Did India End Its Program of Anti-Pakistan Covert Warfare In 1997?

[Former Intelligence chief B. Raman freely acknowledges that India had its own "ultras" (militants) anti-Pakistan forces, yet he maintains that it all ended in '97--

"Since 1997, India has been a pathetic victim of Pakistan's covert actions waged through different terrorist organisations. Pakistan has been using terrorism as a means of covert action against India since 1981.Between 1981 and 1997, India was retaliating in its own limited manner. The policy of covert retaliation was stopped in 1997 and has been totally discarded since then."

SEE: If the Following Report Is Real, It is the Proof That Pakistan Has Been Looking For ; Image of the Beast]

Is it possible that all of today’s anti-state elements within Pakistan are not sponsored by RAW, but by the CIA, or even the ISI itself?  That would mean that soldiers were having other soldiers killed, along with thousands of civilians–a typical “false flag” set-up.  Stranger things have transpired since September 11, 2001.]

Covert Actions

By B. Raman

The strongly-presumed hand of Mossad, the Israeli external intelligence agency, in the successful neutralisation of a Damascus-based leader of the Hamas (Mahmoud al- Mabhouh) while he was on a visit to Dubai in January last has come in the wake of other suspected covert actions of the Mossad in recent months, which were directed against Iranian nuclear scientists, who were reportedly playing a role in the development of the uranium enrichment technology.

2.  While all these operations succeeded in eliminating the intended targets who posed a threat to Israel’s national security, those directed against the Iranian scientists were copybook examples of covert actions whereas the one against the Hamas leader was not.  The Mossad was able to maintain the total deniability of its strikes against the Iranian scientists.  Till today, Iranian intelligence officials and police investigators have not been able to find out what happened. Apart from allegations, they have no evidence of the involvement of the Mossad, which has taken care not to leave any trace of its involvement.

3. In the case of the Dubai operation, the deniability has been weak and many tell-tale traces  left behind by those who participated in the alleged elimination of the Hamas leader have enabled the Dubai Police to reconstruct in a fairly convincing manner what happened.  The employment of an unusually large team of agents for carrying out the action and their inability to make the closed circuit TV in the hotel non-functional have enabled the Dubai police to make a break-through in the investigation.

4. The fact that the Mossad agents decided to go ahead with the operation despite their inability to make the CCTV non-functional strongly speaks of local collusion in the covert action. Since the CCTV was presumably functioning, those in the security control room of the hotel who would have been monitoring the CCTV, would have definitely noticed the Mossad agents forcing their way into the room of the Hamas leader. The fact that they did not raise an alarm for  hours, which enabled the Mossad  agents to flee Dubai without being intercepted, is an indicator of collusion in the hotel.

5.  Even when they travel incognito, Hamas leaders are usually accompanied by at least one person from their security set-up who takes up a room opposite the room occupied by the leader so that they could keep a look-out for any attempt to break into the room of the leader. The fact that no one intervened as the Mossad agents forced their way into the room indicates that either there was collusion by Hamas elements too or the Mossad agents had neutralised the security detail of the Hamas leader before attacking him.

6.  The entire story of the covert action will never come out.  Particulars of any collusion will remain unknown for some time to come.

7.  The Dubai operation of the Mossad was not copy-book perfect, but it was a successful operation in the sense that the agency eliminated a worrying threat to Israel’s national security and to the lives of Israeli citizens and other Jewish persons.  It was an attack carried out in exercise of the right of self-defence of the Israeli nation and people.

8. Laws of all countries—including India—- provide this right of self-defence and this rigt can be exercised by individuals as well as States.

9. Those opposed to covert actions might argue that despite the repeated resort to covert actions against identified enemies of the State of Israel and its people, Israel has not succeeded in eliminating terrorism and in countering effectively States like Iran which are determined to destroy Israel. Another way of looking at it is that but for such covert actions Israel and the Jewish people might have been forced to their knees by now by their enemies. It is such successful covert actions which have enabled the State of Israel to survive and even flourish.

10.  The importance of selective covert actions to ensure the security of  a State and its people has been recognised by many States—-democratic and authoritarian. Some States—-such as the US and Israel—admit that they have a covert action capability. Others don’t, but they maintain the capability clandestinely. Pakistan is an example of a State in Asia which has over the years maintained an effective covert action capability for use against India. It has followed the model of other rogue States such as North Korea, Libya, Syria, Iraq of Saddam Hussain and Sudan in using terrorism as a way of waging a covert warfare.

11. Since 1997, India has been a pathetic victim of Pakistan’s covert actions waged through different terrorist organisations. Pakistan has been using terrorism as a means of covert action against India since 1981.Between 1981 and 1997, India was retaliating in its own limited manner. The policy of covert retaliation was stopped in 1997 and has been totally discarded since then.

12. None of the Indian Prime Ministers in office since 1997 has had the political will to revert to a policy of at least limited retaliation against the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and its terrorist surrogates. The result has been that our national security has been continuously endangered and our people have been dying in their hundreds. When Pakistan, through its intelligence agencies and terrorist surrogates, has been waging a relentless covert warfare against India, we cannot protect the State and the people merely by revamping our counter-terrorism architecture.

13. Unless we create a capability for retaliatory covert actions in a deniable manner and use that capability we will continue to bleed.

14.  Between 1981 and 1997, the Prime Ministers in office followed a dual policy of “talk, talk, hit, hit” against Pakistan. They never fought shy of talking to Pakistani leaders and officials. At the same time, they never missed an opportunity to undermine the State of Pakistan covertly in retaliation against its covert actions against India.

15. Since 1997, our policy has been reduced to one of talk, talk and more talk with no retaliation even covertly. Our political leadership and large sections of our bureaucracy have no concept of the importance of covert action in an asymmetric proxy war.  That is the tragedy of our country.

(The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-Mail: seventyone2@gmail.com)

Holbrooke Seeking Georgian Help In New Serpentine Path to Afghanistan

US considering Georgia Afghan supply offer

Today at 16:48 | Associated Press

TBILISI, Georgia (AP) — A senior U.S. diplomat said Monday that Washington is carefully considering Georgia’s offer to use its territory as part of an armaments supply route. Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, spoke while visiting a base where Georgia is training troops to be sent to Afghanistan. Georgia, located in the Caucasus, has about 170 soldiers in Afghanistan, and plans to expand its contingent to about 700 this year.

Georgia’s offer would make it part of a complicated route through several countries: Supplies would be shipped from Romania across the Black Sea, offloaded in Georgia, sent by land through Azerbaijan to the Caspian Sea, then to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. It is unclear whether transit countries other than Georgia are on board with the proposal.

“This is a very complicated logistical issue that involves many considerations and they are studying it very, very carefully,” Holbrooke said at a news conference with Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili.

“Already there are some things that Georgia’s involved in,” Holbrooke said in response to a question about the proposed supply route, but he did not elaborate. The Georgian Defense Department has declined comment on the country’s precise involvement.

U.S. acceptance of Georgia’s proposal would likely anger Russia, which is suspicious of Western military activity in former Soviet states, and which fought a war against Georgia in 2008. Russia contends that U.S. military aid for Georgia would constitute support for Georgia’s intentions to retake control of two separatist regions that Russia recognizes as independent.

“We Georgians understand that in many ways the future of Georgia, the country’s unity, depends on the success of the mission in Afghanistan,” Saakashvili said Monday.

The Georgian president has pushed for Georgia to become a member of NATO and some observers believe the small country’s large troop contribution in Afghanistan is meant to curry favor with the alliance.

Holbrooke denied any connection, saying “In the discussions that led to this deployment … and in everything that followed in the last 12 months, the subject that you have raised has never come up. There was no quid pro quo.”

The “S” in US Steel Stands for Serbia

USD 60 mln invested in U.S. Steel Serbia’s new equipment

Source: Tanjug

Minister of Environment and Spatial Planning Oliver Dulic visited the steel plant U.S. Steel Serbia in Smederevo, and familiarized himself with the advantages of the new equipment for environmental protection, in which USD 60 mil was invested, i.e. 10 mil more than it was planned.

Minister of Environment and Spatial Planning Oliver Dulic visited the steel plant U.S. Steel Serbia in Smederevo, and familiarized himself with the advantages of the new equipment for environmental protection, in which USD 60 mil was invested, i.e. 10 mil more than it was planned.

After touring the plant, Dulic pointed out that this is a good example of how, with a lot of effort, investment and cooperation, the pollution of air, water and land could be reduced to be in the scope of the allowed limits.

The minister and the representatives of U.S. Steel Serbia discussed air monitoring, but also how to fix the existing equipment and set up new measure station.

Speaking of new investments, Dulic said that in the following period only new steel facilities made in accordance with the latest technology can be delivered to Serbia and not old, already used facilities from other countries.

He announced that U.S. Steel Serbia will “enter the process of obtaining integrated permission for steel facilities in 2011.”

Director General of U.S. Steel Serbia Matthew Perkins evaluated that one of the biggest ecological investments was installed into the steel plant, and pointed out that the equipment fulfills all the conditions envisaged by the agreement signed with the Ministry of Environment and Spatial Planning.

Retired generals detained in Turkey coup plot

[More retired generals fomenting revolution.  Sound familiar anyone?]

Turkish police Monday detained three retired generals as part of an investigation into an alleged military plot.

The leader of the Democratic Society Party (DTP), Ahmet Turk (C), addresses the media on December 12, 2009 in Ankara in front of party headquarters, flanked by DTP deputies Aysel Tugluk (R) and Emine Ayna (L). Turkey’s top court on December 11 banned the country’s main Kurdish party for alleged links to separatist rebels of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Turk and Tugluk were also stripped of their parliamentary seats as well as banned from politics for five years along with 35 other party members.

ANKARA, February 22, 2010 (AFP) – Turkish police Monday detained three retired generals as part of an investigation into an alleged military plot designed to help bring down the Islamist-rooted government, media reports said.

There was no immediate official confirmation of the four-star officers being taken into custody.

It coincided with rising tensions in Ankara between the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) — the moderate offshoot of a banned Islamist movement — and its secularist opponents.

Police detained the men — former air force chief Ibrahim Firtina, former navy chief Ozden Ornek and Ergin Saygun, the former First Army commander — at their homes in Ankara and Istanbul, CNN-Turk and NTV news channels said.

Several retired and active-duty officers were also taken into custody, the reports said.

The generals’ names were linked to a purported 2003 plot to discredit the AKP government which was published by the liberal Taraf daily in January.

The plan involved bombing two Istanbul mosques and escalating tensions with Greece by forcing Greek jets to down a Turkish plane over the Aegean Sea in a bid to show the government as inept, according to Taraf.

The Turkish army immediately denied the plot.

Firtina and Ornek had already testified to police in December over supposed links to the so-called Ergenekon network, an alleged secularist group accused of plotting to plunge the country into chaos and oust the AKP.

Dozens of suspects are already on trial as part of the investigation into the network, among them two retired generals accused of being ringleaders.

The Ergenekon investigation, which began in 2007, was initially hailed as a success in a country where the army has unseated four governments since 1960.

But it has since lost credibility as police started targeting journalists, academics and writers known as AKP critics, and some suspects accuse police of doctoring and fabricating evidence.

Government critics fear the coup allegations are orchestrated attempts by AKP supporters to cripple the army and remove a major obstacle to the party’s alleged secret agenda of transforming Turkey into an Islamic state.

God Bless America, 70% Share of Global Arms Sales! We did it!!

Global military and defence sector set to grow

by Jonathan Ratner

Fuelled by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, which led to the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, global military spending surged by 45% during the last decade to an all-time high of $1.46-trillion in 2008.

While the United States is the world’s military power at 41.5% of total expenditures and close to 70% control of the global market for arms exports, faster-growing economies and the proximity of many geopolitical hot spots has made the developing world the most rapid area of growth.

These trends, identified in an extensive report by National Bank Financial analysts Angelo Katsoras and Pierre Fournier suggest that global instability might make the military industry the ultimate defensive investment.

They recommend targeting military contractors with significant exposure to the developing world such as Lockheed Martin, as opposed to those with most of their business in the developed world.

The analysts also tell clients to look for companies that supply cutting-edge military products designed for unconventional warfare and terrorist threats. These include satellite imagery firms like DigitalGlobe, GeoEye, ITT and Ball Aerospace. Canada’s Com Dev International is indirectly related to this field as a supplier of communication satellite components.

Thirdly, the analysts suggest investors consider buying shares in names that provide military equipment and related services required by soldiers on the ground.

ITT, Mantech and Chemring Group produce devices that detect roadside bombs; L-3 Communications, Raytheon and General Dynamics make computer networks specializing in intelligence; L-3, American Science and Engineering, and Smiths Detection are some of the world’s leading suppliers of body and luggage scanners for airports; Rockwell Collins designs advanced navigation and communication systems.

Companies active in the unmanned aeriel vehicles sector include General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, L-3, Northrop, and Aerospace Industries and Elbit System – both from Israel. Raytheon and Integrated Defense Systems produce Partriot missile interceptors.

While rising government debt levels may force countries to rein in defence spending, the analysts cite China’s growing military clout and its desire to narrow the gap between America’s military advantages over it as a large source of increased spending.

“The more economically and militarily powerful China becomes, the more confident and aggressive it is in defending its national security interests against the United States,” they said. “China, once Russia’s largest customer, is slowly emerging as one of its biggest competitors.”

The analysts note that while most of China’s defence production is done by firms that are not publicly listed, Aviation Industry of China stands out as the country’s leading maker of both military and civilian aircraft.

Unlike Western countries, they point out that China does not shy away from selling to pariah nations such as Iran, Myanmar, Sudan, Zimbabwe and Venezuela. One of the geopolitical goals of selling weapons to some of these countries is to facilitate access to their natural resources.

With China beefing up its defence spending, this has raised concerns among its Asian neighbours who have increased their military expenditures in response.

At the same time, Russia has begun to re-arm following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989 and the devastating effect this had on its army.

India is also boosting its arms purchases and was the world’s tenth highest military spender in 2008, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. With $30-billion in defence spending that year, it registered a 44% increase since 1999.

China and India also happen to be competing for regional influence, despite the fact that trade between the two nations hit a record of $52-billion in 2008, National Bank noted.

The analysts highlighted Mahindra & Mahindra’s joint venture with BAE to eventually produce mine-resistant all terrain vehicles. They also mentioned Indian engineering and construction firm Larsen & Tourbro, which will build the shipyard for six submarines from Italy’s Fincantieri and France’s Thales, as well as state-controlled Hindustan Aeronautic, which is building fighter jets for the Indian military.

Then of course there is the Middle East, where countries spent $75.6-billion on the military in 2008. That represents an increase of 56% from 1998.

“A combination of revenue from oil sales, and increasing geopolitical regional tensions, means that defence spending looks set to accelerate at an even quicker pace over the next few years,” the analysts said.

Growing concerns about Iran have been a boon for U.S. arm sales, they note, with Middle Eastern countries accounting for more than half of U.S. arm exports between 2001 and 2008. However, the majority of the sales have come in the last few years.

South America has also gone shopping for arms, with some of the growth in defence outlays attributed to economics and the rise in commodity prices. Increasing tension between several South American countries is another driver, particularly with Venezuela and Columbia.

Brazil meanwhile, as the region’s most powerful country, needs to protect its vast natural resources and its border to prevent any spillover from conflicts elsewhere. Violent conflicts between indigenous groups, farmers and criminals must also be controlled.

In Brazil, Fiat Iveco is helping manufacture more than 2,000 armoured vehicles, while aviation company Embraer is active in the fighter aircraft market.

Meanwhile, National Bank notes that Western Europe has for the most part, defied the trend of increased defence spending. Between 1999 and 2008, its military spending only grew by 5%.

“This small increase in military spending results from a lack of serious military threats, a slow economy and an unwillingness to sacrifice social programs for increased defence spending,” the analysts wrote.

History has shown that one of the first things a nation does as it gets richer is to upgrade its defence forces. Combine that with increasing geopolitical tensions, the national security issues facing the United States and no shortage of hotspots around the world, and National Bank’s analysts think we’ll likely see a continued increase in military spending globally for the foreseeable future.

In fact, in the unlikely event of a major decline in U.S. defence spending, they anticipate rising expenditures in the developing world will more than make up the difference.

“While certainly not immune to downturns, the defence sector has historically been spared from major cuts when such periods have coincided with increased geopolitical tensions.”

Jonathan Ratner

Photos: An Iraqi soldier rides in a M1A1 Abrams tank during the celebration of Iraqi armed forces day in Baghdad January 6, 2010. (REUTERS/Saad Shalash), Paramilitary recruits take part in a training session at an army base in Shenyang, Liaoning province, March 5, 2008. (REUTERS/Stringer)

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/tradingdesk/archive/2010/02/11/military-and-defence-sector-set-to-grow.aspx#ixzz0gHT09P6L
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Probes overlook McChrystal’s role in costly Afghan battles | McClatchy

Probes overlook McChrystal’s role in costly Afghan battles

more about “Probes overlook McChrystal’s role in …“, posted with vodpod

McClatchy’s Jonathan S. Landay talks about the ambush of U.S. and Afghan troops he was embedded with on Tuesday, Sept. 8, 2009. For reporter, no doubt: ‘I’d use the rifle if I had to’

MORE ON THIS STORY

• Story | Slain medic’s parents blast Army missteps in deadly ambush
• Story | Officers blamed in Afghan ambush that killed 5 U.S. troops
• Story | Report: ‘No strategic value’ to Afghan outpost where 8 died
• Graphic | Map of Afghanistan locates Nuristan province
• Gallery | The battle for Barg-e Matal, Afghanistan
• PDF | Official report on Sept. 8, 2009, ambush of U.S. troops in the Ganjgal Valley
• PDF | After Action report on Combat Outpost Keating, Afghanistan

By Jonathan S. Landay | McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — Army Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, kept a remote U.S. base in the country manned last year at the local governor’s request despite warnings from his field commanders that it should be closed because it was vulnerable and had no tactical or strategic value.

McChrystal’s decision to maintain the outpost at Barg-e Matal prompted the top American commanders in eastern Afghanistan to delay plans to close a second remote U.S. outpost, Combat Outpost Keating, where insurgents killed eight U.S. troops in an assault Oct. 3, a McClatchy investigation has found.

Keeping Barg-e-Matal open also deprived a third isolated base of the officer who would have been its acting commander and left its command to lower-ranking officers whose “ineffective actions” led “directly” to the deaths of five American and eight Afghan soldiers in an ambush Sept. 8, according to a high-level military investigation.

In addition, an unidentified witness told the military investigators that the operations center that failed to provide effective artillery and air cover to the U.S. and Afghan force that was ambushed in the Ganjgal Valley was focused instead on Barg-e Matal.

However, the ambush inquiry and a similar high-level Army probe into the Oct. 3 deaths at COP Keating, the worst single American combat loss in 2009, don’t mention that McChrystal’s decision to keep Barg-e Matal open made the combat outpost and the Ganjgal operation more vulnerable.

Instead, the inquiries hit lower-ranking officers — including two field commanders who’d urged McChrystal for months to close Keating and Barg-e Matal — with administrative penalties.

The two officers, Col. Randy George and Lt. Col. Robert B. Brown, and other U.S. officials had warned repeatedly that the two outposts were worthless and too costly to defend, two American defense officials and a former NATO official told McClatchy.

Neither George nor Brown could be reached for comment.

A spokesman for McChrystal said the U.S. commander had ordered American troops to remain in Barg-e Matal to prevent it from falling to insurgents while a local militia was being trained there.

“The threat at that time was both significant and real,” Rear Adm. Gregory Smith wrote in an e-mail.

Nuristan Gov. Jamalluddin Badr pressured the United States publicly and privately to keep troops in Barg-e Matal to prevent the village from falling to the Taliban before Afghanistan’s Aug. 20 presidential election. The two U.S. defense officials said McChrystal’s decision to keep the outpost there open until the local militia was trained was intended to help Badr survive the political fallout had insurgents captured the village after an American withdrawal.

“Everyone knew why we were in Barg-e Matal,” one U.S. defense official said. “McChrystal . . . was not in favor of pulling out because of the political ramifications.”

The two American defense officials and the former NATO official said they wanted to discuss the matter because of what they considered flawed investigations that penalized the two field commanders but failed to hold McChrystal and other superior officers accountable. They requested anonymity to avoid retaliation.

They said that George, of the Army’s 4th Infantry Division, based at Fort Carson, Colo., had begun making plans to close Keating in January 2009, six months before his 4th Brigade Combat Team deployed to Afghanistan last June.

He briefed plans to close Keating and Barg-e Matal to McChrystal, other senior commanders and top Afghan officials at a July 17 meeting in Kabul, they said, and he and Brown briefed McChrystal again in early August at Brown’s headquarters at Forward Operating Base Bostick in Kunar province, they said.

“The Barg-e Matal operation made it impossible to close Keating,” the former NATO official said. George “had a whole schedule for coming down out of those COPs accordion-style.”

George, the American commander in four Afghan provinces that border Pakistan, has received a letter of admonishment; Brown, whose operational area included Keating and Barg-e Matal, has received an official reprimand.

The admonishment, which is a minor penalty, is unlikely to affect George’s career, but the official reprimand could end Brown’s career.

“They are screwing these two guys,” the first U.S. defense official said of the field commanders.

“They were looking for heads,” the second American defense official said. “It’s a travesty.”

Penalizing the pair is even more egregious, the U.S. defense officials and the former NATO official said, because their plans to close the outposts were consistent with McChrystal’s counterinsurgency strategy of moving American troops from remote areas to economically important population centers.

The fact that officers in the field are being punished while no mention has been made of the role that their superiors played signals that those on the front lines always will take the blame when things go wrong, the first U.S. defense official said.

“This will make the Army even more casualty-averse,” he said. “This is the worst message at the worst time for McChrystal to send.”

Army Lt. Gen. Guy Swan, who conducted the Keating investigation, didn’t return calls seeking comment on why his report, which found that manning Barg-e Matal delayed Keating’s closure for several months, didn’t hold McChrystal or any other general officer responsible for that decision.

Fewer than 70 American soldiers were deployed at Keating, which was in a deep valley and under frequent attack. It was closed after the Oct. 3 assault by an estimated 300 insurgents, some 150 of whom are thought to have been killed after U.S. airpower finally arrived.

“By mid-2009, there was no tactical or strategic value to holding the ground” and “the chain of command” decided to close Keating in “July-August 2009,” the report says. The withdrawal was “delayed when the assets required to backhaul base supplies were diverted to support intense brigade-level operations in Barg-e Matal.”

In addition, it says, drone aircraft and other intelligence-gathering “assets that could have given the soldiers at COP Keating better situational awareness for their operational environment were reprioritized to support Barg-e Matal as well as the search for a missing U.S. soldier in the south.”

“The delayed closing of COP Keating is important as it contributed to a mindset of imminent closure that served to impede improvements in force protection on the COP,” the report continues. “There were inadequate measures taken by the chain of command, resulting in an attractive target for enemy fighters.”

A U.S. Army spokesman in Afghanistan said he couldn’t discuss why Barg-e Matal’s impact on the ambush in Ganjgal wasn’t included in that investigation.

The report found that the commander of Forward Operating Base Joyce, which had operational control of the ambushed force of Afghan troops and border police and their American Marine and Army trainers, was away on leave, and his deputy was assigned to Barg-e Matal.

“The absence of senior leaders in the operations center with troops in contact . . . and their consequent lack of situational awareness and decisive action was a key failure,” the report says.

An unidentified officer said in a sworn statement on the incident that “during this same period, we were managing leave, and providing battalion command and control to the fight in Barg-e Matal. The fight in Barg-e Matal had an even greater need for a competent battle captain because they were constantly in contact (with the enemy), and the (sic) lethal fight far more complex at that time than anywhere else in our battlespace.”

The roughly 200 10th Mountain Division troops in Barg-e Matal were nearly a third of FOB Joyce’s combat power, creating a major strain on the contingent, which was spread across parts of Kunar and Nuristan provinces.

The area was so “expansive” that a quick reaction force that would have been dispatched to relieve the ambushed force in the Ganjgal Valley had been disbanded, the unidentified officer said in his sworn statement.

Smith, McChrystal’s spokesman, acknowledged that the top U.S. commander had ordered the makeshift base in Barg-e Matal held from July until mid-September to prevent insurgents from seizing the area while a local militia was being recruited and trained. Four American soldiers died during that operation.

“We responded to a request by the government of Afghanistan to support nascent security forces that had come under direct and sustained insurgent pressure and were jeopardizing governance and the people in the area,” he said.

The area was a “historical rat line” — or infiltration route — for the Hezb-i-Islami insurgent group and al Qaida, Smith added.

There also was a “political component to the decision,” Smith said, indicating that in one pillar of U.S. counterinsurgency strategy, McChrystal wanted to extend Afghan government authority to the district.

“The decision on the scale and tempo of support to Barg-e Matal was balanced against other competing operations,” said Smith, who added that the local militia in Barg-e Matal is “doing a pretty effective job, so the investment has paid dividends.”

Knowledgeable American officers and officials countered that the impoverished mountain backwater of 2,500 in Nuristan province has no strategic value, lacks any roads, is far from key population centers, traditionally has disdained the authority of the central government in Kabul and is historically hostile to outsiders, including other Afghans.

“It’s lunacy to deploy forces to a location simply because the unseasoned, politically driven host government so requests,” said a U.S. diplomat who spoke only on the condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak publicly. “Bear in mind that this operation in what is undoubtedly one of the most remote and difficult locations in all of Afghanistan occurred at the time of discussion about revising our strategy to concentrate our forces in areas of dense population and strategic importance.”

Barg-e Matal is deep in rugged mountains where insurgent snipers were so well dug in that American troops resorted to calling in jet fighters and attack helicopters to silence them, U.S. soldiers based there told a McClatchy reporter in September after he was denied permission to visit Barg-e Matal.

The troops, who originally were told that they’d be in Barg-e Matal for four days, said they were under constant attack.

The outpost of sandbags and concertina wire consisted of a girl’s school and wooden homes on one side of a river that bisects the village, and the local administration compound where Afghan troops and Latvian trainers were based on the other.

It could be supplied only by dangerous nighttime helicopter missions, and the nearly constant fire made the reconstruction projects on which American counterinsurgency strategy hinges all but impossible. Local officials distributed some U.S. aid to the few locals who remained there, but they hoarded most of it, the American troops said.

Two Afghan soldiers shot and wounded themselves in September so they could be evacuated, U.S. troops said.

For the Arms Industry, India Is a Hot Market

By JYOTI THOTTAM AND NILANJANA BHOWMICK / NEW DELHI Friday, Feb. 19, 2010

Scale models of helicopters are on display at Defexpo 2010 in New Delhi on Feb. 16, 2010

Gurinder Osan / AP

The Indian Defense Minister, A.K. Antony, called this week’s massive defense-industry trade show, Defexpo 2010, “an endeavor to showcase India’s capabilities in land and naval systems as well as its emergence as an attractive destination for investment in the defense sector.” His junior minister, M.M. Pallam Raju, was a little more blunt. He called the event, which attracted more than 600 companies from 35 countries, a “one-stop shop.” India is emerging as one of the most important defense markets in the world, with billions of dollars to spend, and the global defense industry is only too happy to help it do so.

The country’s marquee bid is an order for 126 fighter planes, worth $10 billion — the single biggest tender in the world in the past 15 years. Six companies’ jets are in the running: Boeing’s F/A-18 E/F Super Hornet, Dassault Aviation’s Rafale, Lockheed Martin’s F-16, Russia’s MiG-35, Saab’s JAS 39 Gripen and the Eurofighter Typhoon from EADS, a six-nation European consortium. All of them sent teams of delegates to Defexpo. They hovered around their booths, giving impromptu presentations over free cappuccino to bureaucrats, army officers and local journalists. The bid is already in its final stages — Indian air force pilots are testing the planes in the field — so it is unlikely that the PowerPoint slides at Defexpo will sway the decision. Still, says Marco Bonelli, spokesman for the Eurofighter Typhoon, “you have to be here.”

So it was with no small pride that EADS representatives pointed out that the Defense Minister came to their booth this week and tried out the Eurofighter Typhoon flight simulator. He sat in a replica of the cockpit, watching a head-up display projected onto a screen in front of him as a simulated landscape — in this case, the west of England, near Manchester — passed underneath. Wing Commander Anthony (Foxy) Gregory of the Royal Air Force was there to answer technical questions, and will head to Bangalore to work with Indian test pilots. “We see the Indian air force becoming a strategic partner in the region,” Gregory says.

What has really drawn defense companies to India, however, is the smaller-ticket market for internal security, especially after the Nov. 26, 2008, terrorism attacks in Mumbai. “We had to rethink our strategy after 26/11,” says Woolf Gross, corporate director of international programs for Northrop Grumman. “After our review, we decided to cater to India’s homeland security.” The company adapted one of its surveillance systems, for example, to identify suspicious vehicles at sea, the route that the Mumbai attackers are believed to have used. For the first time since the inaugural Defexpo in Delhi in 1999, Northrop Grumman has flown in representatives from all five of its units. “We are hoping for that one big sale in India,” he says.

The Indian government, too, has signaled the new importance of what it calls “low-intensity conflict,” like the multiagency security offensive aimed at defeating India’s armed Maoist insurgency, a movement that controls a wide stretch of territory in central India. The Defense Ministry’s research and development arm, which traditionally caters to the needs of the armed forces, displayed this year for the first time unmanned aerial vehicles and other weapons developed for counterinsurgency. “Technology is being dovetailed to suit low-intensity conflicts,” a top defense research official told TIME.

U.S. companies are following their lead. Taser, for example, is selling its controversial stun-guns, used by law-enforcement authorities to subdue people, to Indian state police forces as well as central security forces, which are conducting joint anti-Maoist operations. It has already signed contracts for Taser weapons with the police forces of two states — Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir — and expects India to become one of its “top 10, if not top 5,” export markets, says spokesman Yogesh Saini. “They’re not allowed for private security guards [in India], but we have had people asking about it.”

One question left unanswered at Defexpo 2010 was whether a country in which one-third of the adults are illiterate and 43% of children are malnourished should spend so much on weapons. India’s central government spent $4.5 billion on education in 2008 — about the same amount that it plans to spend on 197 new helicopters. A handful of protesters picketed outside the gates of the exhibition hall on opening day, but they drew little notice. India’s attention is firmly focused on what a defense-company representative called the “quality gap” between its weapons and those of its neighbors, Pakistan and China. The gaps at home will have to wait.

Pakistan backs India for UNSC seat

Monday, February 22, 2010  News Desk  UNITED NATIONS: India’s campaign to secure a non-permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council has received a major boost as 53 nations from the Asia region endorsed its candidature.  According to an official statement from India’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations, 19 countries, including Pakistan, ‘spoke in favour of the proposal to endorse New Delhi’s candidature for the two-tear term in the Security Council, starting from January 1, 2011.’ If India does secure the seat, it will be the first time in 19 years that it will occupy a seat in the council.  The UNSC has 15 members, including five permanent members and 10 non-permanent members, of which two are from Asia. Each member of the council has a vote, while only the five permanent members can veto a resolution.  India is currently running unopposed after the withdrawal of the Central Asian republic of Kazakhstan from the fray. Even if India goes to the election without an opponent, it will still need to secure two-thirds of the votes of the 192 member countries of the United Nations General Assembly that comprise the electoral college.

Pakistan and India Must End “Irregular Warfare” Against Each Other

[How do two hostile states find peaceful co-existence in the face of sixty years of hostility, in which both sides have turned to "irregular warefare" (terrorism) against each other, to continue fighting past the wall of nuclear parity?  You begin by renouncing irregular warfare as an acceptable tool of foreign policy.  Both sides are equally guilty, even though India insists that Pakistan should take the lion's share of the guilt.  Contrary to common misconceptions, the militant groups actively undermining each country are not "rogue" elements, beyond the control of the state organs which created them.  It is simply a matter of government pressure and reeling the militants in.  This must be done if ever there is to be peace on the sub-continent.]

India will talk, but Pakistan must curb ‘terror’: Pratibha

Indian President Pratibha Patil. — Reuters photo

We will talk, but Pakistan must curb ‘terror’: Indian president

We will talk, but Pakistan must curb ‘terror’: Indian president

NEW DELHI: India said Monday that any meaningful relationship with Pakistan required Islamabad to crack down on “terrorism” — as the rivals prepared for their first official talks since the Mumbai attacks.

In a speech to the opening session of parliament, President Pratibha Patil left the door open for improved relations between the neighbours, whose foreign secretaries are scheduled to meet on Thursday.

“India is ready to explore a meaningful relationship with Pakistan if Pakistan seriously addresses the threat of terrorism and takes effective steps to prevent terrorist activities against India,” said Patil.

The talks this week will be the first since India froze all dialogue in the wake of the November 2008 assault by gunmen on Mumbai that left 166 people dead.

India blamed the attack on Pakistan-based militants.

New Delhi and Islamabad announced the resumption of talks on February 12, with India insisting that they would focus on counter-terrorism issues.

A day later, a bomb blast ripped through a packed restaurant in the western Indian city of Pune, killing 15 people and leading some opposition politicians to call for the foreign secretaries’ meeting to be put off.

A previously unknown militant outfit, which said it had splintered from a larger Pakistan-based group, claimed responsibility for the attack in a telephone call last week to the Indian English-language newspaper The Hindu.

Pakistan Backs India for UNSC Seat

Monday, February 22, 2010 News Desk UNITED NATIONS: India’s campaign to secure a non-permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council has received a major boost as 53 nations from the Asia region endorsed its candidature. According to an official statement from India’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations, 19 countries, including Pakistan, ‘spoke in favour of the proposal to endorse New Delhi’s candidature for the two-tear term in the Security Council, starting from January 1, 2011.’ If India does secure the seat, it will be the first time in 19 years that it will occupy a seat in the council. The UNSC has 15 members, including five permanent members and 10 non-permanent members, of which two are from Asia. Each member of the council has a vote, while only the five permanent members can veto a resolution. India is currently running unopposed after the withdrawal of the Central Asian republic of Kazakhstan from the fray. Even if India goes to the election without an opponent, it will still need to secure two-thirds of the votes of the 192 member countries of the United Nations General Assembly that comprise the electoral college.

UNSUCCESSFUL ‘FAST BREEDER’ IS NO SOLUTION FOR LONG-TERM REACTOR WASTE DISPOSAL ISSUES

Posted by marin2008

Hopes that the “fast breeder”- a plutonium-fueled nuclear reactor designed to produce more fuel than it consumed — might serve as a major part of the long-term nuclear waste disposal solution are not merited by the dismal track record to date of such sodium-cooled reactors in France, India, Japan, the Soviet Union/Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States, according to a major new study from the International Panel on Fissile Materials (IPFM). Titled “Fast Breeder Reactor Programs: History and Status,” the IPFM report concludes: “The problems (with fast breeder reactors) … make it hard to dispute Admiral Hyman Rickover’s summation in 1956, based on his experience with a sodium-cooled reactor developed to power an early U.S. nuclear submarine, that such reactors are ‘expensive to build, complex to operate, susceptible to prolonged shutdown as a result of even minor malfunctions, and difficult and time-consuming to repair.’” Plagued by high costs, often multi-year downtime for repairs (including a 15-year reactor restart delay in Japan), multiple safety problems (among them often catastrophic sodium fires triggered simply by contact with oxygen), and unresolved proliferation risks, “fast breeder” reactors already have been the focus of more than $50 billion in development spending, including more than $10 billion each by the U.S., Japan and Russia. As the IPFM report notes: “Yet none of these efforts has produced a reactor that is anywhere near economically competitive with light-water reactors … After six decades and the expenditure of the equivalent of tens of billions of dollars, the promise of breeder reactors remains largely unfulfilled and efforts to commercialize them have been steadily cut back in most countries.” The new IPFM report is a timely and important addition to the understanding about reactor technology. Today, with increased attention being paid both to so-called “Generation IV” reactors, some of which are based on the fast reactor technology, and a new Obama Administration panel focusing on reprocessing and other waste issues, interest in some quarters has shifted back to fast reactors as a possible means by which to bypass concerns about the long-term storage of nuclear waste. Frank von Hippel, Ph.D., co-chair of the International Panel on Fissile Materials, and professor of Public and International Affairs, Woodrow Wilson School, Princeton University, said: “The breeder reactor dream is not dead but it has receded far into the future. In the 1970s, breeder advocates were predicting that the world would have thousands of breeder reactors operating by now. Today, they are predicting commercialization by approximately 2050. In the meantime, the world has to deal with the legacy of the dream; approximately 250 tons of separated weapon-usable plutonium and ongoing — although, in most cases struggling — reprocessing programs in France, India, Japan, Russia and the United Kingdom.” Mycle Schneider, Paris, international consultant on energy and nuclear policy, said: “France built with Superphenix, the only commercial-size plutonium fueled breeder reactor in nuclear history. After an endless series of very costly technical, legal and safety problems it was shut down in 1998 with one of the worst operating records in nuclear history.” Thomas B. Cochran, nuclear physicist and senior scientist in the Nuclear Program at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said: “Fast reactor development programs failed in the: 1) United States; 2) France; 3) United Kingdom; 4) Germany; 5) Japan; 6) Italy; 7) Soviet Union/Russia 8) U.S. Navy and 9) the Soviet Navy. The program in India is showing no signs of success and the program in China is only at a very early stage of development. Despite the fact that fast breeder development began in 1944, now some 65 year later, of the 438 operational nuclear power reactors worldwide, only one of these, the BN-600 in Russia, is a commercial-size fast reactor and it hardly qualifies as a successful breeder. The Soviet Union/Russia never closed the fuel cycle and has yet to fuel BN-600 with plutonium.” M.V. Ramana, Ph.D., visiting research scholar, Woodrow Wilson School and the Program in Science, Technology, and Environmental Policy, Princeton University, said: “Along with Russia, India is one of only two countries that are currently constructing commercial scale breeder reactors. Both the history of the program and the economic and safety features of the reactor suggest, however, that the program will not fulfill the promises with which it was begun and is being pursued. Breeder reactors have always underpinned the DAE’s claims about generating large quantities of cheap electricity necessary for development. Today, more than five decades after those plans were announced, that promise is yet to be fulfilled. As elsewhere, breeder reactors are likely to be unsafe and costly, and their contribution to overall electricity generation will be modest at best.” OTHER KEY FINDINGS The IPFM report also found: -- The rationale for breeder reactors is no longer sound. "The rationale for pursuing breeder reactors -- sometimes explicit and sometimes implicit -- was based on the following key assumptions: 1. Uranium is scarce and high-grade deposits would quickly become depleted if fission power were deployed on a large scale; 2. Breeder reactors would quickly become economically competitive with the light-water reactors that dominate nuclear power today; 3. Breeder reactors could be as safe and reliable as light-water reactors; and, 4. The proliferation risks posed by breeders and their 'closed' fuel cycle, in which plutonium would be recycled, could be managed. Each of these assumptions has proven to be wrong." more about “ROCKETDYNE Nuclear Fire-Santa Susanna “, posted with vodpod -- Significant safety issues are unresolved. "Sodium's major disadvantage is that it reacts violently with water and burns if exposed to air. The steam generators, in which molten-sodium and high-pressure water are separated by thin metal, have proved to be one of the most troublesome features of breeder reactors. Any leak results in a reaction that can rupture the tubes and lead to a major sodium-water fire. .... a large fraction of the liquid-sodium-cooled reactors that have been built have been shut down for long periods by sodium fires. Russia's BN-350 had a huge sodium fire. The follow-on BN-600 reactor was designed with its steam generators in separate bunkers to contain sodium-water fires and with an extra steam generator so a fire-damaged steam generator can be repaired while the reactor continues to operate using the extra steam generator. Between 1980 and 1997, the BN-600 had 27 sodium leaks, 14 of which resulted in sodium fires ... Leaks from pipes into the air have also resulted in serious fires. In 1995, Japan's prototype fast reactor, Monju, experienced a major sodium-air fire. Restart has been repeatedly delayed, and, as of the end of 2009, the reactor was still shut down. France's Rapsodie, Phenix and Superphenix breeder reactors and the UK's Dounreay Fast Reactor (DFR) and Prototype Fast Reactor (PFR) all suffered significant sodium leaks, some of which resulted in serious fires." -- Downtime makes the breeder reactor unreliable. "... a large fraction of sodium-cooled demonstration reactors have been shut down most of the time that they should have been generating electric power. A significant part of the problem has been the difficulty of maintaining and repairing the reactor hardware that is immersed in sodium. The requirement to keep air from coming into contact with sodium makes refueling and repairs inside the reactor vessel more complicated and lengthy than for water-cooled reactors. During repairs, the fuel has to be removed, the sodium drained and the entire system flushed carefully to remove residual sodium without causing an explosion. Such preparations can take months or years." -- Proliferation risks have not been addressed. "All reactors produce plutonium in their fuel but breeder reactors require plutonium recycle, the separation of plutonium from the ferociously radioactive fission products in the spent fuel. This makes the plutonium more accessible to would-be nuclear-weapon makers. Breeder reactors -- and separation of plutonium from the spent fuel of ordinary reactors to provide startup fuel for breeder reactors -- therefore create proliferation problems. This fact became dramatically clear in 1974, when India used the first plutonium separated for its breeder reactor program to make a 'peaceful nuclear explosion.' Breeders themselves have also been used to produce plutonium for weapons. France used its Phenix breeder reactor to make weapon-grade plutonium in its blanket. India, by refusing to place its breeder reactors under international safeguards as part of the U.S.-India nuclear deal, has raised concerns that it might do the same." -- Most breeder reactors are being shut down. "Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States have abandoned their breeder reactor development programs. Despite the arguments by France's nuclear conglomerate Areva, that fast-neutron reactors will ultimately fission all the plutonium building up in France's light-water reactor spent fuel, France's only operating fast-neutron reactor, Phenix, was disconnected from the grid in March 2009 and scheduled for permanent shutdown by the end of that year. The Superphenix, the world's first commercial-sized breeder reactor, was abandoned in 1998 and is being decommissioned. There is no follow-on breeder reactor planned in France for at least a decade." For the full text of the IPFM study, go to http://www.fissilematerials.org/ on the Web. ABOUT THE IPFM The International Panel on Fissile Materials (IPFM) was founded in January 2006. It is an independent group of arms-control and nonproliferation experts from 17 countries, including both nuclear weapon and non-nuclear weapon states. The mission of the IPFM is to analyze the technical basis for practical and achievable policy initiatives to secure, consolidate, and reduce stockpiles of highly enriched uranium and plutonium. These fissile materials are the key ingredients in nuclear weapons, and their control is critical to nuclear disarmament, halting the proliferation of nuclear weapons, and ensuring that terrorists do not acquire nuclear weapons. The IPFM is co-chaired by Professor R. Rajaraman of Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi and Professor Frank von Hippel of Princeton University. Its members include nuclear experts from Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Ireland, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, Pakistan, Russia, South Africa, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States. Princeton University’s Program on Science and Global Security provides administrative and research support for the IPFM. IPFM’s initial support is provided by a five-year grant to Princeton University from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation of Chicago.

Dumb Ass and Condi Look for War Opening for American Forces In Nigeria

L-R: US Ambassador to Nigeria, Robin Sanders , George Bush, Goodluck Jonathan, former US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ojo Maduekwe at the Villa in Abuja Yesterday .

Oil agenda and Bush’s visit

By Bassey Udo February 22, 2010

United States of America’s insistence on establishing a military high command for Africa called AFRICOM in the Gulf of Guinea is not for the love of the continent, but principally for the lust for its oil resources.

Over the years, the U.S. has significantly increased its oil imports from Africa, mainly through most of its companies operating in Nigeria, Angola, and to a lesser extent from Equatorial Guinea, Sao Tome and Sudan.

The expectation of an average American is that by 2015 about 25 percent of its oil imports would come from Africa, essentially from the Gulf of Guinea. Therefore, any threat to sustained oil exploration and production activities in the region is, invariably, a direct threat to America’s interest.

Maintaining stability in the centres of oil production in Africa has remained a prime concern to the US.

The threat from China With China also venturing outside for other sources of oil to support its quest for solutions to its energy needs, the competition has heightened the pressure on the U.S. to safeguard its existing oil interests.

Therefore the many visits to Africa by top American businessmen and leaders, including erstwhile American President, George W. Bush, may not be unconnected with the ever-tougher competition from China for the control of the continent’s oil resources.

Most of the major oil exploration and production companies in Nigeria are of American origin. These include ExxonMobil Corporation and Chevron Nigeria Limited, which are respectively the second and third largest upstream operators in a joint venture with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).

ExxonMobil, which currently accounts for almost 600,000 barrels of oil per day, also has Esso Exploration and Production of Nigeria (EEPN), which is the deep offshore production arm of the corporation, in charge of Erha oil field, Nigeria’s second largest deep water oil acreage.

Similarly, Chevron, which produces about 400,000 barrels per day, also has a deepwater subsidiary, Star Deepwater, which operates the Agbami offshore oil field reputed to be one of Nigeria’s biggest oil concessions in recent times.

The Niger Delta challenge Since the breakout of crisis in the Niger Delta in late 2005,

following the launching of attacks on oil installations by armed militant groups in the oil region, the operations of these companies, along with others, have been seriously curtailed.

For more than a decade, the crisis appears to have defied resolution, thus deeming the prospects of America and its allies’ access to the region’s ‘sweet crude’, which has been their main source of energy for their industries.

Nigeria, the world’s sixth leading oil and gas producers, produces an average of 2.3 million barrels of oil every day, with prospects of raising the capacity to about 4.5million in the near future.

A leading member of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), Nigeria is America’s fifth largest supplier.

The U.S. consumes between 18 million and 20 million barrels of oil per day. With a proven pool of about 60 billion barrels from the Gulf of Guinea, with prospects of more supplies from the deep water discoveries, oil is certainly on the front burner of Bush’s visit agenda.

Observers say Mr. Bush would attempt to use the visit to open diplomatic talks with Nigeria on the possibility of helping to restore peace in the crisis-torn region, particularly at a time when the Federal Government’s amnesty programme appears to have been stalled as a result of the unceremonious absence of the ailing President, Umaru Musa Yar’Adua.

The programme initiated to help disarm, rehabilitate, mobilise and integrate erstwhile armed militant group leaders in the Niger Delta for constructive development engagement, recorded some significant positive benefits within the short period it was introduced, with oil production climbing gradually back to it’s the level prior to its take off.

With the coming of the Acting President, Goodluck Jonathan, there appears to be a glimmer of hope for America to move in to find a way of forging new alliances to protect its oil supply interests.

There is no better personality who would fit the bill of the assignment than Mr. Bush, whose interest in oil business dates back to 1978, when he, following his father’s footsteps, set up series of limited liability partnerships, including Arbusto Energy, in Midland, Texas for the primary business of drilling for oil. He was to later change Arbusto’s name to Bush Exploration, after a merger deal into Spectrum 7 Energy Corporation in 1984.

The Bush-controlled oil business eventually ended up being folded into Harken Energy Corporation, a Dallas-based corporation.

An oil industry source who pleaded anonymity yesterday night told NEXT ‘‘ The visit of Mr. Bush although not official because he came for a media event, should not be lost on all. He is an investor in the oil sector and would not allow such an opportunity to pass without discussing some form of oil business with the Acting President.’’

Iran to build new uranium enrichment plants in mountains

File photo of a sample of enriched uranium in Mashhad, northeast of Tehran. Iran’s atomic chief said on Monday that Tehran is considering plans to build two new uranium enrichment sites in the next Iranian year which starts in March.

Iran said on Monday it is considering plans to start building two new uranium enrichment plants from March, with the sites concealed in the mountains to avert air strikes.

The announcement from Iran’s atomic chief Ali Akbar Salehi comes just days after the UN nuclear watchdog raised concerns that Tehran could be building a nuclear warhead.

“Inshallah (God willing), in the next Iranian year (starting in March) as ordered by the president (Mahmoud Ahmadinejad), we may start the construction of two new enrichment sites,” Salehi told ISNA news agency.

He said the enrichment capacities of the new sites would be similar to the existing facility in the central city of Natanz, where Tehran is refining uranium despite three sets of UN sanctions.

According to the latest UN nuclear watchdog report, Iran has installed in Natanz 8,610 centrifuges, the device which rotates at supersonic speed to enrich uranium.

Of these, 3,772 centrifuges are actively enriching uranium under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

File photo shows Iranian and foreign photographers taking pictures of machines using yellow cakes to produce uranium hexafluoride (UF6) at the Iranian Isfahan Uranium Conversion Facilities (UCF), south of Tehran. Iran said on Monday it is considering plans to start building two new uranium enrichment plants from March, with the sites concealed in the mountains to avert air strikes.

Iranian officials maintain Natanz has an annual capacity to produce about 30 tonnes of enriched uranium. According to IAEA, the Islamic republic currently has an estimated 2,065 kilogrammes (4,540 pounds) of low-enriched uranium.

Salehi said the new plants will be equipped with new generation centrifuges and the facilities would be hidden in mountains so as to protect them from “any attacks.”

Washington and its ally Israel have not ruled out military strikes against Iran’s nuclear sites in a bid to stop its gallopping atomic programme.

Iran is currently building its second uranium enrichment facility inside a mountain near the Shiite holy city of Qom, a development for which it was strongly rebuked by world powers in late 2009.

On December 5, Salehi said Iran needs 20 uranium enrichment plants to meet all its electricity needs for a growing population.

World powers suspect Iran is enriching uranium to make nuclear weapons, a charge Tehran denies.

Map showing the reported Qom and Natanz uranium enrichment facilities in Iran. Iranian officials maintain Natanz has an annual capacity to produce about 30 tonnes of enriched uranium. According to IAEA, the Islamic republic currently has an estimated 2,065 kilogrammes (4,540 pounds) of low-enriched uranium.

Enriched uranium can be used as fuel to power nuclear reactors or in very high refined form to produce the fissile core of an atom bom.

Salehi’s announcement is expected to raise tensions with Western powers, which have stepped up efforts to slap a fourth round of sanctions on the Islamic republic for defiantly pursuing its nuclear programme.

Iran is already at loggerheads with world powers for not accepting an IAEA-drafted deal which would supply it with nuclear fuel for a Tehran research reactor in return for the transfer of the bulk of its low-enriched uranium.

Tehran insists it wants a simultaneous exchange of the two materials, with the transfer taking place inside the country, a demand strongly opposed by world powers.

Tension between the two groups further rose after IAEA chief Yukiya Amano said on Thursday there were concerns Iran could be working on developing nuclear warheads.

“The information available to the agency … raises concerns about the possible existence in Iran of past or current undisclosed activities related to the development of a nuclear payload for a missile,” he said in a report to the agency’s board.

The Vienna-based IAEA has been investigating for a number of years intelligence reports which claim Iran is involved in weapons research.

These so-called “alleged studies” included uranium conversion, high explosives testing and the adaptation of a ballistic missile cone to carry a nuclear warhead.

Iranian officials have dismissed the latest IAEA report as “baseless.”

© 2010 AFP

Homeland Security Ramping-Up “Homegrown Terror” Angle

U.S. Concerned by Threat of Domestic Extremists

VOA News

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says authorities are becoming more concerned about American citizens or legal residents becoming involved in terrorist plots against the United States.

Speaking Sunday in Washington to a gathering of U.S. state governors, Napolitano said law enforcement officials do not have good methods for preventing people from becoming violent extremists.

In one recent case, five young Pakistani men who lived in the northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C., traveled to Pakistan where they allegedly attempted to join militant Islamist groups.

In a separate incident, an Afghan-born resident of the western state of Colorado was arrested last year and charged with conspiring to use weapons of mass destruction.

Officials at the meeting of U.S. governors endorsed outreach efforts by law enforcement agencies to Muslim communities.

Capturing Mullah Baradar: Afghan Experts Sound Off

21/02/2010

By Mohammed Al Shafey

London, Asharq Al-Awsat-An informed Afghan source familiar with the Afghan reconciliation issue has stated to Asharq Al Awsat that Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the second highest-ranking member of the Taliban Movement who was arrested in Pakistan last week, was a supporter of reconciliation and peace in Afghanistan both before and after the London conference that was held last month.

Speaking from Kabul, in a telephone interview with Asharq Al-Awsat, the source said that, even though Mullah Baradar belongs to the wing of Taliban Leader Mullah Omar and comes from the Pashtun (Bobalzi) Tribe in Urzajan, the same tribe of President Hamid Karzai, a disagreement happened between them in recent weeks because he encouraged negotiations and won over a number of field commanders in Helmand.

The source asserted that a “Pakistani deception” led to the arrest of Mullah Baradar in Karachi after Islamabad found out that the US authorities seek to exclude Pakistan from the Afghan reconciliation process. The source added that they [the Pakistanis] wanted to prove to the Americans and Afghans their decisive role in the Taliban issue.

The source noted that any commander who rebelled against the Pakistani intelligence in the past was arrested and handed over to the United States.

But the source said that Mullah Baradar was a charismatic and popular figure, especially to the Afghans, and that he worked out military strategies and helped rebuild the group to become a powerful fighting force after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, experts on Afghan affairs warned of expected reactions by the Afghan Taliban in Pakistani territories, and said that such reactions might add to the deteriorating security situation in the country.

They said that Taliban might step up their military operations in Afghanistan in the coming days to show that they are not affected by the arrest of Baradar.

It should be noted that the arrest of the military commander of the Afghan Taliban Movement in Pakistani territories validates US and Afghan claims that the movement’s command runs the battles inside Afghanistan from Pakistan. Washington said many times that the leader of the Taliban Movement, Mullah Omar, resides in the Pakistani City of Quetta.

It is Baradar who ran the Taliban’s day-to-day affairs from outside of Afghanistan. He secured supplies, planned military campaigns, and studied the latest US statements on plans to weaken his fighters and achieve stability in Afghanistan.

Elsewhere, Abdul Ghaffar Aziz, official in charge of foreign relations in the Pakistani Jamaat-i-Islami [Islamic Party], said in a telephone interview with Asharq Al-Awsat that some 1.5 million Afghan immigrants live in Pakistani cities, including the City of Karachi whose population is about 22 million.

He added: The Afghans speak the Pashtu and Urdu languages and can easily integrate into the society. They cannot be expelled because they are Muslim people who suffered from the afflictions of wars. They have been living in our country since the years of fighting against the Soviets.

He continued: Also, it is easy for the Taliban members to hide in most Pakistani cities because they integrate into the society. They cross the Afghan borders and come back.

He noted that the joint military operation that led to the arrest of the second man in the Taliban Movement also shows that the Pakistani intelligence services’ cooperation with the CIA has not ceased since the fall of the Taliban Movement at the end of 2001.

Speaking about a collapse in the security situation in the City of Karachi, Abdul Ghaffar Aziz said acts of killing are carried out every day in the city where security chaos prevails because members of the “United National Group”, led by Pakistani oppositionist Altaf Hussein who resides in Britain, are in control of the situation.

He spoke about the people’s endless overwhelming anger at US drones’ strikes in the tribal strip. He held the Pakistani Government responsible for these attacks because of what he termed the government’s stupid policies and the war that it has been waging on Taliban’s armed men.

Mullah Baradar, who was captured in a joint operation by US and Pakistani forces, is described as the greatest author of the Taliban strategies and as having played a leading role in the raids that were carried out in the Special Forces style. Also, he is described as a defender of suicide bombings.

Most likely, he is the man who encouraged the hardliners to confront one of the largest NATO operations in Afghanistan that is currently under way in the Helmand Province.

Berader, who was born in 1968, was the right-hand man of Mullah Omar. Mullah Omar named him Baradar “the brother”, and this title gave him influence and high standing in the Taliban circles

Airstrike Kills at Least 33 Civilians

Afghan Cabinet: Airstrike kills at least 33

By RAHIM FAIEZ and NOOR KHAN Associated Press Writers © 2010 The Associated Press

KABUL — The Afghan Cabinet says at least 33 civilians are dead as the result of NATO airstrike in southern Afghanistan — an incident that is inflaming already heightened sensitivities over noncombatant casualties in the war.

In a statement released on Monday, the Afghanistan Council of Ministers strongly condemned the airstrike, saying it was “unjustifiable.”

The Cabinet says initial reports indicate that NATO fired Sunday on a convoy of three vehicles killing at least 33 civilians, including four women and one child. The ministers say 12 others were injured while they were on their way to Kandahar.

NATO has confirmed that its planes fired on what it believed was a group of insurgents in southern Uruzgan province, but later discovered that women and children were hurt.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.

KABUL (AP) — A NATO airstrike in southern Afganistan killed at least 21 civilians, the Afghan Interior Ministry said Monday, in an incident that could inflame already heightened sensitivities over noncombatant casualties.

NATO forces confirmed in a statement that its planes fired Sunday on what it believed was a group of insurgents in southern Uruzgan province on their way to attack a joint NATO-Afghan patrol, but later discovered that women and children were hurt. The injured were transported to medical facilities.

The Afghan government and NATO have launched an investigation.

Interior Ministry spokesman Zemeri Bashary said the Sunday morning airstrike hit three minibuses traveling on a major road near Uruzgan’s border with central Day Kundi province. There were 42 people in the vehicles, all civilians, Bashary said.

The NATO statement did not say how many people died or whether all the occupants of the vehicles were civilians.

Afghan investigators on the ground have collected 21 bodies and two people are missing. Fourteen others were wounded, he said.

“We are extremely saddened by the tragic loss of innocent lives,” NATO commander Gen. Stanley McChrystal said in the statement. “I have made it clear to our forces that we are here to protect the Afghan people and inadvertently killing or injuring civilians undermines their trust and confidence in our mission. We will redouble our effort to regain that trust.”

McChrystal apologized to President Hamid Karzai for the incident on Sunday, NATO said.

On Saturday, Karzai had admonished NATO troops for not doing enough to protect civilian lives. During a speech to the opening session of the Afghan parliament, Karzai had called for extra caution on the part of NATO, which is currently conducting a massive offensive on the southern Taliban stronghold of Marjah in neighboring Helmand province.

“We need to reach the point where there are no civilian casualties,” Karzai had said. “Our effort and our criticism will continue until we reach that goal.”

NATO has gone to great lengths in recent months to reduce civilian casualties — primarily through reducing airstrikes and tightening rules of engagement — as part of a new strategy to focus on protecting the Afghan people to win their loyalty over from the Taliban.

This is the largest joint NATO-Afghan operation since the Taliban regime was ousted from power in 2001. It’s also the first major ground operation since President Barack Obama ordered 30,000 reinforcements to Afghanistan.

But mistakes have continued. In the ongoing offensive against Marjah, two NATO rockets killed 12 people in one home and others have gotten caught in the crossfire. At least 16 civilians have been killed so far during the offensive, NATO has said, though human rights groups claim the number is at least 19.

Last Thursday, an airstrike in northern Kunduz province missed targeted insurgents and killed seven policemen.

Gen. David Petraeus, who oversees the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, said on NBC’s “Meet The Press” that Marjah was the opening salvo in a campaign to turn back the Taliban that could last 12 to 18 months.

But the continued toll of civilian lives will only make it harder for NATO in its goal to win over the support of local Afghans against Taliban militants in the south.

The newly appointed civilian chief for Marjah arrived Monday to begin the task of restoring government authority after years of Taliban rule even though NATO troops are still battling insurgents in the area.

District leader Abdul Zahir Aryan will be flying into Marjah for the first time since the massive NATO offensive began Feb. 13. He plans to meet with community leaders and townspeople about security, health care and reconstruction, he said in a phone interview Sunday.

“The Marines have told us that the situation is better. It’s OK. It’s good,” Aryan said. “I’m not scared because it is my home. I have come to serve the people.”

___

Khan reported from Kandahar, Afghanistan. Associated Press writers Heidi Vogt and Tini Tran contributed to this report in Kabul.

Obama Indonesian Statue Taken Down For Disappointing Lack of Achievement

Obama statue to be moved to Indonesia school yard

A statue of Barack Obama that was torn down from a public park in Indonesia will be relocated to the US president’s former school in Jakarta, a school official said on Sunday.

Obama, who spent part of his childhood in Jakarta and is due to visit Indonesia in March, was initially welcomed by locals almost as a long-lost son but his appeal has waned in recent months.

A statue of the president as a 10-year-old boy was installed in central Jakarta’s Menteng Park in December 2009 but was recently removed by authorities after a campaign by locals, who argued that Obama has done little to deserve the tribute.

Akhmad Solikhin, deputy headmaster of Obama’s former primary school, State Elementary School 01 Menteng, said the statue was removed from Menteng Park on Feb 14 and would be installed on the school grounds on Sunday night or early next week.

“It is better if the statue can be placed here, so it will be an inspiration and motivation for students to reach their dreams, like Obama,” he told Reuters by phone.

“We will place it in the front yard.”

The mayor of central Jakarta, Sylviana Murni, told Reuters that council officials were helping facilitate the relocation of the statue.

ISI and AFGHAN TALIBAN: DISCARDING THE OLD and USHERING IN THE NEW

[SEE: Pakistan Vetoes American/Afghan Quest to Buy-Off Moderate Taliban]

ISI & AFGHAN TALIBAN: DISCARDING THE OLD & USHERING IN THE NEW

INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM MONITOR—PAPER NO. 621

By B.Raman

The well-publicised arrests by Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the supposed No.2 of the Afghan Taliban, and two other senior Taliban leaders Mullah Abdul Salam and Mullah Mohammad Mir have not had any impact on the morale of the Afghan Taliban fighters confronting the 15.000—strong US led NATO cum Afghan National Army troops, which launched an offensive on February 13,2010, to wrest control over the Marjah area of the southern Helmand province from the Afghan Taliban.

2. While it has been confirmed that Mulla Baradar was captured in Karachi on the basis of intelligence collected by the US agencies, it is not yet clear where the other Afghan Taliban leaders were captured. According to some reports, Mulla Salam was captured from Faislabad in Pakistani Punjab, while Mulla Mir was captured in Balochistan. Acording to some other reports , both were captured in the madrasa at Akora Khattak, near Peshawar, run by Maulana Samiul Haq, the Amir of one of the factions of the Jamiat-ul-Ulema Islam Pakistan.

There have been some other arrests of middle-level office-bearers of the Afghan Taliban in Karachi. These arrests have been projected by many American analysts, including Bruce Riedel, formerly of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), as a possible game-changer and indicator of a welcome Pakistani decision to co-operate sincerely with the US against the Afghan Taliban.

4. These projections have not been borne out by reports from well-informed police sources in Karachi, which describe these arrests as a manoeuvre by the ISI to discard the well-identified leaders of the Afghan Taliban and usher in a new leadership consisting of well-motivated and well-trained recruits of recent vintage, who have not yet come to the notice of the US agencies.

5. They say that the leaders arrested since January-end in Karachi and other parts of Pakistan no longer constituted the command and control of the Afghan Taliban and that is why their arrests have not yet had any impact on the operations of the Afghan Taliban on the ground—-either in the Helmand province or elsewhere. They say that the Taliban forces presently resisting the US-led offensive in the Helmand province are led by a new crop of leaders devoted to Mulla Mohammad Omar, the Amir of the Afghan Taliban, but capable of operating independently without the need for directions from a central command and control.

6. The Taliban forces in the Helmand province have been following the same tactics as the Taliban had followed in the past and as Al Qaeda had followed in Tora Bora. This tactics consists of the bulk of the forces withdrawing from the battle zone into Pakistan or dispersing to their native villages, while a smaller number stayed put in the battle zone to inflict casualties and equipment damage to the advancing US-led troops and make their “victory” pyrrhic.

7.Though it is now a week since the battle started, the advance made by the US-led forces has been expectedly slow. This is partly due to the large planting of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and landmines by the Taliban along the expected route of advance of the US-led troops and partly due to the resistance to the advance put up by the Taliban forces still in the battle zone.

8. During the first week of the fighting, 11 NATO troops and one Afghan soldier have been killed in the operation, according to the International Security Assistance Force. The Afghan authorities have claimed that at least 40 Taliban fighters were killed in and around Marjah.

9.The repeated allegations by the NATO forces that the Taliban has been using civilians as “human shields” in order to slow down the NATO advance speak of the difficulties faced by the NATO forces. Major-General Nick Carter, of the British Army, has been quoted as saying: “I guess it will take us another 25 to 30 days to be entirely sure that we have secured that which needs to be secured and we will probably won’t know for about 120 days whether or not the population is entirely convinced by the degree of commitment that their Government is showing to them. So I guess looking downstream, in three months time or thereabouts we should have a pretty fair idea of about whether we have been successful. “

10. In their media briefings, US spin-masters have been projecting the entire operation as carried out on the orders and under the political leadership of President Hamid Karzai, who is being projected as being in the driving seat of the operation. In a report carried on February 19,2010,the “Wall Street Journal” described how Gen.Stanley McChrystal , the US Commander, obtained the approval of President Hamid Karzai before launching the operation. It reported: “Gen. McChrystal said: “Mr. President, tonight is the night the operation needs to happen. I need your permission to go.” Mr. Karzai paused, remarked that it was first time anyone had ever asked him to make such a decision, and gave his assent.”

11.Mr.Karzai apparently did not suspect that the Americans wanted to show him as being in the driving seat so that they could blame him tomorrow if the operation failed. A victory in the operation will be Mr.Obama’s, but a defeat will be Mr.Karzai’s.

( The writer is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. of India, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com )

The Inevitable Cycle of Cuts and Protests Begins In Greece

more about “Much Of Greece Shut Down Due To Gener…“, posted with vodpod

Greek fuel supplies run dry as strike over harsh austerity measures bites

By MARGARET NEIGHBOUR

PETROL stations ran dry in Greece yesterday as a customs strike over government austerity measures began to bite.

Customs staff initially walked out for three days on Tuesday over salary freezes and cuts in bonuses.

But their union announced on Thursday three 48-hour rolling strikes that will keep customs offices shut until next Wednesday, when all worker

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s are being asked to join a general strike.

The customs walkout has hampered imports and exports, but the supply of fuel has been the most affected.

Many service stations in Athens had run out of all fuel, while those still open were rationing supplies with a £20 limit per customer. Traffic police were called to some outlets as cars queued for hundreds of yards.

Taxi drivers also held a 24-hour strike yesterday over sections of the austerity package that increased fuel tax and will force them to issue receipts.

Greek unions have been opposing the Socialist government’s harsh austerity measures, which were imposed in an effort to pull the country out of its worst debt crisis in decades – one that has seen its deficit swell to a massive 12.7 per cent of economic output.

European finance ministers warned Athens this week that it would have to impose even tougher budget cuts if its current measures do not manage to reduce the deficit to 8.7 per cent this year. Athens has until 16 March to report back to the EU on its progress.

Meanwhile, the Greek government said a complex debt deal with investment bank Goldman Sachs that has come under scrutiny by the European Union was above board and will be explained.

The EU’s top economy official, Olli Rehn, gave Greece until yesterday to supply answers on how it used transactions known as currency swaps and how that affected the country’s debt and deficit figures.

“There will be a response. There is a letter by the finance minister,” a government spokesman said, last night.

George Papaconstantinou’s letter “will analyse the compatibility of those acts with European Union regulations and (say] there is no problem, and that other countries have also carried out equivalent actions exactly because Eurostat accepted this until a certain time,” said the spokesman, referring to the European Union statistics agency.

Athens insists that it stopped using the practice when the Eurostat rules changed.

Mr Rehn said earlier this week that a “profound investigation” must be carried out, and that “if it turns out that there is such kind of securitisation of swaps that are not in line with the rules of the time, then of course we would need to take action”.

The EU can take Greece to court, under threat of daily fines, to change its statistics methods. It is already threatening legal action for Greece’s failure to report accurate public finance figures last year.

French finance minister Christine Lagarde said Eurostat was looking into “how a merchant bank, in this case Goldman Sachs, helped Greece structure, postpone a certain number of debt repayments.”

Asked whether the bank had broken rules, the minister said: “That is the question that we have to ask ourselves and to which we need the answer. And I don’t have that answer.”