The Anti-Empire Report–October 4th, 2011

by William Blum
www.killinghope.org

The crime of making Americans aware of their own history

Is history getting too close for comfort for the fragile little American heart and mind? Their schools and their favorite media have done an excellent job of keeping them ignorant of what their favorite country has done to the rest of the world, but lately some discomforting points of view have managed to find their way into this well-defended American consciousness.

First, Congressman Ron Paul during a presidential debate last month expressed the belief that those who carried out the September 11 attack were retaliating for the many abuses perpetrated against Arab countries by the United States over the years. The audience booed him, loudly.

Then, popular-song icon Tony Bennett, in a radio interview, said the United States caused the 9/11 attacks because of its actions in the Persian Gulf, adding that President George W. Bush had told him in 2005 that the Iraq war was a mistake. Bennett of course came under some nasty fire. FOX News (September 24), carefully choosing its comments charmingly as usual, used words like “insane”, “twisted mind”, and “absurdities”. Bennett felt obliged to post a statement on Facebook saying that his experience in World War II had taught him that “war is the lowest form of human behavior.” He said there’s no excuse for terrorism, and he added, “I’m sorry if my statements suggested anything other than an expression of love for my country.” (NBC September 21)

Then came the Islamic cleric, Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen, who for some time had been blaming US foreign policy in the Middle East as the cause of anti-American hatred and terrorist acts. So we killed him. Ron Paul and Tony Bennett can count themselves lucky.

What, then, is the basis of all this? What has the United States actually been doing in the Middle East in the recent past?

• the shooting down of two Libyan planes in 1981
• the bombing of Lebanon in 1983 and 1984
• the bombing of Libya in 1986
• the bombing and sinking of an Iranian ship in 1987
• the shooting down of an Iranian passenger plane in 1988
• the shooting down of two more Libyan planes in 1989
• the massive bombing of the Iraqi people in 1991
• the continuing bombings and draconian sanctions against Iraq for the next 12 years
• the bombing of Afghanistan and Sudan in 1998
• the habitual support of Israel despite the routine devastation and torture it inflicts upon the Palestinian people
• the habitual condemnation of Palestinian resistance to this
• the abduction of “suspected terrorists” from Muslim countries, such as Malaysia, Pakistan, Lebanon and Albania, who were then taken to places like Egypt and Saudi Arabia, where they were tortured
• the large military and hi-tech presence in Islam’s holiest land, Saudi Arabia, and elsewhere in the Persian Gulf region
• the support of numerous undemocratic, authoritarian Middle East governments from the Shah of Iran to Mubarak of Egypt to the Saudi royal family
• the invasion, bombing and occupation of Afghanistan, 2001 to the present, and Iraq, 2003 to the present
• the bombings and continuous firing of missiles to assassinate individuals in Somalia, Yemen, Pakistan, and Libya during the period of 2006-2011

It can’t be repeated or emphasized enough. The biggest lie of the “war on terrorism”, although weakening, is that the targets of America’s attacks have an irrational hatred of the United States and its way of life, based on religious and cultural misunderstandings and envy. The large body of evidence to the contrary includes a 2004 report from the Defense Science Board, “a Federal advisory committee established to provide independent advice to the Secretary of Defense.” The report states:

“Muslims do not hate our freedom, but rather they hate our policies. The overwhelming majority voice their objections to what they see as one-sided support in favor of Israel and against Palestinian rights, and the long-standing, even increasing, support for what Muslims collectively see as tyrannies, most notably Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Pakistan and the Gulf states. Thus, when American public diplomacy talks about bringing democracy to Islamic societies, this is seen as no more than self-serving hypocrisy.”

The report concludes: “No public relations campaign can save America from flawed policies.” (Christian Science Monitor, November 29, 2004)

The Pentagon released the study after the New York Times ran a story about it on November 24, 2004. The Timesreported that although the board’s report does not constitute official government policy, it captures “the essential themes of a debate that is now roiling not just the Defense Department but the entire United States government.”

“Homeland security is a rightwing concept fostered following 9/11 as the answer to the effects of 50 years of bad foreign policies in the middle east. The amount of homeland security we actually need is inversely related to how good our foreign policy is.” – Sam Smith, editor of The Progressive Review

The lies that will not die

In his September 22 address at the United Nations, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad mentioned the Nazi Holocaust just twice:

“Some European countries still use the Holocaust, after six decades, as the excuse to pay fines or ransom to the Zionists.”

“They threaten anyone who questions the Holocaust and the September 11 event with sanctions and military action.”

That was it.

By the term “questions the Holocaust” the Iranian president has made clear repeatedly over the years what he’s referring to. He has commented about the peculiarity and injustice of a tragedy which took place in Europe resulting in a state for the Jews in the Middle East instead of in Europe. Why are the Palestinians paying a price for a German crime? he asks. And he has questioned the figure of six million Jews killed by Nazi Germany, as have many historians and others of all political stripes who think the total was probably less. This has nothing to do with the Holocaust not taking place.

But, as usual, the Western media pretends that it doesn’t understand.

The New York Post (September 22) referred to the Iranian president as “the world’s foremost Holocaust denier, the would-be genocidist Ahmadinejad”.

Agence France Presse (September 22) stated: “The Iranian leader repeated comments casting doubt on the origins of the Holocaust.”

The Washington Post wrote of “Ahmadinejad’s speech suggesting larger conspiracies were behind the Holocaust and the Sept. 11 attacks caused delegates to walk out.” (September 23)

And Amy Goodman on Democracy Now! (September 23) included this amongst the radio program’s news headlines: “For the third straight year, Ahmadinejad sent delegates to the exits after questioning the Nazi Holocaust.”

Without further explanation of that incendiary term — and none was given — what can “questioning the Nazi Holocaust” mean or imply to most listeners other than that Ahmadinejad was questioning whether the Holocaust had actually taken place?

Once again I must point out that I have yet to read of Ahmadinejad ever saying simply, clearly, unambiguously, and unequivocally that he thinks that what we know as the Holocaust never happened. For the record, in a speech at Columbia University on September 24, 2007, in reply to a question about the Holocaust, the Iranian president declared: “I’m not saying that it didn’t happen at all. This is not the judgment that I’m passing here.”

Indeed, I do not know if any of the so-called “Holocaust-deniers” actually, ever, umm, y’know … deny the Holocaust. They question certain aspects of the Holocaust history that’s been handed down to us, but they don’t explicitly say that what we know as the Holocaust never took place. (Yes, I’m sure you can find at least one nut-case somewhere.)

Another enduring lie about Ahmadinejad is that he has called for violence against Israel: His 2005 remark re “wiping Israel off the map”, besides being a very questionable translation, has been seriously misinterpreted, as evidenced by the fact that the following year he declared: “The Zionist regime will be wiped out soon, the same way the Soviet Union was, and humanity will achieve freedom.” (Associated Press, December 12, 2006) Obviously, the man was not calling for any kind of violent attack upon Israel, for the dissolution of the Soviet Union took place peacefully.

Carl Oglesby

The president of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), 1965-66, died September 13, age 76. I remember him best for a speech of his I heard during the March on Washington, November 27, 1965, a speech passionately received by the tens of thousands crowding the National Mall:

The original commitment in Vietnam was made by President Truman, a mainstream liberal. It was seconded by President Eisenhower, a moderate liberal. It was intensified by the late President Kennedy, a flaming liberal. Think of the men who now engineer that war — those who study the maps, give the commands, push the buttons, and tally the dead: Bundy, McNamara, Rusk, Lodge, Goldberg, the President [Johnson] himself. They are not moral monsters. They are all honorable men. They are all liberals.

He insisted that America’s founding fathers would have been on his side. “Our dead revolutionaries would soon wonder why their country was fighting against what appeared to be a revolution.” He challenged those who called him anti-American: “I say, don’t blame me for that! Blame those who mouthed my liberal values and broke my American heart.”

We are dealing now with a colossus that does not want to be changed. It will not change itself. It will not cooperate with those who want to change it. Those allies of ours in the government — are they really our allies? If they are, then they don’t need advice, they need constituencies; they don’t need study groups, they need a movement. And if they are not [our allies], then all the more reason for building that movement with the most relentless conviction.

It saddens me to think that virtually nothing has changed for the better in US foreign policy since Carl Oglesby spoke on the Mall that day. America’s wars are ongoing, perpetual, eternal. And the current war monger in the White House is regarded by many as a liberal, for whatever that’s worth.

“We took space back quickly, expensively, with total panic and close to maximum brutality,” war correspondent Michael Herr recalled about the US military in Vietnam. “Our machine was devastating. And versatile. It could do everything but stop.”

Items of interest from a journal I’ve kept for 40 years, part V

• A Bush administration regulation on Sept. 30, 2004 said Americans cannot buy or smoke Cuban cigars even in countries where the cigars are legal, such as Canada, Mexico, Europe, indeed most of the world. The same goes for Havana Club rum and other Cuban products.
• April 26th, 2007 posting from the courageous but anonymous Iraqi woman who has, since August 2003, published the indispensable blog Baghdad Burning. Her family, she reported, was finally giving up and going into exile. In her final dispatch, she wrote: “There are moments when the injustice of having to leave your country simply because an imbecile got it into his head to invade it, is overwhelming. It is unfair that in order to survive and live normally, we have to leave our home and what remains of family and friends. … And to what?”
• “God appointed America to save the world in any way that suits America. God appointed Israel to be the nexus of America’s Middle Eastern policy and anyone who wants to mess with that idea is a) anti-Semitic, b) anti-American, c) with the enemy, and d) a terrorist.” — John LeCarre (London Times, January 15, 2003)
• Army Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq admonished his troops regarding the results of an Army survey that found that many U.S. military personnel there are willing to tolerate some torture of suspects and unwilling to report abuse by comrades. “This fight depends on securing the population, which must understand that we — not our enemies — occupy the moral high ground,” he wrote in an open letter dated May 10 and posted on a military Web site. (Washington Post, May 11, 2007)
• “To most of its citizens, America is exceptional, and it’s only natural that it should take exception to certain international standards.” — Michael Ignatieff, former Canadian politician and Washington Post columnist
• It is easy to understand an observation by one of Israel’s leading military historians, Martin van Creveld. After the U.S. invaded Iraq, knowing it to be defenseless, he noted, “Had the Iranians not tried to build nuclear weapons, they would be crazy.” — Noam Chomsky
• “It is easier for an American member of Congress to criticize an American president than to criticize an Israeli Prime Minister; it is easier for them to criticize an unjust and unwarranted US war than one launched by Israel.” — Jeffrey Blankfort
• Ken Livingston, Mayor of London, re: his visit to Cuba in 2006: “What really stood out for me was hearing first hand from people working in the medical services just how appalling the US blockade is. When you meet people who are treating eye disorders and blindness on a huge scale and they describe how difficult it is to get the equipment they need except through indirect routes because of the blockade you get a feel for the scale of the injustice that is being imposed on Cuba.” Livingston might have added that the “indirect routes”, even if available, are much more expensive.
• In 1965 when UN Secretary-General U Thant tried to open back-channel ties to the North Vietnamese, US Secretary of State Dean Rusk called him off by shouting: “Who do you think you are, a country?” (Washington Post BookWorld, January 7, 2007)
• George W. Bush: “Years from now when America looks out on a democratic Middle East, growing in freedom and prosperity, Americans will speak of the battles like Fallujah with the same awe and reverence that we now give to Guadalcanal and Iwo Jima” in World War II. (Associated Press, November 11, 2006)
• The National Endowment for Democracy was US Government initiated, and although ostensibly “independent,” has been continually funded by the US Congress, and its Board has included top level actors in the US Government’s foreign policy apparatus, including former Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and Madeleine Albright, former National Security Council Chair Zbigniew Brzezinski, and former World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz.
• CBS News, September 9, 2006: Senator Jay Rockefeller says the world would be better off today if the United States had never invaded Iraq. Does Rockefeller stand by his view, even if it means that Saddam Hussein could still be in power if the United States didn’t invade? “Yes. Yes.” says Rockefeller. “He wasn’t going to attack us.”
• William Appleman Williams, in his 2007 book “Empire as a way of life”: Analyzing US history from its revolutionary origins to the dawn of the Reagan era, Williams shows how America has always been addicted to empire in its foreign and domestic ideology. Detailing the imperial actions and beliefs of revered figures such as Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Franklin Delano Roosevelt, this book is the most in-depth historical study of the American obsession with empire, and is essential to understanding the origins of our current foreign and domestic undertakings.
• Compare Washington’s reaction in recent years to popular uprisings alleging electoral fraud in the Ukraine and Georgia to its reaction to the same in Mexico in 2006 when the rightwing Felipe Calderon was declared the winner in a very questionable manner.
• Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, in his talk at the United Nations, September 20, 2006, sharply criticized US president George W. Bush’s foreign policies and Bush himself. Britain’s Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett suggested that the Chávez comments were beyond the pale of diplomatic protocol at the UN. “Even the Democrats wouldn’t say that”. However, the Guardian reported that “Delegates and leaders from around the world streamed back into the chamber to hear Mr Chávez, and when he stepped down the vigorous applause lasted so long that it had to be curtailed by the chair.”
• Only the imperialist powers have the ability to enforce sanctions and are therefore always exempt from them.

–

William Blum is the author of:

• Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War 2
• Rogue State: A Guide to the World’s Only Superpower
• West-Bloc Dissident: A Cold War Memoir
• Freeing the World to Death: Essays on the American Empire

Portions of the books can be read, and signed copies purchased, at www.killinghope.org

The War In Balochistan–(Oct. 4, 2011)

Given below is a summary of the war in Balochistan, which the Pak. military is allegedly “not fighting”–

From the first report below, it seems the intelligence officials accompanying the troops carry a “five-page” list of names of people they are looking for (possibly a death list?), even going so far as to confiscate cell phones at check points, in order to look for phone numbers linked to the names.

Reports of a fresh military operation in Mand and Dasht region of Balochistan

Occupied Balochistan: According to a report aired on Radio Gwank Balochistan heavy contingents of Pakistan military and intelligence forces have started a fresh houses – to – house search in Mand and Dasht area. “From past three days there has been unprecedented increase in military activities in Dasht and surrounding areas”, reported a Radio Gwank local correspondent. He further said that backed by helicopters, a convoy of around 25 -30 military armoured vehicles and two Vigo Jeeps of intelligence officials arrived Gogord and Hapsi regions of Balochistan. They have been randomly picking people and interrogating them about a five-page-long list of names which they carry with them. According to the intelligence agencies personal these names are of supposed Sarmachars (Freedom Fighters) who they say are in the remote areas of Dasht and Mand mountains. Helicopters have been seen hovering over nearby mountains earlier on Tuesday morning. “They are brutally torturing innocent people who refused to cooperate with the military or simply say they have no information about the named person on the security forces’ list. There have also been reports of skirmish between the Baloch fighters and Pakistani security forces in the remote mountainous areas”, explained Radio Gwank reporter from an unknown location in Balochistan. The correspondent said that the security forces have been stopping people at check posts and their mobile phones have been confiscated for unknown reasons. Military is still pouring into the Gawader region and it is feared that they plan to intensify their atrocities in coastal regions of Balochistan.

BLA guns down three including an FC personal, three staff of foreign company taken hostage

Occupied Balochistan: A Pakistani security personnel and two employees of a foreign oil and gas company were killed as Baloch militants opened attacked on the place where employees were engaged in exploring oil and gas in Shahrag near Harnai on Wednesday. Five others sustained bullet wounds in the shooting incident, local residents said. Militant outfit Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) claimed responsibility, saying that it would continue to target all people, including engineers, involved in exploration of oil and gas in Balochistan. Merak Baloch, spokesman of the BLA, told newsmen on the telephone that the BLA had kidnapped three employees of an oil and gas company after the attack. “Nawaz, Noor and Delshad belonged to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and are in the custody of BLA,” he said. He further said that earlier fighters from his Organisation have carried out similar attack in Chamalang area where Pakistani security forces are engaged in looting Balochistan natural resources. “Despite several warning from our Organisation the foreign and Pakistani companies did not halt their work in Balochistan. Hence, leaving us with no other option but to attack them”, he explained. He warned the International Companies and investors to stop their works in Balochistan and do not further invest their wealth because Baloch freedom fighters will not allow anyone to loot and plunder Balochistan’s natural resources. Until and unless occupying Pakistan forces vacate Balochistan the attack against them will continue. According to Deputy Commissioner Khudai Nazar Barech, officials of BGP were busy in conducting a survey in Shahrag when armed men on the mountain-top opened indiscriminate fire on them, killing three persons, including an official Jameel Hussain and Ijaz Ali, a security official, and injuring five others. The dead and injured were taken to a government hospital for treatment, where one of the injured identified as Shabab Ali succumbed to his injuries. Personnel of the Frontier Corps escorting the company’s officials returned fire. The attackers fled from the scene. Official sources said three employees went missing after the attack. However, they did not confirm whether they were kidnapped by assailants. Law enforcement agencies are investigating the incident. Courtesy: DailyTawar & Dailytimes

Attack on Pakistani security forces convoy, 15 killed, over twenty wounded , BRA accept responsibility

Occupied Balochistan : Baloch Republican Army fighters attacked a convoy of occupying forces in “Dasht Goran” area of Dera Bugti on Wednesday. According to the details, pakistani occupying forces with the help of helicopters and other machinary started a massive operation in different parts of Balochistan including Mand, Dasht and adjacent areas of Dera Bugti “Zamurdan, Zahro and Harraank”. The convoy was proceeding toward the operation affected areas to assist the forces already engaged in the operation when it was attacked in “Peshbogi, Dasht Goran” on main road connecting Dera Bugti and Sui. BRA fighters detonated 2 remote controlled explosive devices and opened heavy firing with sophiscated weapons afterwards. As a result, 3 vehicles of the forces were completely destroyed, 15 personnel of the forces were killed and more than 20 were wounded. Baloch Republican Army fighters carried out the attack to weaken the massive operation of occupying forces going on in adjacent areas of Dera Bugti.

Three including two security forces personnel killed in Kalat, BLA accepts responsibility

Occupied Balochistan: Three people, including a police constable and personnel of Balochistan Levies, were killed and another sustained bullet injures in Kalat city, some 170 kilometres away from Balochistan’s capital, on Friday. According to details a police constable, Mohammad Ismail, informed media that four armed men ridding on two motorbikes opened fire at a shop in the main city of Kalat, town of Balochistan. Resultantly three people, including two brothers and a cousin were killed and a passer-by sustained bullet injures. Police personnel rushed to the spot soon after the incident. The deceased and injured were taken to the nearby state-run hospital for autopsy. The deceased brothers were identified as Balochistan levies force’s head constable Hafeezullah and police constable as Kaleemullah and their cousin Saifullah and injured as Abdul Hakeem. Meanwhile the Baloch Liberation Army has accepted responsibility for killing the two Pakistan security personnel. Mr Meerak Baloch, a spokesperson of the BLA informed News Agencies from an unknown location that Hafeez Sasoli and Kaleemullah Sasoli were collaborators of Pakistani intelligences and were helping them to abduct and kill innocent Baloch youth. The BLA spokesperson has also strongly condemned the brazen murder of advocated Salaam Baloch and his 8 year old daughter. He said those who killed an eight year old daughter of Balochistan have put their own families at risk because such attacks proved to Baloch Nation that they (state hired agents) do not deserve forgiveness. He vowed that BLA will not let innocent Baloch men and women’s blood go in vain and the collaborator will be punished severely. Attack on FC vehicle in Mand: In other incident an F C (frontier corps/Para-Military) was vehicle ambushed in Mand Bollu region of Balochistan. The Baloch Liberation Front’s (BLF) spokesman Mr Basham Baloch has accepted the responsibility for the attack and claimed that three FC personnel were killed several wounded. Mr .Basham said that the attacks on occupying forces will continue till the freedom of Balochistan. On the other hand, however, the FC spokesperson did not confirm that attack and there was no such news so far. Courtesy: Daily Balochistanexpress & Daily Tawar

Four Baloch youth abducted from Pasni, Operation continues in Dera Bugti & other region of Balochistan

Occupied Balochistan: Four Baloch youth including a Levis personal have been abducted by Pakistan security agencies from Pasni town of Balochistan. According to details around fifteen security forces personnel came in two official vehicles and abducted the four youth from near police check point in Jaddi area of Pasni town’s Ward number 7. Eye-witnesses said the men were abducted at gunpoint before the eyes of police. The police only resisted when the armed officials tried to abduct a Police ASI. The abducted men have been named as Hakeem S/O Pandok of Rekposht Pasni, Saddam S/O Munshi Akhtar of Ward number 5 Pasni, Yad Baloch of Pasni and Mohammd Ali Jamot a residence of Sindh. The cause of their abduction could not be known immediately, however, the eye-witnesses and police have confirmed that the abductors were driving official vehicles. Meanwhile sources from Dera Bugti reported that Pakistani security forces have been conducting raids and search operations in several areas of Sui and Dera Bugti. They said that on Friday houses were burnt down by the Pakistani armed forces in Zamuran and Nazd Sori regions. A report on Daily Tawar also claimed that several people have been arrested during these raids. It is pertinent to note that Pakistani security forces also carried out search operations in Shahrag, Degari, and Harnai areas of Balochistan. According the Baloch National Voice around 40 Marri Baloch were abducted during these operations. A Baloch Doctor, Wazir Khan Marri, was also abducted from a government hospital in Dergari on 29 September 2011.

China Unwilling To Back Pakistan In Standoff With America

[This may burst Pakistan's bubble and convince them that there is no escape route for them--China cannot be considered "strategic depth" as is Afghanistan.  It is time for Pakistan to join the civilized Nations and put an end to the roving bands of terrorists and terrorist supporters who have made some form of the terror war absolutely necessary.  "Islamist terrorism" is a very real phenomenon and it plagues much of the world, mostly the Muslim world. 

Americans once faced a similar situation in this country, when bands of hooded killers haunted our nights and terrorized our days.  The Ku Klux Klan was, at one time, the third largest political party in the United States, and they thrived on fear, driving this country towards a second civil war.  Making them a criminal organization, saved us from the fate we were being forced into.  Pakistan must turn its own tide and outlaw all forms of "Islamist terror."  Neither America, nor China can turn that tide for it.]

China to keep Pakistan embrace at arm’s length

Reuters

Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani talks with China’s Public Security Minister Meng Jianzhu during their meeting at the prime minister’s residence in Islamabad September 27, 2011.—Reuters

BEIJING: Pakistan, facing a crisis with the United States, has leaned closely to longtime partner China, offering its “all-weather friendship” with Beijing as an alternative to Washington.

But Pakistan will be disappointed if it hopes to replace American patronage with the same from China.

While China does not welcome the US presence near its border, it wants stability on its western flank and believes an abrupt withdrawal of Washington’s support for Pakistan could imperil that.

It also does not want to upset warming relations with India by getting mired in subcontinent security tension.

Maintaining that delicate balance, China will continue supporting economic cooperation with Pakistan but go slow on defence cooperation.

While outwardly all smiles and warm pledges of friendship, China will quietly keep things at arms length.

“I think they see what’s going on in the US-Pakistan front at the moment as reason to tread very carefully,” said Andrew Small, a researcher at the German Marshall Fund think-tank in Brussels who studies China-Pakistan ties and often visits both countries.

“They are taking extra care to make sure that what’s going on in the relationship is correctly understood, not reflecting any willingness to rush in or fill the gap or exploit differences.”

Pakistan’s brittle relationship with the United States, its major donor, has turned openly rancorous. Washington accused Pakistan’s powerful ISI spy agency of directly backing the Afghan Taliban-allied Haqqani network and of providing support for a September 13 attack on the US mission in Kabul.

Pakistan has angrily rejected the accusation and warned the United States that it risked losing an ally if it kept publicly criticizing them over militant groups.

Meanwhile, as it often does in times of crisis, Pakistan has been trumpeting its ties with China.

Pakistan’s Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani declared Beijing and Islamabad were “true friends and we count on each other” after talks with China’s visiting public security minister, Meng Jianzhu.

President Asif Ali Zardari stressed the point last week that Pakistan had other options should its deteriorating relationship with Washington prove beyond repair, and pointedly praised China for its assistance in “stabilizing the situation.” Publicly at least, China has gone out of its way to reassure Pakistan.

“Wary Of Offending India”

In May, just weeks after US forces killed Osama bin Laden on Pakistani soil, Premier Wen Jiabao reassured visiting Gilani of their longstanding friendship and spoke of the “huge sacrifices” Pakistan had made in the global struggle against terrorism.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman echoed that line just last week, saying “Pakistan is on the front lines in the fight against terrorism” and China hoped “the relevant countries respect every country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

But China’s assistance also has limits. “The ‘all-weather friendship’ doesn’t mean that all of Pakistan’s bills should be paid by us,” said Zhao Gancheng, director of South Asia studies at the Shanghai Institute for International Studies.

“China does not have that ability, nor does the US or any other country. It all depends on Pakistan itself.”

China regards Pakistan as an important strategic counterweight against its longstanding rival, India, and a hedge against US influence across the region.

It also wants to use Pakistan as a gateway to the Muslim world and needs Islamabad’s help to combat separatists in its far-western Xinjiang region on their common border.

China is a major supplier of military hardware to Pakistan and also a major investor in areas such as telecommunications, ports and infrastructure.

But China’s leaders have no desire to turn that limited stake in Pakistan into a heavy security footprint.

“The partnership is as deep as it needs to be for China,” Scott Harold, associate political scientist at the RAND Corporation, said. “They’ve got what they want diplomatically and economically.”

During Meng’s visit last week, Beijing bolstered its cooperation with Pakistan, with the signing of $250 million in economic and technical agreements, Zardari’s office said.

Many of Beijing’s deals with Pakistan have had a strategic payoff in helping to balance US influence in the region.

China invested more than $200 million to help build the deep-sea Gwadar port on Pakistan’s Arabian Sea coast, partly with a view to opening an energy and trade corridor from the Gulf, across Pakistan to western China.

China also helped Pakistan build its main nuclear power generation facility at Chashma in Punjab province. Two reactors are in operation and two more are planned.

Analysts say China pointedly agreed to expand the Chashma complex to counter a 2008 nuclear energy deal between India and the United States.

But Beijing appears much less interested in a bilateral defence accord, despite a report by Pakistan media that Islamabad had been secretly lobbying for such an agreement.

“I don’t think that’s the sort of space that the Chinese want to get into,” said Small of the German Marshall Fund. “I don’t see why they would suddenly want to be stuck with the liability of Pakistan, particularly vis-a-vis India, given the way Pakistan has behaved in a number of crisis situations.”

In each of Pakistan’s wars with India, China has been fairly restrained, to the point of being almost neutral.

Analysts say China is wary about tilting the relationship too much in favor of Pakistan, to avoid offending India, with which China wants to develop better economic ties.

Annual two-way trade with India was worth $65.2 billion in 2010, compared with bilateral trade with Pakistan of $8.7 billion, according to Chinese statistics.

Ultimately, Beijing has little to gain from a rift between Islamabad and Washington, experts say.

“If US-Pakistan relations deteriorate, and the region falls into instability, China will not be able to shoulder the responsibility by itself and other regional actors will have a difficult time cooperating to restore stability,” said Hu Shisheng, an expert on South Asia at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations think-tank.

“The US still has to be responsible for the stability of this region.”

Panetta Attempts To Alter Egyptians’ Normal Human Reaction To Zionist Aggression

[Since the overthrow of Mubarak, Egyptians have felt freed from the constraints of the Egyptian/Israeli accords.  Now, in response to Israel's many forms of aggressions, Egyptians feel free to react like human beings and to burn-down the symbols of surrender to Zionist aggression.  Egypt is no different from its other Arab neighbors (except for the puppet state Jordan), meaning that it has paid a price over the years for allowing the shitty little Zionist state to affect its daily activities, especially for serving as Israel's gatekeeper into southern Gaza.  Panetta cannot change any of this, or alter the natural reactions of normal human beings to it.   Egyptians and everyone living in Israel's neighborhood (as well as every decent human being) cannot help but to react in a negative manner to the daily bloody Zionist repression of the Palestinian people.] 

Pentagon chief in bid to defuse Egypt-Israel tensions

AFP

US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, left, talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Monday. – Photo by AP

TEL AVIV: US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta was headed to Cairo from Tel Aviv on Tuesday in an effort to defuse tensions between Egypt and Israel that have mounted since the end of Hosni Mubarak’s rule.

Before flying out after a one-day visit to Israel, Panetta said he will seek to encourage both sides to ease friction over the Sinai and will ask Egypt’s military rulers to release an alleged Israeli spy.

Ilan Grapel, a US-Israeli dual national, is accused of spying for Israel and has been in custody since June 12 but Israeli officials say it is all a mistake.

Speaking to reporters in Tel Aviv on Monday, Panetta said he hoped Grapel would be released but did not say whether the accused would be freed during his visit to Cairo as reported by some media.

“There’s really nothing I can say about the specifics of that,” Panetta said.

“We have made our concerns known to the Egyptians about holding that individual,” he said.

“We would hope that whether it happens with me, or whether it happens at some point in the future, that they do take steps to release that individual.” Grapel has been charged with being an agent of Israel’s Mossad intelligence service and of sowing sectarian strife in Egypt during the uprising which ousted longtime US ally Mubarak in February after three decades in power.

Egypt said on Saturday it was considering releasing Grapel.

Relations between Egypt and Israel, which have been bound by a peace treaty since 1979, have entered a turbulent period since Mubarak’s overthrow.

The end of the veteran strongman’s rule has coincided with uprisings across the Arab world that could give greater voice to popular anger over Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians.

Panetta expressed concern that Israel was “increasingly isolated” in the diplomatic arena and needed to work to shore up its relations in the region, particularly with Egypt and Turkey.

Speaking to reporters before his arrival in Tel Aviv on Monday, Panetta said Israel and Egypt needed to engage “directly” to defuse problems in the Sinai peninsula.

Israel has said an attack on its south in August was mounted from the Egyptian territory and has expressed concern that a “security vacuum” has developed there since Mubarak’s fall.

In Cairo, Panetta is also due to discuss Egypt’s plans for elections and a transition to a civilian-led government in talks with Egypt’s military ruler Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi and Prime Minister Essam Sharaf.

The Pentagon chief planned to reassure Cairo of Washington’s commitment to the two governments’ longstanding security ties.

He will also “encourage the transitional government to take the necessary and irreversible steps to clear the way for democracy,” said a senior defence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Panetta met Egyptian Foreign Minister Muhammed Amr last week in Washington.

After a day of meetings in Cairo, Panetta is due to fly to Brussels to meet Nato defence ministers who plan to discuss the allied air campaign in Libya and the war effort in Afghanistan.

Another Busload of Shia Gunned-Down By Motorcycle-Riding Assassins Outside Quetta

[Pakistan likes to claim that it is an "Islamic Nation," but the "Islam" that is spread from the madrassas there is a peculiar form of "Islam," one which has no room for fellow Muslims, following traditional Muslim teachings.  Shia, Sufis, Berelvis, Ahmadi, all of them are faithful Muslims, but they are branded as "Kfir" throughout the country, making them targets, treating them like prey, to be hunted down and killed by the armies of marauding Sunni Jihadists.   The   peculiar brand of "Islam" followed by these Wahhabi/Deobandi murderers, who roam freely throughout Pakistan, organizing themselves into jihadi armies (even though they are allegedly "outlawed" or "defunct"), lures in the uneducated and criminal types, who believe the distorted religious values taught by self-proclaimed "Maulvis and Maulanas," who motivate them to seek the honor of murdering "God's enemies." 

The worst of these armies of organized killers is the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, the monsters blamed for most of the recent mass-murders around Quetta.  Lashkar Jhangvi has provided the backbone of the dreaded band of murderers known as TTP.  

Membership in Lashkar-e-Jhangvi should be grounds for long-term imprisonment, if Pakistan had a real working government that at least tried to protect its own citizens, no matter what their religious affiliation.  It's primary leaders should be charged for all the Shia murders and sentenced to the same fate as the murderer of Salmaan Taseer.

Pakistan is doomed, by its own decisions, and by its own hands.  They don't need America to destroy their country...their leaders have every intention to destroy the Nation themselves.]

Sectarian attack: Gunmen kill 14 people in Quetta

By AFP / Express / Reuters

Members of Shia community protest sectarian killings. PHOTO: EXPRESS/FILE

QUETTA: Fourteen people belonging to the Shia community were killed while seven injured in a firing incident near the Western Bypass in Quetta on Tuesday morning.

About 20 people were on board a bus when unidentified gunmen appeared on a motorcycle and opened fire at the vehicle enroute to Hazara Ganji.

Conflicting media reports stated that the passengers were lined up and subsequently shot by the assailants.

Express 24/7 correspondent Mohammad Kazim reported that the passengers were on their way to the fruit and vegetable market when the assailants opened fire.

“The bus was carrying people mostly from the Hazara

community who were returning from Quetta,” senior police Hamid

Shakeel told Reuters.

“Four gunmen riding two motorcycles opened fire on a bus in the outskirts of Quetta,” local police official Hamid Shakeel told AFP.

“The death toll has risen to 14. Two of the injured who were in critical condition died in hospital. Now 13 Shiite Muslims and one Pashtun have been killed in the attack,” he said after initially putting the death toll at 10.

Meanwhile, police have cordoned off the area and initial investigations of the incident is underway.

Sectarian violence is on the rise in Quetta as 26 Shia pilgrims were killed in a firing incident last month in Mastung, about 30 kilometres southeast of Quetta, when a group of armed men attacked a passenger bus carrying Shia pilgrims from Quetta to Iran.

The Mastung attack was claimed by banned militant outfit Laskar-e-Jhangvi.

Protesting violence

Up to 400 furious Hazaras demonstrated outside the Bolan Medical Complex where the wounded were taken for treatment, condemning the government for inaction over sectarian groups, said police official Wahid Bakhsh.

Angry protesters also reportedly set ablaze the bus that was attacked by the assailants.

“These are not random killings but demonstrate the deliberate targeting of the Shia by armed groups,” said Amnesty’s Asia-Pacific director Sam Zarifi.

“These attacks prove that without an urgent and comprehensive government response, no place is safe for the Shia,” Zarifi added.

The rights group said it had recorded details of at least 15 attacks specifically targeting Shiites across Pakistan.

“Continued failure to address sectarian violence will only exacerbate the general breakdown in law and order in Pakistan,” it said.

Pakistan’s own independent rights watchdog said the killers had been emboldened by a persistent lack of action against sectarian militant groups, which have been implicated in thousands of deaths in past years.

Tuesday’s attack “exposes once again the diminishing writ of the state”, warned the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP).

Balochistan is also rife with militancy and a regional insurgency waged by separatists who rose up in 2004 demanding political autonomy and a greater share of profits from the region’s wealth of natural resources.

China warns of trade war if U.S. bill passes–Scapegoating Congress Playing With Fire

China warns of trade war if U.S. bill passes

By David Stanway and Aileen Wang

BEIJING

(Reuters) – An angry China warned Washington on Tuesday that passage of a bill aimed at forcing Beijing to let its currency rise could lead to a trade war between the world’s top two economies.

China’s central bank and the ministries of commerce and foreign affairs accused Washington of “politicising” currency issues and putting the global economy at risk after U.S. senators voted on Monday to start a week of debate on the bill.

The response suggested China sees a greater risk from the proposed bill than it has in the past when U.S. lawmakers attempted to put forward similar legislation to speed up the pace of appreciation in the yuan, or renminbi.

Beijing made similar remarks last year after the House of Representatives passed a currency bill that later failed to make any further progress in Congress.

Tuesday’s coordinated salvo and the central bank’s warning of a trade war and a slowdown in China’s exchange rate reforms indicated Beijing was taking the latest currency bill more seriously.

“It is very rare for three different ministries of the country to refute something so quickly and strongly, showing how deeply the Chinese government is concerned about the yuan bill,” said Wang Zihong, a researcher at the China Academy of Social Sciences, a top government think tank.

“The strong responses made by the Chinese government may also suggest that the possibility would be quite high this time that the United States will pass the final bill in the end and that Beijing is worried about the possible negative impact on China’s exports resulting from the legislation,” he said.

U.S. Senate vote opened a week of debate on the Currency Exchange Rate Oversight Reform Act of 2011, which would allow the U.S. government to slap countervailing duties on products from countries found to be subsidising their exports by undervaluing their currencies.

U.S. lawmakers, eyeing 2012 elections, said keeping China’s currency undervalued had cost American jobs and that a fairer exchange rate would help cut an annual trade gap Washington puts at more than $250 billion.

“By using the excuse of a so-called ‘currency imbalance’, this will escalate the exchange rate issue, adopting a protectionist measure that gravely violates WTO rules and seriously upsets Sino-U.S. trade and economic relations,” foreign ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu said in a statement posted on China’s official government website (www.gov.cn) on Tuesday.

“China expresses its adamant opposition to this.”

Ma urged U.S. legislators to “proceed from the broader picture of Sino-U.S. trade and economic cooperation” and “forsake protectionism.”

He repeated Beijing’s position that it will continue to gradually reform its currency policy, “strengthening the flexibility of the renminbi exchange rate.”

China’s exchange rate has long been a bone of contention between Beijing and Washington. The yuan has appreciated some 30 percent against the dollar since it was revalued in 2005, although critics say it is still valued too low and gives Chinese exporters an unfair advantage.

The emergence of China as the world’s fastest-growing major economy has led to often testy relations with the United States. The most recent tension was over U.S. plans for a $5.3 billion upgrade of the F-16 A/B fighter fleet of Taiwan, which Beijing considers to be a breakaway province.

CAN THE BILL PASS?

Monday’s vote bolsters prospects for the bill to clear the Democrat-run Senate later this week, but prospects for action in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives are murky.

If the bill did clear both chambers, it would present President Barack Obama with a tough decision on whether to sign the popular legislation into law and risk a trade war with Beijing, or veto it to pursue a more diplomatic approach.

“My colleagues, both Democrats and Republicans, agree that China’s deliberate actions to devalue its currency give its goods an unfair competitive advantage in the marketplace,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

China has routinely denied claims that its policies are responsible for trade imbalances and a high rate of unemployment in the United States, saying that structural problems were to blame.

“It is widely understood that the renminbi exchange rate is not the cause of China-U.S. trade imbalances,” Ma said.

China’s central bank said in a statement that the bill failed to address the underlying issues in the U.S. economy.

“The yuan bill passed by the U.S. senate will not solve its problems, such as insufficient savings, high trade deficit and high unemployment rate, but it may seriously affect the whole progress of China’s reform of its yuan exchange rate regime and may also lead to a trade war which we would not like to see.”

Ma said Beijing would continue “proactive” and “gradual” reform of the currency and the central bank added Chinese inflation had already pushed the real yuan exchange rate further “toward the equilibrium.”

Ministry of Commerce spokesman Shen Danyang said the United States was trying to pass on the blame for its own failings.

“Trying to turn domestic disputes onto another country is both unfair and in violation of standard international rules, and China expresses its concern,” he said in a statement issued on the ministry’s website.

The Senate move had to be viewed in the context of deepening economic and political uncertainties in the United States, as well as dwindling approval ratings ahead of next year’s elections, the state news agency Xinhua said in a commentary.

“U.S. politicians are using the pretext of creating jobs and playing the China currency card — the practice of diverting attention from domestic conflicts has almost become a political convention in recent years,” it said.

TRADE WAR

Shen said any move by the United States to force the yuan to appreciate would undermine joint efforts to revive global economic growth, which took another blow on Monday with data showing that global manufacturing shrank in September for the first time in over two years.

“It will weaken China-U.S. efforts to join hands and together promote global economic recovery,” he said. “The global economic is in a complex, sensitive and changeable period, and so even more needs a stable international monetary environment.”

U.S. critics of China’s currency policy have gained some traction as a weak economy keeps U.S. unemployment stuck above 9 percent and as 2012 presidential elections draw near.

Passage of the bill by the Democratic-controlled Senate would send it to the House, which is run by traditionally free-trade-friendly Republicans.

A China currency bill passed the House last year with 99 Republican votes, but lapsed because the Senate took no action. This year, the bill already has more than 200 House co-sponsors and this week supporters expect to reach 218, the number needed to pass it.

However, House Republican leaders have not shown a great appetite to pursue currency legislation, and it is unclear if the bill would ever face a vote in that chamber.

As with similar legislation in the past, the Obama administration has not taken a public stance on the bill, although White House spokesman Jay Carney said on Monday that the president shares “the goal it represents.”

The Senate decision was a sign that China was being made a scapegoat by struggling western economies, said Wang Jun, researcher at the China Center for International Economic Exchanges.

“Maybe the United States will not be the only and last country to do so. With the worsening of the European sovereign debt crisis, we must also be on high alert that euro zone countries could also press China on the exchange rate issue.

“We need to launch some pre-emptive measures to hit back against any more attacks,” Wang said.

(Additional reporting by Chris Buckley; Editing by Neil Fullick)

Is US Trying To Arm Japan with Nuclear Arsenal?

[SEE:  Was Fukushima Stuxnet Attack?]

Secret US-Israeli Nuke Transfers Led To Fukushima Blasts

By Yoichi Shimatsu
A Rense World Exclusive
Copyright 2001 – All Rights Reserved

Sixteen tons and what you get is a nuclear catastrophe. The explosions that rocked the Fukushima No.1 nuclear plant were more powerful than the combustion of hydrogen gas, as claimed by the Tokyo Electric Power Company. The actual cause of the blasts, according to intelligence sources in Washington, was nuclear fission of. warhead cores illegally taken from America’s sole nuclear-weapons assembly facility. Evaporation in the cooling pools used for spent fuel rods led to the detonation of stored weapons-grade plutonium and uranium.

The facts about clandestine American and Israeli support for Japan’s nuclear armament are being suppressed in the biggest official cover-up in recent history. The timeline of events indicates the theft from America’s strategic arsenal was authorized at the highest level under a three-way deal between the Bush-Cheney team, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Elhud Olmert’s government in Tel Aviv.

Tokyo’s Strangelove

In early 2007, Vice President Dick Cheney flew to Tokyo with his closest aides. Newspaper editorials noted the secrecy surrounding his visit – no press conferences, no handshakes with ordinary folks and, as diplomatic cables suggest, no briefing for U.S. Embassy staffers in Tokyo.

Cheney snubbed Defense Minister Fumio Kyuma, who was shut out of confidential talks. The pretext was his criticism of President George Bush for claiming Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. The more immediate concern was that the defense minister might disclose bilateral secrets to the Pentagon. The Joint Chiefs of Staff were sure to oppose White House approval of Japan’s nuclear program.

An unannounced reason for Cheney’s visit was to promote a quadrilateral alliance in the Asia-Pacific region. The four cornerstones – the US, Japan, Australia and India – were being called on to contain and confront China and its allies North Korea and Russia.. From a Japanese perspective, this grand alliance was flawed by asymmetry: The three adversaries were nuclear powers, while the U.S. was the only one in the Quad group.

To further his own nuclear ambitions, Abe was playing the Russian card. As mentioned in a U.S. Embassy cable (dated 9/22), the Yomiuri Shimbun gave top play to this challenge to the White House : “It was learned yesterday that the government and domestic utility companies have entered final talks with Russia in order to relegate uranium enrichment for use at nuclear power facilities to Atomprom, the state-owned nuclear monopoly.” If Washington refused to accept a nuclear-armed Japan, Tokyo would turn to Moscow.

Since the Liberal Democratic Party selected him as prime minister in September 2006, the hawkish Abe repeatedly called for Japan to move beyond the postwar formula of a strictly defensive posture and non-nuclear principles. Advocacy of a nuclear-armed Japan arose from his family tradition. His grandfather Nobusuke Kishi nurtured the wartime atomic bomb project and, as postwar prime minister, enacted the civilian nuclear program. His father Shintaro Abe, a former foreign minister, had played the Russian card in the 1980s, sponsoring the Russo-Japan College, run by the Aum Shinrikyo sect (a front for foreign intelligence), to recruit weapons scientists from a collapsing Soviet Union.

The chief obstacle to American acceptance of a nuclear-armed Japan was the Pentagon, where Pearl Harbor and Hiroshima remain as iconic symbols justifying American military supremacy.The only feasible channel for bilateral transfers then was through the civilian-run Department of Energy (DoE), which supervises the production of nuclear weapons.

Camp David Go-Ahead

The deal was sealed on Abe’s subsequent visit to Washington. Wary of the eavesdropping that led to Richard Nixon’s fall from grace, Bush preferred the privacy afforded at Camp David. There, in a rustic lodge on April 27, Bush and Abe huddled for 45 minutes. What transpired has never been revealed, not even in vague outline.

As his Russian card suggested, Abe was shopping for enriched uranium. At 99.9 percent purity, American-made uranium and plutonium is the world’s finest nuclear material. The lack of mineral contaminants means that it cannot be traced back to its origin. In contrast, material from Chinese and Russian labs can be identified by impurities introduced during the enrichment process.

Abe has wide knowledge of esoteric technologies. His first job in the early 1980s was as a manager at Kobe Steel. One of the researchers there was astrophysicist Hideo Murai, who adapted Soviet electromagnetic technology to “cold mold” steel. Murai later became chief scientist for the Aum Shinrikyo sect, which recruited Soviet weapons technicians under the program initiated by Abe’s father. After entering government service, Abe was posted to the U.S. branch of JETRO (Japan External Trade Organization). Its New York offices hosted computers used to crack databases at the Pentagon and major defense contractors to pilfer advanced technology. The hacker team was led by Tokyo University’s top gamer, who had been recruited into Aum.

After the Tokyo subway gassing in 1995, Abe distanced himself from his father’s Frankenstein cult with a publics-relations campaign. Fast forward a dozen years and Abe is at Camp David. After the successful talks with Bush, Abe flew to India to sell Cheney’s quadrilateral pact to a Delhi skeptical about a new Cold War. Presumably, Cheney fulfilled his end of the deal. Soon thereafter Hurricane Katrina struck, wiping away the Abe visit from the public memory.

The Texas Job

BWXT Pantex, America’s nuclear warhead facility, sprawls over 16,000 acres of the Texas Panhandle outside Amarillo. Run by the DoE and Babcock & Wilson, the site also serves as a storage facility for warheads past their expiration date. The 1989 shutdown of Rocky Flats, under community pressure in Colorado, forced the removal of those nuclear stockpiles to Pantex. Security clearances are required to enter since it is an obvious target for would-be nuclear thieves.

In June 2004, a server at the Albuquerque office of the National Nuclear Security System was hacked. Personal information and security-clearance data for 11 federal employees and 177 contractors at Pantex were lifted. NNSA did not inform Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman or his deputy Clay Sell until three months after the security breach, indicating investigators suspected an inside job.

While Bush and Abe met at Camp David, 500 unionized security guards at Pantex launched a 45-day strike. Scabs were hired, but many failed to pass the entry exam, according to the Inspector General’s office at DoE. The IG report cited witnesses who said: “BWXT officials gave passing grades to some replacement guards even though they actually flunked tests,” and “contractor officials gave correct answers to those that failed the tests.” Although the scene was nearly as comical as the heist in “Ocean’s Eleven”, Pantex is not some Vegas casino. At stake was nuclear Armageddon.

At an opportune moment during the two-month strike, trucks loaded with warhead cores rolled out of the gates. Some 16 metric tons of nuclear cores packed in caskets were hauled away in refrigerated containers to prevent fission. At the port of Houston, the dangerous cargo was loaded aboard vessels operated by an Israeli state-owned shipping line. The radioactive material was detected by port inspector Roland Carnaby, a private contractor working under the federal program to interdict weapons of mass destruction.

The intelligence community is still buzzing about his shooting death. On April 29, 2008, Houston police officers pursued Carnaby on a highway chase and gunned him down. His port monitoring contract was later awarded to the Israel-based security firm NICE (Neptune Intelligence Computer Engineering), owned by former Israeli Defense Force officers.

Throughout the Pantex caper, from the data theft to smuggling operation, Bush and Cheney’s point man for nuclear issues was DoE Deputy Director Clay Sell, a lawyer born in Amarillo and former aide to Panhandle district Congressman Mac Thornberry. Sell served on the Bush-Cheney transition team and became the top adviser to the President on nuclear issues. At DoE, Sell was directly in charge of the U.S. nuclear weapons complex, which includes 17 national laboratories and the Pantex plant. (Another alarm bell: Sell was also staff director for the Senate Energy subcommittee under the late Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska, who died in a 2010 plane crash.)

An Israeli Double-Cross

The nuclear shipments to Japan required a third-party cutout for plausible deniability by the White House. Israel acted less like an agent and more like a broker in demanding additional payment from Tokyo, according to intelligence sources. Adding injury to insult, the Israelis skimmed off the newer warhead cores for their own arsenal and delivered older ones. Since deteriorated cores require enrichment, the Japanese were furious and demanded a refund, which the Israelis refused. Tokyo had no recourse since by late 2008 principals Abe had resigned the previous autumn and Bush was a lame duck.

The Japanese nuclear developers, under the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, had no choice but to enrich the uranium cores at Fukushima No.1, a location remote enough to evade detection by nonproliferation inspectors. Hitachi and GE had developed a laser extraction process for plutonium, which requires vast amounts of electrical power. This meant one reactor had to make unscheduled runs, as was the case when the March earthquake struck.

Tokyo dealt a slap on the wrist to Tel Aviv by backing Palestinian rights at the UN. Not to be bullied, the Israeli secret service launched the Stuxnet virus against Japan’s nuclear facilities.

Firewalls kept Stuxnet at bay until the Tohoku earthquake. The seismic activity felled an electricity tower behind Reactor 6. The power cut disrupted the control system, momentarily taking down the firewall. As the computer came online again, Stuxnet infiltrated to shut down the back-up generators. During the 20-minute interval between quake and tsunami, the pumps and valves at Fukushima No.1 were immobilized, exposing the turbine rooms to flood damage.

The flow of coolant water into the storage pools ceased, quickening evaporation. Fission of the overheated cores led to blasts and mushroom-clouds. Residents in mountaintop Iitate village overlooking the seaside plant saw plumes of smoke and could “taste the metal” in their throats.

Guilty as Charged

The Tohoku earthquake and tsunami were powerful enough to damage
Fukushima No.1. The natural disaster, however, was vastly amplified by two external factors: release of the Stuxnet virus, which shut down control systems in the critical 20 minutes prior to the tsunami; and presence of weapons-grade nuclear materials that devastated the nuclear facility and contaminated the entire region.

Of the three parties involved, which bears the greatest guilt? All three are guilty of mass murder, injury and destruction of property on a regional scale, and as such are liable for criminal prosecution and damages under international law and in each respective jurisdiction.

The White House, specifically Bush, Cheney and their co-conspirators in the DoE, hold responsibility for ordering the illegal removal and shipment of warheads without safeguards.

The state of Israel is implicated in theft from U.S. strategic stockpiles, fraud and extortion against the Japanese government, and a computer attack against critical infrastructure with deadly consequences, tantamount to an act of war.

Prime Minister Abe and his Economy Ministry sourced weapons-grade nuclear material in violation of constitutional law and in reckless disregard of the risks of unregulated storage, enrichment and extraction. Had Abe not requested enriched uranium and plutonium in the first place, the other parties would not now be implicated. Japan, thus, bears the onus of the crime.

The International Criminal Court has sufficient grounds for taking up a case that involves the health of millions of people in Japan, Canada, the United States, Russia, the Koreas, Mongolia, China and possibly the entire Northern Hemisphere. The Fukushima disaster is more than an human-rights charge against a petty dictator, it is a crime against humanity on par with the indictments at the Nuremberg and Tokyo tribunals. Failure to prosecute is complicity.

If there is a silver lining to every dark cloud, it’s that the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami saved the world from even greater folly by halting the drive to World War III.