7.99 DoD photo by Spc. D. Ernst USArmy
    antiW A R
links &
"The only way to abolish war
  is to make peace heroic."
John Dewey, 1859-1952
U.S. philosopher & educator
Phil Ochs ¹
soldiers destroying weapons
  OPERATIONJoint Guardian
DC protest group stands test of time   7.9.00   Matt Hagengruber KnightRidder

Wash.DC   Ellen Thomas sits on a blue Mexican serape blanket, which partly covers a large blue protest sign directly across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House. It's adorned with the slogans "LIVE BY THE BOMBDIE BY THE BOMB " & "CONVERT THE WAR MACHINES". She's been sitting there, peacefully protesting since 1984. The signs have been there since 1981, and so has her husband, vigil founder Wm. Thomas, whom they call simply "Thomas."

Ellen Thomas talks quietly with passers-by and hands out fliers to tourists, schoolkids and business people. Only those who stop to read the signs are offered a flier. Many toss them once out of view, but a few will read the newsletter, and a few more might check out the group's Web site. At the base of a large tree, her dog, Bo, lounges in the late-morning summer heat. He pants even though he just got a haircut.

plowshares, not swords Ellen Thomas is just one of a handful of volunteers who spend their evenings, nights, mornings, weekends or afternoons in the shade, with theirback to the White House, looking into Lafayette Park. Twenty-four hours aday, 365 days a year. 19 years and counting. They're protesting nuclear weapons. They want the U.S. govt, along with the other nations of the world, to give up their nuclear weapons and divert the money spent on the arms to humanitarian and environmental causes.
"Basically, the core motivation is my beliefs," Wm Thomas said. "I believe that energy & resources should be expended in a constructive manner, and I live in a society where constructive use of those resources isn't highly valued."

Party lines
They have been successful in introducing in the U.S. House of Representatives an initiative known as Proposition 1, which calls for the disarmament of nuclear weapons. The proposition has been introduced 4 times by D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, but it never made it out of committee.
William Thomas began the Lafayette Park vigil in 1981 with Concepcion Picciotto, another protester who sits about 20 ft away with her signs. The protesters have endured bitter cold, pulsing heat and jail time in order to promote their message to tourists and now three presidents. One group member claims that President Clinton once pulled up at 3 a.m. and spoke with him for several minutes, but the story can't be substantiated. Ellen Thomas is relieved of her vigil duties after several hours by Donn Condron, another protester. He's been involved in the vigil since its inception, but didn't start protesting until last June.
"I've done all kinds of things, construction, carpentry; but I used to come over here on my lunch break," he said. "We used to use my apartment to make the signs."

Group members have to be careful with how they protest. Displeased presidents and Secret Service agents have pushed for ordinances over the years that limit their protesting, such as allowing only two signs and the right to remove the signs if protesters are more than 3 feet away from them. "When the Republicans are in office, it's more stringent," Condron said. "With the Democrats, it's not as bad." Thomas concurs, pointing out that the group is banished from the White House side of Pennsylvania Avenue. But the vigil is still going with no end in sight.
"The police tried to get rid of him (Thomas), but we just keep on going," Ellen Thomas said. "There used to be a concerted effort to get us out of here, but it doesn't seem to be a policy to remove us anymore, and we appreciate that."

"Planted some seeds"
Ellen Thomas became involved in the group after her two children were grown. "I was working at the National Wildlife Federation," she said. "I decided that when I didn't need to worry about providing for my daughter, I was going to reduce my income to below the poverty level so I wouldn't have to pay taxes, because I don't agree with the policies" of the U.S. govt. She met William Thomas soon after and the two were married in 1984. Since then, she has spent time in prison for "camping" in Lafayette Park. She and Thomas were arrested in 1987 for wrapping themselves in a blanket to keep warm, which, according to the U.S. Park Police, is considered illegal.
Ellen Thomas believes that after 19 years, something has been accomplished. "We've planted some seeds because 3 million people visit the White House each year," suggesting that some of those visitors leave with a different perspective on nuclear weapons. Many people who pass by the signs think that the protesters are homeless, but that isn't the case. The group lives and works out of an office on 12th Street in Northwest Washington, where they run their award-winning Web site. They received the office, a former crack house, free in exchange for bringing it up to code.
Through it all, Ellen is proud to point out that she's there to offer a solution. "I'm doing it because I choose to do it. I meet a lot of interesting people and learn stuff I wouldn't otherwise learn," she said. "I'm not here to complain, I'm here to fix."

A revolution for revolt ¹   Britain's biggest political protest was mobilised on the web
2.20.03   Alistair Alexander Stop the War Coalition

This weekend's anti-war demonstration was almost certainly the largest coordinated political protest the world has seen. Events began in Melbourne, Australia, and then erupted in hundreds of cities across the world like a global wave before ending in San Francisco 48 hours later. While estimates range from six to 12 million people taking part, February 15, or F15 in activist parlance, underlines the extent to which the dynamics of protest politics have been transformed by the internet.
As a press officer for the Stop the War Coalition in the run-up to Saturday's march, I experienced first-hand how the internet has allowed tiny political groups with virtually no resources to mobilise millions of people. The press campaign would not have existed without the internet. By using email for press releases, we could send immediate responses to govt statements at no cost. We could direct journalists to our website.

The internet provides a vital resource for checking discrepancies in govt statements. The revelation that a govt dossier was cut & pasted from a 10-year-old thesis would never have made the headlines had the original author not read the dossier on the internet. The web exposes govt information to unprecedented scrutiny.
The internet has dramatically effected the way Stop the War Coalition is organised. "A major part of campaigns in the past was stuffing envelopes. That used to take literally days," says Andrew Burgin, one of the founders of Stop the War. "So campaigns in the past always required a much bigger labour force."

Using mailing lists & its website, the central office communicates with a rapidly growing network of local groups that provide much of the movement's organisation. Those local groups communicate with their members and the wider movement through their own mailing lists, group text messages and local websites. The groups also run their own press campaigns with local media.
My local group is in Dulwich, South London, hardly a hotbed of revolutionary fervour. But meetings draw people from every ethnic background, class, age and political persuasion, who you could hardly imagine meeting in any other circumstance.

The founder of the group, Mike Healey, has also researched the social effects of the internet as a lecturer for Westminster University. "We've used the internet to build the group," he says. "There's a lot of talk of virtual communities and what's happened here is one example.
"But the community only exists to mobilise, not to just chat online." This distributed structure has proved to be infinitely extensible, with more & more local groups continuing to be formed and the central office remaining minimal, it is run by less than 10 people.

But for the anti-war movement the internet is only a means to an end. The reason people get involved is not for online discussions, but for offline protest such as Saturday's march. The internet makes that process more accessible to people who would not normally get involved in politics.


Bush, Blair nominated 2002 peace Nobel   ¹
2.4.02   Doug Mellgren AP

Oslo, Norway   Pres.GWBush & British PM Tony Blair nominated for the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize for fighting terrorism & securing world peace, a Norwegian lawmaker announced Monday. Harald Tom Nesvik, a member of parliament from the right-wing Party of Progress, said he has nominated the 2 leaders who have been at the forefront of the war in Afghanistan. "The background for my nomination is their decisive action against terrorism, something I believe in the future will be the greatest threat to peace," Nesvik said. "Unfortunately, sometimes ... you have to use force to secure peace." Nesvik has nomination rights as a member of a national legislature. The Oslo-based awards committee accepts nominations postmarked by Feb. 1, so proposals continue to arrive and a final number is not expected until late in the month.

Last year, 136 individuals and groups were nominated. The $943,000 prize was shared by the UN & Sec.Gen Kofi Annan. The committee keeps the names of nominees secret for 50 years. However, those making nominations often reveal their choice. 9.11.01 expected to influence this year's nominations, because those events were too late to be considered in last year's award. Other nominations mentioned, but not confirmed, include former NYC Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and Guy Tozzoli, an engineer who helped design the World Trade Center. Also Monday, 2 Christian Democratic members of Norway's parliament announced their nomination of the Salvation Army, adding to a list that includes Rome-based Catholic group Church of Sant'Egidio for peace & humanitarian efforts and the Mission of Mercy humanitarian group for work in Latin America. The Nobel Prize winners are named in mid-Oct. and the awards are always presented on Dec. 10, the day their founder, Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, died in 1896. The peace prize is awarded in Oslo, and the others in Stockholm, Sweden.

Belgium amends law to avoid war crimes lawsuit against Bush   3.25.03   AFP

Brussels   The Belgian parliament amended a controversial law to prevent US President GWBush being prosecuted for war crimes over the conflict in Iraq. The law allows Belgian courts to try suspects for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, regardless of where the alleged acts took place or the nationality of the accused.
Under the amendment, which the Belgian Senate must approve before it takes effect, a federal prosecutor will decide in certain cases whether to accept a suit filed under the so-called "universal competence" law. This was one of the "filters" that lawmakers inserted into the law to prevent plaintiffs bringing "harebrained" lawsuits.

Critics of the law, incl U.S., have warned Belgium that its role as host to intl institutions like NATO & the European Union, would be threatened if a war crimes suit were filed against Bush. "It's a serious problem," said US Sec.State Powell, after he was named last week in a lawsuit for alleged crimes during the 1991 Gulf war along with former US president George Bush & current VP Cheney.
"For a place that is an intl center they should be a little bit concerned about this," Powell said. The lawsuit against him was filed by 7 Iraqi families over the bombing of a civilian shelter in Baghdad that killed 403 people on the night of 2.12-13.91. Powell served as the head of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff and Cheney as defense secretary during the 1991 Gulf war.

Some 30 current or former political leaders are facing action under the Belgian law, incl Israeli PM Ariel Sharon, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and Cuban President Fidel Castro. "I expect there to be, any day, a suit against President (George W.) Bush in Belgium," Herman De Croo, speaker of Belgium's lower house of parliament, said earlier Tuesday.
Throughout the day, Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt had hosted intense negotiations among political leaders from his ruling "rainbow" coalition to discuss changes to the law. Under the amendments passed, the prosecutor will decide if a lawsuit is valid if the alleged crime did not happen in Belgium; if the alleged perpetrator is not Belgian or is not on Belgian territory; and if the victims are not Belgian or have not resided in Belgium for at least 3 years. If one of these conditions applies, the lawsuit goes ahead automatically.

If none of the conditions apply, the Belgian justice minister can pass on the case to the country of the accused. The amendments will affect only cases filed after 7.1.02, like the one against Bush senior and only those where the country of the accused has war crimes legislation.
Fears that a war crimes lawsuit over the Iraqi conflict could be brought against the current US president have further strained relations between U.S. & Belgium, which has been a fierce critic of the war on Iraq and was at the center of an unprecedented crisis at NATO over the conflict last month.

The changes to the law came only a week before Belgium's parliament was due to be dissolved ahead of a general election scheduled 5.18.03. According to parliamentary sources, the parties in the ruling coalition were divided over how to amend the law. Verhofstadt's Liberals, backed by Flemish-speaking Socialists, had proposed a "diplomatic filter" allowing the govt to pass on any cases to the country where the alleged crimes took place, providing it is democratic. Francophone Socialists & Greens feared that the law would be rendered toothless if the amendments were too radical.

Teen anarchist's supporters accuse FBI of AIM hack   2.7.02   Brian McWilliams Newsbytes

Los Angeles   The FBI declined to comment Wednesday on allegations that federal agents have commandeered online chat accounts belonging to the teen-aged operator of anti-govt site Raisethefist.com. However, the agency denies allegations that it has harassed associates of 18-year-old self-proclaimed anarchist Sherman Martin Austin. According to several of Austin's supporters, someone has repeatedly logged into the teen's accounts on America Online's AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) real-time chat service while he was in police custody.
Austin, a resident of Sherman Oaks, Calif., has been incarcerated in a high-security federal jail in Manhattan since Saturday on charges of disorderly conduct following a protest against the World Economic Forum in New York. A friend listed on Austin's AIM Buddy List who identified himself only as "James" said he was threatened Monday by someone he suspects was an FBI agent using Austin's account. "He told me, 'Your ass is next, pal,'" James said.

Laura Bosley, a spokesperson for the FBI's Los Angeles field office, declined to say whether the FBI would commandeer someone's AIM account as part of an investigation, citing its ongoing nature. But she said FBI agents would never harass associates of a suspect. Last week, federal agents executed a search warrant at Austin's home and confiscated several computers as well as equipment for making explosives. According to an affidavit, the FBI suspects Austin of hacking into several Web sites to post anarchist messages and using his own site, Raisethefist.com, to publish bomb-making information.
Newsbytes independently observed that someone using Austin's AOL screen name "Ucaun" signed on to the service briefly Tuesday night. But that person did not respond to interview requests. Matt Yarborough, head of the cyberlaw section at Fish and Richardson and a former assistant U.S. attorney, said it was "certainly possible" that FBI agents commandeered Austin's AIM accounts as part of their undercover work on the case. "I've dealt with federal agents who did things that made my stomach turn. But, assuming these claims are true, the agents might see this as a good technique for flushing people out," said Yarborough, who noted that Austin may also have been instructed to sign on to his AIM account while in custody.

However, Mark Rasch, vice president of cyberlaw at Predictive Systems and a former federal prosecutor, said it was most likely that one of Austin's enemies, and not the FBI, was responsible for hijacking his AIM accounts. "It would be very improbable that even an overzealous agent would do this. It's unfathomable that a court would grant such an order," said Rasch. Susan Tipograph, the attorney representing Austin in New York, said Austin has not spoken to the FBI since being arrested. According to Tipograph, he has been held in a maximum-security cell around the clock and it was impossible that he would have signed on to his account.

"He's in the same unit where they held people who bombed the U.S. embassies in Africa in 1998. It seems odd to treat an 18-year-old this way," said Tipograph.
Austin's political views have made him a target for verbal attack by right-wing extremists, his associates said, but they dismissed suggestions that his accounts may have been compromised by such adversaries.

While AIM accounts are password-protected, the technology has been abused in the past by attackers who hijack others' AIM accounts through trickery, Trojan horses, packet-sniffing and other techniques. Matthew Dickinson, a San Diego-based accountant who said he was an online acquaintance of Austin's, reported that the teen told him last autumn that his AIM accounts had been hacked into by law enforcement officials. Dickinson provided a Nov. 10 e-mail message, purportedly from Austin, in which he recounted discovering that one of his AIM screen names was being used by the FBI to harass him.

The message included a log file of an AIM session in which someone using Austin's screen name Raisethefist told Austin, "This is a matter of national security, pal. We're tapping all accounts," and, "We're watching you, and packeting you. Warrants are wonderful." AIM log files are simple text documents that can be created or edited using a word processor. As such, their authenticity is difficult to determine. It was not clear whether Austin shared the login information for his AIM account with family members or friends. Austin's mother referred all inquiries to Tipograph, who said she had no information on the matter. If federal agents took over Austin's AIM accounts without his permission, such an action would constitute unauthorized access and be illegal, according to Yarborough.
"The govt doesn't have the right to hack into someone else's computer. If these allegations are true, it would look bad in court, as if the agents were attempting to intimidate people to disclose information," he said. In an interview with Newsbytes last week over AIM, Austin admitted to defacing several Web sites in the past three years to post messages about overthrowing the U.S. govt. One of the defacements included the message: "We don't gather weapons, plan extreme operations, and risk our lives for nothing. This is real." Austin was not charged with any crimes as a result of his arrest in New York, Tipograph said. However, federal charges were filed against him for posting information at his site about making explosives and with possessing a Molotov cocktail, which is considered an "unregistered firearm" by the FBI.

No hacking charges have yet been filed against Austin, although Bosley told Newsbytes that additional charges are possible. Raisethefist.com has been unreachable since late last week. Austin's former hosting company, About Web Services, refused to comment on the status of the site, citing the firm's privacy policy. Domain registration records today showed that Raisethefist.com is no longer receiving domain-name service from About Web's Freeservers.com service, and that the domain was transferred to InfoSpace's HyperMart hosting service on Feb. 1.

In the interview last week, Austin told Newsbytes that he didn't think 18 was too young to be an anarchist. "16yr olds fight in the New Peoples Army in the Philippines," he said. When asked whether he thought it should be illegal to publish bomb-making information, Austin replied that everyone should have a right to distribute such knowledge.
"I think it should be illegal for other people to get rich off dropping bombs on poor women and children. I personally would like a society without bombs," he said. According to an FBI affidavit, a search by New York police of Austin's car last weekend uncovered "electrical wiring, electrical tape, one empty gasoline tank, and anarchist literature."


I joined the Army seven months after I squeaked through high school. In 1970, I volunteered for the airborne infantry & Vietnam. Now I am the Viet Cong. In 1980, I went to Panama. I was in Guatemala in 1983 for the last coup. In 1985, I was in El Salvador; 1991, Peru; 1992, Colombia. Over & over, the fact that we as a nation seemed to take sides with the rich against the poor started to penetrate, first my preconceptions then my rationalizations & finally my consciousness. People don't generally hear from retired Special Forces soldiers. But people need to hear the facts from someone who can't be called an effete liberal who never "served" his country. A liberal will tell you the system isn't working properly. I tell you the system works exactly the way it's supposed to.
12.99   "Inside U.S. Counterinsurgency" Stan Goff iF magazine
"Military spending FY2000 will be almost $290 billion; all other domestic discretionary spending, such as education, job training, housing, Amtrak, medical research, environment, Head Start & many other worthwhile programs will total $246 billion, the biggest disparity in modern times."
former US Sen. Dale Bumpers, Dir. Ctr for Defense Information
BOGOTA   Flying missions over guerrilla-infested coca fields or staffing remote radar stations in the jungle, private American citizens are working perilously close to the front lines of the drug war in Colombia. Referred to as "contractors" by the Washington agencies who hire them and "mercenaries" by critics, they are supposed to number no more than 300. Yet with the U.S. govt "outsourcing" much of its drug war aid to these contractors, officials are already indicating that the ceiling needs to be raised. As Colombian President Andres Pastrana travels to Washington to meet with President Bush on Tuesday, worries are mounting about the danger the U.S. contractors face and whether their presence and that of U.S. troops could lead to deeper involvement in Colombia's decades-old civil war. street theatre at 11/19/99 demo Photo: Jack Gould 1/17/01   When Defense Dept opens new Western Hemisphere Inst. for Security & Cooperation at Fort Benning GA today, it will revitalize old debate about U.S. role in training military personnel from countries where democracy is vulnerable. Officials in Washington said the Institute will promote new era in military relations between U.S. & Latin America, making democracy a priority.
Critics insist Institute is merely touched-up version of School of the Americas that in 54 years trained more than 63,000 members of Latin American armed forces. After graduating such infamous individuals as Manuel Noriega, officers of Augusto Pinochet and death squad leaders from El Salvador, it became known by some as the "School of the Assassins."

Rep. Joe Moakley D-MA said changes in the school proposed by the Clinton admin & approved by Congress last year are "little more than a fresh coat of paint, and do not address our concerns with this training facility." Moakley spearheaded long campaign in Congress to close the school, said, "Democracies aren't built with weapons & war. They are built with democratic institutions like fair judiciaries, open electoral systems and civilian police forces that protect people. That is what we should be teaching Latin Americans, not how to wage war against their own people."
Defenders of the new institution say military exchanges bring greater understanding & cooperation in the hemisphere, which are key elements to confront new realities & threats in the Americas. They also say that bringing together the region's armed forces, esp. those with questionable human rights records, is better than no contact at all.
  [ No contact is not the only option. Intl tribunal's prosecution & imprisonment for convicts are excellent alternatives. ]

"Arguably our best instrument of cooperation, of defense engagement in the hemisphere, is military education & training and that is what this institute does," said Pedro Pablo Permuy, dep. asst secretary of defense for inter-American affairs. "It is absolutely critical." He added that there is no doubt that training 800 members of Latin American armed forces at the school each year in professionalism, respect for human rights and support for democracy is positive. He said it is unfortunate Pentagon is trying to break past patterns while new institute's critics been slow "to get into the mindset that we are no longer in a Cold War."
Unlike the school, which closed last month, the new institute will also train civilians in govt & nongovt jobs and will be under congressional oversight. It will have a civilian-military dept directed by State Dept official not yet been named, and the curriculum will include courses such as natural disaster response, intl law & human rights. All students take 8hrs min. of human rights training.
New institute opening & earlier changes in SOA resulted in part from critics efforts but these also may have brought military training increase outside the U.S. which limits possibility of oversight, said observers, incl authors of a report to be released Thursday. Most U.S. military training takes place in the Andean region & Mexico under pgms such as Joint Combined Exchange Training (JCET) & International Military Education & Training (IMET). "If all training was as transparent as the SOA's, we wouldn't have much of a mission," said Adam Isacson of the Center for Intl Policy in Washington, which prepared the report with the Latin American Working Group, a coalition of religious, human rights & policy organizations. The report, Just the Facts 2000-2001, says 5% to 10% of U.S. training for Latin American military personnel in 1999 was provided at SOA. The report estimates 13,000 to 15,000 Latin American military & police personnel were trained by U.S. in 1999, more than all armed forces personnel trained by the U.S. in the Middle East, East Asia and countries of the former Soviet Union.

Isacson recognized courses' value in promoting better relations with civilians & respect for human rights, but added that other courses are worrisome, such as training in combat, weapons familiarization & infiltration. Concern is heightened, he said, with perception that the U.S. govt underestimates need to take responsibility for training results. "We contend that with training comes a share of responsibility for how skills transferred are subsequently used," the report says. Last year Congress passed a law to establish a way to track foreign military personnel trained by the U.S. which states beginning Jan. 1, Sec.Def must maintain database with information about all trainees, the type & date of their training and, as far as possible, the positions they hold after training.

action on location
"[Nearly 70% of the military budget] is to provide men and weapons to fight in foreign countries in support of our allies and friends and for offensive operations in Third World countries … Another big chunk of the defense budget is the 20% allocated for our offensive nuclear force of bombers, missles, and submarines whose job it is to carry nuclear weapons to the Soviet Union … Actual defense of U.S. costs about 10% of the military budget and is the least expensive function performed by the Pentagon."
Rear Admiral Gene LaRoque, U.S. Navy retired
at School of Assassins, GA

New military school gives officers new tools   Course in Iraq challenges conventional tactics, stresses cultural awareness   2.21.06   Thos. Ricks Wash.Post

Taji, Iraq   If the U.S. effort in Iraq ultimately is successful, one reason may be the small school started recently on a military base here by U.S. commander in Iraq Army Gen. George W. Casey Jr. Called the COIN Academy, using military shorthand for "counterinsurgency", the newest educational institution in the U.S. military establishment seeks, as a course summary puts it, to "stress the need for U.S. forces to shift from a conventional warfare mindset" to one that understands how to win in a guerrilla-style conflict. Or, as a sign on the wall of one administrator's office here put it less politely: "Insanity is doing the same thing the same way and expecting a different outcome."

The purpose of the school north of Baghdad is to try to bring about a different outcome than the U.S. military achieved in 2003-04, when Army commanders committed mistakes typical of a conventional military facing an insurgency. "When the insurgency started, we came in very conventional," said Col. Chris Short, the District native and recent Manassas resident who is the new school's commandant.
Back then, U.S. forces rounded up tens of thousands of Iraqis, mixing innocent people in detention with hard-core Islamic extremists. Commanders permitted troops to shoot at anything mildly threatening. They failed to give their troops the basic conceptual and cultural tools needed to operate in the complex environment of Iraq, from how to deal with a sheik to understanding why killing insurgents usually is the least desirable outcome in dealing with them. (It is more effective, they are now taught, to persuade them either to desert or to join the political process.)

Last year, an internal study by Army experts of U.S. commanders here found that some understood the principles of counterinsurgency and applied them well, while others faltered. "If the commander had it, the unit had it, but if the commander got it halfway, then the unit got it halfway," Casey said in a recent interview. The new school is designed to ensure that all the commanders get it.
Even now, some conventional unit commanders balk at the idea of leaving their troops for the 5 day course, which covers subjects from counterinsurgency theory and interrogations to detainee operations and how to dine with a sheik. When told that he had to leave his battalion of Marines in Fallujah to come here, recalled Lt. Col. Patrick Looney, his reaction was disbelief.
"I didn't want to come," concurred Lt. Col. David Furness, commander of the 1st Battalion of the 1st Marine Regiment, now operating between Baghdad and Fallujah. "But I'm glad I came."

Casey, the school's builder, found an easy way to make them come: He made attendance compulsory for any officer heading to a combat command in Iraq. He also meets with each class, offering the captains and lieutenant colonels a rare chance to quiz a four-star general.
Some members of the facultydraws heavily on Special Forces officers, were not eager to teach U.S. infantry, artillery, aviation and armor officers. Short recalled that some said: "That's not our mission. We don't teach U.S. forces." Such qualms have been eliminated, he said with a chuckle.

Again and again, the intense immersion course, which 30 to 50 officers attend at a time, emphasizes that the right answer is probably the counterintuitive one, rather than something that the Army has taught officers in their 10 or 20 years of service. The school's textbook, a huge binder, offers the example of a mission that busts into a house and captures someone who mortared a U.S. base.
"On the surface, a raid that captures a known insurgent or terrorist may seem like a sure victory for the coalition," it observes in red block letters. It continues, "The potential second- and third-order effects, however, can turn it into a long-term defeat if our actions humiliate the family, needlessly destroy property, or alienate the local population from our goals."

At points, the school's leaders seem to go out of their way to challenge current U.S. military practices here. Short said in an interview Friday inside his sandbagged headquarters that he has issues with "this big-base mentality" that keeps tens of thousands of troops inside facilities called forwarding operating bases, or FOBs, which they leave for patrols and raids. Classic counterinsurgency theory holds that troops should live out among the people as much as possible, to develop a sense of how the society works and to gather intelligence.
As Apache attack helicopters clattered overhead, Short also offered an unconventional view of Iraq's December elections, which many U.S. officials have portrayed as a great victory.
"You can ask just about every Iraqi, 'What about the elections?' " he said. "They'll say", Short shrugged his shoulders, " 'Well, we voted five times, and nothing's happening out here.' "

Recent attendees at the school came away impressed. "I think it's an incredibly insightful course," said Army Maj. Sheldon Horsfall, an adviser to the Iraqi military in Baghdad. "One of the things that was brought home to us, again and again, was the importance of cultural awareness."
"The course opened my eyes to some of the bigger picture," said Lt. Col. Nathan Nastase, the operations officer for the 5th Marine Regiment, based near Fallujah. He said he especially liked hearing about the role of Special Operations Forces in Iraq, as well as learning about the tactics being used by successful commanders.

The school's greatest effect seems to be on younger officers. "My initial impression of it was it was a waste of time," said Capt. Klaudius Robinson, commander of a cavalry troop in the 4th Infantry Division. "But after going through it, it really changed my thinking about how to fight this insurgency. I came to realize that the center of gravity is the people, and you have to drive a wedge between the insurgents and the people."
Before the course, he said, he expected to spend his time here combating insurgents, but instead he is focused on training and operating with Iraqi troops. "We're never going to catch every bad guy," he tells his troops. "That's not a ticket home. But what I can do is help Iraqi security forces and get them to take the lead."

"One of the things I picked up at the COIN Academy is, we don't need to be hard on people all the time," said Capt. Bret Lindberg, commander of another 4th Infantry cavalry troop.
The major criticism offered by students is that it would have been better to have the education 6 months earlier, when they were training their troops to deploy to Iraq, not after the units have arrived. Short had a tart response: It's not a bad idea, he said, but the Army back home wasn't stepping up to the job. "They didn't do it for three years", the length of the war so far, he noted. "That's why the boss said, 'Screw it, I'm doing it here.' "

At any rate, the school isn't just about operating in Iraq, Short said, but about preparing officers for the rest of their careers. "I think we're going to be in more of these wars," he said.


Olympic sniper competition   DoD photo by TechSgt Rick Sforza USAF

Fed. Acq. Reform Act eliminated foreign arms sales fee req. by law to recoup tax funded R&D

active denial technology


Pentagon fielding electromagnetic crowd dispersal weapon   3.2.01   F. Morales
CNN

"The Marine Corps is on the verge of unveiling perhaps the biggest breakthrough in weapons technology since the atomic bomb: a nonlethal weapon that fires directed energy at human targets. I have nothing to hide. This is a good news story. Our American public needs to understand that we have done our homework."
5.5.01 Col. Geo.Fenton, dir. Defense Dept Joint NonLethal Weapons Directorate per Marine Corps Times
In a neatly calculated "unveiling" of weapons designed for social control, for use against civilians and the suppression of dissent, the Pentagon has gone "transparent" with the latest in electronic weapons technology which targets people.
Vehicle Mounted Active Denial System prototype At a selective 3.1.01 press briefing for congressional & military leaders, Pentagon officials stated they were "developing a new non-lethal weapon which uses electromagnetic energy to cause a burning sensation on the skin..." (Reuters, 3/1/01) The "biggest breakthrough in weapons technology since the atomic bomb" is none other than the so-called "Vehicle-Mounted Active Denial System" VMADS.

According to 3.5.01 Marine Corps Times article entitled, "The People Zapper: This new secret weapon doesn't kill, but it sure does burn", the "VMADS system is the first non-lethal, directed energy weapon designed specifically for use against humans." The weapon "focuses energy into a beam of micromillimeter waves designed to stop an individual in his tracks." Powered by electricity, it would ultimately "be powered by the modified Humvee on which it would be mounted."

According to Marine Corps Times report, the projected energy "falls near microwaves on electromagnetic spectrum, causes the moisture in a person's skin to heat up rapidly, creating a burning sensation, similar to a hot light bulb pressed against one's flesh." The microwaves, "whose exact length, frequency and amplitude are classified, cause water molecules in the skin cells to vibrate." Presumably, "when used as directed, i.e. briefly, the weapon causes no long-term problems".

Meanwhile, "the amount of time the weapon must be trained on an individual to cause permanent damage or death is classified." Studies of long-term effects of "the VMADS system" have been completed, according to the report, but "the findings have not been released publicly." It should be noted that the Joint Chiefs of Staff major policy directive in the area of non-lethal weapons, DoD Directive 3000.3, which is currently under revision, calls for these weapons to have a built-in "rheostatic" (ie. "tunable") capability.

  speculative conjecture
  longitudinal EM interferometers scattered around the world (sometimes called "Tesla howitzers). One of the abilities of these new superweapons is to create waves of electromagnetic energy at the distant target which can soften metal. …
*
Sounds like specular RF reflector 'd send the beams off in all directions, & with practice maybe even right back at those firing them. Wonder what a large, parabolic dish would do.
Break out the mirrors per RF Causes Cancer 3.16.01

U.S. military unveils 'super sandwich'
4.11.02   BBC

American military researchers have cooked up an indestructible sandwich for soldiers to eat on the battlefield. It is designed to stay fresh & dry for up to 3 years, and to withstand airdrops, rough handling and extreme climates. Until now, American soldiers have been forced to construct their own sandwiches from pasteurised ingredients stored in separate pouches. …

To combat sogginess, researchers at the US Army Soldier Systems Center in Natick, Massachusetts used fillings such as pepperoni and chicken, then added substances called humectants which prevent water from leaking out. Humectants also limit the amount of moisture available for bacterial growth. Oxygen-scavenging chemicals prevent yeast from growing in the sealed plastic sandwich pouches.

Soldiers who tried the pepperoni and barbecue-chicken "pocket sandwich" have given it their approval, New Scientist magazine reported. Researchers hope to extend the menu of indestructible edibles to include pocket pizzas, cream-filled bagels, breakfast burritos and peanut butter sandwiches.

New Scientist wrote: "The pocket sandwiches won't see action until 2004. But like dehydrated egg, freeze-dried coffee and processed cheese all originally developed by the military; the long-life sandwich will probably find its way into grocery stores."


While the Marines expect to be microwaving people, it was the Air Force that developed the "technology" in the first place. On February 22, 2001 U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory, located at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico, issued it's own news release announcing that "a breakthrough technology designed to project an energy beam that drives away adversaries without injuring them, is now undergoing advanced testing." (2) According to the Air Force, the projected energy "beam" travels "at the speed of light" and penetrates "1/64 of a inch into the skin", rapidly heating up the skin's surface, causing the "subject", within seconds, to "feel pain that stops when the transmitter is shut off or when the subject moves out of the beam." According to the news release, the weapon was developed by two Air Force Research Laboratory teams: one from it's Directed Energy Directorate at Kirtland, the other from it's Human Effectiveness Directorate, located at Brooks Air Force Base, Texas. The learned team leaders, Lt. Col.Chuck Beason and Dr. Kirk Hackett noted, in reference to the new EM weapon, that "the effect exploits a natural defense mechanism, pain, that has evolved to protect the human body from damage."

The Air Force Research Laboratory Directed Energy Directorate, in addition to developing "high powered electromagnetic weapons and countermeasures" also develops "moderate and high power laser devices". (3) In fact, recently (2/212/01), the public affairs office of the Airborne Laser System Program Office, located at Kirtland, AFB, announced that "Lockheed Martin Space Systems will open an $8 million, 16,000 square-foot optical test center...designed to analyze the beam guidance system for the U.S. Air Force's Airborne Laser, the world's first combat aircraft armed with a directed energy weapon." (4) Meanwhile, the Space Vehicles Directorate - Air Force Research Laboratory, "develops technologies to support evolving warfighter requirements to control and exploit space." (5) This past November, Kirtland AFB was the sight of the 3rd Annual Directed Energy Symposium entitled, Directed Energy for the 21st Century, presented by the Directed Energy Professional Association, in cooperation with the Office of the Secretary of Defense. (6)
The VMADS system is currently being tested in field conditions by the Air Force at Kirtland, AFB. At the New Mexico site, "they are using a transmitter that sends a narrow beam of energy to a test subject hundreds of yards away." It is reassuring to note that "all testing is being conducted with strict observance of the procedures, laws and regulations governing animal and human experimentation". In addition, "the tests have been reviewed and approved by the Air Force Surgeon General's Office and are conducted by the Air Force Research Laboratory's Human Effectiveness Directorate." Finally, "although testing is expected to continue in this summer (2001), officials have begun examining the technology for use on a vehicle-mounted version. Future versions might also be used onboard planes and ships." (7)

Col. George Fenton, director of the US Marine operated NLW program firmly believes in the safety of this "revolutionary force protection technology." He recently stated that "humans have been exposed more than 6,000 times in testing, all inside the laboratory (and that) no long term effects have been detected." Given that track record, Fenton believes that "the technology could move into the acquisition phase of making a prototype as soon as this summer (2001), when the project would be taken over by the Air Force's Electronic Systems Center at Hanscom Air Force Base, Mass., near Boston." (8)
Finally, on-cue the New York Times joined in on the "unveiling", heralding "what some military officials hope will become the rubber bullet of the 21st century: a weapon that uses electromagnetic waves to disperse crowds without killing, maiming or, military officials say, even injuring anyone slightly." (9) Not even slightly! After all, notes the Times, they are only "intended to influence motivational behavior." According to free lance writer/researcher David Guyatt, "less than lethal anti-personnel weapons, especially some classes of EM weapons that are viewed as having a capability to remotely modify behavior or attack higher functions, are seen in some influential quarters as being the ideal remedy for future domestic disturbances...", wherein, the forces of repression will target the opposition, "armed with innovative technological weapons that do not necessarily kill but which render disenfranchised segments of society physically inactive, emotionally stupefied and incapable of meaningful thought..." (10)

Sound farfetched? Back in 1986, Marine Corps Captain Paul E. Tyler, author of an influential study entitled, "The Electromagnetic Spectrum in Low-Intensity Conflict" (11) was already making the point that "the potential applications of artificial electromagnetic fields are wide ranging and can be used in many military or quasi - military situations" including "crowd control". At that time he pointed out that although scientists hadn't identified electromagnetism for what it really was until the eighteenth century, "the results of many studies that have been published in the last few years indicate that specific biological effects can be achieved by controlling the various parameters of the electromagnetic (EM) field." And further, "many of the clinical effects of electromagnetic radiation (have) been reported in the literature to induce or enhance the following effects (including) … electroanesthesia...behavior modification in animals, altered electroencephalograms in animals and humans, altered brain morphology in animals, altered firing of neuronal cells." According to Capt.Tyler, "a 1982 Air Force review of biotechnology had this to say: Currently available data allow the projection that specially generated radio frequency radiation (RFR) fields may pose powerful and revolutionary antipersonnel military threats. Electroshock therapy indicates the ability of induced electric current to completely interrupt mental functioning for short periods of time, to obtain cognition for longer periods and to restructure emotional response over prolonged intervals." Further, "experience with electroshock therapy, RFR experiments and the increasing understanding of the brain as an electrically mediated organ suggested the serious probability that impressed electromagnetic fields can be disruptive to purposeful behavior and may be capable of directing and or interrogating such behavior", while "the passage of approximately 100 milliamperes through the myocardium can lead to cardiac standstill and death, again pointing to a speed-of-light weapons effect."

1. Marine Corps Times, "The People Zapper: This new secret weapon doesn't kill, but it sure does burn", C. Mark Brinkley, March 5, 2001, pg.10.
2. United States Air Force, Air Force Research Laboratory, News Release, Office of Public Affairs, "New Technology Drives Away Adversaries", February 22, 2001. www.de.afrl.af.mil/pa/releases/2001/01-09.html
3. Air Force Research Laboratory, Kirtland AFB, New Mexico, Directorate descriptions, www.afrl.af.mil/techconn/directorate_descriptions.htm
4. United States Air Force, Airborne Laser System Program Office, Office of Public Affairs, "Airborne Laser Optical Facility Opens", February 21, 2001. www.de.afrl.af.mil/pa/releases/2001/01-06.html
5. Air Force Research Laboratory, Directorate descriptions (above)
6. Directed Energy for the 21st Century, 3rd Annual Directed Energy Symposium, Preliminary Program and Registration, Kirtland Air Force Base, White Sands Missile Range, 30 October - 3 November 2000.
7. Air Force Research Laboratory, "New technology Drives Away Adversaries" 2/22/01 (above) 8. Marine Corps Times, 3/5/01 (above)
9. New York Times, "Pentagon Unveils Plans for a New Crowd-Dispersal Weapon", James Dao, 3.2.01
10. David G. Guyatt, "Some Aspects of Antipersonnel Electromagnetic Weapons", February 1996 www.adacomp.net/~mcherney/aspects.html
11. Capt. Paul E. Tyler, MC, USN, "The Electromagnetic Spectrum in Low-Intensity Conflict", in, LtCol. David J. Dean, USAF, Editor, Low-Intensity Conflict and Modern Technology, Air University Press, Alabama, June 1986. www.adacomp.net/~mcherney/mn142a.htm
    general
    & links
  re
"Patterns of Conflict" & OODA loop :   2 primary themes   • A focus on time, not speed, specifically using dislocations in time to shape the competitive situation, effects quite different in business than in war.
  • A culture with attributes that enable, even impel, organizations to exploit time for competitive advantage. Within Boyd´s culture, members will seek out or invent specific practices that will work for it.

"   … ability to employ these maneuver concepts rests on an underlying cultural foundation. Sun Tzu, writing sometime before 400 B.C., made the earliest known identification of the elements of such a high-performing culture.
  Chief among these is trust, which is so fundamental that he simply called it, "The Way." Mutual trust is now recognized as essential by every successful practitioner of maneuver concepts.
  … destruction of trust as a result of corporate short-sightedness or lack of integrity among sr managers is the single most significant cause of business failures in the early 21st century."  
Belisarius
  ¹ ² ³


" I fear that machines are some centuries ahead of morals. "
Harry S. Truman touring bombed out post-war Berlin
Of 67 fatal casualties by the 12th day of the second Gulf War, more died of mishap (multiple helicopter crashes & other vehicle accidents), 25, than by enemy fire in combat, 21. In addition to these, more died from friendly fire, 6, than by sappers, 4.
3.30.03   Forces: U.S. & Coalition / casualties CNN
According to NATO's own figures, of 307 cruise missiles launched at Iraq during the first Gulf War, 65 (21%) missed their targets.
10.10.01   Bombing long-term fears BBC
What mythological confusion is this? Since when has Mars been god of commerce & Mercury god of war ?
Viennese ed. Karl Kraus auth. & publ.
"Die Fackel" (The Torch) 1899-1936
… (few) will pick up a gun if it means putting down a cash register.
Horse under water   auth. Len Deighton

Mother Jones' Index
Proposition One Washington's finest peace patrol
Country Joe McDonald & Zipper Wars
Ctr for Intl Policy   hammering out plowshares
California Peace Action L.A.   formerly SANE/FREEZE
infoshop.org
Chico State Gulf protest
Friends Committee on Legislation of California, longest running cause lobby in Sacramento
FY99 655 Report State Dept rpt on direct commercial sales licenses of munitions
Arms Control per
  Intl Security Pgm Union of Concerned Scientists
COAT Coalition to Oppose Arms Trade (Canada)
U.N. recent docs re conventional arms/small arms
The Arms Fixers   weapons watch
Biowar kill patient to cure disease : Tricky Dick's ghost vs. the future of the planetary ecosystem
Pentagon's Fraud   Emperor's newest clothes
Army InspectorGen Kosovo abusive troops report   &   RULES of PEACEKEEPING
FEMA ¹
D I Y munitions   from the front lines of the drug wars
torture

The last days of mankind a tragedy in 5 acts
auth. Karl Kraus   "a play to be performed on Mars" compiled from Vienna newspaper articles, official bulletins, and overheard conversations during WWI re wartime reporting as popular entertainment. Performed excerpts during the war.   Franz Pfemfert

Global Exchange of Military Information As a participating state in the Helsinki Document 1992, U.S. must submit annually to the Organization of Security & Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) information on major weapon and equipment systems & personnel in their conventional armed forces.
Only Russia stood between Napoleon and France's domination of Europe. … At the beginning of the 18th century, the Russian frontier had been on the Dneiper; a century later, it reached the Vistula, 500 miles farther west.
At the beginning of the 18th century, Russia had been fighting for its existence against Sweden at the Poltova, deep in the present day Ukraine. By the middle of the century, it was participating in the Seven Years' War and its troops were at the outskirts of Berlin. By the end of the century, it would be the principal agent in the partition of Poland.
Henry Kissinger Diplomacy p74

    OSCE
U.S. meets European allies for talks on bases
12.8.03  
Reuters

Brussels   U.S. began a diplomatic roadshow Monday to explain the post-Cold War realignment of its military forces, which is widely expected to bring base closures in Western Europe. Bush admin has made no decisions yet, but Defense under secretary Feith said its new defense policy would reflect NATO's eastward shift as countries once behind the Iron Curtain join the alliance.
"A lot of the current force posture in Europe is based on the realities of the Cold War, and so adjustments are going to have to be made to take into account that the alliance is larger & stronger than it was a few years ago," he said. Feith was speaking at a news conference after briefing NATO ambassadors with Under Sec. State Marc Grossman at the U.S. led alliance's HQ.

From Brussels the 2 men will split for consultations in nearly a dozen capitals across Europe, a sign, diplomats said, of Washington's eagerness to tread carefully after transatlantic strains over the Iraq war. "No final decisions have been made. The work we are doing now is an attempt to talk to people about the strategy and the concepts," Grossman said.
Some adjustments would be made in the next year or two, Feith said, but the whole review would take years to implement. 1991 Gulf War and more recent conflicts in Afghanistan & Iraq have taught the U.S. & its allies that military mobility, incl temporary basing & overflight rights, combined with technology, rather than entrenched Cold War forces, are the keys to preventing or winning future wars.

Washington has already withdrawn its forces from Saudi Arabia and is working on plans to realign the 100,000 U.S. troops in the Western Pacific, South Korea and Japan. It keeps 2 of its 10 army divisions in Europe. In Germany, it has some 77,000 personnel, many with families, at bases which have become thriving townships in their own right and bring considerable benefits to the local economies.
U.S. strategic planners have long argued that 110,000 service personnel stationed in Europe at huge cost should be replaced by smaller units with troops on short rotation tours at bases stretching into eastern European countries. This would give U.S., and by extension NATO, a foothold in the Balkans and strategic reach into central Asia & MidEast to take on new security threats such as terrorism and the spread of weapons of mass destruction.

U.S. forces in Europe commander Gen. James Jones, champion of expeditionary forces, has been pressing for a 3 tiered bases structure. He told Reuters recently that this would entail main operating bases such as Ramstein in Germany, lighter forward operating bases at further-flung locations such as Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo and bare- bones forward operating locations "where you … bring in what you wish to have on your back."

Joint Task Force Six   JTF-6 supports Domestic Law Enforcement Agency counterdrug efforts in the continental US to reduce availability of illegal drugs. Established in 1989, mission originally focused exclusively along SW US border. Succession of National Defense Authorization Acts expanded JTF-6 charter by adding specific mission tasks for the organization. In 1995, JTF-6 area of responsibility expanded to incl entire continental US.
To date, the focus of the U.S. Govt's efforts to disrupt private support to terrorists has been on prosecutions under provisions of the Antiterrorism & Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA). This law requires the Secretary of State to designate groups that threaten U.S. interests & security as Foreign Terrorist Organizations. There are 28 organizations on the most recent list, issued in October of 1999 by the Secretary of State. Current practice is to update the FTO list every 2 years, although the threat from terrorist groups can change at a faster pace.
The FTO designation makes it a crime for a person in the U.S. to provide funds or other material support (including equipment, weapons, lodging, training, etc.) to such a group. There is no requirement that the contributor know that the specific resources provided will be used for terrorism. In addition, American financial institutions are required under the law to block funds of FTOs & their agents and report them to the govt. The FTO designation process correctly recognizes that the current threat is increasingly from groups of terrorists rather than state sponsors. In addition to deterring contributions to terrorist organizations, FTO designation serves as a diplomatic tool. It provides the State Department with the ability to use a "carrot and stick" approach to these groups, providing public condemnation and a potential for redemption if the groups renounce terrorism.

Rather than relying heavily on the FTO process, the U.S. Govt should take a broader approach to cutting off the flow of financial support for terrorism from within the United States. Anyone providing funds to terrorist organizations or activities should be investigated with the full vigor of the law and, where possible, prosecuted under relevant statutes, including those covering money laundering, conspiracy, tax or fraud violations. In such cases, assets may also be made subject to civil & criminal forfeiture.
In addition, the Treasury Dept. could use its Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) more effectively. OFAC administers & enforces economic sanctions. For example, any U.S. financial institution holding funds belonging to a terrorist organization or one of its agents must report those assets to OFAC. Under OFAC's regulations, the transfer of such assets can be blocked. OFAC's capabilities and expertise are underutilized in part because of resource constraints. Other govt agencies such as IRS & Customs also possess information & authority that could be used to thwart terrorist fundraising. For instance, the IRS has information on NGOs that may be collecting donations to support terrorism, and Customs has data on large currency transactions. But there is no single entity that tracks and analyzes all the data available to the various agencies on terrorist fundraising in the U.S.

In addition to domestic efforts, disrupting fundraising for terrorist groups requires intl cooperation. A new UN convention, the Intl Convention for Suppression of Financing of Terrorism, provides a framework for improved cooperation. Each signing party is to enact domestic legislation to criminalize fundraising for terrorism and provide for seizure & forfeiture of funds intended to support terrorism. The parties are to cooperate in criminal investigation & prosecution of terrorism fundraising & in extraditing suspects.

U.S. seeks to bolster leased facilities
Security rules would affect cities, private sector
3.16.02   Spencer S. Hsu Wash.Post

The federal govt is seeking new security standards for more than 6,500 buildings it leases across the country to protect workers in privately owned sites from biological, chemical or conventional bomb attacks. Recommendations under consideration for new or renewed leases include setting sensitive buildings up to 100 ft from streets, securing parking lots or garages and using stronger construction materials & techniques to prevent a catastrophic collapse. Such guidelines would have broad implications for the commercial real estate industry & other corporate tenants in the District, where the federal govt is the dominant renter, and could potentially affect downtowns in larger cities where the govt houses workers. General Services Administration this week proposed the changes to the federal Interagency Security Committee, panel established soon after 1995 OKC federal bldg bombing to safeguard govt operations. The committee oversees security standards set after that bombing for 1,700 federally owned buildings, a $1.3 billion effort to date that has increased new construction costs 15 to 25%

"What we now need, esp. after 9.11.01, is similar guidelines for space the govt leases from the private sector," said GSA's Public Buildings Service commissioner F. Joseph Moravec, which owns 180 million sq ft and leases 150 million sq ft across the country. "It's one thing for govt to incorporate some of these expensive measures because we're building buildings to last 100 years," said Moravec, whose agency leads the panel. "But it's going to be challenging for the private sector to incorporate them and at the same time be competitive with market rents." The proposal is a response to 9.11.01 and illustrates the govt's pace-setting role in office-building security, even as it struggles to streamline actions taken by myriad independent agencies. Adjusting to the new threat often places security-minded officials at odds with local leaders, urban planners and architects, who say that too much security will sacrifice public access and economic vitality.

The debate is sharpest in Washington, where an empty downtown office tower dramatizes the stakes for the capital & urban downtowns nationally. In Dec., Federal Emergency Management Agency surprised GSA & Washington officials by canceling plans to move its national HQ & 1,000 workers to the million sq ft Potomac Center redevelopment near Washington's waterfront, backing out of a 10-year, $100 million lease after citing unspecified security concerns.

Members of Congress quietly grumbled at the FEMA decision, which they say is an overreaction. People close to the project say the agency demanded that the building be set back 100 ft from the street, strictly interpreting a safeguard that could make major federal offices unsuitable in downtowns.
"Scared? Are you mad?" said Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton D-D.C., recalling her reaction when she asked for a Capitol Hill meeting with FEMA dir.
Joe M. Allbaugh in January. "Do you know that if FEMA looks like it is afraid to be in downtown D.C., 200,000 federal workers will wonder whether they should be here?"
Allbaugh is working with GSA and still wants & intends the agency to remain in the District, a spokesman said. But the GSA this week failed to find a site within a 20-mile radius, said congressional officials tracking the project, leaving FEMA in its current HQ atop a parking garage it shares with a hotel.

FEMA spokesman John Czwartacki said former top Pres.Bush political aide Allbaugh acted after 9.11.01 heightened the agency's unique homeland security role. Law enforcement agencies concluded that the building was exposed because it was close to the street, an off-ramp of Interstate 395 and the Potomac River, a flight corridor for Reagan National Airport.
The decision, among other things, suggests that any building housing a federal office is subject to a security overhaul or, worse, agency relocation.
"There's a snowball effect here," said GSA's 1995 to 2000 Public Buildings Service commissioner Robert A. Peck , referring to security measures embraced by federal agencies. "We're talking about spending a lot of money, disrupting a lot of lives and commerce, and some of it may not be necessary at all." Peck, now president of Greater Washington Board of Trade, said the govt must be wary of reacting to past threats, instead of future ones, and spending tax dollars on a false sense of security. "We need to ask … 'What are the risks a democracy must take?' " Peck said. "Security people are going to push for what they can get. We need to push back."

Norton has called for a national commission to balance security demands against the values of an open society. The American Institute of Architects, American Planning Assoc., American Society of Landscape Architects and National Trust for Historic Preservation and others formed coalition arguing Washington should be model for how security is applied to public buildings & spaces nationwide.

"We have to be vigilant," D.C. Planning Director Andrew Altman said at a forum last month on federal security held at the National Building Museum, "not to allow an environment or an atmosphere of fear to pressure us to make huge decisions about the federal workforce & federal offices and relocate them." The task has largely fallen on the Interagency Security Committee, which meets monthly and draws together security directors from 17 major govt agencies as well as representatives from law enforcement & national security agencies. The panel regularly updates a seminal June 1995 federal study that set 52 security standards for federal facilities, such as perimeter lighting, physical barriers and tv surveillance. The report divided facilities into 5 security levels, assigning each one to escalating degrees of compliance with the standards.

To meet govt requirements for leased buildings, Moravec said, developers need clear standards. For example, building owners may have to limit who can enter or park at their properties or what other businesses, including retail, can lease space. The committee, chaired by GSA Administrator Stephen A. Perry, deliberates in private and will be addressing standards for privately owned buildings in the coming weeks. The govt also is seeking but not mandating assurances that foundations, supports and exterior walls will not fail in case of an explosive impact; that heating, ventilation and water systems resist easy tampering with chemical or biological agents; and that electrical & critical communications systems have backups.
"The idea will be to achieve a consensus that can be used as a template for the private sector," Moravec said. Buildings that fail a guideline would not necessarily be knocked out from a bid but could be graded lower than a competitor, he said. "We really want to avoid being rigid.

Officials point to the recently completed U.S. mission to the UN in NYC planned before September, as one of the most secure federal facilities ever built in a city. The mission has hardened exterior walls, large windows restricted to high above street level and other measures that render it safe even though it is less than 50 ft from the street. Similarly secure buildings are being constructed from Brooklyn to Los Angeles to Seattle, where a federal building uses a water pool as a moat. In Washington, a $104 million Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms HQ set to break ground this spring will be among the first to incorporate all post-Oklahoma City federal recommendations. The 1,100-worker center at Florida Ave & N Street NE will anchor a new office corridor & Metro stop when complete by 2005. The project features an L-shaped building and a curving 3 story "garden wall" that also serves as a defensive ring. City & federal planners agreed to partly close 2 streets behind the building to meet the 100 ft buffer requirement, while still permitting traffic. The govt plans to allow public access to cafes or other retailers in the outer wall away from the building itself. Nevertheless, terrorist attacks have prompted new security assessment for the building, designed before 9.11.01. The ATF is requesting that pedestrians be kept 100 ft away. No decision has been made.

    The Phantom Menace
    Could terrorists attack U.S. with weapons of mass destruction? Highly unlikely, say defense experts. So why is the Clinton administration spending billions to foil a most improbable threat?
    9.00   Robt Dreyfuss M.Jones ¹
Bush calls for $50 billion for war on terrorism ¹ ² ³
Talks economic compromise with congressional leaders
1.23.02   Sandra Sobieraj AP
perpetrators, profiteers & pork

Wash.DC   Pres. GWBush called 1.23.02 for nearly $50 billion in additional military spending for the war on terrorism, the largest increase for the Pentagon in 2 decades. Privately, he assured GOP & Democratic leaders that he has "no ambition whatsoever" to exploit the war on terrorism for political gain in this election year. With his chief political strategist Karl Rove seated behind him in the Cabinet Room, Bush gave House & Senate leaders an update on the fight against terrorists and added: "I have no ambition whatsoever to use this as a political issue. There is no daylight between the executive & the legislative branches."
No one in the room for the closed-door morning meeting responded, according to congressional & White House sources who related the scene. Rove had caused a stir among Democrats last week when he told a GOP conference that Republicans would do well to talk up the popular war in this year's midterm elections.

In an afternoon address to the Reserve Officers Association, Bush gave the first details of the $2 trillion budget that Bush submits to Congress on Feb. 4. That spending plan will ask Congress to give the Pentagon an increase of $48 billion, bringing its budget within range of $380 billion. If approved by the House & Senate the funds would amount to the largest increase in military spending in 20 years, Bush said. The extra money would give service personnel another pay raise, acquire more precision weapons and build missile defenses. "Buying these tools may put a strain on the budget but we will not cut corners when it comes to the defense of our great land," Bush said to cheers from the Reserve officers. To keep Americans safe from terrorists here at home, Bush said his budget will also call for hiring 30,000 airport security workers & an additional 300 FBI agents, buying new equipment to improve mail safety, and beefing up research on bioterror threats.

For the budget year beginning on Oct. 1, Bush is expected to request roughly double the current $13 billion for homeland security, a spending item that did not exist a year ago. The budget is expected to be in deficit for the first time in 4 years, by just over $100 billion for this year and about $80 billion for 2003. To address the recession, which Bush blames for the return to deficits, lawmakers emerged from their White House meeting and expressed commitment on both sides to a compromise economic package. Senate Republican Leader Trent Lott told reporters in the White House driveway that the middle-ground plan offered by Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., has potential to break the long partisan stalemate over how to boost the economy and help millions of unemployed Americans. "It is a focus of our attention. It's a process that could get us into considering the bill and reaching a conclusion," said Lott, R-MS. House Speaker Dennis Hastert agreed, for the most part. "We made a commitment to at least start the discussion and try to work things out."

" I'm committed and I think other leaders are that we need some type of a stimulus package," said Hastert, R-IL. Daschle, who for much of the holiday recess was locked in a long-distance war of words with the White House over economic policy, suggested detente was in the works. Bush invited Daschle & the other leaders to continue the White House breakfast meetings he began after launching the anti-terror war in Afghanistan, Daschle said. The breakfasts will shift from a weekly happening to once every 2 weeks, with the first already scheduled for Tuesday, aides said.

Daschle chuckled when Bush jokingly wondered whether they would be able to keep the breakfasts going "as things heat up" in the election year, the Capitol Hill & White House sources said. "A new year brings a new opportunity to start over. We're going to do that and work, hopefully, in a very positive & a bipartisan spirit," Daschle said. "We talked today about the areas for which we both have a high priority and it was amazing. I thought it was identical, trade, energy the economy, election reform, prescription drugs, patients bill of rights, agriculture." Bush wants tens of billions of dollars more for homeland defense & military spending. On the economic front, he's pushing to break the stalemate over his economic revival package of tax cuts, mostly for businesses, and extended unemployment benefits.

Daschle proposes that Republicans & Democrats work on a compromise economic plan requiring both sides to make concessions. Democrats would shelve raising unemployment benefits and subsidizing health care premiums for the newly unemployed under the Daschle plan, while Republicans would drop accelerating the income tax cuts enacted last year and repealing the corporate alternative minimum tax. The Democratic proposal focuses on extending unemployment benefits, giving tax rebate checks to people who missed out last year, allowing businesses more generous tax write-offs for new investment and increasing federal Medicaid money to cash-strapped states.
Administration advisers said Wednesday the president was open to a slimmed-down package as long as it includes job-creating provisions. Later Wednesday, Bush was signing legislation waiving income tax liability for 2 years for families of 9.11.01 victims, last fall's anthrax attacks & the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. The bill is H.R. 2884.

11.24.03   Reuters

Wash.D.C.   President Bush signed a record $401.3 billion defense bill on Monday that includes a 4.15% raise for troops as the Iraq occupation puts increasing strain on soldiers & their families. "In this time of war, our military is facing greater sacrifice," Bush said as he signed the legislation in a ceremony at the Pentagon. "Your men and women in uniform are facing longer separations. Your families are feeling great pride and sometimes they worry," he said.
Since Bush declared major combat over in Iraq on 5.1.03, 185 soldiers died as guerrilla attacks have escalated. The administration has extended military deployments in Iraq to a full year and begun mustering tens of thousands of regular & reserve troops for rotation into Iraq next year.

Besides raising military wages, the defense authorization bill for fiscal 2004 continues $225 per month in imminent danger pay and $250 in a monthly family separation allowance for troops in Iraq & Afghanistan, incl tens of thousands of reserve & national guard troops. The Pentagon in August said it had considered altering the compensation plan for soldiers in the 2 countries, but denied in the face of criticism that it intended to cut their pay.

Last year's defense authorization bill totaled $393 billion and included a 4.1% raise for troops. This year's bill clears the way for the Air Force to acquire 100 Boeing Co. refueling aircraft, expands veterans' benefits and allows research on new types of nuclear weapons. It also includes $9.1 billion for ballistic missile defense and $12 billion for the purchase of Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force fighters as well as further development of a Joint Strike Fighter program.
Separate legislation is needed to actually spend the money authorized by the bill Bush signed.

After he signed the measure, Bush left Washington for Ft Carson CO to hold a rare meeting with families of U.S. troops who have died in Iraq. In a speech to troops at the base, he thanked the families of fallen soldiers and said "our prayers are with you."
Bush has come under increasing criticism for not attending any funerals of soldiers killed in attacks in Iraq and for barring media coverage of the return of dead service members to U.S. Ret. Gen. Wesley Clark, Democratic candidate for presidential nominee, accused Bush of "the kind of cover-up tactics we saw during Vietnam."

White House aides say Bush has met privately with families of war casualties and writes letters to the families of each soldier who has died. In Senate testimony last week, Pentagon officials acknowledged reports of morale problems in some units serving in Iraq, and said the Army Reserve had fallen short of its goals for re-enlisting existing members.
"The longer we operate at the tempos we have, the greater the challenge will be in this," said Army Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Schoomaker. Longer-than-expected call-ups have also pulled many reservists away from regular jobs and fueled discontent among families.

Bush said U.S. troops were "standing between our country and grave danger. You're standing for order and hope and democracy in Afghanistan and Iraq. You're standing up for the security of all free nations, and for the advance of freedom," he told the military audience at the Pentagon.

War injured toll soars, hits veterans health costs
6.28.05   Reuters

As the numbers of U.S. war injured in Iraq and Afghanistan soared, the Bush administration admitted to lawmakers on Tuesday it had underestimated funds to cover health care costs for veterans and Congress would have to plug a $2.6 billion hole.
"The bottom line is there is a surge in demand in VA (health) services across the board," said Veterans Affairs Secretary James Nicholson. The Veterans Administration assumed it would have to take care of 23,553 patients who are veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan but that number had been revised upward to 103,000, Nicholson told a House of Representatives panel.

Nicholson told a House Appropriations subcommittee that his agency's estimate of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans in need of health care services was now four times greater than thought. The updated figures underscored how the costs of the Iraq war, approaching $300 billion, were rippling through other parts of a federal budget already under tight spending limits.
Nicholson's testimony, coming after his assurance to Congress in April that veterans' health programs were being adequately funded, angered some lawmakers. House Appropriations Committee Chairman Jerry Lewis R-CA complained during a hearing that the Veterans Administration was silent as his panel wrote a fiscal 2006 veterans spending bill. The measure, he said, could have responded to the funding shortage.
"It borders on stupidity," said Lewis, adding, "I think someone was hoping they could hide the ball for a while." At the same time, resources are being stretched by aging veterans from past wars who are suffering from "more maladies" than new veterans, Nicholson said.

Lewis said Congress will have to "move very quickly" to approve additional funding, before the start of the next fiscal year on 10.1.05. But he did not say whether other programs would have to be cut to pay for the fix. The Senate debated on Tuesday a proposal by a group of Democrats to add $1.4 billion to veterans' health care funding for next year.
Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid NV chided Republicans for finally acknowledging a problem. He noted that early attempts by Democrats to add money for veterans health care were "voted down on a strictly partisan vote."
The House already has approved a fiscal 2006 veterans funding bill that is about $1.1 billion above the Bush administration's request. Lawmakers said that will take care of part of the health-care funding problem, which still must be reviewed by the Senate.

Nicholson said his agency is in intensive discussions with the Office of Management and Budget on a request that is likely to be around $1.5 billion in additional funds. Meanwhile, a $1 billion health-care funding shortage is being taken care of this year, Nicholson said, by tapping a reserve fund and deferring some maintenance and equipment acquisition costs, moves criticized by Democrats.
While Nicholson said veterans' health care was not being compromised by the budget problem, some Democrats were skeptical, citing a veterans health clinic closing in California, cutbacks at an Arlington VA, veterans' medical center and supply shortages in Chicago. Veterans groups have complained that funding is not keeping pace with inflation and rising medical costs and that veterans in some parts of the country experience long waits for care.


Fed. aid promised to cities for counter-terrorism   ¹
1.24.02   Toby Eckert Copley News Service

Wash.D.C.   Homeland Security Dir. Tom Ridge assured the nation's mayors yesterday that their cities will get substantial federal aid for their counter-terrorism efforts. But Ridge cautioned that the added funds "won't cover all your costs" since 9.11.01 which the mayors put at more than $2.6 billion. L.A. Mayor James Hahn welcomed Ridge's comments. But he was disappointed that Ridge said the funding would only cover the cities' future costs. "We need it now," Hahn said of the federal support. "These extra costs come at the same time we've also experienced decreased revenues. It's really cut a big hole in our budget." The budget President Bush will propose to Congress early next month will include "unprecedented support" for police, firefighters and emergency personnel who would be the first to respond to a terrorist attack, Ridge said in a speech to the U.S. Conference of Mayors.

"This … isn't a one year & out initiative. This is a major investment," Ridge said, without citing a specific spending figure. "We want to empower cities and states to build upon their first-response capability." Bush is expected to detail some of the homeland security elements of his budget today. The proposal is for FY2003, which starts 10.1.02.

To underline their priorities, the mayors released a study yesterday estimating that cities would spend more than $2.6 billion for extra security by the end of 2002. The figure was based on a survey of 192 cities and incl spending since 9.11.01. Hahn said Los Angeles has spent $11 million to $12 million on police overtime alone.

While an overall spending figure for the city of San Diego was not available, the police dept alone incurred more than $540,000 in additional costs between Sept. 11 and Dec. 11, said asst chief John Welter. That includes increased security at city buildings, water facilities and large public events, as well as training and equipt for biological & chemical attacks. NatSec fashions. AP foto The dept expects to spend an extra $2 million a year on security in the post-Sept. 11 environment, Welter said. "It's a major expense and a serious impact. When you couple that with the loss of revenue from sales taxes, we're really hurting," he said.

The mayors' concerns over the fiscal impact of the war on terrorism echo those already expressed by governors. The National Governors Assoc. has lobbied the White House for at least $3 billion for the states. Gov. Gray Davis is counting on $350 million in federal funds to help cover state security costs in California. Hahn, meanwhile, called for a beefed up Coast Guard on the West Coast. "We see more . . . resources going to the East Coast than the West Coast, even though we have greater coastline," he said. "The Coast Guard is really stretched pretty thin on the West Coast. They have to cover Alaska and Hawaii and California, Oregon and Washington."
environment

Allies deliberately poisoned Iraq public water supply in Gulf War
9.17.00   Felicity Arbuthnot
Sunday Herald Scotland
more re

US-led allied forces deliberately destroyed Iraq's water supply during the Gulf War, flagrantly breaking the Geneva Convention & causing thousands of civilian deaths. Since 1991 war end, allied nations thwarted any attempts to make contaminated water safe.
American Thos. J. Nagy, Professor of Expert Systems at Geo.Washington Univ. Business School & Public Management doctoral fellowship in public health intends to convene expert hearings to pursue criminal indictments under intl law against those responsible. "Those who saw nothing wrong in producing [this plan], those who ordered its production and those who knew about it and have remained silent for 10 years are in violation of Federal Statute and perhaps conspired to commit genocide." Professor Nagy obtained a minutely detailed 7pg document prepared by the US Defense Intelligence Agency, issued the day after the war started, entitled Iraq Water Treatment Vulnerabilities and circulated to all major allied Commands.

It states Iraq had gone to considerable trouble to provide a supply of pure water to its population. It had to depend on importing specialised equipment & purification chemicals, since water is "heavily mineralised & frequently brackish". Geneva Convention Article 54 states: "It is prohibited to attack, destroy or render useless objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population" and includes foodstuffs, livestock and "drinking water supplies and irrigation works". Results of the allied bombing campaign were obvious when Dr David Levenson visited Iraq immediately after the Gulf War, on behalf of Intl Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War. He said: "For many weeks people in Baghdad, without tv, radio, or newspapers to warn them, brought their drinking water from the Tigris, in buckets. "Dehydrated from nausea & diarrhea, craving liquids, they drank more of the water that made them sick in the first place." Rep. Tony Hall D-OH wrote SecState Madeleine Albright saying he shares concerns expressed by UNICEF about "profound effects the deterioration of Iraq's water supply and sanitation systems on children's health". Diarrheal diseases he says are of "epidemic proportions" and are "prime killer of children under five".

U.S. Truth Commission   Roni Bowers
US has its own record of atrocities
12.23.00   Boston Globe
Johns Hopkins Univ. asst prof. sociology & poli-sci Jas. Ron & Brown Univ. Watson Inst. for Intl Studies asst prof. for research Chas. T. Call

During Serbia's forced depopulation of Kosovo in 1999, Slobodan Milosevic, the former Yugoslavian president, acknowledged that irregular Serbian forces were committing excesses while fighting Kosovar insurgents. He claimed, however, that these were mild when compared with US war crimes in Vietnam. Slobodan Milosevic was a deceptive autocrat responsible for the deaths of thousands, but he had a point. Compared with the US record in Vietnam, Serbia's Kosovo atrocities were far fewer.
Remember My Lai? In just a few hours, Lieutenant William Calley's men shot or knifed more than 400 men, women, and children, raping and mutilating some victims. Even that chilling episode, however, pales alongside US tactics in the Vietnamese and Cambodian countryside, where high explosives, napalm, and defoliant were the methods of choice. Serbian forces killed some 10,000 Kosovars, but in Southeast Asia U.S. and its allies slew 1 million, many of whom were civilians. More than twice that number were wounded or forcibly displaced.

Direct US involvement in war crimes continued even after the Vietnam conflict. CIA operatives mined Nicaragua's main harbor in the 1980s, and until the 1990s, US Army courses for Latin American soldiers included torture. In the early 1990s, CIA agents created a right-wing group in Haiti that killed hundreds of civilians. Although most Americans barely recall those events, others elsewhere have not forgotten. For them, the contemporary US fascination with human rights seems empty and cynical. If U.S. does not investigate its past misdeeds, these suspicions will ring true. In addition to directly participating in abuses, U.S. also covertly aided brutal authoritarians abroad. Just as Milosevic pulled the strings during Bosnia's ethnic cleansing, U.S. secretly sponsored cruel allies to advance political goals.
Consider Chile, where CIA operatives helped overrow an elected leftist leader in the early 1970s, creating the long nightmare of Pinochet's rule. The Chilean judiciary is now investigating Pinochet's crimes, but the CIA is only reluctantly opening its files. Or recall Iran, where US operatives in the 1950s helped depose an elected govt that was threatening Western oil profits. They then installed the Shah, a dictator who relied on torture to maintain control. The same is true for Guatemala, where UN-backed investigators found that govt counterinsurgency forces killed 90% of an estimated 200,000 civil war victims.

President Clinton recently called the substantial, clandestine US role in that war wrong, but did nothing to investigate those responsible. The US govt offered widely accepted reasons for its behavior during the Cold War years. It was fighting global communism, which to many seemed a noble and worthwhile goal. Yet wouldn't men like Milosevic supply similarly reasonable explanations? Govts are skilled at justifying abusive policies, citing overwhelming threats to national security. Milosevic defended the Serbian nation, Pinochet battled subversives, and South African whites were fighting communism. Although the rhetoric of justification shifts with time, the realities of abuse remain constant. When states use indiscriminate force to get their way, innocents usually suffer.
In the post-Cold War environment there is increasing cause for optimism. Many countries, including Rwanda, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Ethiopia, Chad, El Salvador, Chile, Haiti, and Guatemala, have tried to expose the truth about their past, often at great political cost. Yet U.S. still refuses to practice what it preaches. As supreme Cold War victor, its representatives lecture others about human rights without stopping to consider their own past crimes. For both moral and political reasons, U.S. should create a commission to investigate its own involvement in Cold War misdeeds. The methods of an official US "truth commission" should be professional and nonpartisan in order to avoid narrow political agendas. Despite these precautions, a U.S. inquiry would be painful and divisive. Presidential fortunes might suffer, and congressional careers could be hurt. Yet recall that these are only some of the powerful risks run every day by politicians promoting truth-telling elsewhere, from S.Africa to Argentina. How long can U.S. promote accountability for others if it itself is unwilling to do the same?


    spartans
For gays, secrecy in love, war
Partners of American military personnel are the invisible players back home, bearing their burdens without support or rights.
4.17.03   Patricia Ward Biederman
L.A. Times

When he went off to fight in Iraq, the 39-year-old Los Angeles resident did what any airman might do. He took with him a photo of his beloved, a reminder of who waits for him at home. But the airman is gay. So the photo he carries with him appears to be of his dog. The pet is in the foreground, and the man's partner of 5 years, a 41-year-old talent agent named Brian, is in the background, as if Brian were a friend who just wandered into the frame.
U.S. armed forces deem open homosexuality a risk to morale, good order, discipline and unit readiness. Gay servicemen & women who reveal their sexual orientation or are found to be homosexual are subject to discharge.

Brian and other partners of American military personnel are invisible players on the home front. Media photos of worried families of straight soldiers include tearful, poignant goodbyes or joyous reunions. Gay & lesbian partners can't access support services the military offers spouses. They can't be sure they would find out if their loved ones were wounded, captured or killed.
"We do our goodbyes at home behind closed doors and then drive to the base or the airport … and, there, we'll just shake hands like we're brothers or friends," Brian said. Brian's partner has been mobilized several times since they met, said Brian, who asked to be interviewed in a Beverly Hills restaurant, where other diners would not overhear. He declined to let his surname be printed, lest it reveal his partner's identity to other airmen. The men keep in touch by e-mail, but they never know who might be reading their exchanges. "We have to keep our e-mails very sterile & cryptic," Brian said.

Brian said he hates pretending that they are just pals, but subterfuge has become second nature for his partner after almost 20 years in USAF. Their caution extends to the greeting heard by anyone who calls their Westside home, a house that Brian lived in for years before he met his partner: "Our answering machine at home has to be in his voice only, no mention of me," Brian said.
Brian tolerates these evasions, which he blames on the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy. "Americans shouldn't have to do this," he said. A Defense Dept cial pointed out that "don't ask, don't tell" is the law and said: "The dept continues to work tirelessly to administer that law in a manner that is both fair & consistent. Defense Dept remains committed to treating all service members with dignity & respect while fairly enforcing the provisions of the law."

In 1982 the Defense Dept formalized World War II-era policies against allowing homosexuals to serve. As a presidential candidate, Bill Clinton supported repealing the ban, but early in his first term he softened his stance in the face of opposition from the military, Congress and a substantial portion of the U.S. public. The opposition argued that the presence of homosexual soldiers could offend or make other troops uncomfortable, undermining esprit de corps and possibly compromising security.
In 1994 the "don't ask, don't tell" compromise took effect. Recruits could not be asked their sexual orientation, but evidence of homosexual conduct could be turned over to unit commanders for fact-finding investigations. In recent years, most European countries have begun allowing out-of-the-closet gays to serve in their militaries. In the MidEast, closeted American gays serve alongside openly gay troops from Britain and Australia. Among the 19 NATO countries, 6 do not let openly gay men & women serve: Greece, Hungary, Poland, Portugal, Turkey and U.S.. Ireland & Israel are among the 24 nations that allow openly gay soldiers.

UC Santa Barbara Ctr for Study of Sexual Minorities in the Military dir. Aaron Belkin said his group is keeping watch to see whether other nations open their militaries to gays as a result of a 1999 ruling by the European Court of Human Rights that led to Britain's lifting of its ban in 2000.
Servicemembers Legal Defense Network in Washington has counseled & provided legal services to about 3,000 gay, lesbian and bisexual Americans in the military over the last decade. The defense network advises gay soldiers filling out military life insurance forms to describe the beneficiary partner only as a "friend."
Similarly, the defense network advises gay soldiers to use "friend" on the form that tells the military whom to notify in case the soldier is wounded, taken prisoner, missing in action or killed. Next of kin must be listed on notification forms as well, and blood relatives are more likely to be called than "friends," say the defense network and other advocates for gay soldiers. Unlike blood relatives and straight spouses, gay & lesbian partners don't have access to base support groups & services, and they often can't visit hospitalized service personnel, let alone have a voice in their treatment.

Brian is listed as a friend on his partner's notification form, and Brian doubts that he would be treated like a mourning spouse if his airman partner were to fall in battle. "If something were to happen to him, they're not going to knock on my door. They're going to go to the person who is first on that list, and the person who's first on that list is not going to tell me," Brian said.
In wartime, when manpower needs are high, soldiers who are identified as gay are less likely to be ousted than in peacetime, according to a 2001 report by the UC Santa Barbara center. Discharges often all but stop during the actual conflict, only to pick up again as soon as the fighting is over. Discharges for homosexuality tripled after World War II ended in 1945, the report notes. They also surged after the Korean War. After the Vietnam War, discharges for homosexuality didn't increase significantly until 1977.

UCSB report author sociologist Rhonda Evans speculates that the end of the draft heightened the need for willing soldiers, whatever their sexual orientation. During the 1991 Persian Gulf War, discharges of gay military members were put on hold, only to be started again when the fighting was over.
But gay service people in the U.S. military are always at risk of exposure, war or no war, advocates say. Defense network staff atty Kathi Wescott said the organization warns gay military members that their secret may not be safe even with their military physician, mental health professional or chaplain. Defense attys in a court martial or other legal proceeding in which a gay soldier is the defendant "are really the only safe place in the military where people can talk openly about their sexual orientation," she said.

According to the UCSB report, lesbians in the military are much more likely to be expelled than gay men. In 1999, almost a third of the 1,046 American military members discharged because of their sexual orientation were women, although they made up only 14% of the active armed forces.
27-year-old S.Calif. contractor Jen has been the partner for more than a year of a woman now serving on a Navy ship in the gulf. Jen, who also asked that her surname not be used, knows firsthand what happens to sailors who are identified as gays or lesbians. She graduated from the Naval Academy and served as a naval lieutenant until last year, when she was discharged after deciding, she said for reasons of integrity, to reveal that she is a lesbian.

Now she worries what will happen to her 34-year-old partner, who is coming to the end of a long career as an enlisted woman. The women talk every day via e-mail. Jen fills her partner in on what's happening at home, including the state of her finances. The active sailor signed 2 boxes of checks before she shipped out and trusts Jen to pay her bills on time.
Unlike Brian & his airman partner, the women are "pretty open" in their exchanges, though not so explicit as to raise alarm: "There's not a lot we censor," Jen said. They know that their e-mails are read by the Navy for security reasons, but they feel it is important to nurture their relationship, now more than ever, given the pressures of war & distance: "We work really hard at staying close," Jen said.

But the couple took precautions as well. The women created an e-mail account in the name of the mobilized partner. Both of them use that same sign-on when they correspond, which makes it almost impossible for anyone to identify the recipient of the sailor's e-mails.
The woman at war has an informal support group close at hand. 3 of her 4 roommates are lesbians, a statistical anomaly, according to the defense network's Wescott. (No one knows how many of the U.S.' 1.4 million service members are homosexual, but the UC Santa Barbara report repeats standard estimates of the size of the gay, lesbian and bisexual population in U.S., 1% to 6% of women and 2% to 8% of men report having had at least one sexual experience with someone of the same gender.)

Back home, Jen is cut off from the support system established by the military for spouses: "There are resources here on land I'm not allowed to tap into." The base ombudsman is off limits to her, for one: "If I were a spouse, I could call that person and find out what was happening on the ship," Jen said. Jen has a good relationship with her sailor partner's parents and trusts that they would call her if anything happened to her partner.
Being able to acknowledge their love, Jen said, "would take a weight off our shoulders." Although Jen said she is not bitter about the "don't ask, don't tell" policy that ended her naval career, she thinks reform is overdue. "The policy needs to change because there are so many gays serving and serving well," she said, sounding like any proud spouse of an American service member. "They're out there, and they're fighting for us."

As the troops return from the war, gay & lesbian military members will have to exercise restraint no one expects of the straight soldiers they fought beside. "The goodbyes are not the hardest part," Brian said. "It's the hellos. The first time you see your partner in 5 or 6 months, it's very emotional. And you have to shake hands."

The U.S. is "running out of demons. I'm down to Fidel Castro & Kim Il Sung"
Colin Powell, former Joint Chiefs of Staff chair & millenial Secretary of State
Robt. Borosage   "Inventing the Threat: The Clinton Defense Program" World Policy Journal Winter 1993-94
Ex-Envoy faults U.S. on N. Korea   Bush sr expert on the communist nation until he quit Jack Pritchard says face-to-face talks are vital to heading off nuclear escalation.   9.10.03   Sonni Efron L.A. Times

Wash.DC   State Dept's former sr expert on N.Korea said Tuesday that Bush admin refusal to engage directly with the country made it almost impossible to stop Pyongyang from going ahead with its plans to build, test and deploy nuclear weapons. 6 nation talks are a good step, but not enough, said Jack Pritchard, who was the dept's special envoy for negotiations with N.Korea until he resigned last month. U.S. should immediately initiate direct talks with the communist nation, he said.
"The idea that in a short period of time you can resolve this problem" in talks where diplomats from 6 countries sit down with 24 interpreters and try to make a deal without private consultations is "ludicrous," Pritchard said. "It cannot happen." Pritchard's resignation came as current and former U.S. officials described bitter fighting in the administration over how to deal with the problems posed by N.Korea's nuclear ambitions.

Some in the administration have argued that all contact with N.Korea, incl negotiations, constituted a reward for the regime of Kim Jong Il, which has long seen better relations with U.S. as key to ending its international isolation. These officials advocate taking a hard line against N. Korea.
The opposing camp has argued that even though U.S. might like to hasten the collapse of the regime, while the nuclear clock was ticking the U.S. must instead seek the narrower goal of persuading N. Korea to abandon its nuclear ambitions. They agree that Pyongyang must not be bribed into such a move, but they say Kim must be offered incentives and a way to save face.

Each side claims to be implementing the policies laid out by President Bush. One official, who is in favor of negotiations, expressed frustration with the bickering, saying he did not believe the president knew what his aides were doing in his name. When Bush gives aides his views and they turn it into "guidance" for subordinates to implement, "it doesn't come out anywhere near what a reasonable person would say is what the president meant," the official said.
"The secretary [Powell] got his marching orders from the president on this one," a sr State Dept official said. The administration is willing to talk to N. Korea directly within the context of 6 party talks, but because N. Korea's nuclear ambitions threaten the entire region, its neighbors must be involved in the solution, the senior official said.

Pritchard "says we have to have a bilateral or nothing ever happens. The secretary & president say N. Korea doesn't make the rules," the official said, adding that America will not come running every time N. Korea "does something stupid. Our strategy is to say no." In interview Tuesday, Pritchard, 28 year military veteran, State Dept and National Security Council, said he did not resign in protest, and did not have an ax to grind.
Pritchard said he decided to speak out on policy issues because of the urgent need to stop N. Korea's nuclear weapons program. N. Korea has claimed to be reprocessing its 8,000 spent plutonium fuel rods, and U.S. officials believe that it might produce 6 or more nuclear weapons within a year.

The CIA believes that N. Korea probably already has 2 nuclear devices, and Pyongyang has said it might test or export its weapons depending on how U.S. responds to its demands. At 6 party talks in Beijing last month, the Bush admin made an overture to Kim by saying it would agree to a step-by-step approach by which N. Korea would not have to unilaterally disarm before seeing any benefits. Some news reports billed that as a major shift in U.S. policy.
In remarks Monday at his new employer D.C. think tank Brookings Institution, Pritchard called the movement "minuscule." Pritchard's departure made waves in Washington because he was the longest-serving admin N. Korea expert. He has met with N. Korean diplomats for years and accompanied former Sec. State Albright to her meetings with Kim in 2000. In the Clinton administration, Pritchard was seen as a hard-liner, arguing, for example, that President Clinton should not visit Pyongyang, the N. Korean capital. Later, his support for engaging N. Korea, at least in direct discussions, placed him in the left wing of the Bush administration, and he was denounced in the conservative media as an appeaser.

Pritchard argued Tuesday that mere contact with U.S. did not affect N. Korea's strategic decisions. In 2000, even as sr N. Korean military official was in the Oval Office handing Clinton an invitation from Kim to visit, N. Korea was moving from dabbling with a research & development program in highly enriched uranium to a secret program to make bombs, Pritchard said. (Clinton declined the invitation.)
U.S. later received intelligence that Pakistan had provided N. Korea with a large number of centrifuges for uranium enrichment, according to U.S. & Asian sources. When Asst Sec. State James A. Kelly confronted Pyongyang with the evidence Oct. 2002, N. Koreans first denied it, then acknowledged the program and said they had a right to nuclear weapons.

Since then, however, N. Korea has been insisting that it does not have a secret uranium enrichment program and never told Kelly that it did. It has said that Kelly misunderstood what he was told, perhaps because of a translation problem. N. Korea raised the issue again at the Beijing talks, rattling some of the other participants.
U.S. sources incl Pritchard, however, said the U.S. intelligence community was unanimous in its confidence that the intelligence on the secret program was solid, and that the message to Kelly was unmistakable. "The N. Koreans are rewriting history for their own reasons," Pritchard said.
'Axis of evil' countries push bomb programs
U.S. attention might have spurred efforts
12.14.02   Ron Kampeas AP

Wash.D.C.   The countries dubbed an axis of evil" by President Bush may be going nuclear, U.S. officials fear. N.Korea said it would resume its nuclear program the same week U.S. officials lent credence to recent reports that Iraq & Iran are actively seeking the fissile material, enriched uranium or plutonium, they need most for membership in the nuclear club.
Bush placed containment of all 3 nations at the top of his to-do list in January, when he described an axis of evil in his State of the Union address that posed a "growing danger" by developing weapons of mass destruction. That might have been a self-fulfilling prophecy, said Carnegie Endowment for Intl Peace John Wolfsthal. "While they were proliferating before they were called the axis of evil, calling them by that name may have accelerated their programs," he said yesterday.

U.S. is using different approaches to containing each of the 3. Regarding Iran, U.S. officials Thursday endorsed claims by an Iranian opposition group that the govt may be using 2 construction sites in central Iran to develop nuclear weapons, a nuclear fuel production plant & research lab at Natanz and a heavy water production plant at Arak that could be part of a plutonium program.
Iran denied the allegations yesterday; U.S. does not believe Iran has yet made nuclear weapons. Iran's lack of fissile material is its main obstacle to building nuclear weapons. Reports that Iran is constructing an underground nuclear facility "reinforce our already grave concern that Iran is seeking technology to produce fissile material for nuclear weapons," State Dept spokesman Richard Boucher said yesterday.

The concern about Iraq is also about its search for fissile material. The 12,000 pages of documents filed with the Intl Atomic Energy Agency last weekend fail to address U.S. intelligence reports of a recent purchase of uranium in Africa, and purchases in Western countries of high-tech equipt that could be used in a uranium enrichment program.

Officials in N.Korea, meanwhile, said they will reactivate nuclear facilities frozen under a 1994 deal with Washington. They blamed the Bush administration's hard line for the policy change. Western officials believe N.Korea built one or two plutonium-based nuclear bombs before it froze its nuclear facilities in 1994, and could quickly generate enough plutonium for several more bombs if the program resumes.
Bush spoke by telephone yesterday with S.Korean President Kim Dae-jung and agreed to seek a "peaceful resolution" to the crisis, although both said they could not accept N. Korea's resumption of its nuclear weapons program.
Richard Armitage, deputy secretary of state, sounded optimistic about persuading the North to back down. "We believe that the situation on the Korean Peninsula lends itself to the possibility of a diplomatic solution," he said in Australia.
Wolfsthal shares such optimism, saying N. Korea ultimately seeks the good graces of U.S.


Pyongyang, N. Korea   Whichever of the two losers assumed the presidency of these U.S. mattered not at all in terms of construction of a "Star Wars," or Ballistic Missile Defense, system, since both promised to begin work on it. Indeed, this agreement may well form part of the much-anticipated healing process between the two party oligarchies. (Perhaps Bush will retain the services of William Cohen, who was a compassionate conservative to begin with, at the Defense Dept. Gore could have generously found room for a Powell/Rice clone in the same capacity.)

Given the proven & demonstrated unworkability and cost of the proposed system, it is very slightly more probable that Bush could cancel it without loss of face. But the "contractor community" (as I once heard it seriously called) has demands and donations to make and raised expectations to be fulfilled, and the exorbitant amount already committed may need to be justified, so it is sure that we will be hearing a great deal more about the need to protect ourselves from N.Korea.

How to convey the absurdity of this? Take the example of the Taepodong missile test, that "shot heard round the world," when the N.Koreans fired a rocket into the air and watched it splash down on the other side of Japan. Red alerts all around, huge talk about a new "rogue state" and a threat from sinister Asian Stalinism. Well, the most salient fact about that missile test was that, like the more grandiose Pacific tests of the Star Wars interceptors, it was a failure.
The objective of the Taepodong rocket was to get a N.Korean satellite into orbit; no signal from any such satellite has ever been picked up.

This puts the N.Korean regime in an embarrassing position, because it proudly announced that the launch was a success. However, the hysterical Western reaction to the test has helped transform impotence into potency, an uncovenanted propaganda victory for Kim Jong Il and his regime. At the "Mass Games" in the May Day stadium in Pyongyang, which I attended a few days before Sec. State Madeleine Albright arrived to watch the replay, the centerpiece "special effect" was a giant montage of the Taepodong missile thrusting its way skyward, as if to bring the might of the Dear Leader to the attention of a waiting world.

They say that visitors to N.Korea see only what the regime wants them to see. This is not true. In a country with almost no vehicles on its roads, one of the commonest sights is a group of soldiers from the Korean People's Army, peering mournfully into the innards of a broken-down transport. I hardly think that these scenes were provided just to lull me into a sense of false security, either, any more than were the bald tires and clapped-out accouterments of the top-of-the-line tourist bus on which I traveled.

The power cuts & blackouts in the capital, the people taking care of their laundry & personal hygiene needs in an open drain in the city of Kaesong, the bullocks doing much of the work on main highways, abandoned projects & buildings, the peasants scavenging food by the grain in the fields, none of these are Potemkin showpieces.

It is even worse in the northern provinces, where visitors don't get taken at all. I've seen film secretly shot from across the Chinese border, where towns and factories are completely idle because the plants and machinery were broken up for barter during the famine. Good reports describe the once-vital coal mines as being often flooded and partially abandoned. (The pumps don't work because the vandals took the handles.) It's always worth remembering that N.Korea embarked on the building of a nuclear power station in the first place because it wanted to end dependence on coal.

Everything you have read about the party state in N. Korea is true or understated; from a purely human point of view it is the most literally oppressive and regimented society I have ever seen. But total control has diminishing returns; you cannot orchestrate people more than 100%, and you cannot manage them all the time. The same goes for ideology. In its proclamations about US imperialism the regime outdoes the rhetoric of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, but in its actual negotiations it conducts a tough but entirely pragmatic diplomacy.
If this were not so, there might well have been a nuclear exchange on the Korean peninsula in the summer of 1994. When the worst has been said about the Clinton Administration's abysmal foreign and military policy (much of it by me), it must be admitted that the President did overrule a crazed "pre-emptive-war party" in Washington and, with typical secrecy, hesitation and reluctance-replayed in miniature Truman's veto of Gen. Douglas MacArthur. (For an account of this almost unknown moment of near-calamity, see Don Oberdorfer's invaluable book The Two Koreas.)

In closed sessions, the N.Koreans have agreed to a deal whereby they close down their graphite reactors and put the rods into "cooling ponds," allowing intl inspection of the latter to determine whether there is any stray reprocessable plutonium. In return the U.S. will help furnish light-water reactors (which are much less proliferation- friendly) in order to help overcome the country's energy crisis. I have actually met some of the on-the-ground invigilators of the Intl Atomic Energy Agency, tough & cynical guys who say that the agreement is being properly observed. But this leaves us with a mystery, or at any rate a conundrum.
In secret, the military & intelligence authorities of the U.S. have concluded an agreement with Pyongyang that does them some credit and that has averted what could have been an annihilating confrontation. In public, the political leadership speaks as if an impoverished & exhausted N.Korea is so menacing & intractable that it requires the investment of untold billions in a destabilizing & fraudulent boondoggle. If this is not rogue behavior, then I should very much like to know what is.
    Israel      
  [ shades of the Stern gang & 1948 ]
Israel to stick to killings policy
7.3.01  
AP

Jerusalem   Ariel Sharon & his closest advisers brushed aside U.S. criticism and said Tuesday that Israel would stick to its policy of tracking down and killing suspected Palestinian militants. Israel television reported that a forum of top Israeli leaders authorized the military to step up the campaign of targeted killings. Sharon's spokesman, Raanan Gissin, said the number of killings depends on Palestinian efforts to stop attacks. "The less they do, the more we have to do," he said. A senior Palestinian official, Ahmed Abdel Rahman, called the Israeli policy "the biggest violation" yet of the faltering Mideast cease-fire.
Israel insists it will carry out pre-emptive strikes in a bid to prevent Palestinian attacks that have persisted despite the U.S.-brokered truce. Israel's deputy defense minister, Dalia Rabin-Pelossof, who was part of the forum of Israeli leaders that met Tuesday, defended the policy. "When we know of a terrorist who is a ticking bomb, meaning he is on his way, carrying explosives, to carry out an attack in Israel, it is incumbent on us to prevent it and that is what we do," she said.
  [ Who when defines known terrorist on his way carrying explosives? Presumably the military, hopefully distinguished from the secret police. ]

Rabin-Pelossof, daughter of assassinated Israeli leader Yitzhak Rabin, was asked about media reports that Prime Minister Sharon was weighing a broad assault against the Palestinian Authority if the cease-fire collapsed entirely. "We have to consider all the existing options," she told Israel radio. Interviewed by German television, Sharon said he is committed to the cease-fire and blamed Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat for the violence. "The Palestinian Authority is behind terror and has done nothing to stop it," he said. The continuing unrest has prevented the launch of a seven-day test-period the sides agreed to during Sec.State Colin Powell's visit last week. Israel says that for the count to begin there must be no violence whatsoever. The test-period would trigger a series of other stages leading to resumed peace talks.
Israel began its targeted attacks against Palestinian militants last November, and has killed 24 people in 19 attacks, according to the Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights. The attacks have included helicopter strikes, exploding telephones and sniper shootings. In the most recent raid, an Israeli helicopter fired missiles Sunday night, obliterating a car carrying 3 militants in the West Bank which was, according to Israel, filled with explosives. A total of 6 Palestinians and 2 Israelis were killed Sunday & Monday in the worst surge of violence since the cease-fire was declared June 13. No major violence was reported Tuesday as of the evening, but both sides said the truce remained unstable.

"The Israelis are the ones who violate it," Arafat said. "We are passing through a very dangerous period." Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said the truce was in "a profound crisis and everything has to be done to save it." A meeting between Israeli and Palestinian security chiefs Monday night was acrimonious and produced no breakthroughs, both sides said. Peres, the most prominent dove in Sharon's govt, has come under criticism from some fellow Cabinet members for his willingness to meet with Palestinian leaders despite the violence. But he said he would press ahead. "If I am not allowed to fulfill the foreign policy in which I believe, there is no point in my being foreign minister," he said. He called for removal of settler outposts in the West Bank, which were set up without permission. "It is a first-class political mistake" to refuse to remove the outposts, Peres said. "It focuses attention on an issue on which the world is united against us."
U.S. State Dept said Monday the Palestinians were not doing enough to prevent violence, but spokesman Richard Boucher also stressed that U.S. was "opposed to Israel's policy of targeted killings." Israeli Science Minister Matan Vilnai scoffed at the U.S. criticism. "I'm not sure they (American officials) really understand the rules of the game," Vilnai told Israel Radio. "I would like to see how the Americans would react if a car packed with explosives blew up in the middle of Manhattan." On Monday, 2 car bombs exploded in central Israel, but no one was hurt. A radical Palestinian group, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, said it carried out the attack to avenge the killing of Islamic Jihad activists Sunday.

Assassinations will continue, Israel says
8.1.01 M.Kalman & B.Nichols USA TODAY

Jerusalem   Israel said Wednesday that it will continue targeting extremists despite international criticism of its "pre-emptive strikes" against Palestinian terrorism suspects. The decision came a day after an Israeli army helicopter fired missiles on the offices of the militant group Hamas in the West Bank city of Nablus. Eight people were killed in the attack, including two children. As many as 20,000 people attended the victims' funeral. Among those killed Tuesday was Jamal Mansour, a senior Hamas leader who had been arrested several times by the Israelis and Palestinian Authority. Two Palestinian boys who were in a nearby shop also died.
Israel said the Hamas officials targeted in Tuesday's attack planned and executed a string of suicide bombings and were finalizing plans for an attack in Jerusalem. "This really was a preventive action," said Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, a key member of the peace process that has come to a standstill amid a cycle of killing and retaliation. Peres said Israel was under attack and had no choice but to respond with force. "We simply have no other option," he said.

This week has been the bloodiest in the region since a suicide bombing killed 21 Israelis on June 1 in Tel Aviv. Since the latest cycle of fighting erupted Sept. 28, 551 Palestinians & 133 Israelis have been killed. The assassinations of Palestinians, so far about 50 have been killed, have generated international outrage. In an interview Wednesday with CNN, Sec.State Powell reiterated the U.S. condemnation of the attacks. "We felt that this was a targeted killing of the kind that we have spoken out and condemned in the past, and we did so yesterday, both at the White House and in the State Dept," Powell said. "This kind of response is too aggressive, and it just serves to increase the level of tension and violence in the region."
During a conversation Sharon reportedly had with Powell on Wednesday, the Israeli leader defended the latest missile strike. According to media reports, Sharon told Powell that Israel has a right to defend itself. Also condemning the Israeli attack were China, Egypt and Mary Robinson, UNations' high commissioner for human rights. U.S. officials said no new peace initiatives are planned. They said the administration is committed to a cease-fire that CIA Dir. Geo. Tenet mediated June 13. Peres said the White House's harsh response to Tuesday's strike surprised him. "I was slightly amazed by it because the Americans knew that we didn't do it with joy, with enthusiasm or by choice," he said.

Some in the region said the targeted attacks violate international law. "The govt itself does not refer to the current conflict as war," said Gabi Lasky, a lawyer & Peace Now activist. "Regardless of definition, there are rules of war stating what is allowed and what is not." Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo called on Israel to agree to international observers. Israel has rejected posting observers in the Palestinian territories. Israel says it would be unfairly blamed for retaliatory and preventive attacks.
In Nablus, Palestinians chanting "Death to Israel" marched in a funeral procession for the eight dead. Palestinian flags were used as shrouds for Bilal & Ashraf Khalil, ages 8 & 10, the brothers who were killed Tuesday. The six men were buried in green religious banners. Some of the mourners fired shots in the air amid cries for a jihad, or holy war, against Israel.

Israeli airstrike kills 2 Palestinian militants   ¹ Men were reportedly laying a bomb near the fence between Gaza, Israel   2.19.06   AP

Gaza City, Gaza Strip   An Israeli aircraft attacked two Palestinians laying a bomb near the Gaza-Israel border fence on Sunday, military officials said. 2 militants were killed, Palestinians said. Palestinian medical officials said the 2 bodies were recovered in Khouza'a, a border village near the Palestinian city of Khan Younis.
Residents said the 2 men, ages 18 and 20, were members of the Popular Resistance Committees, a militant group that has carried out several deadly bombings on Israeli targets in the past. The resistance committees did not immediately comment on the incident.
The Israeli military officials told AP the men had been involved in rocket attacks on Israeli targets over the past week. The officials could not be identified under Israeli military regulations.

MK seeks court ban on targeting terrorists
8.3.01   Moshe Reinfeld Ha'aretz (Israel)

MK Mohammed Barakeh (Hadash) yesterday petitioned the High Court of Justice with a demand that it prohibit PM Ariel Sharon & Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer from approving "executions without trial" of Palestinians from the territories. Barakeh also asked the court to issue an injunction to suspend the "assassination policy" until it rules on the petition. The High Court will discuss the petition in two months, as well as a similar one submitted by the widow of Dr. Thabet Thabet, who headed Fatah in Tul Karm until he was killed by Israeli forces late last year.
Barakeh argued that the decisions on "summary executions" are taken behind closed doors, on the basis of unreliable intelligence information and without judicial review. He said the continuation of the assassinations policy escalates the armed confrontation, in which a small number of Palestinians are involved, into unnecessary bloodshed that includes innocent victims on both sides. An example of this, Barakeh claimed, is the fact that after Thabet's death a group of Palestinians shot dead 2 Israeli civilians in revenge.

'Human shields' protect Beit Jala residents
8.3.01   Amos Harel Ha'aretz (Israel)

30 human rights activists from Israel, Europe and America have moved in with Palestinian families in Beit Jala to act as "human shields" against heavy IDF firing into the village across the wadi from Gilo. The IDF says it is trying to find out exactly where the activists are staying for fear that wounding or killing any of them would create an international incident. The group, calling itself "the International Solidarity Movement," says its mission is to prevent harm to innocent Palestinians in the village when the IDF retaliates with artillery & missiles for rifle fire from Palestinian snipers. Several Palestinians and a German doctor have been killed and dozens have been wounded by IDF fire at Beit Jala in response to sniper fire at Gilo.

At least two of the 30 are Israeli women and the group says more activists are due to arrive soon. Neta Golan, who has been living in the village for the past few weeks, told Ha'aretz yesterday the activists are staying with Palestinian families in homes that have already been shelled. "I'm living with a family in which a five-year-old boy lost a hand from Israeli fire a few weeks ago. On Wednesday night, shells hit the building." Another activist left a house with the family moments before a missile struck it. Golan says the activists "are not deluded into believing" that they can prevent shooting, "but we hope to draw international attention. It's clear it would be more upsetting to the IDF to hit one of us than some innocent Palestinians."

Golan says she has spotted Palestinians firing from Beit Jala toward Gilo. The IDF says it has spotted 3 women from the group in a house snipers have used as a base in the past. Golan concedes the women were in the house, but not while there was any firing from it. "We aren't here to provide cover for Palestinian snipers," she says, "but for the civilians who are hit by Israeli fire." She says most Palestinian shooting is ineffectual and called the IDF responses "exaggerated." She said nobody from the IDF has contacted her to find out where she or the group is staying. IDF sources say the army is aware of the existence of the group in Beit Jala and is trying to avoid hitting any of them. They say that attempts to reach an arrangement with Palestinian officers to prevent fire from Beit Jala failed this week following the helicopter attack on the Hamas offices in Nablus. The sources say the Palestinian officers are "afraid" to confront the gunmen in Beit Jala.

Israel launch reprisal attacks
1.26.02  
AP

Gaza City   Israeli F-16 warplanes have bombed Palestinian positions in Gaza City & the West Bank city of Tulkarem, in reprisal for a suicide bombing in Tel Aviv that left 18 injured. Warplanes pounded the Palestinian security compound in Gaza City, known as Ansar camp, in two waves. The compound sits next to the offices of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, which have been blitzed several times since the outbreak of the 16- month Palestinian uprising or intifada. At least one Palestinian was wounded in the late-night strikes, Palestinian hospital sources said. In the West Bank, an Israeli F-16 fired a missile, destroying a building close to the governor's building in Tulkarem, which has also been used as a headquarters for the security services and was hit by warplanes on January 18. A Palestinian security man was killed and some 40 other people were wounded in that attack. Today in Tel Aviv, a suicide bomber killed himself and injured 18 others, 3 seriously, in the first human bomb blast in Israel since Dec. 2.

    Israeli targeted killings gone awry
    4.6.02   Peter Kenyon NPR
preface   In addition to its military offensive in the West Bank, Israeli forces renewed its targeting killings of suspected terrorists. The policy is criticized as violation of international law, but Israeli officials defend it as a legitimate way of preventing further loss of innocent lives. Besides the ethical questions surrounding that policy, it can also be dangerous for both Palestinian bystanders & Israeli soldiers.
Hebron   The full scale incursion Hebronites were bracing for yesterday didn't materialize although Israeli soldiers manning rooftop sniper posts were on edge. But most of the action in Hebron involved isolated attacks on wanted Palestinian suspects. Both operations proved to be deadly for the wrong people.

On Thursday morning, an undercover unit of the Israeli border police pulled up to a Hebron house in an unmarked civilian car. They were looking for Hasan Kafeeshe (sic), a wanted gunmen from the Tanzi (sic) militia which is linked to Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement. There are conflicting accounts of what happened next. Israeli officials said a gunfight erupted between the police and Kafeeshe & his brother. Hasan's father said his son ran away as soon as the police pulled up. "I was at the store just down from the house and Hasan was with me. I told him to run away."
There's no doubt shots were fired because one of them killed Border Police Superintendent Patrick Poleg (sic). 30 year old Poleg left behind a wife & 2 children. Hasan's wife, Haola, says she doesn't know if the Israelis will keep pursuing her husband. "They want to make our lives difficult. Maybe Hasan carries a gun to protect his family & his house, but, to the Israelis, anyone who carries a gun is a terrorist. I think they were mad because they didn't get him."

Signs of Israeli anger & frustration are everywhere. Water pours from a bullet riddled rooftop tank of his neighbor. From the roof, there is a clear view of the remains of Hasan's house. Neighbor Mohammed Abusneni says the army was thorough in its demolition job. Three tanks shells hit the house, then the bulldozer went to work. Then more shells and finally at night, they laid explosives and blew the place up, damaging homes for 100 yards around.

Yesterday came the second assassination attempt, a rocket fired from a helicopter destroyed a car sitting at an intersection. The intended target, a wanted Islamic Jihad activist, heard the helicopters and bolted from the car before it was hit, according to witnesses. But others weren't as lucky. A young boy happened to be close to the car when the rocket hit. Witnesses said it looked like Mohammed Shreyer simply burst into flame as the car turned into a fireball. At the hospital, doctors said he suffered second and third degree burns over 90% of his body.

2 operations using state of the art equipt and intelligence resulted in one dead Israeli police officer and one horribly burned Palestinian boy. Israelis have seen similar carnage after suicide bombings. They say something has to be done to stop the attacks. Israeli security sources say with Sec.State Powell's visit imminent, it's critical to try to eliminate as many potential bombers as possible, and these operations will continue as necessary.

Cheney sees 'some justification' in Israeli attacks
8.3.01  
Reuters

WASHINGTON   VP Cheney said Friday that Israel had "some justification" when it deliberately killed Palestinians thought to be planning bombings. In remarks that contradict State Dept policy on the attacks, Cheney told Fox News: "If you've got an organization that has plotted or is plotting some kind of suicide bomber attack, for example, and they (the Israelis) have hard evidence of who it is and where they're located, I think there's some justification in their trying to protect themselves by preempting." ¹

State Dept spokesman Richard Boucher repeated on Thursday the long-standing U.S. position that it opposes the Israeli govt's policy of killing prominent Palestinians. "We're against this practice of targeted killings," he told his daily briefing. On the phone with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on Wednesday, Sec.State C.Powell criticized an attack that killed 8 people in or near a Hamas office in the West Bank city of Nablus on Tuesday.
Cheney told Fox News it would be better if the Israelis could work with the Palestinian Authority of President Yasser Arafat to prevent bombings and imprison people planning them. "In some cases they (the Israelis) have in fact gone to the Palestinian authorities with names & locations, and asked that the Palestinians take action against the terrorists in Palestinian territory. And when the Palestinians have failed to do that, then the Israelis have gone forward and launched a strike," he added.

The State Dept & the White House denied this week a Washington Post report that they were at odds over how to deal with Israeli-Palestinian violence. Powell said they had "a consistent view" of Israeli targeted attacks. White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said: "The administration … at all levels, deplores the violence there and that includes the targeted attacks." A State Dept official said he could not comment immediately on Cheney's remarks.

    Israel's firepower challenged
    4.5.02   Paul Adams BBC
… mounting Israeli toll inflicted by suicide bombers, the army is perhaps more concerned that recent weeks have seen a devastating sniper attack on an Israeli checkpoint and disabling of 2 Merkava battle tanks. For the military, this is uncomfortably familiar, inviting parallels with events in southern Lebanon, where Israel's occupation ended 2 years ago. Hezbollah guerrillas harried their opponents with roadside bombs & rocket attacks, eventually forcing Israel's withdrawal. Some analysts believe Hezbollah's example has stirred Palestinian militants to follow suit.
Both conflicts have provided uncomfortable lessons in what military theorists call "asymmetric warfare", use of unconventional tactics to counter an enemy's overwhelming conventional military superiority. When superior power takes on highly motivated gunmen fighting to protect their homeland, effect on morale can be corrosive, particularly if the superior power starts to take casualties. Years of practice, and support from Syria & Iran, turned Hezbollah into an extremely effective fighting force. Disparate Palestinian militant groups & security organs have yet to coalesce into something equally threatening, but the longer this conflict rages, the harder Israel may find it to maintain the advantage.

Israel's foremost military historian Prof. Martin Van Creveld, "he who is wise should never engage the weak for any length of time." During 1987-1993 intifada, Creveld warned a force trained & equipped to fight conventional battles in wars seen as existential struggles might suffer if asked to perform duties more naturally suited to riot police. The second intifada has proved infinitely more complex than the first, with Palestinians gunmen using a variety of weapons. But military imbalance is still glaringly obvious; death toll among unarmed Palestinian civilians appalls outside observers.
One result is growing number of soldiers & officers refusing to serve in the occupied territories. Israeli newspapers say that a record number of them, 21, are now in jail. The movement representing so-called "refuseniks" claims that 400 reservists & officers have now signed a letter declaring their refusal to serve in the territories. Despite years of rioting & low-level guerrilla activity, Israeli Defence Force has yet to develop an effective response, relying instead on heavy-handed reprisals that arguably serve to make a bad situation much worse. …


recruit Powell says U.S. opposes targeted Israeli killings
7.5.01  
Reuters   ¹

Wash.D.C.   Sec.State Powell on Thursday underlined U.S. opposition to targeted strikes against Palestinian militants, one day after the Israeli security cabinet decided to resume the tactic. "We continue to express our distress and opposition to these kinds of targeted killings and we will continue to do so," Powell said in an interview with Reuters. However, he said that since the Israeli decision came out in media reports, there had been no such action by Israel. "But our well-known opposition to this kind of action is intact," he added. Powell said he still believed the Israelis, led by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, and Palestinians could not get started on a plan for peace sketched out by a committee led by former U.S. Senator George Mitchell until violence levels fell.
But the two sides disagree about what constitutes an appropriate level from which to start moving, he noted. "Mr Sharon says it has to go down to what he calls absolute quiet. The Palestinians believe that it's at a level now that we should move forward on the Mitchell plan," Powell said. Neither U.S. nor any other institution or country was "in a position to dictate to the parties when it begins. It is a judgement that the two of them have to make and Mr. Sharon has set for himself a very high standard," he said. Powell's remarks contrasted starkly with a Palestinian emphasis on moving swiftly beyond a cease-fire and cooling-off period prescribed by Mitchell to confidence-building measures. "At the moment I don't think any reasonable person would look at the situation ... and say that the level of violence has gone down to a point where someone would say we should all agree that it has reached a level where we should move forward," he said.

Israeli soldiers killed a Palestinian and critically wounded another in the West Bank on Thursday, further eroding a shaky three-week-old cease-fire. Powell said there was no immediate plan for a high-level visit like his trip to the Middle East last month or by CIA Director George Tenet, who mediated the June 13 truce. But he said Washington remained committed to the peace process, stressing his belief that the Mitchell plan, which he has described as "the only game in town", was the way forward. U.S. officials say there is "no plan B" if Mitchell's fails. "We remain deeply involved and engaged. It's a source of continuing discussion here. It's a source of continuing discussion between me and my ambassadors in the region and our consul general in Jerusalem. "I will continue to consult with the parties in the region, but there is no scheduled plan right now for another high-level visit," Powell said.

pleas for calm
He made clear his strategy for now was to plead for calm. "I just keep imploring both sides to do everything they can to restrain their passions, to keep from inciting the other side with statements and rhetoric and to do everything within their power to bring under control those who might be responsible, and are responsible, for violence and terrorism." This is a far cry from July last year when the Clinton administration hosted a marathon summit at Camp David that ended inconclusively but broke new ground in tackling some of the toughest issues, including the fate of Jerusalem. The U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity said there was "no alternative in mind" if the Mitchell plan failed. "We've given it our best shot ... Hopefully the period of relative calm developing over the last few days is going to stay," he said. "The plan isn't very complex because the problem is so incredibly simple. It's that the two sides don't trust each other and they can't get a hold of the violence."
The Mitchell plan envisages confidence-building steps by the two sides after seven consecutive days of calm, and a return to talks shattered when violence erupted in September. "We're hopeful but it's hard to be optimistic given how many times we've seen a period of calm followed by renewed violence," the U.S. official said.

U.S. urges Syria to exercise restraint after raid
7.7.01   Reuters

Damascus   U.S. Middle East envoy William Burns urged Syria on Saturday to exercise maximum restraint after an Israeli strike on a Syrian military post in Lebanon in which three soldiers were wounded. Burns told reporters he also told Syrian Foreign Minister Farouq al-Shara that Syrian-Israeli peace talks, broken off over 18 months ago, could revive if the confrontation halted in Lebanon between Israel, Syria and Syria's Hizbollah guerrilla allies. The U.S. envoy, who held similar talks with Lebanese leaders in Beirut on Friday, said attacks across the United Nations "blue line" on the Lebanese-Israeli border would block peace efforts. "I emphasized the critical importance for all parties at minimizing violence, maximizing restraint, and avoiding the escalation which can arise from violations of the blue line," Burns said. "Violence of that sort will make it much harder to revive the comprehensive process that I think we all seek," he said. The U.N. envoy's talks in Damascus follow last Sunday's Israeli air strike on a Syrian radar post deep inside Lebanon in retaliation for a Hizbollah missile attack on Israeli troops occupying the disputed Shebaa Farms area near the border.

Two Syrian troops & a Lebanese soldier were wounded in the raid on the Syrian post in the Bekaa valley, where Syria maintains some 20,000 troops. The raid, which drew a Hizbollah counter-strike on Israeli troops in Shebaa farms, was the second such attack since April. Hizbollah, backed by Syria and Iran, led Lebanese resistance which forced Israel to withdraw its troops out of south Lebanon last year after a 22-year-old occupation. The United Nations recognized Israel's pullout as complete and demarcated its extent with the so-called blue line, at the edge of which lies Shebaa Farms.
The U.N. regards Hizbollah attacks on Shebaa and Israeli counter-strikes as violations of the blue line. It does not recognize Lebanese claims that Shebaa is Lebanese territory, saying it is Syrian land occupied by Israel. Syria has held sporadic peace talks with Israel since 1991 but the negotiations broke off in January last year without reaching agreement on the fate of the Golan Heights, captured by Israel from Syria in the 1967 Middle East war. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said in an interview released on Saturday that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was planning a war in the region. "Today he is planning an even more extensive war because he cannot cope with a crisis in Israel," Assad told the German weekly magazine Der Spiegel.

U.S. asks Israel to end policy of assassinations
8.3.01   N.Guttman & A.Benn Ha'aretz

U.S. yesterday asked Israel to stop conducting operations such as the helicopter attack on the Hamas offices in Nablus earlier this week because such actions damage Washington's relations with other countries in the Middle East. In contacts between Israeli and American representatives after the Tuesday attack, U.S. officials asked Israeli counterparts to "understand Washington's interests" in the region and to keep them in mind. But Washington yesterday refrained from a direct public condemnation of the govt decision to continue the policy of assassinations against known terrorists while stating its reservations about the policy.
A U.S. State Dept spokesman said that the U.S. "has always been against a policy of assassinations," while White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said that the U.S. calls on all sides to show restraint "and that definition includes" opposition to the assassination policy. The U.S. also did not directly and publicly condemn the use of U.S.-made Apache helicopters for the missile attack on the Hamas offices.

The security cabinet yesterday decided to continue with the current policy of "downing terrorists." A senior diplomatic source said that "the current policy is much more effective against terror and also politically. This is not the time to bomb empty buildings or move into Area A. And nobody suggested escalation. The decision remains to continue and to monitor the situation, and to adapt policy if necessary." "We are committed to the Mitchell report and the Tenet plan, to regional stability and the prevention of escalation. And we are acting with the necessary responsibility."
PM Ariel Sharon, who received a phone call from U.S. Sec.State Powell last night, convened the security cabinet for a 5 hour discussion of the govt's strategy versus the Palestinians. Ministers heard briefings from all the relevant security services, and there was a consensus between the head of the Shin Bet and Military Intelligence that Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat has the situation under his control, influences and encourages terror attacks. Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said that Arafat should not be attacked. According to participants in the meeting, nobody in the meeting suggested a major military operation or any other form of toppling the PA.

Sharon, Peres, Defense Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer and his deputy Dalia Rabin-Pelessof, and Finance Minister Silvan Shalom took part in the meeting. The Sharon-Powell conversation was initiated by Powell who asked about the situation. Sharon said the Nablus attack was against people who had organized terror attacks in the past and planned more in the future. He told Powell, "it's our right and duty to defend ourselves, the way the U.S. defends its citizens. The PA doesn't act to prevent the murders and hasn't stopped the fighting for a single day." He said that 45% of Israeli casualties since the beginning of the Intifada have been by Palestinian Authority forces, "and Arafat has done nothing to stop the terror and Israel won't negotiate under fire."
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher called Peres to express concern about the situation and to condemn the "assassinations" policy. Peres denied that Israel was involved in the deaths of the six Fatah men in Jenin earlier this week, before the Nablus attack. He justified the Nablus attack, saying that the names of the Hamas activists had been given to the PA but it did nothing to stop their activities. Later yesterday, Peres said the time had come to seek a cease-fire by talking with the Palestinians "across the board, and not just about military affairs."

The Peres-Maher conversation created a brief flurry of tension between Peres' office and Sharon's, after Peres issued a statement saying that Israel agreed to an American presence in Rafah, as requested by Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. An hour later, Sharon's office issued a statement saying that Israel had not agreed to anything regarding observers or monitors." And an hour after that, Peres' office said that Arafat had raised the idea of Rafah monitors in his last meeting with Peres in Cairo. Peres promised to look into it and the next day told Egypt that Israel was not opposed. But nothing had happened since. Peres also spoke with his German counterpart Joschka Fischer yesterday, who expressed concern about the deteriorating situation.

Washington's worried
U.S. anxiety about the impact of the hostilities between Israel and the Palestinians on U.S. relations with the Arab world is beginning to have an impact on Washington's attitude toward the crisis. Saudia Arabia has been applying pressure on the administration to restrain Israel and return the parties to the negotiating table. Egypt and Jordan have also been calling for Washington to intervene to calm the situation. President George Bush heard that directly from King Abdullah in a phone call on Tuesday.
State Dept Spokesman Richard Boucher said yesterday that Israel heard U.S. reservations about the helicopter attack on the Nablus Hamas offices from both Undersecretary of State Richard Armitage, who met with Cabinet Secretary Gideon Sa'ar, and in a meeting between U.S. Ambassador Daniel Kurtzer and Israeli officials in Israel. Hours after the Israeli attack on Tuesday, Cong. John Dingell held a hearing on U.S. relations with the Arab world, where various spokesmen for the American-Arab community called for a more balanced U.S. policy toward the conflict. At the hearing, Boucher said that U.S. policy is based on a regional approach and consideration of U.S. bilateral relations with countries in the region. He confirmed that there have been many approaches to Washington by govts in the region on the issue, but "all agree that the way to resolve the crisis is through the Mitchell plan."

Canceled security session
The scheduled Israeli-Palestinian security committee session, which was to be held last night in Tel Aviv and chaired by a representative of the CIA, was canceled last night by the Palestinians. An Israeli source said that the Palestinians told the Americans yesterday morning that they won't make it to the meeting as a protest against the situation in the territories and "Israel's actions against the Palestinian leadership and Palestinian people." Meanwhile, Public Security Minister Uzi Landau, back from a trip to Washington, said that the U.S. expressed interest in a joint project to study ways to identify explosives, and promised to send Israel 2 new "robots" used for neutralizing bombs by remote controls after 5 Israeli robots have been destroyed by bombs since the start of the Intifada.

Billy Graham apologizes for comments
31.02   Darlene Superville AP

Wash.D.C.   The Rev. Billy Graham apologized Friday for a 1972 conversation with former President Nixon in which he said the Jewish "stranglehold" of the media was ruining the country and must be broken. The conversation was among 500 hours of Nixon tapes released by the National Archives. Most were recorded between January and June 1972. "Although I have no memory of the occasion, I deeply regret comments I apparently made in an Oval Office conversation with President Nixon ... some 30 years ago," Graham said in a statement released by his Texas public relations firm. "They do not reflect my views and I sincerely apologize for any offense caused by the remarks." In the conversation with Nixon, the Southern Baptist evangelist expressed disdain for what he saw as Jewish domination of the media. "This stranglehold has got to be broken or this country's going down the drain," Graham said, agreeing with Nixon's own comments earlier in the conversation.
"You believe that?" Nixon says in response.
"Yes, sir," says Graham.
"Oh boy. So do I," Nixon agrees, then says: "I can't ever say that but I believe it."
"No, but if you get elected a second time, then we might be able to do something," Graham says, reassuring the president.

Friday, Graham said his legacy has been one of working for stronger bonds between Jews and Christians. "Throughout my ministry, I have sought to build bridges between Jews and Christians," Graham said. "I will continue to strongly support all future efforts to advance understanding and mutual respect between our communities." Graham, 83, has been in frail health for years. The friendship between Graham and the president began during the Eisenhower administration, when Nixon was vice president. At a later point in the conversation, when Nixon raises the subject of Jewish influence in Hollywood and the media, Graham says, "A lot of Jews are great friends of mine." "They swarm around me and are friendly to me. Because they know that I am friendly to Israel and so forth. But they don't know how I really feel about what they're doing to this country, and I have no power and no way to handle them," Graham says.
Nixon says: "You must not let them know."

We bought & paid for carnage of Palestinians
4.9.02   Robert Jensen Houston Chronicle
UTAustin journalism prof., Nowar Collective member
auth. Writing Dissent, "Citizens of the Empire"

… new report by Institute for Southern Studies shows that in the one-year period after the Sharm el-Sheikh peace agreement in Sept. 1999, U.S. govt pumped $3.6 billion worth of arms into Israel, odd policy for a country playing a supposedly neutral role. … Israeli tanks rolling through cities & refugee camps of the West Bank made in U.S. & purchased by Israel with U.S. aid. Israeli jets & helicopters used in the assault are American F-16s, Blackhawks and Apaches. Machine guns, grenade launchers, missiles and bombs, made in the USA, paid for with our tax dollars, …

Current Israeli attack on West Bank towns is not a war on terrorism, but part of long, brutal war against Palestinian people for land & resources. … Israel's war against the Palestinians would not be possible without U.S. military & economic support, $3 billion a year in direct aid.
[ $8 to $10 million per day ]
Israel can continue to ignore … U.N. Security Council resolutions calling on it to end the occupation because of U.S. support. … regional arms control should be part of reducing insane levels of armaments globally, of which U.S. is leading salesperson. …

Confessions of an Israeli reservist   ¹
4.13.02   Tarik Kafala
BBC     Yesh Gvul

Jerusalem   Israel has called up about 20,000 reservist soldiers to support its operations in the West Bank. But sending the reservists into refugee camps to destroy what the govt calls the Palestinian "terrorist infrastructure" has been controversial. Killing of 13 reservists in ambush 4.9.02 in the Jenin refugee camp shocked Israelis. Parents of the dead soldiers complained that their sons were sent unprepared into "a hornets' nest of terrorism". Yoni, reservist serving in the West Bank, told BBC News Online: "We have become cannon fodder. We are reservists. Many people are asking why we don't just go in and carpet bomb the place." Yoni did not advocate the bombing of refugee camps because of the civilian casualties. But he said that even regular Israeli soldiers, let alone reservists, should not be sent into the alleys and tightly packed buildings of the Palestinian camps.

Current operations on the West Bank are being strongly criticised internationally. Death toll among civilians is believed to be high and aid agencies say the humanitarian crisis in the closed off Palestinian towns & villages is critical. However, the operations are popular with the Israeli public as a response to a wave of Palestinian suicide bombings. Israeli leaders have made it clear that they will not pull back until their mission is completed. Yoni, who is probably in the minority in Israel, argued that he saw no military solution to the conflict because "it is about people. Take this for an example," he said. "There is a village where we have intelligence that someone is planning a terrorist attack. We surround the village and move in but there is a 17-year-old shepherd in a field on the edge of the village. He could be a terrorist, or he might warn them. Do I arrest him, blindfold him, tie his hands? Do I tell him to get inside quick?
We are trained to fight armies & soldiers, and yet we have to deal with people in this situation." The whole principle of Operation Defensive Shield was questionable, Yoni said.

He & many of his colleagues, he said, are not as sure as their political & military leaders that the campaign in the West Bank will stop terrorist attacks. "How do you destroy the terrorist infrastructure? We can get the weapons & the terrorists, but this infrastructure is in people's hearts and it cannot be uprooted from there. They hate me because I am an Israeli soldier, not personally. The people are not being held hostage by the terrorists, they sympathise with them. They think terrorism is going to help their national cause."
"The most terrible thing is to go into houses and see that they are just regular families. The children with their wide frightened eyes, I find very difficult. We all have kids at home. We are serving here because it is our duty. But I don't know where it is leading and we would all rather be at home."


Hamas official says suicide attacks to resume
12.8.03  
Reuters

Gaza   A top official of Islamic group Hamas said Monday the recent lull in Palestinian militant suicide attacks against Israel was just a break between waves. "The martyrdom operations come as waves so there are gaps between the waves," Hamas chief spokesman Abdel-Aziz al-Rantissi told Reuters in an interview. "We are just in the period of a gap between waves."
A day after the collapse of talks among Palestinian factions on a complete cease-fire with Israel, which Hamas opposed, Rantissi said Palestinian militants were emboldened by Israeli PM Sharon's domestic woes and U.S. problems in Iraq and Afghanistan. "Everything is changed. Locally, regionally and internationally," Hamasco- founder Rantissi said. "The problems of America and the situation of America in Iraq & Afghanistan has its effect on the situation in Palestine. I believe that Palestinian people are stronger than before."

Sworn to destruction of Israel and at the forefront of a suicide bombing campaign, the radical Islamic group opposes U.S. as the Jewish state's main ally. While Hamas urges resistance to the Americans in Iraq, it says it has no link to any groups fighting there.

Palestinian officials have said the decision by Hamas & other Muslim militant groups to spurn a truce reflected a poor grasp of the international climate. "They had a very weird analysis of the international situation," said Ahmed Ghneim, senior official in President Yasser Arafat & PM Ahmed Qurie's mainstream Fatah faction who participated in the Cairo talks. "They believe U.S., Palestinian Authority and Israel are in a crisis, while they are not."
Sr Arafat security adviser Jibril al-Rajoub added: "Apparently Hamas has not understood changes in the international arena."

Hamas agreed in June 2003 to a one-sided truce, but Israel never recognized it and it crumbled amid violence within weeks, hobbling a U.S.-backed peace plan that Hamas opposes. Rantissi said Hamas now sensed that Sharon's position had been weakened by a rise in domestic opposition to Israeli policies in occupied territories. Sharon has recently come under criticism from his own army chief and former heads of the security service while polls at the weekend put his support at an all-time low.
"I believe they (the Israelis) are in a bad situation because of the policy of Sharon, the murderous Sharon, and they are in a bad situation economically and of morale and of many other things," he said.

Israeli security sources say they believe Hamas itself has been weakened by the killing of some of its leaders and arrests of militants, but Rantissi said resistance would continue. At Egyptian-brokered talks which collapsed in Cairo on Sunday, Hamas said it was willing to stop attacks on civilians inside Israel proper if Israel reciprocated. But the Israelis rule out any cease-fire that would not also cover soldiers & Jewish settlers living in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, occupied since the 1967 war.
A cease-fire is seen as vital to any meaningful revival of a U.S.-backed "road map" designed to lead to a Palestinian state by 2005.
insurrection ingenue Girl suicide bombers ¹
4.2.02   A.Applebaum Slate

Last weekend, following the Friday suicide of Ayat Akhras, an 18-year-old Palestinian girl who blew herself up at the entrance to a Jerusalem supermarket, the BBC broadcast a small segment of the video tape she had recorded beforehand. A flash of dark eyes & long black hair, a checkered head scarf. A few words in Arabic could be heard then the BBC switched to another set of pictures. Excerpts from such videos have a weird formality about them and a stage-managed feel that somehow fails to evoke much emotion on the part of the viewers. After Ayat Akhras appeared on screen, however, it was hard to focus on the rest of the news. In part, it was the shock of seeing a girl's face behind the keffiyeh, although rationally there is no reason to be surprised by a female martyr, plentiful enough in Western cultural history. Catholic Church martyred female saint Joan of Arc and women terrorists with Italy's Red Brigades, Germany's Baader-Meinhof gang, and America's Weathermen, among many others. In the Arab-Israeli conflict, woman combatants are hardly exceptional either: The Israeli army itself has female soldiers.

Yet Ayat Akhras, third Palestinian woman to die carrying out a suicide attack, was still unusual. She fit no standard description of "typical" suicide bombers. She not male, she was not overtly religious, not estranged from her family, not openly associated with any radical groups. She can hardly be described as a woman without a future. She was young, she was a good student, and she was engaged to be married, all of which is why her death reveals a great deal about the changing nature of the Palestinian terror campaign.
Her death tells the effects Israel's border policy has on terrorist organizations inside the territories. Up to a point, the Israeli checkpoints work. Since the middle of the 1990s, it has been almost impossible for unmarried men under the age of 40 to get legitimate permits to cross the border into Israel, for any reason at all. Terrorist groups therefore look further for potential volunteers. They had some success among Israeli Arabs; Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, group that armed Akhras, claims to have a special unit to train female suicide bombers. "We have 200 young women from the Bethlehem area alone ready to sacrifice themselves for the homeland," an Al-Aqsa leader told the Guardian last week.

Use of young women isn't entirely a matter of terrorist tactics. The the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade or backers' public relations at work by sending someone like Akhras knowingly breaks frail, lingering barriers between combatants & noncombatants, terrorists & innocent civilians in the MidEast. War has come to women & children now killing women & children.
[ Strategically labeled "total war" ]
One of the two Israelis who died following Akhras' suicide attack was a teen-ager, a year younger than her. The message for Israel, and the rest of the world, is clear: Terrorism is not just a fringe phenomenon. Terrorists are not just strange young men whispering in dark rooms. Terrorists are high-school students, terrorists are women and terrorists are all around you. No one can be discounted. All Palestinians are potential terrorists, and terrorism will never go away. Whether or not all of this is actually true is immaterial: The point is to make the Israelis think it is, and thus give up, withdraw, quit the MidEast or else undertake a massive & potentially disastrous military operations of sort begun this week.

Unlike al-Qaida, Palestinian terrorist attack groups are not all religious fanatics. People killing themselves in the name of the Palestinian cause are not necessarily doing so because they believe they will be granted entrance to paradise or because God will reward them with a succession of beautiful virgins. Nor are those in charge of this war madmen gripped by holy ecstasy or by a burning desire to see all their female relatives locked behind black veils. This is political war, not religious war, and suicide bombings carefully planned & executed are part of precise political strategy. Men who sent a young girl into a supermarket carrying explosives knew what they were doing as did she.

Palestinian bomber kills 3   Female student blows herself up on shopping mall steps in northern Israel. 5th attack in 2 days.   5.20.03   M.K.Stack & P.Richter L.A. Times

Jerusalem   A Palestinian literature student climbed the steps to a thronged shopping mall in northern Israel on Monday afternoon and blew herself up, killing 3 bystanders and wounding dozens more in the fifth such suicide attack in 48 hours. The string of blasts suggested that U.S. efforts to quell the violence in this region have divided the Palestinian leadership, shattered Palestinian militants' cease-fires and thrust the 31-month-old intifada into a dire new phase.
"This is a declaration of war," Israeli PM Sharon advisor Ranaan Gissin said after the Monday bombing. Nevertheless, President Bush, chief force behind recent peace efforts, insisted in Washington he remained committed to pushing the process forward.

"The road map still stands," Bush said, referring to a new internationally designed peace plan during an appearance at the White House with Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. "The vision of 2 states existing side by side in peace is a real vision and one that I will work toward. I not only believe, I will move the process forward," Bush vowed.
Administration officials said they had maintained contacts with the 2 sides since the bombings began and were continuing to prod them to take incremental steps toward a final peace. Some admin officials were privately somber about the developments and said that at the least, the increase in violence would greatly lengthen the time needed to coax the parties forward.

U.S. experts were also pessimistic. Former asst sec. of State for MidEast Edw. S. Walker Jr, said the attackers had succeeded in "stopping things cold. Frankly, I don't expect this administration to push Sharon while his people are suffering," said Walker, now Washington think tank Middle East Inst. president. He predicted that the bombings would also undercut authority of new Palestinian PM Mahmoud Abbas unless U.S. can find a way to end the violence.

In the latest attack, a woman identified as 19-year-old Hiba Daraghmeh stood in line at the entrance to a shopping mall in Afula, a sleepy, working-class town not far from the line that separates Israel from the northern West Bank. She neared security guards, then set off her explosives, witnesses said.
There was a flash of fire, flying metal, the crack of exploding windows. Off-duty border policewoman Eti Pitilo stood a few feet away when the explosion occurred. She was blown onto her back and lay smelling the smoke and another odor she couldn't quite place. "I think it may have been the smell of the bodies," she said later from her hospital bed. "I couldn't see, I couldn't walk, I couldn't talk. I was just crying."

Sharon and Abbas met Sat. night to talk peace. 2 days & 5 suicide bombings later, Abbas was complaining that the string of attacks played into Sharon's hands by providing him with a ready excuse to delay further negotiations. "We strongly condemn the killing of innocent civilians," he said Monday, "be they Palestinian or Israeli."
Islamic Jihad & Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade, military offshoot of Palestinian Auth. Pres. Yasser Arafat's Fatah faction, both took credit for Monday's attack. As the militants vowed to keep fighting occupation, tense Israel tightened roadblocks & closures in the Palestinian territories. In bid to further isolate Arafat, Israeli officials also decided to boycott any foreign dignitaries who might visit him.

Meanwhile, frustrated Israeli lawmakers urged Sharon to pluck Arafat from the ruins of his West Bank compound and send him into exile. Deporting Arafat is a suggestion that seems to surface whenever Palestinian militants have dealt Israel a particularly painful blow. But this time, officials hinted that their patience was wearing thin.
"If Arafat continues to act as the main obstacle to the process," Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz said in a speech to Tel Aviv Univ. board of trustees, "there will be no alternative but to think about steps to deport Arafat."
Sharon, however, ignored the calls to exile his longtime foe, a move that would certainly further destabilize the region and anger intl mediators. "Arafat causes less damage in the Muqata", the Palestinian leader's compound in Ramallah, Gissin said. "For the moment, he has to stay put."

Israelis who helped engineer the appt of Abbas, Arafat's choice for prime minister, now say they overestimated his popularity and ignored Arafat's staying power. As Israel pushes Abbas to dismantle the infrastructure of Palestinian militants, the resistance organizations grow scornful of the new prime minister, and wary of being disarmed by his security forces.
The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade abandoned its cease-fire around the time of Abbas' appointment 4.30.03. The powerful Islamic resistance group Hamas followed suit. "Things are exploding now because patience has its limits," said Hamas spokesman Ismail abu Shanab in the Gaza Strip. "We were trying to give the peace effort a chance, but now the resistance continues."
Since Saturday, Hamas bombers have killed 9 people, striking Jews in the West Bank city of Hebron, soldiers in Gaza and blue-collar commuters in Jerusalem.

With violence surging around him, Sharon backed out of a visit to Washington planned for today, drawing sharp criticism from his govt. Lawmakers berated the prime minister for squandering a moment of vulnerability, when it might have been easier to win U.S. sympathy for Israel's objections to the peace plan.
Sharon, who prides himself on his close relationship to Bush, slapped aside the complaints. "Leave these matters to me," he told legislators from his Likud Party. "My relationship with the U.S. admin & U.S. president is such that they perfectly understand the situation here."

Palestinians & Israelis are stuck, each side demanding that the other act first, each awaiting U.S. intervention . Palestinian negotiators say they won't tighten security until Israel accepts the U.S.-backed peace plan, and are calling for U.S. to force Sharon to cooperate. "We thought the Americans would really put more pressure on the Israelis, but has Bush got the courage?" said Palestinian analyst & negotiator Manuel Hassassian. "This is the real test of power."
In White House comments, Bush called it "sad & pathetic" that some people in the region "still cannot stand the thought of peace." The president also understood Sharon's reasons for postponing his White House visit, aides said.
Bush "respects this decision, understands it," said Wh.House press secretary Fleischer. "He looks forward to greeting Prime Minister Sharon at the first opportunity." Admin officials said Palestinian authorities must take steps to close down Palestinian terror organizations. Then, Israel must "think of how it can act in ways to support PM Abbas & his new govt and show respect for the life & dignity of the Palestinian people," said chief State Dept spokesman Richard Boucher.

U.S. officials said that they were also urging Palestinian & Israeli security officials to work together to try to halt terrorism and that only through such joint efforts can progress be made. Sec.State Powell talked Sunday with Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom & Abbas and was keeping in contact with other regional leaders, Boucher said. U.S. officials also made it clear to the Israelis that they agreed with Sharon's decision to resist efforts to have Arafat expelled.
Walker said he too believed that the best hope lies in trying to foster cooperation between Israeli & Palestinian security organizations. "They need to work together and recognize that it's in their best interests to do so," he said. Fdtn for Middle East Peace pres. Philip C. Wilcox Jr argued U.S. officials cannot follow Sharon's demand that all violence stop before the 2 sides move toward peace.

    Female bomber's mother speaks out
    1.30.02   BBC
proud mom The mother of the first female Palestinian suicide bomber has said she is proud of her daughter and hopes more women will follow her example. Body parts found at the scene suggested that an attack on Sunday, which killed an 81-year-old Israeli man and left more than 100 injured, was the first of its kind by a woman. But confirmation of the bomber's identity did not come until Wednesday, when relatives identified her as Wafa Idris, a 28-year-old divorced paramedic. The al-Aqsa Brigades militant faction, part of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement, also published a leaflet saying she had carried out the bombing in response to Israeli military actions. Wafa's tearful mother, Wasfiyeh, described her only daughter as a martyr, as she was consoled by relatives at their home in Amari Refugee Camp near Ramallah. She told the BBC she did not know what turned her daughter into a bomber.

Wafa Idris "Maybe it was because of all the wounded people she saw in the ambulances. She wanted to help her people. She was a daughter of Palestine," she said. Mrs Idris said Wafa was not a known activist with any Palestinian militant group, although her 3 brothers are Fatah members. She said she had suspected nothing when her daughter, who had been shot several times by Israeli rubber bullets during her work for the Red Crescent, rushed from home on Sunday morning saying she would be late for work. "When I heard in the media that a woman may have been behind the bombing in Jerusalem and she didn't show up, I believed this could be the only explanation for her absence," Wasfiyeh told the Reuters news agency. Ms Idris's sister-in-law said Wafa, whose father died when she was a child, had become withdrawn and morose in the weeks preceding the attack.

The paramedic was angered by seeing children shot and killed during confrontations in Ramallah, she said. "She was happy when martyrdom attacks were carried out against the Israelis and told me she wished she would one day carry out such an attack," another relative, Manal Shaheen, said. It is still not clear, however, whether Ms Idris blew herself up intentionally, or whether explosives she was carrying detonated accidentally. The BBC's Orla Guerin in Ramallah says that Wafa Idris is already a heroine on the streets of the refugee camp where she lived. One woman from the Amari camp, a pregnant mother of three, told the BBC she would carry out a similar operation if she was given the opportunity. Wafa Idris's notoriety is also spreading rapidly: Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has called for a memorial in her honour to be built in one of Baghdad's main squares, according to reports in Iraqi newspapers on Wednesday.

    Daughter's hidden truth: an angry martyr's soul
    3.31.02   Joel Greenberg NY Times
HEISHEH REFUGEE CAMP, West Bank   Palestinian construction foreman Muhammad Akhras thought he knew his 18-year-old daughter, Ayat, as well as anyone. But on Friday he was devastated to learn the truth. She left that morning at the normal hour, 7am, for half-hour walk to her high school in neighboring village. Straight-A high school senior, she hoped to study journalism in college and was preparing for graduation exams, her father said. But that afternoon Mr. Akhras was horrified to learn it was Ayat who was the suicide bomber who struck a supermarket in Jerusalem, killing herself & 2 Israelis and wounding at least 30 others. One of the 2 Israelis she killed was a teenager just a year younger than herself.

Ayat left behind a farewell video, her head wrapped in checked Arab head scarf, and the bombing was claimed by Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades, militant group affiliated with the mainstream Fatah movement. Mr. Akhras, who said he has worked with & befriended many Jews, said today that he found the video too heartbreaking to watch for long. He sat cross-legged on a mattress on the floor of his spare home as people streamed in to pay condolence calls. "You can't see anything because of the grief, and anyone who tells you he can focus is lying," he said. Ayat Akhras was third & youngest woman bomber of the current Palestinian uprising, her attack signaling new readiness among some Palestinian women to join ranks of dozens of men who became human bombs in the fight against Israel.

Mr. Akhras, grief-stricken & baffled, discovered after his daughter's death that she was living a far different life than the one her family thought. On the surface, he said, everything seemed normal. Ayat was engaged to be married to a local tile layer this summer, she was an outstanding student, and her days revolved around school, homework & housework, he said. There wasn't even a hint of anger, despair or political zeal that could have led her to a suicide mission. "She kept it a secret," Mr. Akhras said. "Had I known I would have closed the door & locked it with a key." Out early to work in the morning and back in the afternoon for a meal, his prayers and an early bedtime, Mr. Akhras said he did not get a chance to spend enough time with his 11 children, of whom Ayat was the seventh. Neither he nor anyone else in the family had a clue what she was planning, he said.

Older brother Fathi Akhras, 26, said he saw only a teenager going about her daily routine. "After school she would come home and help with cooking, laundry, ironing," he said. "What was inside remained inside." Did she harbor a seething hatred for Israelis, stoked by months of deadly violence, or was she perhaps acting out of personal distress brought on by a planned marriage she did not want? Her relatives said they had no clue. "Had I known, I would have prevented it," said another older brother, Samir Akhras, 27. "She didn't show anything, and we didn't sense anything. We're against this killing & blood. If people want to fight, they should fight soldier to soldier, man to man. What is the guilt of Israeli civilians?" But there were others outside the house who voiced pride in what Ayat Akhras had done, pronouncing her a martyr for the cause. "We're proud of her, " said Jamil Qassas," 32, whose teenage brother was killed in the first Palestinian uprising more than a decade ago. "How many children and innocent people have the Israelis killed? This is a natural response. The equation works both ways."

Mr. Akhras was devastated. A foreman at construction sites in the Jewish settlement of Beitar, he said he had made Jewish friends there and at previous jobs in Israel proper, friendships that have survived 18 months of deadly conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. "Politics is one thing, and work is something else," he said. "We work together, eat together, live together, like family. I love them like my children, and they love me like an older brother. I'm concerned for them like I am for my own son." "I taught my children to love others," he said. "We hope for life."


At 18, bomber became martyr & murderer
3.30.02   Graham Usher
Guardian

Jerusalem   Aayat al-Akhras, 18, yesterday became third & youngest female suicide bomber of the Palestinian intifada. She blew herself up, killing two Israelis, in a supermarket in suburban West Jerusalem. Her "martyrdom" came within 48 hours of a suicide bombing in the seaside town of Netanya that left 22 dead and more than 100 wounded, the worst Palestinian atrocity in Israel in 18 months of fighting. It gave chilling testimony to an even bleaker future prophesied yesterday by the speaker of the Palestinian parliament, Ahmed Korai: "Israel is pushing us more and more. If it continues, there will be a million suicide bombers."

Akhras approached the Supersol supermarket on a wet, windy afternoon in W.Jerusalem's Kiryat Yoval district, crowded with shoppers stocking up for the sabbath & the Passover holiday. Witnesses said there was nothing unusual about her appearance. Her western dress & European looks melded seamlessly into a middle class neighbourhood. Suspicions were aroused by her behaviour & heavy bag slung over her shoulder. She passed one guard at the supermarket before being confronted by another. She detonated her bomb, killing herself & two Israelis, a man & woman. 20 people were wounded, 2 seriously. "The blast was huge. She was just a few meters from the entrance inside," a witness said. Police spokesman Gil Kleiman said she set off her explosives as the security guard attempted to keep her out of the store. The guard's efforts "saved a large number of lives," he said. Hanna Cohen, who spoke to Israel Radio, said she was about to enter the store when there was "a huge blast and I saw people flying all around, arms & legs".

38-year-old doctor Avraham Ben-Yakov remembered telling the security guard as he entered that he was doing a good, important job. A few steps behind the doctor, the bomber approached the guard. "I saw a very intense explosion with dark smoke," Dr Ben-Yakov said. "People started running, crying." He rushed to help the wounded and found the young security guard barely breathing, both of his legs severed. "He lost all of the blood," he said. Police said the bomber was carrying parts of mortar shells that had yet to explode. "It was a partial explosion. Had she gone up fully, we would have an even worse carnage here," Mr Kleiman said. Akhras was claimed as a "martyr" by the al-Aqsa Brigades, linked to Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement. They have reportedly set up a special unit for female suicide bombers. "We have 200 young women from the Bethlehem area alone ready to sacrifice themselves for the homeland," an al-Aqsa leader in Bethlehem said last week.

The bombing occurred after fights between Palestinian youths & Israeli police broke out at the al-Aqsa mosque mosque compound, contested site in occupied E.Jerusalem to Muslims & Jews. After Friday prayers, Palestinians threw rocks at Jews worshipping at the Western Wall. Israeli police stormed the compound, using stun grenades to disperse Palestinian worshippers. One Israeli police officer was injured and a Palestinian was arrested. A sudden deluge of rain & sleet doused tempers. The more Israel raises heat on Arafat in Ramallah, the more likely to ignite Jerusalem.

Akhras lived in Bethlehem's Dehaisha camp, home to 10,000 Palestinian refugees. AP reported last night that as word of the bombing spread through the camp, some residents celebrated, handing out sweets & firing guns into the air. Akhras was engaged, according to a source in the camp. But instead of marriage she chose to follow in the footsteps of Wafa Idriss, woman bomber who killed herself & an Israeli in W.Jerusalem in January, and Daria Abu Aysha, English literature student from a village near Nablus who killed herself & wounded 3 soldiers at West Bank checkpoint in February. Palestinians in Dehaisha expressed "astonishment" at her death. But a glance at her history revealed motives for vengeance.

6.16.02 video mother & son holding hands & exchanging smiles as they spoke of his likely death. 
 Reuters handout Born into a family made refugees by the 1948 Arab- Israeli war, she witnessed one cousin killed by Israeli soldiers in the first Palestinian intifada, a second left permanently disabled and a third wounded. Amjad, friend of the Akhras family, speculated that the incident that had helped to turn Aayat into a killer was Israel's invasion of Dehaisha earlier this month. 3 Palestinians were killed, hundreds were arrested and women & children were held captive by Israeli soldiers in their homes. "It bred in us all feelings of despair & revenge," he said. "And that is what a suicide bomber is: a mixture of despair & resistance. You don't have to be a man to feel that. You don't have to be a woman. You can be a boy or a girl."

    Sharon's war?
    12.26.03   Robert D. Novak CNN
Wash.D.C.   Sen. Chuck Hagel R-NE, having just returned from a week-long fact-finding trip to the MidEast, addressed the Chicago Council of Foreign Relations 12.16.02 and said out loud what is whispered on Capitol Hill: "The road to Arab-Israeli peace will not likely go through Baghdad, as some may claim."
The "some" are led by Israeli PM Sharon. In private conversation with Hagel & many other members of Congress, the former general leaves no doubt that the greatest U.S. assistance to Israel would be to overthrow Saddam Hussein's Iraqi regime.

That view is widely shared inside the Bush administration, and is a major reason why U.S. forces today are assembling for war. "Military force alone," Hagel told his Chicago audience, "will neither assure a democratic transition in Iraq, bring peace to Israelis & Palestinians, nor assure stability in the MidEast." The senator returned from the Mideast more concerned than his prepared speech indicates. As the U.S. gets ready for war, its standing in Islam, even among longtime allies, stands low.
Yet, the Bush administration has tied itself firmly to Gen. Sharon & his policies. Gen. Amran Mitzna, new Labor Party leader challenging the heavily favored Sharon in the Jan. 28 election, is denied access to senior U.S. officials. In private conversation, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice has insisted that Hezbollah, not al Qaeda, is the world's most dangerous terrorist organization.

How could that be, considering al Qaeda's global record of mass carnage? In truth, Hezbollah is the world's most dangerous terrorist organization from Israel's standpoint. While viciously anti- American in rhetoric, the Lebanon-based Hezbollah is focused on the destruction of Israel. "Outside this fight (against Israel), we have done nothing," said the organization's secretary general Sheik Hassan Nasrallah said in a recent NY Times interview.
Thus, Rice's comments suggest that the U.S. war against terrorism, accused of being Iraq-centric, actually is Israel- centric. That ties GWBush to Sharon. The PM says astonishing things to U.S. visitors. He once rejected hope for negotiations, contending that Arabs & Jews will kill each other for a hundred years. More recently, he promised to put a Jewish settlement on top of any high ground. …


Suicide bombings kill 23 in Tel Aviv
1.6.03   CNN

Tel Aviv   Two nearly simultaneous suicide bombings rocked central Tel Aviv early Sunday evening, killing at least 23 people and wounding more than 100 others, Israeli police said. The explosions happened around 6:30 pm (11:30 am ET), the peak of rush hour, near a closed bus station.
The neighborhood is home to a large number of immigrant workers and was the scene of another suicide attack in July that left 5 people dead. Just hours later, Israeli forces fired rockets at targets in Gaza. Israeli police spokesman Gil Kleiman said the Tel Aviv explosions went off about 150m (165 yards) apart and were timed "very close." Police said 103 wounded people were evacuated from the scene.

Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, militant offshoot of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement, initially claimed responsibility for the attack and said the bombers were 2 Palestinians from Nablus. But in a fax sent later to CNN on the group's letterhead, the group denied all responsibility.
"The brigade remains fully committed to the legitimate Palestinian leadership headed by Yasser Arafat and stick by it," the statement said. The group is designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Dept. Islamic Jihad, likewise on State Dept's list of terrorist groups, also claimed responsibility in a phone call to CNN's Beirut bureau, but its militant wing later denied the claim.

After the attack, Israeli PM Sharon called an emergency meeting of his top Cabinet ministers, Foreign Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz and Finance Minister Silvan Shalom. Sharon held the Palestinian Authority responsible for the terror attacks. "All attempts to lead to a cease-fire, even today, are failing due to the Palestinian leadership that continues to support, fund and initiate terror," he told a group of intl students in Jerusalem.
Even as the Cabinet ministers were meeting, Israeli forces fired 9 missiles at targets in Gaza early Monday, witnesses said. One of the targets was a workshop. At least 4 people in a house were injured when one of the missiles apparently went astray, witnesses said. On the West Bank, Nablus and Bethlehem were under complete curfew early Monday, as was the part of Hebron near the settlement of Kiryat Arba.

The attack was the deadliest since March 2002, when the bombing of a hotel dining room during a Passover seder killed 29 Israelis and wounded 140. Sharon spokesman Ra'anan Gissin was swift to hold the Palestinian Authority responsible for the bombings, saying it "instigated & supported" attacks on Israeli civilians.
But chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat condemned the attacks and called Gissin's assertions a "broken record, assigning blame & finger-pointing at us." He called on U.S. to step in to bring both sides back to the negotiating table. "We need the help of a third party," Erakat said. "We need the help of an American administration because the trust level between us & Mr. Sharon is below zero."

Sharon said talks would not resume until attacks on Israelis ended. "Our goal is to stop the brutal terror, to achieve calm & quiet," Sharon said. "Only when the brutal terror is stopped, only then we will be able to talk peace." Gissin suggested the attacks may have been intended to influence Israel's Jan 28 election in which Sharon faces a challenge from Labor Party leader Amram Mitzna, dovish former general.
The last suicide bombing in Israel was 11.21.02, when a Palestinian bomber killed 11 people and wounded 50 on a bus in Jerusalem. But Gissin said that the "relative calm" has been deceptive because Israeli authorities stopped several planned attacks before they could be carried out. President GWBush & U.S. Sec.State Powell condemned the bombings in separate statements Sunday evening. … Powell: "These attacks on innocent Israelis only serve to set back further the hopes of the Palestinian people and the president's 6.24.02 vision of 2 states, Israel & Palestine, living side by side in peace & security." …


    war update
    3.30.03   CNN
battles … An Egyptian electrician working for the U.S. military drove a pickup truck Sunday into a line of American soldiers waiting outside the post exchange at Camp Udairi in Kuwait's northwest desert, injuring 15 of them.

Fedayeen militia bears Hussein's stamp of cruelty
3.25.03   Scripps Howard News Svc

Cairo   Saddam Hussein's most trusted paramilitary militia, Saddam's Fedayeen, has assassinated the Iraqi leader's enemies, put down protests and ruthlessly cracked down on dissidents since its founding in 1995. Now, with U.S.-led coalition troops advancing toward Baghdad, Saddam's Fedayeen are putting up stiff resistance and trying to prevent regular army soldiers from surrendering.
Reports from the front suggest fedayeen members have organized battlefield ruses, like posing as civilians or faking surrender, to trap U.S. & British forces. Such scenes played out in An Nasiriyah & Umm Qasr, where the advancing troops suffered their first major casualties.

The result of the fedayeen activity, intended or not, is to sow suspicion & division between the invading troops & the civilians and stop any uprising against Hussein. U.S. intelligence believes the fedayeen were dispatched from their strongholds in the Baghdad area to outlying areas over the last few weeks. Gen. Tommy Franks, speaking yesterday in Qatar, said U.S. forces had "intentionally bypassed enemy formations," and the fedayeen had been harassing the U.S. rear in southern Iraq.
"We know that the fedayeen has in fact put himself in a position to mill about, to create difficulties in rural areas," Franks said. "I can assure you that contact with those forces is not unexpected."

The guerrillas were formed to quash internal dissent & disturbances after Iraq's defeat in the 1991 Gulf War, esp. in the oppressed Shiite Muslim areas in central & southern Iraq. The first recruits, all extremely loyal to the ruling Baath party, incl criminals who were pardoned in exchange for serving in the units.
Prewar U.S. intelligence estimates put the fedayeen's strength at between 20,000 & 25,000. Training includes urban warfare & suicide missions. By all accounts, Iraqis stand in mortal fear of these operatives, who favor either all black or all white attire, along with ski masks or scarves to hide their faces. They are renowned for cutting out the tongues of those who dare to criticize Hussein, and executing anyone believed to be plotting to topple his regime. Before this war, they also would sever the ears of those who deserted the army. For a time, they were shown on Iraqi TV butchering cats & dogs, then eating the raw meat.

During 2000 & 2001, the fedayeen ascended to a new level of violence & intimidation through a campaign of publicly beheading the wives, sisters or mothers of those believed disloyal to Hussein as their offspring were forced to watch. Iraqi journalist Ali Abdel Amir, operating in neighboring Jordan, said Hussein trusts the force even more than his elite Republican Guard.
"They have blind loyalty, they might even kill their fathers if they are ordered to do so," he told AP from Amman. Fedayeen members receive up to $100 a month, compared with the $3 govt employees are paid each month. They receive plots of land & other privileges, such as extra food rations & free medical care.

The fedayeen report directly to Hussein's eldest son, Odai, powerful figure in Iraq with a reputation for extravagance & violence. This month, Al Zawra, a weekly newspaper owned by Odai, reported that fedayeen units were sent to the southern town of Al-Majar to crush a protest by villagers. The fedayeen can be expected to fight to the death because, if Hussein falls, they will not only lose their jobs, but also likely face violent retribution from the families of those they have harmed in the past.

    Iraq
Before move on Baghdad, allies to go after fedayeen   3.26.03   Michael R. Gordon NY Times

Camp Doha, Kuwait   Allied forces have shifted the focus of their land campaign in Iraq to concentrate on defeating the fedayeen and other militia serving Saddam Hussein in the south before beginning the battle for Baghdad, senior officers said last night. The strategy had been to bypass Iraq's southern cities and drive toward the capital to take on Hussein's Republican Guards and ultimately topple his regime.
But the resistance from the militia groups to the rear of the advancing forces has been so stiff that commanders have concluded that this Iraqi threat has to be addressed first. The attack on the Republican Guard will be delayed while American & British forces fight in and around Iraq's southern cities.
"We will go to where the enemy is," a senior U.S. military official said last night.

While the British were moving to the outskirts of Basra, forces from the Army's 7th Cavalry Regiment fought a battle near Najaf with what was reported to be a mixture of fedayeen & regular troops. Hundreds of the enemy were reported killed. In An Nasiriyah, Marines captured paramilitary fighters in a hospital that they had turned into an outpost. There was also fighting near Samara.
The forces available to attack the paramilitary groups, incl special operations forces, light infantry as well as mechanized units. U.S. military officials said they intend to cut off the routes to the southern cities and, if necessary, send forces into those cities & towns to take the fight to the Iraqis.

The goal will be to avoid street-to-street fighting and to direct attacks against the command centers, weapon caches and hide-outs used by the fedayeen, 60,000 fighters said to be commanded by Hussein's son Odai, hard- core members of the ruling Baath party and other Iraqi security forces.
That commits allied forces to some form of urban warfare in southern Iraq. Yesterday, for instance, the British forces around Basra called in an air attack on the Baath party headquarters. American satellite-guided JDAM bombs turned the building into a pile of rubble, allied officials said.

Allied military officials said the strategy is necessary to protect the long & still lengthening supply lines upon which the U.S. military relies to support the advance on Baghdad by the Army and the Marines. The shift in tactics is also of psychological importance: to demonstrate to Iraqis in the south, overwhelmingly Shiite Muslims, that allied forces are prepared to encourage and protect any rebellion against Hussein.
Bush admin & British govt had hoped that allied troops would be hailed as liberators, a development that might mollify critics of the war, especially in the Arab world. But many Shiites have been sitting on the sidelines, waiting to see whether the Americans or Hussein will prevail.

According to Iraqi exiles with contacts in Basra, Iraq's second-largest city, the city was well stocked with food ahead of the war and put under virtual martial law to discourage any revolt. Shiites in the south recall the 1991 Persian Gulf War, when the American-led allies called for the Iraqi people to rebel against Hussein but did not intervene with support when the Shiites did so.
"We are going to prosecute this fight in a violent manner," said land war command chief operations officer Maj. Gen. J. D. Thurman. "We must make the people know we are prepared to take care of them." The strategy was in evidence yesterday. British forces, under the command of Maj. Gen. Robert Brims, moved toward Hwy 6 to cut off Basra from other Iraqi forces.

British deployment & air attack on the Basra party HQ came amid reports of rebellion in the Shiite-dominated city and harsh reprisals by security forces loyal to Hussein. A woman who waved to British forces on the outskirts of the city was said to have been found hanged, and Iraqis moved artillery to shell rebellious residents. A huge cache of arms was discovered at Tallil air base, near An Nasiriyah. U.S. officials said the fedayeen were retrieving the weapons from the bunker to use against allied forces. There were reports that American uniforms had been found north of Basra.
U.S. officials had anticipated that they would have to confront the fedayeen, but the general assumption was that they would primarily be a problem in Baghdad. The principal opposition in the south had been expected to come from Iraq's Republican Guard troops. In recent days, however, it became clear the paramilitary group was a far bigger problem than U.S. had anticipated.

Dressing in black or civilian clothes, they have been driving in SUVs and using guerrilla tactics: hit & run attacks on American forces. One consequence of the new focus on fedayeen is that attack on Baghdad will be delayed. Allied commanders sought to dispel any suggestion that the delay would be long, suggesting that it would be measured in days, not weeks.
The delay has a silver lining since there were indications that the U.S. forces could use more time to prepare for a major battle in and around the capital. A delay will give allied warplanes more time to bomb the Republican Guard positions near Baghdad. American warplanes yesterday bombed the Medina division, which is defending one of the approaches to Baghdad. A delay will also give the Army more time to move up men and supplies. Even now, units like 101st Airborne Div. were trying to get all their units ready for the Baghdad engagement.

Iraq files complaint with UN
Mkt strike 'a violation of all united laws & principles'
3.31.03   CNN

Baghdad   Iraqi govt has written a letter of complaint to the United Nations denouncing what it says was a missile strike last week in a shopping area in Baghdad. Iraqi officials said 15 civilians died in the explosion at the Shaab District market Wednesday. U.S. officials said coalition forces were not responsible, but Iraq insists they were. In a letter read Sunday on Iraqi TV, Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri called the incident "a crime against humanity and all principles.These raids are a pure violation of all U.N. principles that prohibited everyone from attacking civilians and spreading terror among them," the letter said.

The letter was addressed to U.N. SecGen Annan. A U.N. spokesman said Sunday that Annan had not received the letter, which called on the UN to take action. "This is a violation of all united laws and principles," Sabri wrote. "This aggression challenges the UN and the intl community as a whole."
U.S. Central Command said earlier that what happened at the marketplace "may never be known. We think it's entirely possible that this may have been in fact an Iraqi missile that either went up and came down or, given the behaviors of the regime lately, it may have been a deliberate attack inside of town," Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks said. Brooks said coalition planes flew a mission over Baghdad at the time the marketplace was hit, but "not in that area."

Both sides have charged the other with violations of the Geneva Conventions, which call for the humanitarian treatment of POWs & civilians during conflicts. According to Sabri's letter, 420 Iraqis have been killed since the beginning of the war, and more than 40,000 had been injured. Iraq's casualty numbers cannot be verified independently.
… "Kofi is aware that the war has had casualties and insists all sides do everything to minimize casualties and to insure that all humanitarian norms regarding conflicts be respected," said U.N. spokesman Farhan Haq.

The March 26 market incident was the first of two such explosions in Baghdad. Iraqi TV reported that more than 50 were killed in a market bombing Friday. The Pentagon said both incidents were under review. Also, fires raged Sunday when explosions went off near the 28 April Shopping Center in central Baghdad. The blasts occurred around 2 a.m., when the center was closed. The source of the blast was not known. However, coalition forces said they targeted the Ministry of Information near the shopping center.


Netanya, Israel   A suicide bomb that injured dozens in northern Israel Sunday was "a gift to the Iraqi people," according to a Palestinian militant group that claimed responsibility for the attack. The bombing, which took place at a busy cafe in the coastal town of Netanya, injured at least 49, 5 seriously, Israeli police & ambulance services said. 10 Israeli soldiers were among the injured.
Israeli govt official called the attack "another indication the Palestinian terror campaign against Israeli civilians continues. Palestinian terrorists continue to make every effort to strike at Israelis in the heart of our cities. Israel will take whatever measures are necessary to prevent such attacks from occurring against us."

In a leaflet, the Islamic Jihad said the attack was "a gift to the Iraqi people from Palestine." Moreover, the group said it was "happy to announce" it had sent a fighting force to Iraq, a "kamikaze brigade" that had already arrived in Baghdad.
Palestinian Islamic Jihad is a militant group dedicated to the creation of an Islamic Palestinian state and the destruction of Israel. It has been declared a terrorist group by the U.S. State Dept. The bomber was identified as Jamil Ranem, a Palestinian from Tulkarem, Islamic Jihad sources told CNN. The sources said the group is calling for Palestinians to act against coalition forces in Iraq and for those who can to act against Israeli civilians in a way to show solidarity with the Iraqi people. A report on Iraqi TV praised the mission.

The Palestinian Authority moved quickly to condemn the bombing and urged the so-called Mideast Quartet to revive its efforts to create a "road map" to MidEast peace. Elsewhere in the region Sunday, 3 Palestinians were killed by Israel Defense Forces in incidents in the Gaza Strip and on the Israeli side of a fence marking the Gaza border. 2 Palestinians crossed into Israel from Gaza and were shot to death by IDF forces as they headed toward Kibutz Erez armed with Kalashnikov rifles & hand grenades, Israeli military sources said.
IDF soldiers also killed a Palestinian and wounded 4 others whom the IDF identified as "suspicious figures" in an area of central Gaza closed off to Palestinians. The Palestinians were talking on cellular phones and using binoculars to observe a road that connects 2 Israeli settlements, possibly gathering information for future terrorist activities, the IDF said. The Palestinians were shot while trying to run away after the Israelis had told them to stop and had fired warning shots, the IDF said. It said that 3 other Palestinians escaped.

Israel's last suicide bombing happened in the northern port city of Haifa 3.5.03, when an attacker set off an explosion that destroyed a suburban bus, killing 17 people and injuring at least 40 others. Witnesses told CNN's Jerrold Kessel that a security guard or Israeli soldier stopped the suicide bomber from entering the cafe. The bomber then detonated his explosive outside the eatery, Israeli media reported. The attack occurred before 1 p.m. at the London Cafe in downtown Netanya's Independence Square. Many of the injured were sitting outside the eatery, enjoying the day's fair weather. The bomber's body was found outside the cafe, witnesses said.

Israel has been on a heightened state of alert since a U.S.-led coalition launched a war against Iraq 3.19.03. "This is another attempt to paralyze the Israeli society and to cause death," said Israeli Police Minister Tsahi Hanegbi. "We knew in advance that there will be an attempt to take advantage of the war in Iraq in order to cause casualties in the country. Fortunately, we don't have many casualties today. But we're still expecting more problematic events during the time of the conflict in Iraq," Hanegbi said.
A senior Bush administration official said, "We condemn this act of terrorism in the strongest terms." The leaflet claiming responsibility for the attack said, "This mission comes on the 27th annual day that marks the Land Day. This is our answer to the Israeli crimes against our people." Land Day is observed in Israel & Palestinian territories 3.30.03. Israeli Arabs hold annual protests on the day to mark what they claim were Israeli land seizures after the creation of the state of Israel in 1948.

Netanya is north of Tel Aviv, only a few miles from the West Bank. The city has been the target of a number of suicide bombings & attacks in the past. One of the worst, known as the Passover suicide blast, happened 3.27.02. In that incident, a suicide bomber walked into the seaside Park Hotel and made his way toward a dining room, where police say 227 people were having their Seder meal. 29 died and more than 150 were injured.

legacy Kennebunkport, ME   President Bush, who has often criticized a global nuclear test ban treaty, hopes the treaty will die in the Senate where it was rejected two years ago, White House officials said on Saturday. Officials noted that Bush had repeatedly voiced his opposition to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty during the 2000 presidential campaign, calling it "fatally flawed." The Senate, previously controlled by GOPs, declined to ratify the treaty in 1999, to the dismay of U.S. allies. Now that the Senate is led by Democrats, some analysts say the treaty could be revived. Despite that possibility, Bush will not try to withdraw the CTBT because, as one official said, there was "little precedent" for taking a treaty back once it had been sent to the Senate. Before leaving office, former President Bill Clinton had urged the new Senate to take up the treaty again. But the Bush administration disagrees.
"There is little confidence that the treaty can actually be verified," a senior administration official said. "With a treaty flawed in that way, it doesn't further nonproliferation efforts." Some analysts had expected Democrats to launch an effort to revive the test ban treaty after they took 50-49 control of the Senate last month. The Bush administration has no desire to see a new debate on the treaty. "There is no support within the administration for the treaty to be taken up for consideration again," the official said. Delaware Democratic Sen. Joseph Biden, who replaced North Carolina GOP Sen. Jesse Helms, an opponent of the treaty, as head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, supports the CTBT, but it needs a two-thirds majority to be ratified.
In January, just before Bush took office, Gen. John Shalikashvili, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, presented a report to Clinton urging U.S. to ratify the treaty. More than 150 countries have signed the CTBT, but it can come into force only when 44 potentially nuclear-capable countries ratify it. Shalikashvili, who spent 10 months conducting a review of the contents of the treaty by interviewing nuclear experts, weapons designers and senators, concluded that ratifying the CTBT would increase national security, and the security benefits of the treaty would outweigh disadvantages. He had said the Senate's vote not to ratify the treaty raised concern at home and abroad that U.S. might be walking away from its traditional leadership of international nonproliferation efforts.

Secret plan outlines the unthinkable commentary
Secret policy review of nation's nuclear policy
= chilling new war contingencies

3.10.02   Wm M. Arkin LA Times
sr fellow Johns Hopkins Univ. School of Adv.Intl Studies
adj. prof. USAF School of Advanced Airpower Studies
contrib. Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

Wash.D.C.   The Bush admin, in a secret policy review completed early this year, ordered Pentagon to draft contingency plans for the use of nuclear weapons against at least 7 countries, naming not only Russia and the "axis of evil",Iraq, Iran& N.Korea, but also China, Libya & Syria. In addition, U.S. Defense Dept told to prepare for possibility nuclear weapons may be required in some future Arab-Israeli crisis. And, it is to develop plans for using nuclear weapons to retaliate against chemical or biological attacks, as well as "surprising military developments" of an unspecified nature. These and a host of other directives, including calls for developing bunker-busting mini-nukes and nuclear weapons that reduce collateral damage, are contained in a still-classified document called Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), delivered to Congress Jan. 8. Like all such documents since the dawning of the Atomic Age more than a half-century ago, this NPR offers a chilling glimpse into the world of nuclear-war planners: With a Strangelovian genius, they cover every conceivable circumstance in which a president might wish to use nuclear weapons, planning in great detail for a war they hope never to wage. In this top-secret domain, there has always been an inconsistency between America's diplomatic objectives of reducing nuclear arsenals and preventing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, on the one hand, and the military imperative to prepare for the unthinkable, on the other.

Nevertheless, the Bush admin plan reverses an almost 2 decade-long trend of relegating nuclear weapons to the category of weapons of last resort. It also redefines nuclear requirements in hurried post-9.11.01 terms. In these and other ways, the still-secret document offers insights into the evolving views of nuclear strategists in Sec. Rumsfeld's Defense Dept. While downgrading the threat from Russia and publicly emphasizing their commitment to reducing the number of long-range nuclear weapons, Defense Dept strategists promote tactical & so-called "adaptive" nuclear capabilities to deal with contingencies where large nuclear arsenals are not demanded. They seek a host of new weapons & support systems, incl conventional military & cyber warfare capabilities integrated with nuclear warfare.

The end product is a now-familiar post-Afghanistan model with nuclear capability added. It combines precision weapons, long-range strikes, and special & covert operations. But the NPR's call for development of new nuclear weapons that reduce "collateral damage" myopically ignores the political, moral and military implications, short-term & long, of crossing the nuclear threshold. Under what circumstances might nuclear weapons be used under the new posture? The NPR says they "could be employed against targets able to withstand nonnuclear attack," or in retaliation for the use of nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons, or "in the event of surprising military developments." Planning nuclear-strike capabilities, it says, involves the recognition of "immediate, potential or unexpected" contingencies. N.Korea, Iraq, Iran, Syria and Libya are named as "countries that could be involved" in all 3 kinds of threat. "All have long-standing hostility towards the U.S. & its security partners. All sponsor or harbor terrorists, and have active WMD [weapons of mass destruction] & missile pgms."

China, because of its nuclear forces & "developing strategic objectives," is listed as "country that could be involved in immediate or potential contingency." Specifically, the NPR lists military confrontation over status of Taiwan as one of scenarios that lead Washington to use nuclear weapons. Other listed scenarios for nuclear conflict are a N.Korean attack on South Korea and an Iraqi assault on Israel or its neighbors. The second important insight the NPR offers into Pentagon thinking about nuclear policy is the extent to which the Bush admin's strategic planners were shaken by 9.11.01. Though Congress directed the new admin "to conduct a comprehensive review of U.S. nuclear forces" before, the final study is striking for its single-minded reaction to those tragedies. Heretofore, nuclear strategy tended to exist apart from ordinary challenges of foreign policy & military affairs. Nuclear weapons were not just option of last resort, they were the option reserved for times when national survival hung in the balance, doomsday confrontation with the Soviet Union, for instance.

Bush faith in old-fashioned deterrence is gone. It no longer takes a superpower to pose a dire threat to Americans. "9.11.01 was clearly not deterred by the massive U.S. nuclear arsenal," Rumsfeld told an audience at the National Defense Univ. in late January. Similarly, U.S. Undersecretary of State John R. Bolton said in a recent interview, "We would do whatever is necessary to defend America's innocent civilian population .... The idea that fine theories of deterrence work against everybody ... has just been disproven by 9.11.01." Moreover, insisting nuclear only if other options seemed inadequate, officials are looking for nuclear weapons that play a role in the kinds of challenges U.S. faces with Al Qaeda. Accordingly, NPR calls for new emphasis on developing nuclear bunker- busters & surgical "warheads that reduce collateral damage," as well as weapons used against smaller, more circumscribed targets, "possible modifications to existing weapons to provide additional yield flexibility," in the jargon-rich language of the review.

It also proposes to train U.S. Special Forces operators to play same intelligence gathering & targeting roles for nuclear weapons that they now play for conventional weapons strikes in Afghanistan. And cyber-warfare and other nonnuclear military capabilities would be integrated into nuclear-strike forces to make them more all-encompassing. As for Russia, once primary reason for having U.S. nuclear strategy, the review says that while Moscow's nuclear programs remain cause for concern, "ideological sources of conflict" have been eliminated, rendering a nuclear contingency involving Russia "plausible" but "not expected. In the event that U.S. relations with Russia significantly worsen in the future," the review says, "the U.S. may need to revise its nuclear force levels and posture."

When completion of NPR was publicly announced in January, Pentagon briefers deflected questions about most of the specifics, saying the information was classified. Officials did stress that, consistent with a Bush campaign pledge, the plan called for reducing the current 6,000 long-range nuclear weapons to one-third that number over the next decade. Rumsfeld, who approved the review late last year, said the admin was seeking "a new approach to strategic deterrence," to include missile defenses and improvements in nonnuclear capabilities. Also, Russia would no longer be officially defined as "an enemy." Beyond that, almost no details were revealed.

Classified text, however, coins the phrase "New Triad," which it describes as comprising the "offensive strike leg," (our nuclear & conventional forces) plus "active & passive defenses,"(our anti-missile systems & other defenses) and "a responsive defense infrastructure" (our ability to develop & produce nuclear weapons and resume nuclear testing). Previously, the nuclear "triad" was the bombers, long-range land-based missiles and submarine-launched missiles that formed 3 legs of America's strategic arsenal.
The review emphasizes integration of "new nonnuclear strategic capabilities" into nuclear-war plans. "New capabilities must be developed to defeat emerging threats such as hard & deeply-buried targets (HDBT), to find & attack mobile & re-locatable targets, to defeat chemical & biological agents, and to improve accuracy & limit collateral damage," the review says. It calls for "a new strike system" using four converted Trident submarines, an unmanned combat air vehicle and a new air-launched cruise missile as potential new weapons.

Beyond new nuclear weapons, the review proposes establishing what it calls an "agent defeat" program, which defense officials say includes a "boutique" approach to finding new ways of destroying deadly chemical or biological warfare agents, as well as penetrating enemy facilities that are otherwise difficult to attack. This includes, according to the document, "thermal, chemical or radiological neutralization of chemical/biological materials in production or storage facilities." Bush admin officials stress that the development & integration of nonnuclear capabilities into the nuclear force is what permits reductions in traditional long-range weaponry. But the blueprint laid down in the review would expand the breadth & flexibility of U.S. nuclear capabilities.
In addition to the new weapons systems, the review calls for incorporation of "nuclear capability" into many of the conventional systems now under development. An extended-range conventional cruise missile in the works for the U.S. Air Force "would have to be modified to carry nuclear warheads if necessary." Similarly, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter should be modified to carry nuclear weapons "at an affordable price." The review calls for research to begin next month on fitting an existing nuclear warhead into a new 5,000-pound "earth penetrating" munition.

Given the advances in electronics & information technologies in the past decade, it is not surprising that the NPR also stresses improved satellites & intelligence, communications, and more robust high-bandwidth decision-making systems. Particularly noticeable is the directive to improve U.S. capabilities in the field of "information operations," or cyber-warfare. The intelligence community "lacks adequate data on most adversary computer local area networks and other command & control systems," the review observes.

It calls for improvements in the ability to "exploit" enemy computer networks, and the integration of cyber- warfare into the overall nuclear war database "to enable more effective targeting, weaponeering, and combat assessment essential to the New Triad."
In recent months, when Bush admin officials talked long-term military policy, they focused on "homeland defense" and need for an anti-missile shield. In truth, what has evolved since last year's terror attacks is an integrated, significantly expanded planning doctrine for nuclear wars.

[Eating blame for bureaucratic error in lieu of genocide]
CIA chief admits Iraq uranium claim error
7.11.03   John Solomon AP

Wash.D.C.   CIA dir. Tenet gave Congress & White House the accountability they demanded, declaring Friday that the blame for President Bush's false allegation about an Iraqi nuclear deal rested squarely with him and his agency. The CIA should never have let Bush repeat a British allegation that Iraq was seeking uranium from the African country of Niger when U.S. intelligence analysts could not corroborate it, Tenet said in a statement. Ultimately, it proved false. "These 16 words should never have been included in the text written for the president," Tenet said, referring to Bush's Jan. 2003 State of the Union speech.

Tenet's extraordinary statement was released after Bush and his national security adviser Condoleezza Rice blamed the error on the CIA & members of Congress called for someone to be held accountable. "This was a mistake," the director said. CIA and administration officials said that despite the mea culpa, they did not expect Tenet to resign. The Democrat is the long holdover from the Clinton administration and, while distrusted by some conservatives, has enjoyed Bush's confidence.
"I've heard no discussion along those lines," CIA spokesman Mark Mansfield said Friday night when asked whether Tenet would consider resigning. Other administration officials noted that Rice and Bush, while placing blame on Tenet's agency, also expressed confidence in the CIA director. Tenet said the responsibility for vetting the allegations included in Bush's speech rested with CIA.

"Let me be clear about several things right up front," he said. "First, CIA approved the president's State of the Union address before it was delivered. Second, I am responsible for the approval process in my agency. And third, the president had every reason to believe that the text presented to him was sound."
Tenet said CIA officials reviewed portions of the draft speech and raised some concerns with national security aides at the White House that prompted changes in the language. But he said the CIA officials failed to stop the remark from being uttered despite the doubts about its validity. "Officials who were reviewing the draft remarks on uranium raised several concerns about the fragmentary nature of the intelligence with National Security Council colleagues," Tenet said.
"Some of the language was changed. From what we know now, agency officials in the end concurred that the text in the speech was factually correct that the British government report said that Iraq sought uranium from Africa."

"This should not have been the test for clearing a presidential address," the statement continued. "This did not rise to the level of certainty which should be required for presidential speeches, and CIA should have ensured that it was removed." Tenet's 2 page statement came at the end of a tumultuous 24 hours in which reports surfaced suggesting the CIA had raised concerns about the nature of the African allegations before the president made his speech.
That prompted Bush and Rice to take issue. On a trip in Africa, they said Tenet's agency approved the language in the speech and never raised objections to them. Members of Congress called on the CIA to be held accountable. Senate Intelligence Committee chair Pat Roberts R-KS, said Tenet was ultimately responsible for the mistake.

Tenet said there were "legitimate questions" about the CIA's conduct and he sought in his statement to explain his agency's role. Although the CIA did not learn until well after the president's speech in January that some documents obtained by British intelligence that formed the basis of the Iraq-Niger uranium allegations were forged, CIA officials recognized at the beginning that the allegation was based on "fragmentary intelligence gathered in late 2001 and early 2002," the director said.

A former diplomat was sent by the CIA to the region to check on the allegations and reported back that one of the Nigerian officials he met "stated that he was unaware of any contract being signed between Niger and rogue states for the sale of uranium during his tenure in office," Tenet said. "The same former official also said that in June 1999 a businessman approached him and insisted that the former official meet with an Iraqi delegation to discuss 'expanding commercial relations' between Iraq and Niger. The former official interpreted the overture as an attempt to discuss uranium sales," Tenet said.
The diplomat sent to the region has alleged he believed Vice President Dick Cheney's office was apprised of the findings of his trip. But Tenet stated that the CIA "did not brief it to the president, vice president or other senior administration officials." Tenet said when British officials in fall 2002 discussed making the Niger information public, his agency expressed their reservations to the British about the quality of the intelligence.

A CIA report that came out in Oct. 2002 mentioned the allegations but did not give them full credence, stating "we cannot confirm whether Iraq succeeded in acquiring uranium ore." In addition, the report noted that State Dept intelligence analysts found the allegations "highly dubious." Because of the doubts, Tenet said he never included the allegations in his own congressional testimonies or public statements about Iraqi efforts to obtain weapons of mass destruction.

  [ CIA DID disqualify this Niger uranium allegation in advance of the State of the Union address, but Cheney visited CIA HQ repeatedly to lobby against the disqualification so Shrub would have a war-justifying headline revelation. ]

    Iran resists IAEA
    9.23.03   Reuters
Tehran   Iran will give the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) less cooperation than in the past after the agency set Tehran a deadline to prove its nuclear aims are peaceful, a sr Iranian diplomat said. In an interview with state tv late Monday, Ali Akbar Salehi, Iran's representative to the U.N. nuclear watchdog, said Tehran had previously allowed IAEA inspectors to take environmental samples and visit non-nuclear sites "to show our good will and transparency. This was beyond our obligations but from now on we will act according to the current regulations," he said referring to Iran's obligations as a signatory of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

Salehi said a team of legal experts from the IAEA was due in Tehran shortly for a second round of talks on the technical aspects of the protocol. IAEA said concerns remain about Iran's nuclear aims and has given Tehran until 10.31.03 to dispel any doubts that it is secretly seeking to develop nuclear arms. The agency has also called on Tehran to sign and implement an Additional Protocol of the NPT which would allow snap inspections of any suspected site.
IAEA said it was stepping up inspections in Iran ahead of 10.31.03 deadline and urged Iran to cooperate. Iran's Economy & Finance Minister Tahmasb Mazaheri said his country would fully cooperate with the IAEA if it can receive outside help to its nuclear program. "We have no worries about or restrictions on any inspection & supervision of our activities by the agency," Mazaheri told Reuters during a visit to Dubai in United Arab Emirates. It is only that we are unhappy about double-standards," he added.

Mazaheri said Iran "hopes to reach an understanding with the agency with a full explanation of our position." "We have a right as a member to receive help … for peaceful use of the technology. We want the agency not to discriminate and adopt a single & just attitude toward all members. This has been our whole argument," he said.
Hard-liners in Iran argue that signing the additional protocol might open the country to foreign spies, but the reformist govt in Tehran has said it is studying signing up to the tougher inspections.



  U.S. works up plan for using nuclear arms
Secret report calls for strategy against at least 7 nations
China, Russia, Iraq, Iran, N. Korea, Libya & Syria.
3.9.02   Paul Richter LA Times

Wash.DC   The Bush admin directed the military to prepare contingency plans to use nuclear weapons against at least 7 countries and to build smaller nuclear weapons for use in certain battlefield situations, according to classified Pentagon report obtained by LA Times. The secret report provided to Congress Jan. 8, says the Pentagon needs to be prepared to use nuclear weapons against China, Russia, Iraq, N. Korea, Iran, Libya and Syria.
It says the weapons could be used in 3 types of situations: against targets able to withstand nonnuclear attack; in retaliation for attack with nuclear, biological or chemical weapons; or "in the event of surprising military developments." A partial copy of the report was obtained by defense analyst & Times contributor Wm Arkin. Officials have long acknowledged that they had detailed nuclear plans for an attack on Russia. However, this "Nuclear Posture Review" apparently marks the first time that an official list of potential target countries has come to light, analysts said. Some predicted the disclosure would set off strong reactions from govts of the target countries.

"This is dynamite," said Carnegie Endowment for Intl Peace nuclear arms expert Joseph Cirincione in Washington. "I can imagine what these countries are going to be saying at the U.N." Arms control advocates said the report's directives on development of smaller nuclear weapons could signal that the Bush admin is more willing to overlook a long-standing taboo against the use of nuclear weapons except as a last resort. They warned that such moves could dangerously destabilize the world by encouraging other countries to believe that they, too, should develop weapons. "They're trying desperately to find new uses for nuclear weapons, when their uses should be limited to deterrence," said Council for a Livable World president John Isaacs. "This is very, very dangerous talk . . . Dr. Strangelove is clearly still alive in the Pentagon." But some conservative analysts insisted that the Pentagon must prepare for all possible contingencies, especially now, when dozens of countries, and some terrorist groups, are engaged in secret weapon development programs. They argued that smaller weapons have an important deterrent role because many aggressors might not believe that the U.S. forces would use multi-kiloton weapons that would wreak devastation on surrounding territory and friendly populations. "We need to have a credible deterrence against regimes involved in international terrorism and development of weapons of mass destruction," said conservative Heritage Foundation defense analyst Jack Spencer in Washington. He said the contents of the report did not surprise him and represent "the right way to develop a nuclear posture for a post-Cold War world." A spokesman for the Pentagon, Richard McGraw, declined to comment because the document is classified.

Congress requested the reassessment of the U.S. nuclear posture Sept. 2000. The last such review was conducted in 1994 by the Clinton admin. The new report, signed by DefSec Rumsfeld, is now being used by the U.S. Strategic Command to prepare a nuclear war plan. Bush admin officials have publicly provided only sketchy details of the nuclear review. They have publicly emphasized the parts of the policy suggesting that the administration wants to reduce reliance on nuclear weapons. Since the Clinton administration's review is also classified, no specific contrast can be drawn. However, analysts portrayed this report as representing a break with earlier policy. U.S. policymakers have generally indicated that U.S. would not use nuclear weapons against nonnuclear states unless they were allied with nuclear powers. They have left some ambiguity about whether the U.S. would use nuclear weapons in retaliation after strikes with chemical or nuclear weapons.

The report says the Pentagon should be prepared to use nuclear weapons in an Arab-Israeli conflict, in a war between China and Taiwan, or in an attack from N.Korea on the south. They might also become necessary in an attack by Iraq on Israel or another neighbor, it said. The report says Russia is no longer officially an "enemy." Yet it acknowledges that the huge Russian arsenal, which includes about 6,000 deployed warheads and perhaps 10,000 smaller "theater" nuclear weapons, remains of concern. Pentagon officials have said publicly that they were studying the need to develop theater nuclear weapons, designed for use against specific targets on a battlefield, but had not committed themselves to that course.

Officials have often spoken of the advantages of using nuclear weapons to destroy the deep tunnel and cave complexes that many regimes have been building, especially since the Persian Gulf War of 1991. Nuclear weapons give off powerful shock waves that can crush structures deep in the Earth, they point out. Officials argue that large nuclear arms have so many destructive side effects, from blast to heat and radiation, that they become "self- deterring." They contend the Pentagon needs "full spectrum deterrence", that is, a full range of weapons that potential enemies believe might be used against them. The Pentagon was actively involved in planning for use of tactical nuclear weapons as recently as the 1970s. But it has moved away from them in the last 2 decades.

Analysts said the report's reference to "surprising military developments" referred to the Pentagon's fears that a rogue regime or terrorist group might suddenly unleash a wholly unknown weapon that was difficult to counter with the conventional U.S. arsenal. The administration has proposed cutting the offensive nuclear arsenal by about two- thirds, to between 1,700 & 2,200 missiles, within 10 years. Officials have also said they want to use precision guided conventional munitions in some missions that might have previously been accomplished with nuclear arms. But critics said the report contradicts suggestions the Bush administration wants to cut the nuclear role. "This clearly makes nuclear weapons a tool for fighting a war, rather than deterring them," said Cirincione.

Report cites unaccounted plutonium
Amounts sufficient to make 'dirty bomb,' official says
3.27.02   Walter Pincus
Wash.Post pA9

The Energy Dept cannot fully account for small amounts of potentially dangerous plutonium provided under a 1954 Atoms for Peace program to 33 countries including Iran, Pakistan and India, according to an inspector general report released yesterday. Some of the plutonium, packed in sealed capsules, contained between 16 & 80 grams of the radioactive material and "would be a serious health hazard if damaged," an official familiar with the report said. "They would be able to create a dispersal device," the official said, referring to "our concern being the dirty bomb." Although it would take more than 6 lbs pounds of plutonium to create a nuclear explosion, the chemical explosion of radioactive material in a "dirty bomb" could spread minute amounts of plutonium that, if inhaled or ingested, could be fatal, said Natural Resources Defense Council physicist Thomas B. Cochran

Energy Dept inspector general report noted that the plutonium capsules sent overseas were supposed to be followed through a Sealed Source Registry, but that program was discontinued by the Reagan administration in 1984. The capsules, which were distributed under the Atoms for Peace program until the late 1970s, were intended for use in calibrating radiation-measuring devices or for research. The Clinton administration disclosed in 1996 that U.S. had distributed abroad "approximately 2 to 3 kg of plutonium mostly in the form of sealed sources to foreign countries since the late 1950s." Among the other countries that received sealed plutonium capsules were Brazil, Israel, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia, Greece, Colombia, Thailand, Turkey, Venezuela and Vietnam. At that time it was unclear as to the ownership of the plutonium capsules because some were only loaned to foreign govts and others were actually transferred. The report says "it has inconsistent historical data regarding the ownership of the material."

Natural Resources Defense Council researcher Robert S. Norris said yesterday that U.S. nuclear assistance to Iran & India under the program helped those govts' efforts to build a bomb. "The Atoms for Peace program was designed to put a good spin on the atom," Norris said, "and instead it has helped Iran & India to start their bomb programs." Although relatively small amounts of plutonium are involved, Energy Inspector General Gregory H. Friedman said in his report, "Recent world events have underscored the need to strengthen the control over all nuclear materials, including sealed sources." He added, "In the wrong hands, these sources could be misused."

    Borders fortified in bid to keep out plutonium
    1.15.02   L.A.Times
Gov. Jim Hodges ordered state troopers & other authorities to South Carolina's borders to stop federal shipments of plutonium that could begin arriving from Colorado as early as this weekend. Hodges, who has vehemently opposed the shipments, read a statement in Columbia declaring a state of emergency but refused to answer any questions about specific plans for roadblocks or other barricades at the Savannah River Site, a nuclear weapon complex near Aiken.
A federal judge on Thursday refused to block the shipments of weapon-grade plutonium. Hodges appealed and asked for a delay until the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals could hear the case. The Energy Dept plans to move the material from the Rocky Flats weapon installation in Colorado, which is being closed. At the Savannah River site, the material would be converted into nuclear reactor fuel over the next 2 decades.
    Plutonium will be sent to S.C.
    Court: Governor's suit to halt nuclear shipments is dismissed. He says he'll try to block transfers
    6.14.02   Jeffrey Gettleman L.A.Times
AIKEN, S.C.   A federal judge Thursday threw out South Carolina's lawsuit to halt a massive plutonium shipment, clearing the path for 34 tons of radioactive material to begin arriving here as early as next week despite intense local resistance. Gov. Jim Hodges repeatedly has threatened "to do whatever it takes" to stop the shipment. He has even vowed to lie down in the road if necessary
On Thursday, Hodges took a less dramatic tack, stressing he would pursue all available "legal means," starting with an appeal of the judge's decision. "This is bad for the people of South Carolina, very bad," he said. "We'll go all the way to the Supreme Court if that's what it takes." When asked whether he still plans to stage a roadblock as a last resort, the governor abruptly called an end to his news conference and drove off.

A few hours later, Energy Sec. Spencer Abraham issued a statement saying "the dept intends to proceed with those shipments." Abraham didn't provide a date, that's classified, his spokesman said. But energy officials had set Saturday as the earliest they could start moving plutonium from the Rocky Flats nuclear facility near Denver, where much of it is stored. "We're working under the assumption there won't be a blockade," Energy spokesman Joe Davis said.
Thursday's developments were the latest volleys in the clash over the fate of the nation's stockpile of weapon- grade plutonium: 34 tons; enough for 5,000 nuclear bombs. The dispute has pitted the Energy Dept against South Carolina, home to the Savannah River Site nuclear facility, 200 miles east of Atlanta, where energy officials intend to recycle surplus plutonium into nuclear power plant fuel. The recycling is part of an arms control agreement with Russia.

Gov. Hodges has said he doesn't trust the federal govt to follow through on its plan to build a pioneering recycling facility. Despite assurances from Abraham, Hodges worries that the dangerous material, coveted by terrorists, will be abandoned at the Savannah River Site. He has accused Energy officials of favoring Rocky Flats to help reelect Sen. Wayne Allard R-CO.
Energy officials have denied these claims.
On Thursday, Hodges, a Democrat who also is up for reelection this fall, asked U.S. Dist. Judge Cameron McGowan Currie to delay shipments until the Energy Dept further studies the matter. In his motion for an injunction, he accused the dept of violating the National Environmental Policy Act by failing to file supplemental environmental reports after plans changed about how to store the plutonium.

"Even though we're the repository, we can't tell the govt what to do; we wish we could, but we can't," said Hodges' atty Bill Want. "All we can ask is that they do some serious environmental reviews before jumping into this." Energy Dept lawyers responded that all environmental & safety issues had been analyzed. They pointed to a series of studies going back to 1996.
Currie agreed and not only dismissed Hodges' bid for an injunction but also granted summary judgment, throwing the case out. "There were detailed studies," she said, "and the courts have consistently ruled that federal courts must defer to the judgment of the agencies." But Currie did not go so far as to grant the dept's request to preemptively stop Hodges from staging a roadblock. "I don't want to presume the governor will break the law."

U.S. inspectors screen Le Havre cargo containers
1.29.02  
AP

Wash.D.C.   U.S. inspectors, trying to prevent smuggling of nuclear & other deadly weapons, will screen cargo containers destined for the U.S. before they leave Le Havre, France, the Customs Service said Friday. The agreement with French govt allows U.S. customs inspectors to be stationed at that port for the first time. The Customs Service has entered into similar agreements, which are intended to improve cargo security at seaports, with Canada, Singapore, the Netherlands and Belgium. Last year, 108,300 cargo containers entered U.S. from Le Havre, the Customs Service said. It hopes to place some officers at the Havre port in a few months.

Russian nuclear sub sinks, 9 killed
8.30.03   Tanya Ustinova & Alister Doyle
Reuters

Moscow   A Russian nuclear-powered submarine sank in stormy Arctic seas early Saturday, killing 9 servicemen, as it was being towed into port for scrapping, defense officials said. Head of the operation to move the K-159 through the Barents Sea was immediately suspended and pres. Putin pledged a thorough probe into the accident, which evoked memories of the Kursk disaster 3 years ago. The 40-year-old vessel, one of 2 submarines being transported to a scrapyard at the port of Polyarny, sank to the seabed 510 ft down after floats supporting it broke up during a storm.

Officials said its nuclear reactors had been shut down in 1989 when it was decommissioned and posed no ecological threat. But an environmental pressure group said water was likely to seep into the reactors and radiation levels in the area would have to be watched closely.
Putin, who suffered badly in the political fallout from Aug. 2000 Kursk sinking when 118 servicemen were killed, said in Sardinia where he was on holiday: "Of course, all reasons for the tragedy will be established." Of the 10 crewmen on board when the accident occurred at about 4 am, one officer was rescued alive and 2 bodies were recovered from the sea.

The submarine was being towed along the Kola Peninsula coast to Polyarny when the floats broke apart and the K- 159 tipped over and sank 3 miles northwest of Kildin Island. Interfax news agency, quoting Northern Fleet sources, said a second submarine being transported to Polyarny for scrapping at the same time arrived there successfully. The sources suggested the air rescue operation was delayed because rescuers saw one submarine on the surface and did not at first realize that a second one had sunk.
After a day-long search for survivors, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said hope had been abandoned. "We have to recognize … that there are no chances of finding anyone alive from the crew," he said after flying to the Arctic port of Severomorsk to confer with naval chiefs on the tragedy. Interfax news agency quoted Ivanov as saying the Northern Fleet would observe a day of mourning for the lost submariners Sunday.

Ivanov, long-standing associate of Putin, said technical procedures for towing submarines had been violated and he fully supported the dismissal of Sergei Zhemchuzhov, captain in charge of the towing operation. Navy chief of staff Viktor Kravchenko said rescue ships using special listening equipt had detected no signs of life on board the sunken submarine.
But he said the K-159, like the Kursk, would be raised. Kravchenko, in a televised exchange with Ivanov, said both the K159's reactors had been switched off in 1989 and "put into a nuclear safe condition." "At this site, the radioactive level is normal," he said.

The Norwegian environmental group Bellona, which has long studied Russia's nuclear arsenal, blasted Moscow for allowing the elderly vessel to be towed in rough seas and said new disasters were likely because of poor safety measures. Bellona head Frederic Hauge said there was no seal around the reactors to stop water seeping in. Radiation levels would have to be monitored, but even if all the radiation leaked out it would only slightly raise levels in the area, he added.

Russian sub sinks, killing 9 crew members
8.30.03   AP

… The storm tore off pontoons attached to the K-159 submarine for its trip to the dismantling point. Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov also said the ship's conning tower had been left open, and he fired the commander of the submarine division that included the K-159. "In addition to objective factors, sea waves, there were subjective one: technical standards of towing were ignored during the voyage," Ivanov said.
The 2 nuclear reactors of the 40-year-old submarine have been shut down since it was decommissioned in 1989 and radiation levels remained normal after it sank about 3 nautical miles northwest of Kildin Island near the entrance to Kola Bay, Russian military officials said.

Navy deputy chief Adm. Viktor Kravchenko said one sailor was rescued and the bodies of 2 others were pulled out of the 50-degree waters. … Chief Military Prosecutor's Office said Navy officials were being charged with violating navigation rules and "it is already obvious that the Northern Fleet Command broke the law and didn't show enough resolution in carrying out rescue operations," the Interfax news agency reported.
Although the navy insisted that the K-159's nuclear reactors posed no environmental hazard, environmentalists quickly warned of a possible radiation leak that could contaminate the busy fishing area. "The risks are very high," said retired Russian navy captain Alexander Nikitin who heads St. Petersburg branch of Bellona Fdtn, Norwegian environmental group.

Nikitin said that the uranium fuel, which was loaded into the submarine's reactors some 30 years ago, was far more radioactive & dangerous than a fresher load would be. He harshly blamed the navy for moving the crumbling, leaky submarine to the scrapyard some 190 miles away from its base, saying that its nuclear reactors should have been removed prior to the journey.
"They have chosen the cheapest & the worst option," said Nikitin, whose report on nuclear risks posed by the Russian navy led to his arrest in 1996 and 11-month imprisonment on treason charges. He was acquitted in 1999.
The K-159 sank about 4 a.m. local time in waters 560 ft deep after four pontoons attached for the towing operation were ripped of the sub during a battering storm.

Retired Adm. Eduard Baltin recalled that the K-159 was already taking water when it made its last mission in 1983. He said on Echo of Moscow radio that the navy shouldn't have placed the crew on the submarine, saying that "it was like putting them in a barrel full of holes." Pres. Putin was informed of the accident while on the island of Sardinia for a 3 day meeting with Italian leader Silvio Berlusconi. The sinking "testifies to how the sea demands discipline, it does not forgive any kind of blunder or mistake," Putin said while conducting Berlusconi on a tour of a Russian missile cruiser anchored off Sardinia.
The tour was apparently intended to boost the prestige of the Russian navy, badly hurt by Aug. 2000 Kursk nuclear submarine sinking, which killed all 118 men on board. In contrast to the Kursk disaster, when the govt issued scarce & conflicting information, the Defense Ministry quickly reported the K-159 accident. "Our military & political leadership has at least learned some lessons from the Kursk tragedy," retired Capt. Igor Kurdin, the head of the St.Petersburg-based Submariners' Club, said in a telephone interview.

The Kursk was raised from the Barents Sea floor Oct. 2001 by a Dutch consortium in an unprecedented salvage effort that cost Russian govt about $65 million. Ivanov said the K-159 also would be raised.
Condition of Russia's aging nuclear submarine fleet has long raised intl concern. Russian officials said it will cost an estimated $3.9 billion to scrap more than 100 mothballed nuclear submarines that await destruction. Yet last year, Russian govt budgeted just $70 million for improving nuclear safety in the country as a whole.

The K-159 entered service in 1963. A November-class submarine, it was intended for attacking enemy ships with conventional or low-yield nuclear torpedoes. "It was a workhorse of the Cold War," Kurdin said. A submarine of the same type, the K-8, caught fire and sank April 1970 in the Bay of Biscay during naval maneuvers, killing 52.


Japan A-bomb effects linger 60 years later
2.28.06 amp; Serena Gordon
HealthDay News

How radiation affects the body  per
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
It's been 60 years since atomic bombs fell on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, but survivors are still struggling with the effects, according to new research. The latest research found that survivors of the attacks continue to develop thyroid nodules, either benign or cancerous, and the presence of these nodules is in direct proportion to the radiation dose they received.
The researchers also found that the younger a person was at the time of the bombings, the more likely they were to develop thyroid nodules. However, the research found no connection between radiation exposure and thyroid autoimmune diseases.

Thyroid nodules result from an excess growth of thyroid tissue and can be either benign or malignant. External radiation exposure is one of the known causes of thyroid nodules, according to background information in the study.
"Careful examination and follow-up of thyroid diseases are still important long, 55 to 58 years, after radiation exposure because the present results indicate that radiation dose effects on thyroid nodules, including benign and malignant nodules, were significantly higher in those exposed when young. And the younger-exposed people are now becoming the cancer-prone ages," said the study's lead author Dr. Misa Imaizumi, Radiation Effects Research Foundation clinical studies dept research scientist and chief of the division of radiology in Nagasaki, Japan.

The new findings appear in the 3.1.06 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Assn. 5 years after the bombs were dropped, the Radiation Effects Research Foundation (known then as the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission) was established to study the long-term effects of such extreme radiation exposure in more than 120,000 survivors.
The new study includes nearly 4,100 survivors from that cohort. The study was conducted between March 2000 and February 2003, with study participants averaging 70 years of age. The study included 2,739 women and 1,352 men.

Nearly 45 percent of the participants had some type of thyroid disease, including nodules, autoimmune disease, hypothyroidism and hyperthyroidism, according to the study. Women were more likely to have thyroid problems than men, 51 percent of women vs. 32 percent of men.
The study found that the higher the radiation exposure, the more likely a person was to develop a thyroid nodule. The researchers estimate that 37 percent of malignant tumors,

31 percent of benign nodules and 25 percent of cysts discovered during ultrasound as part of the study were associated with bomb-linked radiation exposure.

Age at the time of exposure was also an important factor in the development of thyroid nodules. The most significant effects were seen in those under 10 at the time of exposure. The study found no association between radiation exposure and autoimmune thyroid diseases, such as Graves' disease.
"The effects of radiation exposure may last for a lifetime," said author of an accompanying editorial Rockville MD International Epidemiology Institute scientific dir. Dr. John Boice Jr in the same issue of the journal. "Even exposure that occurred many years in the past still can have biological effects today."

That information may be important not just for survivors of atomic bombs, but also for anyone who's had medical treatment with radiation, particularly during the 1940s or '50s. Boice, also Vanderbilt University School of Medicine medicine prof.in Nashville TN, noted that anyone with a history of such treatment needs to let their current physician know about it, so they can receive proper follow-up.
He stressed that the risk remains low, and that risks from common radiation exposures, such as through X-ray or CT scans, are much lower still.

Gasoline Alley 6.2.42 Skeezix enlists in the Army (Ordinance Dept)
    olive branching  

    War comes second to Gulf camel races
    1.18.03   Nicholas Blanford
    Times London
Kuwaiti desert   American warplanes, invisible against the pale sky, roar overhead. But all eyes are on the camels racing around the 6 mile (9.7km) sand track. Children as young as 5 perch on the rear of their camel's hump, listening to instructions from the owner, relayed to a mobile phone tied around their neck, while flicking sticks against their steed's flanks.
The Camel Racing Club in the desert about 25 miles south of Kuwait City is a welcome diversion from the uncertainties of a possible war with neighbouring Iraq. Hundreds of Kuwaitis attend the weekly meetings, with official race tournaments attracting thousands of visitors from all over the Gulf, incl royalty.

"This is the heritage of Kuwait," said avid racegoer Ghanem Mutairi. "People are anxious about what is going to happen with Iraq, but there is nothing we can do so why not enjoy the racing." Yet even in the desert it is hard to escape the sounds of looming conflict. U.S. troops are training a few miles north, near the Iraqi border.
The club, founded in 1992, has 5,300 members. Camel-owners, some of whom own up to 60 animals, watch the races from the comfort of plush leather sofas in a cool grandstand. Televisions and an enthusiastic commentator keep fans updated. As betting in Kuwait is forbidden under Islamic law, racegoers make predictions on who will win and get a prize, cash or cars, donated by the club or members of Kuwait's royal family.
There's big money, too, buying & selling racing camels. United Arab Emirates president Sheikh Zaid bin Sultan al- Nahayan recently bought one for the equivalent of £205,000. Some camels can fetch up to £1.5 million.

simple potentially powerful grassroots campaign to protest war.
Place 1/2 cup uncooked rice in a small plastic bag (snack-size Ziploc). Squeeze out excess air & seal bag. Wrap it in a piece of paper on which you have written,
"If your enemies are hungry, feed them."
Romans12:20.
Please send this rice to the people of Iraq;
do not attack them."
If you are of a different faith than Christian, substitute a statement from your own faith tradition.
Place the paper & bag of rice in an envelope (either letter-sized or padded mailing envelope; both are same cost to mail) and address it:   President, White House
1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW   Washington, DC 20500

Attach $1.06 in postage. Trio of 37¢ stamps equal $1.11 circa 2.1.03

  Quemoy & Matsu
"In the mid-1950s, the pacifist
Fellowship of Reconciliation, learning of famine in the Chinese mainland, launched a 'Feed Thine Enemy' campaign. Members & friends mailed thousands of little bags of rice to the White House with a tag quoting the Bible, "If thine enemy hunger, feed him." As far as anyone knew for more than 10 years, the campaign was an abject failure. The President did not acknowledge receipt of the bags publicly; certainly, no rice was ever sent to China.

What nonviolent activists only learned a decade later was that the campaign played a significant, perhaps even determining role in preventing nuclear war. Twice while the campaign was on, President Eisenhower met with the Joint Chiefs of Staff to consider U.S. options in the conflict with China over 2 islands, Quemoy & Matsu. The generals twice recommended use of nuclear weapons.
President Eisenhower each time turned to his aide and asked how many little bags of rice had come in. When told they numbered in the tens of thousands, Eisenhower told the generals that as long as so many Americans were expressing active interest in having the U.S. feed the Chinese, he certainly wasn't going to consider using nuclear weapons against them."
  People Power David H. Albert p43

Gene Sharp  
Albert Einstein Institution sr scholar in residence, Cambridge, MA
Univ. of Massachusetts Dartmouth Political Science prof. emeritus
Harvard Univ. Ctr for Intl Affairs assoc.
"When the great lord passes,
  the wise peasant bows deeply and silently farts
."
"Clausewitz of nonviolent warfare", pioneer developing civilian based defense, Sharp "has identified 198 different 'methods' of nonviolent action, categorized into 3 general classes of action and 49 subclasses". ¹
He applies results of his studies on nonviolent struggle to the problems of deterrence & defense.

Political power is not intrinsic to rulers but derives exclusively from citizens. Thus political power requires social support. Therein lies key to nonviolent action:

    "Political power disintegrates when
      people withdraw their obedience & support"
His works explain for general public & policymakers how massive & selective noncooperation & defiance by country's population & institutions deny attackers their objectives without the dangers of modern war.
Sharp attempts to correct common "misconceptions" about nonviolence. Among these:

Sharp studies the ways of "transarmament", changeover from military defense systems, is conducted, esp. how broad-based coalition & nonviolent protest swept away decade-long dictatorship.
  ex.   On 10.6.00 Slobodan Milosevic conceded national election to Vojislav Kostunica, culminating incredible campaign spearheaded by Otpor! student movement, Serbian for "resistance". Armed only with rock concerts & ridicule, the Internet & e-mail, spray-painted slogans and willingness to be arrested, Otpor! students became shock troops in army of pro-democracy, anti-war and opposition parties.
The Albert Einstein Institution   non-violence according to the CIA; soft and undercover coups d’état 1.4.05 & Thierry Meyssan Voltaire Network

Non violence as a political action technique can be used for anything. During the 1980s, NATO drew its attention on its possible use to organize the Resistance in Europe after the invasion of the Red Army. It’s been 15 years since CIA began using it to overthrow inflexible govts without provoking international outrage, and its ideological façade is philosopher Gene Sharp’s Albert Einstein Institution.
Unknown to the public, Gene Sharp formulated a theory on non violence as a political weapon. He first helped NATO then the CIA train the leaders of the soft coups of the last 15 years. Since the 50s, Gene Sharp studied Henry D. Thoreau and Mohandas K. Gandhi’s theory of civil disobedience.

For these authors, obedience & disobedience were religious & moral matters, not political ones. However, to preach had political consequences; what could be considered an aim could be perceived as a mean. Civil disobedience can be considered then as a political, even military, action technique.
In 1983, Sharp designed the Non Violent Sanctions Program in the Center for International Affairs of Harvard University where he did some social sciences studies on the possible use of civil disobedience by Western Europe population in case of a military invasion carried out by the troops of the Warsaw Pact.
At the same time, he founded the Albert Einstein Institution in Boston with the double purpose of financing his own researches and applying his own models to specific situations.

In 1985, he published a book titled "Making Europe Unconquerable" ²

General Edward B. Atkeson, well-known by CIA director, ³ incorporated the Institute to the American interference stay-behind network in allied States. To focus on the moral issues of an action helped to avoid all doubts on the legitimacy of an action. Therefore, non violence, recognized as good-natured and assimilated to democracy, offered a suitable aspect to antidemocratic secret actions.
In 1989, when the Albert Institution became well known, Gene Sharp began to advice anticommunist movements. He participated in the establishment of Burma’s Democratic Alliance, a coalition of notable anticommunists that quickly joined the military govt, and Taiwan’s Progressive Democratic Party, which favored the independence of the island from communist China, something U.S. officially opposed.

He also unified the Tibetan opposition under Dalai Lama and tried to form a dissident group within PLO so that Palestinian nationalists would stop terrorism 4 (he made the necessary arrangements with Colonel Reuven Gal, 5 director of the Psychological Action division of the Israeli armed forces, to train them secretly in the American Embassy in Tel Aviv).
When CIA realized how useful could the Albert Einstein Institution be, it brought Col. Robert Helvey into play. An expert in clandestine actions and former dean of the Embassies’s Military Attachés Training School, "Bob" took Gene Sharp to Burma to educate the opposition on the non violent strategy for criticizing the cruelest military junta of the world without questioning the system.

By doing this, Helvey could identify the "good" and "bad" opponents in a critical moment for Washington: the true opposition, led by Mrs. Suu Kyi, was labeled as a threat to the pro-American regimen. Bob’s job was easily done. Since he was military attaché in Rangoon from 1983 to 1985 and helped to structure the dictatorship, he knew everybody.
By playing a double game, Colonel Helvey simultaneously directed a classical action of military support to Karen resistance: by providing weapons and controlling a limited guerrilla, Washington wished, indeed, to maintain the military junta under pressure.

Since that moment, Sharp has always been present everywhere American interests are put at risk. In June 1989, he and his assistant, Bruce Jenkins, went to Beijing, 2 weeks before Tiananmen events. They were both expelled by Chinese authorities.
In February 1990, the Albert Einstein Institution hosted a Conference on Non Violent Sanctions that brought together 185 experts of 16 countries under Colonels Robert Helvey and Reuven Gal. This marked the beginning of an international anticommunist crusade to involve peoples in non violent action.

Professor Thomas Schelling, 6 well known economist and CIA consultant, joined the Administrative Council of the Institution whose official budget was still stable though it was also funded by the International Republican Institute (IRI), one of the four branches of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED/CIA). 7
At the same time, Baltic countries proclaimed their independence but, after a test of endurance with Mikhail Gorbachov, they postponed their decision for 2 or 3 years to negotiate their terms. In October 1990, Gene Sharp and his team traveled to Sweden and trained several Lithuanian politicians in the organization of a popular resistance against the Red Army.

Months later, in May 1991, when the crisis broke out and Gorbatchov deployed his special forces; Gene Sharp was the adviser of Sajudis separatist party (Perestroika Initiative Group) and remained close to Vytautas Landsbergis. In June 1992, independent Lithuania Minister of Defense, Audrius Butkevicius, hosted a symposium to thank Albert Einstein Institution’s key role during the independence process of the Baltic countries.
When the U.S began its rearmament in 1998, 8 the Albert Einstein Institution became part of an expansionist strategy. It provided ideology and technique to Otpor («Resistance»), a group of Slobodan Milosevic’s young opponents.
Simultaneously, it intervened in Kosovo province to train Ibrahim Rugova’s LDK, but it turned useless for Washington during the Kosovo war. Then, Otpor quickly became a choice to overthrow Milosevic who was very popular for resisting NATO.

Colonel Helvey trained Otpor’s leaders through seminars hosted at Hilton Hotel in Budapest. Money was not a problem to overthrow Europe’s last communist govt. The person in charge of commanding the operation was agent Paul B. McCarthy, discreetly settled at Moskva hotel in Belgrade until Milosevic’s resignation in October 2000.
In September 2002, Gene Sharp went to The Hague to train the members of the Iraqi National Council who were preparing themselves to return to Iraq, along with the American army.
In September 2003, it was also the Albert Einstein Institution who advised the opposition to question the electoral results and go on demonstrations to force Eduard Shevardnadze’s resignation 9 during the "revolution" of the roses in Georgia.

When the CIA-organized-coup against Venezuela failed in April 2002, the State Dept counted again on the Albert Einstein Institution which advised the owners of enterprises during the organization of the revocatory referendum against President Hugo Chávez. Gene Sharp and his team led the leaders of Súmate during the demonstrations of August 2004.
As done before, the only thing they had to do was questioning the electoral results and demanding the resignation of the president. They managed to get the bourgeoisie out in the street but Chavez’s popular govt was too strong. All in all, international observers had no other choice but to recognize Hugo Chávez’s victory.

Gene Sharp failed in Belarus and Zimbabwe for he could not recruit and train in the proper time the necessary amount of demonstrators. During the orange "revolution" in November 2004, 10 we met again with Colonel Robert Helvey in Kiev.
Finally, we must point out that the Albert Einstein Institution has begun to train Iranian agitators.

Why Albert Einstein? It is an unsuspicious name.
Gene Sharp’s first book on Gandhi’s methods began with a preface signed by Albert Einstein, though the book was written in 1960, 5 years after the genius’s death. Therefore, Albert Einstein did not write anything for Sharp’s work. Sharp was reproducing an article on non violence written by the scientist.

1   Making Europe Unconquerable: The Potential of Civilian-based Deterrence and Defense. Taylor & Francis Publishing House, London, 1985. Its second edition included a preface by George F. Kennan, Ballinger Publishing House, Massachusetts, 1986.

2   General Georges Fricaud Chagnaud had been military attaché at the Embassy of France in Washington, and some time later he was appointed Chief of NATO’s French military mission.

3   General Edward B. Atkeson is currently a CSIS expert and manager of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers (AFIO).

4   Mubarak Awad, one of the agents formed by Sharp, is currently (January 2005) in charge of the American aid sent to Indonesia after the tsunami.

5   Nowadays, Colonel Reuven Gal is deputy head of the National Security Council of Israel in charge of molding Palestine society.

6   In March 2004, Thomas Schelling was one of the drafters of the Copenhagen Consensus. Sponsored by The Economist, this document questioned the UN Millenium Program and the Kyoto Protocol. Schelling formulated a theoretical model which suggested that economic growth is the best way to combat global warming for, in the future, it should guarantee the development of the necessary techniques to solve the problem.

7   Thierry Meyssan : «The Networks of “Democratic” Interference», Voltaire (text in French), November 21, 2004.

8   In 1998 and despite the lack of enemy, the Congress forced President Clinton to implement a rearmament policy.

9   See Paul Labarique : «Les dessous du coup d’État en Géorgie», text in French, Voltaire, January 7, 2004.

10   See Emilia Nazarenko: «Moscow and Washington confronting each other in Ukraine», Voltaire (Text in French), November 1st, 2004. This article was published by Red Voltaire before the first part of the presidential elections and described the organization of the pretended spontaneous movement of the following weeks.


An interview with Gene Sharp   transcript
7.9.03 Metta Spencer Peace Magazine

M. Spencer: How did you come to do your original research?

Gene Sharp: Well, from high school age, I was aware of the world's problems. The Second World War was just finishing, nuclear weapons were new, Stalin was in control of the Soviet Union, colonialism was strong, and war was a problem because we knew a little about nuclear weapons.
I wanted to see what could be done about all of that. At Ohio State I did a masters thesis in sociology on nonviolence, covering both belief systems and action.

There was a tremendous problem with lack of clear terminology about the technique of nonviolent action. In my thesis I was still confusing the two, putting belief and action in the same general category.
Years later I realized that they were different phenomena. They might overlap on occasion but often did not. Some believers in pacifism objected to certain kinds of nonviolent resistance because they didn't believe in conflict at all.

Later I distinguished between different types of principled nonviolence. The technique of nonviolent action sometimes had religious pacifists participating, but often did not.
It was a revelation to realize that most of the people in India who were participating in nonviolent struggles against the British did not believe in nonviolence as an ethic. On one occasion down in the basement of the library of Ohio State University. I was looking at an old newspaper for materials on Gandhi's 1930 campaign. I wondered: Should I put that down? Better just leave it out!
But I put it down.

Later it dawned on me that, rather than that being a threat, it was a great opportunity, because it meant that large numbers of people who would never believe in ethical or religious nonviolence could use nonviolent struggle for pragmatic reasons. This could happen decades or centuries before their descendants accepted the principle of nonviolence.
Then I found references on nonviolent resistance in Samoa, Korea, and American colonies before Lexington and Concord as well as general strikes. I went into some of the literature on labor strikes and boycotts. There was a heritage here.

There was a theory that Gandhi was propounding: that all govts depend on the obedience of the population, which was an interesting idea, but it certainly wasn't classical. I tried tracing that to different people. Was it found in Thoreau, for example, where it was sometimes credited? Clearly, it was in Tolstoy. Gandhi had got this idea from Tolstoy, not the ethics, but the idea that govts depend on the obedience of the population.
In Norway I met people who had participated in the anti-Quisling and anti-fascist resistance. I began drawing some of those threads together from studies on strikes and boycotts.
I came up with a list. I think I had 18 methods of nonviolent action. The largest list I had come across previously was 12. When I was in Norway, I drew up a list which I think went up to 65 and took it to a conference in Accra, Ghana.

People there were absolutely fascinated by this list. Someone asked: How does this technique work? I had to give a talk on that. My notes were later expanded and became Part Three of The Politics of Nonviolent Action whereas the list in Part Two grew to 198 methods. The power discussion became the basis of Part One of that book.
At one stage I had called myself a pacifist, but pacifists, even today, still concentrate on what they are going to refuse to do and are often weak on what they are going to do, except for reconciliation, forgiveness and relieving human suffering.
The notion that you couldn't get rid of the violence for nothing, this was an amazing revelation.

M. Spencer: "You couldn't get rid of the violence for nothing?"

Gene Sharp: Yes. You can't say, "We renounce violence" and expect that to be applied socially, politically, and internationally. Violence is not just aggression. It's not just evil. It's a way to wage a conflict. Not all conflicts are equal. The issues in them vary widely. Some issues you can compromise on. They're not very important, ex. which color do we paint a wall, what kind of food can we have tonight? You can even compromise on salary increases.
But when it's whether you're going to be taken over by a foreign aggressor, whether some of your people are going to be exterminated, whether you are going to accept a dictatorship, or they are going to prohibit your religion, whether they are going to violate your human rights and impose serious oppressions, those are not issues in which, morally and politically, you can compromise.

So what do you do, if renouncing the violence doesn't get rid of it? I realized that, in some of these other cases, they did not use violence. They did something else.
Some sociological theorists described the function of different kinds of social institutions. They said, "You can't just get rid of an institution. You have to have some way of fulfilling the function that the institution was supposed to do. If you don't have a substitute way to do that job, to fulfill that function, the institution is going to stay".

That would explain why war has not been abolished, because people always believe that military means were the only means they had to prevent aggression and fight off attackers. One needed a substitute.
Many of my later studies were on these other cases where nonviolent struggle actually had been used, not because people thought it was morally superior (except relatively, perhaps) but because it was there and so they took it.
They didn't always do it very effectively, but they did it more effectively they most people might have predicted. Only much later did I realize (and this is a major point in the new book I'm working on) that you could by conscious effort take this primitive technique, which has usually been improvised, often by people who didn't know what they were doing, but who had guts and determination.

You could learn how to wage that type of conflict more effectively in the future than it has been done in the past. You could also take this technique and adapt it for particular purposes, as in the American Civil Rights movement, the Montgomery bus boycott, the Winnipeg General Strike.
People weren't improvising on the basis of what they knew about nonviolence generally. They were trying to figure out how to act in this particular situation and they knew something about particular methods, such as strikes. We could adapt this technique against a take-over, a coup d'etat. We could adapt it and prepare it for use against foreign aggression, invasions and occupations with specific types of planning. We could use it for whatever purposes people thought they had to use violence because they presumed there was no alternative.

This meant a very different way of getting rid of violence & war, because it was not going to be renounced. That hasn't happened. It's not going to happen.
But it could be replaced not all of a sudden, but incrementally, for specific purposes and specific needs. Gradually there would be less "need" to resort to violence at all.
You could ask whether it could be used against imperialist domination and to get the English out of India, for example. That choice was pragmatic in India. It wasn't because Gandhi was a Mahatma or any such nonsense. It was a very concrete, pragmatic decision by major Indian leaders, including Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister, who had been an advocate of violent revolution until 1928.

Then he recognized this thing Gandhi had been using can be used to get our independence! Not all Indians went along with this, but many other people did, in many other countries. It happened on every continent, I think, except Antarctica. There has never been a penguin liberation movement.
This kind of struggle kept recurring, sometimes with disastrous results, sometimes with remarkable successes, but it kept recurring, so it is possible. Kenneth Boulding º had something called Boulding's First Law, which I think he stole from one of the Greek philosophers: "That which is, is possible".

M. Spencer: The reverse of this aphorism also accounts for a lot. Sometimes, because people don't believe something is possible, they can't see that it is happening right around them. They can't recognize what actually takes place because their ideas do not have room for it to exist.

Gene Sharp: Yes, and there's the opposite of that too.
When violence fails, people don't say, "Violence doesn't work". They keep the belief that violence is the most powerful thing they can do even though it has proved to be a disaster.

M. Spencer: If nonviolent action doesn't work in 2 minutes, they say it doesn't work, so let's go back to what works.

Gene Sharp: Even though it didn't work! So adherence to violence is a doctrine, because "we know that's true."
There was Soviet domination, direct & indirect, in all Eastern Europe. At that time we spent billions on military capacity against the Soviet Union, which did nothing to wipe out dictatorial Communist regimes. The people mostly did it themselves, by nonviolent struggle.
Who would have thought that the Poles would become supreme practitioners of nonviolent struggle, when they had risen up in violent rebellion against the Russian Empire time after time, with disastrous results? They had charged out on horses against the Nazi tanks. But they became practitioners of nonviolent struggle.

Estonia with a population of about 1.5 million got independence from the intact Soviet Union, (as did) the people of Latvia or Lithuania. Now, nobody thinks much about that in those countries. They want into NATO.

M. Spencer: Recently we showed the film about Otpor and the overthrow of Milosevic, Bringing Down a Dictator. Lots of pro-Milosevic people were present. The real issue for them is, here is the evil U.S. (and most of us do think US policies often are pretty evil) funding this nonviolent resistance. To them that's a cardinal sin. A govt cannot (legitimately) fund or sponsor the overthrow of another govt.

Gene Sharp: Why not?

M. Spencer: Because the U.S. has interests and it's supposedly immoral to have interests. Nobody is surprised that the U.S. gives guns to people, but the idea that they assisted the Serbs to get rid of Milosevic seems somehow especially evil.
To my mind, it is particularly the U.S., of all countries, that I want to see supporting nonviolence. It would be the greatest thing in the world for the U.S. adopt nonviolence.

Gene Sharp: What do they prefer that the U.S. spend the money on?

M. Spencer: They just shouldn't interfere. No country should interfere in the affairs of another country.

Gene Sharp: No country should have been upset with the Nazi regime? That's a clear example. Whoever is in control of the state apparatus, no matter what they do, should be untouchable?
I think any superpower has a responsibility to explore other kinds of struggles that might be developed so that frustrated people seeking democracy don't kill thousands of people. Superpowers should devote one or two percent of their military budgets to exploring these other possibilities. That's the least that one could ask for.

M. Spencer: What about nonviolent action in Tibet? When I interviewed Samdhong Rinpoche he mentioned some contact with you and hoped you would help them do something.

Gene Sharp: I have been waiting for a report on recent developments since we were with them in India. We don't yet have it yet. There is a clear case, I think, where nonviolent struggle is the only option they have of their own accord.
When the US was funding guerrilla activity in Tibet against the Chinese, it was disastrous.
Just meditating on nonviolence and reaching higher levels of spiritual achievement doesn't exactly remove an aggressive Chinese occupation. This is about all they have.

Whether they all see that, and what they choose to do about it, that's another question.
I also have a book in Tibetan; it is not published in English. The English translation of the title is The Power and Practice of Nonviolent Struggle. The Dalai Lama wrote the introduction to it. Although his approach is not identical to mine, he was welcoming this examination of nonviolent action.

M. Spencer: You once told me that military people understand you better than peace people do.

Gene Sharp: Yes. That does not mean that no peace people can understand this. Some are very good at it. Some see nonviolent struggle on a pragmatic basis as a fulfilment of their principles. But there are many people in peace organizations who don't like conflict.
A few years ago, I gave a talk about national defense by prepared nonviolent resistance. Someone in the audience was very shocked, and accused me: "All you are doing is taking the violence out of war!"
And someone else in another audience said, "Well, my goodness, what if the Nazis had learned to use this nonviolent resistance?"

M. Spencer: What did you say?

Gene Sharp: That there would have been 6 million Jews left and millions of other people would not have been killed. If the Nazis had expressed their racial theories through boycotts and so forth, it wouldn't have been wonderful, but it would have been a whole lot better.

M. Spencer: How far would you go with that? Suppose some neo-Nazis came to you and said, "We want to learn how to do nonviolent action."

Gene Sharp: I would say, "Here is a list of publications on nonviolent struggle. I think your world outlook and your racial theories are detestable. I will not advise you on how to conduct your struggle. If you want to learn how to use nonviolent methods, they are there. I would prefer that you change your outlook on the world and on other people. If you continue to be Anti-Semites, then it is better for you do this than to slaughter people."

This was reflected in the U.S. South. I was in Europe during most of the Civil Rights struggles, but when the civil rights workers found the local gas station wouldn't sell them gasoline, or when the bank manager foreclosed on loans early, because they were campaigning for rights for African Americans, that was bad, but it was much preferable to lynching, of which there were many cases.

M. Spencer: The example of Iran confirms that. The opposition to the Shah was nonviolent. I know of no one who supported having the Ayatollahs take charge and create theocracy. Nevertheless, I'm glad they did it nonviolently.

Gene Sharp: Yes. I don't think all the people participating in the Iranian situation of 1979 were in favor of theocracy. Some of them were just for more democracy.
There is the phase of the struggle and then there is the phase of transition of the regimes. If you are not careful, you can be successful in undermining a regime that is oppressive and then leave yourself wide open to a new group taking over and installing themselves as dictators.
That's what Lenin and the Bolsheviks did in 1917 and that's apparently what the Ayatollahs did in Iran. There are other cases of this, so you have to plan the transition carefully and have methods planned to block future takeovers or coups d'etat.
<>p> One of my new publications is called The Anti-Coup. There have been many cases where a regime has been undermined but then a new group takes advantage of the confusion and the people passively submit instead of resisting that outfit too.

M. Spencer: My sense is that nonviolence needs to be coupled with an emphasis on democracy and what to do after you have destabilized dictatorship. By itself, nonviolence is only half of the equation.

Gene Sharp: I have a few pages on that point in the booklet From Dictatorship to Democracy, which was written for the Burmese democrats and published in Bangkok in 1993.
There's a case where the 1988 uprising undermined the military dictatorship, which had been established by the coup d'etat long ago. They undermined three or four military governments.
Then the democratic leaders started arguing among themselves over who was going to head the new democratic govt.

This gave the military a chance to carry out a new coup d'etat, and people collapsed in the face of massacres. Though they really undermined the military dictators in Burma, the democrats did not use that partial victory effectively and helped mess things up themselves.

M. Spencer: Which is what also happened in Serbia, before and after Milosevic. The democratic parties couldn't get their act to gether.

Gene Sharp: I don't know much about that. When was I there, I think it was in May of 2001, they certainly had a democratic govt. They didn't have a perfect regime. You can't expect that, if you do one nonviolent struggle, then you've got a kingdom of God on earth.
They held a democratic election, with different parties and they weren't aiming for a complete transformation of all the society or getting rid of all their problems. But it was infinitely better than what they had previously. It gave them a chance to make that society better. Whether they used this opportunity well or not, I can't judge.

M. Spencer: Well, as I understand it, the murder of Djindjic finally woke some people up and made them realize they actually had to get rid of some of these Mafias that had been buddies with Milosevic. Yes, they are cleaning house now, but only because they had this assassination.

Gene Sharp: I heard that too. There is a naivete among some advocates of nonviolent means. They think that if you've had one nonviolent struggle, you are not going to have any more serious problems.
I have heard people say that all the nonviolent struggles for independence in India and all of Gandhi's work was a waste. They still have the caste system, they still have poverty, they have an Indian Army, as though one series of struggles for independence from a colonial power could have possibly solved all these problems.

That's nonsense. They set much higher standards for evaluating effectiveness and success of nonviolent struggle than for violent struggle.

M. Spencer: What about a nonviolent struggle against a nonviolent struggle? Such as in, say, Venezuela. Both sides in conflict now have largely used nonviolent methods.

Gene Sharp: I haven't been to Venezuela. A couple of people who worked with us, including Bob Helvey, have been there and done a workshop for Venezuelans, but I am not well informed on that situation.
However, without discussing Venezuela, which I don't know much about, the idea that you can have nonviolent resistance confronting nonviolent resistance, that's wonderful.
We don't think it's strange that in a war both sides use violence. If you can get both sides using nonviolent struggle against each other, that's a great advance. We should be welcoming that, even though we could still take sides.

M. Spencer: I raised the Venezuelan case because it illustrates another point, that whether or not the side using nonviolence is the one with the better policies, it won't win if citizens don't strongly support them.
Chavez is steering the wrong course on economic matters. They won't get out of the hole until they have different policies. But the nonviolent opposition against him lost. I am not sure that nonviolence always gives the best political outcome, but at any rate, I would rather see nonviolence used than violence.

Gene Sharp: Nonviolent struggle can fail because it wasn't planned well, because it had a poor strategy. People sometimes say, "Let's just have a strike and stop everything from functioning economically".
But how long can people not feed their families because they are not getting any pay? There is a limit on how long a strike can continue. When it fails, it doesn't necessarily mean the population favored one side over the other. It may have been a simplistic economic solution to what was largely a political problem.

Some of the means being used now by the Chavez govt such as the currency limitations mean that people can't buy things abroad. So the newspapers, which have often been anti-Chavez, cannot buy newsprint. Therefore opposition newspapers will be driven out of business, which means govt control of the news.
So it is a very complex situation.

M. Spencer: What do you think about the use of force in such cases as Rwanda or East Timor, to prevent oppression by part of the population or by the govt itself on its own people?

Gene Sharp: First let me react to your use of the word "force." I have a problem with that word because it's a polite term for military violence. It assumes that nonviolent means are incapable of force. It sets up a terminological bias in favor of military means. We say it is "force" and that is more respectable.
But the question of genocide by the govt, that is a grave problem. We can't wait to find an answer until the slaughter starts. It's like getting a car on the edge of a cliff and saying, "If you don't like the way I'm driving, you take over".

You get to the point where there is no easy solution, whereas we should have started in a different direction long ago. Hannah Arendt's book, Eichmann in Jerusalem, for which she was maligned, is very important. She said that the slaughter that the Nazis perpetrated will not be the last.
At that time, many people thought, "Oh good, it's over!" She was saying, No, it's not over. This is going to happen again and we have to examine how it happened if we are to block it it in the future.
She showed that the Nazis did not get as many Jews and Gypsies out of occupied countries as they wanted. In some cases they got massive numbers to the gas chambers. In other countries they got very few, not that they didn't want them; they just couldn't get them.

She asked: Why were more people saved in some countries than in others? It turns out it was largely because someone whose help was needed, refused to help the Nazis. Sometimes even German officials didn't give the instructions or make their troops available. Sometimes it was the general population that hid the Jews or helped them escape.
Sometimes it was Jews themselves who made themselves difficult to collect and send on to the gas chambers.
Decades ago I proposed studying cases of attempted genocide and the degree to which the perpetrators' attempts were successful, how they were blocked, so we can learn what forms of resistance are likely to be useful in the future.

There are more studies of genocide now, but that kind of comparative study has not been done. When you have a massive slaughter going on, what do you do? I don't have easy solutions. We should have started those kinds of studies before, knowing there is ethnic hatred in an area where military institutions are continuing to build up that can be transferred to a different purpose when they get the command.
If such institutions weren't there, if people had training in noncooperation & resistance and identifying the danger points, we could put a stop to it now. Then we wouldn't be depending upon military or international assistance, which may or may not be helpful.

Genocide happens under wartime conditions. Goebbels and Hitler both recognized that fact and were looking forward to a war in order to exterminate Jews and others.

M. Spencer: Some critics say that a nonviolent campaign requires special circumstances, such as a free press and means of communicating with members of the opposition.

Gene Sharp: Well, obviously, under a totalitarian regime communication is more difficult and the activities are more dangerous. But the idea that it cannot happen under such conditions is ridiculous. It has happened.

M. Spencer: Where?

Gene Sharp: Nonviolent struggle occurred in Nazi occupations. In Norway, for example, and the Netherlands. Newspapers were published in the hundreds of thousands of copies per issue in Nazi-occupied Netherlands. Not just one, but several.
In Norway, they published small newspapers, newsletters, and books. Copies of them are in the Norwegian Resistance Museum in Oslo. The same thing happened in the Soviet Union with their "samizdat" publications. It happened in Poland during the Soviet presence and the Communist regime. They had underground publishing houses.

M. Spencer: Let's talk about the future. How can we advance this technique? What research issues still need to be addressed? How can we promote nonviolence as a message?

Gene Sharp: First, we need to disseminate knowledge about this type of struggle. How do you face difficult conditions? I acknowledge that there are difficult conditions, but difficulties are not the same as impossibilities.
Bob Helvey focuses on one important element: How can people control their fear and act despite it? I am not sure whether this is different from soldiers in the front lines of conventional wars. They are afraid, yet they keep fighting. How do they do this?

In nonviolent struggles people knowingly face terrible potential consequences for their actions and their protests. They have to learn what not to do. Don't deliberately march down the street toward the machine guns. Stay home! Mobilize the city in silence! It will be harder for them to kill anybody, let alone thousands of people in a few minutes.
Some people oppose strategic thinking. Time after time, people march down facing the guns, very brave. Sometimes the soldiers lower their guns and sometimes they don't. But resistance movements need to plan. This is no time for spontaneity or feeling.

People say, "I feel that … " in many nonviolent action planning groups. How conceited! Their feeling is more important than whether the struggle succeeds?
This is one of the terrible things that happened in Tiananmen Square. The students had voted to leave the square. Then students came from other parts of China who had not had a chance to demonstrate yet, so they voted to stay in the square, because they wanted to. Foolish!

How to plan to make nonviolent struggle more effective? My next book will have 4 chapters on planning strategies for nonviolent struggles. People in nonviolent struggles rarely understand what the word means, so be careful when you hear people talk about "strategy".
It means calculating how to remove the sources of power from the oppressive regime. You have to identify what makes those sources strong. You must also be aware of the weaknesses of the regime and how to aggravate them and make the regime disintegrate.

In Poland they came up with 9 points: Do not do this, do this, do that, a simple list. Then disseminate this knowledge right away. Correct our history books. Put nonviolent struggles into the places they merit in history. How people view the past helps determine their present and future.
Our military establishments are well prepared for decades in advance. Nonviolent struggles may be prepared a few days in advance, and frequently that's not done well. This tips the bias in favor of the use of military means. Methods of undermining dictatorships can be presented in clear terms and spread throughout the whole population. Then they will have greater chance of success.

We need programs on genocide prevention. Instead of just considering how to do it at the last minute, ask, how can we prevent it from getting started? How can we prevent the rise of new dictatorships, not just how we can fight them when the Gestapo is knocking at our door.
If they are there, how can we disintegrate those dictatorships before they slaughter a population or engage in international aggression or develop methods of mass extermination? We have a lot to do.
    Man arrested for 'peace' T-shirt
    3.4.03   Reuters
NYC   A lawyer was arrested late Monday and charged with trespassing at a public mall in the state of New York after refusing to take off a T-shirt advocating peace that he had just purchased at the mall. According to the criminal complaint filed Monday, Stephen Downs was wearing a T-shirt bearing the words "Give Peace A Chance" that he had just purchased from a vendor inside the Crossgates Mall in Guilderland, NY, near Albany.
"I was in the food court with my son when I was confronted by 2 security guards and ordered to either take off the T-shirt or leave the mall," said Downs. When Downs refused the security officers' orders, police from the town of Guilderland were called and he was arrested and taken away in handcuffs, charged with trespassing "in that he knowingly enter(ed) or remain(ed) unlawfully upon premises," the complaint read.

Downs said police tried to convince him he was wrong in his actions by refusing to remove the T-shirt because the mall "was like a private house and that I was acting poorly. I told them the analogy was not good and I was then hauled off to night court where I was arraigned after pleading not guilty and released on my own recognizance", Downs told Reuters in a telephone interview.
Downs is the director of the Albany Office of the state Commission on Judicial Conduct, which investigates complaints of misconduct against judges and can admonish, censure or remove judges found to have engaged in misconduct.
Calls to the Guilderland police and district attorney, Anthony Cardona and to officials at the mall were not returned for comment. Downs is due back in court for a hearing on March 17. He could face up to a year in prison if convicted.

… In the 1980s, the U.S. & Soviet Union were in the midst of "Cold War", war between the ideologies of democracy & communism. 10 year old Samantha Smith from Manchester, ME was concerned about peace. She suggested that her mother write to the new president of the Soviet Union. Instead, Samantha's mother proposed Samantha write to him. In her letter, Samantha expressed her fear about a "nuclear war" between Russia & U.S. She questioned why Andropov wanted to "conquer the world or at least our country." She stated that "God made the world for us to live together in peace and not to fight."

The following April, Samantha received a 3 page letter from Andropov. He addressed her concerns and said that the Soviet Union did indeed "want very much to live in peace, to trade & cooperate with all our neighbors on this earth." In his letter, Andropov invited Samantha to visit the Soviet Union in the summer. The press showed up at the Smith household. Samantha was an instant celebrity. 7.7.83 Samantha flew to the Soviet Union. She toured the country; met with the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova; met with the U.S. ambassador; and attended the Soviet youth camp Artek, on the Black Sea. The children at the Artek Pioneer Camp were members of a group called the "Young Pioneers," similar to the Boy & Girl Scouts in America.

… After returning, Samantha continued to be involved in the crusade for peace. She made speeches & television appearances. She wrote a book, Journey to the Soviet Union. She traveled with her mother to the Children's International Symposium in Kobe, Japan. … Tragically, Samantha & her father were killed in a plane crash Aug. 1985 when she was 13 years old. The Soviet govt issued a stamp in her honor and named a diamond, flower, mountain and planet after her. In Augusta ME a life size statue stands in commemoration of the brave girl. The statue shows Samantha releasing a dove while a bear, the symbol of Maine & the Soviet Union, clutches at her leg.


Critics called him Dennis the Menace in 1977 when the 31-year-old was "the boy mayor" of Cleveland. But he was elected to save the city's electric power system. He did. Now the 56-year-old Ohio congress from , who was campaigning in Austin on Saturday, wants to be the Democratic nominee for president. He thinks he can wrest the presidency from GW Bush.
"I'll be appealing to the basic courage of the American people," Kucinich said. "This administration is based on fear. They're totally manipulating the people of America." Kucinich has been endorsed by Willie Nelson, based on a pledge to restore rural communities & family farms by breaking up agricultural monopolies.

The candidate was in town for a speech to the national convention of the Campus Greens at the Austin Music Hall. He flew in from an appearance in San Francisco, plans to appear on CNN this morning from an Austin TV studio, and will fly to New Hampshire in the afternoon. "This election will be based on what happens on America's campuses," Kucinich said Saturday. "To rouse America to the cause of peace. Principal among that is eliminating the waste in the Pentagon and the programs that are preparing us for World War III."

He is the author of legislation to create a cabinet-level Dept of Peace as a counterbalance to the Dept of Defense and to establish nonviolence as a principal in domestic & foreign affairs. "It's about challenging the underlying assumption that war is inevitable," he said. Kucinich dismisses critics who say that after 9.11.01 a Democratic presidential peace candidate has about as much chance as Democratic president nominee George McGovern did in 1972 when McGovern lost 49 states in his race with President Nixon.
"To the contrary, I am the taxpayer's friend," Kucinich said. "What the Bush administration has done is scare the American people into believing we should passively x a huge increase in defense spending."


While praising the U.S., Kligerman does not hesitate to speak out against the Bush administration. He contends that its policies, particularly involving the war in Iraq, are tarnishing the worldwide image of U.S. as "a haven for the oppressed, a place of free speech, free thought and free yet governed economic growth." Kligerman, who will turn 73 this month, protested the Vietnam War in the 1960's. He supports the Anti-Defamation League & NAACP. He supports Business Leaders for Sensible Priorities, nonpartisan group of business executives & former military officers who contend that govt's spending priorities, particularly involving the military, do not address the nation's most pressing needs.
Mr. Kligerman's name has appeared in antiwar advertisements that the group has run in newspapers & magazines to warn that war in Iraq will not only take a terrible toll in human life but will also hurt the economy and breed terrorism. In addition, he has given speeches & written op-ed essays criticizing govt positions on the war, energy policy and civil rights. Most of all, he has lamented what he calls the hubris that characterizes the Bush administration.

In debates about the war in Iraq and the country's domestic & foreign agendas, such views are not uncommon. What is unusual is for a business executive to express them as publicly and as often as Kligerman does. He acknowledges that it is easier for him to speak his mind because his co. is small & privately owned. Leaders of large, publicly traded companies, on the other hand, generally find it too risky to take a stand on the war, for or against.
The few who have made their feelings known have been harshly rebuked. Milwaukee Wisconsin Energy Corp. chair & CEO Richard Abdooin , for example, was pilloried as un-American by talk-radio hosts and criticized in an editorial in The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel after he made a private $250 donation last Nov. to the Not in Our Name Project group opposed to the war. Mr. Abdoo's name appeared on the group's Web site, as did the name of his co. A spokesman for Wisconsin Energy said Mr. Abdoo was trying to put the episode behind him and would not comment on it.

Unlike Hollywood celebrities or other public figures who have been openly critical of the govt, corporate executives have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders that makes it difficult to separate personal actions from official duties. Not surprisingly, most of the executives who have taken a public stance on the war have been from small or private companies, or are retired.
One notable example is R. Warren Langley, one of dozens of antiwar protesters arrested in mid-March trying to disrupt the Pacific Stock Exchange. Former USAF Lt Col. Langley, was president of the exchange from 1996 to 1999. Kligerman said he had received no negative reactions to his public comments and had no second thoughts about making them. "The Bush administration does not embody America," he said. "America to me is not a country that suddenly suspends constitutional rights, imprisons without charge, without access to legal counsel or family."

Enemy soldiers gather - to strive for peace   Shunned by their respective govts, former Israeli & Palestinian fighters have been meeting in secret, seeking common ground.   ¹ t ª
4.6.06   Amelia Thomas Christian Science Monitor

Arram, West Bank   The stark white room buzzes with Arabic and Hebrew conversation as a group of about 50 men jovially shake hands and arrange themselves in seats around its perimeter. The men range in age from 20 to 60. Some wear suits and polished shoes; others are dressed casually in sweat pants and T-shirts.
They have one thing in common: All are former combatants who struggled to defend their state - but half of them are former Israeli soldiers or pilots, while the other half are former Palestinian "freedom fighters," many of whom served time in Israeli jails.

These men once fought against each other. Together they form a new organization called Combatants for Peace, which, after being kept secret for a year, will make its public debut in Jerusalem 4.10.06. The date coincides with the Jewish holiday of Passover and Palestinian Prisoners Day, which is devoted to those detained in Israeli prisons.
Combatants for Peace brings together these ex-fighters to encourage dialogue, peace, and an end to conflict in the region.

Former commander Zohar Shapira, an elite Israeli Defense Force (IDF) soldier for 15 years, started the ball rolling when he left the army because he felt its actions and incursions in Palestinian territories were "immoral." He contacted a group of former Palestinian Fatah fighters from around Bethlehem. In their first meeting, Shapira says, all were stunned to find so much common ground, and they decided to formalize an alliance.
"Our members are fighters from all ranks of Israeli military and Palestinian militant factions," says Bassam Aramin, one of the Palestinian cocreators of the group. They "know the meaning of freedom, and the price of war."

The group's monthly meetings are charged with emotion, says Yonatan Shapira, Zohar's brother and another cofounder. For new Palestinian members, it may be the first time they have seen an unarmed Israeli soldier, Yonatan says. "For Israelis," he continues, "they're often at first afraid of talking in front of Palestinians about what they did during combat. For every new member, it's a frightening experience, but it's also exhilarating."
Aramin, who served seven years in an Israeli jail for "acts of defiance" against Israeli soldiers, agrees.
"It's a paradox," he says. "You hear a man talking about how he shot, killed, damaged your neighbor's house. But you feel empathy for him. You realize that we are all from the same background, but just from different sides. The soldier wanted to protect his people, and so did we. But we've all discovered we were wrong in how we did it."

On this particular night, 8 new Israeli & Palestinian members attend, bringing the total membership to roughly 90, evenly divided between both sides. After a brief introduction from two chairmen, a new Israeli member stands up and nervously greets the group. The new member remains anonymous; there is no pressure for attendees to reveal their names.
The room becomes quiet. At first he is hesitant, but then he opens up, describing the turning point that made him decide to refuse army orders in Palestinian territories.
"I was a soldier in Nablus," he explains, "and was told to fire 'light bombs' [powerful exploding flares] to illuminate the sky one night during a military operation. I fired 7, but the 8th had a problem. I knew it would explode somewhere on the ground if I fired it."

His commanding officer, however, ordered him to fire the bomb regardless of possible civilian casualties.
"When I fired," he recalls, "I asked myself how I could be doing something that could kill innocent people."
This is not an uncommon experience in this group. Another member, a former Israeli Air Force pilot, was ordered to bomb a building in Gaza in order to assassinate an alleged terrorist. It was only when he returned home and turned on the television that he realized 15 innocent women and children had been killed in the attack.
"At first I asked him," says Aramin, "how he could live, how he could look at his wife and children. But this is his way of making amends."

Raed, a Palestinian father of two from Hebron, stands up next. He relates how, after an Israeli soldier killed his best friend, he engaged in "activities against soldiers," including throwing Molotov cocktails at Israeli troops. He was a fugitive for a year before he was caught and put in jail. His time there, however, only made him more committed to his cause, and he began planning a "large attack" against Israel.
"But then, my cousin was killed, and something changed," he says. "I suddenly started thinking there must be another way. First I lost my friend, then my cousin. I didn't want to lose more. There had to be a way out of this violent circle. I hope," he says, adding, "this group will become an important part of both our societies, and an example to the world of how peace is possible, even among fighters."

The leaders of Combatants for Peace felt it was important to keep their group secret until they had established clear goals. Their aim: To press for an end to Israeli settlements and military incursions, and for the creation of clear frontiers between independent Israeli and Palestinian states.
So far, the group's low-key approach has confined it to speaking at smaller public events, to Jewish groups in the United States and young Palestinians and Israelis. Following their official public launch on Monday, though, they will start addressing larger international audiences, promoting their vision of a "road to peace."

That road is not without obstacles. First, it's difficult for the group to find a meeting location. It is illegal for Israelis to enter most of the West Bank. For most Palestinians, procuring entry permits into Israel is time-consuming and often fruitless. But the group has been able to meet in Arram, an area just north of Jerusalem that is part of the Palestinian Territories, surrounded by security checkpoints and roadblocks administered by Israel.
Members say it will become even more difficult to meet as the "security wall" goes up. Half-finished sections of wall currently slice through a main road in the center of town.

Despite its efforts to promote peace and understanding, the group has opponents on both sides of the conflict. Group member Elazar Elchanan says they are "staunchly opposed by the Israeli government." Aramin says Hamas, too, sees the group as part of the opposition.
"We may be putting our lives in danger just by meeting," says Yonatan Shapira, "but we need to do this for the sake of everyone. Palestinians have tried for years to oppose the occupation, and everything they've done has just made the response more brutal. So we want to create an alternative to the military, so that young people on both sides can join us instead of army or militia groups."

Yonatan knows, though, that the group's decision to go public will have repercussions for its members. He was an instrumental figure in the creation of the September 2003 "Pilots' Letter" signed by 27 Israeli Air Force pilots that stated, "We, who were raised to love the state of Israel ... refuse to take part in Air Force attacks on civilian population centers."
"I was at the center of a storm," he says. "It was a real crisis in my life when that letter went public."
Nevertheless, he says, as the new members' introductions come to an end and the group divides up to discuss strategies for the upcoming launch, these former fighters are willing to face another storm in order to "truly serve their families, to finish the occupation and be able to live in peace together."

"It doesn't cease to be hard," says Aramin with a smile and sighing deeply. "You must listen to what each person has to say, even though he might be the one who once hit you, or killed a member of your family. But you must listen, and you must forgive, even for the most difficult things."

    local
Orange Cty Peace & Justice Intl Action Ctr   nee Orange Cty Peace Coalition   714.840.6862   email
"ideologically broad-spectrum alliance of OC's Catholic Worker, Unitarian Society, Veterans for Peace, Green & Libertarian parties, and others" per OCW
7pm last Monday Community Room B142 Irvine Univ. Ctr, Campus Dr in passage between Comedy Club & Cinema [405 to Jamboree exit, S to Campus, left to Stanford, left to parking lot, left into lot]

YANO / COMD
celebratory pacificism

Community leaders last week called for a cease-fire, not in the Gaza Strip but in L.A. Pleading for a moratorium on violence over the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, a coalition of south L.A. nonprofit organizations & neighborhood activists launched a campaign against gang terrorism that last year cost at least 50 lives in the Police Dept's 77th Street Div. alone.
After falling for 7 years, homicides citywide rose in 2000 and again last year, to 584, with most tied to drugs & gangs. The increase has sparked fears of a return to 1992's record high of 1,096, about the number of Israelis & Palestinians killed in MidEast violence over the past 15 months.
Why don't such numbers strike outrage here?

Outrage struck south L.A. in Nov. 2001 when 13-year-old Marquese Rashad Prude, who was not involved with gangs, was killed by suspected gang members in the lobby of the St. Andrews Park Recreation Ctr. From the response to the tragedy, 200 people attended a meeting on the shooting, came the coalition. Its first goal after the weekend moratorium is to create safety zones at parks, schools and community functions.
To get there, the coalition aims to improve historically testy relations between the black community & the Police Dept so that police officers are seen as community partners, not an occupying army. As coalition member Henry T. Stuckey put it, "It's impossible for us to stop the violence without the LAPD. And it's impossible for the LAPD to stop the violence without us."
The group has also enlisted the participation of L.A. school board member Genethia Hayes, who promised to work to expand after-school programs.

Ahead are plans to hold town hall meetings in churches citywide to develop neighborhood-based plans to counter gang violence. Because south L.A. residents are shouldering their share of responsibility doesn't absolve the rest of L.A. from doing its part.
Like many cease-fires, the King holiday moratorium was broken; the 3 day weekend did not pass without violence. But police reported that violent crime, including aggravated assaults, robberies, sexual assaults and homicides, was down 16% from last year's holiday. Whether the decrease had anything to do with the moratorium is impossible to measure. What is certain, however, is that nothing will really change until all of L.A. decides that it won't tolerate homicide numbers here that rival the number of murders in the MidEast.

Polls show the U.S. public stands firmly behind the war on terrorism. It didn't take an intl terrorist to upend Julia Zepeda's life, just a trio of home-grown ones. Zepeda's daughter died the day after Christmas as she waited in a pickup truck with a friend outside a Hawthorne apartment while the driver went inside to retrieve a gift. Neighbors saw 2 young men chasing another and heard shots, an all-too-common sound. Police believe Leslie Zepeda was caught in gang cross-fire. She was 11 years old.

… Sharon Johnson's 18-year-old son, Andre Morgan, was walking to a friend's house in Inglewood after basketball practice when he was shot multiple times by a gunman, who then got into a car that had been waiting. Morgan was not mixed up with gangs. He was an honors student & basketball player who had his eye on playing for UCLA. He died a week before he was to take his SATs. Inglewood City Councilwoman Judy Dunlap said that in 2001 a killing occurred in Inglewood every 8 days.

In central L.A., gang members stopped Esteban Ortiz, 21, as he walked down E. Manchester Ave and demanded to know which gang he was from. It didn't matter that he didn't belong to any gang. They attacked him, and when his 19-year-old brother, Arturo, and their 18-year-old friend Jesus Silva ran to his aid, the gang members opened fire. Estaban was wounded, his brother & friend killed. It was 11 days shy of Christmas.

It took an act of intl terrorism on U.S. soil to make many Americans feel vulnerable for the first time in their lives. For residents of some of Southern California's poorer neighborhoods, it just takes getting up in the morning.

Compared with rallies against the war in Iraq, the gathering Wednesday in front of the mid-city First Presbyterian Church on West Blvd was small. About 50 men & women had come to protest the death of 13-year-old Joseph Arthur Swift … (who) died Sunday across the street from the church. It was the sunny middle of the day, and he had just left his Bible study class. Witnesses say a car with tinted windows passed, spitting bullets at pedestrians on either side.
"They talk about Osama bin Laden," said Joey's grandfather Wm Arbuckle. "There are Osama bin Ladens in my neighborhood. There are Osama bin Ladens in east L.A.. There are Osama bin Ladens in Whittier & Compton."

Joey's mother Lorri Arbuckle told those at the rally that her boy had died in her arms saying he loved her, saying he would be OK. "Children are supposed to be able to go to church and be safe," she said. It sounded like a plea. Police believe that the shooters were gang members, and Wednesday they promised protection, incl relocation, to witnesses afraid to speak up.
When it was his turn, community activist Najee Ali of Project Islamic Hope urged witnesses to "break this black code of silence." "I have one message to these gang members," he said. "The murder of Joseph Swift is an act of war against this community."

As with any antiwar demonstration, this one had tensions & divisions. One speaker worried that talk of terrorists & war would compel police to rush to arrest every African American man they see in certain neighborhoods, although the vast majority, like Joey, are just trying to live & learn, work & play, like most boys and young men in Pacific Palisades, Eagle Rock and Valencia.
They spoke of the need for jobs to deter crime and urged members of the news media to "bring your corporations, not just your cameras." But mostly they pleaded for attention to the violence that, despite a promising downturn citywide, plagues too many of Los Angeles' poorer neighborhoods.

About 10,000 people have turned out for 22 major demonstrations against the war in Iraq in the last week alone, according to LAPD. Joey's aunt, Loreal Arbuckle, somehow found the strength to talk at the rally. Afterward, her voice barely audible, she said: "I can't feel anything … I was there when he was born, and you're telling me I have to bury him? … I can't accept it."


active duty personnel   per Globalsecurity.org 1.10.06
China 2,250,000 U.S.
1,625,852 incl. mobilized National
Guard & Reserve
India 1,325,000 N. Korea 1,075,000
Russia 960,000 S. Korea 685,000
Pakistan 620,000 Iran 540,000
Britain 515,000 Turkey 515,000
Myanmar 490,000 Vietnam 485,000
Egypt 450,000 Syria 320,000
Thailand 315,000 Ukraine 295,000
Taiwan 290,000 Brazil 285,000
Germany 284,000 France 259,000
Stockton finds to stop gangs, disarm them   ¹
Using tough multi-agency approach, city taken 1,200 guns off the street & lowered killings from about 20 to 4 per year.   9.24.01   Rone Tempest L.A.Times

Stockton   After seven young women were killed or wounded in the cross-fire of gang shootings here in 1997, city officials decided to try something new to stem the city's rampaging gang violence. Borrowing from a program pioneered in Boston, they launched Operation Cease-Fire, a multi-agency carrot-and-stick effort to get guns out of the hands of gang members. Since then, gang-related killings have dropped from about 20 to four per year. Crime in schools has fallen 40%. The number of people younger than 24 killed by firearms has been cut in half. The success comes in one of California's toughest cities, a San Joaquin River port and agricultural center that annually records one of the state's highest crime rates. An estimated 150 gangs prowl Stockton's streets, representing a variety of ethnic and geographic groups typical of diverse California: Hmong, Cambodian, black, Norteno, Sudeno.

The approach features intensive enforcement by specialized police units that work with county probation officers to identify gangs most prone to violence. Community liaisons called Peacekeepers, often recruited from gang ranks, are sent into the toughest neighborhoods offering help: job training, high school diploma studies--and warning of draconian consequences to those who do not take it.
Cease-Fire, launched on a limited basis last year in East Los Angeles and in San Francisco, does not employ the gang sweeps that became notorious in the Rampart scandal. "The problem with those approaches," said David Kennedy, one of the creators of the Cease-Fire concept at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Govt, "is that much of this kind of incessant policing actually strengthens gang identity and alienates police from the community. Cease-Fire is not directed at gangs as such. It is an anti-violence strategy." Funded by a $400,000 grant from the National Institute of Justice and administered by Rand Corp., the Los Angeles experiment with Operation Cease-Fire is limited to the Boyle Heights area.

But George Tita, a UC Irvine criminologist who is a consultant to Rand on the project, said the program has been slowed by the Rampart controversy, the police manpower drain caused by last year's Democratic National Convention and a change of leadership in Los Angeles. "It has been difficult to maintain continuity," said Tita, "but there is a core of individuals within the Probation Dept, the prosecutors' office and the Los Angeles Police Dept who are committed to the project." The San Francisco program is still in the beginning stages.

Operation Cease-Fire does not try to solve all of society's ills, proponents say. Rather, it aims its efforts specifically against guns and violent crime. If a gang engages in drug dealing or petty crime but does not commit violence, it is likely to be left alone by Cease-Fire personnel. But a violent gang is likely to be pursued relentlessly for everything from drugs to expired bicycle licenses. Stockton Police Lt. Mike Becker, who heads the city's gang intelligence unit, often encourages landlords to evict tenants in homes where gang shootings have occurred. City building codes are strictly enforced in known gang hangouts, even family homes.
"What we do is tell the gangs that if they do violence," said Stewart Wakeling, juvenile justice coordinator for San Joaquin County, "then we will make it very hard for them to do all the other things they really like to do, such as sell drugs or sit on a stoop and drink a 40-ouncer." According to Cheryl Maxson, a UC Irvine criminologist who specializes in gang issues, it is this clarity of message that distinguishes the Cease-Fire program from other anti- gang efforts. "This is a strategy that is being picked up across the country," Maxson said. "It involves a clear message and a follow-up. It tells the gang, 'If you do this particular thing, the wrath of the state will be called upon all of your members.' "

In the Sacramento office of Assistant U.S. Atty. Richard Bender is a glossy photograph, arranged like a team picture, of one of Stockton's most violent street gangs, the Southside Stocktone. The photo was taken two years ago by a police officer who somehow managed to get the gang to pose in a local park. To Bender's satisfaction, nearly all of the gang members in the picture are in prison or face trial in federal court on drug and gun charges after 200 federal, county and city officers swept through the gang's turf in the summer of 2000 and again this year. So far, 23 members of Southside Stocktone have been charged. "Between the two busts," said Bender, "we took the core out of what had been the Southside Stocktone."

It is Jose Gomez's job to make sure that the lesson of the Stocktone crackdown gets out to other gangs. Gomez, 32, is a muscular former Marine who works for the Peacekeeper unit. He is also a former gang member, who in his youth was arrested for possession of a sawed-off shotgun and for his involvement in a drive-by shooting. "The Marines are the most powerful gang in the world," Gomez said. "Joining them was the best thing I ever did. They turned me around." Now Gomez spends his time counseling gang members, warning them about dangerous behavior and gently using his example as a path out of violence that they might also take. "That kid has really expressed a desire to change," Gomez said after riding around in one of Stockton's toughest neighborhoods with a reporter and a young gang leader dressed in his blue colors. "He's smart. He's streetwise. But he's got the death wish."
When he gets a chance, Gomez, who makes about $35,000 a year, said he likes to drive some of his favorite gang leaders into the Sierra, where they can experience trees and snow. "I just like to show them that there is a different world," he said. His biggest success, he said, has been convincing several of his proteges to enlist in the Marines.

On the front lines of Operation Cease-Fire is Stockton Police Sgt. Brian Ingersoll, a 12-year veteran who commands one of the five-man Gang Street Enforcement Teams, known on the streets as G-SET. When gang violence breaks out, G-SET swings into action. On a recent night, Ingersoll's job was to crack down on two rival Asian gangs for a series of shootings. His first step was to contact members of the county Probation Dept. One of the key components of Cease-Fire is the involvement of probation and parole offices in sweeps of gang neighborhoods. Ingersoll asked the probation officers to identify members of the two gangs who were under court supervision and therefore subject to search without a warrant.

For several hours the plainclothes G-SET team, backed up by uniformed patrol officers, conducted impromptu searches of gang members' homes and cars, recovering three guns and several thousand dollars from one young man who had a 9mm handgun under his front seat. "We are part of the high-visibility enforcement--saturation enforcement," said Ingersoll. Later that night, Ingersoll and his team would station themselves at key intersections in a neighborhood where the 2 gangs are at war, hoping to intercept them. Other tactics include shadowing gang members in public places, such as a weekly flea market that one of the gangs likes to frequent. This clearly has not earned the G-SET any favor with gang members. Popular gang graffiti includes "187 G-SET," using the police code for homicide.

But the saturation tactics have been effective. According to program director Wakeling, Stockton officers recovered 1,200 guns in the first year of the program. This compared to 600 guns in Boston, a city more than twice Stockton's size. As the G-SET unit searched the ranch-style family home of one gang member, recovering a rifle and a shotgun, Patrolman Dave Brown, a 10 year veteran, looked on. "You can't believe how much this place has changed," said Brown, a native of Chicago. "A few years ago this was like Vietnam."

10.00   re first visit of U.S. military personnel & equipt since the end of S. Africa's apartheid regime an effort to advertise expensive weapons which African countries cannot afford. "No doubt the weapons makers are pleased that the taxpayers are picking up the tab for advertising their lethal wares," McKinney noted. She lashed out at Clinton Administration's foreign policy in Africa, saying it "is over- militarized, puts trade before life and limb, and is indifferent to the real needs of the people of Africa."

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