Open Letter to a Democratic President by Richard Bulliet
January 21, 2009, Dear (Sir or Madam): May history remember your term in office as the greatest political turn-around in American history. Now to Iraq...
more...

Three Cultures, Three Views of Terror by Rami G. Khouri
A trip from Beirut to Boston, by way of London, reveals three different views of the global crisis of terrorism. In the case of the United States, a refusal to address reality is aiding the global terrorists' causes.
more...

Attacking Iran on the Agenda? by Immanuel Wallerstein
Those groups desirous of and promoting a U.S. attack on Iran are essentially two: Dick Cheney and friends, and Israel's rightwing government and friends. Given their reasons for such an attack -- and the arguments of those against it -- would it be "rational"? No.
more...

US rate cuts: Like a blow to the head

The US Federal Reserve's cuts of 50 basis points in both the Federal Funds target rate and the discount rate are a clear indication that it feels the surface calm that has returned to world equity markets is illusory. The move sent the greenback into a tailspin, while stocks surged. The cuts also put China, with its massive wad of cash kept as US dollars, in a fix. But the Fed, despite the debasement of its own currency and the defrauding of its lenders, can be expected to keep the party going with more cuts next month. - Julian Delasantellis (Sep 19, '07)


Neo-cons have Syria in their sights
Whether Israel really did bomb a facility in Syria, and whether that facility was a North Korea-linked nuclear site, is pure speculation as long as Israel and Syria remain silent. For neo-conservatives in the United Sates, though, this is an opportunity to re-ignite political debate that fits neatly with the infamous cast of the "axis of evil": Syria has long been designated as a junior partner in the "reign of terror" of Iran, North Korea and the erstwhile Iraq. (Sep 19, '07)


A real success story in the US's Iraq: Iran
Of all the unintended consequences of the Iraq war, Iran's strategic victory is the most far-reaching. The George W Bush administration, while threatening Tehran constantly, has actually forwarded Iranian interests in Iraq at every level, while giving new life to Iran's allies in Syria. - Peter Galbraith (Sep 19, '07)


Saudis quietly go about 'business' in Iraq
Iran attracts by far the bulk of the criticism from the United States over foreign intervention in Iraq. Yet Saudi Arabia, US ally and beneficiary of massive military largesse, is supporting resistance groups and spreading fundamentalist ideology in Iraq, and intends to continue to do so. - Dahr Jamail (Sep 19, '07)

Third 9/11 Jihadist Video Calls For Attacks on West (Updated)

By Jeffrey Imm


September 18 Update with additional SITE report

Media reports state that a third 9/11 Jihadist video, reportedly by Al Qaeda, has been released via Islamist web sites today, calling for Jihadist terror acts on the West to be a daily occurrence and calling for "acts of mass extermination".
AKI and AFP have thus far provided the primary reporting on this new Al Qaeda video.

AKI reports that the new 26 minute video is entitled "The attacks in New York and Washington - reasons and motives".
AFP reports that the video "features a montage of images of the burning World Trade Center towers and scenes from Islamist training camps."

AFP reports that a voiceover on the video states:
"We must take Islamist terrorism to Western countries so that it becomes a normal part of life like natural disasters" and "n that way, we will have acts of mass extermination in which people will feel that their affluence also brings death... and we will have created a balance of deterrence between us and them".

AKI reports that the new video begins with a message from Abu Yahya al-Libi, the leader of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. On the new video, Al-Libi is reported to praise the role of Al Qaeda in defending the principles of Islam

AKI reports that the new video includes a montage of audio and video footage of previous messages Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri on the rationale behind the 9/11 attacks. AFP reports that the video also includes a clip by Mustafa Abu Al-Yazid, also known as Sheikh Said, the group's commander in Afghanistan.

AKI reports that:
"[a] voice on the video also gives an account of the war in Chechnya, blames the West for having committed a mass extermination and calls for revenge for this action. Also included is footage of interviews carried out by the Arab satellite TV network, Al Jazeera, with university professors, Arab commentators and editor of the London-based al-Quds al-Arabi newspaper. The entire video describes various events that occured before the 9/11 attacks, in particular the conflict in Chechnya, and tries to explain the reasons behind the terror attacks."

AKI reports that the video ends with a speech by Abdullah Azzam. Abdullah Azzam, who died in 1989, was an inspiration to Osama Bin Laden and countless other Jihadists.

AKI reports that the new video does not the logo of al-Sahab, Al Qaeda's communications arm, but carries the new logo of "al-Tanzim". AFP reports: "A third release had been trailed by Al-Qaeda's media arm, As-Sahab. In the event the new video was issued in the name of Al-Tanzem, prompting suggestions the network has launched a new media arm."

[i]Additional SITE Reporting

SITE provided additional reporting on the 9/11 Jihadist video, pointing out that in this Al-Tanzem Jihadist video, there was significant focus on Chechnya. SITE reported that: "Chechnya is the lens through which al-Tanzem is fixated, the narrator stating: “If you see the massacres of Chechnya, you would say that this is enough reason to strike the towers of the World Trade Center.” Footage of destruction in Chechnya in human and material terms, and excerpts from interviews with Islamic scholars and al-Qaeda spokesman, Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, defend the jihad in Chechnya and portrays it as an example of a war on Islam not isolated to Russia."

SITE reported that "Al-Tanzem, in the past, has produced media praising deceased jihadi leaders, such as Mullah Dadullah, Shamil Basayev and Abu al-Walid al-Ghamdi."

SITE also provided a similar translation on the video voiceover previously reported by AFP, with SITE stating: "[a] voice which sounds like that of Abu Musab al-Suri states: 'Islamic terror must move to the Western countries so that it turns into a natural disaster such as earthquakes, volcanoes and things similar to that. They should have mass extermination so they can feel what we suffer and stop what they are doing to us, then they will have sympathy and a balance is achieved. We don’t need to understand the West; instead we make the West understands us.' "


Sources:

September 17, 2007 - SITE Intelligence Group -- "Reasons and Motivations for the Attacks in New York and Washington" – Video Presentation from al-Tanzem Foundation for Sixth Anniversary of 9/11

September 17, 2007 -- AKI: Terrorism: Al-Qaeda releases third 9/11 video

September 17, 2007 -- AFP: Qaeda urges Islamic terror in West in third 9/11 video

September 17, 2007 -- Agenzia Giornalistica Italia -- Terror: Third Al Qaeda's video, attacks must be normal

April 16, 2002 - Slate: Abdullah Azzam - The godfather of jihad


September 17, 2007 01:00 PM Link

Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Rice Apologizes to al-Maliki for Blackwater Shootings
Was Abu Rishah a Fake?

McClatchy reports from Baghdad that Iraqi eyewitnesses maintain that Blackwater security guards fired at civilians without provocation on Sunday, in contrast to the company's own story about the incident. Probably they were firing at a car that neglected to stop when told to, or neglected to stop fast enough. Since such vehicles might be driven by suicide bombers, American military and civilian security forces have often opened fire on innocent Iraqis who just did not hear or did not understand the command to halt their vehicles, or who panicked and sped up. The offending car in this instance had a family of three in it, including a toddler who ended up being melted to his mother's body in the resulting conflagration.

Al-Hayat reports in Arabic that Condi Rice personally apologized to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki for the killing of 10 Iraqis by Blackwater guards and promised that steps would be taken to ensure the tragedy was not repeated. The Iraqis are from all accounts absolutely furious about the Blackwater cowboys running around their country armed and dangerous and acting with impunity. The State Department, which employs Blackwater, is highly embarrassed and has ordered State Dept. personnel in Iraq not to circulate for the time being. Debate is raging over whether Iraq has the right to try the apparently trigger-happy civilian security men of Blackwater.

Al-Hayat also says that a US officer in Salahuddin, Col. Barry DiRosa, admitted that the US was paying the salaries (but not the weapons costs) of the tribal irregulars recruited to fight "Al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia." The paper says he admitted in a telephone interview that "Al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia" as it operated in Salahuddin Province is mainly an Iraqi organization, not primarily made up of foreign fighters.

Greg Palast argues that Sattar Abu Rishah, the leader of the Al-Anbar Salvation Council who was assassinated last week, was a 'phony sheikh' who had no real tribe behind him and is opposed by the very powerful and very real sheikh of the Dulaim tribe. He points to video reportage produced by Rick Rowley and David Enders and carried by Aljazeera English, which includes interviews with Iraqis who doubt Abu Rishah's bona fides. The videos had earlier been blogged by Marc Lynch, who had been following Abu Rishah and had blown the whistle on him as having an unsavory past.

My own feeling is that Palast is generally on to something but is exaggerating a bit. The al-Anbar Salvation Council does have representation on it from the Dulaim tribe, and weekly attacks in al-Anbar have fallen from 400 in summer of 2006 to 100 this summer, according to the US military. Al-Anbar is hardly quiet, and it is easy to exaggerate the changes (more especially since at least one major city, Fallujah, has had a private vehicle ban since late May, an artificial policy that cannot continue much longer). But to say that the Al-Anbar Salvation Council is a complete fake and no tribal leaders are cooperating with the US, if that is what Palast is saying, would be to go too far in the other direction.

Another 50,000 persons were displaced in Iraq since July bringing the total to 2.25 million. I don't think the optimism about the 'surge' 'working' included this data.

McClatchy reports attacks in Iraq on Tuesday:

' Baghdad

- Around 7 a.m. a road side bomb targeted police patrol in Zafaraniyah. One civilian was killed and 2 policemen were injured.

- Around 8 a.m. a bomb inside a bus exploded in Zayuna. Two civilians were killed and 5 were injured.

- Around 9 a.m. Two parked car bomb exploded in parking yard not far away from Baghdad morgue. 5 people were killed and 20 were injured.

- Around 1 p.m. a parked car bomb targeted civilians in Ur neighborhood near Al Firdous mosque. 8 civilians were killed and 15 others were injured.

- Police found 9 dead bodies throughout Baghdad . . .'

Another attack was launched on an aide of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani in Basra, but the aide, Imad Abdul Karim, escaped injury.

At the Global Affairs Group Blog, Barnett Rubin comments on Afghan reactions to recent saber-rattling by Tehran against 'US interests" in Iraq and Afghanistan if Washington attacks Iran.

At the Napoleon's Egypt blog, Sucy writes to Joseph Bonaparte of France's new conquest, Egypt: 'There is much to be hoped for from this country; but then this hope is of the nature of those which a length of time alone can realize. ' It is always the way in colonial conquest, that the military maintains there is hope but it just needs more time . . .Labels: Iraq

posted by Juan Cole @ 9/19/2007 06:30:00 AM 0 comments

<h3 class="post-title"> Jihadis Threaten to Kill Leaders of al-Anbar Council </h3> The USG Open Source Center summarizes and partially translates a threat by the 'Islamic State of Iraq' [Salafi Jihadis] to kill more members of the al-Anbar Salvation Council, tribal sheikhs who are cooperating with the Americans. The organization claims to have killed the ASC leader, Sattar Abu Rishah, last week.

Statement Says Islamic State of Iraq Threatens To Kill Al-Anbar Salvation Council Members
Jihadist Websites -- OSC Summary
Wednesday, September 19, 2007 . . .

' Terrorism: Statement Says Islamic State of Iraq Threatens To Kill Al-Anbar Salvation Council Members On 15 September, a forum participant posted to a jihadist website an unsigned statement that was intended to appear as though it had been issued by The Islamic State of Iraq. The statement discussed how The Islamic State of Iraq has succeeded in killing Abu-Rishah, the late leader of the Al-Anbar Salvation Council, and boasted that The Islamic State of Iraq will continue killing others like Abu-Rishah because Abu-Umar Al-Baghdadi has "decided to once again free Al-Anbar and purify it from the filth of the apostates, beginning in the blessed month of Ramadan." The statement lists the names of the individuals targeted and their pictures in the form of a deck of cards.

A summary of the statement follows:

The unsigned statement is said to have been copied from another source, although the latter is not named. The statement says that The Islamic State of Iraq killed Abu-Rishah, the late leader of the Al-Anbar Salvation Council, and promised to continue killing others like him. The statement is accompanied by pictures, listing the names of the individuals targeted and their pictures on cards in a deck. The statement promises that "we will not allow the majority of your leaders to pray the Id prayer (holiday following Ramadan)" and that "the men have turned Ramadan into a graveyard for the apostates."

The individuals named in the statement are:

--Abu-Rishah's brother, Ahmad Abu-Rishah: "Ahmed Abu Reesha, Al-Anbar Salvation Council senior member"

--Hamid Al-Hayis: "Hamid Hayes, Al-Anbar Salvation Council senior member"

--Ali Hatim: "Ali Hatem, Al-Anbar Salvation Council senior member"

--Falih Al-Dulaymi: "Faleh Al Dolaimi, Al-Anbar Salvation Council senior member"

--Jabbar Al-Fahdawi: "Jabbar Al Fahdawi, Al-Anbar Salvation Council senior member"

The statement promises that "just as the mujahidin hunted down the head of the apostasy, Abd Al-Sattar, hours before he escaped to Jordan and right from the arms of the Americans, the mujahidin will overpower you too, God willing." This, they say, is because Abu-Umar Al-Baghdadi has "decided to once again free Al-Anbar and to purify it from the filth of the apostates, beginning in the blessed month of Ramadan." '

Labels: <a rel="tag" href="http://www.juancole.com/labels/Iraq.html">Iraq

posted by Juan Cole

"We Sound Like We Don't Want Black People To Vote For Us"
AP

GEAB N°17 is available! The current crisis explained in one thousand words
Public announcement GEAB N°17 (September 16, 2007)As explained many times since the beginning of 2006 by LEAP/E2020's team of researchers, the main cause to the current systemic crisis is in the United States. This "end of the Western world as we've known it since 1945 " anticipated by LEAP/E2020... Read...


An implosion of the US society: The middle class is sacrificed between the endless collapse of housing prices and a revenue disparity ratio now above that of 1928

- Abstract GEAB N°14 (April 16, 2007) - Anticipated by LEAP/E2020 in February 2006, the US housing bubble burst is now at the core of a socio-economic tragedy directly affecting dozens of millions of Americans with consequences expanding more and more deeply into the country's financial system. Read... <h3 class="titre"> In February 2007, LEAP anticipated: 'Spectacular rise of US home foreclosures: 10 million Americans out on the street'

GEAB quote (February 16, 2007)" According to LEAP/E2020, the year 2007 will register at least a doubling in the number of foreclosures (3) due to the surge of record high numbers of mortgage loan refinancing on the market (close to 2,000 billion USD). 2 to 3 million homes will probably be filed in... Read...

Subprime crisis : After the financial sector, the next victim is the US Dollar - Decoded news (August 19, 2007) -Contrary to today's declarations made by those very experts who yesterday firmly rejected any idea of a possible 'subprime related global financial crisis', the US Dollar will be the main victim of the exchange rate's major reassessment ahead of us. ...

Anyone near the Washington area may be interested in attending this event sponsored by the Center for Defense Information.
There are many ways U.S. Department of Defense spending and other national security related data can be broken down. In our third release of excerpts of data from CDI’s 2007 Military Almanac (to see information on the release event for this publication, click here), we present state by state data on military personnel and U.S. casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan, demographic and education level data on the Armed Forces, and data on political contributions made by major defense manufacturers. Below, we briefly summarize the data and provide a link to the excerpts from CDI’s 2007 Military Almanac.



How many active duty and reserve military personnel are in each state? How many Department of Defense civilian employees are in those same states? These data, shown here, are just some of the state by state breakdowns of defense spending and other data.

We show here a state by state breakdown of the military casualties (killed and wounded) from Iraq and Afghanistan. The sad statistics show that California and Texas have borne the largest burden in absolute numbers.

How do the military services break down by race and ethnicity? Find the answer here. What are the education levels of officers and enlisted personnel in each military service? Find that data here.

What dollar amounts have the 20 largest defense manufacturers “contributed” to political campaigns in the 2006 elections? How does that “generosity” break down between Republicans and Democrats for each corporation? Find the data here.

These data and far more can be found in CDI’s 2007 Military Almanac. Ordering information for this volume can be found here.

Tom Omestad has an interesting special report in the current US News and World Report discussing the conversations that are going on in Washington about Iran. The link is:
http://www.usnews.com/articles/news/world/2007/09/14/think-tank-buzz-is-building-on-the-chances-of-war-with-iran.html

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2007/...iran/print.html





Why Bush won't attack Iran
Despite saber-rattling, and the Washington buzz that a strike is coming, the president doesn't intend to bomb Iran. Cheney may have other ideas. By Steven Clemons

Sep. 19, 2007 | During a recent high-powered Washington dinner party attended by 18 people, Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft squared off across the table over whether President Bush will bomb Iran.

Brzezinski, former national security advisor to President Carter, said he believed Bush's team had laid a track leading to a single course of action: a military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities. Scowcroft, who was NSA to Presidents Ford and the first Bush, held out hope that the current President Bush would hold fire and not make an already disastrous situation for the U.S. in the Middle East even worse.

The 18 people at the party, including former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, then voted with a show of hands for either Brzezinski's or Scowcroft's position. Scowcroft got only two votes, including his own. Everyone else at the table shared Brzezinski's fear that a U.S. strike against Iran is around the corner.

In the national debate about America's next moves in the Middle East, an irrepressible and perhaps irresponsible certainty that America will attack Iran now dominates commentary across the political spectrum. Nerves are further frayed by stories like this one, about the Pentagon making a list of 2,000 military targets inside Iran.

The left -- and much of the old-school, realist right -- fears that Bush means to bomb Iran sometime between now and next spring. Both would like to rally public opinion against the strike before it happens. The neoconservative right, meanwhile, is asserting that we will bomb Iran but that we need to get to it posthaste.

But both sides are advancing scenarios that are politically useful to them, and both sides are wrong. Despite holding out a military option, ratcheting up tensions with Iran about meddling in Iraq and Afghanistan, and deploying carrier strike-force groups in the Persian Gulf, the president is not planning to bomb Iran. But there are several not-unrelated scenarios under which it might happen, if the neocon wing of the party, led by Vice President Cheney, succeeds in reasserting itself, or if there is some kind of "accidental," perhaps contrived, confrontation.

One of the reasons so many believe action is near is the well-known neoconservative preference that it be so. There is still a strong neoconservative faction within the Bush team, and their movement allies outside the administration, such as Michael Ledeen, John Bolton and Norman Podhoretz, have openly advocated striking Iran before it can develop nuclear weapons. The neoconservatives believe that in the end, Bush's team will indeed launch a military strike against Iran, or will nudge Israel to do so.

There is also evidence that the administration has given serious thought to the bombing option. In June 2006, I helped organize a round table on Iran for the New America Foundation, where I work, that attracted some heavy hitters in the national security world, including some of the names associated with the Aspen Strategy Group co-chaired by Brent Scowcroft and former National Intelligence Council chairman and Harvard Kennedy School dean Joseph Nye. As at the Aspen Strategy Group, comments made in my session were on a "not for attribution" basis. Several current and former Bush administration officials were in attendance.

I moderated the session. The task of those participating was to think and talk through the "unthinkables." On the one hand, was an Iran with nukes so hard to live with that the potentially disastrous consequences of an attack, even if it negated Iran's nuclear gains, would be worth it? Would an Iran with nukes be less paranoid about its security and thus less prone to meddling in other countries, or would it use the nukes as a shield to protect itself while continuing to finance terrorism?

Alternatively, if we bombed Iran would we be prepared to cede American primacy over the world's fossil fuel regime and see Iran, China and Russia develop what Flynt Leverett calls a "new axis of oil"? Would we be prepared for a post-bombing terrorist superhighway to erupt from Iran and race through Iraq, Syria and Jordan to the edge of Israel? America might not just see its global geo-energy position undermined, but could see a set of falling dominoes among Sunni Arab states that could dramatically remake the map of the Middle East -- and not in America's favor.

In other words, the task was to ponder what each of these bleak binary choices meant for America. They are often framed as "bombing" vs. "appeasement." The emerging polite term for the appeasement option is "strategic readjustment."

After the session, two Bush administration senior officials who were not present sent me letters, one to say the binary "to bomb or not to bomb" scenario was premature, the other to say it was not premature.

But a former administration official who was present at the session vigorously and emphatically embraced the either/or formula. He also had this to share about the inner workings of the Bush White House on Iran and the inevitability of military action:

The President is going to receive a memo -- some time in the next 6 to 12 months -- that presents a "bleak binary choice". Either he takes action to preempt Iran from reaching a nuclear threshold and calls for a military strike or he stands down and accepts a future with Iran with nuclear weapons.

Condi's job is to develop a "third option". She will dance round and round, waltzing with that third option. She will dance faster and faster with it, spinning and spinning, all around she'll go -- but when she's done she'll see that she's dancing with a corpse.

This President is the kind of president who believes it is his moral responsibility to address serious problems now and not to leave these tough actions to a successor.

Those are the cold, harsh realities that we face -- and to me, as I look ahead, I don't see how we come out of this without military action. Unless Iran abandons its nuclear weapons intentions, which I don't see happening, there will be a war.

So 15 months later, the president has now, presumably, received that memo, and those who hold the deterministic view that bombing Iran is around the corner could argue that they are in good company.

To try to discern what the president himself thinks, however, is very difficult. It's particularly hard when Bush is trying to convince Iran that the military option is real, and that if Iran doesn't work out a mutually acceptable deal with the U.S., he will launch a strike.

To date, however, nothing suggests Bush is really going to do it. If he were, he wouldn't be playing good cop/bad cop with Iran and proposing engagement. If the bombs were at the ready, Bush would be doing a lot more to prepare the nation and the military for a war far more consequential than the invasion of Iraq. There is also circumstantial evidence that he has decided bombing may be too costly a choice.

First, journalist Joe Klein documents a December 2006 meeting in which Bush met in "the Tank" with his senior national security counselors and the military's command staff and walked out with the impression that either the costs of military action against Iran were simply too high, or that the prospects for success for the mission too low.

Klein writes:

Then Bush asked about the possibility of a successful attack on Iran's nuclear capability. He was told that the U.S. could launch a devastating air attack on Iran's government and military, wiping out the Iranian air force, the command and control structure and some of the more obvious nuclear facilities. But the Chiefs were -- once again -- unanimously opposed to taking that course of action.

Why? Because our intelligence inside Iran is very sketchy. There was no way to be sure that we could take out all of Iran's nuclear facilities. Furthermore, the Chiefs warned, the Iranian response in Iraq and, quite possibly, in terrorist attacks on the U.S. could be devastating. Bush apparently took this advice to heart and went to Plan B -- a covert destabilization campaign reported earlier this week by ABC News.

After this meeting, Bush immediately tilted away from the Cheney-dominant view that military action was the most preferable course and empowered and released other parts of his administration to animate a third option.

Secondly, we know via material first reported on my blog, the Washington Note, and subsequently confirmed by the New York Times, Time and Newsweek, that Cheney and his team have been deeply frustrated by the "engage Iran team" that the president empowered and felt that they were losing ground to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell and the president's new chief of staff, Joshua Bolten.

One member of Cheney's national security staff, David Wurmser, worried out loud that Cheney felt that his wing was "losing the policy argument on Iran" inside the administration -- and that they might need to "end run" the president with scenarios that may narrow his choices. The option that Wurmser allegedly discussed was nudging Israel to launch a low-yield cruise missile strike against the Natanz nuclear reactor in Iran, thus "hopefully" prompting a military reaction by Tehran against U.S. forces in Iraq and the Gulf. When queried about Wurmser's alleged comments, a senior Bush administration official told the New York Times, "The vice president is not necessarily responsible for every single thing that comes out of the mouth of every single member of his staff."

We know Bush rebuffed Cheney's view and is seeking other alternatives. That is the most clear evidence that Bush is not committed to bombing Iran. Even if Bush wanted to make the Iranians believe that he could go either way -- diplomacy or military strike -- Bush would not so clearly knock back one side in favor of the other to the point where the "bad cops" in a good cop/bad cop strategy would tell anyone on the outside that they did not enjoy the favor and support of the president.

Bush is aware that America's intelligence on Iran is weak. Even without admitting America's blind spots on Iraq, the intelligence failures on Iraq's WMD program create a formidable credibility hurdle.

Bush knows that the American military is stretched and that bombing Iran would not be a casual exercise. Reprisals in the Gulf toward U.S. forces and Iran's ability to cut off supply lines to the 160,000 U.S. troops currently deployed in Iraq could seriously endanger the entire American military.

Bush can also see China and Russia waiting in the wings, not to promote conflict but to take advantage of self-destructive missteps that the United States takes that would give them more leverage over and control of global energy flows. Iran has the third-largest undeveloped oil reserves in the world and the second-largest undeveloped natural gas reserves.

Bush also knows that Iran controls "the temperature" of the terror networks it runs. Bombing Iran would blow the control gauge off, and Iran's terror networks could mobilize throughout the Middle East, Afghanistan and even the United States.

In sum, Bush does not plan to escalate toward a direct military conflict with Iran, at least not now -- and probably not later. The costs are too high, and there are still many options to be tried before the worst of all options is put back on the table. As it stands today, he wants that "third option," even if Cheney doesn't. Bush's war-prone team failed him on Iraq, and this time he'll be more reserved, more cautious. That is why a classic buildup to war with Iran, one in which the decision to bomb has already been made, is not something we should be worried about today.

What we should worry about, however, is the continued effort by the neocons to shore up their sagging influence. They now fear that events and arguments could intervene to keep what once seemed like a "nearly inevitable" attack from happening. They know that they must keep up the pressure on Bush and maintain a drumbeat calling for war.

They are doing exactly this during September and October in a series of meetings organized by the American Enterprise Institute on Iran and Iraq designed to reemphasize the case for hawkish, interventionist deployments in Iraq and a military, regime-change-oriented strike against Iran. And through Op-Eds and the serious political media, the "bomb Iran now" crowd believes they must undermine those in and out of government proposing alternatives to bombing and keep the president and his people saturated with pro-war mantras.

We should also worry about the kind of scenario David Wurmser floated, meaning an engineered provocation. An "accidental war" would escalate quickly and "end run," as Wurmser put it, the president's diplomatic, intelligence and military decision-making apparatus. It would most likely be triggered by one or both of the two people who would see their political fortunes rise through a new conflict -- Cheney and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

That kind of war is much more probable and very much worth worrying about.



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William Greider: The lies of Alan Greenspan
Submitted by cpowell on 07:29PM ET Tuesday, September 18, 2007. Section: Daily Dispatches By William Greider
The Nation, New York
via San Francisco Chronicle
Tuesday, September 18, 2007

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?.../18/EDCLS7TH4...

Alan Greenspan has come back from the tomb of history to correct the record. He did not make any mistakes in his 18-year tenure as Federal Reserve chairman. He did not endorse the regressive Bush tax cuts of 2001 that pumped up the federal deficits and aggravated inequalities. He did not cause the housing bubble that is now in collapse. He did not ignore the stock market bubble that subsequently melted away and cost investors $6 trillion. He did not say the Iraq war is "largely about oil."

Check the record. These are all lies.

Greenspan's testimony endorsing the Bush tax cuts was extremely influential but now he wants to run away from it. In the instance of Iraq, Greenspan is actually correcting his own memoir, "The Age of Turbulence," which just came out. Last weekend, newspapers reported provocative snippets from the book, including this: "I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil."

Wow, talk about your "inconvenient truth." Greenspan was blithely acknowledging what official Washington has always denied and the news media faithfully ignored. "Blood for oil." No, no, no, that's not what he meant, Greenspan corrected in a follow-up interview (with Bob Woodward in the Sept. 17 Washington Post). He was only saying that "taking out Saddam was essential" for "oil security" and the global economy.

Are you confused? Welcome to the world of slippery truth that Greenspan has always lived in. He was the Maestro, as Woodward's loving portrait dubbed him. Wall Street loved the chairman best because the traders and bankers knew he was always on their side and would come to their rescue. The major news media treated him like an Old Testament prophet. Whatever the chairman said was carved on stone tablets, even when it didn't make any sense, as it often didn't.

Some of us, who followed his tracks more closely, were not so kind. Harry Reid, now the Democratic Senate leader, said Greenspan was "one of the biggest political hacks in Washington." Amen. I called him "the one-eyed chairman" who could always spot reasons to stomp on the real economy of work and production, but was utterly blind to the destructive chaos in the financial system. No matter. The adoration of him was nearly universal.

Until now. The economic consequences of his rule are accumulating, and even the dullest financial reporters are stumbling on crumbs of truth about Greenspan's legendary reign. It sowed profound and dangerous imbalances in the U.S. economy. That's what happens when government power tips the balance in favor of capital over labor, favoring super-rich over middle class and poor, then holds it there for nearly a generation.

Things get out of whack and now the country is paying enormously. A pity reporters and politicians didn't have the nerve to ask these questions when Greenspan was in power.

He retired only a year ago, but is already trying to revise the history -- to explain away blunders that are now a financial crisis facing his successor; to rearrange the facts in exculpatory ways; to deny his right-wing ideological bias and his raw partisanship in behalf of the Bush Republicans.

The man is shrewd. He can see the conservative era he celebrated and helped to impose upon the American economy is in utter ruin. He is trying to get some distance from it before the blood splashes all over his reputation. Of course, he also came back to cash in -- an $8 million advance for a book that is sure to be a huge best-seller.

I don't want to be unkind, but Greenspan could have avoided all the embarrassing questions if his book was posthumous. I haven't read it yet. I have a hunch I am not going to like it.

----

William Greider, The Nation's national affairs correspondent, has been a political journalist for more than 35 years. A former Rolling Stone and Washington Post editor, he is the author of "One World, Ready or Not," "Secrets of the Temple," "Who Will Tell The People?," and, most recently, "The Soul of Capitalism" (Simon & Schuster).

Foreign Policy News and Commentary Update September 20, 2007

"House of Wisdom."

--Name given by the US military to a facility in Iraq which provides "religious
enlightenment" and other education programs for Iraqi detainees, some of whom
are as young as 11; cited in Walter Pincus, ?U.S. Working to Reshape Iraqi
Detainees: Moderate Muslims Enlisted to Steer Adults and Children Away From
Insurgency? (Washington, September 19)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...1802203_pf.html

BOOK REVIEW

The New American Militarism: How Americans Are Seduced by War [review of Andrew
Bacevich, The New American Militarism: How Americans Are Seduced By War] -
Gerald Loftus (Book Review, USC Center on Public Diplomacy, September 19)
http://uscpublicdiplomacy.com/index.php/li...seduced_by_war/


THE EDUCATION OF ROBERT GATES - DAVID BROOKS (NEW YORK TIMES, SEPTEMBER 19):
Again and again, Defense Secretary Robert Gates in an interview returned to the
importance of soft power. The U.S. 'made many mistakes after the end of the cold
war,' he said. Two of the biggest were shrinking the Agency for International
Development and dismantling the U.S. Information Agency.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/19/opinion/...agewanted=print

TRANSFORMING STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS TO FIGHT TERRORISM SINCE 1492 -
COLLEEN TURNER (HUFFINGTON POST, SEPTEMBER 12): Until Americans offer a
convincing narrative of the U.S. as a David image rather than that of a Goliath,
anti-American sentiment will continue to be fueled not just in the Middle East,
but in Russia, Asia, and Africa, for instance. Perhaps the power of
transformational strategic communications lies in the fundamental appreciation
of how the most inspirational messages are not about us or them, rather they are
about the inclusive "we."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/colleen-turn...co_b_64149.html

A WAY FOR AMERICA TO ASSERT ITS MORAL STRENGTH: IF THE US JOINED THE
INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT, IT WOULD SEND A DRAMATIC MESSAGE TO A WORLD
SKEPTICAL OF AMERICA'S HUMAN RIGHTS RECORD - ALEX LITTLE (CHRISTIAN SCIENCE
MONITOR, SEPTEMBER 18)
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0918/p09s01-coop.html

PEACE CORPS RECRUITS OLDER VOLUNTEERS: MORE RETIREES AND GRANDPARENTS ARE
FINDING FULFILLMENT IN SERVING OVERSEAS - MARILYN GARDNER (CHRISTIAN SCIENCE
MONITOR, SEPTEMBER 10)
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0919/p14s02-lign.html

NO WAY OUT EDITORIAL (NEW YORK TIMES, SEPTEMBER 19): Washington has a
profound moral obligation, especially to those Iraqis who have risked their
lives on America?s behalf. If America abandons them now, it will mean even more
suffering and more shame for the United States from this shameful and disastrous
war.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/19/opinion/...agewanted=print

CHECKBOOK IMPERIALISM - ROBERT SCHEER (SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE, SEPTEMBER
19): The US government purchases whatever army it needs, which has led to the
dependence upon private contract firms such as Blackwater USA, with its $300
million-plus contract to protect U.S. State Department personnel in Iraq.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?...;type=printable

RICE APOLOGIZES TO AL-MALIKI FOR BLACKWATER SHOOTINGS JUAN COLE (INFORMED
COMMENT: THOUGHTS ON THE MIDDLE EAST, HISTORY, AND RELIGION, SEPTEMBER 19): The
Iraqis are from all accounts absolutely furious about the Blackwater cowboys
running around their country armed and dangerous and acting with impunity.
http://www.juancole.com/2007/09/rice-apolo...maliki-for.html

BLACKWATER DOWN: THE U.S. NEEDS TO AVOID THE PERCEPTION OF 'VICTOR'S
JUSTICE' AS IT INVESTIGATES THE SECURITY CONTRACTOR EDITORIAL (LOS ANGELES
TIMES, SEPTEMBER 19): The Iraqis have grown more and more frustrated by what
they see as the impunity with which private contractors have harmed civilians.
And the Americans have done too little to regulate and control the contractors,
who likely now outnumber U.S. troops in Iraq.
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/a...1,1633036.story

WHAT HAPPENS TO PRIVATE CONTRACTORS WHO KILL IRAQIS? MAYBE NOTHING:
BLACKWATER USA EMPLOYEES ARE ACCUSED OF KILLING SEVERAL CIVILIANS, BUT THERE
MIGHT NOT BE ANYONE WITH THE AUTHORITY TO PROSECUTE THEM - ALEX KOPPELMAN AND
MARK BENJAMIN (SALON, SEPTEMBER 18)
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/09/18/blackwater

U.S. BANS OVERLAND TRAVEL BY DIPLOMATS IN IRAQ AFTER SECURITY INCIDENT -
ASSOCIATED PRESS (NEW YORK TIMES, SEPTEMBER 19): The United States on Tuesday
suspended all land travel by US diplomats and other civilian officials
throughout Iraq, except in Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone. The move
follows a weekend incident involving private security guards protecting a
diplomatic convoy in which a number of Iraqi civilians were killed.
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-US-I...agewanted=print
SEE ALSO
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7002164.stm

NEW MILITARY REPORT ACKNOWLEDGES SIGNS OF POLICE STATE IN BAGHDAD - TOM
HAYDEN (HUFFINGTON POST, SEPTEMBER 18): Virtually ignored in last week's
national debate on the US military surge was a report by military experts
recommending that the Iraqi police service be scrapped because of its brutal
sectarian character.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-hayden/n...no_b_64920.html

GUNS, NOT ROSES, FOR IRAQ: THE U.S. IS SELLING BILLIONS IN WEAPONS TO IRAQ.
IS THE PENTAGON'S PLAN MAKING THE COUNTRY SECURE OR ARMING IT TO THE TEETH FOR
CIVIL WAR? - MARK BENJAMIN (SALON, SEPTEMBER 18): With respect to Iraq, most
experts agree that it very much remains an open question as to who in that
country might be on our side in the future.
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/09/...pons/print.html

BUSH CATAPULTS THE PRO-WAR PROPAGANDA ... AGAIN - B MERRYFIELD (DAILY KOS,
SEPTEMBER 19): For less than ten minutes on the morning of September 18, 2007,
President George W. Bush spoke to "about 850 members" of so-called "Military
Support Organizations" who were gathered "at picnic tables" set up on the White
House South Lawn, including Families United for Our Troops and Their Mission,
Vets for Freedom, the American Legion, and Veterans of Foreign Wars, which had
been, the Associated Press reported, "invited to the White House for coffee,
juice and pastries."
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/9/19/7941/18233

THE HAPHAZARD WAR - H.D.S. GREENWAY (BOSTON GLOBE, SEPTEMBER 18): Nothing
about the Iraq war has made the U.S. safer, and it never will. It is, and always
will be, a detriment and a distraction to our struggle against Islamic
extremism. The occupation itself is the cause of extremism and violence -- a
recruiting tool in Baghdad, Muslim enclaves in Europe, turbulent Pakistan, and
on to the Far East.
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial...ard_war?mode=PF

CRITICS KNEW PETRAEUS WAS ON POINT - ALAN NATHAN (WASHINGTON TIMES,
SEPTEMBER 18): Since when should we permit the enemy's resistance in Iraq to
become the self-serving justification for our military's acquiescence? By such a
standard, the only way to deter an enemy's growth in ranks is to grant them a
victory with the forces they already possess. It's like saying we're only
allowed to win providing we don't defeat the enemy.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.d...mplate=printart

FAILURE IN IRAQ - HARLAN ULLMAN (WASHINGTON TIMES, SEPTEMBER 19): Despite
presidential optimism over the surge, using these measures, both we and Iraq are
failing in our efforts to create a functioning state.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.d...mplate=printart

IRAQ FOREVER LAST WEEK'S INTENSE FOCUS ON WHETHER THE SURGE WAS WORKING
OBSCURED THE REAL BUSH AGENDA -- A LONG-TERM U.S. PRESENCE IN IRAQ - SPENCER
ACKERMAN (AMERICAN PROSPECT, SEPTEMBER 18
http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=iraq_forever

FOLLOWING MR. BUSH'S 'WAY FORWARD' IN IRAQ WILL GET US NOWHERE - TRUDY RUBIN
(BALTIMORESUN.COM, SEPTEMBER 18): When he introduced the surge in January, the
president declared that "we will use America's full diplomatic resources to
rally support for Iraq." Yet the administration has made only faint gestures at
international diplomacy.
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/o...0,7910556.story

AN HONORABLE EXIT FROM IRAQ - POKA LAENUI (YES! MAGAZINE, SEPTEMBER
18/COMMON DREAMS): The continuation of this war will not resolve terrorism. If
terrorism is to end, it will only come through a just peace. An end to U.S.
government terrorism will decrease other forms of terrorism.
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/09/18/3916/

BREAKING THE IRAQ STALEMATE: ONCE A MIGHTY WAR GOD, BUSH HAS RUN OUT OF
TRICKS, TROOPS AND TIME. WILL AMERICANS FINALLY RISE UP TO STOP HIS ENDLESS WAR?
- GARY KAMIYA (SALON, SEPTEMBER 18): The deepest, darkest fear of those opposed
to the war is that Americans simply don't care enough to end it.
http://www.salon.com/opinion/kamiya/2007/0...mate/print.html

GREENSPAN: SO, WHAT IS THE IRAQ WAR ALL ABOUT AFTER ALL? EDWARD M. GOMEZ
(WORLD VIEWS, SF GATE, SEPTEMBER 17): The insistent protestations and
propagandizing of the Cheney-Bush White House notwithstanding, the Iraq war
really was or is about oil after all, not about ridding the world of a dictator
who supposedly threatened his neighbors, the United Kingdom and the U.S. with a
stockpile of weapons of mass destruction, which were never found. Instead, notes
former Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan, who served in that
influential role from 1987 to 2006: "I am saddened that it is politically
inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about
oil."
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfgate/det...;entry_id=20343

WAS THE IRAQ WAR ABOUT OIL? - PETER BEINART & JONAH GOLDBERG (TNR ONLINE,
SEPTEMBER 18)
http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=w070917&...urproblem091807

IT WAS RIGHT TO DISSOLVE THE IRAQI ARMY: WE BROKE AMERICA'S TERRIBLE HABIT
OF RULING BY PROXY THROUGH MILITARY REGIMES - CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS (SLATE,
SEPTEMBER 17): It stands to the credit of the United States that it did not
insult the population by grabbing and using the existing reins of repression,
just as it stands to our credit that we adopted de-Baathification, or, in other
words, the policy of demolishing the rule of a corrupt and fascistic party.
http://www.slate.com/id/2174047/

NATION-BUILDING, R.I.P. - THOMAS SOWELL (BALTIMORESUN.COM, SEPTEMBER 19): If
nothing else comes out of the Iraq war, it should banish the concept of
"nation-building" from our language and our minds.
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/o...888,print.story

AMERICAN FILMMAKERS HOPE TO BRING IMPACT OF IRAQ WAR HOME - JOE GAROFOLI
(SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 19): Without a military draft,
few middle-class Americans have been directly touched by the Iraq war, making
the 4-year-old conflict seem distant compared with the war in Vietnam. But over
the next few weeks, the war will land at the multiplex, thanks to prominent
feature films starring Robert Redford, John Cusack, Meryl Streep and Tommy Lee
Jones -- and co-starring the war either in the background or in your face
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?...9/MNCJS8OV1.DTL

THE MIRAGE OF 'VICTORY' AMERICA'S REAL WAR AIMS IN IRAQ ? JUSTIN RAIMONDO
(ANTIWAR.COM, SEPTEMBER 18): The lunatics in charge of the asylum are bound and
determined to attack Iran, and nothing ? not Congress (in the unlikely event
they object), not common sense (if our elites should suddenly have a surge of
rationality), and not the American people (if they ever wake up from their
O.J.-and-Britney-induced narcosis) -- is going to stop them.
http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=11638

PETER GALBRAITH, THE IRANIAN CONUNDRUM - TOM DISPATCH (SEPTEMBER 18): The
U.S. has good reason to worry about Iran's activities in Iraq. But contrary to
the Bush administration's allegations -- supported by both General David
Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker in their recent congressional testimony --
Iran does not oppose Iraq's new political order. In fact, Iran is the major
beneficiary of the American-induced changes in Iraq since 2003.
http://tomdispatch.com/post/print/174838/T...n%2520Conundrum

IRAN BLOWBACK? - TOM ENGELHARDT (NATION, SEPTEMBER 19): Who would be the
beneficiary of a late-term Bush administration assault on Iran? Only one thing
is clear at the moment -- not the United States.
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion?pid=234263

AHMADINEJAD AT THE U.N. EDITORIAL (WASHINGTON TIMES, SEPTEMBER 18): It is
a disgrace to the founding principles and mission of the United Nations that
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will be allowed to speak before the body
next week during the gathering of its General Assembly.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.d...mplate=printart

U.S. SEES DIPLOMATIC SOLUTION ON IRAN ? REUTERS (WASHINGTON POST, SEPTEMBER
18)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...7091800690.html

WHY BUSH WON'T ATTACK IRAN: DESPITE SABER-RATTLING, AND THE WASHINGTON BUZZ
THAT A STRIKE IS COMING, THE PRESIDENT DOESN'T INTEND TO BOMB IRAN. CHENEY MAY
HAVE OTHER IDEAS - STEVEN CLEMONS (SALON, SEPTEMBER 19): Bush's war-prone team
failed him on Iraq, and this time he'll be more reserved, more cautious. That is
why a classic buildup to war with Iran, one in which the decision to bomb has
already been made, is not something we should be worried about today.
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2007/...iran/print.html

U.S. ENGAGE OR ISOLATE IRAN? - AMAR C. BAKSHI (WASHINGTON POST, SEPTEMBER
17): "Flying home from Los Angeles, I work to fit together the pieces of my
visit with Iranian Americans there. It's more complicated than I expected. There
are some constants: Everyone I spoke to wanted the current theocracy in Iran to
loosen up on its own people and open up to the world, including America. At the
same time, they opposed war vehemently, saying it'd be catastrophic for both
nations."
http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/postglo...ml?nav=rss_blog

EGYPT EXTENDS CRACKDOWN TO PRESS: THE ARREST OF IBRAHIM EISSA AND THREE
OTHER OPPOSITION JOURNALISTS IS THE LATEST SIGNAL OF TIGHTENING GOVERNMENT
CONTROL, REFLECTING ANXIETY OVER PRESIDENTIAL SUCCESSION - DAN MURPHY (CHRISTIAN
SCIENCE MONITOR, SEPTEMBER 18)
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0918/p06s01-wome.html

DOOMSDAY DEBUNKED: THE MIDDLE EAST IS NOT FALLING DOWN - VICTOR DAVIS HANSON
(NATIONAL REVIEW, SEPTEMBER 19): Something quite strange is happening: Despite
all the bad news about the Middle East from the European and American media,
things actually seem to be improving. Bin Laden?s approval ratings are way down;
polls show that the tactic of suicide bombing has suffered a similar fate of
declining popularity.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZWRmM...zE5ZWEwYWM0MDY=

CHALLENGES LIE AHEAD OF U.S. MIDEAST POLICY - YU WANLI (PEOPLE?S DAILY,
SEPTEMBER 14): The presence of the U.S. forces has provided anti-Americanism
with a powerful spiritual motive power, while the pullout of American troops
means a victory for anti-Americanism and will possibly result in the spread of
Islamic extremism in the whole Middle East.
http://english.people.com.cn/90001/90780/91343/6262991.html


AL QAEDA'S THIRD DEFEAT - CLAUDE SALHANI (WASHINGTON TIMES, SEPTEMBER 19):
The defeat of al Qaeda by Sunni tribesmen in Iraq's Anbar Province and of an al
Qaeda-backed militia called Fatah al-Islam in North Lebanon's Nahr el-Bared
Palestinian refugee camp represents two of the most serious blows to the
Islamist movement since the declaration of war on terrorism.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.d...mplate=printart

A STRANGE AIR RAID IN SYRIA EDITORIAL (BOSTON GLOBE, SEPTEMBER 19): The
United States needs to engage in hard-nosed, deal-making diplomacy, not only to
end the war in Iraq but also to prevent new wars across a large arc of the
Middle East and central Asia.
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial..._raid_in_syria/

DOHA AND DALIAN - THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN (NEW YORK TIMES, SEPTEMBER 19): Yes,
?Americans? are popping up all over now -- people who once lived low-energy
lifestyles but by dint of oil wealth or hard work are now moving into U.S.-style
apartments, cars and appliances. Our planet cannot tolerate so many 'Americans,'
unless we take the lead and change what it means to be an American in energy
terms.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/19/opinion/...agewanted=print

STATE DEPT. OFFICIAL ACCUSED OF BLOCKING INQUIRY - DAVID STOUT (NEW YORK
TIMES, SEPTEMBER 18): A top House Democrat began an inquiry on Tuesday into
accusations that the State Department's inspector general repeatedly interfered
with investigations into fraud and abuse in Iraq and Afghanistan, including
security defects at the new United States Embassy in Baghdad.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/18/washingt...agewanted=print

"India's Long-Established Ties With Iran Straining Alliance With U.S.," By Rama Lakshmi, The Washington Post
• "Egypt, Iran Hold Rare Talks on Relations," Reuters
• "Shock Waves From Syria," Editorial, The Washington Post
• "Syria Blast Said 'Linked to Chemical Arms,' Included Iranians," Middle East Times
• "Kingdom Buys 72 Typhoon Jets," By P.K. Abdul Ghafour, Arab News
• "AQ Khan May Move SC Against ‘Detention’," By Rauf Klasra, The News
• "Squeezing Harder," The Economist

Ready for another Mideast war? By James Dobbins
Thursday, September 20, 2007

WASHINGTON:

On Sept. 6, Israeli aircraft bombed Syria and also seem to have violated Turkish airspace. So far, the Israeli government has offered no explanation. Does this mean we on the verge of another Middle East war, to accompany those underway, recently suspended, or in the offing in Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon and Gaza?

Is the United States trying to head off this latest conflict, or has it given Israel the green light?

Of course, Israel has a good case for bombing Syria. The Syrians are helping resupply Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon so that they might at some point begin lobbing rockets at Israel. But then Israel and Syria have never lacked for reasons to go to war. Israel, for example, has occupied a substantial chunk of Syrian territory since 1973. So the issue is not whether one or the other is justified in going to war, but rather what either can hope to gain from one.

On the face of it, neither country has anything to gain from war, since neither can possibly prevail. Syria is too weak reconquer its lost territory and Israel is too small to take and hold much more of Syria.

Both, however, have more subtle objectives in view. Israel wants to restore the prestige and deterrent credibility lost last year in its ill-conceived invasion of Lebanon. Syria wants to sustain pressure upon Israel via its Lebanese proxies with a view to boosting its stature in the region and ultimately ending the Israeli occupation of the Golan Heights.

The real issue is what Washington has to gain from another Middle East war. The Bush administration has acknowledged that Israel attacked Syrian last week, but has not given any indication that the United States sought to prevent it, or discourage a repetition.

That Israel was considering such an attack has been widely known in official circles for several months, so Washington could have weighed in with Tel Aviv had it chosen to do so.

Unnamed American officials have been quoted suggesting that Syria has a nuclear weapons program. So does Israel, of course. That Syria could hide such an activity for any length of time does seem improbable.

The world had decades of notice regarding the Indian, Pakistani, Iranian and North Korean programs before they reached fruition. It would be quite surprising if Syria were anywhere close to acquiring and mastering the needed technologies. Maybe North Korea has gone into the business of selling ready-made bombs, but that too seems unlikely.

In any case, one would like to know more.

In the run up to last year's Israeli attack on Lebanon, which was sparked by Hezbollah's cross-border raid and capture of an Israeli army soldier, the White House is reported to have actually encouraged an invasion. It has also been widely reported that the Bush administration has discouraged any discussions between the Israeli and Syrian governments designed to address the issues at the heart of their conflict, most notably recovery of the Golan Heights.

Given this recent history, it is reasonable to ask what, if any, signal the Bush administration sent leading up to, or in reaction to, this latest attack.

The American people have been understandably focused on the war in Iraq over the past weeks.

It is important to recognize, however, that Iraq is only one of half a dozen civil and international conflicts that are underway, in tenuous suspension, or in prospect throughout that region.

A Middle East literally in flames from the Hindu Kush to the Mediterranean is by no means a distant or unrealistic prospect. So finding out exactly what the United States is doing to forestall a war between Israel and Syria would seem important.

James Dobbins, a former assistant secretary of state, directs the International Security and Defense Policy Center at the RAND Corporation, a nonprofit research organization.

[b]EXCERPT:[/b][b] Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's security cabinet on Wednesday voted to declare the Gaza Strip a "hostile entity," approving among other things the disruption of power and fuel supplies to the Strip, as a response to the ongoing Qassam rocket fire at Israeli communities. The ministers decided, however, not to disrupt Gaza's water supply.[/b]

_{Last update - 21:37 19/09/2007}[/size]


[b]UN chief: Cutting off fuel to Gaza is violation of international law [/b]
_{By Barak Ravid , Haaretz Correspondent, and News Agencies}

[size="1"]
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged Israel on Wednesday to reconsider its decision to declare the Gaza Strip an enemy entity, warning that any cutoff of vital services would violate international law and punish the already suffering civilian population.

In one of his toughest statements aimed at Israel since taking the reins of the UN on January 1, Ban said he was very concerned at the Israeli government's declaration earlier Wednesday and its announced intent to interrupt essential services such as electricity and fuel to the civilian population.

"Such a step would be contrary to Israel's obligations towards the civilian population under international humanitarian and human rights law," he said.

"I call for Israel to reconsider this decision," the secretary-general said in a statement read by UN spokeswoman Michele Montas.

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's security cabinet on Wednesday voted to declare the Gaza Strip a "hostile entity," approving among other things the disruption of power and fuel supplies to the Strip, as a response to the ongoing Qassam rocket fire at Israeli communities.

The ministers decided, however, not to disrupt Gaza's water supply.

The security cabinet unanimously approved a number of sanctions to be imposed on the Gaza Strip should the rocket fire on southern Israel continue. The steps are designed to create "civilian levers" that will pressure Gaza's Hamas rulers to bring the rocket fire to a halt.

A statement released by the Prime Minister's Office after the meeting said that Hamas bore responsibility for the "hostile activity" emanating from the territory where the Islamic movement had seized power in June.

"Hamas is a terrorist organization that has taken control of the Gaza Strip and turned it into hostile territory," the statement said. "This organization engages in hostile activity against the State of Israel and its citizens and bears responsibility for this activity."

"The objective is to weaken Hamas," Defense Minister Ehud Barak said during the meeting, according to one participant.

Barak also said that Israel is moving closer to a large-scale military operation in Gaza. "Every day that passes brings us closer to an operation in Gaza," Barak was quoted as saying. He said an array of options would be considered before a major invasion.

The PMO statement also said that there would be restrictions on "the passage of various goods to the Gaza Strip," but stressed that all steps "will be enacted following a legal examination, while taking into account both the humanitarian aspects relevant to the Gaza Strip and the intention to avoid a humanitarian crisis."

Sanctions to be imposed on Gaza in stages
The sanctions will be imposed on the Gaza Strip in stages, with Israel responding to rocket fire by disrupting electricity during the first stage.

The decision to disrupt Gaza's power supply was in part based on the fact that the electricity is used to power the metal workshops in which Qassam rockets are manufactured.

Participants in the security cabinet meeting told The Associated Press, however, that no decision had been made on when to begin cutting electricity.

According to Israeli and Palestinian officials, Gaza's population uses approximately 200 megawatts of electricity, out of which 120 are provided directly from Israeli power lines, 17 are delivered from Egypt and 65 are produced at a plant in Gaza.

The disruption of the fuel supply will be delayed until the second stage, as the decision is still subject to the findings of an ongoing legal examination of the contracts between the National Infrastructure Ministry and the Palestinians.

Subject to the legal examination, the ministers decided to completely cut off the fuel supply to the Gaza Strip, with the exception of humanitarian needs. For instance, Israel will continue to supply Gaza hospitals with the necessary fuel to power their generators.

In addition, the crossings between Israel and the Gaza Strip will further reduce operations. The crossings will only allow in food and medical supplies, and other goods, such as water pipes that are also used to manufacture Qassams, will not be let in. Human traffic at the crossings will be brought to a complete halt.

Israel will reduce ties with the Strip to a bare minimum. "This [decision] allows Israel to order a number of administrative sanctions against the Gaza Strip, of course on condition they don't cross the red line in terms of inflicting humanitarian damage," said Public Security Minister Avi Dichter.

The ministers determined that the steps will be "implemented in accordance with formal legal position papers and the humanitarian situation in the field."

The ministers stressed that Hamas is the organization in charge in Gaza, and that security forces will continue operating against Hamas and other militant groups.

Shas minister Yitzhak Cohen said during the meeting that the steps Israel must make it clear that to every Palestinian action, there is an immediate Israeli reaction against Gaza.

"The Gaza power switch should be directly linked to the rocket's tail," he said.

Meanwhile, Israel Radio reported that deposed Palestinian prime minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas met early Wednesday with Islamic Jihad leaders, in an attempt to convince them to halt the rocket fire.

Hamas denounces curbs on Gaza as 'declaration of war'
Hamas denounced the security cabinet's decision and the sanctions as a "declaration of war."

"They aim to starve our people and force them to accept humiliating formulas that could emerge from the so-called November peace conference," said Hamas spokesman Barhoum, referring to a U.S.-sponsored meeting expected to be held in two months.

"It is a declaration of war and continues the criminal, terrorist Zionist actions against our people."

Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas condemned Israel's plan, calling it an oppressive decision.

"This oppressive decision will only strengthen the choking embargo imposed on 1.5 million people in the Gaza Strip, increase their suffering and deepen their tragedy," Abbas' office said in a statement.

"It is collective punishment against the people of Gaza, and discourages serious political discussion," said Ashraf Ajrami, a minister in Abbas' government.

"We are going to ask the Americans to pressure Israel to refrain from taking such action," added Palestinian Information Minister Riyad al-Malki

Shas: Tie power switch to rocket's tail
Shas minister Yitzhak Cohen said during the meeting that the steps Israel must make it clear that to every Palestinian action, there is an immediate Israeli reaction against Gaza.

"The Gaza power switch should be directly linked to the rocket's tail," he said.

But Public Security Minister Avi Dichter indicated that the government intended to show a measure of restraint in applying the restrictions. "This [decision] allows Israel to order a number of administrative sanctions against the Gaza Strip, of course on condition they don't cross the red line in terms of inflicting humanitarian damage," Dichter said.

In response to the cabinet's decision, Arab MK Taleb El-Sana (Ra'am Ta'al) said, "Israel is defining the occupied as a hostile entity in order to excuse itself from war crimes."

MK Tibi: Olmert's cabinet going through process of 'Libermanization'
Arab MK Ahmed Tibi warned that cutting off the power supply would worsen the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. "Olmert's government has gone through a process of 'Liebermanization," he said, in reference to hard-lined Yisrael Beiteinu Chairman Avigdor Lieberman.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who arrived in Israel Wednesday to prepare for the November, told a news conference in Jerusalem that Washington considered Hamas to be a "hostile entity."

But Rice pledged the United States "would not abandon the innocent Palestinians", a reference to humanitarian aid.

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, who held talks with Rice, said "all the needs that are more than the humanitarian needs will not be supplied by Israel to the Gaza Strip".

bitterlemons-international.org Middle East Roundtable Holiday Notice: bitterlemons-international will next appear on October 11 due to the Sukkot holiday. We wish our Jewish readers Hag Sameach and our Muslim readers Ramadan Kareem.

Edition 36 Volume 5 - September 20, 2007



French Middle East policy under Sarkozy • Sarkozy and Turkey - Ahmet O. Evin

During the election campaign, many Turks came to view Sarkozy as an unrelenting Turcophobe. • France and Lebanon - Michel Nehme

The Lebanese case is an indication that France's foreign policy will be rhetoric-oriented and action-weak. • Sarkozy, neo-Gaullist? - Eric Rouleau

Will the United States allow France to establish its preeminence in a region where important American interests are at stake? • Sarkozy's rebalancing act - Claire Spencer

He has been bulldozing his way out of the stereotype that saw France in opposition to everything the US has done in the Middle East.



Sarkozy and Turkey
Ahmet O. Evin

Nicholas Sarkozy's oft repeated and blunt statements throughout his presidential campaign brought the Turkish issue into the center of French politics and reinforced it as one of the predominant concerns of European integration. Both the Turkish public and leadership have become accustomed to voices raised against Turkey's membership of the EU by, for example, Giscard d'Estaing and, more recently, by almost the entire spectrum of Austrian political leaders. But Sarkozy's obsession with Turkey in the context of French domestic politics appeared to have been driven more by personal convictions than policy considerations. Many Turks, in short, came to view Sarkozy as an unrelenting Turcophobe.

Some observers, however, thought that a somber consideration of issues would replace the inflammatory rhetoric of the campaign once elections were over. After all, Angela Merkel, who had been staunchly opposed to Turkey's full membership of the union, had to admit, even if half-heartedly, the dictum pacta sunt servanda after becoming chancellor. It is true that populism was one of the motivations to cater to the anti-Turkish membership sentiments of the French public, but the fact that Sarkozy's stand continued unaltered after the elections points to deeper resistance in France to Turkey's membership.

The broad opposition in France to Turkey's membership of the union is linked to a range of concerns, attitudes and perceptions. One is the French unease with enlargement, particularly its perceived economic as well as cultural consequences. Enlargement is seen as a threat to the domestic labor market and capital investments as well as to the Union's coherence and efficiency.

Second, France, host of the largest Muslim population in Europe, feels more acutely the frustration of having failed to integrate even the second or third generation Muslims born locally into French citizenship. Not only are Turks, who represent less than five percent of Muslim residents of France, considered in the same category as Muslim aliens who put a wall of animosity between their culture and essential French values (as some of the Turkish immigrants who uphold their particular values based on religious-communitarian priorities undoubtedly do). But Turkey's membership is also associated with the dire consequences, socially and culturally, of bringing into the union a country of over 70 million Muslims who are perceived to be waiting to migrate to Western Europe but remain strangers there.

The third and politically most significant factor is the existence of an elite consensus in France that Turkey does not belong to Europe. In this respect the old guard is in full agreement with Sarkozy; business interests and investment in Turkey are ignored in the face of strong etatist economic culture. Opening the French economy to global competition, as Sarkozy claims he will do, might ironically reduce French apprehension toward Turkey's membership, but only if cultural apprehensions are also addressed by the political leadership.

Turkey, on the other hand, has unwittingly been sending mixed signals that tend to confirm rather than diffuse French concerns. The reformist, pro-EU AKP seems not to have overcome its obsession with allowing a certain type of women's headscarf (not a traditional Turkish one) to be worn in schools and other public places, despite even European Court of Human Rights decisions to uphold the ban. A battle over public projection of religious preferences serves only to confirm French (and other European) suspicions of Turks being different from Europeans.

On the other hand, the French also tend to wince upon hearing time and again from ideological adherents to laicite that Turkey's modernization was based on the French model. The French political agenda, they are quick to point out, has changed since World War II and the perceived need in Turkey today to mobilize official support to protect secularism only serves to show how far Turkey's Muslim cultural environment is from European social values. Turkey's difference comes into even sharper relief when it turns out that the strongest secularist actor happens to be the armed forces.

If particular features of Turkey's political dynamics prove to be baffling to outside observers, the variety of ways in which the French (as opposed to the leaders of pro- Turkish accession countries such as Spain, Sweden and the UK, to name only three) would identify and call attention to the "otherness" of Turkey has been a source of frustration to Turks of all political leanings. Turkish observers take Sarkozy's statements to mean "anything but Turkey's membership of the Union". Such views are reinforced by Sarkozy's idea of a special role for Turkey in the Mediterranean that appears to have been floated without adequate consideration of policy implications. It will arguably lead nowhere, if lessons are drawn from the Barcelona process.

Whither, then, relations between France and Turkey given this grim outlook? There are surprising developments that have come about as of this writing. On the Turkish side, the prime minister's forthcoming meeting with Sarkozy in New York is a positive sign of engagement, rather than rejection, in keeping especially with the "EU way of doing business". On the French side, President Sarkozy, in a recent unexpected turn of phrase, said France would not oppose opening new chapters in Turkey's accession negotiations, although he reiterated his personal reservations about Turkey's full membership.

Other significant developments have been the proposal to re-amend the French constitution to drop the requirement, introduced under Jacques Chirac, to have a public referendum on future enlargements. (This initiative appears to have been motivated by reasons completely different from facilitating Turkish accession, namely Sarkozy's support for the Nabucco project and his wish to ensure French involvement in it, articulated in his visit to Budapest in mid-September. Turkey, as one of the principals as well as the transit hub, had earlier vetoed French involvement in the project in response to the introduction of legislation in France to criminalize negation of Armenian genocide). Even more surprising is the recent news that France might wish to return to NATO's military wing, an entirely credible shift of policy, given Sarkozy's priority to mend fences with the US. In order to be able to do that, however, France would need to secure Turkey's approval.

The key issue is that France cannot be expected to override or reverse decisions made by the European Council regarding the conditions and procedures in respect to Turkey's accession. Quid pro quo, Turkey has to resolve its own democratic deficits to qualify for accession even while fully protecting secularism. Exceptionalism, of the French or of the Turkish kind, will not work in the EU, but peculiarities of founding member states are tolerated for a longer period than those of accession countries.- Published 20/9/2007 © bitterlemons-international.org

Professor Ahmet O. Evin is founding dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at Sabanci University. He teaches political science at Sabanci and is a member of the board of directors of Istanbul Policy Center.

France and Lebanon
Michel NehmeConsidering Lebanon's history as a former French-ruled territory, it is obvious that the election of Nicholas Sarkozy as president of France should be attended to by all politicians trying to influence the new French administration. Even Hizballah welcomed the election result and urged the new leader to make policy decisions more appropriate to the balance of power in Lebanon. Syria, another former French-ruled territory that since the assassination of Rafiq Hariri had been at odds with France over its Lebanon policy, also congratulated Sarkozy. President Bashar Assad expressed hope that relations between Syria and France would develop in both countries' interests.

For reasons of his own, former French President Jacques Chirac openly sided with the Lebanese government and its allies against Syria and its dependents in the Lebanese opposition thus also alienating Hizballah. Chirac led an international campaign in support of Lebanon's government, organizing a Paris donors' conference that raised more than US$7 billion in soft loans and grants. In addition, he sent French troops as peacekeepers to southern Lebanon to monitor a ceasefire that ended the fighting last year between Hizballah and Israel.

Though the French consider foreign policy not a luxury but a necessity, France's foreign policy has traditionally been characterized by much talk and little action. Chirac's attitude to Lebanon proved an exception. There are thus many issues, some of them political time bombs, to which this new French government has to pay attention. Sarkozy, so far, has confined himself to general pronouncements on points of principle, with occasional detailed statements on the three great French foreign policy issues of the day: relations with the United States, the French presence in Africa and the conflicts in the Middle East.

The transatlantic link is an extremely sensitive issue, especially since the debacle in Iraq and the Democrats' victory in the US mid-term elections in November. It would seem from the statements of the new French admini