Pressure on the dollar

I explained in December how the current arrangement of oil and (natural) gas sales being denominated in dollars gave the American currency a huge artificial boost. I also covered in another post how the Gulf States were beginning to move away from the dollar, along with other oil-producing countries such as Nigeria. Simply put, by requiring the world to buy dollars in order to buy oil, an immense artificial demand for dollars is created. Increased demand means higher value. This situation also means that the world's banks must keep a large supply of dollars in reserve. And when the value of the dollar goes down, those stockpiles of dollars become less valuable. In the oil-producing countries, this means that all of those dollars that the world paid for oil and gas lose value when the dollar declines. The Gulf States lose several million a day with even a tiny depreciation of the dollar. And since the value of their own currencies are based on the dollar, they suffer further. Hyper-inflation is a a serious risk for the Saudi economy if the riyal continues to be linked to the declining dollar.

The Fed’s daily money injections and expectations of more rate cuts, are threatening to transmit hyper-inflation to the Persian Gulf kingdoms. The Bernanke Fed is pursuing a radical monetary policy, expanding the US M3 money supply at a 15.8% annual rate, its fastest in history, and inviting speculators to sell the dollar in exchange for Saudi riyals. To counter the dollar’s weakness, the Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority (SAMA) is expanding the Saudi M3 money supply at a 19.5% annual growth rate, engaging in a round of competitive currency devaluations with the Fed to keep the 21-year old dollar – riyal peg intact.

Last week, the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (SAMA) reduced its reverse repo rate by 50 basis points to 4.25%, and the UAE’s central bank cut rates by as much as 20 basis points, despite inflation raging a decade highs to relieve pressure on the weak dollar. But the dollar remains pinned at a 17-year low against the UAE dirham surge and a 21-year low against the Saudi Arabian riyal as traders bet the Persian Gulf kingdoms would be unable to maintain their pegs to the dollar and fight inflation at the same time.

And because the Saudi riyal is pegged to the US dollar, the Euro is 50% higher from five years ago to a record 5.5 Saudi riyals, increasing the costs of import prices from Europe. Inflation in Gulf countries is leading to calls for a wage hike in Saudi Arabia, rent caps in other states, widespread complaints from business leaders, and riots by migrant workers in the UAE demanding better pay. Further Federal Reserve rate cuts designed to bail out Wall Street from the sub-prime debt crisis could put unbearable pressure on Saudi Arabia and other Gulf oil producers to drop their currency pegs to the tumbling dollar.

To solve this, some oil-producing nations are allowing payments for oil in other currencies, or at least a mixture of currencies. Their own currencies are increasingly being tied to a "basket" of currencies, rather than solely basing it on the dollar. And a bold plan is moving forward for a monetary union of the Gulf States' currencies by 2010, though that date will almost certainly be pushed back. A gold-based Islamic currency has also been proposed by Indonesia. Kuwait's Central Bank dropped it's "dollar peg" last May.

To prevent speculative and manipulative attacks on their currencies, the world's central banks must acquire and hold dollar reserves in corresponding amounts to their currencies in circulation. The higher the market pressure to devalue a particular currency, the more dollar reserves its central bank must hold. This creates a built-in support for a strong US dollar that in turn forces the world's central banks to acquire and hold more dollar reserves, making it even stronger. This phenomenon is known as dollar hegemony, which is created by the geopolitically constructed peculiarity that critical commodities, most notably oil, are denominated in US dollars. Everyone accepts dollars because dollars can buy oil. The recycling of petrodollars is the price the United States has extracted from oil-producing countries for US tolerance of the oil-exporting cartel since 1973.

This arrangement is crucial for the dominance of the United States in the economic sphere. Certainly the U.S. has an immense GDP and would wield large clout based on that alone, but dollar hegemony gives America a huge advantage over the rest of the world. The key to dollar hegemony is stability of value, not the size of the GDP. The declining dollar is no longer providing that stability, and dollars are no longer the only currency with which to buy oil. Japan has secured an arrangement to pay for Iranian oil in yen, for example. Now Iran is setting up an exchange that will sell oil in other currencies, illustrated in the short story below. Meanwhile, the dollar dropped 9.5% against the euro in 2007, and dropped more than 10% in 2006.

“The dollar is losing its status as the world currency,” warned Chinese central bank director Xu Jian on Nov 7th. “We will favor stronger currencies over weaker ones, and will readjust accordingly,” added Cheng Siwei, vice chairman of China’s National People’s Congress, signaling plans to diversify Beijing’s $1.43 trillion of foreign exchange reserves.

A 9.5% drop in the dollar's value means that the UAE alone lost well over $5 billion last year. That's a pretty lousy deal for an arrangement that is supposed to provide stability. Another subtext is the guarantee of security for the Gulf States by the U.S. Security from whom, one might wonder, but Bush's Iraqi occupation has only destabilised the Middle East, halted Iraqi oil production, and increased Iran's influence in the region by eliminating the greatest check on its ambitions in the form of Saddam Hussein. Bush is fortunate that these countries are not democracies, or else these Gulf governments would have abandoned him and his pro-Israeli policies long ago. As we saw with Bush's last Middle East "tour", the Middle East is no longer dancing to the Decider's tune, and the Gulf States in particular have a diminishing sense that their self-interest is tied to the U.S. The 'security guarantee' is increasingly becoming little more than a protection racket - protection from the U.S, not by it.

Gulf Arab economies, of which Saudi Arabia's is the biggest, are experiencing high inflation but central banks have limited options as the peg forces them to track U.S. monetary policy at a time when the Federal Reserve is cutting interest rates.

Saudi inflation is widely expected to continue rising in 2008 after reaching 6.5 percent in December, its highest rate in at least 12 years.

"(Because of) the decreasing value of the U.S. dollar, all our imports from markets other than the U.S., in terms of cost, have gone up significantly in the last 12-24 months," Amr Al-Dabbach, the head of SAGIA, said on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum.

"It is a problem not exclusive to Saudi Arabia; the whole region is facing these problems."

With inflation now higher than official interest rates, it becomes cheaper for Saudis to borrow than keep money in bank deposits where they get negative real returns.

Ironically, while the Decider leans with all his might on Saudi Arabia to maintain the "dollar peg", he is becoming quite shrill over China's foot-dragging over dropping it's dollar peg. We are not seeing any kind of consistent ideology here, and no case is being made that following Bush's demands will benefit any country other than the U.S. It is sheer intimidation, mixed with the realisation that backing away from the dollar as the reserve currency on a large scale would have large short term costs for the country that pursues it. The long-term benefits, however, are still attractive. Combine this with the neocon vision of America dominating the planet, an arrogant Bush Administration issuing dictates to a world that is either "with us or against us" driven by a 1945 view of America's stature, the over-extension of the U.S. military, and the Republican promise of the continuation of Bush's doctrines should they hold on to the White House, and the rest of the world is left wondering if they really want to continue to finance this agenda with dollar hegemony.

story from PressTV

Iran Oil Bourse to deal blow to dollar
Fri, 04 Jan 2008 20:45:41

The long-awaited Iranian Oil Bourse, a place for trading oil, petrochemicals and gas in various non-dollar currencies, will soon open.

Iran's Finance Minister Davoud Danesh-Jafari told reporters the bourse will be inaugurated during the anniversary of the Islamic Revolution (February 1-11) at the latest.

"All preparations have been made to launch the bourse; it will open during the Ten-Day Dawn (the ceremonies marking the victory of the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran)," he said.

The Minister had earlier stated that the Oil Bourse is located on the Persian Gulf island of Kish.

Some expert opinions hold inauguration of the bourse could significantly devalue the greenback.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

From the Daily Telegraph

Fears of dollar collapse as Saudis take fright

By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, International Business Editor

Last Updated: 12:41am GMT 09/12/2007

Saudi Arabia has refused to cut interest rates in lockstep with the US Federal Reserve for the first time, signalling that the oil-rich Gulf kingdom is preparing to break the dollar currency peg in a move that risks setting off a stampede out of the dollar across the Middle East.

"This is a very dangerous situation for the dollar," said Hans Redeker, currency chief at BNP Paribas.

"Saudi Arabia has $800bn (£400bn) in their future generation fund, and the entire region has $3,500bn under management. They face an inflationary threat and do not want to import an interest rate policy set for the recessionary conditions in the United States," he said.

The Saudi central bank said today that it would take "appropriate measures" to halt huge capital inflows into the country, but analysts say this policy is unsustainable and will inevitably lead to the collapse of the dollar peg.

As a close ally of the US, Riyadh has so far tried to stick to the peg, but the link is now destabilising its own economy.

The Fed's dramatic half point cut to 4.75pc yesterday has already caused a plunge in the world dollar index to a fifteen year low, touching with weakest level ever against the mighty euro at just under $1.40.

There is now a growing danger that global investors will start to shun the US bond markets. The latest US government data on foreign holdings released this week show a collapse in purchases of US bonds from $97bn to just $19bn in July, with outright net sales of US Treasuries.

The danger is that this could now accelerate as the yield gap between the United States and the rest of the world narrows rapidly, leaving America starved of foreign capital flows needed to cover its current account deficit - expected to reach $850bn this year, or 6.5pc of GDP.

Mr Redeker said foreign investors have been gradually pulling out of the long-term US debt markets, leaving the dollar dependent on short-term funding. Foreigners have funded 25pc to 30pc of America's credit and short-term paper markets over the last two years.

"They were willing to provide the money when rates were paying nicely, but why bear the risk in these dramatically changed circumstances? We think that a fall in dollar to $1.50 against the euro is not out of the question at all by the first quarter of 2008," he said.

And since this article came out, the Fed has cut rates again, putting further pressure on those countries that have stood by Bush to bail out. GCC countries have cut their deposit rates in response, with Kuwait being able to stand slightly stronger. While a great alternative to the dollar as a reserve currency has not presented itself, the oil-producing nations thus far seem to be only reluctantly clinging to the dollar, with the "basket" idea gaining more adherents.

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It should be noted that the costs of the Iraq occupation have been, to a great extent, financed by sales of Treasury bonds to China - the "Chinese credit card" I have alluded to before. This has worked to China's benefit in many ways. First, it provides them with huge amounts of hard currency, since the yuan is kept artificially low to promote exports. This has allowed them to build up their military, in essence, for free, especially on the naval side. Arms sales to countries such as India have also made their defence industry, in effect, self-financing, while America goes further into debt as their defence industry grows. Perhaps most importantly, however, is that it removes nearly all of the economic leverage the the U.S. exerts on the rest of the world. If the U.S. pushes too hard on China with foreign or economic policy or military threats, China can put the dollar in free-fall virtually at will. While there would be big short-term costs for China, both the short-term and long-term costs for America would be devastating. And the resulting costs to those currencies pegged to the dollar would be catastrophic. The reign of the dollar could very end in such a scenario. Last, since the U.S. is the only regional check on China's military power (with defence commitments to Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and the Phillipines), the more regional instability China creates, the richer it gets by forcing The U.S. to borrow more money to increase its military spending. Meanwhile, the U.S. bears the costs of the GWOT and becomes more unpopular while China takes a path of neutrality towards "internal policies" of its friends.

China threatens 'nuclear option' of dollar sales

By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard

Last Updated: 8:39pm BST 10/08/2007

The Chinese government has begun a concerted campaign of economic threats against the United States, hinting that it may liquidate its vast holding of US treasuries if Washington imposes trade sanctions to force a yuan revaluation.

Two officials at leading Communist Party bodies have given interviews in recent days warning - for the first time - that Beijing may use its $1.33 trillion (£658bn) of foreign reserves as a political weapon to counter pressure from the US Congress.

Shifts in Chinese policy are often announced through key think tanks and academies.

Described as China's "nuclear option" in the state media, such action could trigger a dollar crash at a time when the US currency is already breaking down through historic support levels.

It would also cause a spike in US bond yields, hammering the US housing market and perhaps tipping the economy into recession. It is estimated that China holds over $900bn in a mix of US bonds.

Xia Bin, finance chief at the Development Research Centre (which has cabinet rank), kicked off what now appears to be government policy with a comment last week that Beijing's foreign reserves should be used as a "bargaining chip" in talks with the US.

"Of course, China doesn't want any undesirable phenomenon in the global financial order," he added.

He Fan, an official at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, went even further today, letting it be known that Beijing had the power to set off a dollar collapse if it choose to do so.

"China has accumulated a large sum of US dollars. Such a big sum, of which a considerable portion is in US treasury bonds, contributes a great deal to maintaining the position of the dollar as a reserve currency. Russia, Switzerland, and several other countries have reduced the their dollar holdings.

"China is unlikely to follow suit as long as the yuan's exchange rate is stable against the dollar. The Chinese central bank will be forced to sell dollars once the yuan appreciated dramatically, which might lead to a mass depreciation of the dollar," he told China Daily.

polls and trends

This is a look at a few polls.

• Here in Minnesota, Norm Coleman is slipping and Al Franken is rising in the latest MPR poll (pdf). Republicans have been incredibly smug about Coleman's 'strong' numbers, which have been around 50% favourability, which is lousy for an incumbent. The new poll shows Coleman at 40% against Franken's 43.2% in an election match-up, with an eerie 3.2% margin of error. Last May, MPR pegged it as 54/32 in favour of Coleman. Also in May, Coleman's favourability rating was 48%, down from 52% in 1/04. Now he's at 50% again. The Democratic senator from Minnesota, Amy Klobuchar, had a 66% favourability figure, which should worry Republicans.
  
• Bush's job ratings have dropped. The Fox News poll gives higher numbers for Bush than several other national polls, but now they have Bush's job rating at 33% with 60% disapproval. Fox's last survey in December was 36/57. In support, the late January NBC poll had Bush (very positive or somewhat positive) at 32% and disapproval (somewhat negative or very negative) at 57%. The "very negative" assessment was 40% of those polled, and has been 40% or above since last March.
• Fox has Congress at 22/66 (favourable/unfavourable) in late January. Wingnuts often point to these numbers with glee, since Congress is lower than Bush in the polls. However, Pew has Democrats in Congress at 31/53 in mid-January. The last poll for Congressional Republicans was in December at 26/68. So the Democratic Congresspeople are about as popular as Bush, with the Republican Congresspeople rated even lower than Bush. Further, I think it's safe to say that the dissatisfaction with Democrats is that they have not stood up to Bush enough, so it's hardly some kind of vindication.
• Harris shows in 2007 that 26% of the country identified themselves as Republicans, while 35% identified themselves as Democrats. This 9% lead also appeared in 2006, and is the strongest lead for the Democrats since 1998.
  
• Last week's NBC poll showed that the country wants Congress to set policy, not Bush. 21% said Bush should set policy, with 62% saying Congress should do that. So much for the unitary executive being popular. Only a neocon would see a mandate in those numbers. In December a CNN poll said that 53% thought it was good that Democrats controlled Congress, with 37% saying it was bad. Those low Congressional approval rating don't look so good for the wingnuts now, do they?

I'd also like to note that 28 Republican House members have to date announced retirement and will not seek re-election. Some very senior and important positions are in those 28. While this by no means signifies Democrats' picking up those seats, it is a substantial weakening of the GOP in the House. The Senate is less clear, which is why it's so important for Norm Coleman to get shown the door. If a Democrat wins the White House, there will be no more worries of over-riding Presidential vetoes, but the Republicans will still be able to gum up the works in the Senate. Without the White House to keep them in line, with a House more hostile to their agenda, and nervously looking at their re-elections, those Republican senators will be difficult to control and it will be very hard to make them dance to any kind of neocon tune. Their Party is fracturing all around them. The days when any idiot (such as Coleman) can get elected merely by being associated with the Bush Team are gone.

The Republicans have associated themselves with Bush heavily, and they are paying the political price. Meanwhile, Bush's agenda is frozen and all he can do is stop the Democrats from carrying out their own agenda. Sure, he can keep his wars going for the remainder of his term. They aren't helping him or his Party, though, so it's hard to see that as some kind of big achievement other than to keep the flow of tax dollars to defence contractors. Afghanistan is not going well, Pakistan is coming undone, Iraq could come apart any day now, and the world isn't chomping at the bit for a new war in Iran, Lebanon, or Syria. Nothing has gone the way Bush said it would, and the public is always supposed show to more patience with his schemes. And as the economy sours, change is going to look better and better. The only change Republicans are offering is the name of the person who will continue to carry out Bush's policies. The wealthy simply haven't stepped up to the plate and made the economy grow. They've instead off-shored American jobs. They haven't even contributed to the GOP, with Democrats (DSCC) rasing almost twice as much as the Republicans (NRSC) in December.

Proxy war against Venezuela

We all knew it would come sooner or later. Bush would never leave office without another war, and certainly not without trying to take out Chavez. A proxy war between Colombia and Venezuela is just the thing.

Colombia is Bush's best friend on the continent and the third-largest recipient of American foreign aid. An economic ruin beset by a protracted civil war, reliant on American military aid to keep the current death-squad government in power, and stung already by its American masters for trying to use Chavez in a hostage-swap deal that went against the Bush script, Colombia is the perfect stooge who literally cannot refuse Bush's demands. Colombia hardly needs a war with Venezuela when it can barely handle its own internal civil strife, but orders are orders. Undoubtedly the lame-duck Bush Administration has made huge promises of aid, much like it made to Iraq and Afghanistan, if Colombia co-operates. And, of course, Bush will be 'compelled' to send in American troops and air power to help our poor buddy Colombia out of this 'unfortunate' and 'completely unavoidable' entanglement.

Somehow, it will obviously become necessary to overthrow Chavez in order to protect our good friend Colombia from a Venzuelan invasion. The Colombian government, soaked in blood and kept in power by paramilitary death squads closely linked to the ruling Party as well as deeply complicit in the drug trade, will suddenly become heroic, saintly advocates of democracy that desperately need our help against the brutal aggression from Socialist Venezuela. And the new government we impose in Venezuela will 'eventually' hold elections, but not until the oil fields are given away for a pittance to the oil companies who got 'cheated' out of Iraq's bounty. And we will, of course, need huge new military bases in Colombia and Venezuela to keep things safe for our new friends.

Our military is already stretched pretty thin, but it can still handle bombing runs and naval shelling. It can't handle an occupation of Venezuela, however, and our economy can't take a prolonged cut-off of Venezuelan oil. China certainly would not be pleased, and there are severe options open to it that would further damage the economy. The Colombian rebels would most likely come down on Chavez's side, at least nominally, and they could turn the border skirmish into a quagmire. Chavez has armed and trained a large number of citizens to resist an occupation. If Bush bungles this, as he most likely will, a guerilla war could rage for several months inside Venezuela and disrupt the oil supply. Again, just as in Iran, the big question is what happens after the military victory. If we are facing a severe oil shock on top of our current downturn, and if China cuts off our credit card, where will all of this aid for Colombia come from? Regardless, Colombia is likely to remain a basket case, since previous aid poured into it seems to always mysteriously disappear, and we've already seen the paradise that the Venezuelan opposition has offered its people for the past 50 years - a Republican dream state where the poor remain in abject squalor and the tiny few rich get immensely wealthy and stay that way forever.

But that's not really the issue. This is to be Bush's "quick win" at last. Third time is the charm, as they say.

What we really need to learn is that WW2 is over. Guerillas, insurgents, dead-enders, whatever you want to call them, now have access to a nearly equal level of weaponry as our occupation troops. Sure, we have tanks and bombers and fighter jets, but those don't count for much in a counter-insurgency unless you are willing to kill a whole lot civilians in the process. Look at Vietnam, Afghanistan (now and in the Soviet era), Algeria, Lebanon and Iraq. You don't need high-tech weaponry to tie up an occupation force in a quagmire. Somebody will supply the explosives and weapons, even if it's just the black market. We should also have learned in Iraq that an oil production infrastructure is a fragile and easily-disrupted target. The Venezuelan opposition is also worthless as a miltary force. These are coddled, arrogant, fat, and thoroughly lazy people that have never had to stand up for anything or get their hands dirty. Everything was given to them until Chavez came along. Put them up against hardened, committed Chavists who are finally seeing a glimmer of hope in their lives and who know what it's like to go a day without eating and we'll see who comes out on top in a fair fight. And that means occupation troops, and for more than few weeks at that. Overweight, college-educated, white-collar suburban bozos that have probably never even been in a fistfight against streetwise ghetto dwellers that know how to fight and have had basic military training provided by the Chavez government; who would you put your money on? Without GI Joe in the mix, it would be over before it even started. So where are our troops going to come from as we escalate in Afghanistan and maintain the surge in Iraq? Our allies are already tapped. That means a lot of contractors, and they aren't cheap. Bush is pretty close already to maxing out the Chinese credit card, the dollar is sliding downward, the economy is in recession, and our primary oil supply will be disrupted. $10 per gallon gas will send us into a depression. Is that worth propping up a death-squad government in a sham conflict that we stage as a pretext?

story from The Brazil Sun

Chavez accuses Colombia of plotting aggression
Brazil Sun
Saturday 26th January, 2008
(IANS)

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has accused his Colombian counterpart Alvaro Uribe of plotting 'a military provocation' against his country on the orders of the US.

'I accuse the government of Colombia of designing a conspiracy, a war provocation against Venezuela, following orders from the US, to force us to give a reply that could spark a war,' Chavez said at Miraflores Palace, Spain's EFE news agency reported Saturday.

'A military aggression is being prepared,' Chavez said without offering any evidence to support the claim.

He went on to warn Colombia not to attempt any attack or other 'provocation', saying Venezuela would cut off all oil exports if Colombia initiated military action.

'In that scenario, write it down, the price of oil would reach $300 (per barrel), because there wouldn't be any oil for anybody,' Chavez warned.

The firebrand Chavez - a leftwing populist leader and vehement critic of the US - has repeatedly clashed with the Colombian president.

Sarkozy sells a used Empire with low mileage

An analysis of Sarkozy's weird foreign policy.

Team up with Bush verbally, while rejecting the Decider's simplistic rhetoric. Expand the Empire by pushing friendship without any inconvenient insistences on human rights or democracy. Nuclear power for all, except Iran, because that would make Bush mad. Discard the 'good guys vs. bad guys' approach in favour of those who know how to play ball vs. those who think the game is fixed and refuse to play.

In short, he is Bush without the obvious arrogance. Instead, Sarkozy is the buddy that doesn't mind how bad you smell or who you hang out with, as long as you give him what he wants. He is the smarmy used-car dealer trying to sell the world a late-model French Empire as is. And there's never been a better time to buy. So come on down and see what Smilin' Sarkozy can do for you and your oppressed masses today!

story from IHT

Sarkozy's policy is hard to make out
By Elaine Sciolino
Published: January 27, 2008

PARIS: For France, the symbolism could not have been more powerful. On a trip to the United Arab Emirates 12 days ago, President Nicolas Sarkozy announced a decision to open a permanent military base there. It will be the France's first such base in a country that had not been its colony, and it will make France the only country other than the United States with a permanent military presence in the Gulf.

French officials portray the move as part of a larger effort by Sarkozy to project France's influence throughout the Middle East. In the eight months Sarkozy has been president, he has visited eight countries in the region, announcing plans to build nuclear reactors, sell weapons, resolve crises and deepen cooperation along the way.

"France is back, yes, France is back," Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said in an interview. "We are pursuing a policy that represents something new - activism, realism, involvement, even confidence."

New, for sure. But maybe not quite grand, at least in the sense of a sweeping vision. Some people here, and in the Middle East, have even begun to wonder in just what direction all this energy and motion will take France.

In France's days of empire, it was in the Arabic-speaking lands that the country's dreams were most ambitious. But beyond North Africa and Lebanon, some of its boldest ventures were thwarted. Napoleon landed nearly 40,000 troops in Egypt in 1798, but the occupation ended in 1801. A more lasting presence came in 1830 when the French Army landed in Algeria, beginning an era of primacy over western North Africa. After World War I, France assumed control of Syria and Lebanon. But after World War II came humiliation and defeat - first in the 1956 Suez war, then the long war to hold on to Algeria.

Since then, France has played a key role in the Arab world only episodically.

Now, the U.S. setback in Iraq, the winding down of the Bush presidency, a longing in the region for an alternative to U.S. power, a turn inward by Britain's new leaders and soaring prices for oil have created opportunities for Sarkozy.

Sarkozy is seizing them in a distinctly post-imperial style; he defines the region as a mosaic to be worked on bit by bit, not as one huge prize that, if won, would restore France's lost glory. So this is not about nostalgia. Nor is it an effort to lump the Muslim world into one great "arc of crisis" from Morocco to Bangladesh because of the never-ending terrorist threat, even though France's foreign intelligence service tends to do just that.

In fact, Sarkozy has defined his approach in contrast to such thinking. "There are many Muslim and Arab worlds," he wrote in "Testimony," his 2006 campaign book. "The very concept of an 'Arab policy' is nonsense." The goal, he said, is not to "be blinded by a unity that is only virtual."

His approach is also personal, reflecting his hyperactivism, his passions and his determination to promote French business around the world. One example is his rejection of a conviction enunciated by his predecessor, Jacques Chirac, that the overriding priority in the Middle East had to be resolving the Israeli-Palestinian struggle.

Sarkozy is more preoccupied with Iran, defining Iran's nuclear activities as the world's most challenging crisis.

Gone also is France's automatic distancing of itself from the United States and Israel; when Sarkozy calls Israel "a friend," the Israelis seem to believe him. And while Chirac spoke of the need for a "multipolar world," with Europe as one pole, Sarkozy has tempered that notion with talk about France's place within its "Western family," an expression welcomed in Washington.

But will such an idiosyncratic approach work? A number of Sarkozy's initiatives have already ended in stalemate, if not failure. A visit here by the Libyan leader, Colonel Muammar el-Qaddafi, in which he openly criticized his host - and prompted the closure of the bridges over the Seine when he suddenly decided to take a boat ride - was widely seen as humiliating. Kouchner's numerous trips to broker an end to the political crisis in Lebanon have been dismissed by even some supporters as a waste of his time.

"There is no vision, no strategy here, only a new style based on the president's personal intervention and charisma," said Olivier Roy, a scholar on the Arab and Muslim world and author of the forthcoming "Politics of Chaos in the Middle East" (Columbia University Press). "And this emotional factor has exaggerated the sense that there is a change in France's foreign policy."

.........

If there is one policy line that does stand out, it is Sarkozy's pitching of French nuclear energy. France is second only to the United States in building nuclear power plants, and Sarkozy argues that Muslim and Arab states in principle have the same right to civilian atomic energy as any other part of the world.

This policy paradoxically risks encouraging Iran to continue enriching uranium - in violation of Security Council resolutions - as part of what Iran contends is only a peaceful nuclear energy program.

Nevertheless, Sarkozy has signed a cooperation deal with the United Arab Emirates, the first step in building a $9 billion nuclear reactor there, and he has offered civilian nuclear cooperation to Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Jordan and Morocco. In the wake of criticism that transfers of nuclear technology anywhere could be used on bomb programs, French officials rushed to make clear that it could take 15 years before those reactors are built, and to add that in some of the countries, they probably won't be built.

Olmert faces the boot for failed invasion

Olmert, the man with support in the single digits within Israel, is facing the biggest threat to his Bush-backed government ever.

It has been Cheney that has been the primary director of the Olmert government. He pushed Olmert into the ill-conceived "final conflict" with Hezbollah in Lebanon and he pushed Olmert to bomb the Syrians' putative nuclear facility, thus inflaming relations with Turkey. This resulted in a supremely lame and highly conditional "apology" to Turkey. Paraphrased:

IF we entered your airspace, we didn't do it to hurt your feelings. We don't apologise for actually doing it, only for upsetting you when we did it. IF we actually did it in the first place, of course, which we don't admit to. And we just might do it again, just so you know and don't go getting yourself all worked up. We respect your sovereignty, but we'll violate it whenever we want. No hard feelings, okay?

Over a year later, Israel has finally overcome the stall tactics of the Olmert Administration, and the Winograd Commission is due to issue a report on the ill-fated Second Lebanon War. Somehow, some way, the invasion was supposed to result in freeing two Israeli soldiers held hostage and crush Hezbollah forever. It didn't.

Instead, Israel fought Hezbollah to a standstill. Over a thousand Lebanese civilians were killed and over a hundred Israeli soldiers died for nothing. Eager to make quick gains, Israel ignored the ceasefire imposed by the UN and continued to drive into Lebanon. It gained nothing but more casualties, while the Bush Administration made bold statements backing Israel's right to defend itself by invading a neighbour. There are different rules for Israel in every case, at least in the White House's eyes.

The UN, that worthless and decrepit organisation decried by the Bush Administration, was tasked with the job of peacekeeping in Lebanon - minus the U.S, of course, which had its hands full in Iraq and Afghanistan while plotting a new war in Iran. The UN moved in and did what Cheney's proxy could not do. In return, Bush blamed the UN's "interference" for the failure to rout Hezbollah from Lebanon. The UN didn't want Israel to "win", and they spoiled all the fun with their cowardly ceasefire, just as Israel was poised to "win". The Bush fantasy world is a wonder to behold.

Israel's invasion was carried out with the characteristic optimism of the Bush Administration.
Lack of equipment, unrealistic orders and objectives, poor communication, and dismal planning were the hallmarks, but this is par for the course when you are the "good guys", because the good guys always prevail. Just like in Afghanistan. It's never complicated. Just send in the good guys and let them do their job, and we'll have a happy ending that we can take credit for. Expressing doubts about this strategy means that you hate the good guys, not that you question the policies or logisitics of those that send the good guys into harm's way. So don't look too closely at what went wrong a year and a half ago, just cheer on the brave good guys in their glorious fight to kill off the bad guys that want to kill us for some incomprehensibly sinister reason. Is this a comic book or real life?

Meanwhile, the U.S. gives a gift of $12 million every single day to Olmert's government. It also steadfastly ignores Israel's nuclear arsenal, while screeching about Iran's non-existent nukes at every opportunity. And, the U.S. makes excuses for and shushes up any criticism of Israel regardless of how it matches up with our policies.

Here's hoping that the Bush shill named Olmert gets the boot. It's time for a new stooge to advance our policies, whatever they are. Maybe even successfully this time, so that we don't have to spin reality out of whole cloth while the region chuckles at us. Possibly even a stooge that will actually move forward with the peace process. Is that too much to ask for $12 million a day?

story from The Daily Telegraph

Ehud Olmert faces calls to quit ahead of Lebanon war verdict

By Carolynne Wheeler in Jerusalem
Last Updated: 2:31am GMT 27/01/2008

Eighteen months after her husband's death in a helicopter crash in southern Lebanon, Sarit Gomez is still fighting for the truth

She may get some answers this week when a report into Israel's handling of its 2006 war with Hezbollah, the militant Islamic faction in Lebanon, is published.

The Winograd Committee report is expected to be highly critical of ministers and the military, and to put pressure on Ehud Olmert, the prime minister, to resign. It may yet bring down his government.

It will show why Israeli soldiers, including Mr Gomez, were sent into battle after the United Nations had brokered a ceasefire.

Mrs Gomez's husband Daniel, 25, was shot down on August 12 - after the August 11 ceasefire deal, but 33 hours before Israel halted its military operations. He was one of 33 Israeli soldiers killed between the deal and the end of hostilities.

These fateful hours are at the centre of growing anger from soldiers and relatives.

Many are also angry at the conflict's stalemate ending, military planning errors and equipment shortages, and a lack of government direction.

"I believe in protecting our country and our people, but I don't understand why it had to continue after the Lebanese government had already agreed to stop fighting," said Mrs Gomez, 27, a lawyer who lives at Tel Nof, near Tel Aviv, with Avia, her son, who was born three months after his father's death.

"I really think Danny's death, and the deaths of many other soldiers that day, could have been prevented."

Last week, 50 reserve company commanders signed a public letter calling for Mr Olmert's resignation. Other soldiers voiced their criticisms. "The company commanders are not prepared for this man to lead our country in another war. He failed," Yanir Zaken, a first sergeant in the reserves, told The Sunday Telegraph.

"There was no real reason we were there - putting our lives in danger. The ceasefire was already signed. The government insisted that we fight for one more week, that we press through to the Litani [river], and for what?"

The war began on July 12, after Hezbollah had ambushed an Israeli patrol, seizing two soldiers. Israel retaliated with aerial bombardment and a ground offensive into Lebanon, while Hezbollah fired thousands of rockets into northern Israel. More than 1,100 Lebanese - mostly civilians - and 117 Israeli soldiers and 43 civilians died.

Today, Hezbollah retains a presence in south Lebanon, despite the UN troops posted on the border, and little is known of the fate of the two captive soldiers.

Last week, the Hezbollah leader, Hassan Nasrallah, brandished the "dog-tag" of an Israeli soldier and offered soldiers' body parts from the battlefield, in exchange for Lebanese prisoners in Israeli jails.

Many Israelis now look to the Winograd report to tell them why the military mission failed. The committee cannot lay personal blame, but is likely to issue general findings about what went wrong.

Two leaders during the war, the ex-defence minister Amir Peretz and the former army chief Dan Halutz, have quit. Yet Mr Olmert and his fragile coalition remain.

"Were mistakes made? Yes. Were there failures? Certainly. But lessons were learned, shortcomings were rectified, patterns of action were changed," he said last week, adding that the war succeeded in stopping rocket fire on the north and drove Hezbollah back.

Holding the key to Mr Olmert's survival is Ehud Barak, the defence minister and Labour Party leader.

He is said to be weighing up whether pulling his support from the coalition and triggering a poll is worthwhile at a time when Israel faces US pressure to negotiate with the Palestinians and a deteriorating situation in Gaza.

Karzai: Independent Leader or Bush Shill?

Karzai is distancing himself from the Coalition as he approaches election.

While it's unclear what "progress" Karzai wishes to claim for his own, it follows the course taken by Musharraf in distinguishing himself as something other than a puppet maintaining power by the decree of Western nations. Karzai's predicament is even more precarious than that of al-Maliki in Iraq.

Lord Ashdown has distinguished himself as the most prominent British leader unwilling to parrot the Bush script in Afghanistan. Perhaps this newfound assertion of power on Karzai's part is merely a further illustration of his dependence on the Decider and his willingness to be a shill for Bush's delusional sucess scenario. Karzai hardly even controls the capital, Kabul. In recent months he has struggled, with mixed success, to pay his army and the civil servants that shake down the Afghan populace on a daily basis for bribes in order to conduct their lives. Bombers have struck with impunity inside Kabul, and near-riots have arisen in response to Coalition troops killing civilians within the city. Outside of Kabul, authority shifts constantly between warlords who ignore Karzai, Taliban forces, or foreign troops with their own agenda. The warlords refuse to pay taxes due to the government. The Taliban want to overthrow his government. The foreign troops freely and cheerfully ignore his dictates about killing civilians and have no regard for enforcing his rule beyond the capital. Everyone ignores him, but he can still keep Ashdown from representing the UN in Afghanistan. See how powerful he is?

story from The Daily Telegraph

Lord Ashdown rules out Afghan envoy role

By David Blair, Diplomatic Editor
Last Updated: 12:31pm GMT 27/01/2008

Lord Ashdown, the former Liberal Democrat leader, has ruled out becoming an international envoy in Afghanistan after President Hamid Karzai blocked his appointment.

No final agreement was reached on the powers of Lord Ashdown's possible job as Special Representative of the United Nations Secretary General.

Mr Karzai believed that Lord Ashdown would have undermined his own authority and become a competing power centre inside Afghanistan.

Facing an election next year, the Afghan leader is at pains to assert his independence from the Western powers and make clear that he is the public face of efforts to rebuild his country.

Last week, Mr Karzai told an Afghan cabinet meeting that "some vagueness" surrounded the proposed job for Lord Ashdown and unless the UN clarified matters, the Briton could not take up the post.

"The administration is trying to resolve the issue with UN consent," said Mr Karzai, according to the Kabul Times.

Another Afghan newspaper pointedly said that Lord Ashdown "should know" that his sole responsibility would be to coordinate "UN programmes in Afghanistan" and he would be "void of competence to determine our policy".

Lord Ashdown has now told Ban Ki-Moon, the UN secretary general, that he no longer wishes to be considered for the position. "This job can only be done successfully on the basis of a consensus within the international community and the clear support of the government of Afghanistan," said Lord Ashdown.

"It is clear to me that, in Afghanistan at least, the support necessary to do the job effectively does not exist."

Lord Ashdown served as the international community's high representative in Bosnia after stepping down as Lib Dem leader in 1999. During his four years in Sarajevo, he wielded exceptional power - a precedent which appears to have worried Mr Karzai.

The former Royal Marine has written widely on post-conflict reconstruction and last year he gave warning of the possibility of failure in Afghanistan.

At first, Lord Ashdown was being considered for a uniquely powerful coordinating role in Afghanistan. British officials said the first proposal was that he would have served as the joint envoy of the UN, Nato and the European Union.

But this combined, "triple hatted" proposal was dropped for lack of support. Lord Ashdown was then considered for the role of representing the UN. But even this scaled down proposal was not acceptable to Mr Karzai.

A new Central Front?

Remember Bush's bold assertions that Iraq was the Central Front in the Global War On Terror? Somehow, by occupying Iraq, Al-Qaeda would bet everything and flood into Iraq, and hence be crushed definitively and forever. For years we were told that Al-Qaeda was the problem with Iraq, not some civil war, and that we were in Iraq to inflict a military defeat on Al-Qaeda, as if they were an army with tanks, artillery, and fighter jets. Don't you want to win?
Wingnuts have screeched for years that Iraq is about defeating "militant Islam", and not about determining whether Sunnis or Shia dominate a post-Saddam Iraq. If we withdraw, Al-Qaeda will take over Iraq, we were told repeatedly, again as if Al-Qaeda were a conventional army that takes and holds territory rather than an extremely loose affiliation of irregulars that primarily seeks destabilisation.

Years later, "some senior U.S. military commanders" are 'privately' saying it is Afghanistan and Pakistan that are the Central Front in the GWOT. Wow, I guess when you have a situation where half of Afghanistan and most of the Pakistani Tribal Areas are in the hands of "militant Islam", you just may have something resembling a "front". Is that why we have four times as many troops in Iraq as we do in Afghanistan?

In Iraq, the "Coalition" is largely fictional. The British have left and the remainder of the Coalition troops number in the hundreds per country (at most). South Korean troops seldom even leave their base, and they are one of the "big" contingents at less than a thousand. The rest of the allies mostly just protect themselves at their bases. In Afghanistan, however, the British, Canadians, and Dutch are a significant force. These allies are pushed to the limit, and the Decider relentlessly leans on them to do more and pick up the slack from his own misguided focus on Iraq. The White House has all but blamed them for the failure of Bush's brilliantly optimistic vision in Afghanistan. We're reduced to bragging about girls being able to go to school, where they can grow up in a collapsed economy with warlords as the primary authority, and with an impotent puppet government that seems incapable of controlling the capital. The drug trade is the big economic engine, and areas are 'taken' at high cost only to revert back to Taliban control days after we withdraw. The Afghan government is little more than the new masters of the national shakedown, in which bribes are needed to complete virtually any transaction or travel anywhere. Reconstruction is non-existent, with the vast majority of the money going to pay the salaries and expenses of the administrators, who then blame the lack of security for the lack of reconstruction progress. But girls are now going to school, and that makes it all worthwhile, so smile about the "success".

Meanwhile, Pakistan has seen a de-facto seccession of the Federally-Administered Tribal Areas, with an insurrection that threatens to spread into Pakistan proper. For years, Bush has dismissed this as some kind of aberration, rather than seeing it as the "base" of radical Islam that he continually saw Iraq as. The military knew that the best way to keep their commands and careers intact was to read from the script that the Decider handed them, however disconnected from reality it may be. Afghanistan/Pakistan was offically a sideshow, and those feeble allies of ours had better step up to the plate and kill the "bad guys" or the Decider would stop liking them.

With a strategy that seems to begin and end with the ultra-simplistic "kill the bad guys", the Bush Administration proposed what it saw as the logical outgrowth: send in American troops to Pakistan, and they will kill the bad guys. Apparently the "bad guys" are easily distinguished by their black hats and tendency to twirl their moustaches in a sinister manner, and those silly Pakistani allies of ours, much like those in Afghanistan, were too dumb and feeble to carry out this simple task. So, with the heaving sigh of those who have to do Everything Themselves If They Want It Done Right, GI Joe would move in and Save The Day once again.

The ungrateful Pakistanis, however, didn't want us to "save the day", as we had done in Iraq or Afghanistan. Don't they know who they are dealing with? Do they understand that the Decider might stop liking them if they disagree with him? Don't they want to win? Are they too stupid to jump at the chance at being the next failed state created by Bush?

Apparently so.

Therefore, in the fantasy world created in the White House, it may very well be that Iraq will continue to be the Central Front of Something Poorly Defined and Increasingly Vague. Afghanistan will continue to be a battle that we are perpetually "winning", despite our lousy allies and their inability to take Bush's supreme vision and run with it to Victory. And we will continue to glower at Musharraf and threaten to stop being his friend unless he figures out who the Boss is. And, of course, "militant Islam" will continue to be the "pre-eminent threat of the Century" while somehow simultaneously being perpetually "on the ropes" and "in their last throes". We are always winning, and the danger is always increasing. And nobody sees the contradiction therein.
story from alawsat

US Shift Seen to Pakistan, Afghanistan

27/01/2008

WASHINGTON, (AP) - The Bush administration is attempting to re-energize its terrorism-fighting war efforts in Afghanistan, the original target of a post-Sept. 11 offensive. The U.S. also is refocusing on Pakistan, where a regenerating al-Qaeda is posing fresh threats.
There is growing recognition the United States risks further setbacks, if not deepening conflict or even defeat, in Afghanistan, and that success in that country hinges on stopping Pakistan from descending into disorder.
Privately, some senior U.S. military commanders say Pakistan's tribal areas are at the center of the fight against Islamic extremism; more so than Iraq, or even Afghanistan. These areas border on eastern Afghanistan and provide haven for al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters to regroup, rearm and reorganize.
This view may explain, at least in part, the administration's increasingly public expressions of concern.
At a Pentagon news conference last week, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said that while the U.S. respects the Pakistani government's right to decide what actions are needed to defeat extremists on its soil, there are reasons to worry that al-Qaeda poses more than an internal threat to Pakistan.
The Pentagon says it has fewer than 100 troops in Pakistan, including personnel who are training Pakistan's paramilitary Frontier Corps along the Afghanistan border.
The U.S. military has used other means, including aerial surveillance by drones, to hunt Osama bin Laden and other senior al-Qaeda leaders believed to be hiding near the Afghan border. Ground troops on the Afghan side sometimes fire artillery across the border at known Taliban or al-Qaeda targets, and U.S. officials have said special operations forces are poised to strike.
In recent days, administration officials have said they would send more U.S. forces if the Pakistani government decided it wanted to collaborate more closely. Still, it is far from certain that U.S. combat troops will set foot in Pakistan in any substantial numbers. On Friday, Pakistan's president, Pervez Musharraf, said his country opposes any foreign forces on its soil.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

story from AP

Top Agents in Secret Trip to Pakistan
Jan 27, 4:19 AM (ET)

By PAMELA HESS

WASHINGTON (AP) - The top two U.S. intelligence officials made a secret visit to Pakistan in early January to seek permission from President Pervez Musharraf for greater involvement of American forces in trying to ferret out al-Qaida and other militant groups active in the tribal regions along the Afghanistan border, a senior U.S. official said.

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity given the secret nature of the talks, declined to disclose what was said, but Musharraf was quoted two days after the Jan. 9 meeting as saying U.S. troops would be regarded as invaders if they crossed into Pakistan to hunt al-Qaida militants.

The New York Times - which first reported on the secret visit by CIA Director Michael Hayden and Mike McConnell, director of national intelligence - said Musharraf rebuffed an expansion of an American presence in Pakistan at the meeting, either through overt CIA. missions or by joint operations with Pakistani security forces.

Pakistan has been under growing U.S. pressure to crack down on militants in its tribal regions close to the Afghan border, a rugged area long considered a likely hiding place for al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and his top deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, as well as an operating ground for Taliban militants planning attacks on coalition forces in Afghanistan.

Several U.S. presidential candidates have hinted they would support unilateral action in the area.

In a Jan. 11 interview, Musharraf told The Straits Times of Singapore that U.S. troops would "certainly" be considered invaders if they set foot in the tribal regions. "If they come without our permission, that's against the sovereignty of Pakistan," he said. "I challenge anybody coming into our mountains. They would regret that day."

South Waziristan is a semiautonomous region where the central government has never had much control. It is home to scores of al-Qaida and Taliban fighters, many of whom fled there from neighboring Afghanistan after the U.S-led invasion in 2001.

The border region emerged as a front line in the war on extremist groups after Musharraf allied Pakistan with the U.S. following the Sept. 11 terror attacks. Washington has given Pakistan billions of dollars in aid to help government forces battle militants.

Musharraf, who toured Europe last week seeking support for his embattled government, rejected claims that the violence was a sign of a resurgent Taliban. More than 150 rebels and soldiers are reported to have been killed in the region this month alone.

Musharraf in the past has credited cooperation between Pakistani intelligence services and the CIA, both of whom believe that Pakistani militant leader Baitullah Mehsud was the mastermind of the Dec. 27 gun and suicide bomb attack that killed former prime minister Benazir Bhutto.

But the State Department's counterterrorism chief, Dell Dailey, said Tuesday that the Bush administration was displeased with "gaps in intelligence" received from Pakistan about the activities of extremist groups in the tribal regions.

"We don't have enough information about what's going on there. Not on al-Qaida. Not on foreign fighters. Not on the Taliban," he said.

Dailey, a retired Army lieutenant general with extensive background in special operations, said Pakistan needs to fix the problem. However, said the U.S. wasn't likely to conduct military strikes inside Pakistan on its own, saying that would anger many Pakistanis.

Rather than allow an increased U.S. presence, the Times reported that Pakistan and the United States are discussing other joint efforts, such as increased use of armed Predator surveillance aircraft over the tribal areas, and identifying ways the U.S. can speed intelligence information to Pakistani security forces.

The paper said the Jan. 9 trip by McConnell and Hayden came five days after senior administration officials debated new strategies for dealing with Pakistan. It had reported previously that no decisions were made at that meeting of the National Security Council, which included top administration officials, but not President Bush.

The times quoted a senior officials as saying "the purpose of the mission (by McConnell and Hayden) was to convince Musharraf that time is ticking away" and that the increased attacks on Pakistan would ultimately undermine his effort to stay in office.

Time is "ticking away" for Bush, not for Musharraf. The campaign in the tribal areas is unpopular in Pakistan, and also unpopular with the Pakistani troops. Arrogantly, the Bush Administration sees its association with Musharraf as some kind of boost to the Pakistani dictator, when the opposite is true. Musharraf is increasingly seen as a puppet in domestic opinion, much like Karzai in Afghanistan, and any statements challenging Washington simply make Musharraf appear less of a pawn. Nearly all of the foreign leaders that eagerly read off the script that Bush handed them have been removed from power; the exceptions are those countries whose governments are not democratic, or only nominally so. Generally speaking, the way to hang on to power in the last 2 years has been to distance yourself from the Decider while mouthing placating words of support to prevent being "liberated". This will not improve as Bush's lame-duck status becomes more and more obvious. Sarkozy is already doing and end run around Bush in India with their own nuclear deal. The EU is actually wondering out loud what the plan would be after we bombed Iran into oblivion. Russia is defining its foreign policy by what irritates Bush the most. China is giving Bush the rope he needs to hang himself economically by buying the debt created by the Iraq debacle while letting the U.S. take the heat for tackling "militant Islam". The world no longer is mystified and terrified by the Decider; it's snickering behind his back and playing him for a sap.

And how about those billions in aid the U.S. has given to Musharraf to fight the GWOT? Well, most of that has gone into buying weapons systems designed to fight its longtime foe, India. Nobody in the Bush Administration connected the dots when Pakistan bought F-16 fighters from us that these were not really the kind of thing that would help in fighting the Taliban in the tribal areas. Why scrutinise our allies, after all? They're the good guys.

This isn't a case of corruption, as so many dismiss it as. The problem isn't that billions went into somebody's pocket instead of into the GWOT, but rather that it went toward something absolutely counter to our interests in the region, namely a build-up for an Indo-Paki war. A war between India and Pakistan does nothing to advance the GWOT, so why do we finance one?

I am so sick of people saying that this is Pakistan, corruption is endemic, this is how things are done there. We are spending money to make a war more likely, one that is against our interests and is likely to increase China's influence in the region. It's not a case of lining someone's pockets with aid money. It just isn't. It would be better for us if the money did go into some corrupt politician's pocket, rather than being used to foment a regional war.

By the way, this AP story notes that the Tribal Areas are "home to scores of al-Qaida and Taliban fighters". A score is 20. Are we really to believe that there may be as few as 40 "bad guys" in South Waziristan causing all this trouble? Couldn't they at least say "hundreds"?

Bush Mid-East trip flops

Bush's Mid-East trip is over and accomplished nothing. Sure, he preached democracy to some kings, which is something that would get him thrown in prison if he were not President. And he spun some scary stories about Iran that sounded a lot like the ones he told about Iraq five years ago. Bush has failed to realise that the more he talks up action against Iran, just like in Venezuela and Cuba, the more he strengthens those regimes by creating a siege mentality.

While it must surely have been maddening for the Decider when these foreign monarchs failed to enthusiastically follow his dictates to the letter, his traditional arrogance was toned down from "intolerable" to merely "overbearing". It is ironic that the U.S. guarantees security for the region (from who, one might wonder?), but the people (who are the underpinning for his democracy preachings) are more afraid of him than they are of Iran, the current bogeyman.

Bush has had to work to hard at it, but his credibility with foreign leaders is now at the same level as it is with the American public.

MIDEAST: Bush Sent Home Empty-Handed
By Meena Janardhan

DUBAI, Jan 17 (IPS) - It is not often that a president of the United States tours the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries with a long wish-list. And less so when the ‘world’s most powerful leader’ returns home with just a few symbolic gains.

But that may describe George W. Bush’s visit to four of six GCC countries that ended on Tuesday. Apart from Kuwait, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia, Bush also visited Israel, the Palestinian territories and Egypt as part of his broader tour of the Middle East.

On Washington’s agenda was building a stronger rationale for a Sunni-Arab Gulf alliance with the U.S. against Shiite Persian Iran; seeking Arab support for a renewed Palestinian-Israeli peace effort; pushing the political reform agenda among the region’s monarchies; exploring ways of reining in oil prices; and arms sales.

According to regional analysts, except for getting closer to a 40 billion US dollar arms sales deal with the Arab Gulf countries -- in the pipeline and cornerstone of their security alliance, but still requiring Congress approval --Bush failed to make any headway on the other issues.

Bush’s visit also served as a reminder of the mismatch between the perceptions of the public and that of the governments. While the governments need the U.S. to serve as a security guarantor in the region, the public views it as a bigger threat than Iran.

Topping the U.S. diplomatic agenda was undoing the damage done by last month’s National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), which emphasised that Iran had halted a covert nuclear weapons programme in 2003. This had served as a breather for Tehran in its high-voltage drama with the U.S. and eased tension in the region.

In the UAE, where Bush delivered the tour’s keynote address, Iran was branded ‘‘the world’s leading state sponsor of terror,’’ which is a ‘‘totally different stance in Bush speak,’’ perhaps conditioned by his lame-duck status with less than a year in office, according to noted analyst Prof. Ebtisam Kitbi.

After the NIE cited the U.S. commander in Iraq as saying that Iran was contributing constructively to reduce violence in Iraq, Bush again said in Bahrain last week that Iran’s role in Iraqi violence stood exposed.

Kitbi, who teaches political science at the UAE University, told IPS: ‘‘Earlier all he (Bush) did was to talk about Iran’s nuclear policy, but now it’s about Iran being the reason for terror and instability in the region. In the past, the U.S. always linked terror with al-Qaeda, but now, it seems Iran is taking over.’’

Iranian-born academic Ali Sheikholeslami voiced similar opinions. ‘‘Bush’s main purpose is to divert the attention of the Arab people from the Palestinian situation. He is trying to convince the Arab countries that they should not worry about Israel’s existing nuclear weapons and the daily ill-treatment of the Palestinian people, but focus on the non-existing but potential Iranian nuclear weapons.’’

Iran and the Arabs have been neighbours for long and will continue to remain so, the emeritus professor at Oxford University in Britain told IPS over e-mail. The Arabs realise that ‘‘the U.S. has appeared in the Gulf only recently, and there is no guarantee that it will remain in the Gulf for long''.

The official regional response was no different.

After the face-off between U.S. and Iranian vessels in the Straits of Hormuz just ahead of Bush’s visit, Saudi foreign minister Saud Al-Faisal said: "Saudi Arabia is Iran’s neighbour. We are keen that harmony and peace should prevail among states of the region. We have relations with Iran and we speak regularly to them. If we sense any threat, we will speak to them (Iran) about it."

The GCC governments are certainly wary of Iran’s hegemonic designs and the spread of Shiite influence in the Arab world. But Iranian and Gulf Arab leaders have exchanged visits during the last 18 months as a confidence-building measure.

In fact, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was an official guest at the GCC summit in Doha and a personal guest of the Saudi King at the annual Haj pilgrimage, both in December. This, apart from Iran’s proposal to form a security alliance, indicate a regional effort to limit external and third-party interference from spiralling out of control over minor incidents.

Even on the economic front, GCC-Iran ties have shown maturity with Iran proposing a free trade agreement last year. Despite the tension, their bilateral business was worth 16 billion dollars in 2006. UAE-Iran trade in 2007 was over 14 billion dollars and Iran agreed in December to supply gas to Bahrain.

Bush attempted to use the trip to reach out to the Iranian people by saying that Washington was only targeting the regime, which is counterproductive, said Prof. Sheikholeslami. ‘‘Bush’s attacks on the Iranian government embolden those in power. He has created a situation where the shortcomings of President Ahmadinejad’s government cannot be reasonably discussed. Iran is in the midst of a fuel crisis. This is a damning indictment of a government sitting on a sea of energy resources. However, such questions cannot be raised when the security of the country is threatened by the U.S.’’

The academic of Iranian origin added that ‘‘every time the U.S. attacks the Iranian government, Ahmadinejad gains in strength. Every time, Bush criticises the regime, reformists sound like U.S. mouthpieces’’.

Commenting on Bush’s non-emphatic call for improving political freedom in the region, Kitbi said that ‘’even his call for democracy in the region has changed tune. Earlier the U.S. always sought a total democratic transformation, but now Bush is calling for democratic reform that is in sync with the region’s priorities as well as political and cultural sensitivities.’’

This new approach of ‘‘admiring Islam and Muslims is an attempt to improve the image of the U.S.,’’ she felt.

On the issue of courting Gulf Arab support for a renewed Middle East peace initiative, which derives more public sympathy than the Iranian threat factor, Kitbi identified it as Bush’s personal initiative which does not have any scope for success. ‘‘With U.S. presidential elections looming, Americans will be too involved in domestic politics to be seriously worried about investing time to resolve such a longstanding conflict.’’

The Islamic Ulema Council, the highest Shiite cleric body in Bahrain, issued a statement critical of the efforts at peace building. ‘‘There is nothing in this visit that would serve the Muslim and Arab nations. All indications are that it will aggravate the situation and contribute to squandering Islamic and Arab rights in venerated Palestine and Jerusalem.’’

With Saudi Arabia -- a leading producer of oil in the world and one of the chief suppliers to the U.S. -- saying that market demand and not production levels, determines oil prices, Bush’s effort to get some form of concession for his country’s economic woes also did not materialise.

In fact, the verdict on the utility of Bush’s visit was declared as soon as he started the tour. A scathing front page editorial in the UAE’s ‘Gulf News’ daily concluded by saying: ‘‘We hope you have enjoyed the trip so far. The scenery is great. The food is exotic. As for the more ‘serious’ things, it is unlikely you will make any difference.’’

(END/2008)

Pakistani forces take another beating

In another development that bodes ill for the Afghan campaign and the stability of Pakistan, the insurrection against the Pakistani government has taken a fort in the Tribal Areas in South Waziristan. About 20 Pakistani soldiers are missing, and if the established pattern holds true, these soldiers will become hostages.

Of course, this would never happen to American forces, right? The Decider is never at a lack for simplistic solutions to complex problems, and sending American troops into the Tribal Areas is his latest brainchild. Apparently Pakistani forces are unable to comprehend the simple concept of "kill all the bad guys", so our troops must move in and execute Bush's bold vision of....killing all the bad guys. How could this plan possibly fail?

story from China Daily

Hundreds of rebels seize fort, 47 dead

Hundreds of militants in northwest Pakistan attacked and captured a paramilitary fort early yesterday, and 40 militants and seven soldiers were killed and 20 soldiers missing, the military said.

The militants attacked the fort in the South Waziristan region on the Afghan border at about midnight on Tuesday and fighting went on for hours, military spokesman Major-General Athar Abbas said.

"About 200 miscreants attacked from different directions," Abbas said.

"They were able to breach one of the walls of the fort. In the process, there were about 40 militants dead and seven FC personnel were reported killed," he said, referring to the Frontier Corps paramilitary force.

Fifteen soldiers escaped and 20 were missing, he said.

A spokesman for the militants, Maulvi Omar, said they had killed 16 soldiers and captured 12 in the attack. He said only two of his men were killed. "The fort is still in our control," he said.

The Sara Rogha area where the fort is located is a stronghold of Al-Qaida-linked militant leader Baitullah Mehsud, who the government said was behind the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto in Rawalpindi on December 27.

Security forces retaliated with heavy artillery fire throughout yesterday, residents of the area said.

Pakistani forces have been trying to expel foreign militants and subdue their Pakistani allies in the lawless tribal belt along the border with Afghanistan, where Osama bin Laden is believed to be hiding.

Source: China Daily/Agencies

China tramples Bhutan in border conflict

This a follow-up to my earlier post about the developing border conflict between India and China that threatens the very existence of Bhutan. Most people have never heard of Bhutan, and that suits Bhutanese nicely. It's a tiny, remote, isolated country that minds it's own business and basically lives the same way it did centuries ago. Sure, you will see some fancy, modern compound bows used in the national sport, archery. And in the capital, Thimpu, you may find satellite televisions and modern clothing, but largely it's been a peaceful, happy, slow-moving place.

Until the Chinese Army came around, that is.

China is making military incursions into Bhutan, building (unwanted) roads and stationing (unwanted) troops in the vaguely-demarcated mountainous territory and throughout the Dolam Plateau and Chumbi Valley. China claims (and has claimed for decades) ownership of vast areas that are considered part of India by the rest of the world, but they are only now actually doing something about it. Bhutan is "in the way" of this miltary expansion, much like Belgium and Holland in WW2. And like those two European countries and the German Army, there is little that Bhutan can do to stop the Chinese military from doing whatever it pleases.

Likewise, India is washing its hands of its longtime ally, essentially saying that Bhutan is on its own without even wishing it luck.

This is a situation that will likely play out over the next year, as India seeks to avoid war and China is restricted by the logistics of moving large numbers of troops into such rugged terrain. There are no valuable resources to be had; just the strategic control of an area that, until recently, nobody cared much about at all.

Story from The Asia Times

In Bhutan, China and India collide
By Mohan Balaji

As the world's newest democracy, the Buddhist Kingdom of Bhutan has won praise around the world. Its recent transformation - from a century of monarchy to a multi-party democracy - has all the trappings of cinema: an enlightened king steps aside for his dashing, Oxford-educated son who represents a future of peace and prosperity.

But all's not entirely well in Shangri-la. Bhutan, sandwiched between two Asian giants, China and India, is increasingly embroiled in other nations' realpolitik and has been recently subjected to military incursions that are reverberating around the region. Despite the dazzle of democracy, the often-cited "gross national happiness" of bucolic Bhutan is truly at stake.

Delhi and Beijing are watching the kingdom intensely, and recent moves suggest that Bhutan may become either a strategic pawn or a malleable "buffer" zone between the two expanding powers.

This month, the Wall Street Journal wrote that King Jigme Singye Wangchuk, the "Dragon King" who ascended the throne in 1972 at the age of 16, "deserves to go down in history as his country's George Washington, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson".

In 1998, Wangchuk voluntarily reduced his powers and declared that Bhutan would become a constitutional monarchy. He ordered legal experts to study constitutions of all the world's great democracies and the final version, which was mailed to every home in the country, begins with "We the people". In December 2006, he abdicated and a year later the first general elections were held in the country's 20 dzongkhag (districts). Elections for the lower house of Parliament commence next month, and in the foreseeable future the monarch will become a ceremonial head of state.

The outcome of the elections will impact India and China, both of which have strategic footholds in the landlocked Himalayan kingdom. Bhutan does not have diplomatic relations with China, the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom or France. This is possibly done so Bhutan is not seen as an enemy to China, these nations all being members of the United Nations Security Council.

Informal contact with the US is made through the American Embassy in New Delhi. As Bhutan is close to India's restive northeastern states, any sort of negative development in the Himalayan kingdom is considered critical to India's strategic interest.

India's relationship with Bhutan is based on the Perpetual Peace and Friendship agreement signed in 1949. The pact was tested when Bhutan, under Indian pressure, launched "Operation All Clear" to flush out Indian militants operating inside Bhutan on December 15, 2003. The Bhutanese army, aided by Indian forces, completed the operation in January 2004.

There is a fear of China in Bhutan. There are unresolved border disputes going back centuries and the issue was only addressed in Beijing in 1984. Bhutan has traditional trade relations with Tibet, but Bhutan closed its northern borders with China after an influx of Tibetan refugees in 1960. With that the age-old cross-border trade came to a halt and there have been no official trade or business relations with China ever since.

In 1998, Bhutan and China signed an Agreement to Maintain Peace and Tranquillity on the Bhutan-China border, marking the first and only Sino-Bhutanese peace agreement to this day.

In recent months, Bhutan's relations with it powerful neighbors have had a twist. Chinese forces are alleged to have intruded several times into Bhutanese territory at the tri-junction with India. Over the past six months, the Chinese have increasingly made inroads in the strategically important area. The incursions into Bhutan are precariously close to India's "chicken's neck" - the vulnerable Siliguri Corridor which links the northeast passage.

At the moment, Indian military strength is depleted in its eastern region as one of the divisions normally based in the hills of West Bengal is currently deployed in Kashmir. The other division, located distantly at Binaguri, would be ineffective if the Chinese sliced through Bhutan to sever the Siliguri "neck".

Although the ruling United Progressive Alliance government government in India has publicly dismissed these intrusions as "nothing serious", experts view these "aggressive" Chinese moves as a deliberate strategy to put pressure on India and strengthen China's claims on disputed areas along the "Line of Actual Control". The Indian army has been alarmed at the increasing Chinese forays into Bhutan, which are also close to the strategic Chumbi Valley - another vital junction between India, Bhutan and China.

Trouble is mounting on China's border with Bhutan. The intrusions of Chinese forces, analysts say, has more to do with India than Bhutan. The official statement of Indian army chief General Deepak Kapoor is that Chinese forays into Bhutan are a "matter between the two countries". But, in contradiction, the Indian army recently moved 6,000 troops to the Sino-Indian-Bhutanese junction from the troubled states of Jammu and Kashmir.

In November 2007, Chinese forces demolished several unmanned Indian forward posts near two military bunkers in the border region of Bhutan's Dolam Valley. This has drastically distorted the Sino-Bhutanese border at Sikkim and puts Chinese forces only a few kilometers from North Bengal's Siliguri Corridor. China has always laid claim to Dolam and there is rampant suspicion that it is now extending its claim. So far, India has treaded softly and has been tight-lipped for political and diplomatic reasons.

The Dolam Valley incident has exacerbated fear in Bhutan. The general feeling is the more Bhutan proximates itself with India the more it faces trouble from China. The newly elected government, from February, will be hard-pressed to remain equally distance from both the countries.

There is a strong feeling in Thimphu that Bhutan is becoming a buffer state. The outcome of the elections will likely determine the future of the relationship between India, China and Bhutan. It is believed that China's strategy is to drag India more and more into a Bhutanese gambit and benefit by pinning more Indian troops into border areas. Bhutan stands a great chance of becoming a tiny pawn in a big game between the two Asian giants.

Mohan Balaji is a print and broadcast journalist in India.

Iranian naval "threat" was a hoax

So what do we now know about this alleged "incident" in which we nearly went to war with Iran? Well, the short story is that it's a bunch of bull.

- The "threat" (supposedly) from the Iranian ship was dubbed over the video.
- The "threat" could have been made by anyone, and it's unlikely it was made by anyone in the speedboats due to the lack of background noise.
- The "threat" was not even a threat, and the U.S. ships involved never considered themselves threatened.
- The speedboats could not have harmed the U.S. ships, and the only one of these "aggressive" speedboats that came within visual range of the ships was clearly unarmed.
- U.S. naval vessels never came "very close to firing" on the speedboats. No warning shots were even fired.
- The quotes attributed to the naval commander by the media were, in fact, fabricated and denied by the commander.

Aside from this, our role in the strait of Hormuz is to guarantee the flow of oil. Iran has never threatened the flow of oil.
If our Destroyers can be taken out by bozos with machine guns on the kind of boat used to water-ski, then we've wasted a whole lot of money on our Navy. They might as well be throwing rocks.

story from IPS

POLITICS-US: Official Version of Naval Incident Starts to Unravel
Analysis by Gareth Porter*

WASHINGTON, Jan 10 (IPS) - Despite the official and media portrayal of the incident in the Strait of Hormuz early Monday morning as a serious threat to U.S. ships from Iranian speedboats that nearly resulted in a "battle at sea", new information over the past three days suggests that the incident did not involve such a threat and that no U.S. commander was on the verge of firing at the Iranian boats.

The new information that appears to contradict the original version of the incident includes the revelation that U.S. officials spliced the audio recording of an alleged Iranian threat onto to a videotape of the incident. That suggests that the threatening message may not have come in immediately after the initial warning to Iranian boats from a U.S. warship, as appears to do on the video.

Also unraveling the story is testimony from a former U.S. naval officer that non-official chatter is common on the channel used to communicate with the Iranian boats and testimony from the commander of the U.S. 5th fleet that the commanding officers of the U.S. warships involved in the incident never felt the need to warn the Iranians of a possible use of force against them.

Further undermining the U.S. version of the incident is a video released by Iran Thursday showing an Iranian naval officer on a small boat hailing one of three ships.

The Iranian commander is heard to say, "Coalition warship 73, this is Iranian navy patrol boat." He then requests the "side numbers" of the U.S. warships. A voice with a U.S. accent replies, "This is coalition warship 73. I am operating in international waters."

The dramatic version of the incident reported by U.S. news media throughout Tuesday and Wednesday suggested that Iranian speedboats, apparently belonging to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard navy, had made moves to attack three U.S. warships entering the Strait and that the U.S. commander had been on the verge of firing at them when they broke off.

Typical of the network coverage was a story by ABC's Jonathan Karl quoting a Pentagon official as saying the Iranian boats "were a heartbeat from being blown up".

Bush administration officials seized on the incident to advance the portrayal of Iran as a threat and to strike a more threatening stance toward Iran. National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley declared Wednesday that the incident "almost involved an exchange of fire between our forces and Iranian forces". President George W. Bush declared during his Mideast trip Wednesday that there would be "serious consequences" if Iran attacked U.S. ships and repeated his assertion that Iran is "a threat to world peace".

Central to the depiction of the incident as involving a threat to U.S. warships is a mysterious pair of messages that the sailor who heard them onboard immediately interpreted as saying, "I am coming at you...", and "You will explode after a few minutes." But the voice in the audio clearly said "I am coming to you," and the second message was much less clear.

Furthermore, as the New York Times noted Thursday, the recording carries no ambient noise, such as the sounds of a motor, the sea or wind, which should have been audible if the broadcast had been made from one of the five small Iranian boats.

A veteran U.S. naval officer who had served as a surface warfare officer aboard a U.S. Navy destroyer in the Gulf sent a message to the New York Times on-line column "The Lede" Wednesday pointing out that in the Persian Gulf, the "bridge-to-bridge" radio channel used to communicate between ships "is like a bad CB radio" with many people using it for "hurling racial slurs" and "threats". The former officer wrote that his "first thought" was that the message "might not have even come from one of the Iranian craft".

Pentagon officials admitted to the Times that they could not rule out that the broadcast might have come from another source

The five Iran boats involved were hardly in a position to harm the three U.S. warships. Although Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman described the Iranian boats as "highly maneuverable patrol craft" that were "visibly armed," he failed to note that these are tiny boats carrying only a two- or three-man crew and that they are normally armed only with machine guns that could do only surface damage to a U.S. ship.

The only boat that was close enough to be visible to the U.S. ships was unarmed, as an enlarged photo of the boat from the navy video clearly shows.

The U.S. warships were not concerned about the possibility that the Iranian boats were armed with heavier weapons capable of doing serious damage. Asked by a reporter whether any of the vessels had anti-ship missiles or torpedoes, Vice Adm. Kevin Cosgriff, Commander of the 5th Fleet, answered that none of them had either of those two weapons.

"I didn't get the sense from the reports I was receiving that there was a sense of being afraid of these five boats," said Cosgriff.

The edited Navy video shows a crewman issuing an initial warning to approaching boats, but the footage of the boats maneuvering provides no visual evidence of Iranian boats "making a run on U.S. ships" as claimed by CBS news Wednesday in its report based on the new video.

Vice Adm. Cosgriff also failed to claim any run toward the U.S. ships following the initial warning. Cosgriff suggested that the Iranian boat's manoeuvres were "unduly provocative" only because of the "aggregate of their manoeuvres, the radio call and the dropping of objects in the water".

He described the objects dropped by the Iranian boat as being "white, box-like objects that floated". That description indicates that the objects were clearly not mines, which would have been dark and would have sunk immediately. Cosgriff indicated that the ships merely "passed by them safely" without bothering to investigate whether they were explosives of some kind.

The apparent absence of concern on the part of the U.S. ships' commanding officers about the floating objects suggests that they recognised that the Iranians were engaging in a symbolic gesture having to do with laying mines.

Cosgriff's answers to reporters' questions indicated that the story promoted earlier by Pentagon officials that one of the U.S . ships came very close to firing at the Iranian boats seriously distorted what actually happened. When Cosgriff was asked whether the crew ever gave warning to the Iranian boats that they "could come under fire", he said the commanding officers "did not believe they needed to fire warning shots".

As for the report circulated by at least one Pentagon official to the media that one of the commanders was "close to firing", Cosgriff explained that "close to" meant that the commander was "working through a series of procedures". He added, "[I]n his mind, he might have been closing in on that point."

Despite Cosgriff's account, which contradicted earlier Pentagon portrayals of the incident as a confrontation, not a single news outlet modified its earlier characterisation of the incident. After the Cosgriff briefing, Associated Press carried a story that said, " U.S. forces were taking steps toward firing on the Iranians to defend themselves, said the U.S. naval commander in the region. But the boats -- believed to be from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's navy -- turned and moved away, officials said."

That was quite different from what Cosgriff actually said.

In its story covering the Cosgriff briefing, Reuters cited "other Pentagon officials, speaking on condition of anonymity" as saying that "a U.S. captain was in the process of ordering sailors to open fire when the Iranian boats moved away" -- a story that Cosgriff had specifically denied.

*Gareth Porter is an historian and national security policy analyst. His latest book, "Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam", was published in June 2005.

(END/2008)

Polish gov't shakes down Bush

In a new development over the "missile shield" the Bush Administration wants to put in Poland, it appears that the new Polish government is shaking down Bush. Since the Bush Administration does nothing honestly, the "shield" has been portrayed as a defence against an improbable Iranian attack - because Poland and Iran are such bitter enemies, as we all 'know'. The reality is that the "shield" is strictly for use against Russia, and that it's not Poland that would be defended by it. The former Polish government was one of Bush's "team" of foreign allies that backed everything he said and sent troops to Iraq. Not surprisingly, the Polish voters kicked these toadies out in favour of a government that might actually look out for Poland's interests, rather than striving to make the Decider look good at every available opportunity.

So, in a sly move, the Polish DM has said that this "missile shield" would make Poland a target (which it certainly would), so Poland will need some missiles of its own, such as those in the U.S. arsenal, for example. Oh, and Poland won't rely on Bush's promises to defend them, but would feel better if NATO would guarantee their security.

Poland certainly realises that Bush won't go to war to defend Poland, and that they sre simply being used as a base for American forces to threaten Russia. Poland wouldn't even control the "missile shield", but would instead rely on Bush to decide when things are dangerous and when they are not. The days when foreign leaders bend over for Bush are now in the past. The "missile shield" is bad domestic politics for the new government, and if they are going to swallow it then they will need a shiny new missile system of their own, making them a "player" in European defence - something Bush has promised Poland for years but never delivered. In an even bolder move, they are also saying in public that the premise of the "missile shield" is bogus.

Yes, the once-mighty Decider is now being pushed around by countries like Poland.

story from IHT

Poland wants air defenses bolstered in return for missile shield

BERLIN: Adopting an increasingly assertive tone before meetings in Washington next week, Poland's new center-right government has warned that it would not accept a controversial U.S. antiballistic missile shield until the United States agreed to bolster Polish air defenses.
The request is a departure from the previous nationalist-conservative government led by Jaroslaw Kaczynski, which had all but agreed to deploy 10 interceptors on Polish territory without setting firm conditions over the security and financing of having them in the country.
Bogdan Klich, the Polish defense minister, said he would ask Washington to modernize Poland's air-defense capabilities with short- and medium-range systems, such as the Patriot. If necessary, he said, he would also ask the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the U.S.-led military alliance, for a guarantee that it would come to Poland's assistance if it came under attack.
"The presence of a U.S military installation in Poland undoubtedly makes Polish airspace more vulnerable," Klich told Reuters in an interview Tuesday. "I am speaking about this in categorical terms because this is an essential part of Polish airspace security." Klich added in the interview that Poland could become more vulnerable to attack if it agreed to accept the U.S. system, which according to opinion polls is widely opposed in Poland.
A Defense Ministry official said the Klich wanted to discuss all the options available to Poland at a meeting with Robert Gates, the U.S. defense secretary, during two days of talks in Washington next week. He said the security package Poland was requesting would be purely defensive, adding that it would be difficult to imagine that Poland would agree to deployment without such a package.

Klich's comments appear to be part of a campaign by the Polish government to warn the U.S. administration of a more aggressive negotiating stance before these high-level meetings. In interviews with the Polish media over the past few days, Prime Minister Donald Tusk and Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski have taken a much tougher line in negotiations with the United States over the missile shield.
They have contradicted U.S. policy by stating that Iran or other Middle Eastern states were not the main threat to Poland's security. Senior American diplomats, including Dan Fried, assistant secretary of state for European affairs, who last year traveled to European capitals and Russia, have said that the shield was a necessary protective measure against any missiles coming from so-called rogue states, including Iran.
Neither Tusk nor his ministers have so far elaborated on what threats Poland could face. Security analysts said Poland was simply asking the United States to provide security to modernize Poland's defenses, but they added that they consider Russia as a factor.
"The request for the Patriot missiles is purely a defensive measure," said Gienek Smolar, director of the Center for International Relations, an independent research organization in Warsaw.
"This is about explaining and protecting Poland's national and security interests," Smolar said.
Russia has taken a tough stance against the missile shield, warning of a new Cold War if the United States goes ahead with its plans to deploy the system in Poland and the Czech Republic. This was one of the main reasons why Russia last month suspended its participation in the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe, one of the most important arms control treaties signed in the aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Poland and Russia are also planning their first direct talks in Warsaw over the missile shield. Sikorski will discuss the issue with Russia's deputy foreign minister, Sergei Kislyak.

Whose by-line is it, anyway?

Now we know why those right-wing blogs all sound like they are written by the Bush Administration.
It turns out that they pretty much are.
Their ability to parrot whatever is handed to them without critical thought makes them admirably suited for future work at Fox News.

From The Minnesota Monitor

Defense Department blog coordinator hired for RNC

Fri Jan 11, 2008 at 1:10:02 PM

Andy Birkey

The 2008 Republican National Convention has hired James Davis as communications coordinator, a move that bodes well for bloggers, particularly those on the right.
Before the current move to the RNC, Davis' job was strategic communications in the Public Affairs Office of the Secretary of Defense where, according to Ken Silverstein of Harper's Magazine, he helped pass Iraq war and War on Terrorism talking points from the Department of Defense to hand-picked bloggers.
During almost daily conference calls, bloggers and online journalists, including prominent Minnesota bloggers Scott Johnson and John Hinderaker of Power Line and Ed Morrissey Captain's Quarters, are connected with military personnel during the Blogger's Roundtable.
"The list of bloggers who regularly participate in the conference calls is overwhelmingly conservative and friendly to the goals of the Bush Administration," wrote Silverstein. "The government is picking certain people as 'surrogates' to the exclusion of many others and feeding them news."
According to the Department of Defense, the program, once called the "Surrogates Operation," has as its mission providing "source material for stories in the blogosphere concerning the Department of Defense (DoD) and the Global War on Terrorism by bloggers and online journalists."
"A few moderates are invited to take part, but the list of participants skews far, far to the right. The Pentagon essentially feeds participants the talking points, bullet points, and stories it wants told," wrote Silverstein.
While it's not surprising that the RNC hired someone with such a close history working with pro-Iraq bloggers, it will certainly ensure access between convention officials and bloggers such as Powerline and Captain's Quarters.

Iraq: intolerable is the new normal

The levels of violence that were intolerable before the surge have now become "normalcy" in Iraq. In early 2006, Bush proposed the surge and violence went to record levels. Now, merely returning to the levels of violence Iraq saw before the surge is considered a brilliant success. Vehicles are not allowed in Fallujah. Baghdad is walled into segregated communities. The "Awakening" paramilitaries are now the real power in most of the country, as the elected government shrugs at its own impotence and irrelevance. The humanitarian nightmare continues apace.

But come this March, all of this will become Iraq's problem. The current disaster is good enough to call "victory", or "success", or whatever it is we are claiming to have accomplished. Those Republicans who once shed tears over the thought of the massacres of innocent civilians in the civil war that would take place if we were to withdraw are now happily leaving the Iraqis to their own devices and saying "you're welcome".

story from IPS

IRAQ: Less Violent But Not Less Hellish
By Ali al-Fadhily and Dahr Jamail*

FALLUJAH, Jan 11 (IPS) - U.S. and Iraqi officials claim that security is improving across al-Anbar province and much of Iraq. Security during the last half of 2007 was indeed better than in the period between February 2006 and mid-2007. But this has brought little solace to many Iraqis, because violence is still worse than in 2005 and early 2006.

Top Iraqi and U.S. officials and politicians have been saying that Iraq is back on its feet and that security has been established in the most volatile provinces like al-Anbar, to the west of Baghdad. Security responsibilities here will be handed over to Iraqis in March, the U.S. military says.

Violence levels are down, but attacks have not ceased. "Nine U.S. soldiers were killed in 24 hours, U.S. B-1 and F-16 bombers dropped over 40,000 pounds of special munitions on the Arab Juboor villages just south of Baghdad, and Awakening (militia paid for by the U.S.) leaders and senior police officers are being assassinated all over Iraq, yet U.S. army leaders and top officials say Iraq is safe and sound," lawyer and human rights activist Mahmood al-Dulaimy told IPS.

Dulaimy said U.S. President George W. Bush has succeeded in convincing many people in the United States that everything in Iraq is all right. "It is you media people who fool the world by transmitting false news about the situation in Iraq," Dulaimy said. "Look around you and tell me what is good here."

Looking around, one finds a ruined country. And neither occupation forces nor Iraqi government personnel seem to care about saving the little normal life that remains.

The independent U.S.-based group Just Foreign Policy says more than 1.1 million Iraqis have been killed through the occupation. According to an Oxfam International report, four million Iraqis are in need of emergency aid. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that there are more than 4.5 million Iraqis displaced from their homes.

"Is it good that we still cannot go to Baghdad to sell our crops and buy seeds and other necessary things for our farms," said young Jassim from Fallujah. "Is it good that we only plant ten percent of our land because there is not enough electricity and fuel to run our pumps?"

Many people in Fallujah say they simply want the U.S. forces to leave. "If the U.S. generals mean they will hand over security to Iraqis and leave the province, then I will salute them all," retired Iraqi army colonel Salman Ahmed told IPS in Fallujah. "But I know it is just another comedy like that played elsewhere in Iraq, where Iraqis (officials) are just ropes for American dirty laundry. We want our country back for real, not just on paper."

People in Fallujah, the second biggest city of al-Anbar province after capital Ramadi, say they are still in the grip of draconian security measures implemented and backed by the U.S. military.

"If security is so good then let them end the tragedy of our city," a member of the Fallujah City Council, speaking on condition of anonymity told IPS. "We want our freedom back and we want to leave and enter our city without this humiliation by soldiers and policemen. Fallujah is dying, and our masters (Americans) are bragging about security and prosperity."

Fifty-five-year-old mother Um Bashar came to the house where IPS was meeting with residents.

"Let them (Americans) take everything and bring me my son back," she said. "He stayed to guard the house in the November 2004 siege and the Americans captured him. Now he is missing. Some people who were released told us he was with them in the airport prison."

Iraqi people do not speak of improvement. They do not see it; they see only that these claims have become important for the U.S. elections.

(*Ali, our correspondent in Baghdad, works in close collaboration with Dahr Jamail, our U.S.-based specialist writer on Iraq who has reported extensively from Iraq and the Middle East) (END/2008)