Some military analysts believe that overall, the American military global presence is more pervasive today than at any point in American history.
In Southeast Asia, the U.S. military had a large presence going back a half-century. It has about 47,000 troops in Japan under a mutual security treaty and 38,000 troops in South Korea to deter any possible invasion from North Korea. It also has a longtime security agreement with Australia.
But U.S. military ties in the region expanded substantially beyond those traditional allies during the Clinton administration. The United States basically began using the military "as a vehicle for engaging with and maintaining relations with all these various countries," Pike said.
Now during the war on terrorism, "Having all these military relationships makes it much easier to project American power," Pike said.
Countries with ties to the U.S. military, in turn, get valuable help such as military training or access to equipment. For example, Singapore, where Navy ships dock, get a public linkage with America that might deter aggression, even if the United States makes no formal guarantee of military help.
The buildup in the Philippines could be a test for U.S. involvement elsewhere, defense officials say, including Indonesia and Malaysia.
Terrorist activity in those countries is considered worse than in the Philippines, but their U.S. relations are not as close.
Nevertheless, Blair said the United States would look for ways to focus ongoing exercises, such as those each year with Malaysia, more on scenarios to fight terrorism.
Indonesia, which is barred from U.S. military ties because of U.S. human rights concerns, would be eligible for the counterterrorism training assistance approved by Congress.
Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz recently said that restrictions on military assistance to Indonesia need to be reviewed in light of Sept. 11.
Return To Top February 23, 2002
Does the U.S. President have the right to Expand the War on Terror?
Analysis by Michael Crawford of MILNET, forwarded by our colleauges at AFI Research.
At dinner last night, one of my very liberal neighbors pointed out that
pretty soon U.S. President George Bush will run out authority for running around
chasing terrorists with U.S. military assets. The conversation stopped
immediately. Everyone knows I am the resident military authority on
our block and these sounded like fighting words. But the real reason it
stopped was because I was, so to speak, pole-axed. Then tonight that
Hardball guy on MSNBC had Buchannan and some other fellow arguing over it.
Seems they haven't read the law very well. So we thought we'd brief you --
the backyard barbeque court is now in session.
Our BBQ group all pretty much agreed back in September that the President
could order a retaliation as long as he carefully laid out who did the deed,
where they live and, as this same liberal neighbor insisted, we gave the people
harboring those people a chance to give them up. So when Bush, unaware of
our strategic advice did all these things, we were all pretty satisfied.
It turns out there were some legal hurdles our policy satisfied as well.
But, as the liberal neighbor warned back then, the President has to be
careful when (my neighbor didn't even consider using the IF word, we all knew
where this was going) he expanded. And now the sanctimonious SOB was
pulling a "I told you so" and ruining our BBQ steaks, hot dogs and our
carefully prepared scalloped potatoes (I like to spell it this way too -- its a
cultural thing.
There are really two issues here. The President is the Commander and
Chief of the U.S. military. So his retaliation is sort of supported by
"action reaction" language in the both civil and military code. I say
"sort of" because, in the past, the founders wrote the rules based upon warfare
as they knew it. Nation vs. Nation. Even the French Indian war was a
pretty clear national war. "They" in that case were the French and their
allies. You could also stretch just a tiny bit and say the allies of the
French, certain East Coast tribes of Indians, also were a nation, a place to go
to retaliate. Even under the Geneva Convention the Indians in question
qualified as "combatants" since they put on special "uniforms" and painted their
faces to indicate their membership in a specific group considered combatant
troops.
The notion of "declaring war" was written into the common law and this
implies that there must be a nation to declare war upon. We all saw this
debate on television many times before President Bush committed troops to
Afghanistan and recently as the debate about detainees versus prisoners of war
sprang up.
It was lucky in some sense that our terrorist antagonists chose
to hide out in Afghanistan and choose the Taliban as their chief (at least
publicly identifiable) supporter. When the Taliban refused to turn them
over, a rare occasion in the fight against terrorism occurred -- we had a nation
we could pursue terrorists to and retaliate against. In fact, this in of
itself is a landmark decision made by President Bush. By attaching a
supporting nation to a specific terrorist group, it makes it possible to get
much closer to the needed declaration of war. In this case our brave
Congress generated resolutions supporting the President's "Declaration".
What all the text in this article means up to this point, is that the U.S.
Congress supported the President by passing a nasty letter to the
antagonist. What else do you expect from a bunch of lawyers. But it
has cleared the way for Presidential action, preparing action, cognizant of laws
enacted relatively recently in Constitutional history.
Why All The Legal Hoops?
After Nixon pissed Congress off to no end, Congress began figuring out ways
to limit the President's powers of acting out war fantasies. One result is
the War Powers Act of
1973, which sets out conditions that eventually start building limits
on Presidential actions.
The first hurdle is crossed when you want to do non CIA clandestine
operations -- i.e. deploying U.S. Special Forces. Current law requires a
finding for non-CIA clandestine operations (Hughes Ryan Act -- the
Act was written with the CIA's charter in mind -- they can do covert action all
year long as long as the oversight committees -- House and Senate Intelligence
Committees don't have a problem). This finding can be held for a
"reasonable amount of time" -- most agree it is 30 days max. Then the
finding must be presented to Chairman and Ranking member of each of the House
and Senate Armed Services and Intelligence Oversight Committees (total of 8
people).
Whether the beginning is covert or not, the clock starts ticking to a 60 day
countdown. At the end of that period, the President must go back to
Congress and get a waiver -- typically to allow time for an organized and safe
withdrawal -- or Congress would need to declare war.
In the current situation, we were not acting in clandestine manner. The
President presented a request similar to the finding discussed earlier directly
to Congress at the same time he addressed the nation with his personal
"Declaration of War on Terrorism". Congress responded with very
vague support in the form of House and Senate resolutions, similar to the Tonkin
Gulf resolution that allowed continued action in Vietnam.
Since the War on Terror was "declared" in September of 2001, and Congress has
already written their nasty letter which constitutes a
pseudo-declaration of war (actually more like an indefinite waiver) , the
President can continue to exercise his policy of committing U.S. troops to
combat in the War on Terrorism. You could drive a few countries
through resolutions languages, so we don't perceive of any real legal challenge
to the President's moving the war into any country he desires. We
believe there is a classified annex to the authorization, however which may be
more specific on options Congress and the White House agreed upon.
In any case, as the operations in Afghanistan are winding down, we've
already heard the grumblings about limiting the President's expanding the
war. Armed Service Committee Chairman Levin asked a pointed question of
the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Meyers-- "Your aren't currently planning any
movement of major troops strengths outside of Afghanistan..."
(paraphrased). This leading question was, we believe, intended to either
get the CJCS to either say yes, starting the clock on any such activity, or no,
thus making it almost impossible for any overt action without the CJCS and the
President to do a quick brief beforehand. Moreover, Congress can at
anytime, just as was done in the case of the Boland Amendment, decide to
withdraw the President's "license".
Of course the press has regularly spent a few hours on this topic area (about
every two to three weeks), reminding everyone that they are watching the
President oh so carefully. The "training exercises" in the
Philippines not withstanding, the clock has not started ticking on action
anywhere else in the world -- as far as we know.
But for purposes of argument, let's assume there is a finding stored in a
safe in the President's office -- for instance, George W. might have outlined
his reasoning for carrying the War on Terrorism to the "Axis of Evil". Further,
let's say he filed it the same day he delivered the Axis of Evil remark -- the
State of the Union Address, 1/31/02. This finding would have
specifically addressed where and when covert operations would begin and
summarize the mission and perhaps the conditions that would allow cessation of
the clandestine action. Once he had done this, the President could then turn to
SecDef Rumsfeld (presumably with a copy of the finding), 'let's get operation
Pull His Teeth ready. Let me know soonest it can go."
Rumsfeld and CJCS Meyers would huddle and then CINC-CENTCOM Tommy Franks
would get a warning order.
In other words, the President, on his own initiative could commit us to a
campaign against Iraq just as soon as his military team can be ready to be
inserted. He needs nothing from anyone else.
However, 60 days from when the clock started ticking (in our example on the
last day of March, 2001) a decision point would come rolling up. If the
public relations were stinky, i.e. Europe has gone non-linear or the body count
is a little hard to accept, Congress could pull the plug.
Start-Stop: The American Risk
Literally, we could start a war and fail to finish it. Quite
easily. And this fact is well known and understood by our opponents.
It is a major hurdle we continue to have to leap over whenever we ask people to
accept our help in violently over-throwing a government. A committed
President doesn't mean diddley if Congress turns sour.. We can be there at
the beginning like gang busters, but in a few months later our fickle Congress
simply turn it all off That is a pretty scary proposition for local people
putting their lives in our hands by trying to depose their local dictator.
Congress has forced the withdrawal under no-uncertain terms only once.
The Boland Amendment in
1982 amended the War Powers Act specifically to force President Ronald Reagan to
withdraw ALL covert operations from support of the Contras in El Salvador and
Nicaragua). While this was landmark legislation and is one of the few but
growing examples of heated legal wrangling between the Executive and the
Legislative branches of our government, the Act was later repealed.
The bottom line is that the President could, legally, already have Spec Ops
warriors on the ground preparing for a campaign in Iraq or Iran or North
Korea. The most likely is Iraq, but a VERY close second would be
Iran. However, since the President only has to state his reasons for his
actions in the finding, there is only politics preventing him from moving the
war to any country he desires.
Of course, the political danger ranges from "a little rough" for Iraq, to "a
little more dicey" for Iran, and to "really ugly fallout" for North Korea".
Small exception come to mind... Iran might be a little easier, since reports
have been rampant of Iranian aid and perhaps even training troops creating
problems along the border of Iran and Afghanistan. This might provide, if
events cook along in that direction, the political rationale for going into
Iran. In the case of Iraq, there is an already well built case for attack
based on refusal to comply with the Gulf War Treaty -- substantially the U.N.
WMD and U.N. inspection regimes. Recent U.S. rhetoric has refocused
world attention on this topic area, perhaps preparing the way forward.
Return To Top February 23, 2002
February 22, 2002
Daniel Pearl is dead
27 SAMs found near Kandahar
US won't strike deal with kidnappers
US may seek Omar's Sheikh extradition
Bush administration backs Pastrana's crackdown on rebels
Sri Lanka, LTTE close to ceasefire agreement
Daniel Pearl is dead
From the Daily Jang of Pakistan.
Daniel Pearl, the Wall Street Journal reporter kidnapped in Pakistan, is dead, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing US and Pakistani officials.
"We now believe, based on reports from the US State Department and police officials of Sindh, that Danny Pearl was killed by his captors," Journal Publisher Peter Kann said in a prepared statement.
Daniel Pearl appears to be dead on a videotape reviewed by the FBI in the region, a US official said. "My understanding is that the FBI in Pakistan obtained a copy of a videotape on which it appears to be Daniel Pearl and he appears to be dead," the official, who has not seen the tape, told Reuters.
The 38-year-old reporter was kidnapped January 23 in Karachi after going to meet with sources for a story he was working on.
Two photo e-mails, showing him in chains and with a gun pointed at his head, were later sent to news organisations demanding the release of Pakistani prisoners from the war in Afghanistan and the Taliban's former ambassador to Pakistan in exchange for his freedom. Washington and Islamabad rejected the demand. --Agencies
News Desk adds: Sources said the video tape received by the US Consulate a few days ago showed Pearl interviewing some one when an unidentified person pulled his head back from the hair and severed his head with a knife. The consulate was trying to establish veracity of the tape for the last few days.
Return To Top February 22, 2002
27 SAMs found near Kandahar
From the Daily Jang of Pakistan.
KANDAHAR: The recent discovery of 27 surface-to-air missiles highlights both the continuing threat to coalition forces based here and the success of their efforts to root out Taliban and al-Qaeda remnants, military officials said on Thursday.
The missiles, new and in their original shipping containers, posed a serious threat to the coalition's base at the international airport here, army Sergeant First Class Tony Hammerquist said.
Local authorities in Tarin Kowt, about 100 km north of Kandahar, had reported the missile cache on Sunday to coalition forces, he said. On Tuesday, a four-man demolition team and a security squad of 10 soldiers from the US 101st Airborne Division flew to the area, took control of the missiles and destroyed them, said Hammerquist, a member of the demolition team.
The 27 missiles were Russian-made SA-7s and Chinese-made HN-5 shoulder-fired surface-to-air devices effective between 15 and 5,500 meters. An enemy armed with just one of those missiles could potentially disrupt activity at the base, Hammerquist said. "Any aircraft on approach or takeoff could have been hit," he said.
Kandahar airbase currently serves an average of 120 flights per day, including many large military cargo jets carrying supplies and troops. It is also a base for helicopters performing combat patrols and ferrying troops in the continuing search for remnants al-Qaeda network and Taliban forces.
Return To Top February 22, 2002
US won't strike deal with kidnappers
From the Time of India.
The United States has said it will make no concessions to individuals or groups holding American officials or citizens hostage and urged the private companies to follow its policy of no deal with kidnappers. The announcement gains significance in the wake of the abduction of Wall Street Journal's reporter Daniel Pearl.
"The US will use every appropriate resource to gain safe return of American citizens who are held hostage. At the same time, it is the US government policy to deny hostage takers the benefits of ransom, prisoner releases, policy changes, or other acts of concession," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said unveiling a new US policy on kidnapping.
Urging private companies and citizens to follow the US government's policy of no deals with hostage-takers, he said in a statement Wednesday "it is internationally accepted that governments are responsible for the safety and welfare of persons within the borders of their nations.
"Aware of both the hostage threat and public security shortcomings in many parts of the world, the US has developed enhanced physical and personal security programmes for US personnel and established cooperative arrangements with the US private sector."
The new policy requires federal review of every overseas kidnapping to determine whether any US intervention - diplomatic to military - is warranted, Boucher said.
"It's an attempt to dissuade people who might consider taking hostages from doing so in some vain hope that they might gain a benefit there by."
Noting the ongoing hostage cases of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in Pakistan and Christian missionaries Martin and Garcia Burnham in the Philippines, he said, "The overall policy is an attempt to discourage people from kidnapping Americans."
Return To Top February 22, 2002
US may seek Omar's Sheikh extradition
From the Times of India.
The suspected mastermind of the plot to kidnap Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl is the target of an active grand jury investigation in the United States, and Washington may ask for his extradition, Newsweek magazine reported.
The report in the issue due out Monday quotes justice department sources as saying the grand jury is looking at the Pearl abduction as well as other kidnapping plots involving US citizens, in which Sheikh Ahmed Omar Saeed could have played a role.
Sheikh Omar, who is now in Pakistani authorities' custody, could be indicted in a matter of weeks, and the United States would then seek his extradition from Pakistan, according to Newsweek.
Pakistani police said Omar confessed during interrogation that he was behind Pearl's kidnapping in this port city January 23.
Return To Top February 22, 2002
Bush administration backs Pastrana's crackdown on rebels
From the Times of India.
The United States supported Colombian President Andres Pastrana in his decision to crack down on rebels.
"We've always expressed our support for President Pastrana," the State Department spokesman, Richard Boucher, said Thursday. "We've always said these are decisions for him to make."
Pastrana canceled peace talks and ordered the bombing of positions controlled by leftist guerrillas.
Another administration official, asking not to be identified, said there no consideration was being given to using US troops in a combat role.
The official said the administration is reviewing the measures it might take to help Colombia within the limits imposed by the Congress.
US military assistance is generally limited by law to assisting Colombia's counternarcotics campaign.
Among the options under consideration are enhanced intelligence sharing and a speedup in the delivery of spare parts for US helicopters used by the Colombian military in the drug fight.
The administration also may take steps to permit increased aerial spraying of narcotics fields - something the Colombians have been seeking.
This could impair the rebels' war-fighting capability because they derive much of their income from the drug trade.
The deadly attacks by FARC guerrillas since Jan. 20, when they agreed to make the peace process work, are horrible, a senior US official said.
Also, he cited the hijacking of an airplane Wednesday and the kidnaping of a Colombian senator. "We can understand President Pastrana's frustration," the official said.
A formal statement was not issued immediately by the State Department.
Steve Lucas, spokesman for US Southern Command, said there are about 250 US military personnel, 50 civilian employees and 100 civilian military contractors in Colombia.
Also, State Department employees and contractors, who fly and maintain planes and helicopters used for drug crop eradication, also are in the South American country.
Congress has restricted US personnel in Colombia to 400 military and 400 civilian.
Lucas said US personnel provide military advice to the ambassador and staff and tactical advice and training for Colombian anti-narcotics operations.
Though the administration and Congress had expressed interest in broadening the US military role in Colombia, "We are still operating under the existing guidance which is US assistance to Colombia is limited to counternarcotics," Lucas said.
Return To Top February 22, 2002
Sri Lanka, LTTE close to ceasefire agreement
From the Times of India.
Sri Lanka said on Thursday the government and Tamil Tiger rebels were close to signing an agreement to put an indefinite ceasefire in place ahead of direct peace talks later this year.
The optimism comes even though the military reported a clash earlier on Thursday between the Lankan navy and boats belonging to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), the first battle since the two sides declared ceasefires in December.
"It is extremely likely that historic developments will occur within the next 48 hours with regard to the signing of a cessation of hostilities agreement between the government and the LTTE," Constitutional Affairs Minister and government spokesman G L Peiris said at a weekly news conference.
"As of now we are still on track with the peace process. This (the navy clash) has no bearing," Peiris said.
The government has already said it would extend a unilateral truce due to expire on Sunday if a Norwegian-brokered effort failed to produce a formal ceasefire pact with the Tamil Tiger guerrillas this weekend.
Besides enforcing the ceasefire, the agreement would lay the groundwork for the first face-to-face peace talks in seven years to end nearly two decades of ethnic war.
More than 64,000 have died in the war as the LTTE fight for a separate Tamil state in the north and east of the country.
The sea clash on Thursday took place off the northeastern coast of the island when more than a dozen navy boats encountered about 10 Tiger vessels off the main guerrilla base of Mullaitivu.
"The navy patrol with more than a dozen craft challenged them using the required procedures," military spokesman Brigadier Sanath Karunaratne said.
"They did not respond, so they were engaged," he said.
At least one navy sailor was killed in the fighting, and the military said the air force had been called in.
A draft of the agreement the two sides are expected to sign calls for a stop to "offensive navy operations", but the military has said they had the right to patrol the seas.
Four previous attempts at peace talks have broken down but hopes of an end to the fighting are at their highest level in recent years following the election of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe in December.
Return To Top February 22, 2002
February 21, 2002
Death stalks the Holy Land
Is it now time for Saddam to be ousted Forcibly?
Pakistan
Myanmar: Anti-Terrorism War May Raise Strategic Value
Death stalks the Holy Land
From our colleauge Richard M. Bennett at AFI Research.
The situation in the West Bank and Gaza grows more unstable and dangerous with every attack and counter strike. The Israeli's have begun to take serious casualties and the steady destruction of what's left of the Palestinian authority continues. The Palestinians reinforced by seasoned Hizbollah and Al Qa'ida fighters are proving a greater threat than many in Israel expected. As AFI Research reported earlier last year considerable quantities of Iraqi weapons reached Arafat's forces and these have been supplemented by large quantities of Iranian arms in the last few months, indeed Arafat rather boastfully claims to have 'warehouses full of arms'. While that is an exaggeration, it is believed that he may now have access to some 80,000 or more small arms and a significant arsenal of heavier weapons including anti-tank missiles, shoulder-launched anti-aircraft missiles and several hundred short range unguided bombardment rockets.
Units of the Palestinian Security Forces have ignored Arafats half-hearted attempts to reign in their attacks on Israeli areas and have even linked up with Hamas in some circumstances. They are being strengthened with a small number of professional military officers from other Arab States, significantly from the Pasdaran in Iran. While the Intifada spirals out of control Iran, Iraq, Syria and even Saudi Arabia are coming together in a loose alliance more out of fear of future US actions than of a genuine liking for each other. However much this is a marriage of convenience, it is none the less an important realignment of Arab power and one that both Egypt and Jordan must take into account. Neither Amman or Cairo are prepared to take a step into the unknown and join this new grouping. Fear of Israel and of losing US patronage is far stronger than the allure of Pan-Arabism, at least for now. However should US policy come unstuck, then the trickle of deserters from Washington's camp could quickly become a torrent. Even secular Turkey is uncertain how far to play the Western card, its natural wish to support the Western alliance with air bases and troops for an invasion of northern Iraq is tempered by uncertainty over the long term effects of such actions and the sure knowledge that they have to live in the region long after US forces have been withdrawn.
Both Sharon and Arafat locked into a circle of violence
Both Arafat and Sharon appear to be locked into a macabre dance of death, neither able to stand back from the violence or to have the courage to do the unthinkable, to make meaningful concessions and invite an international peace-keeping force in to enforce an agreement. Arafat fears his inability to control a Palestinian people driven to desperation and violence by being deprived of their homeland and of basic human rights for over 35 years and in some cases 54 years and Sharon is aware that he would not survive politically and in fact may face assassination from right-wing extremist groups should he agree to a large scale military withdrawal from occupied Arab territory and the dismantling of illegal Jewish settlements.
Both leaders and people's are trapped by their history, collective experiences, fears and by a growing paranoia, bordering on hatred of each other. This can only lead to further bloodshed and the risk that in the absence of the courage on both sides to take the appallingly hard decisions necessary to restart the peace process, that Israel will opt finally for a military solution. The annexation of all Palestinian land and the establishment of permanently defensible borders with its neighbours. The resulting flood of refugee's would probably destabilize Jordan and overwhelm the available facilities in Egypt, Syria and Lebanon, leading perhaps to the Israel's worst nightmare, extremist Governments in all of its neighbouring Arab countries.
Israel could well face isolation, the European nations would hardly abandon the lucrative Muslim markets around the world. Even the United States would find it increasingly difficult to maintain its present level of public support in the face of outrage in the UN and the resulting threat to western oil supplies.
Only Washington has the power to bring a chance of peace
Yet, sitting in the War room in Jerusalem and listening to the briefings from the Chiefs of Staff and the Intelligence community there may appear to be little alternative to an embattled Israeli leadership. They, like their Palestinian opponents need an acceptable way out, a political escape from increasing death and destruction. It is highly unlikely that either Sharon or Arafat can provide that miracle. Only the international community, the United Nations, but most importantly of all, the United States can provide a solution and have the ability to enforce it. This too, is unfortunately becoming less likely under a Bush administration set upon its War on terrorism, which to many in the Middle East, rightly or wrongly is translated into a War on Islam.
Colin Powell knows what is needed in the Middle East, he is aware that for the sake of all Israeli's and Palestinian's that only an even-handed, unbiased approach has the slightest chance of success. Enough blood has been spilt in this tortured region already, it is to be hoped that Washington will listen to Powell and those who hopefully think like him, and give both sides a chance of hope, reconciliation and an end to this dreadful slaughter.
Return To Top February 21, 2002
Is it now time for Saddam to be ousted Forcibly?
Written by Michael Crawford of MILNET, forwwarded by our colleauges at AFI Research.
First, let's assume the media is correct. After all, European leaders reacted so strongly to the Bush "Axis of Evil" phrase in the State of the Union address, that we know now where most of Europe stands on really going after Terrorism -- "Its okay as long as you don't disrupt our oil supply and piss off our colleagues in the Middle East."
With the recent propaganda coming out of the Middle East, and European leaders jumping at the chance to climb on U.S. television to slap George W. around for being a "reckless cowboy", we are reminded Ronald Reagan's challenge to the Soviets in his finer moments.
Never-the-less, the Evil Empire, having moved to the Middle East, is quick to enlist the aid of its old allies the Chinese, French and Russians. Remarkably, the new world order is, as we have said several times before, the same world order.
Secretary of State Colin Powell on two separate TV opportunities Tuesday, both being broadcast while President Bush tours Asia, clearly put Bush's messages in perspective. Speaking on Meet The Press, about Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's claim that Iraq is not developing weapons of mass destruction is true, Powell said,
"...there is a simple way to test the proposition; that is, to let the inspectors in."
"If inspections are not allowed, economic sanctions on Iraq must remain in place," Powell said. "And, in fact," he said, "those sanctions which people thought would be falling apart are very much [still] in place, and I think they will become more effective in May of this year when we get into smart sanctions."
MILNET poses a further question to those who criticize U.S. engagement of Iraq and the administration's attempts to change a decade of policy that has utterly failed. President Bush has made it clear there is a line between what is a threat and what is not. We have to ask ourselves,
"So what does a nation have to do to become a threat to world peace anyway?"
If the following list doesn't comprise a threat, then obviously no nation will ever be a threat to world security:
1. aggressively pursuing programs to produce biological, chemical and nuclear weapons,
2. having killed its own people with WMD,
3. killed unpopular relatives because they spoke out against the leader,
4. used woman and children as shields to prevent destruction of WMD facilities,
5. defying the terms of a signed treaty signed agreeing not to build WMD U.N. inspectors thereby preventing inspections to insure and prevent against further WMD development,
6. defied the terms of a signed treaty not to threaten neighbors and then within months attacked both north and south of its capital,
7. defined U.N. sanctions for oil exportation for use in purchase of military weapons and continued WMD development, and
8. showed absolutely no chance in behavior that led to a war with all major countries in their region and the rest of the world
9. has consistently funded terrorist groups both publicly and through clandestine funding
10. called for terrorism against no less than three nations naming innocents as necessary targets
One has to wonder what other line has to be crossed before a country is deemed a bona fide threat. Clearly, if a country claims itself to be a Islamic Nation (whether secular or not apparently), they can be excused all the excesses listed above.
It boggles the mind to see Bush attacked for calling Iraq a member of the Axis of Evil. The President was actually quite soft. Iraq is a central figure in an Axis of Evil that should also include, besides Iraq, the other houses of evil Lebanon, Syria and perhaps Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
For over fifty years these nations have been happily teaching through state sponsored and secular means, a regime of hatred for all things dealing with Christian beliefs, personal freedom, woman's rights, and essentially anything that has modified human behavior since the 8th century if not the 4th.
Is it no wonder that the most economically self reliant, growth oriented nation in the mid-east is the antithesis of all that the full membership of the Axis of Evil stands for? And that the enemies of that nation are now finally turning their attention to America?
What is really hard to believe is the support Iran, Iraq and yes even poor little North Korea are getting from the bleeding hearts. Stand up and salute that Iranian crowd, they are the epitome of all that we want our nations to be. Or North Korea, who has promised everything and only delivered, well sort of, on one promise...they have delayed their production of nuclear weapons grade material. They haven't eliminated the appropriate equipment or destroyed their ability to assemble a nuclear weapon in less than a year, they have simply promised not to do so. This from a nation that has failed to deliver on every promise made when faced with worldwide condemnation (except of course from the bleeding hearts who blamed the U.S. for from everything from starvation in North Korea to the hijacking of aircraft and flying them into the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon). "Mea Culpa, Mea Culpa, we are such bad people, we deserve this punishment...oh me, oh my."
Never mind that Korea is actively helping its brother third world nations build the rockets that will threaten immediate neighbors, then Central Europe and eventually North America. Never mind that the extended list of members in the Axis of Evil (Libya, Syria, Lebanon, Sudan, and perhaps a few others) are all in the midst of preparing NBC weapons bazaar that will mark the deadliest period of proliferation since Soviet spies stole the plans to first the atomic and then hydrogen bomb.
On North Korea, Powell spoke on CNN's "Late Edition", saying in essence, Powell said the United States is open to dialogue with North Korea, and supports South Korean efforts to reach out to engage the North Koreans, but the administration "will not look away from the nature of that regime. ... They are still developing weapons that they plan to
sell to other irresponsible nations, and I think we have to call them to account. They are a despotic regime. And that is not just my opinion; it's an absolute statement of fact. Anybody can see it," he said.
And of course, the U.S. will be blamed for a new cold war if nations like Iraq, Iran, and North Korea continue to defy world requirements for disarming and rejecting terrorism -- everyone will know we could easily have prevented it simply by ignoring the threat until North America was surrounded like Great Britain in the late 1930s.
It is said that many major battles are fought as if they were fighting in the previous war. Whenever proponents of touch action diagram their solution, the appeasement crowd will use this cliché to attempt to deflect the issue and deride anyone proposing to take real action. They choose to either ignore or rewrite history.
In the case of popular worldwide liberalism today, rewriting history has crept into all levels of education -- rewrite it so it isn't so nasty and ugly. There were no gas chambers, Hitler was protecting the French from invasion by the British, and modern day Jews have taken away the land of a nation Palestine -- a nation which has held it since those ancient times when the oppressed Black African's called Egyptians fought that horrible tyrant Moses, finally revolting against the slave master Jews and tossing them off their land.
Don't forget that great freedom fighter and hell of a man Saddam Hussein of Iraq and that benevolent society in Iran where no man shall live without his personal property including wife, daughters, tons of sarin gas, anthrax, botulism, nuclear waste disposal weapons, and even shiny metal spheres of plutonium and tritium surrounded by uranium.
The other fairly tale is that North Korea, Iraq, and Iran will never threaten anyone again, will never develop weapons of mass destruction and there will never be a trade of these weapons and ballistic missiles amongst each other as well as to terrorist organizations, and of course those same terrorists, getting funding, succour and support will never threaten the civilized nations of the world. The Arab nations will not main, kill, and eliminate, without regret, each and every Israeli until that country exists no more, then continue on to eliminate anyone who does not subscribe to their religious tenets.
None of this is familiar and there is no history being repeated. It is all a bad dream and we simply need to ignore it.
For those of us who don't believe in the liberal fairy tale, there is plenty of reason to call the Axis of Evil what it is. It is NOT a kindly brotherhood of pious men producing agri-goods for the benefit of humanity and helping the suffering people within their own borders by ignoring weapons programs and instead feeding and saving their own children, indigent and needy. If you believe that fairy tale, we know where there is a pretty orange bridge for sale in Marin County, California -- you know, where that great patriot and freedom fighter Johnnie Walker came from?
Return To Top February 21, 2002
Return To Top February 21, 2002
Pakistan
- Pakistan Defense Expenditure Increases
The Daily Jang of Pakistan says that the Pakistan Government has sanctioned an extra $166 million to meet the emergency resulting from confrontation with India since December 2001. [This is very approximately equal to 6% of the 2001-02 defense budget. Editor.] More money will have to be allotted as the emergency continues. Pakistan may not, however, be as badly financially stressed as it might be because its provinces have underspent their development budgets for the past few years.
- Daniel Pearl
From
the Daily Jang of Pakistan:
Investigators insisted on Wednesday they are on the trail of Pearl's abductors but there was still no indication of whether he is alive or dead. "We have identified the gang and we are looking for them," the home secretary of Sindh province, Brigadier Mukhtar Sheikh, told AFP. "We're definitely on it and have already arrested the prime suspect and identified his accomplices. "Such cases do take time, even months and years, but we are very near and I am confident that it will be resolved much earlier than that."
One of the senior civilian investigators, Jamil Yusuf, said "60 per cent of the case" had already been solved. "Where can they go?" he said of Pearl's captors. "The manhunt is on." "We have already resolved the case 60 per cent, arrested a prime suspect and three people accused of sending the e-mails; we will resolve the remaining 40 per cent."
- 40% Reduction in ISI Personnel
Reports say Pakistan has ordered 4,000 of the estimated 10,000 ISI personnel to report back to their regular military units following the closure of its Afghanistan section. Its Kashmir section is reported also to have been reduced. Indian officials say if this is correct, the move will go a long way to defusing tension between the two countries. A report in the Times of India paints a different persepective:
Far from any decrease in cross-border terrorism, the last few months have been used by Pakistan for the regrouping of militants in PoK, official sources have said. Members of Osama Bin Laden's al-Qaeda organisation were also moving from Afghanistan towards PoK, the sources added. Pakistan was using the period to build up defensive positions, constructing cement and concrete road blocks right across the border where the eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation continued without any change. While the government assessment shows a drop in infiltration, it is felt that Pakistan is using the period to build up the militant groups. Pakistan had not given up cross-border terrorism but viewed this period as an interregnum.
- India seeks resumption of freight train
From
the Daily Jang of Pakistan:
ISLAMABAD: India has asked Pakistan for a resumption of freight traffic between the two countries, which was halted by New Delhi almost two months ago, but Islamabad will refuse the offer, Minister for Railways Javed Ashraf Qazi said on Wednesday. Qazi said Pakistan finds it more important to resume passenger train services, which have also been at a standstill since January 1. He said that Indian officials asked the Pakistani high commission in New Delhi to start preparations for resumption in freight trains. "If they do not allow Samjhota Express," the main passenger train link between the two countries, "we will not allow freight," Ashraf told AFP. "Hundreds of thousands of families are divided between the two countries. It's more important to restore people traffic than goods traffic," he said.
Return To Top February 21, 2002
Myanmar: Anti-Terrorism War May Raise Strategic Value
From our friends at Stratfor.com.
Summary
Myanmar's military-led government recently said that "success is imminent" in negotiations with the opposition National League for Democracy. Yangon continues to engage the NLD in hopes the international community will loosen economic restrictions on the nation, but at the same time, it does not want to lose central control. The United States is not likely to let the regime have its cake and eat it too -- unless Myanmar has something more strategic to offer in regard to the anti-terrorism campaign.
Analysis
Myanmar's military-led government said recently that although the pace of unspecified negotiations with the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) is slow, their "success is imminent." The comments were part of an official statement sent to Reuters, in response to the Feb. 11 release of the U.S. State Department's latest assessment on conditions in the country and U.S. policy toward the government. Yangon called this year's report "more objective" than previous ones.
Yangon is attempting to maintain centralized control and national cohesion while trying to persuade the West to ease sanctions that have devastated the nation's economy and undermined its potentially lucrative oil and gas sector. Myanmar has lacked the strategic value that allowed countries like China and Vietnam to take a similar course, where centralized power and questionable human rights practices are only minor stumbling blocks to aid and investment. However, Washington's need for friendly Southeast Asian countries in the anti-terrorism war could strengthen Yangon's position.
The ruling State Peace and Development Council has been holding secret meetings for several months with the NLD, which has been kept out of power despite winning in elections more than 10 years ago. The government is also releasing NLD members from detention and allowing greater access to its Secretary-General Aung San Suu Kyi, currently under house arrest.
Return To Top February 21, 2002
February 20, 2002
Israeli Reserve Generals Back Unilaterlal Withdrawal
Afghanistan slowly returns to its old ways
Pakistan rejects Indian demand to share information
"Iranian forces active deep within Afghanistan"
Letter to the Editor: On DebkaFile
Israeli Reserve Generals Back Unilaterlal Withdrawal
This article by Lily Galili writing in the Daily Ha'aretz is forwarded by Ethan Clauset to balance the DebkaFile article we carried yesterday, Palestinian Terror Escalates. Mr. Clauset also has sent a Letter to the Editor.
After four months of intense discussion, the Council for Peace and Security,
a group of 1,000 top-level reserve generals, colonels, and Shin Bet and
Mossad officials, are to mount a public campaign for a unilateral Israeli
withdrawal from all of Gaza and much of the West Bank.
Taking care to avoid the term "separation" - council member Shlomo Avineri,
a former foreign ministry director general, said it smacks of apartheid -
the organization is calling for evacuating Gaza, dismantling 50 settlements,
the immediate establishment of a Palestinian state, and immediate peace
talks with Palestinians, whether there is a cease-fire or not.
The debate inside the organization involved some 300 of its members, and
about 80 percent of the full membership has signed on to the campaign. It
will include public appearances, bumper stickers, and a pamphlet titled
"Saying shalom to the Palestinians." During the debates, many members raised
objections to a unilateral withdrawal from the territories. The arguments
ranged from how it would forestall talks with the Palestinians, because a
withdrawal would be seen as similar to the "escape" from Lebanon, to the
opinion that the council should not deal with withdrawal, which implies
leaving settlements.
But as the debate continued, a consensus evolved to encompass 80 percent of
the membership that believes the immediate establishment and recognition of
a Palestinian state would force the Palestinian leadership to change its
behavior. Council sources said Palestinians shown the plan are firmly
opposed to it because they fear the new lines to be drawn - mostly along the
Green Line - would become permanent, if only de facto, borders.
"I went into the discussions without a firm opinion," said reserve major
general Danny Rothschild, president of the council. "But I was convinced by
the contacts I have through back channels with Palestinians in recent
months. I've learned from them that the street has taken over the entire
moderate camp, and the moderate positions they take behind closed doors
change the minute there's fear that they will be exposed to the threatening
street. I also took into account the demographic issue, and without any
chance right now for negotiations, it requires withdrawal in order to
preserve the Jewish character of the state."
But more than anything else, Rothschild said the deciding factor for him was
the sprouting movement of soldiers refusing to serve in the territories,
even before the officers letter issued late last month that has already
grown to more than 200 signatories. "Four months ago it was clear to me that
the movement would grow if we continue calling up reserves to accompany
settlers to music lessons and to protect real estate that has nothing to do
with ideology."
According to Rothschild, the council members "said to ourselves that
precisely because we aren't politicians, but people who look at the
situation through a security perspective of how to use power, it was clear
that those two jeeps and a tank that accompany a settler who refuses to use
a bypass road, would do much more good if they were on the seam," meaning on
both sides of the Green Line, the pre-1967 armistice lines. "Shifting a
company of soldiers from protecting a settlement to protecting the seam is
the proper use of force," says Rothschild.
Unlike some of the other unilateral withdrawal plans, like "Life Fence," for
example, the council's plan involves evacuating some 40-50 settlements,
where some 15 percent of the settlers live. The council has detailed maps,
but it won't make them public yet to avoid being perceived as an alterative
to the army.
The council plan will be dubbed "Saying shalom to the Palestinians," using
the double meaning of both farewell and peace for the word shalom, and
includes a full withdrawal from Gaza, except for a narrow zone along the
international border with Egypt; new military deployment along a new line
east and south of the Green Line in the northern West Bank, and east and
north of it in the south Mt. Hebron area. The Green Line would become the
new line in the Bethlehem and Ramallah areas. According to the plan,
Israelis would remain - at this stage - in the Jordan Valley, the Gush
Etzion bloc, the Ariel finger, and in Kiryat Arba and in the Jewish
neighborhood in downtown Hebron.
The plan does not touch on the issue of Jerusalem, except for noting that by
moving troops out of other places, more will be available for protecting
Jerusalem. "This is not a 100 percent solution," Rothschild admits, "but the
plan solves the anomaly of there being the most number of troops in the
places with the least number of settlers to protect."
One of the most vehement of the council member opposed to the plan is
reserve major general Shlomo Gazit, a member of the council's executive.
Gazit argued for redeployment to new lines, but said as much as possible has
to be left to negotiations. Indeed, Gazit seems to be expressing the
ambivalence in other organizations that back unilateral separation but are
afraid it will sabotage any negotiations with the Palestinians.
Thus, the Peace Coalition, comprised of Peace Now, Meretz and Labor Party
doves, is speaking in two voices as it calls for unilateral separation and
for negotiations. Indeed, the bumper sticker the Council for Peace and
Security encompasses that ambivalence: "Withdrawal for security, talks for
peace."
In the past, the council threw its considerable weight behind the Oslo
agreements, most of whose architects are now opposed to a unilateral
withdrawal. But Rothschild has a different view. "The negotiations for a
permanent agreement have to be based on Oslo. But an army commander cannot
be dogmatic. When conditions change on the ground, he must change his
behavior. If Oslo is dead, it's because we killed it, and now we're
shooting. But now there's no choice except to do what's best for us."
At the latest session of the council's executive, last week, which was
attended by among others reserve major generals Nati Sharoni and Ami Ayalon,
the former Shin Bet chief, the executive challenged Prime Minister Ariel
Sharon's policy of refusing to negotiate with the Palestinians under fire.
The council called for immediate talks, under fire, with the Palestinians,
and for the immediate evacuation of isolated settlements that require a
large military presence to protect.
Sharon refused to meet with them
During the months of preparation, discussing the plan, council members met
with a host of figures, including Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and former
justice minister Yossi Beilin, who oppose unilateral withdrawal; Haim Ramon
who favors unilateral withdrawal and a permanent agreement with
international peacekeeping forces, which the council rejects; Minister Dan
Meridor, who supports separation primarily for demographic reasons, and with
Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, who opposes evacuating settlements.
As part of their planned public campaign, the council was supposed to meet
with the Labor Party Knesset faction this week, to present the plan. But the
meeting was canceled at the last minute, with the conventional wisdom saying
Ben-Eliezer did not want to provide a platform to the proponents of
unilateral withdrawal, like Ramon.
The council is due to meet President Moshe Katsav and former prime minister
Benjamin Netanyahu, to present the plan. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has
refused to meet them.
The council has an appointment at Rafael in two weeks time to examine new
technologies, including a new security fence, developed by the state-owned
weapons R&D firm, that could be integrated into their security plan.
Afghanistan slowly returns to its old ways
Analysis by our colleague Richard M. Bennett of AFI Research.
Within just two short months of Washington's delight at having apparently rescued Afghanistan from the medieval regime of the Taliban, fighting has once again erupted in a number of areas as the Warlords compete for power. Already the fracture lines of tribalism have re-opened with anti-Taliban forces on both sides having former Taliban fighters amongst them.
The ominous signs are there for all to see and just as AFI Research has been predicting since December last year. The Taliban regime may have been forced out of power and out of the cities, but they have not disappeared from the equation. The internal situation inside Afghanistan remains chaotic and the Taliban are undoubtedly trying to regroup, form alliances and re-establish themselves. Their success or otherwise should be a matter of grave importance to the United States and the viability its long-term position in Central and Southern Asia. A resurgent Taliban in the spring and summer campaigning season would cause them to be treated with great respect amongst the peoples of an increasingly disturbed, uncertain and volatile Muslim world. Extremists will portray the Taliban vision of Islam as having successfully survived an attack by the worlds greatest superpower with incalculable propaganda benefits among young men throughout the Middle East. The greatest recruiting program for Islamic extremism and international terrorism would be a perception that America for all its military might had not actually defeated the Taliban, in addition to failing to capture Osama Bin-Laden or prevent further Al Qa'ida attacks on US targets.
Defence Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has admitted that clashes among rival Afghan factions posed new risks to American Special Operations forces and the interim Afghan government, "It is true that there are Afghan factions on the ground that don't get along," Mr. Rumsfeld added. Afghanistan's continuing security nightmare doesn't end there however, interference by Iran in Western and Southern areas has been seen as a positive response to the pressures being exerted on the majority Pashtun peoples by the arrogant actions of the Uzbek and Tajik Northern Alliance helped to a temporary dominance by the US air campaign and the large scale rearmament of its forces by Russia.
Refugee crisis highlights lack of reconciliation
Further signs that the situation in both southern and eastern Afghanistan is once again deteriorating was recently highlighted by the UN Refugee Agency when it warned that thousands of extra Afghan refugees were moving across the borders into the already overcrowded camps inside Pakistan. Aid workers say most are ethnic Pashtuns who claim they are being harassed by the supporters of the new Government in Kabul and are still being targeted by US Special Forces operations and occasional bombing raids. The Aid Agencies desperate to move some 2.5 million refugees back into Afghanistan are now faced with an influx of at least a further 20,000.
This adds yet another complication to the security issue, the border camps and crowded streets of the major Pakistan cities already provide a secure refuge for most of the new generation of leaders of the Taliban and its offshoots. The steady trickle of worn-out senior Taliban giving themselves up will have little effect on those who believe they have proved the long-term invincibility of their fundamentalist beliefs. The Taliban will be back in one form or another just as surely as the chances of the Western imposed administration in Kabul surviving the inherent tribalism of its constituent parts are extremely slim. The murder of the Transport Minister and the inability of the International Force to provide a genuine security environment are clear signs of the incipient decay.
Pakistan rejects Indian demand to share information
[We have belatedly learned that Sheikh Omar was in the custody of the Pakistan ISI from February 5 to February 12, 2002. Since no one has contradicted Omar's statement that he surrendered voluntarily and was not caught, presumably he surrendered to the ISI. This suggests that the next week was spent on negotiating with the Sindh Police, who's agenda would be quite different from that of the ISI. The Sindh Police were under great pressure to solve the case and find Daniel Pearl. They had no incentive to treat Omar as gently as he indicates he was treated, but the ISI is a greater power than a provincial police force. Naturally we'd love to know what Omar and the ISI discussed for a week. Editor.]
From Pakistan's Daily Jang.
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Tuesday rejected an Indian request to share information from an Islamic militant arrested in connection with the kidnapping of US reporter Daniel Pearl.
India's Ministry of External Affairs spokeswoman Nirupama Rao told reporters earlier on Tuesday the militant, Sheikh Omar, had information on the hijacking of an Indian plane in 1999, as well as last year's bloody attacks on occupied Kashmir legislature and Indian parliament.
"Why should we share information with them?" a Pakistani government official told Reuters. "We have been asking (India) to share information on so many things which they never shared. Why should we share now?" British-born Omar spent five years jailed in India for his alleged role in the 1994 kidnapping of three Britons and an American who were lured from the capital. The Pakistani official said India previously held Omar for five years and had plenty of opportunities to question him. "Omar was in Indian custody for so many years. Why did they not interrogate him then?" he said.
New Delhi's demand was the latest in a series of diplomatic moves against Islamabad. Rao told reporters Pakistan's deputy high commissioner in New Delhi was told Sheikh Omar possessed information about the hijacking of an Indian plane in 1999 and attacks on the occupied Kashmir state legislature and Indian parliament last year. "The government of Pakistan was requested to provide relevant information in this regard to the government of India," Rao said.
She said international laws and global consensus against terrorism required all nations to cooperate and share information about criminal investigations and evidence obtained from suspects in terrorist acts.
"We have our own information about this individual's involvement in various terrorist acts," Rao said and added India hoped Pakistan would act on its demand. "Does that mean we should give up on seeking responsive behaviour from Pakistan or meaningful action from Pakistan," Rao said when asked about the purpose behind India's latest demand in the light of Islamabad's inaction on similar demands in the past. "It certainly doesn't mean we have given up on that."
Omar, who was released from an Indian jail in 1999 in exchange for passengers of a hijacked Indian plane, claimed responsibility for a series of violent attacks in India in the last four months. But Pakistani officials have doubted his claims and said Omar was trying to portray himself as a hero of the insurgency in disputed Kashmir.
"Iranian forces active deep within Afghanistan"
From Pakistan's Daily Jang.
WASHINGTON: US intelligence officials have spotted Iranian intelligence and military personnel deep inside Afghanistan, working to destabilize the interim Afghan government, The Washington Times reported Tuesday.
In recent weeks, Iranians sent 200 to 300 Hezbollah-trained Afghan fighters from Iran to the Mazar-i-Sharif area, the report said, citing unnamed officials "familiar with intelligence reports."
Iranian special forces troops are working with them in efforts to undermine the pro-US interim government and to prevent the return next month of Afghanistan's former king, Mohammed Zahir Shah, currently in exile in Italy, the report said.
Iranian personnel are also active near Herat in western Afghanistan, and near Bamiyan in central Afghanistan, it said. The Afghan embassy in Iran announced earlier Tuesday that interim government head Hamid Karzai will be in Tehran on February 24 and 25.
Iran, a bitter foe of Kabul's ousted Taliban regime, has strongly denied Washington's allegations of interfering in the post-Taliban Afghanistan and of allowing Taliban and allied al-Qaeda terror group fighters to flee across the border.
Tehran radio said last week that Karzai had also rejected the US allegations, quoting him as saying that "the Kabul government has no problem of any sort with Tehran, and we hope to see the development of our bilateral relations."
Meanwhile, Pashtun warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and the Iranian government that shelters him are now a greater threat to Afghan security, a Kandahar government official said on Tuesday.
Letter to the Editor: On DebkaFile
You used to refer to Debka as "the Israeli Drudge Report" every time you
quoted them, but now you're reprinting their histrionics without
commentary. I believe some of the information they provide is valuable
but it can be uncomfortable to read their monomaniac reduction of
Palestinians to Arafat and his terrorist hordes. It's difficult to tell
what they propose to do about the situation other than escalate it to an
all-out war. Anyway, I enjoy reading you - keep it up.
Ethan Clauset
Reader Clauset has a point. Our not mentioning that DebkaFile should be read with caution is inadvertent; your Editor forgets that new readers may not be familiar with the cautions of old. Personally, your editor has serious reservations about DebkaFile's solutions to a horrendously complex problem. Yet, at Orbat.com we keenly feel our status as outsiders in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. We lack the understanding needed to say anything intelligent about the conflict. DebkaFile has a clever way of marrying facts and opinions; we'd be just as happy - if we had the time - to separate the two and carry just the facts. And, of course, DebkaFile's facts must also be approached with caution.
Return To Top February 20, 2002
February 19, 2002
Palestinian Terror Escalates
Separation: plan leaders can't live with, but which Israelis may be unable to live without
Sheikh admits hand in Parliament, J and K, Kolkata attacks
India to buy weapon locating radars from US
Palestinian Terror Escalates
DEBKAfile's Special Analysis
Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon brushed aside the widespread criticism of his handling of Palestinian terror as politically motivated, when he addressed a Likud party faction meeting Monday, February 17. He declared brusquely that he doesn't need experts to advise him on how to combat terror.
As he spoke, the Palestinian terror machine struck again and again with swift hammer strokes over a widely dispersed area - from Israel's coastal district north of Tel Aviv to the southern Gaza Strip and Jerusalem's environs. In further evidence of a central terrorist command working round the clock, the Palestinians showed they were quick to learn the lessons of their failed attack on Sunday, when two armed terrorists, chased by police in the coastal area north of Tel Aviv, were killed before they could strike. Twenty-four hours later, on the Maale Adumim-Jerusalem highway, a Palestinian terrorist drove a booby-trapped car out of Abu Dis east of Jerusalem onto the Maale Adumim-Jerusalem highway. A police van at a roadblock gave chase. The Maale Adumim police had just received an anonymous tip that a booby-trapped car was on its way to a mass-casualty strike in downtown Jerusalem. This time, the Palestinian jumped out of the car and ran off slowly enough to get caught. As he was brought back to his car, he activated the detonator in his pocket, blowing the car up and killing the policeman and himself. A second policeman was injured. The operation was conceived from the start as a trap for the police. One and a-half hours later, a lone Palestinian gunman ambushed an Israeli civilian vehicle on the Gaza Strip's Kussufim road as it turned into Gush Katif. Shooting and tossing grenades, he killed three Israelis on the spot and left five injured, two gravely. The bombings and shootings attacks began Monday morning and went on until night, programmed by sheer weight of numbers to inflict casualties.
Last week, seven Israelis died in terrorist attacks - 5 servicemen and women, 2 children. This week, Israeli police officers are clearly targeted. The Palestinians ability to unleash fresh waves of terror strikes every few hours, each clearly focused, indicates a large army of terrorists functioning efficiently in shooting, bombing and suicide squads, according to well-defined tactical directives from a higher command.
Hundreds more provide the logistical and intelligence support required for selecting a vast array of targets, assembling explosives and bomb belts, delivering assault weapons and providing vehicles. This meticulously prepared terror offensive, employing an estimated 1000 fighting and support personnel, was launched on Wednesday, February 6, the day Sharon flew off to meet President George W. Bush at the White House. To activate this many operatives requires a chain of command, with centers and bases for its officers.
DEBKAfile's military sources emphasize that, so far, Israel has never struck those bases or tackled the core of the terror machine. IDF military has been kept down to mostly defensive and partially preventive tactics. Even punitive assaults have been ineffectual for disabling the burgeoning Palestinian terrorist infrastructure.
Sharon will not still the criticism against him by calling a special session of the Israeli army's general command for Monday night, February 18. As the Israeli death toll climbs hour by hour, the country cries out for military action to disrupt Palestinian terrorist command centers and stop the carnage.
The points Arafat's terror machine is piling up will soon lead him to his goal of unseating yet another Israeli prime minister, a repeat of the methods he employed to remove Sharon's predecessors. Even as a politician, the prime minister needs to issue the generals with their long-delayed orders to go into action.
Return To Top February 19, 2002
Separation: plan leaders can't live with, but which Israelis may be unable to live without
By Bradley Burston of the Israeli newspaper, the Ha'aretz.
Construction of a fence to wall Palestinians off from Israel - an unsinkable proposal that never seems to set sail because of the political dynamite in its hold - has received an unexpected push from the head of the Shin Bet secret service, an endorsement quickly seconded by a former key general.
The "separation fence" concept has been bandied about for years, spurred by the inability of tens of thousands of Israel Defense Force troops, policemen and Shin Bet agents to keep Palestinian militants from crossing the tortuous West Bank border to carry out suicide bombings and shootings in the Jewish state.
But Israeli hard-liners have fought "separation" tooth and nail, fearing that any physical delineation of the unmarked frontier between Israel and the West Bank would be translated in future peace talks into a permanent border closely akin to the lines in force prior to the 1967 Six-Day War.
Speaking before the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, Shin Bet chief Avi Dichter noted that the great majority of the 52 Palestinians who mounted suicide attacks within Israel in the last six months entered from the West Bank. He called the erection of physical barriers around Jerusalem, and along the West Bank's Green Line border with Israel, essential to reducing terror.
"I don't see any method other than a physical barrier that can prevent attacks," Dichter told the committee Tuesday.
Dichter's statements re-ignited the debate over separation, raising hackles among rightist settlers, for whom separation may be the most threatening of all non-military initiatives at a time when the peace process seems to have breathed its last.
Gaza settler leader Avi Farhan, a vocal member of the central committee of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Likud, blasted the separation concept Wednesday, calling it aimed at camouflaging a de facto Israeli withdrawal from the territories, along with eviction of Jewish residents of the West Bank and Gaza.
"It is time to expose the truth - or the scam - behind the various separation plans. The goal of most of these plans is to uproot us from Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and Gaza," Farhan said. "The driving forces behind these plans are the same people who gave us the Oslo accords and who gave the Palestinians guns."
Leftists countered that the price of political opposition to border barriers would be paid in blood.
If Yasser Arafat continues to hold hard-line positions and resist reining in militants, said senior lawmaker Ran Cohen of the dovish Meretz party, Israel will have no alternative but to put up a fence.
"To my great dismay, there is political opposition on the part of the settlers and the prime minister, who don't want a separation fence even at the price that we're paying in blood. It's a fact, that all the terrorist attackers - every one - who entered the state of Israel and blew themselves up wherever it was that they exploded, they all came from the West Bank and not from the Gaza Strip, where there is a separation fence that protects Israel."
Shoring up the Shin Bet director's call for physical barriers, Major-General (res.) Gideon Sheffer, formerly a member of the IDF General Staff and ex-deputy chairman of the National Security Council (NSC), said Wednesday that separation between Israel and Palestinians was a foregone conclusion, and that "the sooner we begin, the better. It is possible to create separation that is, of course, not hermetic sealing-off, but which will be much better, much more controlled than the situation that exists today.
"Amazingly, it is clear today where the line should run," said Sheffer, a party to detailed past NSC discussions of the possible geography of a separation fence. "If one asks if that will be the final line, the answer is no, but there are areas that doubtless will be the final line - areas where Israeli and Palestinian areas are situated back-to-back, where there is no space between them."
At present, Sheffer said, diplomatic complexities render it impossible to put up a fence in Jerusalem, for example, "but you don't need a fence in every area. There are other solutions, which cost money but could save lives." What is needed is a separation "space," which in some places could be a Great Wall of China, in some places a fence, in others a stretch of land in which entry is barred in other ways, or an observation post with no fence at all.
He cited the Qalqilyah-Kfar Sava interface as an example of an area where the proximity of the two populated areas allowed little room for negotiation. "Other locations are much more amorphous," he said, citing the Gilboa and southern Judea regions, where there are few populated areas dictating a line.
At the same time, pressure for separation has been undermined by the firing of Kassam-2 rockets capable of being launched from behind the 1967 lines and still hitting targets more than eight miles into Israel proper - effectively placing much of Israel's urban majority at peril.
According to Ha'aretz commentator Amir Oren, "Arafat's openly declared platform - one can only harbor suspicions about his secret one - seeks to bring Israel back to the Green Line, by means of combined political and military activity." By contrast, "for Hamas, this line has no significance, and they are erasing it with rockets, which fly over the previous and future border."
But as for suicide terrorists on ground-based missions of death, Israel's challenge remains "the unbearable ease of uncontrolled entry into Israeli territory," Sheffer said. As for Israeli politicians who have found it easier to decided not to decide, "whoever waits for a solution to the arguments between Israel and the Palestinian Authority in order to institute separation will have to wait for many years to come, and one day, when he finally goes ahead with it, will be asked, 'Where were you all this time?'
"If, in the future, a leader waits until the number of casualties is such that he says, 'Gentlemen, I have no alternative but to institute [the separation]," Sheffer asked, "will the people, in the end, find themselves able to forgive that man?"
Return To Top February 19, 2002
Sheikh admits hand in Parliament, J and K, Kolkata attacks
This story is from The Press Trust of India and makes little sense. Why would Sheikh Omar have to "admit" attacks on India to his Pakistani interrogators, who presumably should be well aware of what he was doing? And even if he did admit to the attacks, why would the Pakistan authorities give out the news publicly, thereby strengthening India's accusations against Pakistan? The report said he "offered" to reveal the identities of the terrorists who attacked the Indian Parliament in December, but we thought the Indians had established their identities and tied the operation to the Pakistan ISI. So the Indians know who the attackers were, and presumably so do the Pakistanis, who have the evidence presented by the Indians. Sheikh Omar, incidentally, was taken into custody on February 5, a full week before the Pakistan Government announced his arrest. We of course have no way of knowing what was transacted during that week, but we may presume that those in the Pakistan Government that have links to Mr. Sheikh were ensuring he told the required story when produced in court.
Prime accused in US journalist Daniel Pearl's kidnapping, Sheikh Omar Saeed has reportedly revealed his role in the suicide attacks on Indian Parliament, Jammu and Kashmir Assembly and the American Center in Kolkata and admitted having close links with Osama bin Laden and Aftab Ansari whom he cultivated during his stay in Tihar jail.
A senior leader of the banned Muslim militant outfit, Jaish-e-Muhammad, British-born Shiekh, one of the three terrorists released by India to end the 1999 hijacking of an Indian Airlines plane to Kandahar and who is currently in Pakistani police custody, in a lengthy confession narrated his role in all three incidents, English daily 'The News' reported Monday.
The attacks, according to him, were aimed at provoking the Indian leaders to take hardline action against Pakistan, which in turn could have forced President Pervez Musharraf to soften his stand against the Pakistan-based 'Jehadi' groups, the daily quoting officials said.
Sheikh provided the police with unsolicited details about his connections and relationship with Aftab Ansari, the chief suspect in Kolkata shootout, the daily said.
Shiekh offered to reveal the real identities of the Kashmiri militants who had stormed the Parliament and admitted the aim of the attack was to take Indian MPs as hostage and to seek the release of all Kashmiri militants, the daily said.
The paper quoted police officials as saying that Sheikh had under-cover ties with several Arab associates of bin Laden.
Return To Top February 19, 2002
India to buy weapon locating radars from US
From the Times of India.
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In the first government to government purchase of military equipment, India and the US are likely to enter into an agreement for New Delhi acquiring the sorely needed weapon-locating radars for which an American negotiating team is arriving here on Tuesday.
After a hectic round of discussions with what he described as "all the country's key leadership", visiting Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Richard G Myers told reporters a team led by Maj Gen Bruce Scott, the Commanding General, U S Army Security Assistance Command, would be landing here on Tuesday "to seek consensus on an agreement for the Government to purchase AN/TPQ-37 weapon locating radars".
Though numbers were not not specified, highly placed sources said India wanted to purchase about 150 to 200 of these fire-finding radars.
"This agreement will be for the Indian army, the first major Government to Government purchase of military equipment from the United states", a US Embassy statement said, adding agreements pertaining to other types of equipment were expected to follow.
The sources said the deal could include purchase of extra sensitive ground sensors to deter cross border infiltration from Pakistan along the 160-km long Line of Control in Jammu and Kashmir and GE 404 engines for the LCA.
Return To Top February 19, 2002
February 18, 2002
Death toll in Nepal rebel attack rises to 127
Has Sharon Missed His Moment of Truth?
Pakistan hikes defence expenditure
Death toll in Nepal rebel attack rises to 127
By Suman Pradhan writing in the Times of India.
More than 120 people, mostly soldiers and policemen, were killed early Sunday in a daring raid by Maoist rebels in Mangalsen town, the headquarters of Achham district in far-western Nepal.
According to defence sources, the bodies of more than 120 persons, including soldiers, policemen and five civilians, have been recovered from the town and the nearby airstrip of Sanphebagar. They were killed when the rebels launched their biggest raid in the six years of insurgency that has simmered in this Himalayan kingdom.
Three rebels were also killed during thhe exchange of fire, the defence ministry said in a statement.(However, PTI, quoting government sources, said more than 100 rebels were killed). Among the dead were the government's top civil servant in Achham, its top intelligence officer and his wife.)
The government has confirmed only 102 deaths. The defence ministry said 48 soldiers, 49 policemen and five civilians were killed in the attack. Five policemen were killed in a rebel attack early Sunday in the eastern district of Sarlahi, it added.
Sketchy reports emerging from Achham said the rebels had torched Mangalsen town, looted a bank of Rs 20 million and set inmates of the jail free.
Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba called an emergency meeting of the cabinet to take stock of the situation. But additional security decisions taken by the cabinet were kept under wraps.
But home ministry spokesman Gopendra Bahadur Pandey said the police and the army have launched a massive security operation in the jungles surrounding Mangalsen. According to a report on state-owned Nepal TV, Mangalsen resembled a ghost town as houses and government offices set ablaze by the rebels were still smouldering, and a sense of fear prevailed among the residents.
This is the largest casualty inflicted on government forces in a single day by Maoist rebels since they launched the anti-monarchy insurgency six years ago. The rebels are demanding a republican state, a demand repeatedly turned down by the democratically elected government.
Return To Top February 18, 2002
Has Sharon Missed His Moment of Truth?
Reference: DEBKAfile's Exclusive Analysis.
Israel's inner security cabinet meeting Sunday afternoon, February 17, faced the bald option between going to war proper against Arafat and his Palestinian Authority or hold off again and live with a savagely spiraling casualty toll - 14 Israelis dead in the last two weeks.
The cabinet meeting was a formality. DEBKAfile's military
sources reveal that Sharon is considering a telephone call to US President George W. Bush tonight, to describe the vicious spiral in which Israel is trapped and ask to be released from the pledges he gave him in the White House on February 7. The foremost of those pledges was to refrain from harming Yasser Arafat or Palestinian civilians until the United States launches its offensive against Iraq. The prime minister will explain that Israel can no longer endure the rising tempo and ferocity of Palestinian attacks; his government will not survive if it continues to stand by while Arafat is exploiting to the hilt the grace period he has won before the US Iraq offensive.
Insistent demands for an all-out offensive to destroy Arafat's terror infrastructure are coming from almost every quarter of the country as the Palestinians upgrade their tools of war and methods of operation, focusing both on military targets and civilians. DEBKAfile 's military sources report that Israelis are not alone; senior Palestinian factions have also signaled a desperate SOS, warning Israel to take drastic action to quell the violence before it is too late to stave off a terrible disaster - confirming our reports in recent weeks. Yet Sunday, Sharon showed himself incapable of cutting through to a clear decision.
Again, he procrastinated, postponing action on how to stem Palestinian violence to "later in the week". While the Israeli government dithers, the Palestinians could not be clearer about their objectives.
Arafat is activating his two most effective terrorist masters, Muhamed Dahlan, the Palestinian Authority's chief security officer in the Gaza Strip and Tawfiq Tirawi, West Bank General Intelligence chief the West Bank. While Tirawi runs the Fatah's Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, Dahlan heads its Gazan equivalent, the Saladin Brigades, the military wing of the "Popular Resistance Committees", in which the Fatah-Tanzim, Popular Front, Hamas and Jihad Islami are grouped. Tirawi is Arafat's liaison man with Saddam Hussein's military intelligence, whereas Dahlan is his channel to the Iran-backed Hizballah and al Qaeda contingents in Lebanon.
Between them, Arafat, Dahlan and Tirawi have parlayed the uprising against Israel into the positions of top dogs of the Muslim terror movement. They have brought together the terrorist groups sponsored by Iraq, Iran, al Qaeda and the Palestinians for a do-or-die confrontation against Israel.
This confrontation accords with the interests of both Tehran and Baghdad, as a vehicle for distancing the threat of an American offensive from their borders.
The Israeli prime minister is dodging the issue facing him: If the IDF fails to smash the Arafat's war machine, it will face the advancing forces of al Aqsa Brigades, the Saladin Brigades, the Hizballah, Iraq and al Qaeda combined - and a constantly rising level of bloodshed. The only Palestinian forces still in communication with Israel will be obliterated. No rational Palestinian voice will survive to stem the red tide.Israel has been racked by relentless terror for 17 months. If Sharon gets up the courage for total war, it will have to make a supreme effort to gather all its military, economic and emotional resources to achieve victory. What has weakened the country most of all has been a government that speaks in two voices: one voice says that Israel will have to sit down and talk peace with the Palestinian leader at some point, and the sooner the better. The other voice declares this a pipedream - not because of Sharon, but because of Arafat.
The motto on his escutcheon and that of his backers and followers is "With blood and fire, we shall redeem Palestine!"Arafat is not fighting Israel to improve his bargaining position or win a place of honor in world history. Even if the Oslo faction on Israel's political left forces the government to sign the most generous peace accord imaginable meeting every last Palestinian condition, Arafat will fight on. He makes no secret of his fidelity to the Prophet Mohammed's precepts.
When Mohammed could not overcome the Jews of Qureish in the year 628, he signed the Hudiabiya Accords with them - notwithstanding his holy war, explaining to his followers that he would honor his peace pledge only until such time as his army was strong enough to resume the jihad.
That is exactly what the Palestinian leader did before the ink was dry on the 1993 Oslo Accords, frankly admitting as much in Cairo on his way back from the ceremonial signing in the White House. To merit a place of honor in Arab-Muslim history, he knows what he needs to do: to vanquish the Jews or die in the attempt.
Return To Top February 18, 2002
Pakistan hikes defence expenditure
Reference: Times of India
Pakistan has announced an unspecified increase in defence expenditure for the current fiscal, approved by the International Monetary Fund, and said it will charge the US about $60 million monthly for logistical support provided to American forces.
"The IMF has agreed to allow Pakistan an increase in defence allocation in the current financial year and the government is not going to charge any war-related tax as our economy has the potential to absorb it", Finance Minister Shoukat Aziz told reporters here on Saturday.
Aziz declined to reveal details of the hike but he said the IMF has agreed to revise the budget deficit target from 5.3 per cent to 5.7 per cent of the GDP.
The unspecified increase is significant because Pakistan had in the last budget for the first time announced a reduction in defence allocation.
The defence expenditure in the budget for 2001-2002 was pegged at Rs 131.63 billion against Rs 133.49 billion for the previous year.
Aziz also said Pakistan will charge the US monthly bills of roughly $60 million for the logistic support being extended to the American forces who used facilities at the country's military bases.
"We will bill them monthly for certain things under the ACSA (acquisition and cross services agreement)," he said.
"The total amount due from them, including the backlog as of today, is around $300 million," he said.
The $300 million would be in addition to the waiver of one billion dollars promised by the Bush Administration during President Pervez Musharraf's visit to Washington.
The waiver will bring down Pakistan's debt to the US from $2.8 billion to $1.8 billion, Aziz said.
He parried questions about specifics of the charges and facilities saying the defence ministry calculated the amount through a formula under the ACSA.
Pakistan has allowed US troops use of three airbases besides its airspace to conduct operations in Afghanistan.
[Before making an editorial comment on the above, your editor wishes to make clear that Pakistan has the right, as a sovereign nation, to spend what it feels necessary on its defense. His comment is merely on facts, and implies no judgment or opinion. If the US is really going to pay Pakistan $60 million a month or $720 million annually for host nation support, this is simply another way of channeling money to Pakistan - which the US also has every right to do. Pakistan is providing the US base facilities, security, labor, some local food items, and some POL. Under no system of accounting will this add up to more than a fraction of $60 million/month. The bases have to be maintained whether the US uses them or not. The Pakistan security forces have to be paid whether they are guarding US-occupied bases or sitting in their cantonments. As for labor, $3 a day for unskilled and between $5 and $8 for skilled is about what the market cost is. If the US purpose is to make a subsidy to Pakistan's defense without upsetting India, however, it should do so in more subtle a fashion. Since costs in India and Pakistan are roughly the same, it will not take more than five minutes for the Indians to figure out that a subsidy is involved. Editor]
Return To Top February 18, 2002