Summary here and here.

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Post-Rummy, reality coalesces, front and center.

An elite team of officers advising the US commander, General David Petraeus, in Baghdad has concluded that they have six months to win the war in Iraq - or face a Vietnam-style collapse in political and public support that could force the military into a hasty retreat.

[snip]

…the team, known as the “Baghdad brains trust” and ensconced in the heavily fortified Green Zone, is struggling to overcome a range of entrenched problems in what has become a race against time, according to a former senior administration official familiar with their deliberations.

“They know they are operating under a clock. They know they are going to hear a lot more talk in Washington about ‘Plan B’ by the autumn - meaning withdrawal. They know the next six-month period is their opportunity. And they say it’s getting harder every day,” he said.

[snip]

“The scene is very tense,” the former official said. “They are working round the clock. Endless cups of tea with the Iraqis. But they’re still trying to figure out what’s the plan. The president is expecting progress. But they’re thinking, what does he mean? The plan is changing every minute, as all plans do.”

[snip]

According to a British source, plans are in hand for the possible southwards deployment of 6,000 US troops to compensate for Britain’s phased withdrawal and any upsurge in unrest. Article

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Four years ago the woebegone G. Walker administration painted Iraqis as devious masters of every weapon imaginable. Today, that same woebegone administration paints them as boobs who couldn’t screw in a light bulb without a how-to manual being read to them. Self-banishment from the reality-based community has, rightfully, left the woebegone administration aflounder, ripe for a check on their hubris, their mendacity, their power and their exercise thereof.

While it’s difficult to know which armed group planted a bomb, analysts say the casualty numbers show that U.S. officials are exaggerating the importance of EFPs, which military officials say have been used only by Shiites.

“There were relatively few American deaths from explosively formed penetrators until recently, but you can say the same thing about attacks on helicopters or chlorine attacks,” said Loren Thompson, a defense analyst with the Lexington Institute, a policy research group in Arlington, Va. “The fact of the matter is that the insurgents, both Sunni and Shiite, are becoming a lot more sophisticated in their tactics. Explosively formed penetrators are only one part of that, and they are not a particularly important part.”

[snip]

Explosively formed penetrators are also known as shaped charges. The warheads were developed after World War I to penetrate tanks and other armored vehicles. Rocket-propelled grenades and antitank missiles are conventional examples. Shaped charges also are used in the oil and gas industry.

John Pike, the executive director of GlobalSecurity.org, an online clearinghouse for military, intelligence and homeland-security information, said that while designing a shaped charge would require expertise, fabricating the devices was simpler, requiring only skill in using metal-machining tools.

“These are not factory-produced munitions,” he said.

Asked who’d have the expertise to manufacture a shaped charge, Pike cited “people who had worked with explosives in the petroleum industry.” In Iraq, he said, “there would be a fair number of those.” Article

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Evolution of folly, and the (il)logical next step for the wobegone G. Walker administration: Shorting of body armor, equipped vehicles, and even basic weapons continues, so why not just skip training altogether for newly deploying troops? Can you say “fodder?” We knew that you could.

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Though this piece is addressed to the U.K., it is no less applicable to the U.S.

This was always a needless, immoral war. Yet still they won’t admit it.

[snip]

When I write about this now I feel like a pub bore. “Have I said this before? Or maybe you knew that already.” But of course I’ve said it, as many others have, and of course you know. We know that we were taken into a needless, foolish, illegal, immoral and ultimately catastrophic war.

[snip]

…We know that claims about “WMD” were not some unhappy accident, but a necessity forced upon Blair after he had persuaded himself that he must at all costs support George Bush, right or wrong. We know that the case for war was not made in good faith.

The only people who appear not to know this are our rulers. They cannot acknowledge it, and are obliged to stick to a false account of events. It’s anyone’s guess how long it will be before Iraq recovers from the last four years. Another question is how long it will be before political life in this country recovers from the damage inflicted on it. Article

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So how’s that progress going?

The last major British charity working in Iraq pulled out of the country…because the security situation has made it impossible to protect staff. Article

Shorter version: Quagmire. And a forseeable quagmire.

One determinedly non-Hobbesian view:

The insurgents now control at least 20 districts in the Kandahar, Helmand, Uruzgan provinces where Nato troops have replaced US soldiers. And it is hardly a secret that many officials in these zones are closet supporters of the guerrilla fighters. The situation is out of control. At the beginning of this war Mrs Bush and Mrs Blair appeared on numerous TV and radio shows claiming that the aim of the war was to liberate Afghan women. Try repeating that today and the women will spit in your face.

Who is responsible for this disaster? Why is the country still subjugated? What are Washington’s strategic goals in the region? What is the function of Nato? And how long can any country remain occupied against the will of a majority of its people?

Few tears were shed in Afghanistan and elsewhere when the Taliban fell, the hopes aroused by western demagogy did not last too long. It soon became clear that the new transplanted elite would cream off a bulk of the foreign aid and create its own criminal networks of graft and patronage. The people suffered.

A mud cottage with a thatched roof to house a family of homeless refugees costs fewer than $5,000. How many have been built? Hardly any. There are reports each year of hundreds of shelterless Afghans freezing to death each winter.

[snip]

Might Afghanistan been made more secure by a limited Marshall-Plan style intervention? It is, of course, possible that the construction of free schools and hospitals, subsidised homes for the poor and the rebuilding of the social infrastructure that was destroyed after the withdrawal of Soviet troops in 1989 could have stabilised the country. It would also have needed state help to agriculture and cottage industries to reduce the dependence on poppy farming - 90% of the world’s opium production is based in Afghanistan. UN estimates suggest that heroin accounts for 52% of the impoverished country’s gross domestic product and the opium sector of agriculture continues to grow apace. All this would have required a strong state and a different world order. Only a slightly crazed utopian could have expected Nato countries, busy privatising and deregulating their own countries, to embark on enlightened social experiments abroad.

And so elite corruption grew like an untreated tumour. Western funds designed to aid some reconstruction were siphoned off to build fancy homes for their native enforcers. In year two of the occupation there was a gigantic housing scandal. Cabinet ministers awarded themselves and favoured cronies prime real estate in Kabul where land prices reached a high point after the occupation since the occupiers and their camp followers had to live in the style to which they had become accustomed. Karzai’s colleagues built their large villas, protected by Nato troops and in full view of the poor.

Add to this that Karzai’s younger brother, Ahmad Wali Karzai, has become one of the largest drug barons in the country. At a recent meeting with Pakistan’s president, when Karzai was bleating on about Pakistan’s inability to stop cross-border smuggling, General Musharraf suggested that perhaps Karzai should set an example by bringing his sibling under control.

While economic conditions failed to improve, Nato military strikes often targeted innocent civilians leading to violent anti-American protests in the Afghan capital last year. What was initially viewed by some locals as a necessary police action against al-Qaida following the 9/11 attacks is now perceived by a growing majority in the entire region as a fully-fledged imperial occupation.…

[snip]

Washington’s strategic aims in Afghanistan appear to be non-existent unless they need the conflict to discipline European allies who betrayed them on Iraq. True, the al-Qaida leaders are still at large, but their capture will be the result of effective police work, not war and occupation. What will be the result of a Nato withdrawal? Here Iran, Pakistan and the central Asian states will be vital in guaranteeing a confederal constitution that respects ethnic and religious diversity. The Nato occupation has not made this task easy. Its failure has revived the Taliban and increasingly the Pashtuns are uniting behind it.

The lesson here, as in Iraq, is a basic one. It is much better for regime-change to come from below even if this means a long wait as in South Africa, Indonesia or Chile. Occupations disrupt the possibilities of organic change and create a much bigger mess than existed before. Afghanistan is but one example. Article

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Single-sourced, but noted FYI:

Some days ago I got an email containing information about police raids in Kabul restaurants. As a result many of Chinese “restaurants” (actually, bordellos) and Samarkand bar – popular dancing place among young internationals – were closed down. Nine internationals were arrested. There are rumours about new law waiting for approval in parliament. After its acceptance police can arrest any international who seems to be drunk. Article

Two pieces on the ratcheting of rhetoric and tensions vis-a-vis the U.S. and Iran – one presuming the die has been cast but is still protractedly tumbling, the other flatly denying that the die exists at all.

It’s not special rights, it’s universal rights. The two newest justices, Roberts and Alito, swore an oath to the Constitution. One can but hope that that includes not being able to stomach the creation and sanctioning of an unfettered, slanted and truncated ‘judicial’ system as a slapdash and poor substiute to the one that has prevailed for over 200 years.

Two foreign prisoners at the United States “war on terror” detention camp at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have asked the US Supreme Court to rule on their legal rights under the US Constitution.

Salim Ahmed Hamdan of Yemen and Omar Khadr of Canada have asked the nation’s highest court to decide their status, according to a court document filed late on Tuesday and obtained on Wednesday.

[snip]

“As the war on terror enters its sixth year, this court’s guidance is needed on whether the judiciary can be summarily removed from its traditional role in safeguarding liberty and preserving the balance of power,” said the prisoners’ petition filed with the Supreme Court.

The nine-justice Supreme Court twice has ruled in favour of Guantanamo detainees, finding in 2004 and 2006 they could use the US court system, but each time with only a single-vote majority. Article

Related, and “ridiculous” is a more than apt description of the plan to substitute the trappings of justice for its legitimacy (and that of its purveyors).

Defense Secretary Robert Gates downsized a planned compound for war-crimes trials, telling Congress he thought the initial Pentagon plan for a $100 million facility was “ridiculous.” Article

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The whole worlds is watching to learn whether the U.S. walks the walk or merely talks the talk.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour on Wednesday expressed grave concern that the US continues to illegally detain prisoners in Guantanamo detention centres.

“I am very concerned that we continue to see detention without trial and with, in my opinion, insufficient judicial supervision,” Arbour told a press conference here.”

[snip]

She expressed “hope that we will see the American Judicial system rise to its long-standing reputation as a guardian of fundamental human rights and civil liberties and provide the protection to all that are under the authority, control and jurisdiction of the US”. Article

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Hats off to you, Mr. Ramieri.

…in what way is our treatment of these human beings better or different from any other despotic regime throughout history including those we currently label as “Islamofascist” or repressive?

I fear we are no better and have lost the moral high ground both with this unbelievable corruption of constitutional tenets and our unwarranted and unjustified invasion of Iraq.

No need to look elsewhere to see a government’s abuse of power and flaunting of the rule of law. You simply need to look right where you are standing. Article

Because denying those at the bottom of the pyramid the dignity of access to the options and benefits available to other workers is the hallmark of the woebegone, elitist G. Walker administration.

More:

President Bush will veto the proposed Sept. 11 reform bill if it is passed with language granting collective bargaining rights to airport passenger and baggage screeners employed by the Transportation Security Administration, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told GOP senators Tuesday.

Chertoff’s comments, at a private luncheon, were reported to United Press International by Sen. James DeMint, R-S.C., and confirmed by the Department of Homeland Security and a senior administration official authorized to speak to the media.

Chertoff “did make very clear that if the (Sept. 11) bill goes to the White House with the current provision related to TSA personnel authorities, his recommendation, and that of other senior administration officials, would be to veto it,” department Spokesman Russ Knocke [said]. Article

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Shorter version: a government of posturing, warmongering, disdainful, self-righteous cretins.

…weep for the demise of American diplomacy and the simultaneous demise of any threadbare pretense that the Bush administration give a fig for anything or anyone but itself. Article

Highly related:

Thirty eight people believed to have been held in secret CIA prisons - or black sites - are missing, according to a report by a US human rights group. Article

No tribunals, no secret courts, no short-circuiting of process; just charges, trial and verdict within the extant system.

A court in southern Switzerland on Wednesday cleared seven defendants from Yemen, Somalia and Iraq of links to the al-Qaeda terror network in the country’s first ever trial of al-Qaeda suspects, the Swissinfo website reported. The federal criminal court in Lugano rejected the prosecution’s allegations that the defendants belonged to a criminal organisation run by the principal defendant - who admitted having had contact with a known al-Qaeda member Abdullah el Rimi, involved in attacks on the American naval destroyer USS Cole in 2000 and in Saudi Arabia’s capital Riyadh in 2003.

[snip]

However, the court did find six of the seven defendants guilty of violating foreign residency laws and handed down conditional sentences of up to 11 months. Article

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Keeping up with the kidnappings in Nigeria’s oil region:

A Lebanese man on Wednesday became the latest foreign worker to be kidnapped in southern Nigeria, a police source said.

[snip]

A total of 58 foreigners, most but not all of whom had connections to the oil industry, have been abducted since the start of this year. That is almost as many as for the whole of 2006. Article

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In deep kimchi — the sunlight of non-insularity and the open marketplace is a powerful disinfectant.

The author of a best-selling comic book series intended to teach children about other countries says he will change a chapter on Jews that has been called anti-Semitic and similar to Nazi propaganda.

Rhie Won-bok maintained, however, that his depiction of Jewish control of American media and politics was based on fact and “commonly believed.”

[snip]

Rhie said the 9/11 attacks occurred because of Arab terrorists’ hatred for the U.S. he blamed on Jews who “move the U.S. in the way they want using money and the media as their weapon.”

The book also says Korean-Americans are diligent and successful in the U.S. “but in the end, always run into the wall called the Jews.” The accompanying picture shows an exasperated man walking up a hill only to be blocked by a brick wall with a Star of David and the word “STOP” in English.

Images from the book “echo classic Nazi canards,” Rabbi Abraham Cooper of the Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center said. In a letter to the publishers, Cooper urged them to review “the slanders in this book that historically have led to anti-Semitism, violence, hatred and even genocide.”

Rhie asserted he is “not at all anti-Semitic” and that he will remove the parts that have drawn offense or write them differently. “The last thing I want is a conflict between the Koreans and the Jews because of my book,” he said. Article

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Craving dynasty: Mayhaps the scariest (not to mention most insipid if not outright stupidest) thing you’ll read this week.

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Sounding off (the scale):

…an audiologist visited the Wick Royal British Legion Scotland Pipe Band and recorded their bagpipes at 108 decibels and snare drums at an ear-splitting 122 decibels, a total of 230 decibels.

At take-off, the engine of a jet aircraft generally reaches about 140 decibels. Article

Controversial, but noted FYI:

US scientists are casting doubts on the benefits of certain vitamin supplements.

Vitamins A, C and E have long been touted as ways to protect the body….

However, research published today suggests that people who take them regularly do not live longer and there is actually evidence that they die younger than people who don’t take vitamins. Article

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Time and tide wait for no man. But we can tap the latter, beneficially.

Australia’s first commercial wave-generated power station will in weeks begin supplying homes south of Sydney with electricity and fresh drinking water, courtesy of the sea.

“The energy in waves is the densest of any natural sources of energy. It’s pretty much always there and it doesn’t go away like sun and wind do,” John Bell, the Chief Finance Officer from station developer Energetech told Reuters.

Lying anchored just 100 metres (yards) off a popular surf beach near Wollongong, a city of around 200,000 people just south of Sydney, the 485-tonne plant will power 500 homes along the local grid.

Electricity is generated when waves wash into a funnel facing the ocean, driving air through a pipe and into a turbine capable of pumping 500kw of clean power each day into the local grid.

The A$6 million ($4.7 million) floating plant, built to withstand a 1-in-100 year storm, can also desalinate 2,000 litres of drinking water each day for almost as many homes as it powers.

[snip]

Interest in building similar plants has come from Hawaii, Spain, South Africa, Mexico, Chile and both U.S. coasts, with Energetech having just completed a round of venture capital raising, mainly in Europe.

“Our production units will be producing one million litres of water each day and we can produce at very low cost,” Bell said.

The costs of power from the plant ranged below 10 cents per kilowatt of electricity and under A$1 per 1,000 litres of water.

The Portland plants, floating like an ocean-bound wind farm, would produce 10 megawatts, enough for around 15,000 homes.

The turbine at the heart of the station employs new techology which allows it to spin in the same direction, irrespective of wind direction in the tunnel.

“We believe its got the best chance of any of those natural sources to get close to, or we believe get below, the cost of fossil fuel,” Bell said. Article

SPUD SURPRISE

Thankfully, there was no microwaving involved.

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BASKING IN THEIR OWN REFLECTION

They think, therefore they preen and strut. Ego ascendant in Gen Y.

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ATTENTION, WORLD OF WARCRAFT ADDICTS

Beware.

Summary here.

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Trying to polish the apple is a (no pun intended) fruitless task when it is pocked with wormholes.

In Washington, Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell told senators that the crisis was “moving in a negative direction” and that “the term ‘civil war’ accurately describes key elements of the Iraqi conflict.” Article

More:

Attacks against coalition forces in Iraq averaged nearly 180 a day in January, the highest level since major combat operations ended and more than double the rate one year ago, according to intelligence officials.

Lt. Gen. Michael Maples, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday said the attacks matched the previous high, set in October 2006.

Attacks on civilians also reached a new high, with almost 50 per day in January, according to the agency. Attacks on Iraqi Security Forces remained consistent with recent months, at about 30 a day.

[snip]

McConnell said intelligence experts are keeping a close eye on assistance coming to insurgents across Iraq’s borders. However, he noted that most of the fighting in Iraq is still mainly sectarian conflicts.

The Defense Intelligence Agency estimates that less than 10 percent of insurgents in Iraq are foreign fighters, and the majority of those are suicide bombers. Article

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If actually taiking (and not dictating), especially with those openly antagoinistic to the occupation, well and good — but the expressed stance of the woebegone G. Walker administration belies much in the way of any hope (though this may, if as it seems to appear, represent an end-run around the White House and the V.P.’s office by Secretary Gates).

Regarding reports about talks between the Multi-National forces and commanders in the Al-Mahdi Army, Caldwell said, “With the Iraqi Government’s blessing, the Multi-National forces have on-going talks with militia groups, including the Al-Mahdi Army. However, the Al-Mahdi Army is so fractured, and for example, we might speak to one group in Baghdad, but another group in Basra would be different”. He added that, “It would be irresponsible not to pursue all avenues – the political part of the plan means engagement and bringing all into the political process. There are irreconcilable groups, that includes Al-Qaeda and Shiaa extremist elements that we view as being irreconcilable – these are often personality based rather than group-based”. Article

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The unrelenting, overweening pall of chaos.

Baghdad taxi driver Dhia Mohammed Mahdi embraces his family each day before he hits the city’s streets. No one has to say why, but they all know the reason — they may never see each other again.

[snip]

Once he noses his white Hyundai with its yellow “Taxi” sign out on to the streets, he’s fair game for all the dangers lurking in a wasteland bristling with weaponry, primed with roadside bombs and torn apart by sectarian violence.

“Am I scared? Of course I’m scared. But then just about everyone in Baghdad is scared,” Mahdi told AFP. “Unless you can get a job with the government, whatever you do is risky.”

[snip]

His biggest worries, he said, are not roadside bombs — as might have been expected — but the ubiquitous armed convoys.

“Of course everybody out on the roads is worried about bombs. I’ve been close to many bombs, and once my car was hit by falling debris after a blast.”

More dangerous than bombs, he said, are military convoys and the private security agents who zig-zag cowboy style through the traffic, making sure their high-paying clients make it safely through the daily mayhem.

“The military convoys are dangerous because if they come under attack they open random fire and shoot everything in sight.”

Drivers also have to contend with private security teams, Baghdad’s squads of foreign and Iraqi guns for hire.

“Just five days ago I saw a woman driver shot dead in front of my eyes,” said Mahdi, clearly still unnerved by the incident.

“She was driving and they wanted to pass but she was not able to give way, so they just opened fire at her. The car crashed and I saw police pulling her body out of the vehicle.” Article

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North of Baghdad, Samarra has been “lost” and “taken” multiple times, has been bermed and depopulated. Two pieces that amply demonstrate that chaos abides, and the futility of the primacy of a purely militaristic “solution.”

#1:

Come to the mosque and swear allegiance to al-Qaeda, the letter warned, or you will die and your family will be slaughtered. Also, bring US$1,200.

It had the desired effect on American efforts to build an Iraqi security force here.

Nearly a third of the local police force went to the mosque, paid the money and pledged their allegiance. Another third was killed. By late October, only 34 local police officers were left to try to maintain order in this city of 100,000.

Events in Baghdad have dominated the news as American troops move aggressively to quell the sectarian violence that has set Sunni and Shia neighbourhoods at war with each other. But a visit to this restive city is a reminder not only of the many fronts of the war, but also of its many complexities.

[snip]

Lt Col Viet X. Luong, the commander of the 2nd Battalion of the 505th Parachute Regiment in the 82nd Airborne Division, said he was seeing an increase in militant activity to the south of Samarra.

That, he said, is partially a result of the Americans’ successes in the city, but also likely the result of Sunni militants moving out of Baghdad to escape the American offensive there.

“We are getting attacked between the seams,” he said.

Over the past five months, his soldiers in the city have conducted more than 1,000 raids, been attacked by improvised explosive devices 69 times and come under direct fire attack at least 85 times, the colonel said.

There are at least two different forces in Samarra battling the Americans: the Islamic Army of Iraq, a homegrown militant group made up largely of former Baathists, and al-Qaeda in Iraq, which is aided and sometimes directed by foreign fighters.

Some members of the Islamic Army of Iraq, the main Sunni militant group in Samarra, said in interviews that they were pressing al-Qaeda to focus on Shia militias and not the Americans, whom they see as a temporary buffer in their fight against the Shias.

Local residents say that al-Qaeda is so bold as to even run a training camp within the city, managing to avoid the American patrols and intimidating the local population through murder and kidnapping.

[snip]

…”No judge can come to Samarra because he will be killed,” said Lt Col Abdul Jalil Hanni, the commander of the local police force, which now numbers 114. Many new recruits come from Sunni cities farther north.

There are another 201 national police officers in the city, but nearly 70 per cent of them are Shia, presenting a host of additional complications in this Sunni city.

While their commander is Sunni, residents interviewed over the past two weeks said they did not have the slightest faith in them. The Iraqi army does not patrol in the city. Article

#2:

A number of families have fled the city of Samarra, north of Baghdad, saying that if the government does not intervene, their city will end up like Kabul during the Taliban era.

The fleeing families say that extremists have renamed the city “the Islamic Emirate of Samarra, which is one of the emirates of the Islamic State of Iraq, declared by Al-Qaeda in the Land of Two Rivers last year.

Abdul-Karim Sadi, 46, said: “We and our families have gradually fled our city leaving behind our possessions except for some money that will sustain us for a few months. The situation in Samarra and its suburbs has become intolerable because extremist groups have begun interfering in people’s private lives to the point of interfering in private relationships between husbands and wives.”

He pointed out that these groups “began arriving in Samarra specifically a year and a half ago. Most of their leaders hold Arab citizenships, including Syrians, Algerians, Egyptians, and Yemenis, along with some Iraqi tribesmen who assist them and offer them facilities. These groups have been given houses and farms to turn them into training camps. They will train the sons of the city who refuse to join them so that they will force them to join them in the future by threatening to kill their families if they refuse.”

Muhannad al-Samarra’i, 31, a policeman in Samarra, said he received direct threats from these extremist groups to quit work for the police force in the city; otherwise, he will be killed along with his family if he continued to work with the government, which they described as collaborator. He added: “These groups are tightening their grip on the city and its people in the absence of government security establishments, which have weak presence, and only in the center of the city.” He said that US forces look on what is happening in the city and on what those groups are doing without really intervening to eliminate them. US forces sometimes let these groups do what they want in the city and its helpless people.” Article

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Meanwhile in the west:

If the 2nd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment is going to rid the town of Barwanah violent insurgents, it depends on 80 men from the Nimrawi tribe huddled in one dark room of a large house down the street. It is protected by concertina wire, tanks, Marines, soldiers, and one 19-year old Barwanah police officer who searched them when they came in. He is the only police officer on the entire force.

His name is Wahad. He wears a black ski mask to hide his face. His neighbors believe he was arrested and detained by the Americans; they don`t know he joined the police force in December. He has only been home twice in two months, and then under cover of night and with a phalanx of Marines to protect him. Article

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Keeping up with the courts-martial:

An Army medic who fatally shot a fellow soldier during a night of heavy drinking in Iraq was sentenced Tuesday to 33 years in prison.

Prosecutors said Spc. Chris Rolan would serve just 20 years because of an agreement in which he pleaded guilty to unpremeditated murder, violating a general order against drinking in Iraq, communicating a threat and reckless endangerment.

Rolan, 23, of Albuquerque, N.M., will forfeit all his pay and allowances, receive a dishonorable discharge and be reduced to the rank of private under the sentence by Col. Richard Gordon.

[snip]

Initially, Rolan also was accused of shooting at his roommate, Pvt. Mastermichael Ramsey of Milwaukee, on the night that Paytas was killed, but the Army has dropped that charge without explanation. Article

Summary here and here.

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The shades of the chaos may vary, but outside of Kabul it deeply permeates everywhere.

The disarmament of Afghanistan’s illegal private militias has ground to a halt and the price of weapons in the country’s relatively quiet north is skyrocketing – a sign of the embattled central government’s failure to assert its control, Afghan and Western officials say.

[snip]

“No (provincial) governor has stayed for more than three or four months in the job because there are powerful people and networks” who force them out, said Habibullah, a car mechanic in Pul-e-Khumri, the provincial capital of Baghlan, where the top Kabul-appointed administrator was replaced three times during 2006.

Ethnic Tajik and Uzbek warlords from the Northern Alliance that helped the U.S. defeat the hardline Taliban regime still dominate and local citizens are increasingly seeking guns for self-protection because of rampant criminality and distrust of the police, residents say.

[snip]

Some 2,000 illegal armed groups – each with at least five fighters – remain active, including new groups that have popped up across the country, said Ahmad Jan Nawzadi, a spokesman for the disarmament program. It originally hoped to disarm all fighters by the end of 2007.

“As the security environment in the country, particularly in the south, began to deteriorate the whole process of voluntary weapons handovers … began to grind to a halt,” said a Western official involved in the process who would only speak on condition of anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the subject.

[snip]

The Western official said the Taliban resurgence and government drive to establish an 11,000-strong auxiliary police force among Pashtun tribal militias in the south to combat the Taliban has generated suspicion among Northern Alliance factions who fear being outgunned by their tribal rivals. Article

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Beyond “surge,” this is indicative of a major, major expansion in warfare already well into year six of operations.

The 120-day extension of the 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, has left U.S. military commanders in eastern Afghanistan “scrambling to accommodate the sudden influx of soldiers” as new units rotate into the area, officials said Tuesday.

The new troops are largely from the 4th Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division, which has been taking over operations in the area.

Many of the 10th Mountain troops are now being pushed northeast, U.S. military officials said, giving the troops a wider reach but also altering areas of responsibility and adding challenges to logistical support efforts at bases such as Jalalabad.

[snip]

The bases in and around Jalalabad are also undergoing expansion, officials said. According to the news release, the number of U.S. military bases in the area – of varying sizes – has grown from 17 to 30 over the past year, with three more under construction.

Jalalabad itself will expand even more and include expanded facilities for a combat aviation unit that will “become larger and more stationary,” the release reads. Article

Summary here and here.

The other Gitmo: In a nutshell, the bit highlighted by emphasis here provides the doleful nugget of what is being undertaken in our good name by the out of control, imperious G. Walker administration.

Officials at the Navy’s brig in Hanahan developed elaborate plans to dodge public scrutiny of its operations to detain enemy combatants, plans that include destroying “critical info,” scrubbing public Web sites, and warning brig staff about the temptations of “high priced offers from news agencies,” a Navy report shows.

The 17-page document also describes how, with relatively short notice, the Naval Consolidated Brig created an expensive prison-within-a-prison, in part to prevent regular inmates from retaliating against the detainees. In this separate facility, a brig official said detainees are accorded protections under the U.S. Constitution, “except where curtailed by higher guidance.” [No. No. No. Article VI of the Constitution: “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding. The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution….” — voxd]

The document provides a rare insider’s glimpse into what has emerged as one of the most secretive installations in the government’s anti-terrorism effort. It reveals new details about the challenges of housing high-profile terrorism suspects. It also comes amid a backdrop of lawsuits alleging that the solitary confinement of detainees constitutes torture, and that the administration’s policy of holding terrorism suspects without charges is unconstitutional.

[snip]

While the Pentagon has allowed more than 1,100 visits by reporters and others to detention facilities in Guantanamo, Cuba, military officials have denied media requests to tour the Hanahan brig. In fact, much of the brig’s presentation was devoted to how officials sealed the facility from public scrutiny.

[snip]

Jonathan Hafetz, an attorney for the lone detainee in the facility, Ali Saleh al-Marri, said the document shows how the Bush administration is trying to build a separate detention system unbound by the Constitution. “They’re saying, ‘We’ll follow the Constitution, unless the president tells us not to.’ That’s very significant.”

Jacob Hornberger, president of The Future of Freedom, a libertarian think tank near Washington, D.C., added that “the brig officer has it all wrong. The rights enumerated in the Constitution are not privileges bestowed by federal officials subject to discretionary curtailment. Instead, they are inherent, fundamental rights and guarantees that the Constitution expressly prohibits federal officials, including those in the military, from infringing.”

Plexico said the term “higher guidance” refers to “guidance higher in the military chain of command than the brig and alludes to rights” that are commonly restricted in detention facilities to ensure order. He added that “even active duty military members in good standing do not have the full benefit of the Constitution, i.e., the First Amendment.” [Immaterial. They volunteered and signed contracts accepting the limitations, they were not possibly swept up or labeled arbitrarily outside of standard legal or judicial procedure. — voxd] Article

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Making mochi out of Rice: Go savor Keith Olbermann.

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In three words: failing the fallen.

The number of U.S. soldiers who have received permanent disability retirement has fallen sharply since 2001, according to the Government Accountability Office.

A March 2006 GAO report shows that 642 soldiers received permanent disability retirement in 2001, compared with 209 in 2005.

The Army Times first reported Friday that critics claim the numbers show the Army is trying to save money by giving wounded soldiers less of a disability rating than they deserve.

“These people are being systematically underrated,” Ron Smith, of Disabled American Veterans, told Army Times. “It’s a bureaucratic game to preserve the budget, and it’s having an adverse affect on servicemembers.”

[snip]

Over the past five years, the Army has also seen a surge in the number of soldiers needing in-patient care, with Medical Evaluation Boards increasing from 6,500 cases in fiscal 2002 to about 11,000 cases in fiscals 2005 and 2006, and Physical Evaluation Boards going from about 9,000 cases in 2001 to a peak of 15,000 cases in 2005, Boyce said. Article

Just wanted to make sure this did not escape mention (it almost surely will be flagged by those in charge of the ongoing review of Turkey’s bid for membership in the EU).

A court sentenced two prominent Kurdish politicians to a year and a half in prison each in a ruling Monday that found them guilty of distributing party materials in the Kurdish language and of praising a jailed rebel leader. Article

Howdy. Episode 6 of Little Mosque on the Prairie is available to view. You know where to click.

Summaries here and here and here.

U.S. and Iraqi officials have released few specifics about how they’re applying the new Baghdad security plan throughout the capital. But phone interviews provide some insight into how the security plan is working in 20 of the city’s neighborhoods. Check ‘em out

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As the catalysis creeps: Note the inherent contradictions in the part where emphasis has been added.

…U.S. troops, Iraqi soldiers and officials, and Baghdad residents say the plan is hampered because security forces cannot identify, let alone apprehend, the elusive perpetrators of the violence. Shiite militiamen in the capital say they are keeping a low profile to wait out the security plan. U.S. commanders have noted increased insurgent violence in the Sunni-dominated belt around Baghdad and are concerned that fighters are shifting their focus outside the city.

Military patrols frequently push into neighborhoods where they have been shot at or struck with improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, only to find no one to arrest.

“I don’t know who I’m fighting most of the time,” said Staff Sgt. Joseph Lopez, 39, a soldier based in the northern outskirts of the capital. “I don’t know who is setting what IED.”

[snip]

On the streets of the capital, it is impossible to miss the increased military presence. Iraqi police pickups speed down the avenues, sirens wailing, as masked officers fire machine guns to clear their path. Iraqi army soldiers and policemen stand sentry at checkpoint after checkpoint, but more often than not allow cars to pass through without inspection.

“They’re just standing and waving at the cars,” said Sgt. Haider Hasim, 20, a member of the Iraqi National Guard’s 1st Brigade, 2nd Regiment of the 6th Division, who patrols the western Baghdad neighborhood of Amiriyah. “They won’t take weapons from their friends.”

[snip]

For the Americans, the security plan depends heavily on pushing along the Iraqi security forces. The so-called joint security stations envisioned under the plan are intended not only to generate intelligence about insurgents and militias but also to bring together Iraqi military and police personnel, who often fail to communicate, as well as U.S. troops. The stations will be scattered throughout the city’s 10 newly designated security districts. The plan originally divided the city into nine sectors, but one was split in two.

Lt. Col. Christopher C. Garver, a U.S. military spokesman, said that although part of the stations’ function is to encourage Iraqis to visit, their locations would not be disclosed because of concern within the Iraqi government that such information would facilitate attacks.

[snip]

…there is still a bunker mentality among residents of the capital, who are afraid to venture out for any but the most necessary errands. The owner of a deserted fabric shop in Baghdad’s Zayuna neighborhood, Manaf Ali, said his children continue to attend school only once a week because he is afraid for their lives. A goldsmith working next door at al-Faiq shopping center, Haider Mohammed, 31, sleeps on the floor of an unfurnished apartment close to his shop rather than travel to work from his embattled Sunni neighborhood of Adhamiyah. Both men carry guns.

“How can we notice any change in the streets? We are just like chickens, staying in our cages,” Mohammed said. “I am a goldsmith. What am I doing carrying a gun?” Article

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In the crossfire of c-i-v-i-l w-a-r — is that where those who cry the loudest to “support the troops” truly want them to be?

‘Civil war’ implies two sides, but Iraq’s conflict is multi-sided, officials admit. Can US policy cope with them all?

[snip]

Other analysts hold that the chaos of Iraq’s conflict means that the current US effort to establish security in Baghdad will, at best, achieve only a temporary calm there. The divides that fuel the current conflict – both between sectarian groups, and within them – won’t be resolved merely by an absence of fighting, they say. Likewise, they hold out little hope that the political components of US strategy will be able to stabilize Iraq.

“Why won’t we see the same problems again if we try to withdraw?” asks James Fearon, a Stanford University political scientist and author of an analysis of the nature of Iraq’s civil war in the current issue of the journal Foreign Affairs.

The term “civil war” is indeed apt for Iraq, argues Dr. Fearon. It is often applied to conflicts marked by factionalism and chaos, such as the multisided Lebanese civil war of the late 1970s and 1980s. Article

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Overkill: The wrong tools for the wrong job, classically recognized as misguided and unintended for urban counterinsurgency operations, and a further signal of how “force protection” has overtaken civilian protection as a primary tenet of mission guidance.

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G. Walker all but tells Congress they (and their Constitutionally mandated authorities) are irrelevant and that they should be a toothless, gutless, spineless rubber stamp.

Congress’ answer should be along the lines of: You’ve shot your wad, Mr. President, and despite being handed literally everything requested in Iraq for four years, your policies and parameters have failed disastrously. Continued idiocy does not support the troops, and is detrimental to their — and to the country’s — interests.

Call out and rebuff the insanity. And do it again, each and every time.

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The bilious priorities of the woebegone G. Walker administration: Billions for weapons and lethality, bupkis for life, help and hope.

In Diyala, the vast province northeast of Baghdad where Sunnis and Shiites are battling for primacy with mortars and nighttime abductions, the U.S. government has contracted the job of promoting democracy to a Pakistani citizen who has never lived or worked in a democracy.

The management of reconstruction projects in the province has been assigned to a Border Patrol commander with no reconstruction experience. The task of communicating with the embassy in Baghdad has been handed off to a man with no background in drafting diplomatic cables. The post of agriculture adviser has gone unfilled because the U.S. Department of Agriculture has provided just one of the six farming experts the State Department asked for a year ago.

“The people our government has sent to Iraq are all dedicated, well-meaning people, but are they really the right people — the best people — for the job?” asked Kiki Skagen Munshi, a retired U.S. Foreign Service officer who, until last month, headed the team in Diyala that included the Pakistani democracy educator and the Border Patrol commander. “If you can’t get experts, it’s really hard to do an expert job.”

Almost four years after the United States set about trying to rebuild Iraq, the job remains overwhelmingly unfinished. The provincial reconstruction teams like those in Diyala are often understaffed and underqualified — and almost unable to work outside the military outposts where they are hunkered down for security reasons. Today, there are just 10 of the 30-person teams operating in all of Iraq.

[snip]

As State and the Pentagon were sparring over who would staff the reconstruction teams, Bush used his State of the Union address to call for the formation of a civilian reserve corps — three years after the State Department first proposed it and several influential senators backed it. “It would give people across America who do not wear the uniform a chance to serve in the defining struggle of our time,” the president said.

But the corps won’t be built anytime soon: The administration’s 2008 budget, which was sent to Congress earlier this month, includes no money for it. A senior administration official said the White House plans to wait another year before asking Congress for funding. Article

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That the draft oil law sailed through the cabinet* is unsurprising. Come March, when the Parliament is scheduled to meet, much will depend on the numbers who actually show up (having all 275 members present is the exception) and on how much of the draft bill becomes public. Some stories on the cabinet approval here and also here

The thing most interesting about this version of the story (as it is from a Middle Eastern regional site) is the headline they chose to use.

*Whether the full cabinet was involved may also be an open question:

KarbalaNews.net alleges in Arabic that fair numbers of cabinet ministers and parliamentarians have fled abroad, going AWOL with no permission. It says that a couple of weeks ago a web site published a list of 360 names of Iraqi officials that the US military is determined to detain, without any permission from the Iraqi government. The list contained both Sunni and Shiite names, and those listed are accused either of administrative corruption or of ties to death squads. Many of those who went abroad were on the list. Personally, I can’t understand on what grounds US troops can arrest elected Iraqi officials. Force majeure? In any case, you can’t run a government if dozens of its officials are living in Amman and Jordan (the problem of absenteeism actually has been a longstanding one.) Source

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Contours of chaos.

The plight of minorities is being ignored amid the constant news of carnage in Iraq, Minority Rights Group International says.

Its report claims that some groups risk being eradicated from their homeland. Iraqi minority members have been abducted, tortured or killed, or forced to assimilate.

The study says some communities - many of whom have lived in Iraq for more than 2,000 years - are suffering terrible violence as a result of their religion or ethnicity.

Figures from the United Nations suggest that of the 1.8 million Iraqis seeking refugee status across the world, almost a third are from smaller minority groups.

According to the report, these minorities - which include Turkmen, Christians, Shabaks and Bahais - have survived a long history of persecution, but there is a real risk that they might not see out the current conflict.

Much of the violence against them, the study found, is based on faith.

Some groups are negatively perceived as supporters of the West or as disrespecting Muslim values.

As they do not have the tribal or militia protection afforded to the majority groups, they can do little to defend themselves. Article

Related:

Visitors to the northern city of Mosul, currently one of the most restive areas in Iraq, were amazed by its mosaic.

In this city and its outlying villages lived peacefully together Christians with their different denominations, Shebeks – a group of Shiite Kurds - Turkmen, Yazidis amid majority Arabs and Kurds.

But the city is quickly losing its mosaic character. Most Christians have left the city known for its numerous ancient churches and monasteries some of them dating to the early decades of the birth of Christianity.

Churches, which used to be packed on Sundays, are empty and some have even been closed down.

The Shebeks have fled their areas. Turkmen, also mostly Shiites, are fleeing the city. The Yazidis who have their main sanctuary north of Mosul are fleeing in droves.

The calamity of Iraqi minorities, which began with the U.S. invasion, has almost gone unnoticed until the publication of a recent report by the Minority Watch Group in which it warned that the country’s already dwindling communities of Christians, Yazidis, Bahais, Mandeans, Shebeks and Turkmen are under risk of eradication.

These groups, which together make up about 10 percent of the country’s 27 million people, have come under immense pressure and oppression since the U.S. invasion from all sides.

Extremists whether Shiites or Sunnis, Arabs or Kurds, find them easy targets for extortion, abduction, forced evacuation and even torture and killing. Article

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The odious Ahmed Chalabi pops up once again, this time (at first blush) in control of a well-funded version of Tammany Hall.

Summary here and here.

While media attention has been focused on the U.S. quagmire in Iraq, an equally failed war in Afghanistan has received little coverage. As in countless militaristic U.S. nation-building fiascos, “mission creep” in Afghanistan is leading to another foreign policy disaster. Although the escalation in Afghanistan has not been announced publicly, a reliable source with connections at the Pentagon tells me that the Joint Staff has been ordered to plan for a surge in that country, and the Department of Defense Comptroller has been asked to budget the money for it. As in Iraq, however, the escalation just promises to sink the United States deeper into the nation-building morass. Article

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Chaos abides.

It has been four weeks since the district center of Musa Qala was overthrown by Taliban forces. Since then, the occupying Taliban forces have lost two leading commanders due to precision air strikes directed by NATO aircraft. NATO officials have long supported a military takeover but were waiting on word from the Afghan government.

[snip]

Since the takeover, reports have trickled out describing the methods the occupying Taliban units were using to reinforce their positions; land mining the street leading to the city’s center and fortifying the buildings they are currently using as a command center. Article

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The “We pardon ourselves” bill: the proverbial turd in the punchbowl.

The sweeping resolution not only grants blanket amnesty from prosecution - or even criticism - to all parties and individuals involved in gross human rights violations; it also extends a similar reprieve to the current groups who are terrorizing parts of Afghanistan.

Nowhere in the resolution is there any mention of human rights, the suffering of the Afghan people, or any public aspirations of justice - even if merely symbolic. The bill grants full pardons to those who murdered, raped, and maimed their countrymen - and then goes on to laud them as heroes.

Karzai faces a thorny dilemma over the resolution. On the face of it, he must approve it - thus making it part of his country’s laws - or reject it - inviting opposition from powerful elements within and outside his own government.

The Afghan Constitution (Article 94) says a bill becomes law after approval by both houses of the National Assembly and endorsement by the president “unless the Constitution states otherwise.” If the president rejects a bill approved by the National Assembly, he “can send the document back with justifiable reasons to the Wolesi Jirga” within 15 days. The lower house (Wolesi Jirga) can override presidential objections with a two-thirds majority vote. But if the president takes no action on a bill for 15 days, the document becomes law.

[snip]

Karzai now has less than two weeks to influence the fate of a resolution that appears to run counter to the wishes of the Afghan public and the country’s international obligations.

Karzai can choose to reject the bill based on constitutional grounds - which his experts can arguably find in Article 7 and in Article 6, which obliges the state to create a society “based on social justice, protection of human dignity, [and the] protection of human rights.” HRW Asia researcher Sam Zarifi has noted that international law prohibits the extension of national amnesties to genocide or war crimes.

Basing a rejection argument on Afghan law, experts could conceivably turn to Islamic jurisprudence - under which neither the state nor its organs has the right to forgive the perpetrator of a crime like murder.

Karzai’s rejection of the bill would surely alienate some in his immediate circle, including powerful members of both houses of the National Assembly. And in the end, the Wolesi Jirga might muster enough votes to overturn his veto, further eroding the president’s public standing.

Former warring parties have tried to flex their muscles - including through today’s rally by tens of thousands of supporters of the controversial bill.

The “amnesty” bill and the ensuing presidential quandary are ultimately a result of expediency measures - endorsed by Karzai himself - that allowed individuals accused of gross rights violations to escape accountability and even assume positions of power. Article

Related:

A recent report by Human Rights Watch named a number of very senior members of the current government as war criminals, including: the former minister of defence Mohammed Qasim Fahim, the former President Burhanuddin Rabbani, the minister of energy Ismail Khan, army chief of staff Abdul Rashid Dostum, and the current vice-president Karim Khalili, along with Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, a warlord based in south eastern Afghanistan. All of these figures will be covered by the proposed new amnesty law, even though Hekmatyar is currently fighting alongside the Taliban.

[snip]

The current impasse points to a systematic failure by western policy-makers to plan strategically for Afghanistan’s future. The initial failure to deploy an effective international peacekeeping force and the holding of elections in a climate where warlords were bound to hijack the new parliament were entirely predictable mistakes. Allowing the amnesty bill to become law would be another triumph of short-term and cowardly expedience over principle and strategic vision. The bill is unconstitutional and should be struck down on that basis.

[snip]

If the bill is enacted the British government should immediately press the UN security council to refer Afghanistan to the international criminal court. Afghanistan has ratified the court’s statute and the enactment of the amnesty bill would be a clear sign that the domestic courts are unable or unwilling to prosecute perpetrators of crimes within its jurisdiction.

This move could cause some problems for the current US administration, given its hostility to the international court, but there is no other mechanism for holding perpetrators to account. If Tony Blair is reluctant to do this, he must clearly explain why British soldiers are being asked to risk their lives to defend the political careers of Afghan war criminals. Article

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Remember that we’re now in year six of warfare (emphasis added). Unlike Simple Simon, those with fingers in the pie have stuck in the entire hand up to the wrist and their gooey, sticky fingers inevitably stain everything they now touch.

Britain is to send an extra 1,400 troops and equipment to southern Afghanistan, raising its total deployment in the country to 7,700 - and exceeding current British troop levels in Iraq.

[snip]

The fresh deployment will bring the overall number of British servicemen in southern Afghanistan to 7,700 by the summer, Browne said.

Current troop levels in Iraq stand at 7,100, but the government said last week that 1,600 troops would be recalled from southern Iraq over the next few months.

The troops in Afghanistan were committed to the mission until 2009. Most would be deployed to Helmand province and some would be stationed at Kandahar airfield, said Browne.

Among the extra equipment to be sent to Afghanistan were additional helicopters, Harrier fighter jets and guided multiple launch rocket systems, Browne said. Article

More:

Britain has committed 1,400 more troops to Afghanistan to fight the Taliban - as ministers admitted the Army is now at breaking point.

It came as senior defence sources revealed that Britain will also have to send another two battalions later this year - raising the size of the Afghan force to more than 9,000.

[snip]

…Defence Secretary Des Browne told MPs that commanders on the ground have demanded not one but two battlegroups if they are to defeat the Taliban.

[snip]

Mr Browne went further than ever before in admitting that the Army is now at the limit of what it can do.

He revealed that training has had to be cancelled to free up troops.

But with Britain taking command of the whole southern area of Afghanistan - encompassing Kandahar, Oruzgan, Zabol, Nimruz and Daykondi prvinces as well as Helmand - in the summer, pressure on the MoD to find extra troops will be overwhelming.

A well-placed source said: “Nato needs another battlegroup and there will be no prizes for guessing where it will come from. Contingency planning is already under way to find two more battalions before the end of the year.”

The revelations sparked fury among MPs and defence officials, who also warned that the Afghan force is also “woefully” short of air cover.

Mr Browne revealed that just four extra ageing Sea King helicopters and four Harriers will be sent to Afghanistan but no more Apache gunships. He conceded that getting more helicopters from allies would be “crucial”.

The Defence Secretary said that Britain could not send two battlegroups immediately because of the risks of overstretch. He described the new deployment as “manageable” but admitted: “There may be a consequence in relation to the training of some troops because we are operating at a higher level than we had planned for. We cannot sustain this in the long term without doing damage to the core of our troops.”

[snip]

But even in private MoD officials were not able to give an assurance that no more troops will be sent later in the year. While the Army has 100,000 personnel and half could be deployed in a war situation, the number of soldiers deployed overseas is far more than can be sustained on a long term basis. Soldiers have found the time between tours of duty and time with their families slashed, and key training cut, leading many to quit.

[snip]

Whether 1,400 extra troops, spread over an area four times the size of Wales, will be enough to crush the Taliban remains open to doubt.

Commanders privately admit they have come close to defeat at times, with British troops clinging on to positions and narrowly avoiding disaster. Article

Related:

Britain’s growing military mission in Afghanistan could help attract international terrorists to the country, government intelligence analysts have warned.

Assessment documents circulating in Whitehall security circles suggest Afghanistan could soon replace Iraq as the prime focus for radical Muslims wanting to pursue jihad against western interests. Article

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Robert Fisk implores the powers that be to look back in order to look forward.

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Kaleidoscope of chaos: the brutal, tattered legacy of the flawed, short-sighted policies of the woebegone G. Walker administration.

Fears that a revitalised al-Qaida is planning a stepped-up offensive against “soft” western targets are driving an intensifying debate both inside and outside the Bush administration over how to counter the threat. But terrorism experts say the deepening quagmire in Iraq is fatally hampering US efforts while simultaneously fuelling a sevenfold increase in fatal jihadist attacks.

[snip]

“In Washington the consensus view is that while Bush’s foreign policy has been an overall disaster, he can still lay claim to one key achievement: severely weakening al-Qaida in the five years since September 11,” Mr Bergen wrote in The New Republic. “But today, from Algeria to Afghanistan, and from Britain to Baghdad, the organisation once believed to be on the verge of impotence is again ascendant.

“Attacks by jihadists have reached epidemic levels in the past three years … There is considerable evidence that al-Qaida has managed to regroup. And there is reason to believe that over the next few years, it will grow stronger still. More than at any time since September 11, Osama bin Laden’s deadly outfit is back in business.”

Other US experts, independent or otherwise, also talk of an al-Qaida revival, centred on a burgeoning “operations hub” in the Pakistan-Afghanistan border area.…

Lieutenant General Karl Eikenberry, the outgoing US commander in Afghanistan, suggested that Pakistani or US military strikes on reconstituted, joint al-Qaida and Taliban training camps might soon be needed.…

[snip]

And there should be no doubt about who carried most responsibility for these developments, the New York Times said this week. “Al-Qaida’s comeback in Pakistan is a devastating indictment of Bush’s grievously flawed strategies and misplaced Iraq obsession. Unless the president changes course, the dangers to America and its friends will continue to multiply.” Article

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Shorter version of the newest trope: The Democrats are forcing us to at least pretend to conduct serious diplomacy, the days of ‘nudge, nudge – wink, wink’ relations are coming to a close.

Congressional Democrats have threatened to review military assistance and other aid to Pakistan unless they see evidence of aggressive attacks on Al Qaeda. The House last month passed a measure linking future military aid to White House certification that Pakistan “is making all possible efforts to prevent the Taliban from operating in areas under its sovereign control.”

Pakistan is now the fifth-largest recipient of American aid to foreign nations. Bush has proposed $785 million in aid to Pakistan in his new budget, including $300 million in military aid to help Pakistan combat Islamic radicalism in the country.

The rumblings from Congress give Bush and his top advisers a way of conveying the seriousness of the problem, officials said, without appearing to issue a direct threat to the proud Pakistani leader themselves.

“We think the Pakistani aid is at risk in Congress,” said the senior official, who declined to speak on the record because the subject involved intelligence matters.

The administration has sent a series of emissaries to see the Pakistani leader in recent weeks, including the new secretary of defense, Robert Gates. Gates was charged with prompting more action in a region in which American forces operate with great constraints, if they are allowed in at all.

“This is not the type of relationship where we can order action,” said an administration official involved in discussions over Pakistan policy. “We can strongly encourage.” Article

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Rubber. Glue. Denial. Do the math, follow the threads.

“If the U.S. cannot stop infiltration from Mexico, how do you expect us to control our border with Afghanistan that’s mostly desolate and mountainous?” pleaded Tariq Azim, minister of information, in an interview in Islamabad, the capital.

[snip]

Pakistan is tired of hearing that it is not doing enough, says Azim. “But nobody tells us what is enough. Nobody defines what will be enough.” I asked him if Pakistan is getting fed up with the U.S. and other allies.”Up to here,” he said, lifting his hand to his throat. Article

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Regionally speaking, the voice carries immense weight.

In a rare public criticism of Pakistan, the Tehran Times commented last week that an exclusive Islamabad-Washington nexus is at work manipulating the Afghan situation. The daily, which reflects official Iranian thinking, spelled out something that others perhaps knew already but were afraid to talk about publicly.

All the same, the commentary gave a candid Iranian insight into the state of play in Afghanistan. It estimated that without a comprehensive rethink of strategy aimed at addressing the problems of weak political institutions, misgovernance, corruption, warlordism, tardy reconstruction, drug trafficking and attendant mafia, and excesses by the coalition forces, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) couldn’t possibly hope to get anywhere near on top of the crisis in Afghanistan.

The commentary pointed a finger at Pakistan’s training the Taliban and providing them with “logistical and political support”. It highlighted that US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, who visited Islamabad recently, chose to sidestep the issue and instead bonded with President General Pervez Musharraf. This is because Washington’s priority - that the “new cold war” objective of NATO is to establish a long-term presence in the region - can be realized only with Musharraf’s cooperation. Article

Reading the tea leaves: Sooner rather than later the efficacy of presenting, internationally, a less ugly face may seize the moment.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad faced a new round of sharp criticism at home Monday after he said Iran’s nuclear program is an unstoppable train without brakes. Reformers and conservatives said such tough talk only inflames the West as it considers further sanctions.

The criticism came even as new signs have arisen that Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is growing discontented with Ahmadinejad, whom he is believed to have supported in 2005 presidential elections.

Last week, Khamenei voiced rare criticism of the domestic performance of Ahmadinejad’s government, and the president was notably absent when a group of Cabinet members and vice presidents met with Khamenei, who has the final word in all political affairs in Iran, including the nuclear issue.

The increasing criticism reflects public worries about the course of the country’s confrontation with the United States and the West.… Article

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Playing with fire? Or willfully setting up the travails of the administration to follow the woebegone G. Walker one? (emphasis added)

America is secretly funding militant ethnic separatist groups in Iran in an attempt to pile pressure on the Islamic regime to give up its nuclear programme.

In a move that reflects Washington’s growing concern with the failure of diplomatic initiatives, CIA officials are understood to be helping opposition militias among the numerous ethnic minority groups clustered in Iran’s border regions.

The operations are controversial because they involve dealing with movements that resort to terrorist methods in pursuit of their grievances against the Iranian regime.

[snip]

Funding for their separatist causes comes directly from the CIA’s classified budget but is now “no great secret”, according to one former high-ranking CIA official in Washington who spoke anonymously to The Sunday Telegraph.

His claims were backed by Fred Burton, a former US state department counter-terrorism agent, who said: “The latest attacks inside Iran fall in line with US efforts to supply and train Iran’s ethnic minorities to destabilise the Iranian regime.”

[snip]

Such a policy is fraught with risk, however. Many of the groups share little common cause with Washington other than their opposition to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose regime they accuse of stepping up repression of minority rights and culture.

The Baluchistan-based Brigade of God group, which last year kidnapped and killed eight Iranian soldiers, is a volatile Sunni organisation that many fear could easily turn against Washington after taking its money.

A row has also broken out in Washington over whether to “unleash” the military wing of the Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK), an Iraq-based Iranian opposition group with a long and bloody history of armed opposition to the Iranian regime.

The group is currently listed by the US state department as terrorist organisation, but Mr Pike said: “A faction in the Defence Department wants to unleash them. They could never overthrow the current Iranian regime but they might cause a lot of damage.”

[snip]

The US has also moved six heavy bombers from a British base on the Pacific island of Diego Garcia to the Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, which could allow them to carry out strikes on Iran without seeking permission from Downing Street. Article

Related informationally also is the piece from Asia Times cited in the Afghanistan & Pakistan posting today, re-linked here.

Summary here and here.

No. Paranoia and rule by stark fear is not what the people “expect” and is not your “job.” See: Nov 7, 2006.

“I wake up every day thinking about another attack. And that’s my job. It’s what the people expect,” Bush said…. Article

Related: That holds as so even with the bleatings and ignorance defining The ‘Fraidest Generation — a case study of xenophobia coupled with a sick coneception of revenge and the desperate clinging to perverted tribalism.

Those who think that Muslim countries and pro-terrorist attitudes go hand-in-hand might be shocked by new polling research: Americans are more approving of terrorist attacks against civilians than any major Muslim country except for Nigeria.

The survey, conducted in December 2006 by the University of Maryland’s prestigious Program on International Public Attitudes, shows that only 46 percent of Americans think that “bombing and other attacks intentionally aimed at civilians” are “never justified,” while 24 percent believe these attacks are “often or sometimes justified.” Article

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Freedom of travel: a quaint concept.

Welcome to the new world of border security. Unsuspecting Americans are turning up at the Canadian border expecting clear sailing, only to find that their past — sometimes their distant past — is suddenly an issue.

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The Canadian Border Services Agency says its statistics don’t show an increase in the number of travelers turned back. But Cannon says that’s because the “data mining'’ has just begun to pick up momentum.

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Oh, and by the way, if you don’t need to travel to Canada, don’t think you won’t need to clear your record. Lesperance says it is just a matter of time before agreements are signed with governments in destinations like Japan, Indonesia and Europe. Article

U.S. postal rates to leap again, but with a catch: the “Forever” stamp.

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A truly bizarre story of eliminating the need for glasses.

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Long time readers here know about the situation. Once again this year:

At least 11 people died and more than 100 were injured at an annual spring festival in eastern Pakistan, celebrated with the flying of thousands of colourful kites.

The deaths and injuries were caused by stray bullets, sharp kite-strings, electrocution and people falling off rooftops at the conclusion of the two-day Basant festival on Sunday, said Ruqia Bano, a spokeswoman for the Lahore emergency services.

The festival - which traditionally runs for a month - is regularly marred by casualties caused by sharp kite strings or celebratory gunshots fired into the air.

Many kite flyers use strings made of wire or coated with ground glass to try to cross and cut a rival’s string or damage the other kite, often after betting on the outcome. People then chase downed kites to collect them as trophies.

Authorities temporarily lifted a ban on kite flying imposed following a spate of deaths at the festival last year. Lahore’s mayor, Mian Amier Mahmood, said the two-day permission to fly kites ended on Sunday and the ban had been re-imposed.

[snip]

Police arrested more than 700 people for using sharpened kite strings - which had been banned this year - or firing guns, and seized 282 illegally held weapons, said Aftab Cheema, a senior Lahore police officer.

Five of those who died on Sunday were hit by stray bullets, including a six-year-old boy who was struck in the head near his home in the city’s Mazang area, Ms Bano said. Article

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To each his own, but a-holes are a-holes.