We’re going to use a military option,’” said Mr. Levin, who is chairman of the Armed Services Committee. “We ought to dial down the rhetoric.”
Mr. Levin said the West should offer “carrots” to Iran and not just “sticks,” much as had been done with North Korea.
Dr. ElBaradei made a similar point, saying, “The earlier we follow the North Korea model, the better for everybody.”
Senator Trent Lott, Republican of Mississippi and a former majority leader, said on “Late Edition” that he supported the administration’s designation last week of the Quds Force of the Revolutionary Guard in Iran as a supporter of terrorism. But he added, “You do need to be careful about the rhetoric.”
Senator Barbara Boxer, Democrat of California, denounced what she called administration officials’ “quite irresponsible” comments. “What it does is, it pulls the people of Iran together behind Ahmadinejad,” she said on the same program.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:07 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/middleeast/30iraq.html
October 30, 2007
Suicide Blast Kills 28 Iraqi Policemen
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges, as the U.S. continues moving chess pieces tactically with no particular strategy] [******]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 29 — A suicide bomber on a bicycle killed 28 policemen in Baquba today as they prepared for their morning training routine, Iraqi authorities said. The blast also wounded 20 other people, including seven policemen who were severely injured and a woman and her baby, the authorities said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/30/world/middleeast/30iraq.html
October 30, 2007
Suicide Blast Kills 28 Iraqi Policemen
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges, as the U.S. continues moving chess pieces tactically with no particular strategy] [******]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 29 — A suicide bomber on a bicycle killed 28 policemen in Baquba today as they prepared for their morning training routine, Iraqi authorities said. The blast also wounded 20 other people, including seven policemen who were severely injured and a woman and her baby, the authorities said.
The attack was one of the deadliest on Iraqi security forces in some time. No group took immediate credit. But the episode suggested that Sunni Arab guerrillas, who as recently as last spring controlled Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, continue to have the support to carry out devastating attacks that strike at the heart of efforts to bring the perpetually unstable city under control.
Wisam Wahid al-Majmaie, a Sunni policeman who lives in the Ghatoon neighborhood of Baquba, said that a few minutes before the blast he had been relaxing with his colleagues on the police force. “I lost 12 friends who were with me having tea 30 minutes ago,” he said.
American military officials have said that they had largely cleansed Baquba of militants during operations last summer, when a large force of soldiers swept through the city. But many of the insurgents were able to escape and flee north before the soldiers arrived, military officials said, and there are fears that as United States forces are drawn down in Baquba the militants will simply return.
On Sunday night, 10 tribal sheiks from Baquba who had been working with the Iraqi government to defeat extremists were kidnapped as they left Baghdad for the drive back to Baquba. The sheiks — three Sunnis and seven Shiites — had just met with officials from the office of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki when they were kidnapped.
It was initially unclear who was responsible for the kidnapping, although The Associated Press reported that the United States military said today that a rogue Shiite militia leader was responsible.
The A.P. also reported today that the police had found the bullet-riddled body of one of the sheiks close to where the ambush took place. It quoted a police officer as saying that the victim was identified after his cellphone was found on him.
The kidnapping occurred in Shaab, a poor, predominantly Shiite neighborhood, and it showed the vulnerability of Sunnis and Shiites who are working to thwart extremism.
In southern Iraq, meanwhile, the American military today turned over security responsibilities to Iraqi authorities in the mainly Shiite province of Karbala, the eighth of the nation’s 18 provinces to revert to Iraqi control, the A.P. reported.
Regarding the tense situation in another region of Iraq — the border with Turkey — Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top American commander in Iraq, indicated Sunday that behind-the-scenes efforts were under way to calm the situation. But he would not talk about them publicly because the situation was volatile.
“I am not going to be saying anything about what we may be doing with our longtime NATO ally Turkey, although we clearly are doing things with them,” General Petraeus said. “Nor am I saying what we’re doing with our longtime Iraqi partners,” he added.
Turkey and Iraq are at odds because Kurdish guerrillas who have taken refuge in the Qandeel mountains in the Kurdistan region in northern Iraq are using the area as a base for making raids into Turkey.
Last week, the guerrillas, part of the Kurdish Workers’ Party, or P.K.K., killed at least 12 Turkish soldiers and kidnapped several. That, with previous raids, led Turkey to threaten to invade northern Iraq to rout the guerrillas.
General Petraeus made the remarks to a handful of reporters after a change-of-command ceremony he attended at Camp Speicher, the military base five miles northwest of Tikrit that is the headquarters for American-led forces in northern Iraq.
Tensions between Iraq and Turkey have put the United States in an awkward position because Turkey is an ally and there are about 160,000 American troops in Iraq.
General Petraeus also made clear that despite reports describing Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia as a largely spent force, he viewed it as a continuing threat, though with reduced influence among Sunni Arabs in Baghdad over the past several months. The force is composed largely of Iraqi insurgents and is believed to be foreign-led, according to American intelligence sources, but its ties to Osama bin Laden are unclear at best.
“The presence of Al Qaeda in a number of the key neighborhoods that they were in before — Amiriya, Adhamiya, Ghazaliya, Dora — has been significantly reduced and its actions degraded,” General Petraeus said. He added that Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia “remained a very lethal enemy of Iraq” and that the military must “keep the pressure on very, very intensely.”
With Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia’s activity reduced, General Petraeus said, it has been possible to see other problems more clearly, including criminal activities like extortion. He described the criminal influence in some areas of the capital as almost “a mafia-type presence.”
Alissa J. Rubin and Qais Mizher contributed reporting from Baghdad, and James Glanz from Camp Speicher.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:06 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/world/middleeast/29iraq.html
October 29, 2007
Petraeus Says U.S. Seeking Calm in North
By ALISSA J. RUBIN and JAMES GLANZ [turkey] [USFP] [bush administration] [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [followup] [see today’s societal for oped on USFP and missed opportunities] [******]
CAMP SPEICHER, Iraq, Oct. 28 — With tensions on the border between Iraq and Turkey still running high, Gen. David H. Petraeus, the American military’s commander in Iraq, indicated Sunday that behind-the-scenes efforts were under way to calm the situation. But he would not talk about them publicly because the situation was volatile.
“I am not going to be saying anything about what we may be doing with our longtime NATO ally Turkey, although we clearly are doing things with them,” General Petraeus said. “Nor am I saying what we’re doing with our longtime Iraqi partners,” he added.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/world/middleeast/29iraq.html
October 29, 2007
Petraeus Says U.S. Seeking Calm in North
By ALISSA J. RUBIN and JAMES GLANZ [turkey] [USFP] [bush administration] [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [followup] [see today’s societal for oped on USFP and missed opportunities] [******]
CAMP SPEICHER, Iraq, Oct. 28 — With tensions on the border between Iraq and Turkey still running high, Gen. David H. Petraeus, the American military’s commander in Iraq, indicated Sunday that behind-the-scenes efforts were under way to calm the situation. But he would not talk about them publicly because the situation was volatile.
“I am not going to be saying anything about what we may be doing with our longtime NATO ally Turkey, although we clearly are doing things with them,” General Petraeus said. “Nor am I saying what we’re doing with our longtime Iraqi partners,” he added.
He made the remarks to a handful of reporters after a change-of-command ceremony he attended at Camp Speicher, the military base five miles northwest of Tikrit that is headquarters for American-led forces in northern Iraq.
Turkey and Iraq are at odds because Kurdish guerrillas who have taken refuge in the Qandeel mountains in the Kurdistan region in northern Iraq are using the area as a base for making raids into Turkey. Last week, the guerrillas, part of the Kurdish Workers’ Party, or P.K.K., killed at least 12 Turkish soldiers and kidnapped several. That, with previous raids, led Turkey to threaten to invade northern Iraq to rout the guerrillas.
Iraq-Turkey tensions have put the United States in an awkward position because Turkey is an ally and there about 160,000 American troops in Iraq.
General Petraeus also made clear that despite reports describing Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia as a largely spent force, he viewed it as a continuing threat, though with reduced influence among Sunni Arabs in Baghdad over the past several months. The force is composed largely of Iraqi insurgents and is believed to be foreign-led, according to American intelligence sources, but its ties to Osama bin Laden are unclear at best.
“The presence of Al Qaeda in a number of the key neighborhoods that they were in before — Amariya, Adhamiya, Ghazaliya, Dora — has been significantly reduced and its actions degraded,” General Petraeus said. He added that Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia “remained a very lethal enemy of Iraq” and that the military must “keep the pressure on very, very intensely.”
With Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia’s activity reduced, General Petraeus said, it has been possible to see other problems more clearly, including criminal activities like extortion. He described the criminal influence in some areas of the capital as almost “a mafia-type presence.”
The vulnerability of Sunnis and Shiites who are working to thwart extremism was clear again on Sunday evening when 10 sheiks, three of them Sunni Arabs and the rest Shiites, were kidnapped as they tried to return to Al Salam in eastern Baquba, the capital of Diyala Province.
The sheiks had gone to Baghdad to meet with a representative of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki. It was unclear who was responsible for the kidnapping, which occurred in Shaab, a poor, predominantly Shiite neighborhood.
On a separate matter, General Petraeus seemed to distance himself from any effort to save Sultan Hashim, the defense minister under Saddam Hussein, from a death sentence. At the same time, General Petraeus said the three-man Iraqi presidency council “has a very important role.”
The council, made up of President Jalal Talabani and two vice presidents, has yet to ratify the death sentence as required before the execution can be carried out. One result has been to stall Mr. Hashim’s execution. Mr. Talabani opposes the death penalty, but was not a vocal opponent to Mr. Hussein’s execution.
Mr. Hashim is being held in American custody, with the agreement that he will be turned over to the Iraqis when they are ready to hang him. However, the Americans seem to be intent on ensuring that all paperwork be completed. General Petraeus said the Americans would hand Mr. Hashim over when they received the completed paperwork, implying that they had not received it.
Mr. Hashim, who surrendered to General Petraeus in 2003, has been well treated, the general said Sunday. While in American custody, Mr. Hashim was allowed to visit his family and with an imam, General Petraeus said.
Recently, he has become a symbol to Sunni Arabs of the poor treatment of anyone who worked for Mr. Hussein, even those who served the country. The Americans, who are trying to persuade Sunni Arabs to work with them and the Iraqi government to fight Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, want to avoid doing anything that would alienate potential allies.
There has been an outcry in defense of Mr. Hashim primarily from Sunni Arabs, especially those who are former members of the security services. Leading the effort has been Tariq al-Hashimi, a Sunni Arab who is one of Iraq’s two vice presidents. Mr. Hashimi emphasized that Mr. Hashim had had little choice but to obey Saddam Hussein’s orders and that in all respects Mr. Hashim was viewed as a professional soldier, not a defender of Mr. Hussein’s rule.
Alissa J. Rubin reported from Baghdad, and James Glanz from Camp Speicher. Qais Mizher contributed from Baghdad.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:06 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/world/middleeast/29kurds.html
October 29, 2007
In the Rugged North of Iraq, Kurdish Rebels Flout Turkey
By SABRINA TAVERNISE [turkey] [USFP] [bush administration] [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [followup] [see today’s societal for oped on USFP and missed opportunities] [******]
RANIYA, Iraq, Oct. 27 — A low-slung concrete building off a steep mountain road marks the beginning of rebel territory in this remote corner of northern Iraq. The fighters based here, Kurdish militants fighting Turkey, fly their own flag, and despite urgent international calls to curb them, they operate freely, receiving supplies in beat-up pickup trucks less than 10 miles from a government checkpoint.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/world/middleeast/29kurds.html
October 29, 2007
In the Rugged North of Iraq, Kurdish Rebels Flout Turkey
By SABRINA TAVERNISE [turkey] [USFP] [bush administration] [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [followup] [see today’s societal for oped on USFP and missed opportunities] [******]
RANIYA, Iraq, Oct. 27 — A low-slung concrete building off a steep mountain road marks the beginning of rebel territory in this remote corner of northern Iraq. The fighters based here, Kurdish militants fighting Turkey, fly their own flag, and despite urgent international calls to curb them, they operate freely, receiving supplies in beat-up pickup trucks less than 10 miles from a government checkpoint.
“Our condition is good,” said one fighter, putting a heaping spoonful of sugar into his steaming tea. “How about yours?” A giant face of the rebels’ leader — Abdullah Ocalan, now in a Turkish prison — has been painted on a nearby slope.
The rebel group, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or P.K.K., is at the center of a crisis between Turkey and Iraq that began when the group’s fighters killed 12 Turkish soldiers on Oct. 21, prompting Turkey, a NATO member, to threaten an invasion.
But the P.K.K. continues to operate casually here, in full view of Iraqi authorities. The P.K.K.’s impunity is rooted in the complex web of relationships and ambitions that began with the American-led invasion of Iraq more than four years ago, and has frustrated others with an interest in resolving the crisis — the Turks, Iraqis and the Bush administration.
The United States responded to the P.K.K. raid by putting intense pressure on Iraq’s Kurdish leaders who control the northern area where the rebels hide, with a senior State Department official delivering a rare rebuke last week over their “lack of action” in curbing the P.K.K.
But even with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice scheduled to visit Istanbul this week, Kurdish political leaders seemed in no hurry to act.
An all-out battle is out of the question, they argue, because the rugged terrain makes it impossible to dislodge them. [****]
“Closing the camps means war and fighting,” said Azad Jindyany, a senior Kurdish official in Sulaimaniya, a regional capital. “We don’t have the army to do that. We did it in the past, and we failed.”
But even logistical flows remain uninterrupted, despite the fact that Iraqi Kurdish leaders have some of the most precise and extensive intelligence networks in the country. As the war has worsened, the United States has come to depend increasingly on the Kurds as partners in running Iraq and as overseers of the one part of the country where some of their original aspirations are actually being met. [*****]
Iraqi Kurdish officials, for their part, appear to be politely ignoring American calls for action, saying the only serious solution is political, not military. They have taken their own path, allowing the guerrillas to exist on their territory, while at the same time quietly trying to persuade them to stop attacks.
“They have allowed the P.K.K. to be up there,” said Mark Parris, a former American ambassador to Turkey who is now at the Brookings Institution. “That couldn’t have happened without their permitting them to be there. That’s their turf. It’s as simple as that.”
The situation poses a puzzle to the United States, which badly wants to avert a new front in the war, but finds itself forced to choose between two trusted allies — Turkey, a NATO member whose territory is the transit area for most of its air cargo to Iraq, and the Kurds, their closest partners in Iraq. [****]
The United States “is like a man with two wives,” said one Iraqi Kurd in Sulaimaniya. “They quarrel, but he doesn’t want to lose either of them.”
Kurds are one of the world’s largest ethnic groups without a state, numbering more than 25 million, spread across Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Syria.
Most live in Turkey, which has curtailed their rights, fearing secession. The P.K.K. wants an autonomous Kurdish area in eastern Turkey, and has repeatedly attacked the Turkish military, and sometimes the civilian population, since the 1980s, in a conflict that has left more than 30,000 dead.
In this small town a short drive from the edge of rebel territory, and in Sulaimaniya, 55 miles to the south, it is business as usual. A political party affiliated with the rebel group is open and holding meetings. Pickup trucks zip in and out of the group’s territory, and a government checkpoint a short drive away from the area acts as a friendly tour guide. Its soldiers said they had waved through eight cars of journalists on one day last week.
Mala Bakhtyar, a senior member in the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, the party that governs this northeastern region, said there had been no explicit orders from Baghdad to limit the P.K.K., and scoffed at last week’s statement by the Iraqi prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, that Iraq would close the P.K.K.’s offices, saying they had already been shut long ago. [*****]
“They are guests, but they are making their living by themselves,” Mr. Bakhtyar said. “We don’t support them.”
He added: “We don’t agree with them. We don’t like to make a fight with Turkey.”
Fayeq Mohamed Goppy, a leader in the Kurdistan Democratic Solution Party, an offshoot of the P.K.K. that still operates freely, argues that Iraqi Kurdish leaders are only paying lip service to wanting the P.K.K. to leave. In reality, the politicians want the separatists around as protection against Sunni Arab extremists, who most Iraqi Kurds believe will move in if the P.K.K. leaves the mountains.
Noshirwan Mustafa, a prominent Kurdish leader, said the area was as impenetrable as the mountains in Pakistan where leaders of Al Qaeda and the Taliban are thought to be hiding. “For me, the P.K.K. is better than the Taliban,” he said.
Local Kurdish authorities have asked Mr. Goppy to keep a low profile, including canceling a planned conference in Erbil, he said, but otherwise have not limited his activities.
“They really don’t want P.K.K. to go,” he said in an interview in his home in Sulaimaniya. If the group is eliminated, the Iraqi Kurdish area “is a really small piece for eating, very easy to swallow.”
Mr. Parris argues that the Kurdish leader of northern Iraq, Massoud Barzani, ever astute, is holding onto the P.K.K. as a future bargaining chip with Turkey, and will not use it until he absolutely has to.
“The single most important piece of negotiating capital may very well be his ability to take care of the P.K.K.,” he said.
Mr. Jindyany said local authorities would be happy to get rid of them if they could, calling the situation a sword of Damocles for Iraqi Kurds.
Throughout its history in northern Iraq, which dates back to the early 1980s, under an agreement with Mr. Barzani, the P.K.K. has had contentious relations with Iraqi Kurdish leaders. It fought in their civil wars, against Mr. Barzani in 1997, and three years later, against Jalal Talabani, a powerful Kurd who is now the president of Iraq. [****]
But since the American invasion in 2003, the political landscape has changed. Iraqi Kurds, emboldened by their secure position, have stopped fighting each other and turned their attentions to other threats like Turkey, a state that has long oppressed its Kurdish population, and Islamic extremism from Baghdad.
This area of northern Iraq, which Iraqis call Kurdistan, in some ways eclipsed the P.K.K.’s struggle for an autonomous Kurdish area, Iraqi Kurds said.
“They were jealous of our autonomy,” said Goran Kader, a Communist Party leader in Sulaimaniya. “They wanted to do the same thing in Turkey.”
At the same time, the P.K.K. was reorganizing, after its leader, Mr. Ocalan, was captured in 1999, and a skilled group of military commanders took over day-to-day operations, said Aliza Marcus, the author of “Blood and Belief: The P.K.K. and the Kurdish Fight for Independence.”
The commanders were intent on military escalation, she said, and stepped up attacks, under Mr. Ocalan’s jailhouse orders, in part to remain relevant.
“They don’t want to be sidelined,” Ms. Marcus said. “That’s really what’s driven them since 2004,” when attacks resumed after a five-year cease-fire. “They want to say, ‘Turkish Kurds are important too — don’t think the Kurdish problem has been solved.’ ”
The ambush of Turkish soldiers on Oct. 21, which took place just a few miles from the Iraqi border, served the purpose perfectly.
Public sympathy in Raniya and Sulaimaniya is enormous, and the fighters procure supplies and health care here with ease. Fighters do not go to hospitals, for fear of standing out — the ones from Turkey speak a different Kurdish dialect — but are treated in doctors’ homes, said one former fighter, an Iraqi Kurd who was recruited at age 14.
“Their organization is everywhere,” said the fighter, who now works as a police officer for the main political party, after surrendering to local authorities in 2003. “Their members are everywhere.”
To Iraqi Kurds, Turkey’s approach is pure politics. There is no military solution to the problem of the P.K.K., they say, because the terrain would never permit victory, [***] and Turkey’s leaders know that.
The solution, Mr. Mustafa argued, lies with moderates in Turkey, who must push for an amnesty for the rebels. Militant Kurds, for their part, should take advantage of the political opening in Turkey — 20 Kurdish deputies are now serving in Parliament there.
“When you have the door to the Parliament open, why are you going to the caves?” he said.
To that aim, talks were held with intermediaries for the P.K.K., Mr. Bakhtyar said. Since then, the rebels have not attacked, and officials and security analysts say that if the quiet holds until Turkey’s prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, meets with Ms. Rice on Friday and with President Bush three days later, he might not be pressured into military action.
“Soon there will be snow,” Mr. Kader said. “The roads will be blocked. That will be that until next year.”
Alain Delaquérière contributed reporting from New York.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:05 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/world/asia/29PAKISTAN.html
October 29, 2007
Thousands Flee Strife in Northern Pakistan
By REUTERS [Pakistan] [south asia] [Pakistan as the new Afghanistan] [hydra central] [Pakistan seemingly teetering on the brink] [islamists, tribals, and jihadis striking back] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [followup] getting increasingly chaotic] [*****]
MINGORA, Pakistan, Oct. 28 (Reuters) — Thousands of Pakistanis are fleeing a northwestern town and outlying villages because they fear a showdown between the security forces and an Islamist militant Taliban-style movement, [****] residents said Sunday.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/world/asia/29PAKISTAN.html
October 29, 2007
Thousands Flee Strife in Northern Pakistan
By REUTERS [Pakistan] [south asia] [Pakistan as the new Afghanistan] [hydra central] [Pakistan seemingly teetering on the brink] [islamists, tribals, and jihadis striking back] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [followup] getting increasingly chaotic] [*****]
MINGORA, Pakistan, Oct. 28 (Reuters) — Thousands of Pakistanis are fleeing a northwestern town and outlying villages because they fear a showdown between the security forces and an Islamist militant Taliban-style movement, [****] residents said Sunday.
There was fierce fighting on Friday in the Swat Valley in the North-West Frontier Province between security forces and followers of a radical Muslim cleric, after the authorities sent more than 2,000 soldiers to counter growing militancy. [****]
In clashes on Sunday, 10 militants were killed by troops backed by helicopter gunships, said an army spokesman, Maj. Gen. Waheed Arshad.
At least 17 paramilitary soldiers and 4 civilians were killed Thursday in a suspected suicide attack near Mingora, [**]the valley’s main town.
The militants killed seven civilians and decapitated three soldiers and three policemen they had taken hostage on Friday in Matta, [****] a nearby town.
“Troops have their own mortars and have been firing at those militants,” General Arshad said. “Until such time as these people are evicted from the area and peace is restored and innocent people are given full security, I think this is going to continue.”
On Sunday, fighting flared in Charbagh, three miles west of Mingora, when suspected militants fired at paramilitary fighters.
Residents said tension was also rising in another town, Khwazakhela, 15 miles west of Mingora. “People are leaving their homes,” a frightened town resident said, speaking on the condition of anonymity for security reasons. “All shops and markets are closed.”
Badshah Gul Wazir, a top official at the provincial home ministry, said that he was unaware of the exodus from Khwazakhela, but that the atmosphere in Swat Valley was tense.
Swat, a scenic area close to Pakistan’s lawless tribal belt bordering Afghanistan, has experienced a surge in militant activity since Maulana Fazlullah, a pro-Taliban cleric, started an illegal FM radio station and urged his followers to fight to put Islamic Shariah law into effect.
Maulana Fazlullah is the de facto leader of a pro-Taliban group, Movement for the Implementation of Muhammad’s Shariah Law.
Authorities have blamed his militant followers for attacks on the security forces and bomb blasts in Swat, where they have been forcing residents to follow a strict Islamic code.
“The government should implement Shariah in Swat if it does not want fighting,” [*****] Muslim Khan, an aide to Maulana Fazlullah, told reporters on Saturday.
Pakistani tribal areas have been hotbeds of support for Al Qaeda and Taliban militants who have fled Afghanistan. [NS/Sherlock] ****]
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 09:04 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/weekinreview/28shane.html
October 28, 2007
The Nation
Spies Do a Huge Volume of Work in Invisible Ink
By SCOTT SHANE
WASHINGTON [bush white house] [nsc principals] [veep cheney’s office] [sec state Rice, sec def Gates, and the traditionalists] [versus] [veep cheney, supplemented by Abrams’s shop in NSC, some civilian dod employees] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [generally, traditionalist have been less embracing of potential pow abuse] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [the information flow in the runnup to the war] [political casualties fo war] [followup] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
THE splotches of black ink that block out words, sentences and sometimes whole pages of Valerie Plame Wilson’s new memoir, “Fair Game,” pose an irresistible challenge to readers: What did the Central Intelligence Agency not want us to know?

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/weekinreview/28shane.html
October 28, 2007
The Nation
Spies Do a Huge Volume of Work in Invisible Ink
By SCOTT SHANE
WASHINGTON [bush white house] [nsc principals] [veep cheney’s office] [sec state Rice, sec def Gates, and the traditionalists] [versus] [veep cheney, supplemented by Abrams’s shop in NSC, some civilian dod employees] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [generally, traditionalist have been less embracing of potential pow abuse] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [the information flow in the runnup to the war] [political casualties fo war] [followup] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
THE splotches of black ink that block out words, sentences and sometimes whole pages of Valerie Plame Wilson’s new memoir, “Fair Game,” pose an irresistible challenge to readers: What did the Central Intelligence Agency not want us to know?
So let’s play Guess the Redaction!
Right in the middle of Page 7, Ms. Wilson describes her first C.I.A. training class: “It looked like I was the [BLACK INK] by far.” Logic, and eyeballing the width of the splotch, tells me the word the vigilant censors have kept from me has got to be “youngest.”
That would make sense, because the agency has used its obliterating markers to remove all proof of Ms. Wilson’s long covert service, including the year she arrived at the agency (1985), and where she was first posted (Greece).
I’m not just guessing about those details. The publisher, Simon & Schuster, has appended an 80-page afterword by a journalist that essentially unredacts the redactions, giving many of the facts that the C.I.A.’s Publications Review Board cut from Ms. Wilson’s text. [***] Unlike Ms. Wilson, the journalist, Laura Rozen, never signed an agreement to have her words vetted by the agency.
Nothing expresses American ambivalence about government secrecy as vividly as the old Washington craft of redaction, [****] the selective removal of passages from once-secret papers or books by spies. It is the bureaucratic equivalent of lingerie, covering the very parts you most want to see.
In every nook of the national security agencies, redactors labor anonymously. The federal Information Security Oversight Office says 460 million pages of previously classified records have been made public since 1996, usually after a markup by the overworked gnomes of declassification. [*******]
The redactors sometimes slip. Before the days of e-mail, it was occasionally possible to make out imperfectly deleted passages of a document by holding it up to a light. More recently, journalists receiving electronic documents have been thrilled to learn that a mere mouse-click can restore some redactions, as one researcher, Russ Kick of TheMemoryHole.org, discovered with a Justice Department diversity report in 2003.
In 2005, with such mishaps in mind, the National Security Agency published a handy 14-page guide: “Redacting With Confidence: How to Safely Publish Sanitized Reports.”
Such sanitizing is so subjective that a document rarely is redacted the same way twice. The National Security Archive at George Washington University, a prolific requester of declassified documents, has sometimes managed to obtain a complete page by requesting it from two agencies. The first redactor decides the top half of the page is too dangerous for release; the second redactor decides to delete the bottom half. It all becomes public. [****]
“There’s no shortage of absurd and even entertaining redactions,” said Steven Aftergood, director of the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists.
Mr. Aftergood said that publishing a book that shows its deletions dates at least to 1974, when “The C.I.A. and the Cult of Intelligence” by Victor L. Marchetti and John D. Marks appeared with 168 redactions on view.
More recently, Gary Berntsen showed readers the deletions from his book, “Jawbreaker,” about his role in the hunt for Osama bin Laden in 2001. First, however, he sued the agency over its editing, recounting in court papers that when he first told Kyle (Dusty) Foggo, then the C.I.A.’s executive director, of his book plans, Mr. Foggo objected. “We will have no more books,” Mr. Foggo told him, according to Mr. Berntsen’s lawsuit. “I will redact the [expletive] out of your book so no one wants to read it.” [******]
Aggrieved spy-authors are not the only critics of the redactors’ heavy hand. Senator Pat Roberts, a Kansas Republican who is usually friendly toward the spy agency, grumbled publicly about its editing of the 2004 Senate report on pre-Iraq-war intelligence.
“If the agency were classifying basically an elementary book and the book had, ‘See Spot run,’ it would redact ‘Spot,’ ” Mr. Roberts said.
But why would the C.I.A. cut out of Ms. Wilson’s “Fair Game” that she joined the agency in 1985, a fact noted in the Congressional Record? Was the “Alice in Wonderland” approach, as Ms. Wilson describes it, an act of vengeance or merely of incompetence?
Neither, the agency’s deputy director, Stephen R. Kappes explained in a 34-page court filing that lays out the C.I.A.’s view. Harm to intelligence sources by a disclosure in the media is compounded if the agency, in effect, confirms it, he wrote. The agency, after all, sought a criminal investigation of the leak of Ms. Wilson’s covert C.I.A. employment, reflecting its concern about her overseas agents.
“Intelligence sources would note that the C.I.A. was willing to confirm publicly a clandestine human intelligence source’s involvement with the C.I.A.,” Mr. Kappes wrote. Agents, or future potential agents, “could decide that the risks are too great to cooperate with the C.I.A.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:35 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102601866.html
Putin's Guessing Games
By Jim Hoagland
Sunday, October 28, 2007; B07 [oped] [columnist] [putin’s shades of Josef Stalin] [authoritarian-ization of Russia] [former USSR] [*******]
MOSCOW -- Put Iowa and New Hampshire on the back burner for a moment: Election fever also grips Russia, which chooses a new Duma in December and a president in March.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102601866.html
Putin's Guessing Games
By Jim Hoagland
Sunday, October 28, 2007; B07 [oped] [columnist] [putin’s shades of Josef Stalin] [authoritarian-ization of Russia] [former USSR] [*******]
MOSCOW -- Put Iowa and New Hampshire on the back burner for a moment: Election fever also grips Russia, which chooses a new Duma in December and a president in March.
Pollsters, analysts and Duma members are furiously debating two questions: What exact outcome will Vladimir Putin choose for these elections? And when will he communicate it to them and to the world? [****] The only sure thing is that Putin will keep everyone guessing as long as it suits him.
This is not the way the Kremlin portrays its version of "sovereign democracy," but it is not far from it either. When I encounter Vladislav Surkov, President Putin's chief political strategist and ideologue, he assures me that Russian democracy "is going in the right direction," pauses two beats, smiles and adds, "step by step." [*******]
Surkov, an urbane and swift political thinker who could hold his own in any system, has been a key figure in the Kremlin's successful effort to build sham political parties to fragment the Duma election results and then make sure that this show parliament does exactly as Putin wants. [****]In Russia today, politics is "the Kremlin by other means," Muscovites tell a visiting American.
Putin's total domination of the political landscape is remarkable by any standards, including those of landslide-winning democrats in the West or Third World despots. Putin is "the Decider" in ways that George W. Bush can only imagine. [*****]
Even more startling is the fact that most Russians have willingly ceded all this power to him without having any clear picture of how he intends to use it. Trained by the KGB to hide his emotions, his plans and even his identity, Putin now hides his intentions from his nation and the world while his rule floats comfortably on a sea of energy reserves and revenue. [******]
The president builds up potential successors and casts them aside to bring forward, without explanation, new, unknown candidates. He hints that he will crown himself prime minister instead of changing the constitution so he could serve a third presidential term -- and then lets aides suggest that the prime minister's job is not big enough for Putin's talents after all.
It is accepted here that the choices of the next president, prime minister and governing party are solely Putin's to make. [****] The two looming elections will serve as a single referendum on Putin's past and future control, in whatever form he decides it will take.
He keeps other nations guessing, too. Putin tells Bush, France's Nicolas Sarkozy and other foreign leaders in private that, like them, he wants to keep Iran from getting a nuclear weapon. Then, without warning, he publicly denies that there is evidence that Iran seeks a nuclear weapon and leaves a gulping Sarkozy to explain the contradiction at a joint news conference.
(The Kremlin is under no illusion about Iran's nuclear intentions, I was told here. But Putin doubts that Tehran will be able to turn enriched uranium into a usable weapon. However implausible this view seems, Putin's statement was intended to buy time and space for a negotiated outcome. Or so it is guessed here.) In Kennebunkport three months ago, Putin and Bush privately agreed that U.S.-Russia relations would not be made hostage to their overlapping election seasons. Putin has since voiced a stream of complaints, demands and even threats against the United States and its allies that have solidified his public approval ratings, which are close to 80 percent.
This is no longer merely the trained espionage agent once described in this column as " the man with the mirror" to convey his ability to get others to see him as they wanted him to appear -- to look, for example, into his eyes and see a good soul.
This is Putin Unplugged, a domineering and entrenched ruler seeking revenge for the Bush administration's early decision to marginalize Russia by abrogating or ignoring arms-control treaty commitments to Moscow.
Most leaders keep options open as long as possible, especially when avoiding lame-duck status. But Putin openly enjoys toying with allies and opponents. He continues playing the game long after he has won, for it is the game itself that he loves.
Putin has not kept what I think of as the Kennebunkport Kompact. But Bush will be unable to uphold it in the U.S. campaign season. Who lost Russia is an unfair and idiotic question in many ways. But I doubt that the Democratic (and perhaps Republican) nominee will refrain from asking it. [******]
jimhoagland@washpost.com
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:35 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102601867.html
Walking Into Iran's Trap
By David Ignatius
Sunday, October 28, 2007; B07 [oped] [columnist] [bush administration’s fumbling of the Iran mess] [it’s getting scary out there] [*****]
ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates -- Is the United States going to war with Iran? That's what a Lebanese businessman here wants to know from a visiting American. If it's war, he doesn't want to make a big new investment in the region.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102601867.html
Walking Into Iran's Trap
By David Ignatius
Sunday, October 28, 2007; B07 [oped] [columnist] [bush administration’s fumbling of the Iran mess] [it’s getting scary out there] [*****]
ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates -- Is the United States going to war with Iran? That's what a Lebanese businessman here wants to know from a visiting American. If it's war, he doesn't want to make a big new investment in the region.
You hear versions of this same question throughout the Middle East, as Washington and Tehran escalate their campaign of threats and counter threats. President Bush's loose talk of World War III doesn't seem to be deterring the Iranians, but it's scaring the heck out of America's allies in the region. Some talk as if war is almost inevitable. [****]
Slow down, everybody. The Bush administration should stop issuing warnings and ultimatums that could force military action. Iran should get the message that the West -- including Russia [****]-- is serious about stopping Iran from producing nuclear weapons.
This isn't a Tehran intersection, where drivers can go full tilt because they know someone will stop at the last minute. This confrontation could actually result in a crackup because of miscalculations and misunderstood signals. [*****]
If we look at what's going on behind the scenes in the two capitals, we can begin to disentangle the strands of this crisis. First, the military option: Despite all the saber rattling from Bush and Vice President Cheney, the United States doesn't have good military choices now -- and the Iranians know it. [*******] That's one reason they are being so provocative; they believe that a U.S. military strike would hurt America more than Iran.
Here's how one Gulf official sums up the problems with use of force against Iran: "When you look at it seriously, what's the objective and what are the consequences? People talk about a bombing campaign, but in six weeks of bombing in the Gulf War in 1991, you didn't take out the [Iraqi] Scud missiles. If the Iranians fire a missile across the Gulf, what happens to the price of oil? Or suppose they sink a tanker in the Gulf. And then they have Hezbollah, they have sleeper cells. What is your target?" [******]
Many Arabs argue that the Iranians actually want America to attack. [***] Politically, that would help the hard-liners rally support. And militarily, it would lure the United States onto a battlefield where its immense firepower wouldn't do much good. The Iranians could withdraw into the maze of their homeland and keep firing off their missiles -- exacting damage on the West's economy and, most important, its will to fight. [I suspect true believers such as Ahmadinejad wish to hasten the end of time according to their deranged faith in the emergence of the hidden imam (or the rapture for that matter)] [that’s one reason I feel relatively good about those actually in power behind Ahmadinejad] [they are likely secular and selfish—they want to live] [if I’m right, odds are they will use Ahmadinejad only until he ceases to serve their interests] [****]
That's the lesson for Muslim warriors of the Iraq and Lebanon wars: Draw your adversaries deep into terrain that you control; taunt them into starting a war they can't finish. I'm told that the Syrian military, for example, is now changing its doctrine to fight an asymmetric guerrilla war against Israel that it can win, Hezbollah-style, rather than a conventional war it would certainly lose. [*******]
Behind the scenes in Tehran, another drama is playing out, as rivals jockey for control of the Islamic Republic. [****] President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad makes the most noise, so people wrongly tend to assume he's in control. [****] In fact, he faces growing resistance, starting with former president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. Sources tell me that Rafsanjani's allies have been advising officials in Europe and the Middle East that Ahmadinejad is weak and vulnerable. [************] The hard-liners have counterattacked by installing a new head of the Revolutionary Guard Corps who has written on revitalizing the Islamic revolution worldwide. In another dangerous move, the Guard's militant al-Quds Force was recently given responsibility for defending much of Iran's coastline. [also, they jockeyed former national-security adviser out of way recently and placed in his stead a harder lined apparachik] [*******]
The Bush administration's announcement last week of sanctions against the Revolutionary Guard was America's version of asymmetric warfare. By using its control of global finance to exacerbate the split in Iranian politics, the United States is wielding its strongest weapon to challenge its adversary at the weakest spot.
Bush administration officials, for all their bellicose rhetoric, still hope that diplomatic pressure -- backed by ever-tighter economic sanctions -- will persuade Iran to compromise. [that’s heartening to hear] [the problem is the neocons are patiently awaiting the spot to move] [**] The key to this diplomatic campaign is Russia, which still seems to be playing a positive role. According to an informed source, during President Vladimir Putin's visit to Tehran this month he told the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, that Russia supports the Security Council demand that Iran stop enriching uranium. Putin sketched a proposal for "serious negotiations on a long-term settlement," the source said. Khamenei, in response, "promised to look at this thoroughly."
Military action would be irrational for both sides. But that doesn't mean it won't happen. I wish the Bush administration could see that with each step it takes closer to conflict, it is walking toward a well-planned trap.
The writer is co-host ofPostGlobal, an online discussion of international issues. His e-mail address isdavidignatius@washpost.com.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:34 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102601862.html
Free Elections Come First
By Robert Kagan
Sunday, October 28, 2007; B07 [oped] [columnist] [the generalized argument that has underlay USFP for decades: economic liberalization necessarily leads to political liberalization] [now the neocons—who once were part of said conventional wisdom—now having to alter the equation] [explaining Russia’s backsliding and preparing to put
Venezeuala in crosshairs] [***********]
During the slavery controversy of the 1850s, Northerners who opposed confronting the South argued for letting nature take its course. Slavery was doomed, they argued, because it could not spread where the climate was inhospitable to cotton and because the atavistic slave system would inevitably be overtaken by industrialization.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102601862.html
Free Elections Come First
By Robert Kagan
Sunday, October 28, 2007; B07 [oped] [columnist] [the generalized argument that has underlay USFP for decades: economic liberalization necessarily leads to political liberalization] [now the neocons—who once were part of said conventional wisdom—now having to alter the equation] [explaining Russia’s backsliding and preparing to put
Venezeuala in crosshairs] [***********]
During the slavery controversy of the 1850s, Northerners who opposed confronting the South argued for letting nature take its course. Slavery was doomed, they argued, because it could not spread where the climate was inhospitable to cotton and because the atavistic slave system would inevitably be overtaken by industrialization.
Abraham Lincoln called these "lullaby" arguments. He agreed that slavery could not compete in the long run, but he feared slaveholders could adapt for a time and even thrive. Slavery had seemed doomed in the 1790s, too, until Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin, and then it had boomed. The Industrial Revolution could produce new ways to make slavery profitable. It would take the will of men, not nature, to bring down this horrific human invention.
This old debate ought to sound familiar, for we have been having it again over the surprising resilience of autocracy in China, Russia, Venezuela and elsewhere. It wasn't supposed to be this resilient. [******]After the Cold War, many insisted that in a globalized economy, nations had to liberalize to compete and that economic liberalization would produce political liberalization. As national economies approached a certain level of per capita income, growing middle classes would demand legal and political power, which in turn would provide the basis for democracy. Some pundits pointed to the desirability of "liberal autocracy" -- the dictator who could steer his nation through the necessary stages of development until stable democracy could take hold.
The economic determinists shared two common traits. One was an abiding belief in the inevitability of human progress, the belief that history moves in only one direction -- a faith born in the Enlightenment but given new life by the fall of communism. The other was a prescription for patience and restraint. Rather than confront autocracies and demand that they hold free and fair elections, it was better to enmesh them in the global economy, support the rule of law and the creation of stronger state institutions, and let the processes of development do their work. In the long dialectical struggle of human history between liberalism and various forms of autocracy, a struggle driven by the innate human desire for "recognition," liberal democracy was simply destined to win.
Maybe that is true in the long run. But for now, it hasn't worked out as predicted. Rather than reforming themselves or withering in the globalized world, autocracies have been adapting. In Russia and China, booming economies based on expanding international commerce have not undermined but strengthened autocrats. Richer authoritarian governments monopolize television and radio stations and keep a grip on Internet traffic, with eager help from foreign corporations. The growing Russian and Chinese middle classes appear willing to keep their noses out of politics so long as the money keeps rolling in and the penalty for political activity remains imprisonment or death. As the scholars Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and George W. Downs have observed, it is "an ominous and poorly appreciated fact" that "economic growth, rather than being a force for democratic change in tyrannical states, can sometimes be used to strengthen oppressive regimes." [**********]
Democracy experts have recently exposed other popular myths, including the widespread conviction that it is a mistake to push for elections in nations that have not first developed the rule of law or strong state institutions. In an important recent essay in the Journal of Democracy, the Carnegie Endowment's Thomas Carothers concludes that, on the evidence of the past two decades, it has proved almost impossible to establish the rule of law and strong state institutions in non-democratic countries. [wow] [isn’t this turning the old Huntington thesis on its head] [*******]
Autocrats create state power over which they can exercise a monopoly, like the security forces. But they are the enemy of impartial administrative institutions that a developing society needs and that are essential for liberalism. Rather than strengthen the state, "autocrats habitually misuse the state." They keep institutions weak, unthreatening and under their control. [********]
The same is true of the rule of law. Minxin Pei, another Carnegie scholar, once had high hopes for the rule of law in China. Today he sees a "predatory" ruling oligarchy more interested in holding power and enriching itself than in building an impartial legal system. And it's not just China. As Carothers concludes, "The idea that rule-of-law development under autocracy is a natural precursor to democracy gets the story backwards." It is "the lack of democracy" in many countries that prevents the rule of law from taking root. "Liberal autocracy" is mostly a myth. "For every Lee Kwan Yew" of Singapore, there are "dozens or even hundreds of rapacious, repressive autocrats . . . for whom the rule of law represents a straitjacket to be avoided at all costs." [*******]
The fact is, elections do matter. As Marc F. Plattner argues in a new book, "Democracy Without Borders?" free elections may not guarantee liberalism, but liberalism cannot exist without free elections. [*****] This will not be welcome news for those who'd rather believe that autocracy would simply vanish without any great effort on the part of the democracies. But both the experts and the evidence before our eyes have pulled away the props from this lullaby argument. Passivity in the face of tyranny will not suffice. [neoconservative mantra still in tact: democracy can be spread from the barrel of a gun] [***********]
Robert Kagan, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and transatlantic fellow at the German Marshall Fund, writes a monthly column for The Post.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:33 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701077.html
Act on the Shield Law
The Senate majority leader has two good choices.
Sunday, October 28, 2007; B06 [editorial] [media shield law] [obviously, the major newspapers are for it] [********]
THE MOMENT of truth has come for the Free Flow of Information Act. After passing the House with a veto-proof majority this month, the bill that would extend protection of the relationship between journalists and their sources to the federal level awaits a decision on a course of action from Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.). Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) has placed two options on the Senate calendar for Mr. Reid's consideration; he needs to pick one.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701077.html
Act on the Shield Law
The Senate majority leader has two good choices.
Sunday, October 28, 2007; B06 [editorial] [media shield law] [obviously, the major newspapers are for it] [********]
THE MOMENT of truth has come for the Free Flow of Information Act. After passing the House with a veto-proof majority this month, the bill that would extend protection of the relationship between journalists and their sources to the federal level awaits a decision on a course of action from Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.). Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) has placed two options on the Senate calendar for Mr. Reid's consideration; he needs to pick one.
The House bill that passed 398 to 21 would compel the disclosure of sources in federal court only to prevent bodily harm or death, to identify a person who unlawfully revealed a business trade secret or "nonpublic personal information," or to prevent a terrorist attack on the United States or harm to national security. [****] The Senate bill applies to confidential sources except if they were eyewitnesses to crimes or if disclosure would prevent a terrorist attack or bodily harm. While there are other distinctions between the two proposals, we support both of them. The Washington Post Co. continues to lobby actively for a shield law.
In recent years, more than 40 reporters have been taken to federal court and questioned about their sources, notes and reports in civil and criminal cases. Journalists have had to lawyer up after stories on steroid use in baseball and the Wen Ho Lee spy case. Currently, 49 states and the District of Columbia have shield laws or court decisions that protect journalists from being compelled to reveal their sources. There's no such protection at the federal level. Attorney general nominee Michael B. Mukasey's contention that tinkering with internal Justice Department guidelines is the way to go is a non-starter. [***]
And so we wait for Mr. Reid. He could elect for a House-Senate conference committee that would hash out a single bill that would go back to both chambers for a vote. The likelihood of that happening is small since there have been no conference committees in this Congress. Or Mr. Reid could call a vote on the House bill, which would go directly to the president for his signature. We urge Mr. Reid to move on this quickly. Federal prosecutors should turn to the media as a last resort -- not as the first stop.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:32 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/opinion/28dowd.html
October 28, 2007
Op-Ed Columnist
W.M.D. in Iran? Q.E.D.
By MAUREEN DOWD [oped] [columnist] [dowd’s recent rant on veep cheney] [once she gets ahold of something, she doesn’t easily let go] [but as so often the case with dowd, very funny] [*****]
TIM RUSSERT: Mr. Vice President, welcome to “Meet the Press.”
VICE PRESIDENT DICK CHENEY: Good morning, Tim.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/opinion/28dowd.html
October 28, 2007
Op-Ed Columnist
W.M.D. in Iran? Q.E.D.
By MAUREEN DOWD [oped] [columnist] [dowd’s recent rant on veep cheney] [once she gets ahold of something, she doesn’t easily let go] [but as so often the case with dowd, very funny] [*****]
TIM RUSSERT: Mr. Vice President, welcome to “Meet the Press.”
VICE PRESIDENT DICK CHENEY: Good morning, Tim.
RUSSERT: How close are we to war with Iran?
CHENEY: Well, I think we are in the final stages of diplomacy, obviously. We have done virtually everything we can with respect to carrots, if you will. It’s time for squash. Not to mention mushrooms, clouds of them.
RUSSERT: But you squashed Iraq and that didn’t work out so well.
CHENEY: Iraq will be fine, Tim. It just needs a firmer hand. We learned that lesson. [****] We’re not going to get hung up on democracy this time. (Expletive) purple thumbs.
RUSSERT: Isn’t Secretary Rice still pushing carrots for Iran? [circumstantial evidence of factionalism about which I’ve written in nsc book] [****]
CHENEY: The more carrots Condi feeds ’em, the better they’ll be able to see the bombs coming.
RUSSERT: First you threatened to take action if Iran built a nuclear weapon. Now you’re threatening to take action if Iran knows how to build a nuclear weapon. What’s next? [****] You threaten to take action if Ahmadinejad dresses up as a nuclear weapon for Halloween?
CHENEY: Well, the difficulty here is, each time he has rejected what he was called upon to do by the international community. I’m not sure now, no matter what he says, that anyone would believe him. He’s pretending he doesn’t have W.M.D., just like Saddam. [***]
RUSSERT: But Saddam didn’t have W.M.D.
CHENEY: He did, Tim.
RUSSERT: He did?
CHENEY: Ever wonder what happened to them?
RUSSERT: What happened to them?
CHENEY: Think about it, Tim.
RUSSERT: The New York Times reported yesterday that the suspected nuclear reactor in Syria bombed by Israeli jets was well under construction in 2003, the same year we went to war with Syria’s neighbor Iraq. Did we go after the wrong country?
CHENEY: Syria is not a country, Tim. It’s a way station run by an eye doctor. [***]
RUSSERT: Conservatives are tossing around some lock-and-load language. The president is talking about Iran sparking a “nuclear holocaust” and World War III. Giuliani adviser Norman Podhoretz thinks we’re in World War IV. Shouldn’t you at least give the new sanctions against Iran a chance to work? [podhoretz has said the U.S. should attack Iran as soon as logistically feasible] [***]
CHENEY: Oh, we have, Tim. The sanctions were announced Thursday. It’s now Sunday. I think things have gotten so bad inside Iran, from the standpoint of the Iranian people, my belief is we will, in fact, be greeted as liberators.
RUSSERT: But what if your analysis is not correct — again? Let’s put up on the screen part of an interview The New York Times’s Thom Shanker did with the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen: “With America at war in two Muslim countries, he said, attacking a third Islamic nation in the region ‘has extraordinary challenges and risks associated with it.’ The military option, he said, should be a last resort.” Your own chairman of the Joint Chiefs does not think the military can handle a third war. [*****]
CHENEY: If Admiral Mullen wants to be Admiral Sullen, that’s his business. I’m not going to be a defeatist or question the courage of our fighting men. [*****]
RUSSERT: Critics say that if you attack Iran, there will be riots in every Muslim capital, the Iranians will flood Iraq with more explosives and money for the Shiite militias. They say you’ll only end up making more enemies for America, and our troops.
CHENEY: Why don’t we just give the Islamofascists Sudetenland, Tim? Peace in our time.
RUSSERT: The Europeans are upset that you might start another war in their backyard.
CHENEY: (Rolling his eyes and muttering under his breath) Eurappeasers.
RUSSERT: An Iranian spokesman dismissed the new U.S. sanctions as “worthless and ineffective” and said they were “doomed to fail as before.” And Gen. Mohammad Ali Jafari, the head of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards — a group you have accused of proliferating weapons of mass destruction — also warned that his forces would respond with an “even more decisive” strike if attacked.
CHENEY: Don’t worry about General Ali Baba, Tim. We gave the Israelis his home address. [*******]
RUSSERT: How will you even know where to bomb, given that all the experts say the Iranians have hidden their real nuclear facilities underground?
CHENEY: Can you say magic carpet bombing, Tim? We didn’t build those bunker busters just to stack ’em up in a warehouse in North Dakota.
RUSSERT: It’s so close to the next election, Mr. Vice President, shouldn’t you just keep on the diplomatic track and let the next president make this decision?
CHENEY: You really want Rudy Giuliani playing with the nuclear button, Tim? Now, that’s insane. [******]
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:31 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/opinion/28sun4.html
October 28, 2007
Editorial Observer
What Part of ‘Illegal’ Don’t You Understand?
By LAWRENCE DOWNES [oped] [a sort of interesting look at the Lou Dobbs ation of America on immigration] [clearly, many Americans are just tired of it] [however, a little ugliness has crept in along the way—probably from the usual suspects] [CNN just announced today that they’re moving Dobbs to a more desireable time slot] [feeding on itself] [a bunch of CNN winnies are using Dobbsspeak in a hilarious example of market driven media] [***********]
I am a human pileup of illegality. I am an illegal driver and an illegal parker and even an illegal walker, having at various times stretched or broken various laws and regulations that govern those parts of life. The offenses were trivial, and I feel sure I could endure the punishments — penalties and fines — and get on with my life. Nobody would deny me the chance to rehabilitate myself. Look at Martha Stewart, illegal stock trader, and George Steinbrenner, illegal campaign donor, to name two illegals whose crimes exceeded mine.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/opinion/28sun4.html
October 28, 2007
Editorial Observer
What Part of ‘Illegal’ Don’t You Understand?
By LAWRENCE DOWNES [oped] [a sort of interesting look at the Lou Dobbs ation of America on immigration] [clearly, many Americans are just tired of it] [however, a little ugliness has crept in along the way—probably from the usual suspects] [CNN just announced today that they’re moving Dobbs to a more desireable time slot] [feeding on itself] [a bunch of CNN winnies are using Dobbsspeak in a hilarious example of market driven media] [***********]
I am a human pileup of illegality. I am an illegal driver and an illegal parker and even an illegal walker, having at various times stretched or broken various laws and regulations that govern those parts of life. The offenses were trivial, and I feel sure I could endure the punishments — penalties and fines — and get on with my life. Nobody would deny me the chance to rehabilitate myself. Look at Martha Stewart, illegal stock trader, and George Steinbrenner, illegal campaign donor, to name two illegals whose crimes exceeded mine.
Good thing I am not an illegal immigrant. There is no way out of that trap. It’s the crime you can’t make amends for. Nothing short of deportation will free you from it, such is the mood of the country today. And that is a problem.
America has a big problem with illegal immigration, but a big part of it stems from the word “illegal.” It pollutes the debate. It blocks solutions. Used dispassionately and technically, there is nothing wrong with it. Used as an irreducible modifier for a large and largely decent group of people, it is badly damaging. And as a code word for racial and ethnic hatred, it is detestable. [*****]
“Illegal” is accurate insofar as it describes a person’s immigration status. About 60 percent of the people it applies to entered the country unlawfully. The rest are those who entered legally but did not leave when they were supposed to. The statutory penalties associated with their misdeeds are not insignificant, but neither are they criminal. You get caught, you get sent home.
Since the word modifies not the crime but the whole person, it goes too far. [*****]It spreads, like a stain that cannot wash out. It leaves its target diminished as a human, a lifetime member of a presumptive criminal class. People are often surprised to learn that illegal immigrants have rights. Really? Constitutional rights? But aren’t they illegal? Of course they have rights: they have the presumption of innocence and the civil liberties that the Constitution wisely bestows on all people, not just citizens.
Many people object to the alternate word “undocumented” as a politically correct euphemism, and they have a point. Someone who sneaked over the border and faked a Social Security number has little right to say: “Oops, I’m undocumented. I’m sure I have my papers here somewhere.”
But at least “undocumented” — and an even better word, “unauthorized” — contain the possibility of reparation and atonement, and allow for a sensible reaction proportional to the offense. [******] The paralysis in Congress and the country over fixing our immigration laws stems from our inability to get our heads around the wrenching change involved in making an illegal person legal. Think of doing that with a crime, like cocaine dealing or arson. Unthinkable!
So people who want to enact sensible immigration policies to help everybody — to make the roads safer, as Gov. Eliot Spitzer would with his driver’s license plan, or to allow immigrants’ children to go to college or serve in the military — face the inevitable incredulity and outrage. How dare you! They’re illegal. [*****] [another Dobbs ism: feigned moral outrage] [******]
Meanwhile, out on the edges of the debate — edges that are coming closer to the mainstream every day — bigots pour all their loathing of Spanish-speaking people into the word. Rant about “illegals” — call them congenital criminals, lepers, thieves, unclean — and people will nod and applaud. They will send money to your Web site and heed your calls to deluge lawmakers with phone calls and faxes. Your TV ratings will go way up.
This is not only ugly, it is counterproductive, paralyzing any effort toward immigration reform. Comprehensive legislation in Congress and sensible policies at the state and local level have all been stymied and will be forever, as long as anything positive can be branded as “amnesty for illegals.” [******]
We are stuck with a bogus, deceptive strategy — a 700-mile fence on a 2,000-mile border to stop a fraction of border crossers who are only 60 percent of the problem anyway, and scattershot raids to capture a few thousand members of a group of 12 million. [******]
None of those enforcement policies have a trace of honesty or realism. At least they don’t reward illegals, and that, for now, is all this country wants.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:30 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701335.html
NATION IN BRIEF
Sunday, October 28, 2007; A08
Antiwar Rallies Held In Cities Across U.S.
[public opinion] [anti-Iraq War protests] [they have been relatively minor to date] [clearly many Americans are tired of –Iraq] [bush administration’s conflation of –Iraq with global jihadis may come to haunt them] [*********]
SAN FRANCISCO -- In the largest of a series of war protests taking place in New York, Los Angeles and other U.S. cities, thousands of people called for a swift end to the war in Iraq as they marched through downtown San Francisco on Saturday, chanting and carrying signs that said "Wall Street Gets Rich, Iraqis and GIs Die" or "Drop Tuition Not Bombs."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701335.html
NATION IN BRIEF
Sunday, October 28, 2007; A08
Antiwar Rallies Held In Cities Across U.S.
[public opinion] [anti-Iraq War protests] [they have been relatively minor to date] [clearly many Americans are tired of –Iraq] [bush administration’s conflation of –Iraq with global jihadis may come to haunt them] [*********]
SAN FRANCISCO -- In the largest of a series of war protests taking place in New York, Los Angeles and other U.S. cities, thousands of people called for a swift end to the war in Iraq as they marched through downtown San Francisco on Saturday, chanting and carrying signs that said "Wall Street Gets Rich, Iraqis and GIs Die" or "Drop Tuition Not Bombs."
Labor union members, antiwar activists, members of the clergy and others rallied near City Hall before marching to Dolores Park. As part of the demonstration, protesters fell on Market Street as part of a "die-in" to commemorate the thousands of American soldiers and Iraqis who have died since the war began in March 2003.
No official head count of protesters was available. Organizers of the event estimated that about 30,000 people participated in San Francisco. It appeared that more than 10,000 attended the march.
Space Station Crew Inspects New Room
CAPE CANAVERAL -- Astronauts chose the name Harmony as they christened their spacious and sparkling addition to the international space station. The school-bus-size chamber will provide the station with air, electricity and water. Perhaps just as important, Harmony will provide extra living space for the three station residents. It is the craft's seventh section; the first was launched in 1998. The space station's crew will move Harmony to its permanent location after the shuttle Discovery leaves a week from now.
Contractor Denies Bribing Lawmaker
SAN DIEGO -- A defense contractor emphatically denied bribing then-Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-Calif.) when he spoke on the stand in his own defense. "I never bribed anyone," Brent Wilkes testified. "I never asked anyone to do anything for any reason other than that they believed in the projects." Wilkes has denied prosecutors' allegations that he bribed Cunningham with luxurious trips, meals and a rendezvous with prostitutes at a Hawaiian resort in exchange for help securing nearly $90 million in federal contracts. Wilkes blamed the shady dealings with Cunningham on his nephew Joel Combs and his former colleague Mitchell Wade, who pleaded guilty in 2006 to bribing Cunningham.
Purdue Honors Armstrong
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. -- Former astronaut Neil Armstrong addressed a crowd at the dedication of a new engineering building named in his honor at Purdue University, his alma mater. Armstrong, the first person to set foot on the moon, said the faculty, not the building's name, will make it valuable to students. Armstrong graduated from Purdue in 1955 with a degree in aeronautical engineering. Sixteen of Purdue's 22 graduates who became astronauts attended Saturday's dedication, including Gene Cernan, the last man to walk on the moon.
Dutch Officials Fault Lantos
Dutch lawmakers who recently visited the Guantanamo Bay military prison said they were offended by a testy exchange in Washington with a senior congressional Democrat. The lawmakers said that Rep. Tom Lantos (Calif.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told them that "Europe was not as outraged by Auschwitz as by Guantanamo Bay." Lantos, a Holocaust survivor, was responding to arguments that the United States should shut down the U.S. prison in Cuba, the lawmakers said. "You have to help us [in Afghanistan] because if it was not for us you would now be a province of Nazi Germany," Lantos said, according to the Dutch lawmakers. A spokeswoman for the Democrat said Lantos was not available and had no comment.
Cancel WWII Convictions, Army Urges
SEATTLE -- Black soldiers court-martialed 63 years ago in the rioting death of an Italian prisoner of war at Fort Lawton were unfairly denied access to their attorneys and investigative records and, therefore, their convictions should be overturned, the Army said. The decision could grant the soldiers honorable discharges, back pay and benefits. Forty-three black soldiers were tried in the 1944 death of POW Guglielmo Olivotto, in one of the largest courts-martial of World War II. Twenty-eight were found guilty of rioting and sentenced to as many as 25 years in prison.
MRSA Infection Shuts Down Schools
PIKEVILLE, Ky. -- A school district in eastern Kentucky with one confirmed case of antibiotic-resistant staph infection plans to shut down all 23 of its schools Monday, affecting about 10,300 students, to disinfect the facilities. One student of the Pike County school system was diagnosed in September as having been infected with MRSA, or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. The bacterial infection can be treated with other antibiotics, but without treatment, it can be deadly.
-- From News Services
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:29 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/world/europe/28russia.html
October 28, 2007
Weary of Highway Bribery, Russians Take On the Police
By CLIFFORD J. LEVY [Russia] [former ussr] [putin as strong Russian leader] [ethos] [delusions of grandeur still fueling Russia’s foreign policy] [Putin’s inexorable drive to smash democracy in his lifetime!] [use psci 350] [use ir text] [*****]
YEKATERINBURG, Russia, Oct. 25 — Kirill Formanchuk, like almost everyone who drives in Russia, was used to being pulled over by the police and cited for seemingly trumped up infractions. Yet instead of resigning himself to paying a bribe, he turned traffic stops into roadside tribunals, interrogating officers about their grasp of the law, recording the events and filing formal complaints about them. [that will teach him] [***]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/world/europe/28russia.html
October 28, 2007
Weary of Highway Bribery, Russians Take On the Police
By CLIFFORD J. LEVY [Russia] [former ussr] [putin as strong Russian leader] [ethos] [delusions of grandeur still fueling Russia’s foreign policy] [Putin’s inexorable drive to smash democracy in his lifetime!] [use psci 350] [use ir text] [*****]
YEKATERINBURG, Russia, Oct. 25 — Kirill Formanchuk, like almost everyone who drives in Russia, was used to being pulled over by the police and cited for seemingly trumped up infractions. Yet instead of resigning himself to paying a bribe, he turned traffic stops into roadside tribunals, interrogating officers about their grasp of the law, recording the events and filing formal complaints about them. [that will teach him] [***]
And so it was that Mr. Formanchuk became a leader of a budding movement to uphold motorists’ rights in the face of police corruption, making him a not unfamiliar face when he went to a police station here two weeks ago [****] to register his car.
The next time he was heard from, he was in the hospital with severe injuries from a beating, and the resulting outcry in Yekaterinburg has caused an unexpected burst of civic activism across the country at a time when such sentiments appeared to have otherwise withered. [********]
Motorists’ groups have held demonstrations against the police in Moscow, St. Petersburg and Yekaterinburg, and an Internet posting in support of Mr. Formanchuk has received nearly 200,000 hits from around the country. Even the national television networks, which are under the Kremlin’s control and tend to ignore news that reflects poorly on the government, have begun to focus on what happened to Mr. Formanchuk on the night of Oct. 12 in an isolated jail cell. One channel called his treatment “outrageous.”
The affair, echoing the anger that erupted after the Rodney King case in the United States, suggests that resentment toward police misconduct is so widespread that the Russian government senses that it cannot immediately clamp down on the protests, as it usually does with the political opposition. Mr. Formanchuk has become a symbol for Russians who contend that the police are poorly educated, badly trained and allowed to operate with impunity.
“Everyone understands that this can happen to them, too,” Mr. Formanchuk, 24, said in an interview at a hospital in Yekaterinburg, where he is to remain for at least a month with brain and skull injuries. “Because in this country, we have a problem with the law.”
The tensions over the police in Russia have soared with the enormous growth in car ownership. There are 28 million cars now, three to four times more than at the end of Communism in 1991, experts estimate.
More cars mean more opportunities for the police to solicit bribes, in the view of motorists’ groups. The corruption also emboldens people to drive recklessly because they know they can skirt penalties by slipping money to an officer. (The typical bribe is $5 to $20.)
Police malfeasance has an especially corrosive effect on the public outlook toward government since here, as in most places, officers are among the most visible civil servants. The Kremlin, Parliament and the chief federal prosecutor regularly promise reforms, yet little has changed, as even those in government circles concede.
“It’s time for the law enforcement services to understand that the driving public — it’s a force,” said a commentary in the Yekaterinburg edition of Rossiyskaya Gazeta, the official government newspaper. “To reject cooperation with it, is not wise. Kirill Formanchuk, as we can see, is not going to give up.”
The motorist movement in Yekaterinburg, an industrial center about 900 miles east of Moscow, is still relatively nascent, and only a few elected officials have aligned themselves with Mr. Formanchuk. But in an indication of the repercussions of his case, law enforcement officials called a news conference to defend their performance and to accuse his supporters of inciting the public. [*****]
The officials said they were investigating what happened to Mr. Formanchuk, but they denied any police involvement. They said that after he showed up at the station to register his car, he acted belligerently toward officers, and was arrested. In his jail cell, he picked a fight with other detainees, who set on him, the officials said.
They said Mr. Formanchuk was a draft dodger with many serious traffic violations. “Mr. Formanchuk is provoking everybody — the organs of state power as well as ordinary citizens, as a result of which Formanchuk was beaten,” said a senior police official, Adam Bogdanovich. “In fact, he is not a law-abiding citizen.”
Asked whether the police had meted out revenge, Mr. Bogdanovich said, “Unfortunately, that is not the case.” [bodly speaks the truth] [*****]
He then clarified this comment by saying that there was no reason for revenge. While Mr. Formanchuk had filed complaints against the police and then posted them on the Internet, such activities did not influence police conduct, he said.
From the hospital, Mr. Formanchuk said the police charges were ridiculous. He said the conflict began when he tried to use his cellphone to capture video of his interaction with the officers, infuriating them. He said he did not know the identities of those who attacked him, but whether or not they were police officers in plainclothes, it was clear that officers on duty allowed the violence by ignoring his cries for help.
The arrest this month was not the first for Mr. Formanchuk, who was a city bureaucrat until he began working full time with his activist group, the Committee to Protect the Rights of Motorists. Last year, he garnered attention in Yekaterinburg by placing a sign on his Land Rover that resembled a license plate and said “Medved 01,” which means bear in Russian.
Officers detained him for the sign — which he said was legal because he had temporary registration and was waiting for a permanent one — and for not addressing many outstanding traffic violations. A judge ruled entirely in his favor, a remarkable verdict in a system that is typically stacked against defendants.
“After my first encounters with the police, I simply myself began to study the law, to read legal literature and court cases,” Mr. Formanchuk said. “And the more that I interacted with police officers, the more I understood that I knew more than them. They can oppose me, but they just don’t know anything. I go out and they stop me. O.K., I say, ‘Why are you stopping me? Let’s take out the law. Let’s look at the legal code. Let’s look at the orders that you need to follow. Let’s read them together. You will understand that you are not acting correctly.’”
Not everyone here approves of Mr. Formanchuk. The chairman of his activist group, Georgy Badyin, said some motorists for a time considered Mr. Formanchuk a showboat who courted controversy with the sign on his car. But Mr. Badyin added that now, people see Mr. Formanchuk in a different light.
“It’s not just that the driving public supports Kirill in this situation, but that they oppose the lawlessness of the traffic police, realizing that any one of them could be in Kirill’s place,” Mr. Badyin said.
That seemed to be the feeling on the streets of Yekaterinburg.
“Ask any driver, he will tell you many stories about police wrongdoing,” said Roman Belosheykin, owner of a van service. “They do not need a pretext. They say it’s a special action, and then they start making claims. They want money. And it’s that simple.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:28 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701384.html
Kremlin Seeks To Extend Its Reach in Cyberspace
Pro-Government Sites Gain Influence
By Anton Troianovski and Peter Finn
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, October 28, 2007; A01 [Russia] [former ussr] [putin as strong Russian leader] [ethos] [delusions of grandeur still fueling Russia’s foreign policy] [Putin’s inexorable drive to smash democracy in his lifetime!] [use psci 350] [use ir text] [*****]
MOSCOW -- After ignoring the Internet for years to focus on controlling traditional media such as television and newspapers, the Kremlin and its allies are turning their attention to cyberspace, which remains a haven for critical reporting and vibrant discussion in Russia's dwindling public sphere. [******]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701384.html
Kremlin Seeks To Extend Its Reach in Cyberspace
Pro-Government Sites Gain Influence
By Anton Troianovski and Peter Finn
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, October 28, 2007; A01 [Russia] [former ussr] [putin as strong Russian leader] [ethos] [delusions of grandeur still fueling Russia’s foreign policy] [Putin’s inexorable drive to smash democracy in his lifetime!] [use psci 350] [use ir text] [*****]
MOSCOW -- After ignoring the Internet for years to focus on controlling traditional media such as television and newspapers, the Kremlin and its allies are turning their attention to cyberspace, which remains a haven for critical reporting and vibrant discussion in Russia's dwindling public sphere. [******]
Allies of President Vladimir Putin are creating pro-government news and pop culture Web sites while purchasing some established online outlets known for independent journalism. [***] They are nurturing a network of friendly bloggers ready to disseminate propaganda on command. And there is talk of creating a new Russian computer network -- one that would be separate from the Internet at large and, potentially, much easier for the authorities to control.
"The attractiveness of the Internet as a free platform for free people is already dimming," said Iosif Dzyaloshinsky, a mass media expert at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow.
Putin addressed the question of Internet censorship during a national call-in show broadcast live on radio and television this month. "In the Russian Federation, no control is being exercised over the World Wide Web, over the Russian segment of the Internet," Putin said. "I think that from the point of view of technological solutions, that would not make any sense.
"Naturally, in this sphere, as in other spheres, we should be thinking about adhering to Russian laws, about making sure that child pornography is not distributed, that financial crimes are not committed," [naturally] [******] [*****] he continued. "But that is a task for the law enforcement agencies. Total control and the work of the law enforcement agencies are two different things."
Many people here say they believe Putin didn't mind a free Internet as long as it had weak penetration in Russia. But with 25 percent of Russian adults now online, up from 8 percent in 2002, cyberspace has become an issue of increasing concern for the government.
Some Russian Internet experts say a turning point came in 2004, when blogs and uncensored online publications helped drive a popular uprising in Ukraine after a pro-Moscow candidate was declared the winner of a presidential election. Days of street protests in the capital, Kiev, led to a new vote that brought a pro-Western politician into the presidency. [******]
Today, the Kremlin is ready with online forces of its own when street action begins.
On April 14, an opposition movement held a march in central Moscow that drew hundreds of people; police detained at least 170, including the leader of the march, chess star Garry Kasparov.
Pavel Danilin, a 30-year-old Putin supporter and blogger whose online icon is the fearsome robot of the "Terminator" movie, works for a political consulting company loyal to the Kremlin. He said he and his team, which included people from a youth movement called the Young Guard, quickly started blogging that day about a smaller, pro-Kremlin march held at the same time. [******] [sounds eerily similar to to Nazi and old Soviet chauvinists] [****]
They linked to one another repeatedly and soon, Danilin said, posts about the pro-Kremlin march had crowded out all the items about the opposition march on the Yandex Web portal's coveted ranking of the top five Russian blog posts.
"We played it beautifully," Danilin said.
In a lengthy article published online last fall, three Russian rights activists argued that a strident, vulgar and uniform pro-Kremlin ideology had so permeated blogs and chat rooms that it could only be the result of a coordinated campaign.
Putin's allies in the online world acknowledge that the Internet represents a challenge to the status quo in Russia, which has, since Soviet times, relied on state-controlled television to influence public opinion across the country's 11 time zones.
"You watch the first channel or the second channel and you can only see good things happening in Russia," said Andrei Osipov, the 26-year-old editor of the Web site of Nashi, a pro-Kremlin youth group, referring to national stations that back the Kremlin. "The Internet is the freest mass media. . . . There is competition between state and opposition organizations."
The Kremlin is also increasingly allying itself with privately run online outlets that foster a new ideal for life in today's Russia, one that is consumerist and uncompromisingly pro-Putin. [Karl Marx would weep: the state’s normative control] [******]
The main champion of this ideal is 28-year-old businessman Konstantin Rykov. The pearl of Rykov's media empire is the two-year-old Vzglyad ("View") online newspaper, which features a serious-looking news section with stories toeing the Kremlin line and a lifestyle section that covers the latest in luxury cars and interior design. Surveys rank Vzglyad as one of Russia's five most-visited news sites.
"Rykov is a man who created a good business on the government's view that it has to invest in ideology," said Anton Nossik, an Internet pioneer in Russia now in charge of blog development for Sup, an online media company. Nossik said that Vladislav Surkov, Putin's domestic political adviser, organized private funding for Rykov's projects.
Kremlin officials deny any involvement. "It is a general habit of everyone to connect every popular occurrence and success with the Kremlin," deputy Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov said when asked about Rykov. "In reality, it is not so."
In an interview, Rykov would not comment on his investors. A framed portrait of Surkov hung above his desk; Rykov is running for parliament on the list of the pro-Kremlin United Russia [****] party in elections slated for December. [****]
"The Vzglyad newspaper has created this appearance of a state publication for itself since the very beginning," Rykov said. "And from the perspective of business and selling ads, that's very good."
Allies of the Kremlin have also begun buying some of the companies that have helped make the Internet a bastion of free expression in Russia. Gazeta.ru, long the country's most respected online newspaper, was sold in December to a metals magnate and Putin loyalist.
And last October, Sup, which is owned by Alexander Mamut, a tycoon with ties to the Kremlin, bought the rights to develop the Russian-language segment of U.S.-based LiveJournal. The segment, with half a million users, is Russia's most popular blog portal.
"Mr. Rykov is pro-Kremlin. Mamut and Sup are pro-Kremlin. The social networks are all being bought by pro-Kremlin people," Ruslan Paushu, 30, a popular blogger who works for Rykov, said in an interview. "Everything's okay."
So far, Gazeta.ru has continued to publish articles critical of the Kremlin, and no widespread censorship has been reported on blogs run by Sup. But as the government wakes up to the Internet's potential, many of Putin's critics are growing nervous.
Prosecutors have begun to target postings on blogs or Internet chat sites, charging users with slander or extremism after they criticize Putin or other officials. Most such incidents have occurred outside Moscow, and federal officials deny that they signal any broader campaign to control the Internet.
"Personally, I am against developing and adopting a special law that would regulate the Internet," Leonid Reiman, minister of information technology and communications, said in a written response to questions. "The Internet has been always developing as a free medium, and it should remain as such."
But in July, Putin briefed his Security Council on plans to make Russia a global information leader by 2015. Russian news media reported that those plans included a new network apart from the global Internet and open only to former Soviet republics.
"To put it bluntly, we need to fight for the water mains," Gleb Pavlovsky, the Kremlin's foremost political consultant, said in an interview. "We need to fight for the central networks and for the audience segments that they reach."
Wolfgang Kleinwaechter, special adviser to the chairmen of the Internet Governance Forum, a group convened by the United Nations, said some Russian officials he has spoken to are considering a separate Internet, with Cyrillic domain names, and appear to be studying China's Internet controls. [two peas in a pod] [*****]
Peskov, the deputy presidential spokesman, said in an interview that a Russia-only Internet was still in the "investigative phase," adding, "I don't know if it's more than thinking aloud."
"It's not meant to get rid of the global network," he said. "It's a discussion of creating an addition."
For now, supporters as well as critics of Putin see the Kremlin doing something atypical: competing on more or less equal terms with its opponents.
"Certainly, there's the dark segment that is still saying words like 'prohibit' and 'limit,' " said Marat Guelman, who worked as a political consultant for the Kremlin until 2004, when he broke with the administration. But "what is happening on the Web vis-a-vis the authorities is very good," he added. "That is, they're trying to play the game."
That strategy is in contrast to the way Putin brought the independent television network NTV to heel at the beginning of his term, using highly publicized court cases and raids by heavily armed security forces.
Marina Litvinovich, a blogger who used to work for Pavlovsky, the Kremlin consultant, and now works for Kasparov's United Civil Front, said she is satisfied with the government's approach to the Internet because it forces Putin's allies to respond to criticism rather than simply ignore it.
She also argued that as the Kremlin consolidates political power, it has less incentive to come up with sophisticated online propaganda. "They're not really in need of particular creativity right now," she said.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:28 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-afghan-violence.html
October 28, 2007
80 Taliban Reported Killed in Afghanistan
By REUTERS
Filed at 9:47 a.m. ET [Afghanistan] [hydra] [insurgency] [pivotal 2007 when the Taliban and hydra mounted an important spring offensive into the summer] [some indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, many indications of backsliding] [much like –Iraq, Iran seems to be playing a proxy in Afghanistan] [more chaos] [bound to create even more distance between US and its principal NATO allies] [******]
KABUL (Reuters) - U.S.-led coalition and Afghan troops killed some 80 Taliban fighters in a six-hour battle after an ambush in southern Afghanistan, the U.S. military said on Sunday.

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-afghan-violence.html
October 28, 2007
80 Taliban Reported Killed in Afghanistan
By REUTERS
Filed at 9:47 a.m. ET [Afghanistan] [hydra] [insurgency] [pivotal 2007 when the Taliban and hydra mounted an important spring offensive into the summer] [some indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, many indications of backsliding] [much like –Iraq, Iran seems to be playing a proxy in Afghanistan] [more chaos] [bound to create even more distance between US and its principal NATO allies] [******]
KABUL (Reuters) - U.S.-led coalition and Afghan troops killed some 80 Taliban fighters in a six-hour battle after an ambush in southern Afghanistan, the U.S. military said on Sunday.
Taliban fighters opened fire on Saturday with machineguns and rocket-propelled grenades on the joint coalition and Afghan army patrol from a trench near Musa Qala in Helmand province, the most important town held by insurgents.
"The combined patrol immediately returned fire, maneuvered, and employed close air support resulting in almost seven dozen Taliban fighters killed during a six hour engagement," the U.S. military statement said.
Such large pitched battles are relatively rare in Afghanistan, where the Taliban prefer to "shoot and scoot" before air strikes can be called in. [why did they allow themselves to be slaughtered like that?] [what caused them to expose themselves to U.S. air power?] [****]
But analysts say the insurgents are expected to fight hard to defend Musa Qala, in the north of Helmand, [****] where they are heavily dug in after taking control of the town in February.
A Taliban official in the town denied any insurgents had been killed around Musa Qala and accused foreign forces of dropping bombs on civilians.
THREE HANGED
The Taliban hanged three men in Musa Qala on Saturday, accusing them of spying for foreign forces, another Taliban official in the town said. Two were strung up at the entrance to the town and the other in the town centre. [yesterday report of beheading of 3 others] [*****]
Mainly British troops are engaged in almost daily gunbattles further south in the province, an area of harsh, barren desert sliced through by the Helmand River which provides a lush strip of fertile land where more than half the world's opium is grown.
Foreign military forces say they are capable of taking back Musa Qala at any time, but do not want to do so until an Afghan civilian administration and security forces are ready to immediately move in and take control of the town.
In the meantime, U.S. and Afghan forces have launched a series of probing reconnaissance patrols around Musa Qala.
Elsewhere, several Taliban insurgents were killed after an ambush on U.S.-led coalition troops in neighboring Kandahar province, the U.S. military said.
NATO-led forces are also conducting operations in Helmand and Kandahar, but unlike the U.S.-led coalition force, do not release Taliban casualty figures.
Afghanistan has seen a sharp rise in violence since the Taliban regrouped and re-launched their offensive against the Afghan government and its Western backers two years ago.
More than 7,000 people have been killed in that time.
U.S.-led and Afghan forces ousted the Taliban from power in late 2001 after the hard-line Islamist movement refused to hand over al Qaeda leaders following the September 11 attacks on the United States.
Copyright 2007 Reuters Ltd.

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:26 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/world/asia/28weapons.html
October 28, 2007
Afghan Ex-Militia Leaders Hoard Arms
By KIRK SEMPLE [Afghanistan] [hydra] [insurgency] [pivotal 2007 when the Taliban and hydra mounted an important spring offensive into the summer] [some indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, many indications of backsliding] [much like –Iraq, Iran seems to be playing a proxy in Afghanistan] [more chaos] [bound to create even more distance between US and its principal NATO allies] [******]
KABUL, Afghanistan, Oct. 27 — Many former militia commanders and residents in northern Afghanistan have been hoarding illegal weapons in violation of the country’s disarmament laws, giving the excuse that they face a spreading Taliban insurgency from the south that government forces alone are too frail to stop, Afghan and Western officials say.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/world/asia/28weapons.html
October 28, 2007
Afghan Ex-Militia Leaders Hoard Arms
By KIRK SEMPLE [Afghanistan] [hydra] [insurgency] [pivotal 2007 when the Taliban and hydra mounted an important spring offensive into the summer] [some indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, many indications of backsliding] [much like –Iraq, Iran seems to be playing a proxy in Afghanistan] [more chaos] [bound to create even more distance between US and its principal NATO allies] [******]
KABUL, Afghanistan, Oct. 27 — Many former militia commanders and residents in northern Afghanistan have been hoarding illegal weapons in violation of the country’s disarmament laws, giving the excuse that they face a spreading Taliban insurgency from the south that government forces alone are too frail to stop, Afghan and Western officials say.
After years of moderate success for government disarmament programs, rumors of widespread defiance in the north have arisen recently among government officials and intelligence agencies in Kabul and elsewhere. [****] Although there is little hard evidence that commanders are greatly enlarging their arsenals, officials say, some have been thwarting government programs, refusing to disarm and possibly even remobilizing militias.
The talk of rearming underscores a deepening north-south ethnic divide that some diplomats and Afghan officials privately worry could lead the way toward a shift of power back to warlords — and toward a countrywide armed conflict — if left unchecked. And the situation poses a major challenge for President Hamid Karzai, a Pashtun from the south, whose administration has failed to win the confidence of many non-Pashtun leaders and northerners. [***]
Prices on the weapons black market in the north have skyrocketed as residents, governed by suspicion and foreboding, have kept their firearms, driving down the supply.
“There is an environment of mistrust” in the government, Brig. Gen. Abdulmanan Abed, a Defense Ministry official who works with the government’s demilitarization program, said in an interview this month in Mazar-i-Sharif, the capital of Balkh Province. “There is a fear of the return of the Taliban.”
A prominent political leader from the north, speaking on condition of anonymity, put it this way: “The Taliban are coming toward us. What should we do? Who will defend us? Who will protect us? This is in the minds of the people in the north.” [******]
Col. Mats Danielsson, the Swedish commander of a 450-man military unit helping to provide security in four northern provinces, said the Karzai administration and its international allies must find a way to roll back the Taliban threat and reassure northerners.
“We have to keep the window of opportunity open, but I feel that the window is closing,” he said.
The Taliban insurgency is strongest in southern and eastern Afghanistan. And while it has been able to bedevil Afghan and international troops in some other regions of the country, [***]before this year its reach rarely stretched into the northern provinces. [moving north for first time since its near destruction in 2001-02] [*****]
But government officials report an increase in Taliban activity in the north this year, particularly in the northwest. The number of Taliban attacks on Afghan and international security forces in Balkh and the other relatively peaceful provinces of north-central Afghanistan has risen from last year, the authorities say.
Residents here in Balkh Province and elsewhere in north-central Afghanistan say they are beginning to feel encircled.
“The Taliban is trying to start up its old networks here,” Colonel Danielsson said in an interview in early October at his headquarters in Mazar-i-Sharif. “We have to figure out how to stop this influence.” [******]
Afghan and Western officials also say that in addition to an increase in Taliban activity, there has been an escalation in crime and, in some areas, tensions among rival northern political factions. These officials say it is often difficult to determine who is to blame for specific violent acts.
The most apparent signs of rearming, officials say, are in Faryab Province, in the northwest, where commanders have organized an armed militia to fend off a growing Taliban presence in neighboring Badghis Province that has gone largely unchecked by Afghan and international security forces.
Gen. Dan K. McNeill, commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan, said in a recent interview in Kabul that he had received unconfirmed intelligence reports that small shipments of weapons had been smuggled across the border “from one or two countries to the north” and delivered “to receivers in some of the northern provinces.” [****] But he declined to provide further details.
Afghan government officials also say that in certain northern districts, militia commanders have evaded government weapons inspectors by breaking down their stockpiles of illegal firearms and redistributing them throughout their communities, making them harder to find.
Afghan and Western officials say that weapons are hidden everywhere: in grain silos and closets, in mountain caves and in holes in the ground.
And though the government’s demobilization programs have gone some way toward dismantling many of the hundreds of illegal militias, and have removed nearly all the heavy weapons from those factions, former warlords still hold considerable sway.
“They have the power of a phone call to put hundreds, or thousands, in arms,” Colonel Danielsson said. “There are a lot of weapons up here.”
All the weapons in Afghanistan were supposed to be in the government’s hands by now, all the private militias were to be a thing of the past.
After the Taliban fell in 2001 and fighting erupted among rival warlords, the Afghan government began the first of two disarmament and demobilization programs that were principally intended to dismantle warlords’ militias and other illegal armed groups. In three decades of war, weapons had poured across the borders and authority was often established by the rule of the gun.
The programs, which are voluntary, have dismantled at least 274 paramilitary organizations, reintegrated about 62,000 militia members into civilian life and recovered more than 84,000 weapons, including thousands of heavy arms that had fallen under the control of regional warlords. Afghan and NATO forces have confiscated and destroyed many other weapons, officials said. But Afghan and international officials acknowledge that hundreds of illegal armed groups still operate in Afghanistan. And hundreds of thousands — maybe millions — of weapons remain in private hands, although they are mostly small arms rather than heavy weapons, the officials say.
Of the weapons that have been collected, they say, at least 40 percent were not functional.
“There is at least one weapon in each house,” said General Abed, who was an officer in the anti-Taliban mujahedeen. Government officials note that the demilitarization programs were not intended to collect arms and were instead focused on disbanding armed groups.
“I think it will take many, many years” to disarm the population, said Hameed Quraishi, manager of the government’s demilitarization program in the north. “It doesn’t matter how hard you try. It’s the level of confidence the people have in the government.”
But the talk about rearming is not entirely military. It also appears to be a means of pressing the Karzai government, which many northern leaders have accused of favoring the south, [****] [recall the northern alliance was an eclectic mix of Uzbeks, Hazaris, Chechens, variety of Stans] [****] a region mostly populated by members of his Pashtun ethnicity.
“We selected Karzai to unify the country,” said a prominent politician from the north and former member of the Northern Alliance, which fought the Taliban. “But people who joined him have pushed him to being a Pashtun leader, not a national leader.”
Disproportionate amounts of aid money and weapons have flowed to the south to prop up the regional leadership and battle the Taliban. As part of this effort, the government has been trying to build an auxiliary police force among southern Pashtun tribes to confront the insurgency.
Many northern leaders say that they have been shortchanged in the distribution of development aid and worry about the militarization of the south as they are being asked to disarm.
“Northern commanders are saying: ‘We can’t disarm. This guy is trying to unite all Pashtuns. We have to defend ourselves!’ ” a European diplomat said in Kabul.
General McNeill doubts some of the northern claims. “There’s no question that there’s a hell of a lot of political posturing in the northern sectors,” he said. “Where they think they’re ignored in the reconstruction process, there often is a report: ‘They’re here! The Taliban! They got us surrounded!’ ”
In interviews, northern Afghan leaders said that in spite of their concerns about the central government, they were standing by Mr. Karzai. And most of them denied that any stockpiling of weapons was occurring.
“If we take up arms, it means the democratic process is defeated,” said Sayed Mustafa Kazemi, spokesman for the National Front, a political coalition mainly composed of non-Pashtun leaders from the north. “We want this government to survive its entire term because we don’t want the process to be defeated.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:25 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701460.html
Sunni Violence in Baghdad Called Disrupted
Petraeus Says Al-Qaeda in Iraq Strongholds Are Cleared, but Insurgents Remain 'Lethal'
By Joshua Partlow and Amit R. Paley
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, October 28, 2007; A17 [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges, as the U.S. continues moving chess pieces tactically with no particular strategy] [******]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 27 -- The top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David H. Petraeus, said Saturday that the Sunni insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq has been disrupted and no longer operates in large numbers in any neighborhood of the capital.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701460.html
Sunni Violence in Baghdad Called Disrupted
Petraeus Says Al-Qaeda in Iraq Strongholds Are Cleared, but Insurgents Remain 'Lethal'
By Joshua Partlow and Amit R. Paley
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, October 28, 2007; A17 [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges, as the U.S. continues moving chess pieces tactically with no particular strategy] [******]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 27 -- The top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David H. Petraeus, said Saturday that the Sunni insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq has been disrupted and no longer operates in large numbers in any neighborhood of the capital.
"In general, we think that there are no al-Qaeda strongholds at this point," Petraeus said. He added: "They remain very lethal, very dangerous, capable at any point in time, if you will, of coming back off the canvas and landing a big punch, and we have to be aware of that." [********]
Throughout the U.S. military buildup this year, soldiers have focused on denying sanctuaries to al-Qaeda in Iraq fighters by arresting their leaders, attempting to hinder foreign fighters from entering the country, and partnering with Sunni residents to improve the quality of intelligence about the organization. In recent months, U.S. and Iraqi military commanders have noted a marked decrease in sectarian violence and in civilian and U.S. casualties.
Petraeus, speaking to reporters during a trip to the southern outskirts of the capital, attributed the reduction of violence in part to military operations outside the capital targeting areas where car bombs and other explosives are manufactured, before they can be deployed in Baghdad. He said one of the last remaining al-Qaeda in Iraq strongholds in Baghdad had been the southeastern section of Dora, a predominantly Sunni neighborhood in the southern part of the city, but after military operations over the past two weeks, "that was reduced, certainly."
"They're still there, don't get me wrong, and they're still in Adhamiyah, there's still some in Mansour," he said, referring to other Sunni neighborhoods of Baghdad.
Al-Qaeda in Iraq is just one of many groups, large and small, fighting in Iraq. The Shiite militias in particular have pursued campaigns of sectarian cleansing, at times working with Iraqi security forces to kill and displace Sunni families. [****]
Petraeus said he sees uneven progress in terms of stopping Shiite militia violence. He mentioned Bayaa and al-Amil, two neighborhoods in southwestern Baghdad where the Mahdi Army, a Shiite militia loyal to anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, has emerged as a dominant force, as among the more difficult. He described another nearby area, Sadiyah, as probably "the toughest that is out there now."
Fresh violence broke out across the country Saturday, with at least 23 people killed or found dead in separate incidents, the Associated Press reported.
In Diyala province, north of Baghdad, Iraqi soldiers said they killed 40 suspected insurgents during an operation with U.S. troops targeting al-Qaeda in Iraq. The fighting took place east of the provincial capital, Baqubah, and was assisted by former Sunni insurgents who have recently aligned themselves with U.S. forces, they said.
In northern Iraq, three roadside bombs targeting a convoy of trailers carrying concrete blocks south of Kirkuk killed eight people and wounded six others, said police Col. Abbas Muhammad Ameen in the city of Tuz Khormatu. Two other bombs detonated in Kirkuk near police patrols, killing one officer and wounding five, police said.
The U.S. military also announced that an American soldier had been killed by small-arms fire Thursday in Salahuddin province.
Meanwhile, Turkish officials issued fresh bellicose threats to invade northern Iraq and take on Kurdish guerrillas holed up in the mountains there. Thousands of Turkish citizens protested against the guerrilla group, the Kurdistan Workers' Party, and chanted condemnations of the United States. [*****]
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said international pressure to refrain from an invasion would not affect his decision.
"The moment an operation is needed, we will take that step," Erdogan told a crowd in the northwestern port city of Izmit, according to the Reuters news service. "We don't need to ask anyone's permission."
Special correspondent Naseer Nouri in Baghdad and other Washington Post staff in Iraq contributed to this report.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:24 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/world/middleeast/28sunnis.html
October 28, 2007
Iraq Hampers U.S. Bid to Widen Sunni Police Role
By MICHAEL R. GORDON [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges, as the U.S. continues moving chess pieces tactically with no particular strategy] [******]
HABBANIYA, Iraq — The American military’s push to organize Sunni Arabs into local neighborhood watch groups has been one of the United States’ most important initiatives in Iraq [*****]— so much so that President Bush flew to Anbar Province in September to highlight growing alliances with Sunni tribal leaders. [the fundamental rub] [will the Shiia majority share power with Sunni minority who has suppressed Shiia for generations] [*********]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/world/middleeast/28sunnis.html
October 28, 2007
Iraq Hampers U.S. Bid to Widen Sunni Police Role
By MICHAEL R. GORDON [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges, as the U.S. continues moving chess pieces tactically with no particular strategy] [******]
HABBANIYA, Iraq — The American military’s push to organize Sunni Arabs into local neighborhood watch groups has been one of the United States’ most important initiatives in Iraq [*****]— so much so that President Bush flew to Anbar Province in September to highlight growing alliances with Sunni tribal leaders. [the fundamental rub] [will the Shiia majority share power with Sunni minority who has suppressed Shiia for generations] [*********]
But now that the Americans are trying to institutionalize the arrangement by training the Sunnis to become police officers, the effort has been hampered by halfhearted support and occasionally outright resistance from a Shiite-dominated national government that is still inclined to see the Sunnis as a once and future threat. [****]
It was the American military that pressed to open the new Habbaniya Police Training Center where Sunni tribesmen and former insurgents are to be trained to serve as police officers in Anbar. And it was the Americans who provided the uniforms, food, new classrooms and equipment for the police recruits.
While the Iraqi government has agreed to basic police instruction at the academy, it has balked at training more senior officers there. The government has also scaled back plans by Anbar officials to expand the provincial police force by almost 50 percent.
“The Ministry of Interior deals with the Sunni provinces different than they deal with the other provinces,” [****[ said Brig. Gen. David D. Phillips, an American Army officer who oversees the training of the Iraq police. “The only reason the Anbar academy opened is because we built it, paid for it and staffed it.” He said the Interior Ministry “was very hesitant about it.” [******]
The ministry says that it pays the salaries of the Iraqi personnel here, and that more money will come as soon as proper administrative procedures are established between the government and the academy.
Anbar is not the only source of contention. In Diyala Province, north of Baghdad, American military officers have pushed the Iraqi government to hire more than 6,000 local Iraqis, many of them Sunnis, as police. Despite promises of action by Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, none have been hired by the Interior Ministry.
Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. Mixon, who is winding up a tour as the senior American commander for northern Iraq, said in an interview at his headquarters at Camp Speicher that the “foot-dragging” stems from “highly sectarian” hiring in Baghdad. “They want to make sure that not too many Sunnis are hired,” he said. “The situation is unsatisfactory in terms of hiring Iraqi police.” [the old problem of the beneficiary’s tail wagging the benefactor’s dog] [********]
The growing tensions over efforts to hire more Sunni police officers comes at a critical moment in the American military deployment in Iraq. With the number of American combat brigades set to decline by a quarter by mid-July, American commanders are eager to build up the Iraqis’ capability to secure their neighborhoods.
One way has been to organize local Sunnis into neighborhood watch groups, what the American military calls “Concerned Local Citizens.” The benefits of this approach have been evident near Yusufiya and Mahmudiya, in an area south of Baghdad that was once so violent it had been known as the “triangle of death” and has been overseen by the Second Brigade of the American Army’s 10th Mountain Division. Before neighborhood watch groups were organized in this region in June, more than 12 American and Iraqi soldiers were killed each month in the area, according to an analysis circulating within the American military command. After June, the casualties declined to one soldier killed each month. The number of vehicles destroyed from roadside bombs was running at 11 per month before June, but is averaging less than one per month now.
But organizing local Iraqis into neighborhood watch groups is just the first step. The Americans’ ultimate goal is to codify the arrangement by training these groups as police. The Americans also hope that by persuading the Iraqi government to hire Sunnis as police they will encourage a new, ground-up form of political accommodation.
Shiite-dominated ministries in Baghdad will develop new working relations with largely Sunni police forces in the field, easing the sectarian divide and laying the basis for a more representative national government, or so the theory goes.
At its best, the process of hiring new Sunni Arab police is a bureaucratic one. Prospective recruits have their fingerprints taken and undergo retina scans that are included in an intelligence database. The list of potential recruits is submitted to the Interior Ministry, which in turn generally submits them to a committee of national reconciliation overseen by close Maliki aides.
With persistent American pressure the process has led to some new hires.
In the town of Abu Ghraib, just west of Baghdad, 1,738 of the 2,400 Sunnis who had been put forward to serve as policemen in the town were hired. [*****]
Plans have been made to add 12,000 new policemen in Baghdad over the next six months, and it is estimated that about half would be drawn from the ranks of local Concerned Local Citizens.
But as Diyala indicates, the process does not always run smoothly. American forces pushed through western Baquba, the capital of the province, in June in an effort to sweep the city clear of militants from Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a mainly Iraqi insurgent group with foreign leadership. More than 4,600 Concerned Local Citizens have since been organized in Diyala Province.
But hiring them as police has proved difficult. Mr. Maliki ordered that the Diyala police force be increased by more than 6,000, and provincial officials submitted a list of names in July that included many Sunnis to the Interior Ministry in Baghdad. But some Interior Ministry officials have questioned whether such a substantial increase is needed, [****] and some members of the reconciliation committee have argued that the original Maliki decree may no longer be valid, putting the plan to hire them as police in limbo.
While no action has been taken on the list, the Iraqi government surprised the Americans by hiring 548 Iraqis who were not on the roster. When American officials analyzed the new hires they determined that the list was predominantly made up of Shiites.
It was not the only time that the Interior Ministry hired Shiite police despite the concerns of local officials. The ministry sent 663 Shiite police in recent months to the city of Tal Afar in the northern Nineveh Province.
Wathiq al-Hamdani, the police chief in Nineveh, said in an interview at his Mosul headquarters that the decision was taken over his objections and would undermine efforts to establish a force that was more balanced on sectarian lines. “We are trying to have some Sunni police officers in Tal Afar, but we have a lot of problems in doing that,” he said.
Diyala and Tal Afar are mixed areas where both Sunnis and Shiites live, so they have drawn the attention of the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government. But even Anbar, an overwhelmingly Sunni Arab region in western Iraq, has been of concern to wary Iraqi officials in Baghdad.
Initially, provincial police officials in Anbar proposed adding 9,000 officers to the police force of 20,911, an expansion they said was needed because of the vast territory in western Iraq. But the Iraqi government ordered that the provincial force be increased by only 4,000, and issued orders to start the expansion by hiring 3,000 of them.
As for the rest of the 9,000, 2,000 are eventually to be hired by the National Police, which reports to the Shiite-dominated Interior Ministry. And 3,000 are to be given civilian jobs that involve no law enforcement or military training.
Financing for the Anbar police has also been carefully controlled. The police chief is given his budget in 250 million-dinar increments — about $200,000 — and required to provide receipts. No other province has its police financing so carefully metered, American officials say.
To augment its ability to train police and supplement the training at the Baghdad police academy, the Iraqi government has decided to build two new police academies. They are to be located in the southern city of Basra and the northern town of Mosul.
That is of little help to the Sunnis in Anbar. So the Americans pushed this summer to establish a police academy at a former Anbar air base that the British established at Habbaniya during their colonial occupation. [****] At a cost of just over $10 million, the Americans financed the complex and paid for the international police advisers, who are mostly Americans. The base, which is situated between Falluja and Ramadi, is also used for training the Iraqi Army and still features the sturdy structures erected during the British occupation, as well as a British cemetery.
Brig. Gen. Khalid Adulami, the dean of the Habbaniya academy and a former officer in the Republican Guard during the days of Saddam Hussein’s rule, said many of the prospective recruits were picked by Sheik Abdul Sattar Buzaigh al-Rishawi, the leader of the Sunni tribal movement in Anbar who was assassinated in September. The academy will soon graduate its second class of recruits, more than 700, and plans to expand its enrollment.
Maj. Gen. Abdul Karim Khalaf, a senior official at the Interior Ministry in Baghdad, said the Iraqi government was already paying the salaries of Iraqi personnel at the academy, and he said the ministry was working to solve other financing problems.
But General Adulami said the American military seemed to be more concerned than Iraqi government officials that his recruits were properly clothed, fed and trained.
“We know the Americans better than the Iraqis,” he said. “Nobody at the Ministry of Interior asks us what we need.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:23 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/world/africa/28darfur.html
October 28, 2007
Sudan Declares Cease-Fire at Darfur Peace Talks
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN [Libya] [Gaddafi’s involvement now that he’s become a “responsible” member of the int’l community] [Sudan-Darfur talks] [Africa] [northern/horn] [broader middle east] [followup] [********]
SIRTE, Libya, Oct. 27 — The Sudanese government declared a unilateral cease-fire at the opening ceremony of peace talks on Darfur on Saturday, but because crucial rebel leaders were boycotting, it was not clear if the talks would be a breakthrough moment to end the world’s worst humanitarian crisis [****] or yet another lost opportunity.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/world/africa/28darfur.html
October 28, 2007
Sudan Declares Cease-Fire at Darfur Peace Talks
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN [Libya] [Gaddafi’s involvement now that he’s become a “responsible” member of the int’l community] [Sudan-Darfur talks] [Africa] [northern/horn] [broader middle east] [followup] [********]
SIRTE, Libya, Oct. 27 — The Sudanese government declared a unilateral cease-fire at the opening ceremony of peace talks on Darfur on Saturday, but because crucial rebel leaders were boycotting, it was not clear if the talks would be a breakthrough moment to end the world’s worst humanitarian crisis [****] or yet another lost opportunity.
Nafie Ali Nafie, Sudan’s top-ranking delegate to the talks, said the Sudanese military, from now on, “will not be the first ones to fire arms.”
But a representative for the handful of the rebel groups that did attend said they would believe it when they saw it.
“I can’t tell you how many promises they have broken,” said the rebel representative, Ahmed Diraige, who in a sign of the continuing discord among the rebels ignored a statement that other fighters had given him to read aloud at the talks and instead delivered his own, off-the-cuff remarks.
It seems that the much heralded peace talks, which the United Nations and African Union have invested deeply in as a way to end the bloodshed in Darfur, are facing steep odds [****]— dogged by no-shows, mistrust and a degree of chaos that is akin to the free-for-all that Darfur’s conflict has degenerated into.
Even the talks’ host, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, the leader of Libya — who in the span of a few years has gone from pariah to peacemaker, or at least aspiring peacemaker — was decidedly gloomy in his welcome speech.
“I had expected my sons Abdel Wahid and Dr. Khalil to be here,” he said, referring to Abdel Wahid el-Nur, a founding father of Darfur’s rebellion, and Khalil Ibrahim, the commander of one of the strongest rebel armies, both of whom are boycotting the talks. “These are major movements, and without them we cannot achieve peace.”
Colonel Qaddafi, dressed in a short-sleeved, deconstructed camouflage shirt, delivered a meandering 40-minute treatise on the conflict in Darfur, referring to everything from the Westphalia Treaty of 1648 to the Rodney King riots in Los Angeles in 1992. [excrutiatingly, Qaddafi’s drones on] [*****]
He concluded that the world should stay out of Darfur because it is a tribal problem, and a Sudanese one at that.
“Are we more Sudanese than the Sudanese?” he asked. “Who are we to impose?”
The talks are being held in Sirte, Colonel Qaddafi’s hometown and a grandiose testament to his grandiose dreams. Sirte used to be a quiet town on the craggy edge of the Mediterranean. But with billions of dollars of oil money, Colonel Qaddafi has transformed it into Libya’s government center and the embodiment of the pan-African unity he is trying to inspire.
It has endless, straight boulevards, huge billboards of Colonel Qaddafi wearing sunglasses and stadium-size meeting halls for pan-African congresses, with tidbits of Colonel Qaddafi’s wisdom sprinkled on the walls, like “Africa is a paradise with extensive shade and running water — leader of the revolution.”
But there seems to be a ghost haunting the acres of marble, glass and chrome, and that is the ghost of peace talks past. Many delegates said the negotiations were already headed in the same disappointing direction as those held in Nigeria last year, when only one of the rebel groups agreed to a cease-fire, and the others splintered and kept fighting.
United Nations and African Union officials have said that without some sort of peace deal, the expanded United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force of 26,000 soldiers due to begin arriving in Darfur later this year is doomed to fail.
Jan Eliasson, the United Nations’ special envoy for Darfur, called the talks “a moment of truth.”
“If we don’t seize this unique chance, we will see more chaos, violence, death and misery,” he warned the delegates.
But in front of him were hundreds of empty red seats, and it was not just rebel leaders who were absent.
Sudan’s president, Omar Hassan al-Bashir, was in Sirte on Thursday, sitting with Colonel Qaddafi and helping to broker a peace between Chad’s government and its rebels. But Mr. Bashir apparently had no plans to remain for the talks on the conflict raging in his own country. A Sudanese government spokesman said he had left Sirte after the Chad deal was done and would manage the situation from Khartoum, the Sudanese capital. [****]
There are about 20 rebels from half a dozen groups here, and they held a preconference meeting in a hotel lounge on Saturday morning. Huddled around a laptop computer, they worked out what they would say in their group speech, even though that speech was abruptly discarded at the podium.
“We were very surprised,” said Hashim Hamad, the political adviser for a faction of the Sudan Liberation Army, one of the bigger — and more divided — rebel groups. “We don’t know what happened. He came to speak on the behalf of the movement.” [***]
Some rebels wore three-piece suits, gifts of the Libyan government. Others were in full fatigues and desert boots, with camouflage scarves hiding their faces.
The general message from all of them is that they need more time.
“Our differences are not so great,” Mr. Hashim said. “We’re just not ready yet.”
But United Nations officials said ready or not, the talks had to begin, because the situation on the ground in Darfur was only getting worse — more chaotic, more violent and more difficult for relief workers to help the two million displaced people trapped in squalid camps that have become incubators for frustration and crime. The United Nations estimates that more than 200,000 people have died since violence erupted in Darfur in 2003.
Recently, fighting has intensified between the government and rebel groups, with both sides accused of committing atrocities. [****] In early October, villagers in Muhagiriya said Sudanese government troops and allied militias killed more than 30 civilians, slitting the throats of several men praying at a mosque and shooting a 5-year-old boy in the back as he tried to run away.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:22 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701447.html
Talks on Darfur Open With Partial Boycott by Rebels
Host Gaddafi Tells World Not to Meddle
By Ellen Knickmeyer
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, October 28, 2007; A14 [Libya] [Gaddafi’s involvement now that he’s become a “responsible” member of the int’l community] [Sudan-Darfur talks] [Africa] [northern/horn] [broader middle east] [followup] [********]
SIRTE, Libya, Oct. 27 -- International envoys tried Saturday to show that peace efforts for Darfur were still on track despite the growing chaos there, opening new peace talks even in the face of a rebel boycott.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701447.html
Talks on Darfur Open With Partial Boycott by Rebels
Host Gaddafi Tells World Not to Meddle
By Ellen Knickmeyer
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, October 28, 2007; A14 [Libya] [Gaddafi’s involvement now that he’s become a “responsible” member of the int’l community] [Sudan-Darfur talks] [Africa] [northern/horn] [broader middle east] [followup] [********]
SIRTE, Libya, Oct. 27 -- International envoys tried Saturday to show that peace efforts for Darfur were still on track despite the growing chaos there, opening new peace talks even in the face of a rebel boycott.
The partial refusal to attend left young and unknown rebel fighters with their faces hidden behind swaths of military-camouflage cloth filling some of the negotiating seats that envoys had intended for top leaders of the more than a dozen rebel movements now fighting in Darfur.
Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi hosted the U.N.- and African Union-backed conference just four years after the United Nations lifted sanctions against his country for alleged acts of terror.
Libya's agreement to hold the talks in Gaddafi's home town of Sirte on the country's scrubby coast, and the participation of other Mideast envoys, had signaled increasing Arab involvement in efforts to end the violence in Darfur. [****]
But Gaddafi's opening remarks only underscored the sense that the talks were getting off to a troubled start. [****] The best thing that foreign peacemakers and peacekeeping troops could do for Darfur was stay out of it, Gaddafi told an audience that included envoys from the United States, European Union, China and more than 10 other countries and blocs.
"I would have preferred that this conference be the last attempt by the international community to settle this conflict and let the people of Sudan settle it themselves," Gaddafi said in a slow, sonorous 48-minute monologue that went through two shifts of interpreters. While he spoke, the U.N. envoy for Darfur, Jan Eliasson, on the dais next to Gaddafi, stared at his watch and then wrenched it around and around on his wrist. [Gaddafi can be utterly untolerable] [not dissimilar to Fidel, he often blathers on for hours] [I suppose it’s better than having him attempt to exacerbate as he has in past] [**]
"I always say, 'Leave this problem to its own people,' " Gaddafi said. "We have nothing to do with this. It's none of our business."
Fighters from African rebel tribes in Darfur are battling troops from Sudan's predominantly Arab government and its allied militias.
The conflict is estimated to have killed 450,000 people through disease, hunger and violence since 2003. Attacks have driven another 2.5 million people from their homes in Darfur. [******]
A 2006 power-sharing deal brokered by African and international envoys has collapsed. The three rebel movements that took part in those talks have splintered into 13. Rebel groups are fighting among themselves, as are Darfur's Arab tribes, and both sides are attacking civilians. [incredibly, the rebels behavior is beginning to make the Khartoum govt’s behavior appear responsible by comparison] [******]
One rebel faction overran a camp of A.U. peacekeepers last month, killing 10 soldiers.
The United Nations and African Union are scheduled to send 26,000 troops to Darfur in January in response to steady international pressure for peace in the western Sudan region.
Mediators are eager to calm Darfur before the peacekeepers are deployed. Envoys announced the Sirte talks in September.
Rebel leaders gave varying reasons for their boycott: that rebels should resolve differences among themselves before negotiating with Sudan's government, or that the talks should not have started before deployment of the peacekeepers.
Refusal to attend talks "itself could be an act of violence," A.U. Chairman Alpha Oumar Konare warned at the opening Saturday.
Mediators had pressed both sides to declare a cease-fire during the talks. The Sudanese government team obliged Saturday, promising a unilateral cease-fire. Rebels at the talks promised only to consider a truce.
The combatants have announced dozens of cease-fires in the past, only to resume fighting, [****] said Andrew S. Natsios, the U.S. special envoy for Sudan.
The United States, which is spending $600 million a year for humanitarian aid in Darfur, might impose sanctions on the rebels or Sudan's government if either side resumes fighting, Natsios said.
"We are prepared . . . to hold all parties to their cease-fire agreement," he told delegates.
Negotiators and rebels at the talks said they hoped that more prominent rebel leaders would join the talks in coming days, when the negotiations are to break into smaller workshops on security and other issues.
Natsios said it would take "not years, but months" to reach any agreement.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:21 AM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701235.html
WORLD IN BRIEF
Sunday, October 28, 2007; A18
SOMALIA
Heavy Fighting in Capital Kills 7
[Somalia] [northern Africa; horn] [transitional govt supported by West vs. Islamist, Tribals, Somali and foreign jihadis] [Ethiopia and Eritrea involvement] [followup] [push to reconcile transisional with some others] [********]
Insurgents and government-allied forces battled with machine guns, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades Saturday in the heaviest fighting to hit Somalia's capital for months, leaving at least seven people dead and dozens others wounded, [****] witnesses and health officials said.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/27/AR2007102701235.html
WORLD IN BRIEF
Sunday, October 28, 2007; A18
SOMALIA
Heavy Fighting in Capital Kills 7
[Somalia] [northern Africa; horn] [transitional govt supported by West vs. Islamist, Tribals, Somali and foreign jihadis] [Ethiopia and Eritrea involvement] [followup] [push to reconcile transisional with some others] [********]
Insurgents and government-allied forces battled with machine guns, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades Saturday in the heaviest fighting to hit Somalia's capital for months, leaving at least seven people dead and dozens others wounded, [****] witnesses and health officials said.
Islamic fighters briefly occupied a police station in south Mogadishu, before heading back out of the area, chanting "God is great," [*****] witnesses said.
At least 35 people wounded in the fighting between insurgents, government troops and government-allied Ethiopian forces were being treated at Mogadishu's Medina Hospital, said Tahir Mohammed Mahmoud, an administrative assistant. He said it was the worst fighting and the heaviest day for hospital admissions in at least four months.
Another witness to the fighting, Hassan Hussein, said he saw two dead Ethiopian troops. [*****] Ethiopian officials were not available for confirmation.
On the political front, Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi was in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, for consultations. He has been locked in a power struggle for months with President Abdullahi Yusuf, who wants to push through a no-confidence vote this week and form a new government [****]-- presumably without Gedi.
NETHERLANDS
Protest Plea: 'Save the 'Shrooms'
Protesters turned out on Amsterdam's central Dam Square on Saturday, hoping to "save the 'shrooms" by stopping the government from banning hallucinogenic mushrooms.
Carrying banners reading "When will they ban bread?" and "Boss of your own brain," more than 100 people, some with hats resembling the bright red cap of the popular fly agaric mushroom variety, protested to keep "magic mushrooms" legal.
After several incidents involving tourists -- in March, a French teenager jumped to her death from a bridge after taking mushrooms -- the Dutch government plans to ban them.
India
Maoist Fighters Kill 18 at Festival
Communist rebels opened fire on a crowd of revelers at a festival in eastern India on Saturday, killing a politician's son and 17 other people, police said.
About 25 Maoist guerrillas attacked the village festival in Jharkhand state, firing indiscriminately, said local police chief Arun Kumar Singh.
Among the dead was Anuplal Marandi, the son of the state's former chief minister, Babulal Marandi, he said. The politician was thought to be on the rebels' hit list after leading a crackdown against them while in office, Singh said.
AUSTRIA
Vienna's Divorce Fair a Dud
In Vienna, a city where "I do" often turns into "I want out," a fair for those wanting to untie the knot seemed a sure hit.
But journalists easily outnumbered those looking for advice on how to end their marriages on Saturday, the first day of what was billed as the world's first divorce fair.
Detectives were ready to catch a spouse in the act, mediators to help ease the pain of separation, a laboratory to conduct paternity tests, and, of course, lawyers to do everything else.
The Austrian capital would seem a good venue for the event, with its 66 percent divorce rate, near the top for European cities. The country itself has a rate of more than 50 percent. The United States' rate is thought to be between 40 and 45 percent.
* * *
Bombing Kills 3 as Colombian Election Nears
Two Colombian marines and at least one civilian were killed when guerrillas bombed a military patrol in the country's main Pacific port city in the final hours before Sunday's regional elections. Nine people were wounded in the blast late Friday outside a restaurant in Buenaventura.
From News Services
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:20 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/world/asia/28filip.html
October 28, 2007
Clans Complicate Philippine Conflict
By CARLOS H. CONDE [Philippines] [Manilla] [SEA] [relatively quiet over past couple of years] [nevertheless, hydra] [Abu Sayyef and Moro Islamic Front and Jemmah Islamya] [followup, after long stretch of inactivity, of recent flurry] [***************]
MANILA, Oct. 26 — Clan violence has aggravated the conflict between government forces and Islamic separatists in the southern Philippines, making the decade-long search for peace there even harder, a new study says.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/28/world/asia/28filip.html
October 28, 2007
Clans Complicate Philippine Conflict
By CARLOS H. CONDE [Philippines] [Manilla] [SEA] [relatively quiet over past couple of years] [nevertheless, hydra] [Abu Sayyef and Moro Islamic Front and Jemmah Islamya] [followup, after long stretch of inactivity, of recent flurry] [***************]
MANILA, Oct. 26 — Clan violence has aggravated the conflict between government forces and Islamic separatists in the southern Philippines, making the decade-long search for peace there even harder, a new study says.
The study, released Wednesday by the Asia Foundation, said the peace process in Mindanao, the region in the southern Philippines where Islamic separatists have been fighting for self-determination since the 1970s, would have a better chance of succeeding if clan violence were addressed.
The project’s researchers, who included Islamic scholars and anthropologists, found that in Mindanao from the 1930s to 2005, there had been 1,266 cases of clan violence — called “rido” by Filipino Muslims [***]— in which 5,500 people were killed and thousands were displaced. [*******]
While clan conflict is common in many societies, rido is an especially volatile force because it has, according to the study, “wider implications for conflict in Mindanao, primarily because it tends to interact in unfortunate ways with separatist conflict and other forms of armed violence.” [******]
The government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front have been negotiating for peace since 1997, but no substantial agreement has been reached.
According to the study, half of the documented clan violence occurred between 2000 and 2004. During this period, the cease-fire between the government and the Islamic front was broken many times by clan fighting. [******]
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 10:19 AM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/us/27list.html
October 27, 2007
Names of the Dead
[3,826] [KIA] [****]
The Department of Defense has identified 3,826 [KIA] [****] American service members who have died since the start of the Iraq war. It confirmed the death of the following American yesterday:
TOWNS, Robin L. Sr., 52, Staff Sgt., Army National Guard; Upper Marlboro, Md.; 372nd Military Police Battalion.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/us/27list.html
October 27, 2007
Names of the Dead
[3,826] [KIA] [****]
The Department of Defense has identified 3,826 [KIA] [****] American service members who have died since the start of the Iraq war. It confirmed the death of the following American yesterday:
TOWNS, Robin L. Sr., 52, Staff Sgt., Army National Guard; Upper Marlboro, Md.; 372nd Military Police Battalion.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:22 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/washington/27diplo.html
October 27, 2007
State Department to Order 250 to Iraq Posts
By REUTERS [bush white house] [state department] [sec state Rice] [management of state] [followup] [she doesn’t appear to be very effective] [since deputy sec state is the real manager of state, this doesn’t reflect well on Negroponte either] [has this every happened before?] [Vietnam?] [********] [ditto]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 26 (Reuters) — Facing staff shortages in Iraq, the State Department announced Friday that diplomats would have no choice but to accept one-year postings in the hostile environment or face losing their jobs.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/washington/27diplo.html
October 27, 2007
State Department to Order 250 to Iraq Posts
By REUTERS [bush white house] [state department] [sec state Rice] [management of state] [followup] [she doesn’t appear to be very effective] [since deputy sec state is the real manager of state, this doesn’t reflect well on Negroponte either] [has this every happened before?] [Vietnam?] [********] [ditto]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 26 (Reuters) — Facing staff shortages in Iraq, the State Department announced Friday that diplomats would have no choice but to accept one-year postings in the hostile environment or face losing their jobs.
Harry Thomas, the State Department’s human resources director, said about 250 “prime candidates” for vacant Iraqi posts would be notified Monday of the decision. He said that they would have 10 working days to respond to the demand that they go to Iraq in summer 2008, and that only those with valid reasons, like a medical problem, would be exempt.
Until now, postings to Iraq have been on a voluntary basis and often hard to fill.
“If someone decides they do not want to go, then we would then consider appropriate actions,” Mr. Thomas said. “We have many options, including dismissal from the foreign service.”
Many American diplomats say they fear being posted in Iraq because of the risks of working in a war zone. It is a so-called unaccompanied posting, meaning children and a spouse cannot go with the diplomat because of the dangers involved.
There are about 200 American diplomats in Iraq who serve on a one-year basis. That must rise to about 250 for next summer, Mr. Thomas said.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:21 PM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602417.html
State Dept. To Order Diplomats To Iraq
As Many as 50 Positions Are Expected to Be Open
By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A01 [bush white house] [state department] [sec state Rice] [management of state] [followup] [she doesn’t appear to be very effective] [since deputy sec state is the real manager of state, this doesn’t reflect well on Negroponte either] [has this every happened before?] [Vietnam?] [********]
The State Department will order as many as 50 U.S. diplomats to take posts in Iraq next year because of expected shortfalls in filling openings there, the first such large-scale forced assignment since the Vietnam War. [yup ][wow] [*****]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602417.html
State Dept. To Order Diplomats To Iraq
As Many as 50 Positions Are Expected to Be Open
By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A01 [bush white house] [state department] [sec state Rice] [management of state] [followup] [she doesn’t appear to be very effective] [since deputy sec state is the real manager of state, this doesn’t reflect well on Negroponte either] [has this every happened before?] [Vietnam?] [********]
The State Department will order as many as 50 U.S. diplomats to take posts in Iraq next year because of expected shortfalls in filling openings there, the first such large-scale forced assignment since the Vietnam War. [yup ][wow] [*****]
On Monday, 200 to 300 employees will be notified of their selection as "prime candidates" for 50 open positions in Iraq, said Harry K. Thomas, director general of the Foreign Service. Some are expected to respond by volunteering, he said. However, if an insufficient number volunteers by Nov. 12, a department panel will determine which ones will be ordered to report to the Baghdad embassy next summer.
"If people say they want to go to Iraq, we will take them," Thomas said in an interview. But "we have to move now, because we can't hold up the process." Those on the list were selected by factors including grade, specialty and language skill, as well as "people who have not had a recent hardship tour," [*****]he said.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice previewed a possible shortfall in June, when she ordered that positions in Iraq be filled before any other openings at the State Department headquarters in Washington or abroad are available. At the time, Rice said it was her "fervent hope" that sufficient numbers would continue to volunteer. Her order followed a request by Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker in Baghdad for an increase in the number and quality of economic and political officers.
Although a few skilled individuals were ordered to "hard-to-fill" diplomatic posts in past decades, there have been no mass "directed assignments" in the Foreign Service since 1969, when an entire class of 15 to 20 entry-level officers was sent to Vietnam, Thomas said.
Those who receive the selection letters will have 10 days to file a written notice of objection. The review panel will consider the objections, but Thomas made clear that a serious, documented medical condition is likely to be the only valid excuse. The department has the authority to fire anyone who refuses to accept an assignment. [*****]
The union representing U.S. diplomats has officially objected to the Iraq call-up.
"We believe, and we have told the secretary of state, that directing unarmed civilians who are untrained for combat into a war zone should be done on a voluntary basis," said Steve Kashkett, vice president of the American Foreign Service Association. "Directed assignments, we fear, can be detrimental to the individual, to the post, and to the Foreign Service as a whole."
Kashkett said the association had contended in meetings with Rice and Thomas that a diplomatic draft is unnecessary and that "thousands" of diplomats have volunteered for Iraq over the past five years. "We're not weenies, we're not cowards, we're not cookie pushers in Europe," he said. "This has never been necessary in a generation."
Thomas also praised the service and noted that more than 1,200 of 11,500 Foreign Service personnel have already served in what has become the largest U.S. embassy in history. But the embassy's sheer size and the truncated, one-year diplomatic tours there have strained the service. The embassy and other U.S. diplomatic outposts in Iraq employ about 6,000 people, including several hundred Foreign Service officers, other State Department specialists, American contractors, third-country nationals and Iraqi hires.
The number of diplomatic positions in Iraq has increased every year since the embassy was opened in 2004. The expansion of Provincial Reconstruction Teams -- made up of diplomats who work with local communities outside of Baghdad -- from 10 to 25 last summer as part of President Bush's new strategy added another 30 Foreign Service personnel and many more outside contractors. [******]Volunteers have filled all but about 50 slots that will be empty as of next summer, Thomas said.
At congressional hearings last summer, Kashkett testified that medical and psychiatric symptoms have become a growing problem for personnel serving in high-danger zones such as Iraq and Afghanistan. At the same time, the constant need for personnel in Baghdad has drawn new dividing lines between those who have volunteered and those who have not.
Although the secretary of state has the authority to direct assignments, "State Department discipline exists on paper only," one senior official said. "They rarely make people go to places they don't want to go." [******]
Crocker requested a management review of the embassy when he became ambassador in March. In a cable to Rice two months later, he asked for more -- and more experienced -- political and economic officers. "In essence," he wrote, "the issue is whether we are a Department and a Service at war. If we are, we need to organize and prioritize in a way that reflects this, something we have not done thus far."
At the time, President Bush had declared a new push for political reconciliation and economic progress in Iraq, and the State Department was struggling to meet those ambitious goals. When it could not quickly mobilize enough diplomats and other civilians to fill the new Provincial Reconstruction Teams, the far larger Pentagon agreed -- with barely concealed resentment -- to provide temporary manpower.
"The military in the last 12 months has been fed a diet of how the State Department failed and sent a bunch of second-stringers" to Iraq, the senior official said. Some department officials took umbrage at Crocker's cable, which seemed to confirm that assessment, but the end result was a determination to marshal whatever resources it took to fill the need.
Those who are ordered to Baghdad as part of the new call-up will receive incentives, known as the Iraq Service Package, already offered to volunteers. It includes additional pay of about 70 percent for most mid-level officers, plus another 20 percent of basic salary to compensate for long hours. Officers are not allowed to take their families to Baghdad, but the package allows them to leave spouses and children in whatever post they transfer from for the length of their tour, or to send them back to Washington.
U.S. diplomats in Baghdad are given five "rest and relaxation" breaks during the year, including up to three of them in the United States, for a total of 60 days outside Iraq. Those completing a Baghdad tour are also given preference in choosing their next assignment.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:21 PM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602142.html
WASHINGTON IN BRIEF
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A05
Spy Chief Makes it Harder to Declassify NIEs
[bush white house] [the post-IRTPA intelligence community] [recommendations from blue-ribbon commissions] [DNI and ODNI pulling back now?] [why?] [followup] [black sites and CIA program reportedly ended earlier] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell has reversed the recent practice of declassifying and releasing summaries of national intelligence estimates, a top intelligence official said yesterday.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602142.html
WASHINGTON IN BRIEF
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A05
Spy Chief Makes it Harder to Declassify NIEs
[bush white house] [the post-IRTPA intelligence community] [recommendations from blue-ribbon commissions] [DNI and ODNI pulling back now?] [why?] [followup] [black sites and CIA program reportedly ended earlier] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell has reversed the recent practice of declassifying and releasing summaries of national intelligence estimates, a top intelligence official said yesterday.
Knowing their words may be scrutinized outside the U.S. government chills analysts' willingness to provide unvarnished opinions and information, [****]said David R. Shedd, a deputy to McConnell.
Shedd told congressional aides and reporters that McConnell recently issued a directive making it more difficult to declassify the key judgments of national intelligence estimates, which are forward-looking analyses prepared for the White House and Congress that represent the consensus of the nation's 16 spy agencies on a single issue. The analysis comes from various sources including the CIA, the military and intelligence agencies inside federal departments.
Referring to the public release of the reports, Shedd said during a Capitol Hill briefing: "It affects the quality of what's written."
This year, the national intelligence director's office has released unclassified key judgments from three NIEs -- two on Iraq and one on terrorist threats to the U.S. homeland.
The trend toward releasing NIEs started about four years ago, most notably with the White House's July 2003 disclosure of key judgments from a controversial NIE on Iraq's weapons of mass-destruction. The White House was pressured to release those findings after parts of the NIE that supported the Bush administration's case for war with Iraq were leaked to the news media.
Steven Aftergood, the director of the project on government secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists, said national intelligence estimates should be released in their entirety.
"That doesn't mean disclosing sensitive intelligence methods or the identity of confidential sources. But that's not what estimates are," Aftergood said. "The public needs unvarnished assessments as well. Without them, we stumbled our way into the war in Iraq."
Bush Discusses Renewed Fighting in Congo
President Bush expressed concern about renewed fighting in Congo, where the government has struggled with little success to establish authority over lawless eastern regions of the African nation.
Security issues topped Bush's Oval Office meeting with President Joseph Kabila of Congo.
The mineral-rich nation has been wracked by years of war and decades of dictatorship. Last fall's presidential polling marked Congo's first free elections in more than 40 years, but Kabila's government remains fragile.
"We talked about the eastern part of the country, and he shared with me his strategy to make sure that the government's reach extends throughout the entire country and that there's stability throughout the country," Bush said.
Kabila said he stressed the need for continued U.S. support to achieve peace and stability throughout the whole nation, and promote investment -- "to come back from a very, very long journey of development and really try to combat poverty, which is the biggest issue, not only in the Congo but in the region and on the African continent."
Since January, 400,000 to 500,000 people have been displaced by fighting in Congo's Nord-Kivu province. The fighting is between pro-government militiamen and rebels loyal to former army general Laurent Nkunda.
Earlier this week, Jendayi E. Frazer, assistant secretary of state for African affairs, told Congress that the United States is stepping up efforts to train Congo's military to help the government subdue the rebel forces.
-- From News Services
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:20 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/europe/27rumsfeld.html
October 27, 2007
Groups Tie Rumsfeld to Torture in Complaint
By DOREEN CARVAJAL [bush white house] [former and current nsc principals] [sec state def Rummy as leading neocon] [versus] [a relatively ineffectual NSC advisor, then, rice, and a marginalized sec state Powell] [from abu ghraib to gitmo to black sites, to waterbording to. . . ] [gitmo and beyond] [followup] [black sites and CIA program reportedly ended earlier] [societal also] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
PARIS, Oct. 26 — Several human rights organizations based in the United States and Europe have filed a complaint in a Paris court accusing former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld of responsibility for torture.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/europe/27rumsfeld.html
October 27, 2007
Groups Tie Rumsfeld to Torture in Complaint
By DOREEN CARVAJAL [bush white house] [former and current nsc principals] [sec state def Rummy as leading neocon] [versus] [a relatively ineffectual NSC advisor, then, rice, and a marginalized sec state Powell] [from abu ghraib to gitmo to black sites, to waterbording to. . . ] [gitmo and beyond] [followup] [black sites and CIA program reportedly ended earlier] [societal also] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
PARIS, Oct. 26 — Several human rights organizations based in the United States and Europe have filed a complaint in a Paris court accusing former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld of responsibility for torture.
The group, which includes the International Federation for Human Rights, the French League for Human Rights, and the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York, made the complaint late Thursday and unsuccessfully sought to confront Mr. Rumsfeld as he left a breakfast meeting in central Paris on Friday.
Jeanne Sulzer, one of the lawyers working on the issue for the human rights groups, said the complaint had been filed with a state prosecutor, Jean-Claude Marin, saying he would have the power to pursue the case because of Mr. Rumsfeld’s presence in France.
Similar legal complaints against Mr. Rumsfeld have been filed in other countries, including Sweden and Argentina. German prosecutors dismissed a case in April, saying it was up to the United States to investigate the accusations.
The French complaint accuses Mr. Rumsfeld of authorizing torture at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, and says it violated the Convention Against Torture, which came into force in 1987.
As part of their complaint, the groups submitted 11 pages of written testimony from Janis Karpinski, the highest-ranking officer to be punished in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal. She was demoted to colonel from brigadier general and lost command of her military police unit. She contended that the abuses at the prison had started after the appearance of Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who was sent by Mr. Rumsfeld to assist military intelligence interrogators.
Michael Ratner, the president of the Center for Constitutional Rights, said in a statement that the aim of this latest legal complaint was to demonstrate “that we will not rest until those U.S. officials involved in the torture program are brought to justice. Rumsfeld must understand that he has no place to hide.”
While he was secretary of defense, Mr. Rumsfeld denied many times that torture was a policy of the American government. One occasion was in 2005 when an interviewer on Fox News asked about charges of abuse, and Mr. Rumsfeld replied that American policy required that all prisoners be treated humanely. When there was abuse, he said, “people have been punished and convicted in a court-martial. So the idea that there’s any policy of abuse or policy of torture is false. Flat false.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:19 PM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602120.html
Torture Stance Raises Doubts on Mukasey
By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A02 [congress] [[110th congress, 1st session] [bush white house] [nsc principals] [the attorney-general nominee, Judge Mukasey] [may well be an ad hoc principal as was Gonzo on occasion] [avoided stating where or not waterbording constituted torture] [referring to Guliani, McCaine has said it’s torture plain and simple] [Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge used it, so on] [Mukasey seems to believe in the unitary power of the president’s war powers] [but why he wouldn’t answer this, unless he’s being too cute by half, is difficult to fathom] [use psci 355] [455] [use nsc] [********] [ditto]
A growing number of Senate Democrats who had previously praised attorney general nominee Michael B. Mukasey are now focusing on his refusal to answer a question about torture as a pivotal issue for his confirmation.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602120.html
Torture Stance Raises Doubts on Mukasey
By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A02 [congress] [[110th congress, 1st session] [bush white house] [nsc principals] [the attorney-general nominee, Judge Mukasey] [may well be an ad hoc principal as was Gonzo on occasion] [avoided stating where or not waterbording constituted torture] [referring to Guliani, McCaine has said it’s torture plain and simple] [Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge used it, so on] [Mukasey seems to believe in the unitary power of the president’s war powers] [but why he wouldn’t answer this, unless he’s being too cute by half, is difficult to fathom] [use psci 355] [455] [use nsc] [********] [ditto]
A growing number of Senate Democrats who had previously praised attorney general nominee Michael B. Mukasey are now focusing on his refusal to answer a question about torture as a pivotal issue for his confirmation.
Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), a member of the Judiciary Committee, yesterday joined other key Democrats in saying his vote will depend on whether Mukasey declares that a disputed CIA interrogation technique known as "waterboarding" qualifies as illegal torture under U.S. laws.
While no lawmaker has predicted Mukasey's defeat, several have suggested that his confirmation is less assured than it initially seemed.
Mukasey aroused lawmakers' concerns when he repeatedly declined to answer questions about waterboarding during the second day of his confirmation hearings. He said he was not sufficiently familiar with the practice to render an opinion.
"My support for Judge Mukasey's nomination depends in part on him stating clearly that waterboarding constitutes torture and that the president is bound by the law," Biden said in a statement.
His comments followed similar remarks on Thursday by Sens. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), the majority whip, and Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), the Judiciary chairman. Leahy has postponed a vote on Mukasey's nomination until he answers questions on waterboarding, surveillance and other issues. Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) also told reporters the issue is important to his vote.
"For those of us who care about torture, his answer on waterboarding is very important," Durbin said in an interview yesterday. "I was looking for something different from Judge Mukasey, but so far his answers have been disappointing." [*****]
Legislative aides said other Democratic members of the panel are waiting for Mukasey's answers before deciding whether to support him.
The committee's ranking Republican, Sen. Arlen Specter (Pa.), has also written a letter to Mukasey demanding answers about waterboarding and other issues. Other Republicans have said that because Mukasey had no connection to or knowledge of waterboarding, he should not have to answer questions about it. [**]
The skepticism marks a shift from 10 days ago, when Reid, Leahy and other top Democrats praised Mukasey's qualifications and predicted his easy confirmation by the Senate.
The new pressure on the torture issue poses a political and legal challenge for the Bush administration, which officials have said authorized the use of waterboarding on at least three detainees kept in secret detention by the CIA after the Justice Department said it was legal. In appointing Mukasey, who had a reputation as a pragmatic outsider, administration officials sought to avoid a new fight over the controversial policies that tarred former attorney general Alberto R. Gonzales.
White House spokesman Tony Fratto said yesterday that Mukasey will answer lawmakers' questions as best he can but cautioned that Mukasey does not have the security clearances to be briefed on classified programs. "We think it still ought to be a sure thing," Fratto said.
A vote on Mukasey's nomination by the Judiciary Committee is unlikely for at least two weeks, legislative aides said yesterday. That means the nomination may come before the full Senate shortly before Thanksgiving.
Mukasey, a former federal prosecutor who served 18 years as a federal judge in New York, enjoyed the early and highly public support of Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.). Schumer said this month that Mukasey was likely to be confirmed.
But Schumer spokesman Brian Fallon said yesterday that the waterboarding issue "raises serious concerns for the senator. . . . He is waiting for Judge Mukasey's answers before passing any judgment."
The waterboarding tactic generally involves strapping the prisoner to a board, covering his face or mouth with a cloth, and pouring water over his face to create the sensation of drowning, according to human rights groups. The practice dates to at least the Spanish Inquisition, [****] and has been prosecuted as torture in U.S. military courts since the Spanish-American War. [******] [wow] [no longer can any reasonable person think water bording is on the side of angels] [considered uncivilized since Spanish-American War] [remember the Maine]
In testimony before the Judiciary panel on Oct. 18, Mukasey demurred when asked whether waterboarding constitutes torture and is therefore illegal. "I don't know what's involved in the technique," he said. "If waterboarding is torture, torture is not constitutional."
The committee's 10 Democrats responded on Tuesday with a letter to Mukasey demanding that he answer the question directly and noting that the practice is well enough known that the State Department routinely condemns its use in other countries. That letter, spearheaded by Durbin, stopped short of threatening opposition to Mukasey's nomination.
Bradford A. Berenson, a lawyer who worked in the White House counsel's office and who supports the nomination, said that "it's just unreasonable to expect him to express a firm view [on waterboarding] one way or the other unless he's more versed in the facts. It's not as if he went in there and told them it wasn't torture. He just wanted to be better informed." [*******]
Mukasey also testified that while the president could not authorize conduct that would violate torture laws, there may be occasions when the president's powers as commander in chief could trump a federal law requiring that a special court approve intelligence-related wiretaps.
In a letter to Leahy released by the senator yesterday, Mukasey reiterated that he believes the Constitution and U.S. statutes are explicit in forbidding torture but are less clear on the boundaries of surveillance. "The weight of authority indicates that warrantless surveillance to collect foreign intelligence is not unconstitutional so long as it is otherwise reasonable," [******] [what?] Mukasey wrote.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:18 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/washington/27mukasey.html
October 27, 2007
Denounce Waterboarding, Democrats Tell Nominee
By PHILIP SHENON [congress] [[110th congress, 1st session] [bush white house] [nsc principals] [the attorney-general nominee, Judge Mukasey] [may well be an ad hoc principal as was Gonzo on occasion] [avoided stating where or not waterbording constituted torture] [referring to Guliani, McCaine has said it’s torture plain and simple] [Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge used it, so on] [Mukasey seems to believe in the unitary power of the president’s war powers] [but why he wouldn’t answer this, unless he’s being too cute by half, is difficult to fathom] [********]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 26 — The nomination of Michael B. Mukasey as attorney general encountered resistance on Friday, with Democratic senators suggesting for the first time that they might oppose Mr. Mukasey if he did not make clear that he opposed waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques that have been used against terrorism suspects.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/washington/27mukasey.html
October 27, 2007
Denounce Waterboarding, Democrats Tell Nominee
By PHILIP SHENON [congress] [[110th congress, 1st session] [bush white house] [nsc principals] [the attorney-general nominee, Judge Mukasey] [may well be an ad hoc principal as was Gonzo on occasion] [avoided stating where or not waterbording constituted torture] [referring to Guliani, McCaine has said it’s torture plain and simple] [Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge used it, so on] [Mukasey seems to believe in the unitary power of the president’s war powers] [but why he wouldn’t answer this, unless he’s being too cute by half, is difficult to fathom] [********]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 26 — The nomination of Michael B. Mukasey as attorney general encountered resistance on Friday, with Democratic senators suggesting for the first time that they might oppose Mr. Mukasey if he did not make clear that he opposed waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques that have been used against terrorism suspects.
The ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, joined in the expressions of concern about Mr. Mukasey. Mr. Specter said in an interview Friday that the nomination could hinge on Mr. Mukasey’s written responses to questions posed to him this week about the Bush administration’s antiterrorism policies, including its use of interrogation techniques like waterboarding, which simulates drowning, and about his larger views on executive power. [*****]
At his Senate confirmation hearings last week, Mr. Mukasey, a retired federal judge from New York, declined to say whether he agreed with many lawmakers and human rights groups that waterboarding is a form of torture and is unconstitutional. He said he did not know the details of how waterboarding, which has been used by the C.I.A. against senior leaders of Al Qaeda, was conducted. [****] [as though anyone believes he hasn’t a) read the newspapers, and b) been briefed by white house] [*****] In waterboarding, interrogators pour water onto cloth or cellophane that has been placed over the face of a suspect, creating the sensation of drowning.
In an initial letter to the Judiciary Committee that was dated Wednesday and made public Friday, Mr. Mukasey repeated the assertion he had made at his confirmation hearings that torture was unconstitutional and a violation of American obligations under international treaties. But once again, he did not address the question of whether waterboarding was torture. In the letter, he also repeated his suggestion that the administration’s program of eavesdropping without warrants was legal despite criticism by lawmakers that it violated terms of federal surveillance laws.
Until this week, the nomination of Mr. Mukasey to replace Alberto R. Gonzales as attorney general appeared to be a sure thing. Many Democratic lawmakers say privately that he is still likely to be confirmed, given the need for leadership in the Justice Department after months of turmoil. Apart from Mr. Specter, no Republicans on the Judiciary Committee have raised public doubts about the nomination.
But Mr. Mukasey’s sometimes awkward responses at his confirmation hearings to a series of questions about his views on the administration’s antiterrorism policies and its expansive views of its wartime powers under the Constitution prompted the first significant expressions of concern about the nomination from some lawmakers.
“A number of issues need clarification,” Mr. Specter said in a telephone interview Friday. “I’m troubled by the depth of his assertion of executive powers.”
Mr. Specter said he was worried specifically about whether Mr. Mukasey would advise President Bush to disregard acts of Congress, including a proposed law that would limit the ability of the White House to conduct electronic eavesdropping. [******]
“I don’t know that I would confirm a guy who is going to say that he’d advise the president that he has the constitutional authority to ignore a deal he has made with Congress on a specific provision” of a law, Mr. Specter said in reference to the eavesdropping legislation.
Mr. Specter said he hoped Mr. Mukasey would offer satisfactory responses, especially about his views on waterboarding.
“I think now that he has had a chance to know exactly what waterboarding is, my expectation would be that — like everyone else — he would condemn it,” the senator said. “But he’s got to speak for himself.”
Mr. Bush complained Friday that Democratic leaders in Congress were acting too slowly on Mr. Mukasey’s nomination, as well as on several pieces of legislation. He noted that the Senate had failed to approve the nomination “even as members complain about the lack of leadership at the Department of Justice.” [good political jab—talking points—but not effective in getting him confirmed, or for that matter getting any of bush’s agenda through a polarized congress] [******]
On Tuesday, all 10 Democrats on the Judiciary Committee sent a letter to Mr. Mukasey asking him to make a clear-cut statement of opposition to waterboarding and to describe it as illegal.
On Thursday, the majority leader, Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, was asked by a reporter if Mr. Mukasey should be confirmed in light of his failure to make a statement of opposition to waterboarding.
“We’ll have to wait and see,” Mr. Reid said, adding that he was “troubled” by Mr. Mukasey’s testimony last week about waterboarding. “I think if he doesn’t change his direction in that regard, he could have at least one concern. And that’s me.”
The chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont, told reporters that his vote on Mr. Mukasey’s confirmation “would depend on him answering the question” about waterboarding.
Alex Swartsel, a spokeswoman for Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, another Democrat on the committee, said Friday of Mr. Mukasey’s views on waterboarding: “The issue could cause the senator to vote against Mukasey.”
Ms. Swartsel said Mr. Whitehouse “wants to see the judge’s answer before he makes that determination.”
Only Senator Bernard Sanders, a Vermont independent, has said he will vote against Mr. Mukasey.
Intelligence officials have acknowledged that senior members of Al Qaeda were waterboarded after the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, but they have also said the practice was suspended in response to complaints from members of Congress and others. [******]
In a letter to Mr. Mukasey that was also made public on Friday by the Judiciary Committee, Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan, posed a series of questions about specific interrogation techniques that have been used by the United States against terrorism suspects and whether Mr. Mukasey found them inhumane.
“Would you consider it inhumane to intentionally expose a detainee to cold or intentionally immerse a detainee in water until such time as a detainee begins shivering?” Mr. Levin asked. “Would you consider it inhumane to threaten to transfer a detainee to a third country with the knowledge that the detainee is reasonably likely to fear that country would subject him to torture or death? Would you consider it inhumane to force a detainee to remove his clothes or remain naked other than for security or medical reasons?” [note: humane instead of torture] [and Mukasey could have avoided a lot of grief by saying torture is wrong!] [****]
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:18 PM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602326.html
From CIA Jails, Inmates Fade Into Obscurity
Dozens of 'Ghost Prisoners' Not Publicly Accounted For
By Craig Whitlock
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A01 [bush white house] [nsc principals] [sec state Rice, sec def Gates, and the traditionalists] [versus] [veep cheney, Abrams’s shop in NSC, some civilian dod employees] [110th congress, 1st session] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [generally, traditionalist have been less embracing of potential pow abuse] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [gitmo and beyond] [followup] [black sites and CIA program reportedly ended earlier] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- On Sept. 6, 2006, President Bush announced that the CIA's overseas secret prisons had been temporarily emptied and 14 al-Qaeda leaders taken to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. But since then, there has been no official accounting of what happened to about 30 other "ghost prisoners" who spent extended time in the custody of the CIA.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602326.html
From CIA Jails, Inmates Fade Into Obscurity
Dozens of 'Ghost Prisoners' Not Publicly Accounted For
By Craig Whitlock
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A01 [bush white house] [nsc principals] [sec state Rice, sec def Gates, and the traditionalists] [versus] [veep cheney, Abrams’s shop in NSC, some civilian dod employees] [110th congress, 1st session] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [generally, traditionalist have been less embracing of potential pow abuse] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [gitmo and beyond] [followup] [black sites and CIA program reportedly ended earlier] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- On Sept. 6, 2006, President Bush announced that the CIA's overseas secret prisons had been temporarily emptied and 14 al-Qaeda leaders taken to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. But since then, there has been no official accounting of what happened to about 30 other "ghost prisoners" who spent extended time in the custody of the CIA.
Some have been secretly transferred to their home countries, where they remain in detention and out of public view, according to interviews in Pakistan and Europe with government officials, [****]human rights groups and lawyers for the detainees. Others have disappeared without a trace and may or may not still be under CIA control. [****]
The bulk of the ghost prisoners were captured in Pakistan, where they scattered after the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. [****]
Among them is Mustafa Setmariam Nasar, a dual citizen of Syria and Spain and an influential al-Qaeda ideologue who was last seen two years ago. On Oct. 31, 2005, the red-bearded radical with a $5 million U.S. bounty on his head [****] arrived in the Pakistani border city of Quetta, unaware he was being followed.
Nasar was cornered by police as he and a small group of followers stopped for dinner. Soon after, according to Pakistani officials, he was handed over to U.S. spies and vanished into the CIA's prison network. Since then, various reports have placed him in Syria, Afghanistan and India, [*****]though nobody has been able to confirm his whereabouts.
Nearly all the Arab members of al-Qaeda caught in Pakistan were given to the CIA, [****] Pakistani security officials said. But the fate of several Pakistani al-Qaeda operatives who were also captured remains murky; the Pakistani government has ignored a number of lawsuits filed by relatives seeking information. [*****]
"You just don't know -- either these people are in the custody of the Pakistanis or the Americans," said Zafarullah Khan, human rights coordinator for the Pakistan Muslim League, an opposition political party.
Others have been handed over to governments that have kept their presence a secret.
Since 2004, for example, the CIA has handed five Libyan fighters to authorities in Tripoli. Two had been covertly nabbed by the CIA in China and Thailand, while the others were caught in Pakistan and held in CIA prisons in Afghanistan, Eastern Europe and other locations, [*****] according to Libyan sources.
The Libyan government has kept silent about the cases. But Libyan political exiles said the men are kept in isolation with no prospect of an open trial.
Other ghost prisoners are believed to remain in U.S. custody after passing into and out of the CIA's hands, [*****] according to human rights groups.
Relatives of a Tunisian al-Qaeda suspect known as Retha al-Tunisi, captured in Karachi, Pakistan, in 2002, received notice recently from the International Committee of the Red Cross that he is detained at a U.S. military prison in Afghanistan, said Clara Gutteridge, an investigator for Reprieve, a London-based legal rights group that represents many inmates at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay. Other prisoners, since released, had previously reported seeing Tunisi at a secret CIA "black site" in Afghanistan.
At least one former CIA prisoner has been quietly freed. Ahmad Khalil Ibrahim Samir al-Ani, an Iraqi intelligence agent captured after the invasion of Iraq in 2003, was detained at a secret location until he was released last year. [******]
Ani gained notoriety before the Iraq war when Bush administration officials said he had met in Prague with Sept. 11, 2001, hijacker Mohamed Atta. Some officials, including Vice President Cheney, cited the rendezvous as evidence of an alliance between al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein. The theory was later debunked by U.S. intelligence agencies and the Sept. 11 commission, which revealed in 2004 that Ani was in U.S. custody. [well where is he now?] [if he was released in 2006, where is he?] [why haven’t reporters attempted to interview him?] [has he returned to al Qaeda central in Pakistan?] [***]
The Iraqi spy resurfaced two months ago when Czech officials revealed that he had filed a multimillion-dollar compensation claim. His complaint: that unfounded Czech intelligence reports had prompted his imprisonment by the CIA.
Guantanamo Newcomers
When Bush confirmed the existence of the CIA's prisons in September 2006, he said they had been vacated for the time being. But he said the U.S. government would use them again, if necessary. [*****]
The CIA has resumed its detention program. Since March, five new terrorism suspects have been transferred to Guantanamo. Although the Pentagon has not disclosed details about how or precisely when they were captured, [*******]officials have said one of the prisoners, Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi, had spent months in CIA custody overseas. [*****]
Details of the secret detention program remain classified. U.S. officials have offered only vague descriptions of its reach and scope.
Last month, in a speech in New York, CIA Director Michael V. Hayden said "fewer than 100 people" had been detained in the CIA's overseas prison network since the program's inception in early 2002. [*************]
In June, a coalition of human rights groups identified 39 people who may have been in CIA custody but are still missing. Many of those on the list, however, were identified by partial names or noms de guerre, such as one man described only as Mohammed the Afghan.
Joanne Mariner, director of terrorism and counterterrorism research for Human Rights Watch, said the CIA has moved many prisoners from country to country and relied on other spy services to take custody of suspects, sometimes temporarily and sometimes for good.
"The large majority have gone to their countries of origin," she said. "But that doesn't mean all of them. There could be some that are still in proxy detention."
In a footnote to its 2004 report, the Sept. 11 commission named nine al-Qaeda suspects who were in U.S. custody at black sites. Seven were later transferred to Guantanamo.
Still missing is Hassan Ghul, a Pakistani national captured in northern Iraq in January 2004. U.S. officials have described him as a high-level emissary between al-Qaeda's core command in Pakistan and its affiliates in Iraq. [double check the citation] [endnote 2, chapter 5, page 488 (adobe reader, page 505] [reads as follows: Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Abu Zubaydah, Riduan Isamuddin (also known as Hambali), Abd al Rahim al Nashiri, Tawfiq bin Attash (also known as Khallad), Ramzi Binalshibh, Mohamed al Kahtani, Ahmad Khalil Ibrahim Samir al Ani, Ali Abd al Rahman al Faqasi al Ghamdi (also known as Abu Bakr al Azdi), and Hassan Ghul.] [*****]
Another prisoner on the commission's list was Ali Abd al-Rahman al-Faqasi al-Ghamdi, a Saudi accused of planning attacks in the Arabian Peninsula. He surrendered to Saudi authorities in June 2003.
Although the Sept. 11 commission reported that Ghamdi was in U.S. custody, Saudi officials said that was not the case. They said he remains in prison in Saudi Arabia and has never left the country. [*******]
"He was never, under no condition, in U.S. custody," said a Saudi security source who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Officials with the International Committee of the Red Cross said they have failed to find dozens of people once believed to have been in CIA custody, [****]despite repeated queries to the U.S. government and other countries.
"The ICRC remains gravely concerned by the fate of the persons previously held in the CIA detention program who remain unaccounted for," said Simon Schorno, a Red Cross spokesman in Washington. "The ICRC is concerned about any type of secret detention."
The CIA declined to comment on whether certain individuals were ever in its custody.
"Apart from detainees transferred to Guantanamo, the CIA does not, as a rule, comment publicly on lists of people alleged to have been in its custody -- even though those lists are often flawed," said Paul Gimigliano, a CIA spokesman.
Out in the Cold
When the Bush administration disclosed last year that 14 senior al-Qaeda leaders had been transferred to Guantanamo -- leaving the CIA prisons temporarily vacant -- some conspicuous names were missing from the list. [******]
One was an al-Qaeda training camp leader known as Ibn al-Sheikh al-Libi. He was arrested in the Pakistani border town of Kohat in late 2001 and eventually taken to Cairo, where the CIA enlisted Egyptian intelligence agents to help with the interrogation. [ouch] [****]
Libi began to talk. Among his claims: that the Iraqi regime had provided training in poisons and mustard gas to al-Qaeda operatives. [*****]
His statements were cited by the Bush administration as part of the rationale for invading Iraq in 2003. He recanted after the war began, however, and his continued detention became a political liability for the CIA.
Although the CIA has since acknowledged that Libi was one of its prisoners, U.S. officials have not disclosed what happened to him. In interviews, however, political exiles from Libya said he was flown by the CIA to Tripoli in early 2006 and imprisoned by the Libyan government. [*****]
Libi reported that the CIA had taken him from Egypt to several other covert sites, including in Jordan, Morocco and Afghanistan, according to a Libyan security source.
He also claimed that he had been kept someplace very cold and that his CIA captors had told him he was in Alaska, the source said. Human rights groups have suggested that Libi was part of a small group of senior al-Qaeda figures held in a CIA prison in northern Poland.
In Tripoli, Libi joined several other Libyans who had spent time in the CIA's penal system. All were members of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, a network that had plotted for years from exile to overthrow Moammar Gaddafi.
After the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, members of the Libyan network who had been staying there dispersed. The CIA helped Libya's spy agencies track down some of the leaders.
One of them, Abdallah al-Sadeq, was apprehended in a covert CIA operation in Thailand in the spring of 2004, [****] according to Noman Benotman, a former member of the Libyan militant network.
Another, Abu Munder al-Saadi, the group's spiritual leader, was caught in the Hong Kong airport. [*****] In both cases, Benotman said, the Libyans were held briefly by the CIA before U.S. agents flew them to Tripoli. [*****]
"They realized very quickly that these guys had nothing to do with al-Qaeda," Benotman said in an interview in London. "They kept them for a few weeks, and that's it."
Benotman said he confirmed details of the CIA operations when he was allowed to see the men during a visit to a Tripoli prison this year. The trip was arranged by the Libyan government as part of an effort to persuade the Libyan prisoners to reconcile with the Gaddafi regime.
The CIA has transferred at least two other Libyans to Tripoli, Benotman said. Khaled al-Sharif and another Libyan known only as Rabai were captured in Peshawar, Pakistan, in 2003 and spent time in a CIA prison in Afghanistan, [***]he said.
The Libyan Embassy in Washington did not respond to a faxed letter seeking comment.
A Missing 'Gold Mine'
In Spain, prosecutors have been searching for Nasar, the redheaded al-Qaeda ideologue, for four years. [******]
In 2003, he was indicted by an investigative magistrate in Madrid, accused of helping to build sleeper cells in Spain. A prolific writer and theoretician in the jihadi movement, Nasar had lived in several European countries as well as Afghanistan. [****]
Spain has filed requests for information about Nasar with the Pakistani government, to no avail. Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos also raised the issue during a visit to Islamabad last year.
"We don't have any indication of where he is," said a source in the Spanish Foreign Ministry, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Brynjar Lia, a Norwegian terrorism analyst and the author of a new book on Nasar, "Architect of Global Jihad," said the radical would know valuable details about the inner workings of al-Qaeda. [******[
"The Americans are probably the ones who want him the most because he was prominently involved in al-Qaeda in the 1990s," said Lia, a senior researcher at the Norwegian Defense Research Establishment. "He must be a gold mine of information."
Some Spanish media have speculated that Nasar is being held in Syria, his place of birth. The CIA has transferred other terrorism suspects to Syria despite tense diplomatic relations between Washington and Damascus.
Other Spanish press reports have claimed that Nasar remains in U.S. custody. Another rumor is that he's being held in a CIA-run prison in India, said Manuel Tuero, a Madrid lawyer who represents Nasar's wife.
Though Nasar would go on trial if he was brought back to Spain, that would be preferable to indefinite detention in a secret prison, Tuero said.
"He's in a legal limbo," he said. "The Americans would never give him a fair trial. Spain would."
Special correspondents Munir Ladaa in Berlin and Cristina Mateo-Yanguas in Madrid contributed to this report.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:17 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/middleeast/27yemen.html
October 27, 2007
U.S. Criticizes Fugitive’s Release
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [bush white house] [nsc principals] [gsave] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [Yemen’s recent forgiveness of a jihadis involved in the USS Cole disaster] [he took an oath to be loyal to the central govt which is considered pentence apparently] [followup] [********]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 16 (AP) — The White House sharply criticized Yemen on Friday for releasing one of Al Qaeda’s masterminds of the bombing of the destroyer Cole in 2000 that killed 17 American sailors.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/middleeast/27yemen.html
October 27, 2007
U.S. Criticizes Fugitive’s Release
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [bush white house] [nsc principals] [gsave] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [Yemen’s recent forgiveness of a jihadis involved in the USS Cole disaster] [he took an oath to be loyal to the central govt which is considered pentence apparently] [followup] [********]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 16 (AP) — The White House sharply criticized Yemen on Friday for releasing one of Al Qaeda’s masterminds of the bombing of the destroyer Cole in 2000 that killed 17 American sailors.
Jamal al-Badawi, who is wanted by the F.B.I., was convicted in 2004 of plotting, preparing and helping to carry out the bombing of the Cole and received a death sentence that was commuted to 15 years in prison. [*****] [I farily certain the U.S. has no extradition treaty with Yemen but Yemen has found ways to cooperate since 9/11] [the administration probably should have been more on top of this] [******]
He and 22 others, mostly Qaeda fighters, escaped from prison in 2004. But Mr. Badawi was granted his freedom after turning himself in 15 days ago and pledging loyalty to Yemen’s president, [******] Ali Abdullah Saleh, a senior security official in Yemen said Thursday.
“The United States is dismayed and deeply disappointed in the government of Yemen’s decision not to imprison Badawi,” said Gordon D. Johndroe, a White House spokesman.
“This action is inconsistent with a deepening of our bilateral counterterrorism cooperation,” [*****] he said. “We have communicated our displeasure to Yemeni officials and will work with the Yemeni government to ensure Al Badawi is held accountable for his past terrorist actions.” [Badawi better watch out] [bounty hunters and the occasional stray predator drone will be over his soldier] [*******]
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:16 PM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102601715.html
A Missed Moment In Iraq
By Henri J. Barkey
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A15 [oped] [turkey] [-iraq] [the looming mess if Turkey crosses over the border in a major way] [NATO ally] [and it’s already bitter over how France and the EU have treated Turkey] [why hasn’t the administration been more proactive?] [******]
The Bush administration has only itself to blame for the quandary it faces with Turkish forces poised to intervene in northern Iraq. The Turks want to retaliate against the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), whose insurgents killed 12 Turkish soldiers Sunday. A massive retaliation would be a major misfortune for Turkey, Iraq and the United States. [*****]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102601715.html
A Missed Moment In Iraq
By Henri J. Barkey
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A15 [oped] [turkey] [-iraq] [the looming mess if Turkey crosses over the border in a major way] [NATO ally] [and it’s already bitter over how France and the EU have treated Turkey] [why hasn’t the administration been more proactive?] [******]
The Bush administration has only itself to blame for the quandary it faces with Turkish forces poised to intervene in northern Iraq. The Turks want to retaliate against the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), whose insurgents killed 12 Turkish soldiers Sunday. A massive retaliation would be a major misfortune for Turkey, Iraq and the United States. [*****]
First, it would undermine the stability of the only part of Iraq where the United States is welcome. [****] Second, it could plunge Turkey into an Iraq quagmire of its own. [****]
Sadly, this crisis was predictable and predicted. U.S. officials have long known that a Turkish incursion was just one terrorist event away. As tensions mounted, the administration had numerous opportunities to engage in preventive diplomacy. [*****]A combination of lack of imagination, incompetence and sheer lack of knowledge at the State Department has caused this impasse. To make matters worse, on Tuesday the department tried to shift the blame to the Iraqi Kurds, expressing unhappiness over their inaction. [it seems true: Rice has been a failure] [perhaps there are mitigating factors such as her myriad internal enemies, her push for Israeli-Palestinian peace, the DPRK deal that some are trying to scuttle, so on] [but this would seem to be an obvious place to invest time and resources and she and state haven’t] [********]
Granted, tensions between Turks and Iraqi Kurds are not easy to manage. For the Turks the problem extends beyond the PKK. They [Turks] [****] are petrified that an independent Kurdistan will emerge from the chaos in Iraq and become a beacon for their own Kurdish minority. [*****] The PKK, which has waged an insurrection for more than 20 years, has been using northern Iraq as a haven, training ground and headquarters. Its bases along the Turkish border are mostly isolated and rudimentary. Its headquarters is perched high in the Qandil mountains, near the Iranian border and safe from Turkish artillery.
Turks blame the United States and Iraqi Kurds for their lackluster approach to the PKK's terrorist infrastructure in areas they control. Considering that Washington is engaged in a "war on terrorism," their complaint hits a nerve. [****] The Kurdish question is not new to Turkey; Kurds, in search of cultural and political rights, have been in some form of rebellion or political agitation since the inception of the Turkish republic in the 1920s. The PKK and a legal political party are just the latest manifestations of this phenomenon.
Turkey's ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) is the party that has come closest to starting a process of reconciliation between Turks and Kurds. It faces two big hurdles. The first is its own military establishment, which is at odds with the mildly Islamic AKP and considers it anathema to its hard-line secularist principles. The civil-military discord has hampered Turkey's Iraq policy. The AKP government, having recently been rewarded at the polls for its successful governance, finds itself on the defensive on northern Iraq and the PKK, its Achilles' heel. Sensing its reluctance to intervene, the secular establishment has marshaled tremendous pressure on the AKP. [******]
The other hurdle is the PKK itself. With its leader, Abdullah Ocalan, in prison, the organization has become nothing more than a cult intent on using the passions of Turkey's Kurds to find a way of getting him released. [PKK] [*****]
The irony is that both Iraqi Kurds and the AKP government directly or indirectly signaled the Bush administration that they were interested in a deal. I know that senior Iraqi Kurds have forwarded ideas to U.S. officials. The AKP, on the other hand, sought to test the waters first by sending its intelligence chief two years ago to talk to the Kurds -- something the government is loath to do officially -- and by organizing a private meeting this year between the Kurdish Regional Government's prime minister, Nechirvan Barzani, and then-Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul. The chief of the Turkish general staff, Yasar Buyukanit, who in a fiery speech warned the government not to talk to the KRG, scuttled Gul's meeting. [******]
The Bush administration missed an opportunity when it failed to see and support the desire for such dialogue and use its good offices to construct a "grand bargain" between the Iraqi Kurds and Ankara. At minimum, such a bargain would have required the Iraqi Kurds to dislodge the PKK from Iraq and for the Turks to offer guarantees on trade and security to the Iraqi Kurds. [*****]
For the United States, this would have meant the consolidation of northern Iraq; paradoxically, a Kurdish north at peace with Turkey is the best antidote to separation from Iraq. In short, this would have been a winning situation for all.
The best the administration can hope for now is to persuade the Turks to engage in a limited cross-border military operation. That might contain public anger and assuage a vitriolic press. [*******]
The only other thing to hope for is bad weather. With the onset of winter and dwindling military activities, Washington will perhaps have the diplomatic window of opportunity it almost closed. Three years late, it will be much harder to succeed.
The writer chairs the International Relations Department of Lehigh University and was a member of the State Department's policy planning staff from 1998 to 2000.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:15 PM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602329.html
Progress on Surveillance
A bipartisan Senate bill on monitoring foreign communications
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A14 [editorial] [nsa warrant-less spy program] [other TSPs] [FISA] [********]
THE SENATE intelligence committee's bipartisan rewrite of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is not perfect, but it illustrates that there is a path to a reasonable compromise that would give intelligence agencies the flexibility to intercept foreign communications while strengthening oversight of their activities. The proposal has the backing of the intelligence panel's top Democrat and Republican, Sens. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.) and Christopher S. "Kit" Bond (R-Mo.), and the Bush administration has expressed a welcome openness to the approach.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602329.html
Progress on Surveillance
A bipartisan Senate bill on monitoring foreign communications
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A14 [editorial] [nsa warrant-less spy program] [other TSPs] [FISA] [********]
THE SENATE intelligence committee's bipartisan rewrite of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act is not perfect, but it illustrates that there is a path to a reasonable compromise that would give intelligence agencies the flexibility to intercept foreign communications while strengthening oversight of their activities. The proposal has the backing of the intelligence panel's top Democrat and Republican, Sens. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.) and Christopher S. "Kit" Bond (R-Mo.), and the Bush administration has expressed a welcome openness to the approach.
The biggest sticking point [*****]-- and the biggest difference between the Senate bill and a measure backed by the House intelligence and judiciary committees -- doesn't involve the terms under which surveillance would be conducted. Rather, it concerns the question of retroactive immunity from lawsuits for communications providers that cooperated with the administration's warrantless surveillance program. As we have said, we do not believe that these companies should be held hostage to costly litigation in what is essentially a complaint about administration activities. [****] [isn’t the point to find out what happened?] [civil suits against companies that were bullied into submission seems a tertiary if not lower priority] [******]
Immunity aside, both the Senate and House bills would create a strong oversight role for the special court that oversees FISA. Under both measures, the court would review the procedures used to determine that targets of surveillance are outside the United States and to effect the "minimization" measures designed to protect the privacy of U.S. citizens whose communications are inadvertently intercepted.
The Senate measure would expire in six years while the House version would expire in less than two years, along with provisions of the USA Patriot Act; the shorter House time frame is preferable. [***] An amendment to the Senate bill by Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden would go too far by requiring that a warrant be obtained when U.S. citizens are the target of surveillance overseas; this would be an unnecessary and potentially disruptive precedent. [********] [nor is it clear that Americans’ constitutional and civil liberties extend to when they travel abroad] [else, why are Americans subject to local laws abroad?]
As the debate proceeds, lawmakers and the administration need to keep in mind the big-picture points that have, at times, eluded both the Bush administration and some civil liberties groups. Intelligence agencies should be able to intercept the communications of foreign targets overseas without the burdensome and unnecessary requirement of obtaining an individual warrant every time. But that power, and the potential threat to Americans' privacy that it inevitably entails, needs to be checked and constrained, including by the kind of meaningful court review that was not present in legislation that the administration muscled through Congress this year. The Senate intelligence measure, which outlines one path for achieving this balance, is a badly needed contribution to what has been an unnecessarily partisan debate.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:14 PM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102601955.html
Slipping in Afghanistan
As the violence worsens, NATO struggles to raise troops.
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A14 [editorial] [Afghanistan] [slip sliding away] [the nearer your destination the more you’re slip slidding away] [****]
THE UNITED STATES and its NATO allies are engaged in a regular ritual: blaming each other for the deteriorating security situation in Afghanistan. This week, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates forcefully criticized European governments for failing to meet commitments to supply troops and equipment for Afghan operations; he even threatened that the United States might withdraw its troops from Kosovo -- a European preoccupation -- if Afghanistan were not better supplied. [***]At a meeting of defense ministers, the Netherlands again complained that it -- along with the United States, Britain and Canada -- bears the brunt of the fighting against the Taliban, while Germany, Italy, Spain and most other NATO members restrict their soldiers to the safer parts of Afghanistan or ban them from combat. In reply the German defense minister suggested that NATO's aggressive military strategy in the south does more harm than good.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102601955.html
Slipping in Afghanistan
As the violence worsens, NATO struggles to raise troops.
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A14 [editorial] [Afghanistan] [slip sliding away] [the nearer your destination the more you’re slip slidding away] [****]
THE UNITED STATES and its NATO allies are engaged in a regular ritual: blaming each other for the deteriorating security situation in Afghanistan. This week, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates forcefully criticized European governments for failing to meet commitments to supply troops and equipment for Afghan operations; he even threatened that the United States might withdraw its troops from Kosovo -- a European preoccupation -- if Afghanistan were not better supplied. [***]At a meeting of defense ministers, the Netherlands again complained that it -- along with the United States, Britain and Canada -- bears the brunt of the fighting against the Taliban, while Germany, Italy, Spain and most other NATO members restrict their soldiers to the safer parts of Afghanistan or ban them from combat. In reply the German defense minister suggested that NATO's aggressive military strategy in the south does more harm than good.
Loud disputes such as this have always been part of NATO and tend to disguise its successes -- such as the facts that all 26 of the alliance members have troops in Afghanistan, that all have increased their commitment in the past year and that NATO forces continue to rout the Taliban wherever it is encountered. Yet there are real problems, both in the fighting and in the supply and distribution of forces, and they are worsening. According to the United Nations and independent monitoring groups, violence has increased significantly in Afghanistan for the second straight year, spreading from the southeast to areas close to Kabul. Coalition deaths, including 94 U.S. soldiers killed, already exceed the full-year total for 2006. [*****]
The disparity of effort among NATO members continues to be significant. The United States contributes 15,100 troops to the 41,000-member NATO-led international force, known as ISAF, and deploys another 13,000 in counterterrorism operations. Britain has 7,700 troops in the country, meaning that Britain and the United States together account for more than half of ISAF's strength. Meanwhile, France and Germany together deploy 4,200 soldiers, or 10 percent of ISAF -- and none serve in the areas where most of the fighting takes place. Among other nations only Canada and the Netherlands, with 1,700 and 1,500 troops, are contributing substantially to anti-Taliban operations. [***]
The defense ministers' meeting produced some small promises of additional forces: Germany promised to send 200 more trainers for the Afghan army, and France chipped in 50. But the bottom line is that 2007 is looking like another year in which the Western alliance will lose as much as it gains in Afghanistan. Unless the trend is arrested -- which would require more troops, more resources and more willingness to put soldiers at risk -- it will lead both NATO and Afghanistan to failure. [****]
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:14 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/opinion/27shweder.html
October 27, 2007
Op-Ed Contributor
A True Culture War
By RICHARD A. SHWEDER
Chicago [oped] [cultural war ongoing since 1960s] [today’s it wrath is “Islamo Facism] [academe’s role in foreign policy?] [****]
IS the Pentagon truly going to deploy an army of cultural relativists to Muslim nations in an effort to make the world a safer place?

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/opinion/27shweder.html
October 27, 2007
Op-Ed Contributor
A True Culture War
By RICHARD A. SHWEDER
Chicago [oped] [cultural war ongoing since 1960s] [today’s it wrath is “Islamo Facism] [academe’s role in foreign policy?] [****]
IS the Pentagon truly going to deploy an army of cultural relativists to Muslim nations in an effort to make the world a safer place?
A few weeks ago this newspaper reported on an experimental Pentagon “human terrain” program to embed anthropologists in combat units in Iraq and Afghanistan. It featured two military anthropologists: Tracy (last name withheld), a cultural translator viewed by American paratroopers as “a crucial new weapon” in counterinsurgency; and Montgomery McFate, who has taken her Yale doctorate into active duty in a media blitz to convince skeptical colleagues that the occupying forces should know more about the local cultural scene. [****]
How have members of the anthropological profession reacted to the Pentagon’s new inclusion agenda? A group calling itself the Network of Concerned Anthropologists has called for a boycott and asked faculty members and students around the country to pledge not to contribute to counterinsurgency efforts. Their logic is clear: America is engaged in a brutal war of occupation; if you don’t support the mission then you shouldn’t support the troops. Understandably these concerned scholars don’t want to make it easier for the American military to conquer or pacify people who once trusted anthropologists. Nevertheless, I believe the pledge campaign is a way of shooting oneself in the foot. [****]
Part of my thinking stems from an interview with Ms. McFate on NPR’s “Diane Rehm Show” to which I tried to listen with an open mind. My first reaction was to feel let down. It turns out that the anthropologists are not really doing anthropology at all, but are basically hired as military tour guides to help counterinsurgency forces accomplish various nonlethal missions. [******]
These anthropological “angels on the shoulder,” as Ms. McFate put it, offer global positioning advice as soldiers move through poorly understood human terrain — telling them when not to cross their legs at meetings, how to show respect to leaders, how to arrange a party. They use their degrees in cultural anthropology to play the part of Emily Post. [*******]
More worrisome, it was revealed that Tracy, the mystery anthropologist, wears a military uniform and carries a gun during her cultural sensitivity missions. This brought to my increasingly skeptical mind the unfortunate image of an angelic anthropologist perched on the shoulder of a member of an American counterinsurgency unit who is kicking in the door of someone’s home in Iraq, while exclaiming, “Hi, we’re here from the government; we’re here to understand you.” [*******]
Nevertheless the military voices on the show had their winning moments, sounding like old-fashioned relativists, whose basic mission in life was to counter ethnocentrism and disarm those possessed by a strident sense of group superiority. Ms. McFate stressed her success at getting American soldiers to stop making moral judgments about a local Afghan cultural practice in which older men go off with younger boys on “love Thursdays” and do some “hanky-panky.” “Stop imposing your values on others,” was the message for the American soldiers. She was way beyond “don’t ask, don’t tell,” and I found it heartwarming.
I began to imagine an occupying army of moral relativists, enforcing the peace by drawing a lesson from the Ottoman Empire. The Ottomans lasted a much longer time than the British Empire in part because they had a brilliant counterinsurgency strategy. They did not try to impose their values on others. Instead, they made room — their famous “millet system” — for cultural pluralism, leaving each ethnic and religious group to control its own territory and at liberty to carry forward its distinctive way of life. [*****]
When the American Anthropological Association holds its annual convention in November in Washington, I expect it to become a forum for heated expression of political and moral opposition to the war, to the Bush administration, to capitalism, to neo-colonialism, and to the corrupting influence of the Pentagon and the C.I.A. on professional ethics. [*****]
Nevertheless I think it is a mistake to support a profession-wide military boycott or a public counter-counterinsurgency loyalty oath. And I think it would be unwise for the American Anthropological Association to do so at this time.
The real issue for academic anthropologists is not whether the military should know more rather than less about other ways of life — of course it should know more. The real issue is how our profession is going to begin to play a far more significant educational role in the formulation of foreign policy, in the hope that anthropologists won’t have to answer some patriotic call late in a sad day to become an armed angel riding the shoulder of a misguided American warrior. [******]
Richard A. Shweder, an anthropologist and professor of comparative human development at the University of Chicago, is the author of “Thinking Through Cultures.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:13 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/opinion/27sat1.html
October 27, 2007
Editorial
That Old Time Religion
[editorial] [bush as a believer in the rapture?] [Reagan wing that Reagan moved away from himself] [*****]
President Bush was back in campaign mode this week, resurrecting two tried-and-true red-meat issues to rally the cadres in his dispirited Republican Party — fervent supporters of missile defense and of squeezing Fidel Castro’s Cuba. Seven years in the White House have done nothing to change his views. Campaigning now for his legacy, he is still wrong on both issues. [***]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/opinion/27sat1.html
October 27, 2007
Editorial
That Old Time Religion
[editorial] [bush as a believer in the rapture?] [Reagan wing that Reagan moved away from himself] [*****]
President Bush was back in campaign mode this week, resurrecting two tried-and-true red-meat issues to rally the cadres in his dispirited Republican Party — fervent supporters of missile defense and of squeezing Fidel Castro’s Cuba. Seven years in the White House have done nothing to change his views. Campaigning now for his legacy, he is still wrong on both issues. [***]
Mr. Bush has brought his 1960s Cuba policy into the Internet age by allowing private organizations to send computers to Cuban youths — if the government does not control their use. That is unlikely. And he proposed an international fund to provide grants, loans and debt relief to the Cuban government — but only after it allows free speech and open elections. Until then, Mr. Bush will cling stubbornly to the half-century-old economic embargo that has failed to unseat Mr. Castro while giving him an ever ready excuse for his government’s economic failings and repression.
No one knows what will happen when Mr. Castro, who is ailing, dies. The United States is denying itself any chance to help influence Cuba’s future by sticking to the failed policies of the past. Its overriding interest should be in a peaceful transition to the democratic and economically dynamic society that Cubans have dreamed of for decades. [*******]
Easing the embargo could strengthen Cuba’s battered middle class and help it play a more active role in whatever comes next. Mr. Bush’s call for the Cuban people to rise up is more likely to persuade the government’s supporters — the only ones with guns — to hang on even more stubbornly or brutally.
Mr. Bush’s blind faith in missile defense is equally disquieting. The president has already wasted billions on a small and unproven system in Alaska. Now he wants to build one in Europe to guard against a possible attack on American allies by Iran. [****]
Those allies are far less certain that Iran poses a near-term ballistic missile threat, and far less eager than Mr. Bush to anger the Russians, who fiercely oppose the system. [*****] [most Europeans think the short-term cost outweigh the short-term advantages] [****]Moscow, as ever, is being disingenuous. But Mr. Bush should be looking for ways to persuade Russia to increase pressure on Iran rather than giving it more excuses not to.
Mr. Bush and his cadre may be stuck in the past. But Congress does not have to be. It should restrain even more than it has Mr. Bush’s exorbitant missile defense spending.
Congress and the Democratic candidates for president should also find a way to challenge Mr. Bush’s Cuba policies. The issue has not gotten much attention in the campaign, although Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico has said he would reassess the trade embargo in exchange for the release of all political prisoners and “positive steps” toward democratic freedoms. Given Florida’s electoral clout, bold initiatives may be too much to expect in an election year — except that Mr. Castro’s health may not wait. The White House may thrive on red meat; the voters shouldn’t have to.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:12 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/europe/27briefs-putin.html
October 27, 2007
World Briefing | Europe
Putin Meets With Europeans
By STEPHEN CASTLE [Russia] [former ussr] [putin as strong Russian leader] [ethos] [delusions of grandeur still fueling Russia’s foreign policy] [a somewhat hyperbolic use of the Cuban Missile Crisis analogy] [use psci 350] [use ir text] [*****]
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia attended a one-day summit meeting with European Union leaders in Portugal overshadowed by disagreements on human rights, trade, the Iran nuclear standoff and Kosovo independence, and especially energy. [***] Only two minor deals were announced, on cooperating on drug trafficking and raising Russian steel imports. Mr. Putin brought with him his hostility to an American proposal to station a missile defense system in the Czech Republic and Poland, and after the meeting he compared the plan to the Cuban missile crisis of 1962, which brought the world to the brink of nuclear war. [******] “Analogous actions by the Soviet Union, when it deployed rockets on Cuba, provoked the Cuban missile crisis,” Mr. Putin said. “Such a threat is being set up on our borders. ” But he added: “Thank God, we do not have any Cuban missile crisis now, and this is above all because of the fundamental way relations between Russia and the United States and Europe have changed.” [*****]
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/europe/27briefs-putin.html
October 27, 2007
World Briefing | Europe
Putin Meets With Europeans
By STEPHEN CASTLE [Russia] [former ussr] [putin as strong Russian leader] [ethos] [delusions of grandeur still fueling Russia’s foreign policy] [a somewhat hyperbolic use of the Cuban Missile Crisis analogy] [use psci 350] [use ir text] [*****]
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia attended a one-day summit meeting with European Union leaders in Portugal overshadowed by disagreements on human rights, trade, the Iran nuclear standoff and Kosovo independence, and especially energy. [***] Only two minor deals were announced, on cooperating on drug trafficking and raising Russian steel imports. Mr. Putin brought with him his hostility to an American proposal to station a missile defense system in the Czech Republic and Poland, and after the meeting he compared the plan to the Cuban missile crisis of 1962, which brought the world to the brink of nuclear war. [******] “Analogous actions by the Soviet Union, when it deployed rockets on Cuba, provoked the Cuban missile crisis,” Mr. Putin said. “Such a threat is being set up on our borders. ” But he added: “Thank God, we do not have any Cuban missile crisis now, and this is above all because of the fundamental way relations between Russia and the United States and Europe have changed.” [*****]
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:11 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/middleeast/27mideast.html
October 27, 2007
Israelis and Palestinians Pledge to Follow ‘Road Map’
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Israeli-Palestinian] [middle east peace process] [sec state rice is pushing hard as the administration closes in on Jan 2009] [and she has forces working against her] [not least of which is continued attacks mostly out of Gaza and the Israelis consistent practice of tit for tat] [big summit expected in November? to be held in Annapolis] [************
JERUSALEM, Oct. 26 — Israeli and Palestinian leaders on Friday reaffirmed their commitment to carrying out the first phase of the so-called road map peace plan, officials from both sides said. Their pledge gave a more defined form to a series of recent talks, though it was unclear whether it would result in any concrete moves toward peace.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/middleeast/27mideast.html
October 27, 2007
Israelis and Palestinians Pledge to Follow ‘Road Map’
By ISABEL KERSHNER [Israeli-Palestinian] [middle east peace process] [sec state rice is pushing hard as the administration closes in on Jan 2009] [and she has forces working against her] [not least of which is continued attacks mostly out of Gaza and the Israelis consistent practice of tit for tat] [big summit expected in November? to be held in Annapolis] [************
JERUSALEM, Oct. 26 — Israeli and Palestinian leaders on Friday reaffirmed their commitment to carrying out the first phase of the so-called road map peace plan, officials from both sides said. Their pledge gave a more defined form to a series of recent talks, though it was unclear whether it would result in any concrete moves toward peace.
Israel’s prime minister, Ehud Olmert, and the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, met for more than two hours at Mr. Olmert’s official residence here. They were joined by the heads of their negotiating teams — Tzipi Livni, Israel’s foreign minister, and Ahmed Qurei, the former Palestinian prime minister — and senior aides from each side.
The road map, [****] proposed in 2003 by the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations, known as the quartet, called for a performance-based process with clear timelines that would ultimately lead to the establishment of a Palestinian state in permanent borders by 2005. [******]
The first phase of the process called on the Palestinians to restructure their security services and work to end “all acts of violence against Israelis everywhere,” and on the Israelis to ease restrictions on the movement of Palestinian people and goods and immediately dismantle more than 20 settlement [******]outposts erected in the West Bank since March 2001.
“Both sides emphasized their commitment to implementation according to the phases of the road map,” Miri Eisin, a spokeswoman for Mr. Olmert, told reporters after the meeting. She noted that there might be “a gap in perceptions” over some issues, though she did not elaborate.
The meeting came as negotiators on both sides were working on a joint statement to be presented at an American-sponsored peace conference expected to take place in Annapolis, Md., before the end of the year. The statement is supposed to address the core issues of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, like borders, the status of Jerusalem and the Palestinian refugee problem, without necessarily spelling out the solutions. [*****]
Mr. Qurei said the meeting was “constructive,” adding that putting the long-shelved road map in place was “very important for creating real trust and a political horizon,” and that its readoption was a significant step forward. “The road map is the process, the confidence-building measures,” he said.
According to Mr. Qurei, both sides agreed that Israel’s defense minister, Ehud Barak, and the Palestinian prime minister, Salam Fayyad, would form a committee to follow up on fulfilling road map obligations, which would be monitored by the quartet, and specifically, the United States. [****]But Mr. Qurei and Ms. Eisin said no new timelines had been set.
As defense minister, Mr. Barak is responsible for the removal of the unauthorized outposts in the West Bank, something his predecessors have failed to do. The Israeli government’s preference is to reach an agreement with the settlers for a voluntary evacuation, Israeli officials have said. Failing that, the Defense Ministry is said to be working on plans to remove them by force.
At the meeting, Mr. Olmert assured the Palestinians that “everything would be done to avoid a humanitarian crisis in Gaza,” Ms. Eisin said, despite Mr. Barak’s approval on Thursday of a plan to cut back on power supplies to the Gaza Strip. The proposed sanction comes in the wake of continued rocket fire from Gaza.
Stephen J. Hadley, the American national security adviser who is currently visiting the region, met with Mr. Olmert immediately after the meeting, [*****]Israeli officials said.
Also on Friday, the Israeli Army killed at least six Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip, according to Israeli Army officials and the militant groups. Some of the militants belonged to Hamas and others to Islamic Jihad, the groups said.
According to an army spokeswoman, some of the militants died in clashes with soldiers, and the others in two airstrikes.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:11 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Afghanistan.html
October 27, 2007
Base Entrance Bombed in Afghanistan
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 11:05 a.m. ET
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- A suicide bomber wearing an Afghan security uniform detonated his explosives at the entrance to a combined U.S.-Afghan base on Saturday, killing four Afghan soldiers and a civilian, officials said. [almost certainly a foreign fighter or a local who was socialized in the madrassas in Pakistan] [talibanization] [***]

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Afghanistan.html
October 27, 2007
Base Entrance Bombed in Afghanistan
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 11:05 a.m. ET
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- A suicide bomber wearing an Afghan security uniform detonated his explosives at the entrance to a combined U.S.-Afghan base on Saturday, killing four Afghan soldiers and a civilian, officials said. [almost certainly a foreign fighter or a local who was socialized in the madrassas in Pakistan] [talibanization] [***]
The bomber walked up to a security gate for Afghan soldiers outside Forward Operating Base Bermel in the eastern province of Paktika, near the border with Pakistan, NATO's International Security Assistance Force said.
Four Afghan soldiers and a civilian were killed and six Afghans were wounded, NATO's International Security Assistance Force said. No Americans were hurt.
It was not immediately clear if the bomber had been trying to gain entry to the base.
Taliban insurgents have set off more than 100 suicide blasts this year, a record pace, and violence in 2007 has been the deadliest since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.
More than 5,200 people have died this year due to the insurgency,[*****] according to an Associated Press count based on figures from Afghan and Western officials.
Elsewhere, Taliban militants killed three Afghan police who had been trying to prevent them from carrying out a kidnapping, said Helmand provincial police chief Mohammad Hussein Andiwal. The militants successfully kidnapped an Afghan man during the gunbattle, he said.
Separately, U.S.-led coalition forces and Afghan soldiers killed ''several'' Taliban fighters near the Musa Qala region in Helmand province, the coalition said. Fighting has intensified in recent weeks around Musa Qala -- a Taliban-controlled town in the heart of Afghanistan's poppy growing region.
Australia's prime minister, meanwhile, said more NATO powers must directly engage the Taliban to help ease the burden on Australia, the United States, Britain, Canada and the Netherlands, which all have troops in the dangerous southern and central parts of Afghanistan.
Germany, Italy, France and Spain have troops in the relatively safer northern sections, a fact that is causing a rift within NATO, and Australian Prime Minister John Howard said those countries need to help ease the burden on countries operating in the south. [*****]
''Some of the other countries have lots of troops in Afghanistan, but they're not in some of the areas that are experiencing the heaviest fighting,'' he said.
The governments of the Netherlands and Canada, in particular, are coming under domestic pressure to pull out troops because of heavy casualties. [*****]
''I think the Dutch government has been very courageous to date,'' Howard said. ''It's not for me to comment on Dutch politics, but I do observe that the Dutch are making a great contribution and as are of course the Canadians.''
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:10 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/asia/27briefs-nato.html
October 27, 2007
World Briefing | Asia
Afghanistan: 2 NATO Soldiers Killed
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Afghanistan] [hydra] [insurgency] [pivotal 2007 when the Taliban and hydra mounted an important spring offensive into the summer] [some indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, many indications of backsliding] [much like –Iraq, Iran seems to be playing a proxy in Afghanistan] [more chaos] [bound to create even more distance between US and its principal NATO allies] [******]
Insurgents ambushed NATO-led forces in the mountainous Korangal Valley in eastern Kunar Province late Thursday, leaving two alliance soldiers dead and three others wounded, officials said. NATO did not identify their nationalities. Most of the troops in that part of the country are American.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/asia/27briefs-nato.html
October 27, 2007
World Briefing | Asia
Afghanistan: 2 NATO Soldiers Killed
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [Afghanistan] [hydra] [insurgency] [pivotal 2007 when the Taliban and hydra mounted an important spring offensive into the summer] [some indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, many indications of backsliding] [much like –Iraq, Iran seems to be playing a proxy in Afghanistan] [more chaos] [bound to create even more distance between US and its principal NATO allies] [******]
Insurgents ambushed NATO-led forces in the mountainous Korangal Valley in eastern Kunar Province late Thursday, leaving two alliance soldiers dead and three others wounded, officials said. NATO did not identify their nationalities. Most of the troops in that part of the country are American.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:09 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/middleeast/27sultan.html
October 27, 2007
Execution Case Tests Iraq’s Bid to Ease Divide
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. and ALISSA J. RUBIN [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges] [******]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 26 — In late June, three of Saddam Hussein’s senior military officials were found guilty of war crimes, including the notorious henchman known as Chemical Ali. Iraqi law required that they be executed no more than 30 days after the Iraqi courts rejected their final appeals. [*****]

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/middleeast/27sultan.html
October 27, 2007
Execution Case Tests Iraq’s Bid to Ease Divide
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. and ALISSA J. RUBIN [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt riven by sectarian challenges] [******]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 26 — In late June, three of Saddam Hussein’s senior military officials were found guilty of war crimes, including the notorious henchman known as Chemical Ali. Iraqi law required that they be executed no more than 30 days after the Iraqi courts rejected their final appeals. [*****]
That deadline has passed, but the men are still alive and in United States custody. The execution has been delayed because of questions raised by some Iraqi politicians and a spirited behind-the-scenes discussion involving senior Iraqi and American officials over the death sentence of one of the other men, Sultan Hashem Ahmed al-Jabouri al-Tai, the former minister of defense.
Now, Mr. Hashem’s fate has become a test case for reconciliation and whether Iraq’s fractious sects and political alliances can work together to resolve the difficult issues surrounding his death sentence. There are also doubts among some Iraqi officials about the fairness of his punishment. [****]
Beyond the heated arguments about Mr. Hashem’s guilt lies the fraught question of whether Iraqis are ready to stop the retributive killing of members of the former government. It seems that some of them are.
“We need to show there have been enough deaths; we are tired of it, we need to stop it,” said a senior adviser to President Jalal Talabani. The adviser spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the delicacy of the issues. [***] In an emotional press conference in Iraqi Kurdistan last month, Mr. Talabani, who has often spoken against the death penalty, said he refused to ratify Mr. Hashem’s execution.
Other Iraqi politicians are unwilling to forgive those involved in the atrocities perpetrated by Mr. Hussein and his lieutenants, when so many of their victims were shown no mercy. Both Shiite and Kurdish officials believe that if Mr. Hashem’s life is spared, it might set a precedent by which others who committed crimes while the former government was in power would similarly seek to be let off. [*****] They also fear that Mr. Hashem would become a hero to many members of the former government, and provide a dangerous rallying point.
“All other defendants will say that they were only receiving orders and as a result no one would be tried,” said Jalal al-Din al-Sagheer, a member of Parliament from the largest Shiite bloc. “The Al Qaeda militants will adopt the same argument.”
Still, the price of insisting on Mr. Hashem’s hanging could be high because of the respect he commands in the largely Sunni community of former Iraqi military officers. If the government executes him, it risks alienating potential allies in the fight against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, the homegrown Sunni insurgent group that American intelligence officials say is foreign-led.
Mr. Hashem’s execution would also anger Sunni factions that long composed the backbone of the insurgency but have begun to work with the American military.
Despite their new alliance with the Americans, many of these Sunnis deeply distrust the Shiite-dominated central government, and American officials fear that hanging Mr. Hashem would set back hopes for a détente with the government and any larger Sunni-Shiite reconciliation. [*********]
“Once you execute someone, you can’t unexecute him,” one American military official said. “Any benefit that could be derived from sparing his life will be lost. It would be better to see what benefit could be brought out, rather than to see what might be lost from his death.” The official spoke on the condition of anonymity, like other American officials, because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the issue.
The Iraqi Constitution empowers the president to ratify death sentences, but he does not have the power to pardon or commute sentences in cases like this one. Mr. Talabani would like to reduce Mr. Hashem’s death sentence, his aides said, but there is no legal mechanism for that. [*******]
One possibility raised by several people close to the case would be for a group amnesty to be offered to several members of Mr. Hussein’s government, including Mr. Hashem, but that would require new legislation.
Mr. Hashem was one of Iraq’s top military officers for decades, winning respect from many Iraqis for his professionalism. He was a military leader of the Anfal operation in 1988, in which as many as 180,000 Kurds were killed. That operation was led by Ali Hassan al-Majid, known as Chemical Ali. Mr. Hashem also negotiated a cease-fire with American commanders during the Persian Gulf war in 1991. And he was defense minister when American troops invaded in March 2003.
Some American officials say Mr. Hashem helped limit the resistance of the Iraqi Army in 2003. “Had he told the military to dig in and fight, they would have dug in and fought,” the American military official said.
After the defeat of Mr. Hussein’s forces, Mr. Hashem fled to Mosul, his birthplace. In August 2003, Maj. Gen. David H. Petraeus, then the commander of American forces in northern Iraq, wrote a letter praising him as a “man of honor and integrity,” [**] and asking him to surrender. “I offer you a simple, yet honorable alternative to a life on the run from Coalition Forces in order to avoid capture, imprisonment and loss of honor and dignity befitting a General Officer,” he wrote.
To Mr. Hashem, it was a promise that he would avoid lengthy incarceration, his son, Ahmed Sultan Hashem, said in an interview. “Petraeus said that the investigation would take two to three weeks and after that he would be released and could resume his normal life,” he said. “The Americans promised us they would treat him with dignity and respect and keep him alive and release him afterward. They didn’t fulfill their promises.” [****]
General Petraeus, now a four-star general in charge of all American forces in Iraq, never made a promise that Mr. Hashem would be released, said a senior American military official in Baghdad. “It doesn’t mean that somebody else may have said that, but General Petraeus did not,” the official said. The language about avoiding “imprisonment” pertained solely to Mr. Hashem’s time in the custody of General Petraeus’s 101st Airborne Division in Mosul, he said. No offer of immunity from prosecution was extended, he said.
While American officials do not want Mr. Hashem executed, they insist that they will turn him over and allow the sentence to be carried out once a proper “authoritative” request is made by the government of Iraq. Iraqi officials asked for him to be turned over in early September, but American officials refused.
One senior American official in Baghdad characterized the Iraqi requests as “informal,” and cited President Talabani’s objections to the execution.
“If the president isn’t signing the document, then I don’t think we have an authoritative request,” the official said. “We’re not blocking anything. We are awaiting their decision.”
Mr. Hashem’s son says his father believes that he acted appropriately, under orders from commanders. In his last telephone call, he said, his father said, “I am innocent, and I did nothing that I should be ashamed or afraid of.” [******]
Khalid al-Ansary contributed reporting.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:08 PM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602284.html
Iraq Is Criticized for Slow Hire of Police
Sunnis Often Passed Over, General Says
By Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A11 [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt dragging its feet on police] [******]
A senior U.S. commander in Iraq yesterday criticized the Shiite-led government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki for "foot-dragging" in failing to hire thousands of Sunni and other volunteers needed to expand and balance the police force.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602284.html
Iraq Is Criticized for Slow Hire of Police
Sunnis Often Passed Over, General Says
By Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A11 [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [pentagon’s recent status report—pretty awful but also predictable] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [al Maliki govt dragging its feet on police] [******]
A senior U.S. commander in Iraq yesterday criticized the Shiite-led government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki for "foot-dragging" in failing to hire thousands of Sunni and other volunteers needed to expand and balance the police force.
Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. Mixon, the U.S. commander for northern Iraq, said he initiated plans in April to boost by 6,000 the number of police in Diyala province, a volatile region that stretches east from Baghdad to the Iranian border. But despite Maliki's endorsement, he said the plan has not come to fruition. [****]
"We're sitting here today, now in October, with an approval for 6,000 hires signed by Prime Minister Maliki, with no movement. In my book, that's foot-dragging," Mixon said in his final videoconference with Pentagon reporters before leaving northern Iraq, where he has commanded U.S. forces since September 2006.
The hiring of police in Diyala is a test of the U.S. military's effort to harness the emergence of tens of thousands of local volunteers to improve security across Iraq. Senior Pentagon officials have said that some 50,000 to 60,000 local residents -- many of them Sunni tribesmen and former insurgents -- have come forward over the past seven months to work with U.S. and Iraqi forces to help guard their neighborhoods. [******]
"This fairly recent development is perhaps the greatest sign of progress during my time in Iraq," said Mixon, echoing recent statements by Gen. David H. Petraeus. Mixon said that the emergence of more than 15,000 volunteers in northern Iraq shows that popular support "is swinging in our direction."
Yet while the volunteers have helped pacify the western province of Anbar, which is 95 percent Sunni, commanders acknowledge that the Maliki government is more wary of incorporating Sunni volunteers in mixed sectarian areas such as Diyala and Baghdad. The momentum could erode unless volunteers are permanently hired as Iraqi police or soldiers, [*****]U.S. officials have said.
Currently many volunteers in Diyala are funded by temporary security contracts with the U.S. military that do not pay the full police wage. Some volunteers have quit in frustration at not being hired as police, U.S. commanders in Diyala said.
The obstruction is rooted in sectarianism inside the Iraqi government, Mixon said. "The problem we're dealing with now is what appears to be still sectarian divides in the Ministry of Interior that is responsible for the support to the police," he said, adding that "certain individuals may be trying to influence exactly who's being hired." [******]
Mixon warned that time is running out for the Iraqi government to incorporate the local volunteers and take other steps toward political reconciliation -- such as holding provincial elections -- that can help solidify the security gains resulting from major U.S. military operations in Diyala and other parts of northern Iraq, where he said total attacks -- including those on U.S. forces, Iraqi forces and civilians -- have declined by 30 to 40 percent in the past four months.
Northern Iraq remains "a coveted terrorist sanctuary" with porous borders with Iran and Syria, as well as an area where unemployment creates a "fertile ground for an active insurgency," [****] he said.
"We bought time for the government to act. They need to act and include the concerned local citizens and their security forces," Mixon said. "We are giving them an opportunity to resolve these issues," he said, but "that opportunity is now almost going to come to an end."
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:08 PM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602309.html
Turkey Pulls U.S. Into Decision on Kurds
Ankara Postpones Reaction to Iraq-Based Militants Until After Meeting With Bush
By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A09 [turkey] [USFP] [bush administration] [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [followup] [see today’s societal for oped on USFP and missed opportunities] [ditto] [*******]
Turkey's military chief said yesterday that Ankara will delay a decision on whether to launch a cross-border offensive into Iraq until after Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan meets here with President Bush 10 days from now. "We will wait for his return," Gen. Yasar Buyukanit told reporters in the Turkish capital.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/26/AR2007102602309.html
Turkey Pulls U.S. Into Decision on Kurds
Ankara Postpones Reaction to Iraq-Based Militants Until After Meeting With Bush
By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 27, 2007; A09 [turkey] [USFP] [bush administration] [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [followup] [see today’s societal for oped on USFP and missed opportunities] [ditto] [*******]
Turkey's military chief said yesterday that Ankara will delay a decision on whether to launch a cross-border offensive into Iraq until after Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan meets here with President Bush 10 days from now. "We will wait for his return," Gen. Yasar Buyukanit told reporters in the Turkish capital.
In Washington, officials were relieved that an attack does not appear imminent. But they were also discouraged by the statement, which leaves the Bush administration precisely where it does not want to be: in the middle of a confrontation between its troubled client state in Baghdad and a key NATO ally.
Since cross-border attacks this month by Iraq-based militants of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) left 40 Turkish soldiers, police and civilians dead, the Bush administration has sought to persuade Ankara and Baghdad to resolve their differences peacefully and directly.
"We think this is an opportunity for the Iraqis and the Turks to work together," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told Congress [*****]Thursday. So far, however, it is an opportunity that neither side appears eager to take. While administration officials enthusiastically called attention to a meeting of Iraqi and Turkish defense and security officials in Ankara yesterday, Turkish officials said that no progress had been made.
"Everyone there is guilty," Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek said in a Turkish television interview, referring to the PKK, which both the United States and Europe have labeled a terrorist organization. Ankara has given Baghdad a list of names of PKK members, he said, "and we want all of them to be handed over." U.S. officials have estimated the PKK to number about 4,000 fighters, most of them based in remote camps close to the border.
Turkey's movement of nearly 100,000 troops to the Iraqi border has suddenly focused attention on an issue long relegated to the category of "too hard," [****] a senior administration official said.
Retired Air Force Gen. Joseph W. Ralston, a former NATO commander Bush appointed last year as his special envoy to work on the issue, left the job recently because of what several sources described as his frustration at the administration's failure to devote serious attention to the problem. [******] Ralston, vice chairman of an international consulting firm led by former defense secretary William S. Cohen, did not return several calls for comment.
"He never said he was leaving in protest," another administration official said of Ralston, adding that the one-year appointment had expired. "But I guess you could speculate that if things were really going gangbusters, maybe he would have stayed on."
Until the recent escalation, U.S. action was largely paralyzed by divisions between Pentagon and State Department officials responsible for the Middle East -- and Iraq -- and those charged with looking after European and NATO interests, including Turkey.
"If you're a Turkey hand, you say, 'For crying out loud, why isn't Centcom taking action?' " the senior official said, referring to the military's Central Command, which oversees the Middle East. Turkey has repeatedly and loudly asked the same question, [****] [so what’s Fallon doing?] [CINC for Centcom] [****] demanding that U.S. forces turn some of their considerable firepower in Iraq against the PKK camps.
"If you're looking at it from Iraq, you say, 'Hey, we've got our hands full; let's not stir the nest up.' " Iraq's Kurdish north, where the U.S.-allied leadership has long looked away from the renegade PKK's efforts to ignite rebellion among Turkey's 12 million Kurds, has been one of the few relatively peaceful places in the country.
The problem, this official said, is balancing the possible alienation of Iraqi Kurds with the threat of Turkish movement across the border. The latter risk, he said, "right now, is pretty high."
In recent weeks, U.S. officials in Baghdad, Ankara and Washington have worked feverishly to bring the two sides toward a rapprochement that keeps the United States out of the cross hairs. According to several officials, the administration has overcome its earlier reluctance to involve the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad in the Turkish problem and task it with exerting greater pressure on Iraqi officials.
U.S. diplomats have reminded Iraqi officials that Turkey -- in addition to being the entry point for a major part of the U.S. military supply route into Iraq -- is one of their country's prime trading partners. The administration particularly wants Baghdad and Iraq's Kurdish Regional Government to begin sharing intelligence with Turkey on the location of PKK camps.
Early this week, U.S. officials in Baghdad persuaded the regional government to issue a statement condemning the PKK, although they expressed some disappointment that it was signed by a spokesman rather than by regional President Masoud Barzani. On Tuesday, after telephone calls to Ankara by Bush and Rice, Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan flew to Baghdad for crisis talks and received promises that Iraq would take action against PKK activities and funding.
But six hours of talks in Ankara yesterday produced no visible movement. "We do not expect much from this delegation," Erdogan said of the Iraqi visitors as he returned from a meeting in Romania.
In another blow to the effort that reflected the deep animosities any negotiators will have to overcome, Barzani told al-Arabiya television yesterday that Turkey's real aim is to "stop or hinder the development of the Kurdish region." [****] As for the PKK, Barzani said, it has "no site in any city, area or village in the Kurdish region . . . the PKK is present inside Turkey."
Rice has scheduled a stop in Ankara next week on her way to a long-planned ministerial meeting on Iraq scheduled to be held in Istanbul Nov. 2-3. [****] The Istanbul meeting follows one held in Egypt last spring, where senior officials from the region and around the world gathered to pledge their assistance to Iraqi reconstruction and democracy. Now, however, U.S. officials concede that the Istanbul meeting is likely to be dominated by the border conflict.
"We have to put something on the table," a senior administration official said. "We want to come out of Istanbul with at least a political framework for resolving" the dispute.
As it struggles to keep interfering neighbors Iran and Syria at bay, the U.S. military in Iraq is adamantly opposed to opening another border front. Asked yesterday what he was planning to do about the Kurdish militants, the commander of U.S. forces in northern Iraq responded, "Absolutely nothing."
"I have not been given any requirements or any responsibility for that," Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. Mixon said in a videoconference with Pentagon reporters. Asked why Turkey considers the PKK such a serious threat, Mixon replied: "I have no idea. You'll have to ask Turkey."
Correspondent Molly Moore in Paris contributed to this report.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:07 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/europe/27turkey.html
October 27, 2007
Iraq Plan to Add U.S. Troops at Kurdish Border Is Rejected by Turkey
By SEBNEM ARSU and ANDREW E. KRAMER [turkey] [USFP] [bush administration] [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [followup] [see today’s societal for oped on USFP and missed opportunities] [*******]
ANKARA, Turkey, Oct. 26 — Turkey’s prime minister on Friday rejected an Iraqi proposal that included a military role for the United States in resolving a standoff over raids by Kurdish guerrillas across the rugged border [****] into Turkey.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/europe/27turkey.html
October 27, 2007
Iraq Plan to Add U.S. Troops at Kurdish Border Is Rejected by Turkey
By SEBNEM ARSU and ANDREW E. KRAMER [turkey] [USFP] [bush administration] [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [bush administration’s “surge option” or “new way forward” underway] [some positive indicators of improvement] [nevertheless, violence while surge unfolds] [followup] [chaos increases] [the “surge” continues] [followup] [see today’s societal for oped on USFP and missed opportunities] [*******]
ANKARA, Turkey, Oct. 26 — Turkey’s prime minister on Friday rejected an Iraqi proposal that included a military role for the United States in resolving a standoff over raids by Kurdish guerrillas across the rugged border [****] into Turkey.
The offer, made by a delegation of senior Iraqi officials, was rejected by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who said it failed to meet his country’s demands in dealing with the guerrillas, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or P.K.K. In its latest raid, on Sunday, the group killed 12 Turkish soldiers and took eight captive. [****]
“I can say that there is not really anything positive or anything that met our expectations,” Mr. Erdogan said, after his foreign minister, Ali Babacan, met with the Iraqi delegation here.
The Iraqis proposed positioning American soldiers in border forts in the Qandil Mountains, a jagged area that has never been fully under the control of any government. Although American military officials were part of the delegation taking part in the meetings, it was unclear what role, if any, the military might ultimately agree to.
The offer was intended to avert an incursion by Turkey’s military into Iraq’s Kurdish region to fight the rebels. [****] The Turkish Parliament has approved the use of troops to follow the fighters into Iraq if necessary, and the United States and Iraq have been trying at all costs to avert a conflict in the region, which is one of the few relatively peaceful areas of Iraq.
Turkish troops continued to pour into staging areas near the border on Friday, while Turkish officials said that airstrikes had already been carried out inside Iraq.
In spite of the rejection of the Iraqi offer, the head of the Turkish Army, Gen. Yasar Buyukanit, said Friday that no broad attack was imminent. He said Turkish troops would wait until after Nov. 5, when Mr. Erdogan is to return from a visit to the United States, [*****] according to the state-run Anatolian News Agency.
His comments were quickly qualified by the prime minister, however. “I cannot tell what will happen before my visit to the United States,” Mr. Erdogan said in a televised news conference. “We are now momentarily sensitive.”
Meanwhile, a senior American general in Iraq played down the chances of any new American military commitment in the conflict. The officer, Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. Mixon, the top American commander in northern Iraq, said that he had no plans to order his troops to confront Kurdish rebels in the mountains.
The general, speaking to reporters in Washington over a video link from Iraq, was asked what American forces plan to do about fighters of the P.K.K.
“Absolutely nothing,” he responded.
His comments underscored a deep apprehension among administration officials and American military officers about playing any direct role in the tense cross-border situation that pits P.K.K. fighters against the Turkish military. [******]
In Baghdad, a military spokesman later said, in clarification, that the general’s answer referred to current military plans in the region. “We are not currently planning any role in that conflict,” the spokesman, Maj. Brad Leighton, said. “If the Iraqis request our assistance in those areas, then we’ll consider their request as we would consider any request for help from an ally.” [******]
The Iraqi offer, delivered by a delegation led by the minister of defense, Abdul Qader Mohammed Jassim, and the minister of national security, Shirwan al-Waili, suggested that multinational forces would take up positions at new border posts to be opened in the mountains to prevent infiltration of the P.K.K. guerrillas into Turkey. Turkey says about 3,000 rebels operate out of bases in the area.
Mohammad al-Askari, a spokesman for the Iraqis, said the offer was for multinational forces to “monitor and control the border.”
Iraqi officials also suggested that regular military contacts be conducted and that cooperation be improved among the United States, Turkey and Iraq, Mr. Askari told reporters in Ankara.
Turkey, for its part, has demanded that Iraq and the United States take more robust steps, including the extradition of the militant leaders to Turkey, to stop attacks by the guerrilla group. [******]
Kurdish groups in northern Iraq claim that Turkey’s ultimate motive is to prevent the formation of a Kurdish state in northern Iraq by occupying its territory and ultimately controlling part of its natural resources.
Turkey denies those accusations. “We have no desire for Iraq’s land, Iraqi petrol, and we have no problem with the Iraqi people,” said Cemil Cicek, Turkey’s deputy prime minister. “Our problem is the P.K.K.”
Sebnem Arsu reported from Ankara, and Andrew E. Kramer from Baghdad.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:06 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/africa/27darfur.html
October 27, 2007
Empty Seats Add to Worry on Eve of Darfur Talks
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN [Sudan] [Darfur] [Africa] [northern/horn] [broader middle east] [followup] [Ethiopia’s involvement in Somalia and Eritrea’s resultant involvement] [Eritrea precarious situation] [mostly Christian Ethipopia vs mostly Muslim Eritrea] [meanwhile in Libya, the peace talks have stalled and the rebels who have enjoyed backing in the West seem to be dragging it out] [the rebels are factionalized and working at cross purposes] [unbelievably, they are beginning to make the Khartoum govt look semi responsible in its behavior] [********]
SIRTE, Libya, Oct. 26 — On the eve of the much anticipated peace talks for Darfur, United Nations and African Union officials on Friday expressed disappointment that several rebel leaders had not showed up, but they said the talks had to begin anyway.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/africa/27darfur.html
October 27, 2007
Empty Seats Add to Worry on Eve of Darfur Talks
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN [Sudan] [Darfur] [Africa] [northern/horn] [broader middle east] [followup] [Ethiopia’s involvement in Somalia and Eritrea’s resultant involvement] [Eritrea precarious situation] [mostly Christian Ethipopia vs mostly Muslim Eritrea] [meanwhile in Libya, the peace talks have stalled and the rebels who have enjoyed backing in the West seem to be dragging it out] [the rebels are factionalized and working at cross purposes] [unbelievably, they are beginning to make the Khartoum govt look semi responsible in its behavior] [********]
SIRTE, Libya, Oct. 26 — On the eve of the much anticipated peace talks for Darfur, United Nations and African Union officials on Friday expressed disappointment that several rebel leaders had not showed up, but they said the talks had to begin anyway.
“Time is on nobody’s side,” said Jan Eliasson, the United Nations’ envoy for Darfur, at a news conference in Sirte, where the talks were to begin Saturday. “We have seen a deterioration on the ground. We have seen frustration and anger in the camps, which is now exploding. We have seen the growing tensions within the government and rebel groups, and now we have to end this vicious circle.”
About 15 men representing half a dozen of Darfur’s rebel factions arrived in Sirte by Friday evening and began to circulate among the meeting halls. Their first order of business, they said, was agreeing to a cease-fire, something United Nations officials said was crucial for these peace talks to work and something the Sudanese government had implied it was willing to consider. [******]
But major rebel figures, including Abdel Wahid el-Nur, a founding father of the rebellion, and Khalil Ibrahim, the commander of one of the strongest rebel armies, had indicated that they would not be coming — at least for now — because they did not trust the Sudanese government. That could mean that any deal reached here in Libya might not translate into meaningful change in Darfur, [****] because thousands of rebel fighters would not feel bound by it.
The United Nations and African Union have billed this peace conference as a make-or-break moment for Darfur, the desiccated region of western Sudan that has been consumed by bloodshed and turmoil since 2003. United Nations officials estimate that at least 200,000 people have died and more than two million driven from their homes.
But the talks to end the violence seemed to be stumbling before they began, not just because of the lackluster rebel showing. The Sudanese government has recently stepped up attacks in Darfur, and former rebels in southern Sudan accuse Sudan’s leaders of torpedoing a major peace deal signed in 2005, which is supposedly a model for Darfur.
Another issue is the Qaddafi factor. Libya’s leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, is playing host to the talks, hoping to build himself a role as a peacemaker in Africa. But some Darfurian rebels do not like him because they say he has a long history of siding with nomadic tribes in Darfur, and most of Darfur’s rebels are not nomads. [****] Last week, Colonel Qaddafi made a cryptic comment in a video conference to students, likening the conflict to a dispute over a camel.
The combined effect has cast such an air of pessimism that conference organizers felt it necessary to downgrade expectations immediately.
“We are not naïve to believe that once this process has begun it will be rosy,” said Salim Ahmed Salim, the chief African Union negotiator, at the news conference on Friday. But, he added, “We have to do everything humanly possible to facilitate this process.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:05 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/asia/27pakistan.html
October 27, 2007
Fighting Intensifies Around Stronghold of Pakistani Cleric
By ISMAIL KHAN [Pakistan] [south asia] [Pakistan as the new Afghanistan] [hydra central] [Pakistan seemingly teetering on the brink] [islamists, tribals, and jihadis striking back] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [*****]
PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Oct. 26 — Pakistani security forces exchanged heavy gunfire with militants at the sprawling seminary of a powerful cleric in the troubled North-West Frontier Province [*****] on Friday, a day after a suicide bomber killed 20 people, most of them border guards, in the same area.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/27/world/asia/27pakistan.html
October 27, 2007
Fighting Intensifies Around Stronghold of Pakistani Cleric
By ISMAIL KHAN [Pakistan] [south asia] [Pakistan as the new Afghanistan] [hydra central] [Pakistan seemingly teetering on the brink] [islamists, tribals, and jihadis striking back] [more tribal-Islamist-jihadis violence] [*****]
PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Oct. 26 — Pakistani security forces exchanged heavy gunfire with militants at the sprawling seminary of a powerful cleric in the troubled North-West Frontier Province [*****] on Friday, a day after a suicide bomber killed 20 people, most of them border guards, in the same area.
Armed militants also beheaded four men thought to be police officers or members of local security forces in a village 10 miles west of Mingora, [****] a resident said by telephone.
The home secretary of the province, Badshah Gul Wazir, acknowledged at a news briefing late Friday that three men of the armed civil guard known as the Frontier Constabulary and one policeman, who had been kidnapped by militants from a nearby district earlier in the day, had “reportedly” been killed.
The sharp rise in violence in the area, Swat Valley, which is relatively isolated from the lawless tribal areas on the Afghan border, demonstrates the growing strength of Islamists. [*****]
Leading the wave of militancy is the cleric, Maulana Fazlullah, who is also known as Maulana Radio for his illegal broadcasts calling for Taliban-like Islamic law, and who is thought to have some 4,500 followers. [*******]
He is the son-in-law of Sufi Muhammad, [***] the founder of Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi, the Movement for the Implementation of Muhammad’s Law, [*****] who has been in prison since 2001 after sending Pakistanis into Afghanistan to support the Taliban in fighting American forces.
In July the government sent a division of troops into the valley to try to contain the violence, but they have met with frequent attacks. The provincial government deployed 2,500 more border guards to the area on Wednesday. Retaliation was swift: the suicide attack on Thursday.
Maulana Fazlullah’s whereabouts are not known.
The fighting on Friday centered around Imam Dheri Village, the headquarters of Maulana Fazlullah in Kabal district. Security forces and militants were holding positions on the opposite sides of the River Swat and exchanged heavy gunfire, punctuated by explosions. Security forces have occupied hilltop positions but avoided shelling the seminary directly, they said.
The home secretary, Mr. Gul Wazir, said that the government had not moved against the seminary but that a government unit had come under fire when moving in the area. Two civilians were killed in cross-fire, he said.
A resident of Shakkardarra described the execution of the four security officers: Masked men armed with rocket-propelled grenades and assault rifles brought the four men to their village around 5 p.m., fired a few shots into the air and then beheaded them. [***]
The four men, said to be in their mid-20s, all had their hands tied behind them, the resident said.
The resident quoted one of the militants as declaring shortly before the beheadings: “Let this serve as a warning to all those who spy for the government or extend help. The sons of Bush will meet similar fate.” [**]
People in Shakkardarra said that militants, mostly from a banned outfit called the Jaish-i-Muhammad, or Army of Muhammad, [****] who had set up checkpoints on the main road and occupied hilltop positions, had seized the four men during a road check.
No group has claimed responsibility for the killing, but Maulana Naddar, a cleric said to be deputy to Maulana Fazlullah, said in a radio broadcast that the men had been killed to avenge the death of three militants killed earlier [****] Friday.
As evening came, a tense calm returned to the area and the provincial cabinet met in Peshawar to discuss the situation.
A senior government official said the government would like to engage local elders and influential residents to calm the situation and sort out the issue with Maulana Fazlullah through negotiations.
The caretaker chief minister of the province, Shamsul Mulk, said the government would pursue a peaceful resolution, but would not shy away from using force to establish its authority.
Carlotta Gall contributed reporting from Islamabad, Pakistan.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 12:04 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/25/us/politics/25giuliani.html
October 25, 2007
Mideast Hawks Help to Develop Giuliani Policy
By MICHAEL COOPER and MARC SANTORA [individual-role] [vulcans] [vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [invigorated by the Guliani campaign where they have found another redoubt from which to affect USFP] [now they begin to respond] [followup] [they’re back] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
Rudolph W. Giuliani’s approach to foreign policy shares with other Republican presidential candidates an aggressive posture toward terrorism, a commitment to strengthening the military and disdain for the United Nations.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/25/us/politics/25giuliani.html
October 25, 2007
Mideast Hawks Help to Develop Giuliani Policy
By MICHAEL COOPER and MARC SANTORA [individual-role] [vulcans] [vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [invigorated by the Guliani campaign where they have found another redoubt from which to affect USFP] [now they begin to respond] [followup] [they’re back] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
Rudolph W. Giuliani’s approach to foreign policy shares with other Republican presidential candidates an aggressive posture toward terrorism, a commitment to strengthening the military and disdain for the United Nations.
But in developing his views, Mr. Giuliani is consulting with, among others, a particularly hawkish group of advisers and neoconservative thinkers.
Their positions have been criticized by Democrats as irresponsible and applauded by some conservatives as appropriately tough, while raising questions about how closely aligned Mr. Giuliani’s thinking is with theirs.
Mr. Giuliani’s team includes Norman Podhoretz, a prominent neoconservative who advocates bombing Iran “as soon as it is logistically possible”; Daniel Pipes, the director of the Middle East Forum, who has called for profiling Muslims at airports and scrutinizing American Muslims in law enforcement, the military and the diplomatic corps; and Michael Rubin, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute who has written in favor of revoking the United States’ ban on assassination.
The campaign says that the foreign policy team, which also includes scholars and experts with different policy approaches, is meant to give Mr. Giuliani a variety of perspectives.
Based on his public statements, Mr. Giuliani does not share all of their views and parts company with traditional neoconservative thinking in some respects. But their presence has reassured some conservatives who have expressed doubts about Mr. Giuliani’s positions on issues like abortion and gun control, and underscored his efforts to cast himself as a tough-minded potential commander in chief.
And while Mr. Giuliani, like other New York mayors, liked to be seen as conducting his own brand of foreign policy from City Hall, he had little direct exposure to many of the specific issues the next president will confront and is still meeting for the first time with some of his advisers to develop detailed positions on particular subjects.
Mr. Giuliani has taken an aggressive position on Iran’s efforts to build a nuclear program, saying last month it was a “promise” that as president he would take military action to keep the Iranians from developing a nuclear weapon.
Warnings like that one and his reliance on advisers like Mr. Podhoretz, who wrote an article in June for Commentary magazine called “The Case for Bombing Iran,” have raised concerns among some Democrats.
Mr. Podhoretz said in an interview published Wednesday in The New York Observer that he recently met with Mr. Giuliani to discuss his new book, in which he advocates bombing Iran as part of a larger struggle against “Islamofascism,” and “there is very little difference in how he sees the war and I see it.”
Asked in a recent interview if he agreed with Mr. Podhoretz that the time to bomb Iran has already come, Mr. Giuliani said: “From the information I do have available, which is all public source material, I would say that that is not correct, we are not at that stage at this point. Can we get to that stage? Yes. And is that stage closer than some of the Democrats believe? I believe it is.”
Like the neoconservatives, who played a major role in developing the Bush administration’s rationale for invading Iraq, Mr. Giuliani is a strong supporter of Israel who has expressed skepticism about how far the United States should go to back the creation of a Palestinian state.
But Mr. Giuliani has distanced himself somewhat from what was once a central neoconservative tenet, the belief that the United States could spread democracy through the Middle East.
Mr. Giuliani rejects the democracy effort as premature, and overly idealistic, noting that the policy led to the sweeping victory of Hamas in the Palestinian elections.
“Elections are necessary but not sufficient to establish genuine democracy,” Mr. Giuliani wrote in an article in Foreign Affairs, the policy journal. “Aspiring dictators sometimes win elections, and elected leaders sometimes govern badly and threaten their neighbors.”
Neoconservatives said they were generally supportive of Mr. Giuliani’s positions and saw them as being in line with those taken by the other leading Republican presidential candidates.
“I would say, as a card-carrying member of the neoconservative conspiracy,” said William Kristol, editor of The Weekly Standard, “that I think Giuliani, McCain and Thompson are all getting really good advice — and Romney.” Mr. Kristol said that none of the leading Republican candidates “buy any of these fundamental criticisms that Bush took us on a radically wrong path, and we have to go to a pre-9/11 foreign policy.”
The emerging Giuliani doctrine, which is being created through conference calls, policy papers, and seminarlike meetings, contains a number of main elements.
Mr. Giuliani calls for continuing the war in Iraq and building up the military by adding at least 10 combat brigades to the Army. He takes a dim view of the United Nations, which he sees as good for little other than humanitarian and peacekeeping missions, but wants to expand NATO and invite Israel to join it.
He would continue the Bush administration’s efforts to fight AIDS and malaria in Africa, but would tailor policy toward Africa to emphasize trade over aid.
If there is a central tenet to his thinking, it may be that the United States must project strength to keep itself safe. “Weakness invites attack,” Mr. Giuliani warned to cheers in a speech he gave recently to the Republican Jewish Coalition.
On the question of diplomacy, Mr. Giuliani makes it clear that he would impose a number of conditions before opening talks with unfriendly countries. In the Foreign Affairs article, he wrote that it might be advisable at times to hold serious diplomatic talks with the nation’s adversaries, but not with “those bent on our destruction or those who cannot deliver on their agreements.”
In a recent speech to the Jewish Coalition, he went further, accusing the Democrats of putting too much stock in diplomacy. “This is the great fallacy in this now very strong Democratic desire to negotiate, negotiate, negotiate and negotiate,” he said. “You’ve got to know with whom to negotiate and with whom you should not negotiate.”
The foreign policy education of Mr. Giuliani, from former big-city mayor to would-be statesman, has played out in a series of briefings and papers and calls.
Aides to Mr. Giuliani dismiss any comparison to the briefings President Bush received when he was the governor of Texas, and a procession of experts — who called themselves Vulcans, after the Greek god of the forge — visited him in Austin to school him on policy. Mr. Giuliani, these aides said, already had a broad vision of what he wanted to do.
One of Mr. Giuliani’s most important foreign policy tutors is Charles Hill, a career diplomat and former deputy to Secretary of State George P. Shultz in the Reagan administration. Mr. Hill had never met Mr. Giuliani when he was invited to a 45-minute meeting at Giuliani Partners in late February — a meeting that stretched to nearly three hours.
Mr. Hill went on to become the campaign’s chief foreign policy adviser, and to assemble a team that is united by its generally hawkish views and its belief in using American power to achieve its aims.
Just days after the Sept. 11 attacks, Mr. Hill joined a number of foreign policy experts in signing an open letter to Mr. Bush urging that “even if evidence does not link Iraq directly to the attack, any strategy aiming at the eradication of terrorism and its sponsors must include a determined effort to remove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq.”
Instead of talking about “the war on terror,” Mr. Giuliani speaks of “the terrorists’ war on us,” or, as he put it in a recent speech to a group of conservative Christians, the “Islamic terrorists’ war against the United States.” He sometimes faults Democrats for failing to mention that the terrorist threat comes specifically from Muslims.
When Mr. Giuliani was asked in a recent interview if he could be viewed as an evenhanded broker when it came to Israeli-Palestinian issues, he questioned the premise of the question.
“America shouldn’t be evenhanded in dealing with the difference between an elected democracy that’s a government ruled by law, and a group of terrorists,” he said. “I think that was part of the mistake of the 1990s that led to the debacle that we saw in the Middle East in the way Clinton was handling it.”
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 01:45 PM | Permalink

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/25/AR2007102502686.html
Envoy Warns of N. Korea Deal Fallout
Ambassador to Japan Cables Bush to Outline Concerns Over Relations With Tokyo
By Glenn Kessler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, October 26, 2007; A08 [bush white house] [nsc principals] [sec state Rice, sec def Gates, and the traditionalists] [versus] [veep cheney, Abrams’s shop in NSC, some civilian dod employees] [110th congress, 1st session] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [invigorated by the Guliani campaign where they have found another redoubt from which to affect USFP] [now they begin to respond] [followup] [they’re back] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
J. Thomas Schieffer, the U.S. ambassador to Japan, sent President Bush an unusual private cable this week warning that the pending nuclear deal with North Korea could harm relations with Japan. He also complained that the U.S. Embassy had been left in the dark while the deal -- which could include North Korea's removal from the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism -- was negotiated by top State Department officials.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/25/AR2007102502686.html
Envoy Warns of N. Korea Deal Fallout
Ambassador to Japan Cables Bush to Outline Concerns Over Relations With Tokyo
By Glenn Kessler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, October 26, 2007; A08 [bush white house] [nsc principals] [sec state Rice, sec def Gates, and the traditionalists] [versus] [veep cheney, Abrams’s shop in NSC, some civilian dod employees] [110th congress, 1st session] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [invigorated by the Guliani campaign where they have found another redoubt from which to affect USFP] [now they begin to respond] [followup] [they’re back] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
J. Thomas Schieffer, the U.S. ambassador to Japan, sent President Bush an unusual private cable this week warning that the pending nuclear deal with North Korea could harm relations with Japan. He also complained that the U.S. Embassy had been left in the dark while the deal -- which could include North Korea's removal from the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism -- was negotiated by top State Department officials.
Schieffer's cable was described by sources who had read it. Both Schieffer and the White House acknowledged the existence of the cable, which was numbered Tokyo 004947, but they declined to discuss it in detail.
"Communications between myself and the President are privileged," Schieffer said in an e-mailed statement Wednesday night. "I never discuss them with others."
Schieffer's cable appears to be another sign of the unease in some parts of the administration over the North Korea agreement, which sets out a step-by-step process of disabling and accounting for North Korean nuclear programs, in exchange for incentives and economic assistance from the United States and North Korea's neighbors. Pyongyang has long sought removal from the list of state sponsors of terrorism, but Japan has insisted that North Korea first provide details on the abductions of Japanese citizens by the reclusive nation during the 1970s and '80s.
Ambassadors generally do not send diplomatic cables directly to the president, but Schieffer has unusual status as a longtime friend of Bush's. He was an investor in the partnership that -- along with Bush -- purchased the Texas Rangers baseball team in 1989. He is also the brother of CBS broadcaster Bob Schieffer. [*******]
J. Thomas Schieffer was ambassador to Australia in Bush's first term and then was given the high-profile post of Tokyo envoy in the second term.
The North Korea deal has come under attack from conservatives, especially Republicans on Capitol Hill, but Schieffer is a Democrat who served three terms in the Texas House of Representatives. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has made the six-nation accord one of her top priorities, having persuaded the president to put the agreement on a fast track earlier this year.
In his cable, sources said, Schieffer stressed that he does not believe that Japanese interests should dictate U.S. policy toward North Korea. But he warned the president that rumors were flying in Tokyo that the talks on removing North Korea from the terror list were progressing rapidly, which he suggested could potentially harm U.S. relations with its closest ally in the Pacific. He noted that Assistant Secretary of State Christopher R. Hill had assured him that North Korea needed to first show substantial progress on the abduction issue before any action was taken, but Schieffer said he was seeking direction and clarification in part because the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo appeared cut out of the process. [********]
"Ambassador Schieffer was clarifying what he sees on the ground and that the abduction issue was something we need to continue to emphasize in the six-party talks," said National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe.
The new Japanese prime minister, Yasuo Fukuda, will visit Washington in the coming weeks, Johndroe added. During that meeting, "President Bush will reiterate our commitment to help Japanese efforts to resolve the abduction issue with North Korea," he said.
© 2007 The Washington Post Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 01:43 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/world/asia/26briefs-gates.html
October 26, 2007
World Briefing | Asia
Afghanistan: Gates Doubts Europeans’ War Commitment
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [bush white house] [nsc principals] [sec def Gates [110th congress, 1st session] [followup] [they’re back] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
At a conference of army leaders from 38 European nations in Heidelberg, Germany, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates questioned the commitment of some NATO allies to winning in Afghanistan, saying the outcome there was at “real risk” because some European nations were unwilling to provide enough troops and resources to the mission. “A handful of allies are paying the price and bearing the burdens,” he said in remarks that were notably critical of European governments. He spoke hours after leaving a two-day meeting of NATO defense ministers in the Netherlands, where he pressed for more troops for Afghanistan. There were no promises. “If an alliance of the world’s greatest democracies cannot summon the will to get the job done in a mission that we agree is morally just and vital to our security,” he told the European generals, “then our citizens may begin to question both the worth of the mission and the utility of the 60-year-old trans-Atlantic security project itself,” meaning NATO, which was created in 1949. His remarks drew little reaction from the generals, who applauded politely when he finished.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/world/asia/26briefs-gates.html
October 26, 2007
World Briefing | Asia
Afghanistan: Gates Doubts Europeans’ War Commitment
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS [bush white house] [nsc principals] [sec def Gates [110th congress, 1st session] [followup] [they’re back] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
At a conference of army leaders from 38 European nations in Heidelberg, Germany, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates questioned the commitment of some NATO allies to winning in Afghanistan, saying the outcome there was at “real risk” because some European nations were unwilling to provide enough troops and resources to the mission. “A handful of allies are paying the price and bearing the burdens,” he said in remarks that were notably critical of European governments. He spoke hours after leaving a two-day meeting of NATO defense ministers in the Netherlands, where he pressed for more troops for Afghanistan. There were no promises. “If an alliance of the world’s greatest democracies cannot summon the will to get the job done in a mission that we agree is morally just and vital to our security,” he told the European generals, “then our citizens may begin to question both the worth of the mission and the utility of the 60-year-old trans-Atlantic security project itself,” meaning NATO, which was created in 1949. His remarks drew little reaction from the generals, who applauded politely when he finished.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 01:42 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/us/politics/26candidates.html
October 26, 2007
Rivals From Both Parties Spar Over Response to Iran
By MARC SANTORA [bush white house] [nsc principals] [sec state Rice, sec def Gates, and the traditionalists] [versus] [veep cheney, Abrams’s shop in NSC, some civilian dod employees] [110th congress, 1st session] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [also societal: invigorated by the Guliani campaign where they have found another redoubt from which to affect USFP] [now they begin to respond] [followup] [they’re back] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
The escalation of tensions between the United States and Iran has brought the issue to the fore in the presidential campaign, with Republican candidates talking of military action if Iran gets close to building a nuclear weapon and Democrats cautioning against a march to another war.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/us/politics/26candidates.html
October 26, 2007
Rivals From Both Parties Spar Over Response to Iran
By MARC SANTORA [bush white house] [nsc principals] [sec state Rice, sec def Gates, and the traditionalists] [versus] [veep cheney, Abrams’s shop in NSC, some civilian dod employees] [110th congress, 1st session] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [also societal: invigorated by the Guliani campaign where they have found another redoubt from which to affect USFP] [now they begin to respond] [followup] [they’re back] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
The escalation of tensions between the United States and Iran has brought the issue to the fore in the presidential campaign, with Republican candidates talking of military action if Iran gets close to building a nuclear weapon and Democrats cautioning against a march to another war.
As the Bush administration announced sanctions yesterday on a unit of the Iranian military, former Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, in perhaps the broadest warning yet among the Republican candidates, told voters in New Hampshire that he would advocate a military blockade or “bombardment of some kind” if Iran did not yield to diplomatic and economic pressure to give up its nuclear program.
Mr. Romney’s statement came as Democrats warned against military action but also skirmished among themselves, particularly over Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s vote last month calling on the administration to declare Iran’s 125,000-member Revolutionary Guard Corps a foreign terrorist organization.
Such a designation, backed by 75 senators including Mrs. Clinton, would have gone beyond the measures taken yesterday by the administration, which imposed more narrowly drawn sanctions on the guard corps and its elite Quds division.
None of the other Democratic presidential candidates supported the Senate resolution, and Mrs. Clinton’s two leading opponents, Senator Barack Obama and John Edwards, have said the vote provided cover for President Bush to move the country toward war, an interpretation Mrs. Clinton disputes.
Late last night, the Clinton and Obama campaigns sent scathing e-mail critical of each other to their supporters. Mrs. Clinton accused Mr. Obama of desperately flagging the Iran issue to revive a “struggling” campaign. Mr. Obama fired back, saying her “political explanations and contortions” would not change the fact that she had given Mr. Bush the benefit of the doubt on foreign policy and was doing so again.
The administration believes Iran is engaged in a nuclear program that would give it the ability to make bomb fuel. American intelligence officials have told Congress that Iran is probably three to eight years away from its first weapon. Iran has rejected the accusation that its goal is to make nuclear weapons, saying its program is for peaceful purposes. Still, the Republicans often seem to be trying to one-up one another as to who can use the toughest language.
Mr. Romney was not specific about what he meant yesterday by advocating a “bombardment.”
“If for some reasons they continue down their course of folly toward nuclear ambition, then I would take military action if that’s available to us,” Mr. Romney said. “I really can’t lay out exactly how that would be done, but we have a number of options, from blockade to bombardment of some kind.”
Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, said in an interview yesterday that the only thing more dangerous than a war with Iran would be an Iran with nuclear weapons.
The measures proposed by President Bush today are necessary, Mr. McCain said. But he also said there was a need to bring more allies on board in joining the sanctions to make them effective.
“The view of many experts is that Iran within two years of a tipping point,” Mr. McCain said. “They are inexorably on the road to attaining nuclear weapons.”
Rudolph W. Giuliani joined in praising the steps taken by the administration. Mr. Giuliani has said the prospect of a military strike against Iran was a “promise” not a threat, but he has also said he would not think about military action against Iran as a “war,” but more in terms of precise strikes.
While the leading candidates in the Democratic field were united in cautioning against military action, there was debate over the meaning of Mrs. Clinton’s vote on the Iran resolution, and whether it gave Mr. Bush stronger cards in dealing with Iran.
Mrs. Clinton, who has a commanding lead in the polls and whom critics accuse of trying to find a position that will leave her least exposed to Republican assaults in a general election, has been attacked by rivals for making the same mistakes she made in 2002 before the war in Iraq by offering the administration support, however qualified.
In a reflection of how seriously Mrs. Clinton views the political threat, her campaign this week sent out a thousands of mailings to Iowans explaining her vote, saying she had worked to get the most aggressive language out of the resolution. “Let me be clear on Iran,” she wrote. “I am opposed to letting President Bush take any military action against that country without full Congressional approval.”
At the same time, however, Mrs. Clinton’s aides said she fully supported yesterday’s move to stepped-up sanctions.
Mr. Obama also supports the extension of sanctions but, in a statement, he criticized Mrs. Clinton for her support of the Iran resolution, which he claimed “made the case for President Bush that we need to use our military presence in Iraq to counter Iran.”
Mr. Edwards equated Mrs. Clinton’s vote on the Iran resolution with her previous support of the 2002 measure, which, in his view, authorized the use of military force in Iraq.
Mr. Edwards said: “I learned a clear lesson from the lead-up to the Iraq war in 2002: If you give this president an inch, he will take a mile — and launch a war. Senator Clinton apparently learned a different lesson. Instead of blocking George Bush’s new march to war, Senator Clinton and others are enabling him once again.”
Jeff Zeleny and Katharine Q. Seelye contributed reporting.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 01:41 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/world/europe/26turkey.html
October 26, 2007
U.S. Envoy Presses Iraq to Act Against Guerrillas
By JAMES GLANZ and ANDREW KRAMER [bush white house] [nsc principals and beyond] [state, dod, NSC, others] [Turkey] [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [********]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 25 — Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker said Thursday that Iraq should disrupt supply lines and develop a “lookout list” of senior leaders for the Kurdish guerrillas who use the northern Iraqi mountains as a safe haven for attacks inside Turkey.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/world/europe/26turkey.html
October 26, 2007
U.S. Envoy Presses Iraq to Act Against Guerrillas
By JAMES GLANZ and ANDREW KRAMER [bush white house] [nsc principals and beyond] [state, dod, NSC, others] [Turkey] [-ir] [hydra] [insurgency] [********]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 25 — Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker said Thursday that Iraq should disrupt supply lines and develop a “lookout list” of senior leaders for the Kurdish guerrillas who use the northern Iraqi mountains as a safe haven for attacks inside Turkey.
But Mr. Crocker, the American ambassador here, stopped short of supporting Turkish demands that Iraq take military action against the guerrilla group, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, known as the P.K.K., or extradite its leaders to Turkey. The Turkish government has repeatedly threatened to make incursions into Iraq to strike at the fighters.
Any Iraqi military expedition, Mr. Crocker said, would run into the geographic fact that the northern mountains, called the Qandeel range, are remote and inaccessible. “I don’t think it’s realistic to expect that the Iraqis are going to march up that mountain and take on the P.K.K. and arrest their leaders,” Mr. Crocker said. “This is in the hard-to-do category.”
It was unclear whether the new American demands would be enough to keep Turkey from crossing the border.
The Iraqi government was also working furiously to avert an incursion, as a delegation of senior Iraqi officials traveled to Ankara for talks on Friday. Iraq’s foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, on Thursday urged Turkish authorities to accept steps that sounded similar to the ones being demanded by Mr. Crocker.
Mr. Zebari said in a telephone interview that the delegation to Ankara would offer “practical steps and measures to be taken by the Iraqi government to pacify, isolate and disrupt P.K.K. activities.”
The delegation would not be authorized to discuss approving any Turkish military actions inside Iraq, said Mr. Zebari, who is himself a powerful Iraqi Kurdish politician. The Iraqi officials, he said, would offer to stop arms supplies and logistical assistance to the rebels.
Mr. Zebari conceded that the offer fell short of Turkish demands, but said that it represented the best possible proposal from the Iraqi side.
Turkey’s prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, asked the United States on Thursday to take action along with Turkey in the struggle against the guerrillas, saying that the United States had taken action against Iraq with less immediate provocation.
“One would question why America has come to Iraq from thousands of miles away,” he said at a news conference during an official visit to Romania. “We have a disturbance. What kind of disturbance did the United States have with Iraq? Right now, the United States, as our strategic ally, is in a position to act along with us. We acted along with them in Afghanistan.”
With public anger rising after months of attacks in Turkey by the Kurdish rebels, the Turkish Parliament approved a measure earlier this month to allow troops to cross the border to fight them. But the United States has intensified diplomatic efforts to ward off an incursion that could destabilize one of the few relatively peaceful regions of Iraq.
Mr. Erdogan insisted that the decision was up to Turkey, not the United States. “They can suggest that a military operation not be conducted,” he said, “but we make the decision whether we need to do it or not.”
Mr. Crocker, meeting with Western reporters at the American Embassy in Baghdad, also made extensive remarks on Iran and, for the first time, on the Sept. 16 shooting on Nisour Square in Baghdad involving Blackwater USA, a private security firm that protects American diplomats. According to the Iraqi government, 17 Iraqis were killed in that incident and 24 were wounded.
Just before the Nisour Square shooting, Mr. Crocker had strongly defended the use of security contractors like Blackwater in testimony to Congress. Asked Thursday if he now thought better of those comments, Mr. Crocker at first said: “These guys guard my back. I have to say they do it extremely well.
“That said, the incident in September was a horrific one,” Mr. Crocker continued. He expressed serious concern over what happened but did not address whether the shooting was justified. As the chief official at the Embassy, Mr. Crocker said, “I’m responsible,” but he said that he would wait until an F.B.I. investigation is finished to draw conclusions.
Mr. Crocker reiterated assertions by the United States that Iran was providing support to armed groups in Iraq, and raised a new concern that elements of the Mahdi Army, which is nominally under the control of the radical Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr, have moved from militant activities to financially profitable activities such as gas stations and basic services in neighborhoods.
That shift suggests, Mr. Crocker said, a “Hezbollahzation” of parts of Iraq: an emphasis not just on military force but also on social networks, the hallmark of Iranian-supported Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Finally, he made clear that that there was strong American support for at least some of the demands being made on the Iraqi government by Turkey. “We have been registering our support, our sympathy for their losses and their outrage, which we share,” he said.
No Trial for U.S. Soldier
ROME, Oct. 25 — An Italian court ruled Thursday that it did not have jurisdiction to continue a trial against an American soldier who killed a top Italian intelligence agent in Iraq in 2005. The trial, a continuing irritant in relations between Italy and the United States, had been held in absentia because American officials refused to hand over the soldier, Mario Lozano.
Sebnem Arsu contributed reporting from Ankara, Turkey.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 01:41 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/washington/26fisa.html
October 26, 2007
Panel to See Papers on Agency’s Eavesdropping
By SCOTT SHANE [bush white house] [nsc principals] [110th congress, 1st session] [nsa warrant-less spying and other TSPs] [followup] [use psci 355] [use nsc] [********]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 25 — The White House on Thursday offered to share secret documents on the National Security Agency’s domestic surveillance program with the Senate Judiciary Committee, a step toward possible compromise on eavesdropping legislation.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/washington/26fisa.html
October 26, 2007
Panel to See Papers on Agency’s Eavesdropping
By SCOTT SHANE [bush white house] [nsc principals] [110th congress, 1st session] [nsa warrant-less spying and other TSPs] [followup] [use psci 355] [use nsc] [********]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 25 — The White House on Thursday offered to share secret documents on the National Security Agency’s domestic surveillance program with the Senate Judiciary Committee, a step toward possible compromise on eavesdropping legislation.
Fred F. Fielding, the White House counsel, offered to show the documents to Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont, the committee’s chairman; Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the ranking Republican on the committee; and staff members with the necessary security clearances, said Tony Fratto, a White House spokesman.
Mr. Fratto said that if Mr. Leahy and Mr. Specter so wished, other committee members would be granted clearances for the N.S.A. program and permitted to see the documents. A spokeswoman for Mr. Leahy, Erica Chabot, said he would make sure the entire committee had access.
Only Senate Intelligence Committee members and their staffs have seen the documents. Last week, the committee approved a bill that would step up court oversight of N.S.A. eavesdropping while granting legal immunity to telecommunications companies. The companies face class-action lawsuits for giving the agency access to customers’ phone calls and e-mail messages.
On Tuesday, Senator John D. Rockefeller IV, the West Virginia Democrat who is the chairman of the Intelligence Committee, urged the White House to allow all Congressional committees with oversight responsibilities access to the N.S.A. documents.
Neither the House Intelligence Committee nor the House Judiciary Committee has been shown the documents. Mr. Fratto noted that a bill pending in the House contained no provision for immunity from lawsuits and suggested that unless that changed, the House committees would not see the documents.
“If the committees say they have no interest in legislating on the issue of liability protection, we have no reason to accommodate them,” he said.
Mr. Fratto said the administration was generally pleased with the Senate bill, though it opposes its six-year sunset provision and is seeking changes in the language of a provision that would require court warrants for eavesdropping on Americans traveling overseas. “Over all, it’s a pretty good start,” he said.
The security agency’s program to eavesdrop without warrants on international communications of Americans and others in the United States suspected of links to Al Qaeda started with extraordinary secrecy after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Congress has fought for more information on the program for several years.
The documents at issue include orders signed by President Bush every 45 days to reauthorize the surveillance and legal opinions prepared by the Justice Department to justify the program.
Two Democratic members of the Intelligence Committee, Senators Ron Wyden of Oregon and Russ Feingold of Wisconsin, voted against the Senate bill in committee. Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut, has vowed to fight any legislation that grants immunity to the telecommunications companies.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 01:40 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/washington/26assess.html
October 26, 2007
News Analysis
U.S. Plays Its ‘Unilateral’ Card on Iran Sanctions
By HELENE COOPER [bush white house] [nsc principals] [sec state Rice, sec def Gates, and the traditionalists] [versus] [veep cheney, Abrams’s shop in NSC, some civilian dod employees] [110th congress, 1st session] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [invigorated by the Guliani campaign where they have found another redoubt from which to affect USFP] [now they begin to respond] [followup] [they’re back] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 25 — In announcing sweeping new sanctions against an elite unit of the Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iran, Bush administration officials took pains to offer assurances on Thursday that at least for now, the United States is not going to war with Iran.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/washington/26assess.html
October 26, 2007
News Analysis
U.S. Plays Its ‘Unilateral’ Card on Iran Sanctions
By HELENE COOPER [bush white house] [nsc principals] [sec state Rice, sec def Gates, and the traditionalists] [versus] [veep cheney, Abrams’s shop in NSC, some civilian dod employees] [110th congress, 1st session] [the neoconservatives or vulcans have been biding their time] [watching Rice et al. slide out farther and farther on a limb with respect to DPRK, Iran, Israeli-Palestinian conflict, so on] [vulcans have been organizing and fortifying their forces] [invigorated by the Guliani campaign where they have found another redoubt from which to affect USFP] [now they begin to respond] [followup] [they’re back] [use psci 355, 455] [use nsc] [********]
WASHINGTON, Oct. 25 — In announcing sweeping new sanctions against an elite unit of the Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iran, Bush administration officials took pains to offer assurances on Thursday that at least for now, the United States is not going to war with Iran.
“We do not believe that conflict is inevitable,” said R. Nicholas Burns, the under secretary of state for political affairs. “This decision today supports the diplomacy and in no way, shape or form does it anticipate the use of force.”
The move designated the Quds force of the Revolutionary Guard and four state-owned Iranian banks as supporters of terrorism, and the Guard itself as an illegal exporter of ballistic missiles. The decision thus raised the temperature in American’s ongoing confrontation with Iran over terrorism and nuclear weapons.
But it also reflected some caution by an administration that has also accused the Quds force of aiding Shiite militia attacks on American soldiers in Iraq, and has even detained some Quds force members there, but has resisted calls for retaliatory strikes inside Iran.
“This is a warning shot across the bow, not that the U.S. is going to invade Iran, but that Iran has pushed the level of escalation, particularly inside Iraq, to unacceptable levels,” said Anthony H. Cordesman, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “In many ways, this kind of warning is more a demonstration of restraint than a signal that we’re going to war.”
Still, after 18 months in which the administration has touted the virtues of collective action against Iran by the United States and its allies, the sanctions are a major turn toward unilateralism.
The shift represents a tacit acknowledgment that the diplomatic strategy pressed most vigorously by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has been ineffective, [*****]and it prompted fresh criticism on Thursday from Russia: [is the tacit admission the media’s conclusion or background?] [****] “Why make the situation worse, bring it to a dead end, threaten sanctions or even military action?” President Vladimir V. Putin asked, in a report by Agence France-Presse.
The administration clearly hopes to enlist allies around the world in its new, tougher stance — in part because the United States, having maintained its own stiff sanctions against Iran since the Islamic revolution in 1979, does not have much leverage left itself.
The administration hopes its influence can turn Iran into a political and economic pariah from which more foreign institutions will shy away.
The sanctions will “provide a powerful deterrent to every international bank and company that thinks of doing business with the Iranian government,” Ms. Rice said.
Yet officials acknowledged that past attempts to enlist allies in limiting their business ties to Iran have come up short. In each instance, they acknowledged, some other countries have partly offset the sanctions.
China, for instance, has increased trade with Iran in the past year, Mr. Burns said. And analysts pointed out that Russian, Indian, European and even Canadian companies continued to do business with many different sectors of the Iranian economy, particularly its all important oil and natural gas industries.
Ms. Rice maintained that American officials would continue to work with their European, Russian and Chinese counterparts to come up with a new set of United Nations Security Council sanctions to rein in Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. [*****]
But she also said she would be willing to “meet with my Iranian counterpart anytime, anywhere,” as long as Iran first suspended its nuclear activities, a longstanding American precondition for such talks.
But Iran has shown no sign that it is remotely interested in complying with the Security Council demand that it suspend its uranium enrichment.
Indeed, Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator, Ari Larijani, whom American officials viewed as a moderate, quit last week and was replaced by Saeed Jalili, who is believed to be a supporter of Iran’s conservative president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
The United States is not accusing the entire Revolutionary Guard Corps of being a terrorist organization, a step advocated by Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, who voted in favor of such a measure last month and has since come under attack from antiwar members of her Democratic party. Some conservatives in the administration had also pushed for the broader declaration.
But Thursday’s announcement is still an ambitious attempt to squeeze the upper echelons of the Iranian government, including the Ministry of Defense. It is the first time that the United States has tried to use the terrorist label and the sanctions associated with it to isolate or punish another country’s military.
In Tehran, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, Mohammad Ali Hosseini, shrugged off Washington’s announcement, saying America’s hostile policies ran counter to international regulations and were “doomed to fail,” the official news agency IRNA reported.
Mr. Hosseini said the United States produced nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and had supported what he called terrorist groups. He called the Bush administration’s accusation that Iran was arming Shiite militias in Iraq “ridiculous.”
Israel, on the other hand, welcomed the announcement. Sallai Meridor, Israel’s ambassador to the Washington, called it “a major diplomatic step in the effort to prevent Iran — a global menace and leading sponsor of terrorism — from obtaining nuclear weapons, which threatens international peace and security.”
Four state-owned Iranian banks, Bank Melli, Bank Mellat, Bank Saderat and Bank Kargoshaee, were also cited as supporters of terrorist groups for their activities in Afghanistan, Iraq and the Middle East.
Nazila Fathi contributed reporting from Tehran.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Posted by Kent Bolton at 01:39 PM | Permalink

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/25/world/middleeast/25blackwater.html
October 25, 2007
Under Siege, Blackwater Takes On Air of Bunker
By PAUL von ZIELBAUER and JAMES GLANZ [[bush white house] [state department] [blackwater and other contractors] [followup] [********]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 24 — The Blackwater USA compound here is a fortress within a fortress. Surrounded by a 25-foot-high wall of concrete topped by a chain-link fence and razor wire, the compound sits deep inside the heavily defended Green Zone, its two points of entry guarded by Colombian Army veterans carrying shotguns and automatic rifles.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/25/world/middleeast/25blackwater.html
October 25, 2007
Under Siege, Blackwater Takes On Air of Bunker
By PAUL von ZIELBAUER and JAMES GLANZ [[bush white house] [state department] [blackwater and other contractors] [followup] [********]
BAGHDAD, Oct. 24 — The Blackwater USA compound here is a fortress within a fortress. Surrounded by a 25-foot-high wall of concrete topped by a chain-link fence and razor wire, the compound sits deep inside the heavily defended Green Zone, its two points of entry guarded by Colombian Army veterans carrying shotguns and automatic rifles.
In the mazelike interior, Blackwater employees live in trailers stacked one on top of the other in surroundings that one employee likens to a “minimum-security prison.”
Since Sept. 16, when Blackwater guards opened fire in a crowded Baghdad square, the compound has begun to feel more like a prison, too. On that day, employees of Blackwater, a private security firm hired to protect American diplomats, responded to what they called a threat and killed as many as 17 people and wounded 24.
Richard J. Griffin, the State Department official who oversaw Blackwater USA and other private security contractors in Iraq, resigned Wednesday.
For weeks, not a word has emerged publicly from the compound, as the F.B.I., the American military and the Iraqi government investigate the Sept. 16 and earlier Blackwater shootings in Iraq.
But in recent days, that secretive Blackwater world has begun to fray under so much scrutiny, said four current and two former Blackwater employees. They described a grating sense among many of Blackwater guards, especially those with years of experience, that the killings on Sept. 16 were unjustified.
“Some guys are thinking that it was not a good shoot, that it was not warranted,” said one Blackwater contractor, using military jargon for an episode that results in a wrongful death. “I don’t think there was criminal intent involved. I just think it was the application of the use of deadly force gone horribly wrong.”
He added, “To mitigate one threat, 17 people had to die?”
Blackwater employees are aware of the conclusions of Iraqi investigators: that Blackwater never received fire and that any threat was illusory. Like the company in its official statements, the guards appear to believe that three armored Blackwater vehicles received several rounds of gunfire somewhere in the city that day, and that this might help explain why the guards fired into Nisour Square.
Still, a growing number of Blackwater guards here believe that the federal investigation may result in criminal charges against some of the four to six members of the team believed to have fired weapons on Sept. 16. Most of the men who fired are former Marine infantrymen still in their 20s, said one Blackwater contractor with a military background.
In a series of detailed interviews, given despite a company policy that forbids contractors to speak openly, the Blackwater employees provided the first glimpse into how the deaths on Sept. 16 and in prior episodes were being recounted and understood by the armed men who protect American officials on Baghdad’s streets each day.
Reporters for The New York Times spoke directly with four of the current and former employees; two others communicated with The Times in discussions and e-mail messages passed through intermediaries.
In the weeks since the shootings, Blackwater has been flooded with federal agents and investigators. A new group