Half-baked Homeland Security is spending millions to develop sensors capable of detecting a person's level of 'malintent' as a counterterrorism tool. The program is right out of the supposedly canceled Total Information Awareness program aka big brother incarnate. The idea is to detect (at a distance) physiological cues of malintent, enabling police to arrest people based on malintent before they can act on it. Conceived as a cutting-edge counter-terrorism tool, the FAST program ("Future Attribute Screening Technologies") will ostensibly detect subjects' bad intentions by monitoring their physiological characteristics, particularly those associated with fear and anxiety. FAST includes include "a remote cardiovascular and respiratory sensor" to measure "heart rate, heart rate variability, respiration rate, and respiratory sinus arrhythmia," and other sensory stuff.
Remember what freedom of speech was like before Sept 11, 2001? Today it's different, and it's worth pondering the place we've arrived and why. Today you can be arrested for wearing the wrong T-Shirt to specific events, such as attending a speech by the President while a shirt bearing a statement in support of Islam, or critical of the U.S. Government. Many such as myself were wary of the patriotism and flag-waving following Sept 11, 2001 because this sort of nationalistic fervor has been behind atrocities committed by other countries in the past. And the "either you're with us or against us" tone of the Bush Administration may have been useful in corralling support from other governments, but when it was applied to the American People it has turned into a pattern of repressing freedoms of Americans to do things like exercise free speech and other rights that make America what it is.
That's the tone of a Salon.COM article posted yesterday, on Sept 10, 2011 (the eve of 9/11's 10th anniversary), an article that focused on how the Bush and Obama administrations have taken strong measures to criminalize our right to free speech.
Prosecutors, since Sept 11, 2001, have been aggressively using a pre-existing law criminalizing "material support" for designated terrorist groups. The U.S. State Department is in charge of designating these groups, and it would be a concern worthy perhaps of criminal penalties for significant aid to actual terrorist groups. There are other examples that could be an example of aggressive government that limits our freedom, but the Salon.COM article (linked below) focuses on a specific example.
What does the material-support law say, exactly?
It gives the government the power to designate non-U.S. groups as foreign terrorist organizations based on very broad criteria. That includes whether the group has used or threatened to use a weapon against personal property; whether the group's activities undermine our national defense, foreign relations or economic interests.
What's worrying however is that "terrorist group" is broadly defined, one persons terrorist is another persons freedom fighter, and so to is "material support" broadly defined.
What is most problematic about the law, though, is "material support" has been interpreted so broadly. It is used regardless of whether the provider has the intent to support terrorism, or whether any specific act of terrorism has taken place or is being planned, and even to include pure speech and advocacy.
The Salon article references the case of Jubair Ahmad who was recently convicted of "material support" for Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) because he uploaded a video to YouTube. The Salon article doesn't go into what kind of group LeT is, nor the type of video, but it does seem the act of uploading a video is very small in terms of "material support".
How and how much has this statute been used in the decade since Sept. 11?
The law is widely used "in suspected terrorism cases" in both federal courts and military commissions. In the Lashkar-e-Taiba it was used to prosecute what would normally be a First-Amendment-protected-activity (freedom of speech).
Is this a post-9/11 law?
The law existed before Sept 11, 2001. However it's use and interpreted has changed dramatically since that date.
The Supreme Court held in a 1969 case called Brandenburg v. Ohio that even advocacy of violence can be criminalized only when it is intended to result in imminent criminal conduct and if it is likely to produce imminent criminal conduct.
In other words, before Sept 11, 2001, there was acknowledgement that speech the government disagrees with is itself part of the marketplace of ideas that is protected by the First Amendment. A common phrase about this goes something like: "I may hate what s/he says, but I will fight for his/her right to say it". That's one of the core principles of the U.S. but is that what our government is practicing today?
Advocacy and freedom of speech can serve as a safety valve so that people can let of steam before their anger escalates to committing acts of violence.
A Supreme Court case last year held for the first time that the Government can criminalize speech, even speech advocating lawful activity. The case was Holder vs. Humanitarian Law Project (that is, Attorney General Holder). Its result, stated by Salon.COM, is to thwart the efforts of humanitarian groups to persuade violent organizations in renouncing their violence.
What were the facts of that Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project case?
Human rights groups wanted to assist two groups (Kurdistan Workers' Party in Turkey and Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in Sri Lanka) by teaching them the ropes of bringing human rights claims to the United Nations. Their goal was to teach International Law and nonviolence, hoping to promote peace. The U.S. designated both as terrorist groups. The Supreme Court declared that promoting peace among terrorist groups violates the material support law.
Late last night it was announced Osama bin Laden had been killed in Pakistan, and a first thoughts was this wouldn't make any difference. (Osama bin Laden has been killed but will it make any long term difference?) Basically the argument is the radicalization of a generation of people all over the world due to the warring over Terrorism. In yesterdays blog post I wrote about the generation of Middle East people who've seen invasion and/or occupation of several countries by Western forces, widespread death and destruction, and this has acted to radicalize those people. But it occurs to me, the radicalization also extends to Americans due to the 10 years (or more) of demonization of the Terrorists.
Listening to voices on NPR reports this morning I hear grudge-holding and an inability to move on with ones life. For example they interviewed a fellow whose fiancee had been killed in the World Trade Center collapse, and he's turned his car into a rolling billboard with pictures of his fiancee with messages to "Never Forget". As sad as his story is, as understandable it is he's done this, it's a pattern that simply re-opens the wounds over and over and doesn't proceed to healing. The kind of healing which allows you to move on with your life rather than hanging on to the wound keeping it festering inside. I don't want to go too far down this line of thinking, and some events like the Sept 11 2001 attack are just so big that it's hard to imagine having real forgiveness towards the perpetrators. Spiritual traditions over millennia such as Christianity have taught forgiveness as a key central method for achieving peace.
This was a statement by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in which she made it clear the efforts to stomp out the "Syndicate of Terror" would not stop. In one breath she expressed a hope that al Qaida's victims would find comfort that Justice had been Done, and then in the next breath she's saying the hunt will never stop. On the one hand Authority's role is to mete out mete out Justice in the form of prison sentences or executions. Right? On the other hand the "hunt will not stop" is a way to keep re-awakening the wounds these traumatic events have placed in our mutual psyche.
Islamists vow bin Laden death will not mute Jihad call: Contains quotes from several Islamic Jihadi message boards like "Osama may be killed but his message of Jihad will never die. Brothers and sisters, wait and see, his death will be a blessing in disguise." This is the voice of a radicalized person.
Taliban commander vows to avenge Bin Laden's death: Quotes several "commanders" in several Terrorist organizations saying this "will bring no change to jihad." It's a martyrdom situation and his value as a marketing image will not be diminished by death. Right? The article describes Osama bin Laden as "the Shiekh" as someone who inspired people all over the Middle East into fighting a "holy war (a.k.a. Jihad) against the infidels and their agents." The movement is described as having separated "ideology from leadership" in that local al Qaida "affiliate" organizations have sprung up without direct oversight by the al Qaida leadership.
That same article has an interesting paragraph indicating a hatred towards al Qaida by regular folk in the Middle East.
For many years, the Sheikh had been isolated, his organisation disrupted not only by US kill teams and lethal drone attacks but also by general Muslim apathy and outright hostility to the organisation. For most of the victims are Muslim: not only Shia Muslims and Sunni moderates and seculars, but also bystanders who have committed the deadly sin of buying vegetables while one of those holy warriors decides to fight his battle and start his ascendance to the hereafter.
Osama bin Laden's death resonates in Rochester area: Has a range of reactions in the Rochester NY area. From "The only thing I can say is: it’s about time. I would’ve liked if we could’ve taken him alive and put him on trial. Then, a lot more people would understand the role that he played on 9/11." To "It’s probably not going to last very long, but that’s what they’re fearing right now: repercussions." To "It's about time and I'm glad we got him. Getting these guys is good. We are doing something and we are getting them." To "I don't think killing anyone is a good thing. People like bin Laden certainly need to be taken out of circulation, but I don't think killing is the best way to do it. I'm glad he will not bother anyone anymore, but there are probably plenty more like him." To "I felt a sense of relief. It’s been a long time since that day. It’s not going to bring Rich back." To "It’s a mixed feeling because you don’t want to celebrate someone being murdered, but it does give us a sense of security." To "I’m thrilled he’s captured and killed. It’s sad to me that we’re solving this awful crime with a killing." To "It’s great news. It’s been a long time. I feel like that means the war is finally over." To "It's outstanding, but I don't think it changes much for us in Afghanistan. "We still have the Taliban to contend with and we obviously have to finish what we started."
Beyond bin Laden: Is a post on the "Shadow Government" blog at ForeignPolicy.com which describes itself as being "written by experienced policy makers from the loyal opposition" so we should take this with a grain of salt in that it might be skewed towards ObamaSlander. In any case it's an interesting article. They start with saying the person who "emerges as the leader of al Qaeda will be enormously consequential for the movement's direction and appeal throughout the Muslim world." A supposedly likely successor, Ayman al Zawahiri, "has repeatedly emphasized Egypt as the centerpiece of al Qaeda's quest to re-establish a caliphate in the heart of the Islamic world." And: "Protracted wars are not decided on the outcome of any individual episode. Rather, they turn on the progressive attrition of the adversary's sources of power. Similarly, this conflict will not end in a single battle or campaign. Rather, al Qaeda and its extremist vision will be defeated through the patient accumulation of quiet successes. Victory will include discrediting extremist ideology, creating fissures between and among extremist groups, and reducing them to the level of a nuisance, groups that can be tracked and handled by local law enforcement groups."
A long nightmare is over? The leader of al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden, has been killed in northwest Pakistan. I suppose it's not a surprise he was there, except that he wasn't in the mountains but in Abbottabad, in the far north next to the border with Kashmir. According to statements on BBC World Service right now, he was living in a Mansion in a medium sized city, just a few hundred yards from the police station, and one assumes it wasn't exactly a secret he was there and there must have been some cooperation with the Pakistani government that he could be living there. But my question is whether this will make any real difference. UPDATE: For a followup see Reactions to bin Laden's death indicates this won't make much change or difference?
Nowadays what's going on is a whole generation of people growing up with the U.S. and Western forces having invaded the Middle East. Many have been radicalized by these invaders (that is, "us") and I think most of the fighting is an effort to evict occupiers rather than people in ideological cahoots with al Qaeda.
In the prosecution of the U.S. led War on Terror many innocents were killed. Sometimes it was weapons going astray, killing innocent bystanders. Sometimes it was mistaken targets. Sometimes it was bogus intelligence. And there was this issue with the invasion of Iraq, resulting in the death of a hundred thousand or more Iraqi's, based on bogus illegal U.S. policies. Radicalization is quite understandable to a people who suffered the pain inflicted upon them by the U.S. led war.
As I write there are thousands of people gathered outside the White House celebrating, even though it's after midnight. And indeed it is wonderful to hear this news, that the supposed leader of al Qaeda, that supposedly is responsible for the murder of thousands of people, that Osama bin Laden has been killed.
But I question whether this will make any difference. Will the radicalized generation give up the hatred of the U.S. engendered in them by U.S. actions?
In President Obama's remarks (below) he said "Yet his death does not mark the end of our effort. There’s no doubt that al Qaeda will continue to pursue attacks against us. We must –- and we will -- remain vigilant at home and abroad." In other words, the War on Terror is not over. We can expect reprisal attacks and a continuing of the war.
Obama clearly wouldn't be willing to say the things I just said about a radicalized Middle East, but essentially we're saying the same thing, just through different lenses.
Remarks by the President on Osama Bin Laden
East Room
11:35 P.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Good evening. Tonight, I can report to the American people and to the world that the United States has conducted an operation that killed Osama bin Laden, the leader of al Qaeda, and a terrorist who’s responsible for the murder of thousands of innocent men, women, and children.
It was nearly 10 years ago that a bright September day was darkened by the worst attack on the American people in our history. The images of 9/11 are seared into our national memory -- hijacked planes cutting through a cloudless September sky; the Twin Towers collapsing to the ground; black smoke billowing up from the Pentagon; the wreckage of Flight 93 in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, where the actions of heroic citizens saved even more heartbreak and destruction.
And yet we know that the worst images are those that were unseen to the world. The empty seat at the dinner table. Children who were forced to grow up without their mother or their father. Parents who would never know the feeling of their child’s embrace. Nearly 3,000 citizens taken from us, leaving a gaping hole in our hearts.
On September 11, 2001, in our time of grief, the American people came together. We offered our neighbors a hand, and we offered the wounded our blood. We reaffirmed our ties to each other, and our love of community and country. On that day, no matter where we came from, what God we prayed to, or what race or ethnicity we were, we were united as one American family.
We were also united in our resolve to protect our nation and to bring those who committed this vicious attack to justice. We quickly learned that the 9/11 attacks were carried out by al Qaeda -- an organization headed by Osama bin Laden, which had openly declared war on the United States and was committed to killing innocents in our country and around the globe. And so we went to war against al Qaeda to protect our citizens, our friends, and our allies.
Over the last 10 years, thanks to the tireless and heroic work of our military and our counterterrorism professionals, we’ve made great strides in that effort. We’ve disrupted terrorist attacks and strengthened our homeland defense. In Afghanistan, we removed the Taliban government, which had given bin Laden and al Qaeda safe haven and support. And around the globe, we worked with our friends and allies to capture or kill scores of al Qaeda terrorists, including several who were a part of the 9/11 plot.
Yet Osama bin Laden avoided capture and escaped across the Afghan border into Pakistan. Meanwhile, al Qaeda continued to operate from along that border and operate through its affiliates across the world.
And so shortly after taking office, I directed Leon Panetta, the director of the CIA, to make the killing or capture of bin Laden the top priority of our war against al Qaeda, even as we continued our broader efforts to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat his network.
Then, last August, after years of painstaking work by our intelligence community, I was briefed on a possible lead to bin Laden. It was far from certain, and it took many months to run this thread to ground. I met repeatedly with my national security team as we developed more information about the possibility that we had located bin Laden hiding within a compound deep inside of Pakistan. And finally, last week, I determined that we had enough intelligence to take action, and authorized an operation to get Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice.
Today, at my direction, the United States launched a targeted operation against that compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. A small team of Americans carried out the operation with extraordinary courage and capability. No Americans were harmed. They took care to avoid civilian casualties. After a firefight, they killed Osama bin Laden and took custody of his body.
For over two decades, bin Laden has been al Qaeda’s leader and symbol, and has continued to plot attacks against our country and our friends and allies. The death of bin Laden marks the most significant achievement to date in our nation’s effort to defeat al Qaeda.
Yet his death does not mark the end of our effort. There’s no doubt that al Qaeda will continue to pursue attacks against us. We must –- and we will -- remain vigilant at home and abroad.
As we do, we must also reaffirm that the United States is not –- and never will be -– at war with Islam. I’ve made clear, just as President Bush did shortly after 9/11, that our war is not against Islam. Bin Laden was not a Muslim leader; he was a mass murderer of Muslims. Indeed, al Qaeda has slaughtered scores of Muslims in many countries, including our own. So his demise should be welcomed by all who believe in peace and human dignity.
Over the years, I’ve repeatedly made clear that we would take action within Pakistan if we knew where bin Laden was. That is what we’ve done. But it’s important to note that our counterterrorism cooperation with Pakistan helped lead us to bin Laden and the compound where he was hiding. Indeed, bin Laden had declared war against Pakistan as well, and ordered attacks against the Pakistani people.
Tonight, I called President Zardari, and my team has also spoken with their Pakistani counterparts. They agree that this is a good and historic day for both of our nations. And going forward, it is essential that Pakistan continue to join us in the fight against al Qaeda and its affiliates.
The American people did not choose this fight. It came to our shores, and started with the senseless slaughter of our citizens. After nearly 10 years of service, struggle, and sacrifice, we know well the costs of war. These efforts weigh on me every time I, as Commander-in-Chief, have to sign a letter to a family that has lost a loved one, or look into the eyes of a service member who’s been gravely wounded.
So Americans understand the costs of war. Yet as a country, we will never tolerate our security being threatened, nor stand idly by when our people have been killed. We will be relentless in defense of our citizens and our friends and allies. We will be true to the values that make us who we are. And on nights like this one, we can say to those families who have lost loved ones to al Qaeda’s terror: Justice has been done.
Tonight, we give thanks to the countless intelligence and counterterrorism professionals who’ve worked tirelessly to achieve this outcome. The American people do not see their work, nor know their names. But tonight, they feel the satisfaction of their work and the result of their pursuit of justice.
We give thanks for the men who carried out this operation, for they exemplify the professionalism, patriotism, and unparalleled courage of those who serve our country. And they are part of a generation that has borne the heaviest share of the burden since that September day.
Finally, let me say to the families who lost loved ones on 9/11 that we have never forgotten your loss, nor wavered in our commitment to see that we do whatever it takes to prevent another attack on our shores.
And tonight, let us think back to the sense of unity that prevailed on 9/11. I know that it has, at times, frayed. Yet today’s achievement is a testament to the greatness of our country and the determination of the American people.
The cause of securing our country is not complete. But tonight, we are once again reminded that America can do whatever we set our mind to. That is the story of our history, whether it’s the pursuit of prosperity for our people, or the struggle for equality for all our citizens; our commitment to stand up for our values abroad, and our sacrifices to make the world a safer place.
Let us remember that we can do these things not just because of wealth or power, but because of who we are: one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
Thank you. May God bless you. And may God bless the United States of America.
Title: Countdown to Zero Release Date: May 2010 Genre: Documentary Cast: Graham Allison, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Tony Blair, Mikhail Gorbachev, Ahmed Rashid Director: Lucy Walker Studio: Magnolia Pictures
Plot: A documentary about the escalating nuclear arms race.
An elite division of Blackwater plans targeted assassinations of suspected Taliban and Al Qaeda operatives in Pakistan. And everyone's denying it. At a covert forward operating base run by the US Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) in the Pakistani port city of Karachi, members of an elite division of Blackwater are at the center of a secret program in which they plan targeted assassinations of suspected Taliban and Al Qaeda operatives, "snatch and grabs" of high-value targets and other sensitive action inside and outside Pakistan, an investigation by The Nation has found. The Blackwater operatives also assist in gathering intelligence and help run a secret US military drone bombing campaign that runs parallel to the well-documented CIA predator strikes, according to a well-placed source within the US military intelligence apparatus.
SHAC USA was targeting Chiron, a biomedical research company in the SF Bay Area. While Chiron has a history of developing nice and useful medicines, they must have also been having a history of medical research that's cruel to animals, and probably has outsourced some of their research to Huntingdon Life Sciences.
Their activism went well over the line of civility to include vandalism of corporate properties, posting home addresses, home phone numbers, and other personal contact details of high ranking Chiron employees, and vandalism of some of the homes of those Chiron employees. This was posted on the SHAC USA web site, and part of the legal action referenced above caused the SHAC USA web site to be shut down.
It would be one thing to post a call for action against individuals .. and then innocently say that any later action against those individuals are independent decisions by the people who perpetrated those actions. But SHAC USA clearly posted plans concocted by SHAC USA to vandalize certain homes, and when people showed up at those homes they were carrying banners giving the SHAC USA web site address.
Hmm... I say that political activism, environmental activism, etc .. those are valid and worthy activities to engage in. It helps raise awareness and garners some attention. But when these actions cross the line to causing actual damage they start being a criminal act.
A friend told me a useful analogy. "Your right to swing your fists stops at my nose". Applying that analogy here, their right to make protests, to raise awareness, to do activism, all that stops when they cross the line into private property and start causing damage.
An interesting thing here is the use of an online message board to discuss issues, make announcements, etc. This occurred on the SHAC USA web site, but we can no longer see that site because it's been taken down. However the Internet Wayback machine has the history for us.
For example their Jan 19, 2005 web site has links to several articles of criminal animal rights activism actions against several people and organizations.
Anti-war Democrat has ties to U.S.' prewar Iraq claims talks about a surprising winner of Pennsylvania's 10th district. The winner, an "Anti-War Democrat", had worked in the Pentagon office that produced the cooked evidence that helped the Administration lie us into the war. Somehow he found his way to being an "Anti-War Democrat" which the newspaper finds odd and confusing. They probably aren't aware of Karen Kiatkowski who worked in that same office, has 20+ years experience in the Military working on anti-terrorism, and is totally against this war, is totally aghast at what the office she worked in produced etc. Clearly it's within the realm of possibility that two people working in that office could both be against the war.
Iraq Group a Study In Secrecy, Centrism is an examination of the Iraq Study Group. They interviewed a dozen or more of the participants to learn what was learnable. The process seems skewed to a centrist viewpoint, with neocons feeling disgruntled and left out. Hmm...
U.S. Finds Iraq Insurgency Has Funds to Sustain Itself The insurgency (uh... is there just one insurgency? or are there multiple insurgencies?) has been raising money through oil smuggling and other criminal activites and is earning enough revenue to sustain its own operations. I suppose that means they don't have to depend on Iran or on Saddam's pilfered cash stockpile, eh? And just how do we know what they're earning? Did they file a 10-Q with the SEC or something?
Rumsfeld okayed abuses says former US army general Former U.S. Army Brigadier General Janis Karpinski told Spain's El Pais newspaper she had seen a letter apparently signed by Rumsfeld which allowed civilian contractors to use techniques such as sleep deprivation during interrogation.
How did the September 11, 2001 attacks come to happen? Or, more accurately, why were they allowed to happen? Our government leaders such as GW Bush, Condoleeza Rice, Dick Cheney, etc, claimed that nobody in the government imagined such an attack could have happened. But, they were lying, because many in the government had warnings, had thought up that kind of scenario, there were many warnings from foreign intelligence services, etc. We were told to believe that even with warnings the plot could not have been stopped. If so, then what of this recent plot discovered in Britain to bomb airliners, which was stopped by arrests before the attack was carried out? It goes on and on.
The movie, 9/11: Press For Truth (web site), is about the holes in the official story and some daring individuals who researched as much of the truth as can be learned from public sources. We of course cannot know what our government leaders actually did and are actually responsible for. But the public record, as reported in the news media, paints an interesting picture, one of official malfeasance and possibly official cooperation with the launching of those attacks.
Part of the movie centers on a group of relatives of people killed on September 11, 2001. They had questions that weren't being answered. In their grief they banded together to begin researching to find the truth to why their relatives had died. In part the 9/11 Commission was launched due to the efforts of those family members to find the truth.
Consider, though, the contrast in the cost of the investigation into Clintons sexual escapades, and the cost of running the 9/11 Commission. The Clinton investigation cost taxpayers over $100 million while the 9/11 Commission cost taxpayers around $16 million. Tell me, of those two investigations which would you rather have be thorough?
To a large extent the 9/11 Commission was just as satisfying as the Warren Commission was in explaining the Kennedy Assassination. In other words, we can expect conspiracy theorists to be debating the September 11, 2001 attacks for the next 40 years, perhaps. But there is a big difference in terms of technology of the early 1960's and today. Today we have web sites on which people can share information, resources, and connect with each other. One such web site is cooperativeresearch.org which is home to the Complete 911 Timeline.
The problem with this story is that while the individual pieces to the story are well reported, those pieces are widely scattered. You might have a tidbit in a front page article one day, another in an article in another newspaper buried in the back another day, another on a TV program a month later, and so on. By being so widely scattered it's almost impossible for an individual to pull it all together. On the cooperativeresearch.org web site the data is collected and is organized by date, by event, or by individual. You can follow the threads very easily in multiple directions and see the connections and the real history.
The movie presents a small portion of the data listed on the cooperativeresearch.org web site. But the part given in the movie is explosive.
For example .. al Qaeda was an outgrowth of the Mujahadeen forces. The Mujahadeen were supported by the CIA during the 1980's to give the Russian Military their own Vietnam, and to drive them out of Afghanistan. The CIA funneled money and material through Pakastan's secret service, the ISI. After Russia was driven from Afghanistan, the U.S. supposedly walked away from involvement with Pakistan and the Mujahadeen. The movie describes however that the ISI ran training camps and some people from those camps became Taliban fighters in Afghanistan, while others became geurillas in Kashmir, and that overall the distinction between Taliban, al Qaeda and the guerillas in Kashmir are very weak.
In October 2001 evidence was released by the U.S. of payments being funneled through Mohammad Atta from a specific person in Pakistan. This person was originally said to be an al Qaeda "paymaster" but the cooperativeresearch team later learned he was an ISI agent. Incidentally, the head of ISI, Mahmood Ahmed was in Washington DC on the eve of the September 11 attack, on the same day that the final payments were wired from Pakistan to Mohammed Atta.
November 13, 2001: Al-Qaeda Convoy Flees to Tora Bora; US Fails to Attack: A couple times during the invasion of Afghanistan, large convoys of Al Qaeda and others were escaping first from Kabul, later from Jalalabad, etc. Rather than bomb the convoys, they were able to drive on. Later when they were bottled up in the Tora Bora area, some escape routes were left open, and the al Qaeda people escaped along the open routes.
November 14-25, 2001: US Secretly Authorizes Airlift of Pakistani and Taliban Fighters: Another of the escape operations was a large airlift operation flying al Qaeda operatives from Northern Afghanistan into Pakistan. At that time the U.S. had a large force there, had airplanes there, no doubt had AWACS aircraft in the area, and knew very well that an airlift was flying dozens of flights between northern Afghanistan and Pakistan. The U.S. could have stopped the airlift, but it was allowed to proceed. Pakistan’s President “Musharraf won American support for the airlift by warning that the humiliation of losing hundreds—and perhaps thousands—of Pakistani Army men and intelligence operatives would jeopardize his political survival.”
I know there was a lot of details that just flew by there. But the story is that Pakistan is essentially the benefactors of both the Taliban and al Qaeda, perhaps both are merely covert branches of the ISI. And it is Pakistan which the U.S. has proclaimed to be a major part of the War On Terror. Either the U.S. Intelligence is incredibly naive about the connections between Pakistan's ISI and al Qaeda, or else the U.S. is tacitly in approval, and perhaps this explains the weak efforts to capture and kill al Qaeda?
Interestingly these reports are in the news right now:
This is a documentary movie exploring what happened to create the September 11, 2001 attack, what the government leaders knew, the cover-up of the attack, and more. (buy from amazon.com, my review)
Last week Bill Clinton was interviewed by Chris Matthews in what Clinton took as an attack. Now, the Clintons are famous for the lines about the vast Right Wing Conspiracy, and while we do know there is such a conspiracy, perhaps the Clintons are a little sensitive to that. Who is that Conspiracy? Well, it's the Neocons for one, the people who have become the leaders in the U.S. Administration. It was they who, in the 1990's, dogged the Clintons with overly hyped allegations, some of them false.
In the interview Bill Clinton became very angry and passionate. He compared his efforts against Al Qaeda with the Bush administration saying "At least I tried" saying that the Bush Administration did not try to do anything about the Al Qaeda threat. When Clinton left office it was very well understood what the threat of Al Qaeda was, through the attacks on U.S. Embassies in Africa, the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole and some other events.
In 1998 when Clinton launched cruise missles against Al Qaeda bases in Sudan and Afghanistan, what did the neocons do? They berated Clinton for his focus on Al Qaeda and for missing the obvious threat of Iraq. Hmm, where have we hard that line before?
In any case, the Bush groupthink machine launched into motion attacking Clinton for daring to say anything against the Bush Administration.
The Bush Administration is trying to, Olbermann asserts, rewrite history and lay the whole blame for the September 11, 2001 attack on Bill Clinton's feet. Mr. Clinton is very right to refuse this, for it was the Bush Administration who ignored the warning signs, it was the Bush Administration who focussed on the distraction that is Iraq, etc. The rewriting of history is that Clinton was so distracted by the Lewinsky scandal that he could not bring any force to bear against Al Qaeda. Well, history shows that to be false, but what else can we expect from the lie machine that is the Bush administration? The outrageous thing about this is that the people pushing that theory were the ones who in the 1990's created that environment of the overly hyped witch-hunts such as the Lewinsky scandal.
Last week Bill Clinton was interviewed by Chris Matthews in what Clinton took as an attack. Now, the Clintons are famous for the lines about the vast Right Wing Conspiracy, and while we do know there is such a conspiracy, perhaps the Clintons are a little sensitive to that. Who is that Conspiracy? Well, it's the Neocons for one, the people who have become the leaders in the U.S. Administration. It was they who, in the 1990's, dogged the Clintons with overly hyped allegations, some of them false.
In the interview Bill Clinton became very angry and passionate. He compared his efforts against Al Qaeda with the Bush administration saying "At least I tried" saying that the Bush Administration did not try to do anything about the Al Qaeda threat. When Clinton left office it was very well understood what the threat of Al Qaeda was, through the attacks on U.S. Embassies in Africa, the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole and some other events.
In 1998 when Clinton launched cruise missles against Al Qaeda bases in Sudan and Afghanistan, what did the neocons do? They berated Clinton for his focus on Al Qaeda and for missing the obvious threat of Iraq. Hmm, where have we hard that line before?
In any case, the Bush groupthink machine launched into motion attacking Clinton for daring to say anything against the Bush Administration.
The Bush Administration is trying to, Olbermann asserts, rewrite history and lay the whole blame for the September 11, 2001 attack on Bill Clinton's feet. Mr. Clinton is very right to refuse this, for it was the Bush Administration who ignored the warning signs, it was the Bush Administration who focussed on the distraction that is Iraq, etc. The rewriting of history is that Clinton was so distracted by the Lewinsky scandal that he could not bring any force to bear against Al Qaeda. Well, history shows that to be false, but what else can we expect from the lie machine that is the Bush administration? The outrageous thing about this is that the people pushing that theory were the ones who in the 1990's created that environment of the overly hyped witch-hunts such as the Lewinsky scandal.
The CIA is running secret prisons around the world where they are sending prisoners for torture. These prisons are not new, the infrastructure for these prisons have been under construction since the 1970's. Secret CIA Prisons in Your Backyard is an interview of two journalists who have been researching the story. They have published Torture Taxi: On the Trail of the CIA's Rendition Flights to document the results of their research.
The CIA have set up shell corporations who own airplanes. The airplanes are flown under contract from the CIA shuttling people and equipment around the world in secret flights. However since these are civilian owned airplanes, they are required to file flight plans and leave other bits of paper trail. That paper trail is trackable by individuals.
Beginning in 2002 flight watchers began noticing this series of flights that would, for example, start at Andrews Air Force base, stop somewhere and end up in Afghanistan.
Speaking as an average American citizen I am not in support of our government torturing people, and violating normal legal procedures. Secret prisons are completely in violation of the habeas corpus legal precedent, where the government is required to show the body when they are holding someone. Holding people in secret is in violation of that legal precedent, which is a core value of American Justice. How dare our government leaders violate this.
Mercenary soldiers and other kinds of military "contractors" have been with us for centuries. Mercenaries are rarely well thought of, and are widely regarded as without loyalties. One aspect of this War on Terror is the outsourcing of so much to corporate interests. The most obvious is the "no-bid contracts" awarded to Halliburton, but that's just the tip of the iceberg.
Iraq For Sale is a new documentary by Robert Greenwald about this situation. In it he covers the major companies contracting military services in the current War on Terror, and he dives into some of the stories of atrocities coming from these contractors. The thrust of the movie is a matter of loyalty. Supposedly military personell who have sworn oaths of allegience to the country have loyalty to the U.S. while contractors working for a corporation have loyalty to that corporation. The two loyalties produce very different results, with the corporation not being incentivized to provide services which would end the war, but instead being incentivized to make sure conditions keep happening which keep the war going. If the war were to stop then these military contractor corporations would see their contracts dry up.
It is a horrific story that Robert Greenwald is telling. My question coming out was if the conduct of this war is compatible with what America stands for? Is this a country by the people, of the people, and for the people, or is it for the corporations? If we want America to return to being for the people, then we need to free our government from corporate control.
America has strayed from our purpose, and the conduct of this war is example of that misalignment between America's purpose and what we're currently doing.
How it works is ... In the early 1990's Cheney, as Defense Secretary, awarded a contract to Kellog-Brown-Root (KBR) to study whether it was a good idea to award military contracts to contractors. KBR said, that's a great idea. Cheney then went to work as Halliburton's CEO, oversaw the merger with KBR, and KBR was awarded hundreds of contracts during the 1990's. Then Cheney becomes Vice President, does not get rid of his Halliburton stock, and Halliburton and KBR are awarded over $15 Billion in contracts (most on a no-bid basis) during the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. Hmm...
The services? It ranges from food service, to water purification, to building housing, all the way to military services such as interrogating prisoners or protecting political leaders.
What was horrendous in this story is the conduct of military interrogations. If you remember the Abu Ghraib story, it involved horrendous treatment of prisoners by U.S. forces. A few low level soldiers were accused and have gone to trial over the situation. But a minor part of the story, which was covered but not very prominently, was the presence of military contractors as part of the interrogation system.
Some of the interrogation has been outsourced to private contractors. Private contractors are not subject to the military code of justice, they do not have the same military law training, they are not clearly loyal to the country, and it seems in many cases they simply were not American citizens at all. Because they did not have military training, they did not have drilled into them the limits of legal treatment of prisoners and the conduct of war.
The movie Iraq For Sale claims that in prisoner interrogations, these private contractors are sometimes calling the shots, and the horrendous abuses may have been instigated by these private contractors. In some cases these private contractors are "linguists" whose job is translating questions and answers in the interrogation. One would hope these people are highly trained in the languages, and would have high ethics standards in searching for truth. But the movie claims these contractors are instead cutting corners, hiring unqualified people, who then are unable to help the investigators, and are often making up stories or misinterpreting what the prisoners say. The result is then that the U.S. military goes out in the field to arrest people based on bogus information gotten from these interrogations.
It's not just interrogators and food service, the story goes on and on. Another example covered at length is the truck drivers delivering supplies across Iraq. Instead of these deliveries being done by military personell, it's being done by private contractors. The contractors often are going out with little protection through dangerous zones, and the truck drivers are being killed etc. The case covered in the movie happened on April 4, 2004, the one-year anniversary of the fall of the Iraq government. A convoy was sent out unprotected on a day the military knew was extremely dangerous, through a zone marked Red, which the military knew was extremely "hot" with a firefight and into which civilians were not supposed to be sent. But they sent a convoy of private military contractors through that zone, truck drivers really, and their trucks were shot up, several died, others were wounded.
The system is corrupt. The contractors do not have any incentive to keep costs low. The contracts are primarily on a cost-plus basis, meaning the government gets billed for the cost plus a gauranteed profit. This means the contractors routinely buy the most expensive stuff, or mistreat their equipment, or buy the wrong equipment, etc, so they will be reimbursed under the cost-plus contract.
Another effect is the truck drivers will often make runs of empty trucks driving up and down the highway, the military has to spend their resources protecting these empty trucks, and because the contractors ran their trucks down the highway it fulfilled the contract and they get paid some money.
One of the threads of abominations done by the Bush administration is the use of torture by the American Government. In pursuit of the War On Terror we've had this extraordinary rendition program where "terror suspects" would be flown to secret prisons around the world and tortured. The torture was often outsourced to other countries.
Currently there's a legislative move for a U.S. law that "clarifies" the Geneva conventions. Supposedly common article three of the convention is unclear, according to the Bush Administration. Here is a video showing G.W. Bush explaining it
Their argument seems to be ... the U.S. believes common article three of the Geneva Convention is unclear, and that the U.S. is going to interpret that law. The questioner in that press conference has an interesting point, doesn't that leave the door open to other countries interpreting that article differently? I see this as an attempt by the Bush administration to undermine the Geneva Convention, by fracturing the interpretation and enforcement. And this strikes me as being so much like the Signing Statements which this same Bush administration has been issuing with almost every law they sign into effect.
A signing statement is a document a President can issue when signing a law describing how the law will be put into practice. It has been rarely used by previous Presidents, but in the Bush administration it is widely and routinely used. In some cases the effect of the signing statements is that basically they feel free to completely ignore the law they're signing. So if they're going to ignore the law, then why are they signing it? Why not veto it instead? In fact, the Bush administration has not issued any vetos in 6 years of holding office.
This practice seems to me to make a statement that the Bush Administration holds its views as paramount over the laws that have been passed by Congress. That it knows better than Congress. Or in the case above, that the Bush Administration knows better than the Geneva convention what the law should be.
This MoveOn.org advertisement says it very well ... they have a quote of President Nixon saying "When a President does it, it's not illegal":
Congress, the Geneva Conventions & Torture: Bush vs. McCain: Is more coverage, including John McCain standing to protect the Geneva Conventions.
Powell opposes Bush plan for harsh interrogations: Covers a letter and actions by Colin Powell taking a stand against the torture.
Bush admits CIA has secret prisons: He finally admitted to what the rest of us already knew. But he gives a very slanted view of the torture prisons. He doesn't discuss the extraordinary rendition. He doesn't discuss all the people who were captured, taken through rendition to torture prisons, and later determined to have been an accidental or mistaken capture.
Countdown's report on Bush's Constitutional issues: Keith Olbermann's analysis of this situation, along with a constitutional law expert. The argument is that there is a rush to legislation to change the law, because the Administration knows that they have been violating the law and they want the Congress to retroactively approve those violations of the law. Part of the context is a transfer of 14 detainees from the secret prison system to the one at Guantanamo Bay Cuba (GITMO). Once these prisoners reach GITMO the Red Cross will have access to them, and in the Red Cross interviews it's expected that news of the torture practices like waterboarding will come to light in official records, and the U.S. will be accused of violations of human rights laws and committing torture.
"The Constitution is just a piece of paper" - G.W. Bush: Is Keith Olbermann again talking with Jonathan Turley about the Bush Administration fondness for hiring leaders who want to go to the edge of the law, and beyond. In particular the issue is General Hayden who had been the head of the NSA and is now the Director of the CIA. While heading the NSA he oversaw the illegal warrantless wiretaps system.
Lou Dobbs Slams Bush On 'Signing Statements': A discussion of the signing statements and an assertion that George W. Bush is routinely violating the Constitution. It's largely a "line item veto" but the Supreme Court had previously ruled line item veto's were unconstitutional.
Outlawed: Extraordinary Rendition, Torture and Disappearances in the 'War on Terror': Is an interview of two detainees subjected to the extraordinary rendition system.
Torture Taxi: On the Trail of the CIA's Rendition Flights: Is a discussion of how the extraordinary rendition system was exposed. The airplanes in question are run by private contractors working for the CIA. But even though they're CIA flights the planes have to file flight plans, and flight plans are public knowledge which can be tracked by the public.
Open-Content project managed by Paul Thompson. This is a series of events, researched and recorded through the Cooperative Research web site, of the precursors to the September 11, 2001 attack, the events of that day, and resulting events. It is extremely detailed and comprehensive.
The Neocons badly need something to bolster the popularity of their failed war on terror. The war is without moral merit and is going extremely badly. They are failing at achieving the first goal, flipping Iraq to become a moderate Democracy, while at the same time the schedule dicttates they enter into an expensive and foolish war against Iran. The idiots are steering the world into believing Iran is an utterly evil and dangerous state which needs to be destroyed, just like four years ago they steered the world into believing Iraq was an utterly evil and dangerous state needing to be destroyed.
But we since learned that Iraq was a feeble state who had nothing to do with the September 11, 2001 attacks. Yet it was the spectre of that attack, and the spectre of mushroom clouds, which fogged the wisdom of the American people and led the U.S. into this folly of a war.
It was a time when a certain amount of cynicism and moral confusion set in among Western democracies. When those who warned about a coming crisis, the rise of fascism and nazism, they were ridiculed or ignored. Indeed, in the decades before World War II, a great many argued that the fascist threat was exaggerated or that it was someone else's problem. Some nations tried to negotiate a separate peace, even as the enemy made its deadly ambitions crystal clear. It was, as Winston Churchill observed, a bit like feeding a crocodile, hoping it would eat you last.
There was a strange innocence about the world. Someone recently recalled one U.S. senator's reaction in September of 1939 upon hearing that Hitler had invaded Poland to start World War II. He exclaimed:
“Lord, if only I had talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided!”
I recount that history because once again we face similar challenges in efforts to confront the rising threat of a new type of fascism. Today -- another enemy, a different kind of enemy -- has made clear its intentions with attacks in places like New York and Washington, D.C., Bali, London, Madrid, Moscow and so many other places. But some seem not to have learned history's lessons.
So, um, let's see if I get this straight. We're not allowed to practice dissent? If we practice dissent then we're appeasers of the ilk who allowed Hitler to become strong, who allowed England to become weak in the face of a growing military strength in Germany?
Well, gosh, I think it's dissent which makes this country strong. Especially when you have government leaders as inept as the ilk of Donald Rumsfeld and George W. Bush, who have lied to us at every turn, and who have totally mismanaged this war they foisted on us. Not only did they lead us into an illegal war, lying to us the whole way, their mismanagement of the war has cost untold grief and excess suffering of the Iraqi people. Further that excess suffering has only served the cause of the Islamic Militants, turning the people of Iraq against the U.S. because the people of Iraq see us as occupiers. What is the national duty of anybody who loves their country? To fight and drive out occupiers!
In any case, let me offer you a very potent critique of Rumsfeld (transcriptyoutube.com):
Rumsfeld's speech is simply part of a larger effort by the Administration to focus attention on the danger of "Islamic Fascism".
Republicans target 'Islamic fascism': Gives an interesting overview of various statements by political leaders about the danger of Islamic Fascism.
It's interesting to read some of these statements and ponder how they apply to the speaker just as strongly as it presumably does to these Islamic Fascists.
"The key is that all of this violence and all of the threats are part of one single ideological struggle, a struggle between the forces of freedom and moderation, and the forces of tyranny and extremism," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino told reporters traveling with Bush aboard Air Force One.
Uh... Let me see, the Bush Administration has been routinely tromping on the Freedom of the American people. How? Warrantless wiretapping, in violation of U.S. law for a start. And there's the increasingly invasive searches at airports, and in all other aspects of our lives.
Moderation? This administration is anything but moderate! They are more at the extreme conservative edge of American political life. They are the very definition of extremism, of the Christian Fundamentalist variety.
I think what we're facing is a war between two sorts of Fundamentalist religions. Namely, Islamic Fundamentalism and Christian Fundamentalism. Both seem to think they have a monopoly on The Truth, and that their religion and practices are clearly superior to everybody elses.
Discussing the emotional impact and strength of using the word Fascist, the article says this:
"It helps dramatize what we're up against. They are not just some ragtag terrorists. They are people with a plan to take over the world and eliminate everybody except them," Black said.
Uh... Let me see, the Neocons (Rumsfeld, Cheney, Wolfowitz, etc) had published a plan in the 1990's through The Project for a New American Century. That plan? Well, their stated aim was that as the Worlds Primary Superpower, the United States had a moral obligation to create peace in the world. The form of that peace? It was to begin with the Middle of the Middle East, and reshape the Middle East to have Moderate Democracies rather than the extremism which has been growing popular there. They would, uh, begin with Iraq, and topple the government of Iraq. Then after being greeted with open arms and showers of flowers by the greatful Iraqi's, and after establishing a moderate Democracy in Iraq, they would move on to either Syria or Iran. The establishment of a moderate democracy in Iraq would prove enticing to the other countries in the Middle East, and between toppling governments and the allure of moderate democracy, the other governments of the Middle East would too join the ranks of moderate democracies.
Seems to me that is a plan to take over the world and to eliminate every ideology except their own.
And just who was it who concocted that plan? It was the Neocons, Rumsfeld, Cheney, etc.
UPDATE (Sep 4, 2006): Frank Rich, a columnist with the NY Times, wrote another scathing rebuttal along the same lines. (NY Times Select, Mother Jones reprint)
It's interesting, he notes, how Rumsfeld hit the nail on the head contrasting Neville Chamberlain versus Winston Churchill and how it relates to the current era. Neville Chamberlain pretty much ignored the rise of the German war machine, and prevented Great Britain from arming itself in response. Chamberlain wanted to appease Germany hoping that would prevent later wars. At the same time Churchill was a hawk, calling for Great Britain to prepare itself for war, etc. History showed Churchill to be more prescient.
Rumsfeld, in his speech, wants to place himself and the others in the administration in the role of Churchill. He wants to claim their position as being prescient, warning against this danger from Islamo-Fascism. He wants to call the rest of us appeasers who will allow the Islamo-Fascists to eventually destroy us.
But, as Frank Rich reminds ... there is an interesting juxtaposition to consider. In 1938 Neville Chamberlain was famously photographed warmly shaking Hitlers hand in Munich. In 1983 Donald Rumsfeld was famously photographed warmly shaking Saddam Hussein's hand in Baghdad. In both cases the governments in question knew very well the evildoings of the person in question, it being very well known that Saddam Hussein was a very nasty ruler with a lot of nasty deeds to his credit even at the time Rumsfeld met him. But did Rumsfeld do anything about those nasty deeds? No, Rumsfeld was there on a mission to reestablish diplomatic relations between Iraq and the U.S. so that Iraq would be aided in its disastrous war against Iran.
Who is the appeaser?
How can we trust the guys we have leading our country?
In How Hitler Became a Dictator we learn how Adolf Hitler was able to rise to absolute power over Germany, even though his party had a minority of votes. In 1932 Hitlers party stood for a couple elections, and won only 30% of the vote, meaning they were rejected by 70% of the voters. To gain power they staged a series of murders and other violent actions which might be called Terrorism today. This built a climate of fear leading the people to vote for Hitlers party, which then quickly moved to grab control over the government. Once in control over the government, they staged a fire at the Reichstag (Germany's equivalent to the U.S. Capital building) which was blamed on Communists and used to engender even more fear in the population.
That history is instructive today. Hitler's rise to absolute power was based on lies and deceit and manipulating the German public through fearism. It's understood that a political movement can control a population through fearism, and it was the German propoganda masters who honed this to a fine art. One stages an event that causes the people to be afraid. Then, as the political leader, one steps onto the public stage and offers the people a solution to the event which is meant to calm their fear. But, in the fearful state, the people become more pliable, more willing to do anything you tell them must be done.
For example would we be willing to essentially disrobe before boarding airplanes? After the Sep 11, 2001 attack, and after the "shoe bomber", we are willing to do so. But before those two events would we have stood still for such invasive searches?
Following are a series of recent speeches and other events which illustrate the principle in action. It seems obvious to me that a state of continual fear is being maintained so that the government can manipulate us. Rather, so that the neocons can manipulate us into supporting their continued control over government.
For example, take the 2006 State of the Union speech. This clip was constructed from every fear-word spoke by President Bush during that speech. Now, what is the intended message of a speech so filled with with fear-words? Is such a speech meant to calm our fears or to build them?
And it's not just the government figures. Here's Jon Stewart (the Comedy Show) commenting on a recent bit of fearmongering about airplane travel. In mid-August 2006 there was a revealed plot that would have had "terrorists" bringing bomb-making materials onto airplanes, mixing chemicals during the flight, and then supposedly detonating them during the flight. But what it's meant is air travelers are now prevented from carrying a whole range of potentially dangerous things on airplane flights.
In the 2004 Republican National Convention they repeatedly invoked September 11, 2001, Saddam Hussein, and the threat of global terrorism. Over and over.
During the 2004 election cycle an announcement was made of vague threats where al Qaeda would possibly disrupt the election. There was even consideration of whether the election should be delayed until the threat of disruption was over. Here is Jon Stewart's analysis.
Was it a terror sting or entrapment?: A terrorist cell was captured and is being charged for plotting terror attacks. However, the people making the plot had no connection to al Qaeda or any other terror organization. Instead they were contacted by FBI agents, who posed as al Qaeda plotters, and it was these FBI agents who supplied all the money and material with which these plotters were planning to launch their attack. Yup, some terrorist plotters were fooled by FBI agents into thinking they were working for al Qaeda, when they were actually working for the FBI. And, for this "crime" they are under threat of prison sentences for plotting attacks the FBI told them to plot.
Bush setting up next terror speech: Discusses a series of new speeches to be given by Bush that are meant to prop up support for the War On Terror.
Oh, and this plan is said to be proposed directly as a follow-on to the liquids-as-bombs plot that was "prevented" in mid-August 2006. In that plot supposed terrorists in the UK were planning to hide bomb-making materials in innocent looking bottles of sports drinks or hair gels or the like. Once on the airplane they were expecting to mix the chemicals and make their bomb. A big scene was made about this plot, dozens of people arrested, and the public made to dump vast quantities of personal care products or drinks under the guise of their potential for danger.
And, now, in the state of fear created by that event, the Department of Homeland Security is proposing that all of us who travel in airplanes be registered and have to endure background checks. Okay, that is, those of us who travel and wish to avoid enduring ridiculous searches and treatment under great suspicion, that if we want to travel in ease then we would be required to give up some freedoms and privacy. For what? Under a propped up false sense of insecurity?
Hmm, this makes me think of the book 1984 where double-speak would have meant the Department of Homeland Security is really about creating Insecurity among the population.
Well, okay, enough with rhetorical questions. Basically the war in Afghanistan was an underfunded crock. Despite Afghanistan being the location of the cuplrits of the September 11, 2001 attacks, the major war focus was not on Afghanistan but on Iraq. Iraq had nothing to do with that attack, yet the major focus was on creating a war in Iraq.
And.. now... we see Pakistani's helping the Taliban to reestablish itself. Wait, isn't Pakistan the Friend of the United States? Well, these Pakistani's are of the border tribal areas, as are the Taliban themselves. I get the impression that along the Pakistan and Afghanistan border is a tribal area that isn't fully integrated with either country, and possibly is its own culture separate from both Pakistani and Afghan cultures.
Scores of Taliban militants chased police out of two southern Helmand districts near the border with Pakistan.
... Afghan officials have said scores of Taliban fighters, many crossing into Afghanistan from neighboring Pakistan, fought Garmser's small contingent of policemen -- holed up in a concrete compound -- for 16 days before the police withdrew.
While Taliban militants have long operated freely in former southern stronghold provinces, their capture of two towns highlights the weakness of Afghanistan's police forces in remote areas, and the challenge ahead faced by international forces to restore order in the country.
"The Taliban have reconstituted and dispersed, but this is certainly not about the Taliban being strong. The reality is that the government has not yet extended to the far-reaching areas of the country," Collins said.
Col. Collins is proving himself to be a master of spin.
