Petraeus to CIA, Panetta to Pentagon

From the London Independent:
General David Petraeus, the US commander in Afghanistan, is set to become CIA director as part of a major shake-up of President Obama's national security team, in which the agency's current director, Leon Panetta, will replace Robert Gates as Defence Secretary.

Petraeus to head CIA as Obama imposes new order on US security
By Rupert Cornwell in Washington
Thursday, 28 April 2011
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/petraeus-to-head-cia-as-obama-imposes-new-order-on-us-security-2275781.html

Pentagon Gives Dennis Kucinich Runaround

From FireDogLake.com:
Last we heard of Dennis Kucinich’s request to visit Bradley Manning, the Pentagon had spent a full month referring his request from one official to another rather than respond to his request.

On February 4, Dennis Kucinich asked DOD to allow him to visit Bradley Manning so he could assess his conditions of confinement. On February 8, Robert Gates wrote Kucinich a short note telling him we was referring his request to Secretary of the Army, John McHugh. In a letter dated February 24–but apparently not received in Kucinich’s office until March 1–McHugh told Kucinich he was referring his request to the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Legislative Affairs.

In short, a full month after the date when a member of Congress requested a visit with Manning, DOD is still stalling on a real response with bureaucratic buck-passing...

DOD Continues to Stall on Kucinich’s Request to Visit Bradley Manning
emptywheel
Monday March 14, 2011
http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2011/03/14/dod-continues-to-stall-on-kucinichs-request-to-visit-bradley-manning/

Af-Pak War Racket

http://ampedstatus.com/af-pak-war-racket-the-obama-illusion-comes-crashing-down

Af-Pak War Racket: The Obama Illusion Comes Crashing Down
Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009
By David DeGraw, AmpedStatus Report

Report Contents:

————I: Troop Deployments

————II: The Militarized Economy

————III: Masters of War

————IV: PsyOps: Wag the Dog and Shake the Mohammed

————V: U.S. Insurgency: Violent, Strategic Dislocation Within U.S.

The economic elite have escalated their attack on the U.S. public by surging military operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

As Obama announced plans for escalating the war effort, it has become clear that the Obama Illusion has taken yet another horrifying turn. Before explaining how the Af-Pak surge is a direct attack on the US public, let’s peer through the illusion and look at the reality of the situation.

Now that the much despised George W. Bush is out of the way and a more popular figurehead is doing PR for Dick Cheney’s right-hand military leader Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who is leading his second AF-Pak surge now, and with long time Bush family confidant Robert Gates still running the Defense Department, the masters of war have never had it so good.

Barack Obama, the anti-war candidate, has proven to be a perfect decoy for the military industrial complex. Consider all the opposition and bad press Bush received when he announced the surge in Iraq. Then consider this:

I: TROOP DEPLOYMENTS

The Bush surge in Iraq deployed an extra 28,000 US troops. Under Obama, back in March, a surge in Afghanistan, that also further escalated operations inside Pakistan, deployed an extra 21,000 troops. However, in an unannounced and underreported move, Obama added 13,000 more troops to that surge to bring the total to 34,000 troops. Obama actually outdid Bush’s surge by 6000 troops and brought the overall number of US troops in Afghanistan to 68,000, double the number there when Bush left office.

Where opposition was fierce to Bush’s surge, barely any opposition was expressed during Obama’s surge. Part of the reason for so little political and public backlash was the cleverly orchestrated psychological operation to announce the beginning of US troop withdrawal from Iraq. While the drawdown in Iraq has been greatly exaggerated in the US mainstream media, as of October, Obama still had 124,000 troops deployed in Iraq (not counting private military contractors).

When Obama casts the illusion of a 2011 withdrawal from Afghanistan, one just needs look at the reality of the situation with the over-hyped withdrawal in Iraq.

Now, with Obama’s latest surge announcement he will again be adding a minimum of another 30,000 US soldiers. This means that Obama has now led a bigger surge than Bush… on two separate occasions within the past nine months of his new administration.

Obama has now escalated deployments in the Af-Pak region to 98,000 US troops. So in Af-Pak and Iraq, he will now have a total of 222,000 US troops deployed, 36,000 more than Bush ever had - 186,000 was Bush’s highest total.

PRIVATE MILITARY AND NATO DEPLOYMENTS

The amount of private military contractors deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan is rarely reported on in the US mainstream press, but a Congressional Research Service investigation into this revealed that a record high 69% active duty soldiers are in fact private mercenaries.

Although the administration is yet to disclose how many private mercenaries will be deployed in the latest surge, it is believed that the 69% ratio will remain in tact.

The Pentagon released a report showing that Obama already had a total of 242,657 private contractors in action, as of June 30th. 119,706 of them in Iraq, 73,968 in Afghanistan, with 50,061 active in “other US CENTCOM locations.”

Back in June, Jeremy Scahill reported on these findings: “According to new statistics released by the Pentagon, with Barack Obama as commander in chief, there has been a 23% increase in the number of ‘Private Security Contractors’ working for the Department of Defense in Iraq in the second quarter of 2009 and a 29% increase in Afghanistan….”

Plus, we must mention, the immense dangers of having private military contractors as 69% of our fighting force. For those of you unaware, private military contractors are hired from all over the world. Any former soldier, from any country, is welcome to come and fight for a salary - a salary that is often significantly more than what we pay our own US soldiers.

These mercenaries have a vested interest in prolonging the war, for as long as there is a war, they have a well paying job. So it is easy to infer that a significant percentage of these contractors will not have the US soldiers, or US taxpayers, best interests at heart.

Obama continues to feed this out of control private army by pouring billions of taxpayer dollars into shady and scandalous companies like Blackwater, who recently changed their name to Xe Services, because they destroyed their reputation by committing numerous war crimes in Iraq. A recent investigation by Jeremy Scahill revealed the extent to which Blackwater is involved in covert operations inside Afghanistan and Pakistan. In some cases, Blackwater is not working for the US, but were hired by covert elements inside Pakistan. When it comes to private contractors, the fog of war grows ominous, exactly who is fighting for whom is unclear. The crucial factor is who paid them the most that particular day.

The US military can give them $1000 today, and an enemy can give them $1000 tomorrow, when you have people who fight for a payday and not for a country, you get chaos. This leads to a breakdown in the chain of command, effectively turning a military operation into a covert intelligence operation, where you’re never really sure if the person you are fighting with is on your side or not.

A federal investigation by the Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan, revealed in June: “More than 240,000 contractor employees, about 80 percent of them foreign nationals, are working in Iraq and Afghanistan to support operations and projects of the U.S. military, the Department of State, and the U.S. Agency for International Development. Contractor employees outnumber U.S. troops in the region. While contractors provide vital services, the Commission believes their use has also entailed billions of dollars lost to waste, fraud, and abuse due to inadequate planning, poor contract drafting, limited competition, understaffed oversight functions, and other problems.”

Before this latest surge, there were over 123,000 US and NATO troops in the Af-Pak region, and 200,000 Afghan security forces, supporting the US effort. According to US intelligence sources the total number of Taliban and al-Qaida fighters in the region was estimated to only be about 25,000, giving the US led forces a minimum of a 12 to 1 troop advantage.

When you add in estimated private soldiers, you get an approximate minimum of a 17 to 1 advantage.

Although Obama opened his war speech by mentioning al-Qaida as the main justification for this war, consider this AP report: “national security adviser James Jones said last weekend that the al-Qaida presence has diminished, and he does not ‘foresee the return of the Taliban’ to power. He said that according to the maximum estimate, al-Qaida has fewer than 100 fighters operating in Afghanistan without any bases or ability to launch attacks on the West.”

Does it seriously take a surge of hundreds of thousands of troops to contain what amounts to “less than 100? al-Qaida members?

Any serious war strategist will tell you that the most effective way to combat the remains of the al-Qaida network, is through an intelligence operation, and statistics prove that escalating more troops into the region will only fuel further acts of terrorism.

DRONE DEPLOYMENTS

Speaking of fueling hatred toward the US, other than a huge troop increase, there has also been a sharp increase in the use of unmanned drones. The New Yorker reports: “According to a just completed study by the New America Foundation, the number of drone strikes has risen dramatically since Obama became President. During his first nine and a half months in office, he has authorized as many C.I.A. aerial attacks in Pakistan as George W. Bush did in his final three years in office.”

The unmanned drones have caused major controversy due to the high number of civilian causalities they cause. However, as the study stated, the Obama Administration continues to increasingly rely upon them.

So summing up these statistics, we have the most fierce and technologically advanced military force in history, vastly outnumbering what amounts to be a ragtag army of peasant farmers with guns, and our best option is supposed to be an increase in troop levels?

Obviously, something doesn’t add up.

After thinking about all of this, you begin to see through the smokescreen of what this war is said to be about and get a glimpse of some of the sinister forces at play here.

OVER EXTENDED TROOPS

With the rise in deployments, the US military is stretched to a breaking point. Obama is “deploying practically every available US Army brigade to war, leaving few units in reserve.”

As this war enters its 9th year, many soldiers are forced into deploying on their 3rd or 4th combat tours, and morale is fading fast.

The past year has seen a dramatic increase in US soldier deaths, with the number of wounded drastically rising as well. 928 US soldiers have died in Afghanistan thus far, with last month being the deadliest month since the start.

AP reports that “nearly four times as many troops were injured in October as a year ago. Amputations, burns, brain injuries and shrapnel wounds proliferate in Afghanistan, due mostly to crude, increasingly potent improvised bombs targeting U.S. forces…. Since 2007, more than 70,000 service members have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injury — more than 20,000 of them this year…”

US soldier suicides are also on the rise. In 2008, 197 army soldiers committed suicide. Thus far in 2009, there have been 211 army suicides.

McClatchy recently reported: “An Army task force has found that a growing number of soldiers serving in Afghanistan are suffering from some kind of mental stress and is urging the military to double the number of mental health professionals deployed there. The study, conducted by the Army Mental Health Advisory Team, found that soldiers’ morale in Afghanistan is ’significantly lower’ than it was in 2005 and 2007 studies…”

As wounded soldiers return from Afghanistan and Iraq, they are finding a healthcare system that is increasingly more difficult and costly to get care from. In fact, 2,266 US veterans died in 2008 due to lack of healthcare, and “researchers also found that, in 2008, 1,461,615 veterans between the ages of 18 and 64 lacked insurance.”

Despite all of this, in another devastating example of how the economy is unraveling US society, military enlistment levels have reached a high. In a report by the Washington Post headlined: “A Historic Success In Military Recruiting” they reveal:

“For the first time in more than 35 years, the U.S. military has met all of its annual recruiting goals, as hundreds of thousands of young people have enlisted despite the near-certainty that they will go to war.

The Pentagon… said the economic downturn and rising joblessness, as well as bonuses and other factors, had led more qualified youths to enlist. The military has not seen such across-the-board successes since the all-volunteer force was established.…

‘We delivered beyond anything the framers of the all-volunteer force would have anticipated,’ Bill Carr, deputy undersecretary of defense for military personnel policy, said at a Pentagon news conference.

Overall, the Defense Department brought in 168,900 active-duty troops, or 103 percent of the goal for the fiscal year….”

What we are witnessing here with such high enlistment levels during this economic crisis has many parallels to Germany in the 1930’s. Just like the United States now, the German economy in the 1930’s was devastated by an economic crisis brought on by Wall Street. With rising unemployment and poverty, German men turned to the military for income and health benefits that their family severely needed. With over 25 million US citizens unemployed and underemployed, over 50 million with no healthcare, and over 50 million living in poverty, military service is now a last resort for a growing number of desperate Americans as well. The record-breaking enlistment numbers are expected to continue to rise as the economy continues to decline.

“Such a perfect democracy constructs its own inconceivable foe, terrorism. Its wish is to be judged by its enemies rather than by its results.”
– Guy DeBord, Comments On the Society of the Spectacle, 1988

II: THE MILITARIZED ECONOMY

The amount of money necessary to keep the US military machine growing has reached astonishing levels. Considering the increasing amount of troops and contractors, the White House estimates that it spends one million dollars per soldier, per year in Afghanistan, “not including the added expense of training and maintaining a security force.”

According to these calculations, 30,000 troops for this latest surge will add an additional $30 billion to the annual budget, just in troop related costs. Also consider the price of moving fuel around, AFP reports: “Moving soldiers and supplies across the rugged Afghan landscape costs more than in Iraq, with the military consuming 83 liters or 22 gallons of fuel per soldier per day.” The Hill adds: “Pentagon officials have told the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee a gallon of fuel costs the military about $400 by the time it arrives in the remote locations in Afghanistan where U.S. troops operate.”

Other than in Iraq and Afghanistan, you have an unprecedented number of military bases spread throughout the world. Officially there are “900 military facilities in 46 countries and territories (the unofficial figure is far greater). The US military owns or rents 795,000 acres of land, with 26,000 buildings and structures, valued at $146bn. The bases bristle with an inventory of weapons whose worth is measured in the trillions and whose killing power could wipe out all life on earth several times over. The official figures exclude the huge build-up of troops and structures in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past decade, as well as secret or unacknowledged facilities in Israel, Kuwait, the Philippines and many other places. In just three years of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, £2bn was spent on military construction.”

There was public outcry when Bush drastically raised an already bloated military budget to record highs. But in comes the admired anti-war candidate Obama, in the middle of a severe economic crisis, and what happens? Obama drastically increased Bush’s record budget to $651 billion in 2009. Yes, during a severe economic crisis, Obama actually increased Bush’s budget. US military spending is higher than the rest of the world combined. The 2010 budget, which doesn’t account for war-related spending yet, is already set to grow to $680 billion.

However, these budget numbers are deceiving because the Obama Administration has been getting better at hiding extra spending in other budget items. The actual total 2009 budget was over $1 trillion.

And much like the staggering giveaway to the economic elite in the Wall Street banker bailout, no one is really sure where a significant percentage of this money is actually going. On September 10, 2001, Donald Rumsfeld announced that $2.3 trillion in military spending was unaccounted for. As CBS News reported: “$2.3 trillion - that’s $8,000 for every man, woman and child in America.”

At that time, Pentagon auditors admitted that they couldn’t account for a staggering 25% of all military spending. And the budget has exploded since then, with fewer people accounting for where this money is going.

Once again, just like the $23.7 trillion that went into propping up the Wall Street elite - which totals $80,000 for every American - you have trillions more in taxpayer money vanishing and very few regulating and accounting for it.

Other than this staggering loss of taxpayer money, any serious economist will tell you “that military spending increases unemployment and decreases economic growth.”

Economists Joseph E. Stiglitz and Linda J. Bilmes, in their book “The Three Trillion Dollar War,” report that military spending on the war in Iraq has created over a trillion dollars in loses to the US economy.

On top of all the looting of taxpayer money that is occurring, “several powerful House committee chairmen have proposed a surtax on Americans to pay the future military costs.”

With the country already operating at a record $12 trillion deficit, members of congress don’t know how we can afford increasing an already huge war expenditure.

WEAPONS SALES

In this struggling economy, weapon sales have become one of America’s most booming businesses. US weapon sales have hit a record level under the Obama administration. Foreign Policy In Focus reports:

“In fiscal year 2008, the foreign military sales program sold $36 billion in weapons and defense articles, an increase of more than 50% over 2007. Sales for the first half of 2009 reached $27 billion, and could top out at $40 billion by the end of the year. In contrast, through the early 2000s, arms sales averaged between $8-13 billion per year….

But last year, the United States sold arms or military services to well over 100 nations….

… the majority of U.S. arms sales to the developing world went to countries that our own State Department defined as undemocratic regimes and/or major human rights abusers. And over two-thirds of the world’s active conflicts involved weapons that had been supplied by the United States.”

Selling all these weapons, especially during the biggest global financial crisis, will lead to one thing… terrorism.

Given these statistics, it shouldn’t be a surprise to hear how US taxpayer dollars are still funding the Taliban. Prior to the 9/11 attacks, the Taliban government was funded by the US taxpayer. In fact, the Taliban still receives a significant portion of their funding courtesy of the US taxpayer. As The Nation recently reported: “It is an accepted fact of the military logistics operation in Afghanistan that the US government funds the very forces American troops are fighting. And it is a deadly irony, because these funds add up to a huge amount of money for the Taliban. ‘It’s a big part of their income,’ one of the top Afghan government security officials told The Nation in an interview. In fact, US military officials in Kabul estimate that a minimum of 10 percent of the Pentagon’s logistics contracts–hundreds of millions of dollars–consists of payments to insurgents.”

As former CIA Station Chief John Stockwell explained: “Enemies are necessary for the wheels of the US military machine to turn.”

With the war in Afghanistan now entering it’s 9th year, senior military commanders and a growing number of experts have come to the conclusion that this war is unwinnable and will fuel terrorism.

However, they all seem to be missing the point, before explaining this in more detail, let me start by referring you to a quote from a journalist who had firsthand experience operating inside a militaristic empire:

“The war is not supposed to be winnable, it is supposed to be continuous… all for the hierarchy of society… The essential act of war is destruction, not necessarily of human lives, but of the products of human labor. War is a way of shattering to pieces, or pouring into the stratosphere, or sinking in the depths of the sea, materials which might otherwise be used to make the masses too comfortable, and hence, in the long run, too intelligent… it helps to preserve the special mental atmosphere that a hierarchical society needs. War… is now a purely internal affair.” — George Orwell

III: MASTERS OF WAR

“Come you masters of war
You that build all the guns
You that build the death planes
You that hide behind walls
You that hide behind desks
I just want you to know,
I can see through your mask…”

Many of the weapons manufactures and private military contractors are seen as the primary war profiteers. For an example of grotesque war profiteering, let’s look at Dick Cheney’s former company Halliburton. In a report headlined: “U.S. War Privatization Results in Billions Lost in Fraud, Waste and Abuse,” Jeremy Scahill reports on KBR, a Halliburton subsidiary.

“KBR has been paid nearly $32 billion since 2001. In May, April Stephenson, director of the Defense Contract Audit Agency, testified that KBR was linked to ‘the vast majority’ of war-zone fraud cases and a majority of the $13 billion in ‘questioned’ or ‘unsupported’ costs. According to Agency, it sent the inspector general ‘a total of 32 cases of suspected overbilling, bribery and other violations since 2004.

According to the Associated Press, which obtained an early copy of the commission’s report, ‘billions of dollars’ of the total paid to KBR ‘ended up wasted due to poorly defined work orders, inadequate oversight and contractor inefficiencies.’

KBR is at the center of a lethal scandal involving the electrocution deaths of more than a dozen US soldiers, allegedly as a result of faulty electrical work done by the company. The DoD paid KBR more than $80 million in bonuses for the very work that resulted in the electrocution deaths.”

With numerous scandals over KBR operations, Halliburton ended it’s relationship with the company. However, “Halliburton reported $4 billion in operating profits in 2008, while KBR recently said its first quarter revenues in 2009 were up 27%, for a total of $3.2 billion. Its sales in 2008 were up 33%, and according to the Financial Times, the company had $1 billion in cash, no debt, and was looking for acquisitions.”

Beyond these blatant examples of war profiteering, there are more insidious forces at play that most people don’t see. These war profiteering companies are funded by the same banks that have destroyed the US economy.

Consider this example concerning Alliant Techsystems and Textron, two manufactures of cluster bombs, the controversial civilian killing WMDs. The Guardian reported:

“The deadly trade in cluster bombs is funded by the world’s biggest banks who have loaned or arranged finance worth $20bn to firms producing the controversial weapons, despite growing international efforts to ban them…

Goldman Sachs, the US bank which made £3.19bn profit in just three months, earned $588.82m for bank services and lent $250m to Alliant Techsystems and Textron…

Last December 90 countries, including the UK, committed themselves to banning cluster bombs by next year. But the US was not one of them. So far 23 countries have ratified the convention.”

Before going into further detail on how these banks make a lion’s share of war profits, let’s look back at the origins of these wars.

GEO-STRATEGIC OIL OPERATIONS

With all due respect to people who have been force-fed Pentagon propaganda by the US mainstream media, any serious observer of the Iraq and Af-Pak wars knows that these are geo-strategic conflicts based on controlling the world’s oil supply. Anyone in the “news” media who tells you otherwise is either unaware of what is actually going on, or is a well-paid propagandist working for the very people who profit off of them.

ORIGINS OF THE IRAQ OCCUPATION: CHENEY ENERGY TASK FORCE

As an AlterNet report put it: “In January 2000, 10 days into President George W. Bush’s first term, representatives of the largest oil and energy companies joined the new administration to form the Cheney Energy Task Force.”

Secret Task Force documents that were dated March 2001, which were obtained by Judical Watch in 2003 after a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, contained “a map of Iraqi oilfields, pipelines, refineries and terminals, as well as two charts detailing Iraqi oil and gas projects…” They also had:

“… a series of lists titled ‘Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oilfield Contracts‘ naming more than 60 companies from some 30 countries with contracts in various stages of negotiation.

None of contracts were with American nor major British companies, and none could take effect while the U.N. Security Council sanctions against Iraq remained in place. Three countries held the largest contracts: China, Russia and France — all members of the Security Council and all in a position to advocate for the end of sanctions.

Were Saddam to remain in power and the sanctions to be removed, these contracts would take effect, and the U.S. and its closest ally would be shut out of Iraq’s great oil bonanza.”

Project Censored highlighted a Judicial Watch report that stated: “Documented plans of occupation and exploitation predating September 11 confirm heightened suspicion that U.S. policy is driven by the dictates of the energy industry. According to Judicial Watch President, Tom Fitton, ‘These documents show the importance of the Energy Task Force and why its operations should be open to the public.’”

ORIGINS OF THE AFGHANISTAN OCCUPATION: “STRATEGY OF THE SILK ROUTE”

Up until 9/11, oil companies, with the help of the Bush administration, were desperately trying to work out a deal with the Taliban to build an oil pipeline through Afghanistan. One of the world’s richest oil fields is on the eastern shore of the Caspian sea just north of Afghanistan. The Caspian oil reserves are of top strategic importance in the quest to control the earth’s remaining oil supply. The US government developed a policy called “The Strategy of the Silk Route.”

The policy was designed to lock out Russia, China and Iran from the oil in this region. This called for U.S. corporations to construct an oil pipeline running through Afghanistan. Since the mid 1990s, a consortium of U.S. companies led by Unocal have been pursing this goal. A feasibility study of the Central Asian pipeline project was performed by Enron. Their study concluded that as long as the country was split among fighting warlords the pipeline could not be built. Stability was necessary for the $4.5 billion project and the U.S. believed that the Taliban would impose the necessary order. The U.S. State Department and Pakistan’s ISI, impressed by the Taliban movement to cut a pipeline deal, agreed to funnel arms and funding to the Taliban in their war for control of Afghanistan.

“Until 1999 U.S. taxpayers paid the entire annual salary of every single Taliban government official.”

The U.S., Saudi and Pakistan intelligence alliance that created the terrorist financing bank BCCI reunited to facilitate the rise of the Taliban. BCCI was a US intelligence bank, which served as the financing arm for the creation of the al-Qaida network. BCCI was involved in many covert operations throughout the 80’s and early 90’s. They played a pivotal role in arming Saddam in Iraq, the Iran-Contra scandal, the Iran hostage crisis, even selling drugs through Manuel Noriega and other top drug dealers. BCCI gave nuclear weapons to Pakistan, which led to North Korea and Iran obtaining pivotal nuclear secrets as well. BCCI was also a driving force behind the Savings and Loan scandals that were a precursor to our current economic crisis.

Focusing on the creation of the Taliban, let’s read an excerpt from a 2003 book, “ Modern Jihad: Tracing the Dollars Behind the Terror Networks,” by Loretta Napoleoni:

“The alliance between American capitalism and Islamist fundamentalism is not limited to the creation of the Taliban; it also produced business ventures designed to extract favours from the new regime. To strengthen its bargaining power with the newly formed Islamist state, Unocal joined the Saudi Delta Oil Corporation to create a consortium called CentGas. Delta Oil is owned by the bin Mahfouz and al-Amoudi families [pivotal BCCI players], Saudi clans which have strong links with Osama bin Laden’s family…. Mahfouz has been sponsoring charitable institutions used as fronts for bin Laden’s associates through the National Commercial Bank, which his family controls….

Naturally, as soon as George W. Bush was elected president, Unocal and [UK’s] BP-Amoco… started once again to lobby the administration, among whom were several of their former employees. Unocal knew that Bush was ready to back them and resumed the consortium negotiations. In January 2001, it began discussions with the Taliban, backed by members of the Bush administration among whom was Under Secretary of State Richard Armitage, who had previously worked as a lobbyist for Unocal. The Taliban, for their part, employed as their PR officer in the US Laila Helms, niece of Richard Helms, former director of the CIA and former US ambassador to Iran. In March 2001, Helms succeeded in bringing Rahmatullah Hashami, Mullah Omar’s adviser, to Washington…. As late as August 2001, meetings were held in Pakistan to discuss the pipeline business….

While negotiations were underway, the US was secretly making plans to invade Afghanistan. The Bush administration and its oil sponsors were losing patience with the Taliban; they wanted to get the Central Asian gas pipeline going as soon as possible. The ‘strategy of the Silk Route’ had been resumed….

Paradoxically, 11 September provided Washington with a casus belli to invade Afghanistan and establish a pro American government in the country. When, a few weeks after the attack, the leaders of the two Pakistani Islamist parties negotiated with Mullah Omar and bin Laden for the latter’s extradition to Pakistan to stand trial for the 11 September attacks, the US refused the offer….

In November 2001… Hamid Karzai was elected [Afghanistan’s] prime minister… Yet very few people remember that during the 1990’s Karzai was involved in negotiations with the Taliban regime for the construction of a Central Asian gas pipeline from Turkmenistan through western Afghanistan to Pakistan. At that time he was a top adviser and lobbyist for Unocal… during the anti-Soviet jihad, Karzai was a member of the Mujahedin. In the early 1990’s, thanks to his excellent contacts with the ISI, he moved to the US where he cooperated with the CIA and the ISI in supporting the Taliban’s political adventure.”

So it is not all that surprising to see recent reports revealing that Hamid Karzai’s drug kingpin brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, is also on the CIA payroll.

With this, a new Senate investigation just revealed evidence that Donald Rumsfeld made a conscious strategic decision to let Bin Laden escape. AFP reports:

“Osama bin Laden was within the grasp of US forces in late 2001 and could have been caught if then-defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld hadn’t rejected calls for reinforcements, a hard-hitting US Senate report says….

It points the finger directly at Rumsfeld for turning down requests for reinforcements as Bin Laden was trapped in caves and tunnels in a mountainous section of eastern Afghanistan known as Tora Bora.

‘The vast array of American military power, from sniper teams to the most mobile divisions of the marine corps and the army, was kept on the sidelines,’ the report said.”

So now that we see how these wars are driven by oil, let’s look at how the oil industry is benefiting from them. Since the invasion, the industry has experienced record profits across the board, setting new profit records quarter after quarter, year after year, as these wars rage on.

IRAQI OIL DEALS

With Exxon and Shell just signing new oil contracts in Iraq, it’s obvious why there are still over 100,000 troops in Iraq. In a Daily Mirror report headlined, “Oil Billions and Weapons of Mass Deception In Iraq,” they report on the new oil deals:

“Exxon-Mobil and Royal Dutch Shell won the development rights of a massive oil field — West Qurna near Basra in Iraq’s south. The two oil giants hope to boost daily production from the current 300,000 barrels to 2.3 million barrels a day at West Qurna, which the ousted and hanged Iraqi President Saddam Hussein wanted to give to a Russian oil company.

Last month, British Petroleum (BP) and the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) won a contract to develop another oil field. The invitation to China to join the plunder of Iraq is probably a payoff by the US so that this Asian economic powerhouse and rising military power would not rock the pirates’ boat.”

Let’s look back over the years since the start of the War on Terror, here’s a 2005 MSNBC report:

“By just about any measure, the past three years have produced one of the biggest cash gushers in the oil industry’s history. Since January of 2002, the price of crude has tripled, leaving oil producers awash in profits. During that period, the top 10 major public oil companies have sold some $1.5 trillion worth of crude, pocketing profits of more than $125 billion.

“This is the mother of all booms,” said Oppenheimer & Co. oil analyst Fadel Gheit. “They have so much profit, it’s almost an embarrassment of riches. They don’t know what to do with it.

So an oil field that was profitable with oil selling for $20 a barrel is much more profitable with oil trading around $60…. Since January 2002, stocks of major oil companies have gained 88 percent; during that period the Standard and Poor’s 500 index has gained less than half as much.

Oil producers have also given investors a raise by gradually increasing the dividends paid out to shareholders.”

Here’s a 2007 Public Citizen report summing up oil company wartime profits:

“Since George Bush became President in 2001, the top five oil companies in the United States have recorded profits of $464 billion through the first quarter of 2007:

ExxonMobil: $158.5 billion
Shell: $108.5 billion
BP: $89.2 billion
ChevronTexaco: $60.9 billion
ConocoPhillips: $46.9 billion”

In Febuary 2008, CNN reported:

“Exxon shatters profit records

Oil giant makes corporate history by booking $11.7 billion in quarterly profit; earns $1,300 a second in 2007.

Exxon Mobil made history on Friday by reporting the highest quarterly and annual profits ever for a U.S. company, boosted in large part by soaring crude prices.

Exxon, the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, said fourth-quarter net income rose 14% to $11.66 billion, or $2.13 per share. The company earned $10.25 billion, or $1.76 per share, in the year-ago period.

The profit topped Exxon’s previous quarterly record of $10.7 billion, set in the fourth quarter of 2005, which also was an all-time high for a U.S. corporation.”

In January 2009, during a severe economic crisis, the Washington Post reported:

“Exxon Mobil finished a roller-coaster year in the oil markets with an all-time record $45.2 billion in profits…

The world’s most far-flung oil giant broke its own record for corporate profits in a year that saw oil prices climb to $147 a barrel in July… Exxon Mobil still beat analysts’ expectations by registering $7.82 billion in profits, or $1.55 a share, for the final quarter of the year. Exxon Mobil and Chevron’s revenue combined for 2008 exceeded the gross domestic product of all but 16 of the world’s nations, according to Bloomberg.

Royal Dutch Shell, Europe’s largest oil firm… posted a $26.3 billion profit for the year.”

Once again, beyond these blatant examples of war profiteering, there are more insidious forces at play that most people don’t see. When you take a closer look at the oil profits, you see the true driver and ultimate beneficiary of these profits are none other than the same people who benefited the most from the stock market collapse and the ensuing $23.7 trillion taxpayer “bailout.”

As the Washington Post reported, the huge oil profit margins were the result of the soaring price of a barrel of oil, reaching “$147 a barrel in July.”

The InterContinental Exchange (ICE)

In 2000, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and several oil companies “founded the InterContinental Exchange (ICE)…. ICE is an online commodities and futures marketplace. It is outside the US and operates free from the constraints of US laws. The exchange was set up to facilitate ‘dark pool’ trading in the commodities markets.”

A Congressional investigation into this exchange found that these companies were fraudulently inflating the price of oil by executing “round-trip” trades where one company would sell shares in oil to another company who would then sell the shares right back. This would drive the price of oil to however high they wanted it to go to. “No commodity ever changes hands. But when done on an exchange, these transactions send a price signal to the market and they artificially boost revenue for the company. This is nothing more than a massive fraud, pure and simple.”

So when oil was selling at $147 a barrel, the actual worth was most likely closer to half that price. Phil’s Stock World summed up the situation:

“How widespread are ’round-trip’ trades? The Congressional Research Service looked at trading patterns in the energy sector and this is what they reported: This pattern of trading suggests a market environment in which a significant volume of fictitious trading could have taken place. Yet since most of the trading is unregulated by the Government, we have only a slim idea of the illusion being perpetrated in the energy sector.

DMS Energy, when investigated by Congress, admitted that 80 percent of its trades in 2001 were ’round-trip’ trades. That means 80 percent of all of their trades that year were bogus trades where no commodity changed hands, and yet the balance sheets reflect added revenue…

…the InterContinental Exchange; that is, the online, nonregulated, nonaudited, nonoversight for manipulation and fraud entity run by banks in this country….

Under investigation, a lawyer for J.P. Morgan Chase admitted the bank engineered a series of ’round-trip’ trades with Enron….

ICE… turned commodity trading into a speculative casino game where pricing was notional and contracts could be sold by people who never produced a thing, to people who didn’t need the things that were not produced. And in just 5 years after commencing operations, Goldman Sachs and their partners managed to TRIPLE the price of commodities.

Goldman Sachs Commodity Index funds accounted for $60Bn out of $100Bn of all formula-managed funds in 2007 and investors in the GSCI lost 15% in 2006 while Goldman had a record year. John Dizard, of the Financial Times calls this process ‘date rape’ by Goldman Sachs…

It is not surprising that a commodity scam would be the cornerstone of Goldman Sach’s strategy. CEO Lloyd Blankfein, rose to the top through Goldman’s commodity trading arm J Aron, starting his career at J Aron before Goldman Sachs bought them over 25 years ago. With his colleague Gary Cohn, Blankfein oversaw the key energy trading portfolio. According to Chris Cook: ‘It appears clear that BP and Goldman Sachs have been working collaboratively – at least at a strategic level - for maybe 15 years now. Their trading strategy has evolved over time as the global market has developed and become ever more financialised. Moreover, they have been well placed to steer the development of the key global energy market trading platform, and the legal and regulatory framework within which it operates….

Before ICE, the average American family spent 7% of their income on food and fuel. Last year, that number topped 20%. That’s 13% of the incomes of every man, woman and child in the United States of America, over $1Tn EVERY SINGLE YEAR, stolen through market manipulation. On a global scale, that number is over $4Tn per year - 80 Madoffs! Why is there no outrage, why are there no investigations. Well the answer is the same - $4Tn per year buys you a lot of political clout, it pays to have politicians all over the world look the other way while GS and their merry men rob from the poor and give to the rich on such a vast scale that it’s hard to grasp the damage they have done and continue to do to the global economy.”

The congressional investigation into ICE concluded that they couldn’t do anything about it because the exchange was set up offshore.

How convenient!

So here we can see, that behind almost all of our societal problems and suffering, you have this small elite group profiting on destruction and misery at record highs.

When Gold Sachs CEO Llyod Blankfien says that he is doing “God’s work,” one has to wonder, who is the God he is praying to?

Famed two-time Congressional Medal of Honor recipient US Brigadier General Smedley D. Butler accurately summed up the situation when he said: “I spent 33 years in the Marines, most of my time being a high-class muscle man for big business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer for Capitalism…. The general public shoulders the bill. This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones, Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations.”

WHAT IT ALL COMES DOWN TO…

In the global economy, the economic elite don’t need the US public anymore. When you see Obama taking trips to meet with the leader of China, and having his first official White House State Dinner in honor of the Prime Minster of India, you should know that the elite have moved on. There are billions of people in just these two countries that they believe can do all the work we do for much less pay. It is a race to the bottom, and we are considered obsolete to technocratic leaders who think it is better to hire cheaper workers in foreign lands.

As the US continues to collapse, the technocrats have already moved on to the next country to rape and pillage. The economic elite don’t have a home country, to them the entire globe is theirs, and the majority of the US can collapse into poverty for all they care, and that’s exactly what they want to happen.

The US working class is the biggest threat to them and they want us eliminated.

As the IMF would say, there has been a structural adjustment program in place, and the US working class is obsolete.

When you understand this, you can understand how the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan are wars against the US public. Wars that weaken and drain the US working class of vital resources and social safety nets.

In the overall picture, the technocratic elite see everyone as a number on a spreadsheet. To them you are what your economic net worth says you are. Considering this perspective, most in the US public have much more in common with an Afghanistan farmer than the billionaires on Wall Street. And the billionaires have put us in the same category as those in Afghanistan. To them it really doesn’t matter if it’s an American life ended or an Afghani life ended in the war, as long as the profits keep coming in… they can care less.

Common sense and statistics demonstrate that the more troops you send into war, the higher the causality count will be, and the more costs will rise, leading, of course, to higher profits.

So as the Obama illusion and the motives behind this war become exposed, and the massive theft by the economic elite becomes known to a critical mass, the elite are ramping up their psychological operations on the US public by turning up their mainstream media distraction machine.

PSYOPS: WAG THE DOG AND SHAKE THE MOHAMMED

With the healthcare debate losing steam, and the people starting to understand that the final bill will do little to create much needed change, and as “health care reform” is exposed as another gift to insurance company executives, and as unemployment rates remain high, the Economic Death Squad vitally needs some new distractions.

Never mind the criminals on Wall Street: It’s time to… Wag the Dog and Shake the Mohammed

By Wag the Dog, I am of course referring to the old political trick of distracting public consciousness away from a crisis by starting, or in this case drastically escalating, a war.

Don’t worry about the $23.7 trillion of public wealth that was given to Wall Street as a reward for destroying the economy, we are at war and it’s time for you to support our troops.

Ah, yes, another racket to pile up more of the economic poor.

Barack W. Obama, once again, bows to… the elite… and serves up yet another gift by sending more US citizens to the Af-Pak region.

50 million US citizens are already living in dire straights, so what’s the big deal if you just throw another 220,000 US lives onto the fire, not to mention the millions of Afghani, Pakistani and Iraqi lives.

But a war in a distant land just isn’t enough, is it?

American public opinion has long been saturated in the distraction of war, and given the severity of the economic crisis, the elite policy makers figured another surge in Eurasia just wouldn’t be enough of a distraction.

So the psychological operations PR department has decided to also Shake the Muhammad. Yes, bring the 9/11 “mastermind,” Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, back to the scene of the crime and create a New York media frenzy. Now that’s a distraction!

Not only will it cause a media frenzy, it will also reaffirm public opinion in the war effort… win, win!

I don’t know about you, but as someone who grew up a New Yorker and spent the last five years of my life living three blocks from Ground Zero, I have to say, take your psychological operations to a different location.

You are going to have the “9/11 mastermind” in a courtroom right around the corner from the biggest terrorists of all… Wall Street.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Llyod Blankfien, Jamie Dimon and John Mack are all going to be in one place, at the same time! We will have the “9/11 mastermind,” Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley all in the same zip code… HELLO!

Can you say here comes the next Timothy McVeigh?

Yes, the USA… is an insane asylum! So just Wag the Dog and Shake the Mohammed.

U.S. Insurgency: Violent, Strategic Dislocation Within U.S.

Will there be a violent insurgency within the US?

As a growing number of American lives are directly negatively impacted, media propaganda operations will lose their ability to confuse and distract. Studies of societal breakdowns prove that having such a large population experiencing severe and prolonged economic decline will result in violent outbrakes.

Other than the 50 million US civilians living in dire straights, what will happen as thousands of bitter soldiers and US intelligence agents — who have given their lives to these wars, only to return home to find an economy in ruins and a healthcare system that has thrown them overboard — begin to make these connections and understand that a small group of men on Wall Street are at the root of their suffering?

Well, some former military and intelligence agents, including a growing number of current serving members, have already made this connection, and they are organizing, training and strategizing tactical operations. They are factions inside a quickly growing - heavily armed - militia movement that now numbers over 200 active cells, within the US.

The mainstream press gives some passing attention to the fringe factions that make threats against Obama, but the more experienced soldiers understand that he is just a figurehead and they have connected all these dots and have come to the conclusion that this war is actually a war to create profits for the economic elite at the expense of the US public.

Llyod Blankfein, Jamie Dimon and John Mack can arm themselves and hire all the security they can get, but will it actually keep them safe when you have a population of millions living in dire straights as a direct result of their actions? At this point, even their own security members may be conspiring against them.

The Obama illusion is fading fast. Every time you see through it, you get a glimpse of them. The Economic Death Squad is exposed under the bright light of inspection and investigation.

Take a look at many of the major problems facing us today, as a country and as a species, and then you will understand that these problems exist because the economic elite are profiting off of them.

Obama is just their mask, an illusion to pacify the masses. The economic crisis and the wars have now shattered this illusion - it has come crashing down… upon us.

It has become clear that an opinion has emerged among a growing segment of the United States population: If the government will keep pouring money into banks and war, and won’t stop the theft of US taxpayer money by holding accountable those responsible for it, WE MUST.

And the question that arises after that: Can it be done non-violently?

I certainly hope it can.

However, this growing segment of the population uses strong rhetoric and is prepared to take up arms.

With over 200 active militia cells, who are equipped with weapons, training and strategizing, the government must take swift action to rein in the economic elite. Otherwise, we are heading to war, not in a distant foreign land, within the US.

The economic elite are well aware of the threat of a violent uprising within US borders. US Army documents have revealed that strategic plans are already formed for this situation. Chris Hedges explains:

“The military must be prepared, the document warned, for a ‘violent, strategic dislocation inside the United States,’ which could be provoked by ‘unforeseen economic collapse,’ ‘purposeful domestic resistance,’ ‘pervasive public health emergencies’ or ‘loss of functioning political and legal order.’ The ‘widespread civil violence,’ the document said, ‘would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities in extremis to defend basic domestic order and human security.’

‘An American government and defense establishment lulled into complacency by a long-secure domestic order would be forced to rapidly divest some or most external security commitments in order to address rapidly expanding human insecurity at home,’ it went on.

‘… this might include use of military force against hostile groups inside the United States. Further, DoD [the Department of Defense] would be, by necessity, an essential enabling hub for the continuity of political authority in a multi-state or nationwide civil conflict or disturbance,’ the document read.

In plain English… this translates into the imposition of martial law and a de facto government being run out of the Department of Defense. They are considering it. So should you.”

We could have a situation where the government deploys private soldiers, mostly foreign nationals, on US soil to fight against US citizens. Blackwater and DynCorp already had active duty soldiers deployed within the US when Hurricane Katrina hit.

In New Orleans, they were essentially a foreign occupying force.

LOSS OF FAITH IN POLITICAL PROCESS

In response to the report, “The Critical Unraveling of US Society,” readers primarily critiqued the part in which we call on readers to engage their representatives.

An irate majority of the responses have consistently stated that they have repeatedly contacted their representative through multiple forms of communication, and no action was taken. A growing segment of the US population has now lost all faith in our government and they are on the verge of taking violent action.

Personally, I believe that non-violent action is a much more strategic and effective move. We are 99% of the population, and the enemy is less than 1%. We are a sleeping giant; they are a small group of clueless greed-addicted people who desperately cling to the Administration, Treasury, Fed and a few other firms like Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan.

If we can take action on a mass non-violent scale, the rule of law and economic justice can be obtained. In our nation’s history, the stakes have never been higher. If we cannot organize a mass movement to non-violently oppose outright theft, then violence will ultimately tear our nation apart.

The question on my mind: Can we swiftly mobilize such a heavily propagandized population to take mass non-violent action?

A growing population does not believe we can do so, and is on the verge of launching a heavily armed insurgency.

So in the months ahead, while they are Wagging the Dog and Shaking the Mohammed, the US public vitally needs to understand that the stakes have never been higher.

And the clock is ticking . . .

~ AmpedStatus Report

If you would like to see more of these reports, please consider making a donation to support them.

David Swanson, The More Things Change

http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175109

September 01, 2009
Tomgram: David Swanson, The More Things Change

A presidential candidate opposed to the Iraq War is elected and enters the Oval Office. Yet six months later, there are still essentially the same number of troops in Iraq as were there when his predecessor left, the same number, in fact, used in the original invasion of Iraq in March 2003. Moreover, the new president remains on the "withdrawal" schedule the previous administration laid out for him with the same caveats being issued about whether it can even be met.

That administration also built a humongous, three-quarters-of-a-billion-dollar embassy in Baghdad, undoubtedly the most expensive on the planet. Staffed with approximately 1,000 "diplomats," it was clearly meant to be a massive command center for Iraq (and, given neocon dreams, the region). Last weekend, well into the Obama era, the Washington Post reported that the State Department's yearly budget for "running" that embassy -- $1.5 billion (that is not a misprint) in 2009 -- will actually rise to $1.8 billion for 2010 and 2011. In addition, the Obama administration now plans to invest upwards of a billion dollars in constructing a massive embassy in Islamabad and other diplomatic facilities in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Here, too, there will be a massive influx of "diplomats," and here, too, a U.S. command center for the region is clearly being created.

What's striking are the continuities in American foreign and military policy, no matter who is in the White House. The first-term Obama foreign policy now looks increasingly like the second-term Bush foreign policy. Even where change can be spotted, it regularly seems to follow in the same vein. The New York Times, for instance, recently reported that the controversial "missile defense shield" the Bush administration was insistent on basing in Poland and the Czech Republic is being reconsidered in a many-months-long Obama administration "review." While this should be welcomed, the only option mentioned involved putting it elsewhere -- in Turkey and somewhere in the Balkans. At stake is one of the great military-industrial boondoggles of our age. Yet cancellation is, it seems, beyond consideration in Washington.

Organizer David Swanson, founder among other things of the website AfterDowningStreet.org, was long in the forefront of those calling for the impeachment of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney -- and now for bringing them to trial. He gives the term "activist" a good name and he's a prodigious, energetic, thoughtful writer as well. If you're as struck by today's piece as I was, you should consider giving his new book, Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union, published on this very day, a careful look. He's special. Tom

Bush's Third Term?
You're Living It
By David Swanson

It sounds like the plot for the latest summer horror movie. Imagine, for a moment, that George W. Bush had been allowed a third term as president, had run and had won or stolen it, and that we were all now living (and dying) through it. With the Democrats in control of Congress but Bush still in the Oval Office, the media would certainly be talking endlessly about a mandate for bipartisanship and the importance of taking into account the concerns of Republicans. Can't you just picture it?

There's Dubya now, still rewriting laws via signing statements. Still creating and destroying laws with executive orders. And still violating laws at his whim. Imagine Bush continuing his policy of extraordinary rendition, sending prisoners off to other countries with grim interrogation reputations to be held and tortured. I can even picture him formalizing his policy of preventive detention, sprucing it up with some "due process" even as he permanently removes habeas corpus from our culture.

I picture this demonic president still swearing he doesn't torture, still insisting that he wants to close Guantanamo, but assuring his subordinates that the commander-in-chief has the power to torture "if needed," and maintaining a prison at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan that makes Guantanamo look like summer camp. I can imagine him continuing to keep secret his warrantless spying programs while protecting the corporations and government officials involved.

If Bush were in his third term, we would already have seen him propose, yet again, the largest military budget in the history of the world. We might well have seen him pretend he was including war funding in the standard budget, and then claim that one final supplemental war budget was still needed, immediately after which he would surely announce that yet another war supplemental bill would be needed down the road. And of course, he would have held onto his Secretary of Defense from his second term, Robert Gates, to run the Pentagon, keep our ongoing wars rolling along, and oversee the better part of our public budget.

Bush would undoubtedly be following through on the agreement he signed with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki for all U.S. troops to leave Iraq by the end of 2011 (except where he chose not to follow through). His generals would, in the meantime, be leaking word that the United States never intended to actually leave. He'd surely be maintaining current levels of troops in Iraq, while sending thousands more troops to Afghanistan and talking about a new "surge" there. He'd probably also be escalating the campaign he launched late in his second term to use drone aircraft to illegally and repeatedly strike into Pakistan's tribal borderlands with Afghanistan.

If Bush were still "the decider" he'd be employing mercenaries like Blackwater and propagandists like the Rendon Group and he might even be expanding the number of private security contractors in Afghanistan. In fact, the whole executive branch would be packed with disreputable corporate executive types. You'd have somebody like John ("May I torture this one some more, please?") Rizzo still serving, at least for a while, as general counsel at the CIA. The White House and Justice Department would be crawling with corporate cronies, people like John Brennan, Greg Craig, James Jones, and Eric Holder. Most of the top prosecutors hired at the Department of Justice for political purposes would still be on the job. And political prisoners, like former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman and former top Democratic donor Paul Minor would still be abandoned to their fate.

In addition, the bank bailouts Bush and his economic team initiated in his second term would still be rolling along -- with a similar crowd of people running the show. Ben Bernanke, for instance, would certainly have been reappointed to run the Fed. And Bush's third term would have guaranteed that there would be none of the monkeying around with the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) that the Democrats proposed or promised in their losing presidential campaign. At this point in Bush's third term, no significant new effort would have begun to restore Katrina-decimated New Orleans either.

If the Democrats in Congress attempted to pass any set of needed reforms like, to take an example, new healthcare legislation, Bush, the third termer, would have held secret meetings in the White House with insurance and drug company executives to devise a means to turn such proposals to their advantage. And he would have refused to release the visitor logs so that the American public would have no way of knowing just whom he'd been talking to.

During Bush's second term, some of the lowest ranking torturers from Abu Ghraib were prosecuted as bad apples, while those officials responsible for the policies that led to Abu Ghraib remained untouched. If the public continued to push for justice for torturers during the early months of Bush's third term, he would certainly have gone with another bad apple approach, perhaps targeting only low-ranking CIA interrogators and CIA contractors for prosecution. Bush would undoubtedly have decreed that any higher-ups would not be touched, that we should now be looking forward, not backward. And he would thereby have cemented in place the power of presidents to grant immunity for crimes they themselves authorized.

If Bush were in his third term, some of his first and second term secrets might, by now, have been forced out into the open by lawsuits, but what Americans actually read wouldn't be significantly worse than what we'd already known. What documents saw the light of day would surely have had large portions of their pages redacted, and the vast bulk of documentation that might prove threatening would remain hidden from the public eye. Bush's lawyers would be fighting in court, with ever grander claims of executive power, to keep his wrongdoing out of sight.

Now, here's the funny part. This dark fantasy of a third Bush term is also an accurate portrait of Obama's first term to date. In following Bush, Obama was given the opportunity either to restore the rule of law and the balance of powers or to firmly establish in place what were otherwise aberrant abuses of power. Thus far, President Obama has, in all the areas mentioned above, chosen the latter course. Everything described, from the continuation of crimes to the efforts to hide them away, from the corruption of corporate power to the assertion of the executive power to legislate, is Obama's presidency in its first seven months.

Which doesn't mean there aren't differences in the two moments. For one thing, Democrats have now joined Republicans in approving expanded presidential powers and even -- in the case of wars, military strikes, lawless detention and rendition, warrantless spying, and the obstruction of justice -- presidential crimes. In addition, in the new Democratic era of goodwill, peace and justice movements have been strikingly defunded and, in some cases, even shut down. Many progressive groups now, in fact, take their signals from the president and his team, rather than bringing the public's demands to his doorstep.

If we really were in Bush's third term, people would be far more active and outraged. There would already be a major push to really end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan/Pakistan. Undoubtedly, the Democrats still wouldn't impeach Bush, especially since they'd be able to vote him out before his fourth term, and surely four more years of him wouldn't make all that much difference.

David Swanson is the author of the new book Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union (Seven Stories Press, 2009). He holds a master's degree in philosophy from the University of Virginia and served as press secretary for Kucinich for President in 2004. Swanson is just beginning a book tour of 48 cities and hopes to see you on the road.

US Occupation of Iraq Continues Unabated

http://www.truthout.org/070609J

US Occupation of Iraq Continues Unabated
Monday 06 July 2009
Dahr Jamail, t r u t h o u t
"Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind."
- George Orwell

On July 4 in Baghdad, Vice President Joe Biden, who campaigned with Barack Obama on a platform of ending the occupation of Iraq, found himself in one of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's lavish buildings, the Al-Faw Palace. While one of Saddam Hussein's thrones sat on the side of the room, Biden presided over a swearing-in ceremony for 237 soldiers, who were becoming US citizens. Speaking of the ceremony, Biden said, "We did it in Saddam's palace, and I can think of nothing better. That S.O.B. is rolling over in his grave right now." Perhaps the irony of both the scene and his statement were lost to Biden. For if Saddam Hussein was rolling in his grave, the reason would have less to do with one of his palaces being used as a naturalization center for US soldiers, and more to do with the fact that the US government has no intention of withdrawing from Iraq anytime soon.

We have passed the June 30 deadline that, according to a Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) signed between US Ambassador Ryan Crocker and Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari on November 17, 2008, was the date all US forces were to have been withdrawn from all of Iraq's cities. Today, however, there are at least 134,000 US soldiers in Iraq - a number barely lower than the number that were there in 2003. In addition, US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates testified on June 9 that the United States would maintain an average of at least 100,000 troops in Iraq through fiscal year 2010.

The SOFA is a sieve, and the number of US military personnel in Iraq is remaining largely intact for now. Add to the 134,000 US soldiers almost the exact number of military contractors (132,610 and increasing), 36,061 of which, according to a recent Department of Defense report, are US citizens.

While the military and most corporate media would like you to believe that from now on no US soldiers will step foot in Iraqi cities, US military patrols in them are ongoing and will continue.

In addition, there has been an assumption that all US military bases within Iraqi city limits would be moved. For example, US Army Forward Operating Base Falcon, home to 3,000 US troops, is clearly within the city limits of Baghdad. But US military officials, working with Iraqis in the US-supported Iraqi government, have other ideas. "We and the Iraqis decided it wasn't in the city," a military official told the Christian Science Monitor. Thus, city lines are redrawn, to the convenience of the US military, to render certain bases and forward operating bases "outside" of Iraqi cities.

While military commanders claim to have handed over 142 military outposts around Iraq to the Iraqis, US troops will continue to occupy 320 other outposts around Iraq.

Meanwhile, the Democratically controlled Congress just passed a war-spending bill that allocated over $100 billion more for the ongoing occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan, and the military (and military contractors) in Iraq is busily expanding and augmenting new bases in rural areas of Iraq. In fact, they are even building new bases in Iraq.

Furthermore, at least 50,000 troops will remain in Iraq until at least the end of 2011, despite the fact that, according to the SOFA, all US "combat" forces will leave Iraq by December 31, 2011.

A July 30 referendum vote on the SOFA is scheduled to take place in Iraq. Despite attempts by the Obama administration to postpone the referendum, it appears as though the vote will take place. Considering the fact that according to recent polls, 73 percent of Iraqis oppose the presence of US forces, the referendum, if legitimate, will put the Obama administrations long-term plans for Iraq in jeopardy as the vote could force US forces out of Iraq as they would no longer be under the legal "protection" of the SOFA.

Although we can only speculate as to whether the referendum will actually reflect the will of the Iraqi people, there will be one of two outcomes:

1. Due to Kurdish and Sunni opposition to the withdrawal of US forces, Maliki postpones the referendum. The US, which is also interested in maintaining the SOFA, supports Maliki in the delay they (Obama administration) have previously pushed for.

2. The Maliki regime overcomes this opposition and does not interfere with the carrying out of the vote or the results of the referendum, which will most likely reflect the will of the Iraqi people to have US forces withdraw from Iraq completely. This would mean the Maliki regime does not want US forces to remain in Iraq, feels strong enough to finally stand on its own and is prepared to settle scores with the formerly US-backed Sahwa forces (Sunni militia), to establish absolute control in Baghdad.

Regardless of the outcome, it is clear that Iraq is further down the road of Balkanization, a plan that Biden has supported for years -to have Iraq split into three rump states. There is already evidence for this - for as Iraqi refugees in Syria and Jordan have been forced to return home due to funding to support them having been cut due to the Maliki regime pressuring hosting countries, as well as the UN, to have them return. Those returning have been unable to return to their homes. Instead, they are being forced to relocate to either Sunni or Shia areas. Moreover, the Iraqi government has been making no effort to help them return to their original homes, which indicates the Maliki regime is interested in supporting the Balkanization of Iraq.

Nevertheless, again we find the US policy of long-term, indefinite occupation of Iraq to be at loggerheads with the will of the vast majority of the Iraqi people.

From June 28 to July 5, at least 82 Iraqis were killed and 225 wounded, which amounts to another typical week of US occupation of their country. Let us watch how the Obama administration reacts to the referendum at the end of this month, since President Obama is clearly not interested in withdrawing from Iraq anymore than he is interested in a withdrawal from Afghanistan.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dahr Jamail, an independent journalist, is the author of "Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches From an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq," (Haymarket Books, 2007). Jamail reported from occupied Iraq for eight months as well as from Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Turkey over the last four years.

Yale & Geronimo's Skull

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/02/17/geronimos-great-grandson-asks-yale-fraternity-return-ancestors-skull/

Geronimo's Great Grandson Asks Yale Secret Society to Return Ancestor's Skull
The great grandson of Geronimo says he wants to know whether Skull and Bones secret society at Yale University has the remains of the famous Apache chief and shaman.
By Stephen Clark
FOXNews.com
Tuesday, February 17, 2009

It's the stuff of legends: an elite secret society that includes what would become some of the most powerful men of the 20th century allegedly invading the grave of an Apache chief to steal his skull for fraternal rituals. It's also the stuff of a new lawsuit filed Tuesday by descendents of that Apache chief.

On the 100th anniversary of the death of Geronimo, 20 of his blood relatives have asked the courts to force Yale University and the school's secret organization, Skull and Bones, to release his remains for return to his native land and a proper burial.

The lawsuit also names President Obama, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Army Secretary Pete Geren as defendants because they are responsible for maintaining Geronimo's remains on a U.S. Army base in Oklahoma, the group said.

"I believe it's a good cause because indigenous people over the century have been annihilated, removed from their homeland," said Geronimo's great grandson, Harlyn Geronimo, at a press conference in Washington, D.C.

Skull and Bones has never said whether any of Geronimo's remains are in its possession. The descendants say they are investigating long-held claims that in 1918, members of Skull and Bones, including Prescott Bush, the father of George H.W Bush and grandfather of George W. Bush, invaded Geronimo's grave at Ft. Sill and stole his skull, some bones and other items buried with him.

"In this lawsuit, we're going to find out if the bones are there or not," said the group's lawyer, said the group's lawyer, Ramsey Clark, who was attorney general in President Lyndon Johnson's administration.

Gila Reinstein, a spokeswoman for Yale University, said she is unaware of the lawsuit, but Yale can add nothing to the mystery of the Indian chief's whereabouts.

"To the best of my knowledge, Yale University has no relics or bones belonging to Geronimo," she said, adding that she couldn't speak on behalf of Skull and Bones because it is independent of the university.

Geronimo fought for decades against Mexican and American expansion into tribal lands. He and his small band of Apaches surrendered to U.S. troops in 1886 and were sent to Florida as prisoners of war before being transferred to Alabama.

Five years later, he was sent to Ft. Sill, where he lived the rest of his life as a free-range prisoner. Geronimo became a celebrity in the twilight of his life, appearing at fairs and selling souvenirs and photographs of himself. He died of pneumonia in 1909 at Ft. Sill and was buried at the Apache Indian Prisoner of War Cemetery on the military base.

Three members of the Skull and Bones, including Prescott Bush, served as Army volunteers at Fort Sill during World War I. They are accused of stealing the items which supposedly are used in initiation ceremonies. One alleged ritual includes kissing Geronimo's skull.

Geronimo said he's bringing the lawsuit now after contemplating it over the past decade because he has the time to do it after retiring from a tribal council in 2000. Clark added that at the 100th anniversary of the shaman's death, "We really thought it would be a good time to say enough is enough."

Geronimo said he has appealed to former President Bush for help in returning the remains.

"According to our traditions the remains of this sort, especially in this state when the grave was desecrated, need to be reburied with the proper rituals to return the dignity and let his spirits rest in peace."

Asked why he didn't appeal to Obama first, Geronimo said he thought Obama may be too busy to heed his request.

Moscow reacts to US buildup in Afghanistan

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_4330.shtml

Moscow reacts to US buildup in Afghanistan
By F. William Engdahl
Online Journal Contributing Writer
Feb 6, 2009

Moscow has correctly assessed that the announced Obama troop buildup in Afghanistan has no relevance to the stated aim of combatting the ‘Taliban,’ but rather with a new attempt by the Pentagon strategists to encircle both Russia and China in Eurasia in order to retain US global military dominance. It is not waiting for a new policy from Washington. Rather Russia is acting to secure its perimeter in Central Asia through a series of calculated geopolitical moves reminiscent of the famous Great Game of more than a Century ago. The stakes in this geopolitical power game could not be higher -- the issue of world war or peace in the coming decade.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen are asking Obama to double US troop presence in Afghanistan. Both Gates and Mullen said that while they’re thinking about the war in Afghanistan in terms of a three- to five-year time frame, their immediate goals are ‘unclear.’ That’s highly revealing. It is clear from the deliberate pattern over months, despite vehement protest from Pakistan’s government, of US bombing attacks on villages inside Pakistan, allegedly to hit Taliban targets, that the US intends to widen the conflict to Pakistan as well. What could be the possible aim?

Militarily, adding 30,000 more US troops to Afghanistan could never secure peace in that war-torn tribal region. It has been documented that many of the groups whom the US command labels ‘Taliban’ are in fact armed bands controlled by local warlords, and not ideologically close-knit Taliban cadre in any sense. By labelling them Taliban, Washington hopes to convince its NATO allies such as Germany to send their troops to fight in an unwinnable war. Afghanistan presently has an estimated 40 percent unemployment and some five million living below the poverty line. It has been ravaged by more than four decades of continuous war.

Adding a mere 30,000 more for a total of 60,000 US troops in Afghanistan where the current killing rate for US soldiers is running 15 times above that in Iraq, is ludicrous. According to the official US Marine Corps counterinsurgency guidelines, to run a countrywide counterinsurgency strategy with the absolute minimum force levels required by US Army and Marine Corps doctrine, the US would need almost 655,000 troops, or an escalation roughly 600,000 troops higher than the force levels in the proposed Gates strategy. In fact the US strategy as it now appears seems to be a replay of the gradual escalation strategy the US pursued in Vietnam in the early 1960s.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, whose foreign policy guidance, as that of her husband, is virtually indistinguishable from the Bush faction’s, has just convened a dinner discussion of leading policy experts on Afghanistan and South Asia. It included Defense Secretary Gates, CENTCOM commander Gen. David Petraeus, and National Security advisor Gen. James L. Jones. It follows the appointment of former Ambassador, and hawk, Richard Holbrooke as the State Department’s Special South Asia Envoy.

In January 2008, more than a year ago, present National Security adviser to Obama, General James Jones headed a private Afghan Study Group which recommended drastic steps to ‘revitalize’ the war in Afghanistan. Revitalize a war whose goals have not even been clearly formulated? Not surprisingly, Moscow suspects another agenda is at work when Washington puts such heavy concentration strategically on the issue of the forgotten “war on terror” in Afghanistan, a region with no discernable direct national security implications for the United States or NATO member countries. No conceivable combination in Afghanistan, a failed state if there ever was one, could threaten a war of aggression abroad. The tribal warlords around President Karzai seem to be struggling just to maintain their heroin export flows at record levels.

Moscow’s response

Not surpisingly, the Kremlin has reacted to the US plans for Central Asia. The president of Kyrgyzstan just flew to Moscow where he received promises of debt relief and billions of dollars in aid. Kurmanbek Bakiyev was told he would get a write off of Kyrgyzstan’s $180 million debt to Russia, a $2 billion discounted loan and $150 million in financial aid from Russia. On the occasion, President Bakiyev announced plans to close a US air base crucial to the war in Afghanistan. Kyrgyzstan has been home to the only remaining US base in the strategically crucial region to Afghanistan’s north.

After the Bush administration declared its “war on terror” and announced plans to strike Afghanistan to root out the arch evil Osama bin Laden from the caves of Tora Bora in 2001, Washington secured air force basing rights in both Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan.

At about that same time, it covertly began preparing to unleash a series of US-financed ‘regime change’ Color Revolutions in Georgia (The Rose Revolution, in November 2003) and Ukraine (Orange Revolution in 2004). It tried and failed in Belarus as well as Uzbekistan. A glance at a map of Eurasia makes clear the pattern of those pro-NATO efforts was to militarily encircle the territory of Russia, especially as at the time Washington believed it had the government of Kazakhstan in its pocket with military training agreements and Chevron’s large oil investment in Tenghiz.

Once Washington announced in January 2007 that it would station strategic missiles and advanced radar systems in Poland and the Czech Republic to ‘defend against rogue missile attack from Iran,’ as I detail in my soon-to-be-released book, Full Spectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order, then-President Putin told the Munich Wehrkunde conference in February 2007 that the true target of the US ‘missile defense’ strategy was not Iran but Russia.

Similarly, today the US insistence the Afghanistan military buildup is about the Taliban, rings equally hollow. That’s clearly why Moscow is acting to secure its borders from a US militarization of the entire Central Asian region. Oil and gas pipeline routes are a major consideration, including US wishes to build a natural gas pipeline from Turkmenistan to India that would deprive Russia’s Gazprom of a vital component of its current gas supply.

The prime objective of the Afghan escalation however, is to draw a new ‘iron curtain,’ this one between the two formidable Eurasian powers with the only capacity to challenge future US global dominance: Russia and China. Should the two former rivals firm up their cooperation not only in raw materials and industrial economic trade, but as well in the military cooperation sphere, as Obama campaign foreign policy adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski has stated, the combination would present a devastating threat to America’s global hegemony.

Now the decision, aided by the help of generous Russian financial concessions, to abruptly cancel US Air Force landing rights at Kyrgyzstan’s Manas Air Base deals a devastating blow to US Great Game’s grand strategy to encircle the key powers of Eurasia -- China and Russia.

When Washington tried to use its various NGOs to foment a Color Revolution in Uzbekistan in 2005, the country’s not-so-democratic president, Islam Karimov, demanded the US evacuate its air bases, repatriate US Peace Corps volunteers, and most NGOs were shut down and foreign media banned. Karimov moved to firm his frayed ties with Moscow at the time. Today Washington is reported to be feverishly trying to reestablish itself in Uzbekistan, but the sudden cancellation of base rights in Kyrgyzstan deals a new devastating blow to the entire Eurasian encirclement Great Game strategy.

With the major NATO supply routes to Afghanistan going through Pakistan from the Port of Karachi, and strikes on those supply lines increasing by the day, the Pentagon is eagerly searching to find alternative supply routes to the North. Militants just blew up a key bridge in Pakistan’s strategic Khyber Pass.

The securing of alternate Afghan supply routes is at least the official explanation. Unofficially, it would also provide the pretext to beef up US military presence in Central Asia. Now, with the loss of Manas Air Base, a gaping hole in the Washington Great Game ‘Mach IV’ has been left.

To further complicate Washington’s strategy, Moscow is moving to firm up defense cooperation ties across former Communist states in Central Asia.

A Central Asia answer to NATO?

The announcement by Kyrgzystan President Bakiyev that he was cancelling US basing rights came during his visit to Moscow February 4 for a summit meeting of the formerly moribund Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a security grouping comprising Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. They reportedly agreed to set up a collective rapid reaction force to ‘counter military aggression, international terrorism, extremism, crime, drug-trafficking and deal with emergency situations.’ Clearly the US plans for a major military build-up in Afghanistan were high on the agenda as well.

The CSTO was established in 1992 to serve as a basis for maintaining some dialogue between Moscow and her former Soviet republics after their declared independence, Russia’s so-called ‘near abroad.’

Today the level of talks is taking on a quite new seriousness as US encirclement operations clearly are seen as a threat to all the Central Asian republics. The CSTO lists its major security ‘threats’ as Pakistan and Afghanistan. The decision to create a truly collective force with a permanent location and a united command would propel the alliance to a new level.

Russian President Medvedev announced the decision to form the collective regional CSTO Rapid Reaction Force: ‘I would like to emphasise the importance of this decision to establish rapid reaction forces. It’s aimed at strengthening the military capacity of our organisation.’ He claimed the new response units would ‘not be less powerful than those of NATO,’ adding that ‘the reason behind the creation of the collective forces of operative functioning is a considerable conflict potential which is accumulating in the CSTO zone.’ Translated from the Russian, that means the US strategic build-up in and around Pakistan and Afghanistan.

At the same time as it hosted the CSTO summit, Russia hosted a meeting of the so-called Eurasian Economic Community in Moscow, EurAsEC. That group consists of Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Tajikistan as full members. EurAsEC, established in 2000, also involves Armenia, Moldova, and Ukraine which hold observer status.

They discussed establishing a $10 billion joint assistance fund to deal with the effects of the global economic crisis, as well as establishing an international hi-tech technology exchange center and implementing various innovative projects in member countries.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev captured the vulnerability of Washington’s exposed hypocrisy in Afghanistan when he told the press after the Moscow summit, ‘We are ready for full-fledged and equal cooperation on security in Afghanistan, including with the United States.’ That of course is the last thing the Pentagon strategists wish to hear.

F. William Engdahl is author of “A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order” (Pluto Press) and “Seeds of Destruction: The Hidden Agenda of Genetic Manipulation” (www.globalresearch.ca ). His new book, “Full Spectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order” (Third Millennium Press) is due for release in late Spring 2009. He may be reached via his website: www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net.

Orders may not reform Gitmo, expert says

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/01/23/Orders_may_not_reform_Gitmo_expert_says/UPI-53461232726039/

Orders may not reform Gitmo, expert says
Jan. 23, 2009

WASHINGTON, Jan. 23 (UPI) -- U.S. policy regarding accused terrorists detained at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, may not deviate much from what it was under the Bush administration, experts said.

President Barack Obama signed an executive order directing the detention facility be closed within a year. However, observers told Politico that the effect of that order could be blunted.

"I think the administration's commitment to close Guantanamo is heartening; the fact they want to give themselves a year to do it, not so much," said Ramzi Kassem, a Yale Law School lecturer who represents inmate Ahmed Zuhair, who was captured in Pakistan in 2001. "That would bring men like my client to eight years imprisonment for no apparent reason."

Obama ordered Defense Secretary Robert Gates to conduct a review of Guantanamo conditions to ensure they're legal and follow the Geneva Convention. Gates has headed the Pentagon for more than two years and was ultimately responsible for its operations.

"He's not exactly impartial," Kassem said.

Obama's order directing that all agencies follow the Army Field Manual when interrogating prisoners also could be suspect, the Washington publication said. Obama also signed an executive order Thursday creating an interagency commission to examine whether to create "additional or different guidance" for non-military agencies such as the CIA, which could potentially permit harsh interrogation techniques in the future.

Bush reportedly rejected Israeli plea to raid Iran

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090111/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_israel

Bush reportedly rejected Israeli plea to raid Iran
Sun Jan 11, 2009

WASHINGTON – President George W. Bush rejected a plea from Israel last year to help it raid Iran's main nuclear complex, opting instead to authorize a new U.S. covert action aimed at sabotaging Iran's suspected nuclear weapons program, The New York Times reported.

Israel's request was for specialized bunker-busting bombs that it wanted for an attack that tentatively involved flying over Iraq to reach Iran's major nuclear complex at Natanz, where the country's only known uranium enrichment plant is located, the Times reported Saturday in its online edition. The White House deflected requests for the bombs and flyover but said it would improve intelligence-sharing with Israel on covert U.S. efforts to sabotage Iran's nuclear program.

The covert efforts, which began in early 2008, involved plans to penetrate Iran's nuclear supply chain abroad and undermine electrical systems and other networks on which Iran relies, the Times said, citing interviews with current and former U.S. officials, outside experts and international nuclear inspectors who spoke on condition of anonymity. The covert program will be handed off to President-elect Barack Obama, who will deciding whether to continue it.

According to the Times, Bush decided against an overt attack based on input from top administration officials such as Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who believed that doing so would likely prove ineffective and could ignite a broader Middle East war.

Israel made the push for permission to fly over Iraq for an attack on Iran following its anger over a U.S. intelligence assessment in late 2007 that concluded Iran had effectively suspended its development of nuclear weapons four years earlier. Israel sought to rebut the report, providing evidence to U.S. intelligence officials that they said indicated the Iranians were still working on a weapon.

Gordon Johndroe, spokesman for the National Security Council, declined to comment Saturday.

In an interview with The Associated Press earlier this week, Stephen Hadley, Bush's national security adviser, said he believed that Iran is the biggest challenge Obama will face in the Middle East and that more sanctions will be needed to force Tehran to forgo its nuclear ambitions and support for extremists. He said the Bush administration has been trying to "shore up and store up leverage" to bequeath to the Obama administration.

Last month, Obama suggested that a combination of economic incentives and tighter sanctions might work. Tehran rejected the proposal. Obama also has said he would pursue tough-minded diplomacy.

Clinton, Gates on Obama national security team

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-obama-national-security2-2008dec02,0,2022463.story

Hillary Clinton, Robert Gates on Obama national security team
The president-elect formally announces he will nominate Clinton as secretary of State and retain Gates in his current Defense post. Obama, Clinton speak of might as well as diplomacy.
By Rick Pearson
December 1, 2008

Reporting from Chicago -- President-elect Barack Obama unveiled his national security team today, including formally announcing his intention to nominate his onetime rival for the Democratic nomination, Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York, as the next secretary of State.

Obama also announced his intention to keep current Defense Secretary Robert Gates in his post, likely for at least a year in the new administration. The president-elect also said he would nominate Susan Rice as ambassador to the United Nations, retired Marine Gen. James Jones as his national security adviser, Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano as homeland security director and Eric Holder as attorney general.

"The national security challenges we face are just as grave, and just as urgent, as our economic crisis," Obama said during a Chicago news conference where he was surrounded by his newly chosen team. "We are fighting two wars. Old conflicts remain unresolved, and newly assertive powers have put strains on the international system. The spread of nuclear weapons raises the peril that the world's deadliest technology could fall into dangerous hands. Our dependence on foreign oil empowers authoritarian governments and endangers our planet."

Obama said he, his security team and the American people believe "now is the time for us to regain American leadership in all of its dimensions" as he sought to strike a balance between "maintaining the strongest military on the planet" and employing "the wisdom of our diplomacy."

All of Obama's nominees appeared in Chicago as did the vice president-elect, Joe Biden.

The nomination of Clinton comes only months after a hard-fought and often caustic Democratic primary in which the former first lady, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, questioned Obama's experience on the world stage and his credentials to become commander in chief in contrast to herself and Republican nominee John McCain.

But Obama called Clinton "a friend, a colleague, a source of counsel" and "a tough campaign opponent."

"She is an American of tremendous stature who will have my complete confidence, who knows many of the world's leaders, who will command respect in every capitol, and who will clearly have the ability to advance our interests around the world," Obama said, adding that her appointment was "a sign to friend and foe of the seriousness of my commitment to renew American diplomacy and restore our alliances."

Clinton said it was "very difficult" to leave her Senate seat of eight years but said her service prepared her for the job since "New Yorkers aren't afraid to speak their minds and do so in every language."

She called Obama's election a signal that the American people have demanded not only a new direction on domestic affairs, but in foreign relations as well, in which "vigorous diplomacy" is balanced with military might.

Clinton's nomination comes after her husband, former President Bill Clinton, agreed to curtail his foreign speechmaking and acceptance of money for his Clinton Global Initiative charitable conference. The former president also agreed to disclose the names of all contributors to his charitable foundation and submit his speech schedule for review by the State Department and the White House counsel.

In a statement, former President Clinton said his wife was the "right person for the job of helping to restore American's image abroad, end the war in Iraq" and "advance peace and increase our security."

"She has already earned the respect of foreign leaders and diplomats through her work to promote human rights and the empowerment of women through access to education, healthcare and economic opportunity," the former president said. "And Americans know from her leadership in the Senate on national security that she will always put the security, values and the interests of our people first."

But Republicans were quick to pounce on the appointment, noting that during the Democratic primary campaign Obama's camp said Clinton was never a "player" on foreign policy and did not do "any heavy lifting with foreign governments" during her time in her husband's White House.

Obama said he knew it was "fun for the press" to contrast the statements from the campaign trail to today's announcement.

"Look, if you look at the statements that Hillary Clinton and I have made outside of the heat of a campaign, we share a view that America has to be safe and secure, and in order to do that we have to combine military power with strengthened diplomacy," Obama said.

Gates has been secretary of Defense for nearly two years. He previously served as deputy CIA director and was a deputy National Security Agency adviser for President George H.W. Bush. His role for the Obama White House is viewed as transitional.

Jones rose from the Marines to become the supreme allied commander for NATO and has held a number of posts under Democrats in Congress and in the State Department under Republicans. He was said to be on the vetting list as a possible Obama running mate.

Napolitano is a former U.S. attorney and former Arizona attorney general. She was among the first governors to call for the use of the National Guard to patrol the country's borders, at federal expense, to address illegal immigration.

Holder was deputy attorney general in the Clinton White House. A top legal adviser to the Obama campaign, he also served on the team that vetted his potential running mates. Holder also was previously U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia.

Rice was a leading foreign policy adviser to the Obama campaign, on leave from her post as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. She previously served in the Clinton White House as an assistant secretary of State for African affairs.

Obama said there was a common thread linking the nation's economic problems with foreign concerns: "Our destiny is shared with the world's."

"From our markets to our security, from our public health to our climate, we must act with the understanding that, now more than ever, we have a stake in what happens across the globe," he said.

Obama said he had spoken with current Secretary of State Condolezza Rice throughout the past weekend about the terrorist activities in Mumbai, India. And he used the attacks, which killed six Americans, to vow a diligent fight against extremists.

"Both myself and the team that stands beside me are absolutely committed to eliminating the threat of terrorism and that is true wherever it is found," he said. "We cannot tolerate a world in which innocents are being killed by extremists based on twisted ideologies."

Pearson is a writer for the Chicago Tribune