From truthout.org :
McCarthyism: Mary and Joe
By Ray McGovern
t r u t h o u t Perspective
Tuesday 25 April 2006
As additional information on the firing of CIA official Mary McCarthy just ten days short of her retirement becomes available, what is afoot is becoming quite clear. We are witnessing a Stalinesque show trial sans the actual trial and inevitable execution. The purpose is intimidation, not extermination. We should be thankful for small favors, I suppose.
There has been no sign they put on the handcuffs as they "escorted" McCarthy out of the office last week. And it appears she will get off relatively lightly - with the character assassination regarded as appropriate for any "traitor" independently in touch with the press. And then there is the stigma that CIA Director Porter Goss, the staffers he brought with him from Congress (not-so-affectionately known as "the gosslings"), and Rush Limbaugh believe should inevitably attach to anyone who gave $2,000 to the Kerry campaign.
Goss and his "independent" Inspector General Danny Kaye - oops, I mean 35-year CIA veteran John Helgersen - are determined to show their patron, Vice President Dick Cheney, some results from the unprecedented rash of "single-issue" polygraph tests now being administered to CIA employees. Beware, all ye who have let the word "media" slip into consciousness. It's sweaty-palms time at CIA headquarters. The Fourth Estate has morphed into a Fifth Column.
The current witch-hunt atmosphere in Langley calls to mind that of February 1973 when James Schlesinger was appointed to replace the not-sufficiently-malleable Richard Helms as President Richard Nixon's CIA director. Watergate was unfolding and Nixon's poll numbers then were about what President George W. Bush's are now. At his first plenary meeting with CIA managers, Schlesinger came on rather strong: "I am here to make sure you guys don't screw Richard Nixon. And, just so you get the picture, I shall be reporting to Bob Haldeman, not to Henry Kissinger." Haldeman was Nixon's chief of staff; Kissinger his national security adviser (the customary contact for a CIA director).
The recent Washington Post report, quoting intelligence officials to the effect that "the White House has recently barraged the agency with questions about the political affiliations of some of its senior intelligence officers" is an especially alarming sign. Let all those who gave Kerry $2,000 beware. Goss and gosslings are in position to finish destroying any vestige of non-partisanship and objectivity at the CIA. Who is to stop them? John Negroponte who, as ambassador to Honduras, helped run the Contra war in Nicaragua for CIA Director William Casey and feigned ignorance of the rampant death squads there?
Back to McCarthy (Mary)
Whether or not Mary McCarthy was among the many sources used by Washington Post reporter Dana Priest for her Pulitzer Prize-winning story on the secret prisons run by CIA abroad, the PR folks at Langley have shot themselves in the foot by calling renewed attention to the kidnappings, "extraordinary renditions," and torture which Cheney and the president have had the agency carry out on so grand a scale. And we can rest assured that the hunt for patriotic truth tellers (aka leakers) will continue apace.
But it is also likely that the truth telling will continue. And, in the end, the truth tellers will be glad they did. The years of Bush, Cheney, and Goss are limited, and they will not be able to repeal 18 US Code 2441 (the War Crimes Act of 1996 condemning torture) before going out the door. In addition, potential truth tellers have become increasingly aware of the seldom-mentioned "Nuremberg obligation" to do what one reasonably can to prevent the commission of international crimes like torture.
By conducting these activities overseas, Bush's lawyers thought they might dodge the US criminal statute. Maybe so. But international sanctions also apply. Will Donald Rumsfeld be able to travel to Europe once he loses his Secret Service protection and that afforded by the office of secretary of defense? Will CIA operatives, like the notorious keystone-cops kidnapping crew in Milan, be able to vacation on the Riviera? Interpol knows who they are.
Those inside the government who become privy to - or, worse still, become responsible for - such criminal activity have a legal as well as a moral obligation to blow the whistle. So take heart, past or future truth tellers. With the polygraph, they may eventually track you down. But it is bound to be awkward indeed to take you to court for revealing war crimes. And you will have earned not only a badge of courage but also exculpatory evidence in the event there are prosecutions - here or abroad.
Staying Within "Grievance Channels"
Sunday's Washington Post quoted an unnamed "former senior intelligence official" saying he thought a majority of CIA officers would probably agree with the firing of McCarthy if, as the CIA alleges, she "knowingly and willfully shared classified intelligence" with journalists (which she has now denied). "A small number might support her, but the ethic of the business is not to leak," said the former official, adding that one should stay within official grievance channels.
That's what my colleague CIA analyst Sam Adams did 40 years ago - and came to rue the day. Through painstaking research in Washington, combined with imaginative bar-hopping in Vietnam, Adams discovered that Gen. William Westmoreland's staff in Saigon had been ordered to keep Communist force figures artificially low (about half the actual strength), in order to project a picture of progress. When the countrywide offensive at Tet in late-January/early-February 1968 gave the lie to Westmoreland's figures and vindicated Adams, Sam tried manfully to hold the culprits accountable by going to the CIA's and the Pentagon's inspectors general. He got the proverbial run-around, and some 30,000 additional US troops and a million more Vietnamese fell before the war was over six years later. Adams was never able to shake his nagging remorse at the thought that he might have helped prevent further carnage, had he gone out of "official channels" and briefed his findings to the then-free mainstream press. He died at 55 when his heart gave out.
The tragedy of Sam Adams is well known, even to those, like Mary McCarthy, who joined the Agency many years after Sam left. From his present perch, I relish the thought that he is pleased that others may have learned a valuable lesson from the frustration he encountered by "staying within official grievance channels."
Like Sam, Mary McCarthy is an independent thinker, which she proved during her tenure as Senior Director for Intelligence Programs at the White House from 1998 to 2001. There she achieved some notoriety for the personal letter she sent President Bill Clinton, criticizing the flimsiness of the "intelligence" that led to the cruise missile strike on the Sudanese pharmaceutical plant that some suggested might be producing chemical warfare agent. She was correct, but then-CIA director George Tenet vouched for the "evidence," testosterone won the day, and they blew the place up.
Torturous Decisions
Those paying attention to the issue of torture by the CIA and the Army will recall the tortured memorandum of January 25, 2002, authored by David Addington (then-counsel to Vice President Dick Cheney and now Cheney's chief of staff) and signed by then-White House counsel Alberto Gonzales. That memo argued that "Geneva's strict limitations on questioning enemy prisoners" were "obsolete" in the new war-on-terror paradigm. Still, Addington/Gonzales felt compelled to remind the president that US criminal code, the War Crimes Act (18 USC 2441), with its draconian penalties (including death) could come into play.
That statute pins the "war crime" label on any grave breach of Geneva, like "outrages against personal dignity," regardless of whether the detainee qualifies as a prisoner of war. Addington and Gonzales warned the president of the danger that he could be prosecuted under that law by a future independent counsel, but reassured him that there is a "reasonable basis in law that Section 2441 does not apply, which would provide a solid defense to any future prosecution." That was good enough for President Bush, who on February 7, 2002, signed a memorandum saying that detainees should be treated humanely, "as appropriate and consistent with military necessity." And that is the loophole through which Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld drove a Mack truck. The "rotten apples" were at the very top of the barrel.
The infamous memorandum of January 25 was leaked to Newsweek, which published it and others like it in May 2004. The tortured reasoning was greeted with widespread scorn by the US legal profession and in August 2004 roundly condemned by the American Bar Association, 12 former federal judges, former Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach, former FBI Director William Sessions, and many others. The ABA formally condemned the administration's treatment of detainees and called upon it to "comply fully" with the US Constitution and international laws and conventions ratified by the US that outlaw torture. It was that same year, 2004, when the torture of prisoners was depicted in the leaked photos from Abu Ghraib, that Mary McCarthy returned to the CIA from a sabbatical that followed her stint at the White House.
Those who have worked with her testify to her respect for law and regulation. That she had more than passing interest in, and respect for the law is suggested not only by her decision several years ago to attend law school at night, but also by the hackles she reportedly raised among testosterone-laden operatives who saw her in her White House role as an annoying hindrance to aggressive tactics against terrorists.
Back at CIA, Mary McCarthy assumed a position in the office of CIA Inspector General John Helgersen, who is responsible for internal investigations of wrongdoing by the agency and has extraordinary access to secrets deprived to others under the need-to-know principle. It is well known that agency personnel, who witnessed torture by the US military in Guantanamo, for example, complained to superiors and to the White House. It is a safe bet that some agency officers also registered objections to "extraordinary rendition," including kidnapping and transporting "terrorist suspects" to so-called black prison camps for interrogation - "with the gloves off," in the swaggering words of then CIA chief counter-terrorism official Cofer Black (now a vice president with the Defense contractor Blackwater). In addition, some CIA officers may have learned of the warrantless eavesdropping in violation of NSA's "eleventh commandment" - thou shall not spy on Americans. In any event, it is certainly safe to say that Helgersen's IG account had become a growth industry, with a requirement for all the professional help it can muster. When Mary McCarthy came on board, she no doubt gained inside insight into complaints of a variety of abuses.
Departing From Custom
Sadly, common practice in such circumstances for someone at retirement age, as McCarthy was, is to hunker down, retire quietly with a healthy annuity, and then become something of a celebrity by writing a tell-all book and going on "60 Minutes." Not McCarthy. Given the courage and independence she showed in her earlier professional life together with her sensitivity to the law, it is a safe bet she tried hard to get management to address the more egregious abuses - torture and rendition, for example. It is equally likely that she got no help from former director George Tenet or current director Porter Goss, both of them on the end of a tight leash held by Vice President Dick Cheney.
But could she not have turned to her new boss, "independent" Inspector General Helgerson? As statutory IG, Helgerson does enjoy some unique prerogatives and autonomy, should he choose to exercise them. Those familiar with his longstanding penchant for sniffing the breezes from the White House and director's office and trimming his sails accordingly would be shocked to see him actually exercise those prerogatives. Rather, he has obediently acquiesced in denying Congress the particulars of his investigations - the one on the performance of CIA officers before September 11, 2001, for example, which reportedly heaped criticism on Medal of Freedom awardee George Tenet and other senior agency officials. And according to yesterday's New York Times, "independent watchdog" Helgerson recently let himself be talked into submitting to a polygraph exam by those he is supposed to be "watch-dogging." Remarkable.
It seems likely that Mary McCarthy quickly saw the lay of the land and decided the Helgerson-Goss route held no promise for success in addressing the abuses of torture and rendition. Had she any doubts on that score, they presumably were dispelled as she watched Director Porter Goss trot off with Cheney to the office of Sen. John McCain to plead for an exception for the CIA from his draft amendment banning torture. This particular mission was not accomplished, but the president appended a "signing statement" saying, in effect, that he feels free to disregard the McCain amendment banning torture.
Turn to Congress?
Where else to turn? The intelligence committees of Congress? A fool's errand. Indelibly imprinted on my mind is a remark made by CIA darling former Congressman Charlie Wilson (D-Texas) when he took the reins of the House Intelligence Committee during the war with the USSR in Afghanistan. Wilson wrote to his CIA friends, "Well, gentlemen, the fox is in the hen house. Do whatever you like." Some twenty years later, the committee's current chairman, Pete Hoekstra (R-Mich.), has proven a worthy successor, occasionally sniping - as he did yesterday on TV - at National Intelligence Director John Negroponte, but essentially giving the intelligence agencies free rein as long as they remain harnessed tightly to White House policy.
A recent episode may serve to illustrate this. Late last year, having bowed for over a year to White House pressure to suppress New York Times journalist James Risen's Pulitzer-winning scoop on warrantless wiretapping by NSA, the Times management suddenly awoke to the fact that Risen's book was about to appear. In order to avoid the embarrassment of not having carried such a critical story by one of its own writers, the Times told the White House that the story was about to be published. On December 5, 2005, Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. and Washington bureau chief Philip Taubman were summoned to an oval office meeting with President Bush, who tried - this time in vain - to dissuade the Times from publishing the warrantless eavesdropping story, which then appeared 11 days later (and six weeks after Dana Priest's expose in the Post regarding secret CIA prisons for interrogating suspected terrorists).
The White House, however, apparently forgot to inform NSA Director, Lt. Gen. Keith Alexander that a new die was cast. The next day, December 6, the blindsided Alexander - still following the old talking points - assured visiting House intelligence committee member Rush Holt (D-NJ) that NSA did not eavesdrop on Americans without a court order. When Holt later learned he had been deliberately misled about the NSA eavesdropping program, he wrote a blistering letter to Alexander. Nothing has been heard from Chairman Hoekstra, though, and there is not the slightest sign he cared very much that his colleague was lied to on a key aspect of his oversight responsibilities. So, the director of NSA can lie with impunity to minority members of the House intelligence committee; only the chairman counts.
This fits in well with a pattern long familiar to senior intelligence officers. And, as Mary McCarthy watched this latest charade, she must have felt affirmed in her apparent conviction that turning to the House "oversight" committee would, in present circumstances, be a feckless enterprise. And who better than she could see the high farce attached to Hoekstra's hyperbole yesterday on FOX as he parroted (twice) what were doubtless the "McCarthy talking points" from the White House:
"This person in the CIA thought that they were above the law (sic). They thought that the law did not apply to them. They have put America at risk. They have put our troops on the front lines at risk because they broke the law."
With all due respect, Congressman Hoekstra, if you would exercise your oversight responsibilities, the system of checks and balances could work, and folks like McCarthy would not have to go to the press.
Equally feckless would be recourse to the Senate intelligence committee chaired by Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), patsy for the White House since day one of his tenure. No need to rehearse the evidence here. You may wish, though, to check out Scott Ritter's comments on the Semper Fi senator from Kansas - "Semper Fraud, Senator Roberts" at http://www.antiwar.com/orig/ritter.php?articleid=5537.
Mary's Motivation
And so, assuming there is substance to press allegations that McCarthy has admitted she talked with the press, small wonder. (At the same time, she has now denied disclosing any classified information.) I was intrigued by a remark the press has attributed to former CIA deputy director Dick Kerr: "I have no idea what her motive was." Kerr added that McCarthy was a "good, substantive person." And he was right about that - "good" in the sense that she has that all too uncommon mix of smarts, integrity, and guts.
Well, Dick, it's a no-brainer. Is it not clear that she thought the American people should be given the chance to know of the kidnapping, rendition, torture, and other indignities being carried out in our name? Is it not clear that Mary McCarthy is one of those unusually courageous officers willing to take considerable personal risk in order to help democracy work - information being the oxygen of democracy?
But what about her secrecy agreement? The international Truth-Telling Coalition issued a statement on these difficult decisions on September 9, 2004. Perhaps Mary read it; perhaps now her colleagues will.
I have not spoken with Mary McCarthy in ten years, but it seems clear to me that she and many of her colleagues are confronted by an unwelcome choice between her oath to defend the Constitution of the United States and the secrecy agreement all of us signed when we entered on duty with the CIA. Her entire record shows that she did not take such restrictions lightly. None of us did; none of us do.
But agency alumnae/i, at least those of my vintage, believe we must always give priority to the Constitution - and the "Nuremberg obligation."
Ray McGovern was an analyst at the CIA for 27 years.
Tuesday, April 25, 2006
The best of the best...and that's saying something..
About 3 more weeks before I will have this book in my hands. Just take a look:
Title:
The Hard Way
Author: Lee Child
Fiction - Thrillers>
Imprint: Delacorte Press> # of pages: 384 Price: $ 25.00
READ AN EXCERPT:> > CHAPTER 1> >
JACK REACHER ORDERED espresso, double, no peel, no cube, foam cup, no china, and before it arrived at his table he saw a man's life change forever. Not that the waiter was slow. Just that the move was slick. So slick, Reacher had no idea what he was watching. It was just an urban scene, repeated everywhere in the world a billion times a day: A guy unlocked a car and got in and drove away. That was all.> >
But that was enough.> >
The espresso had been close to perfect, so Reacher went back to the same cafe exactly -twenty--four hours later. Two nights in the same place was unusual for Reacher, but he figured great coffee was worth a change in his routine. The cafe was on the west side of Sixth Avenue in New York City, in the middle of the block between Bleecker and Houston. It occupied the ground floor of an undistinguished -four--story building. The upper stories looked like anonymous rental apartments.
The cafe itself looked like a transplant from a back street in Rome. Inside it had low light and scarred wooden walls and a dented chrome machine as hot and long as a locomotive, and a counter. Outside there was a single line of metal tables on the sidewalk behind a low canvas screen.
Reacher took the same end table he had used the night before and chose the same seat. He stretched out and got comfortable and tipped his chair up on two legs. That put his back against the cafe's outside wall and left him looking east, across the sidewalk and the width of the avenue.
He liked to sit outside in the summer, in New York City. Especially at night. He liked the electric darkness and the hot dirty air and the blasts of noise and traffic and the manic barking sirens and the crush of people. It helped a lonely man feel connected and isolated both at the same time.
He was served by the same waiter as the night before and ordered the same drink, double espresso in a foam cup, no sugar, no spoon. He paid for it as soon as it arrived and left his change on the table. That way he could leave exactly when he wanted to without insulting the waiter or bilking the owner or stealing the china. Reacher always arranged the smallest details in his life so he could move on at a split second's notice. It was an obsessive habit. He owned nothing and carried nothing. Physically he was a big man, but he cast a small shadow and left very little in his wake.
He drank his coffee slowly and felt the night heat come up off the sidewalk. He watched cars and people. Watched taxis flow north and garbage trucks pause at the curbs. Saw knots of strange young people heading for clubs. Watched girls who had once been boys totter south. Saw a blue German sedan park on the block. Watched a compact man in a gray suit get out and walk north. Watched him thread between two sidewalk tables and head inside to where the cafe staff was clustered in back. Watched him ask them questions.
The guy was medium height, not young, not old, too solid to be called wiry, too slight to be called heavy. His hair was gray at the temples and cut short and neat. He kept himself balanced on the balls of his feet. His mouth didn't move much as he talked. But his eyes did. They flicked left and right tirelessly. The guy was about forty, Reacher guessed, and furthermore Reacher guessed he had gotten to be about forty by staying relentlessly aware of everything that was happening around him. Reacher had seen the same look in elite infantry veterans who had survived long jungle tours.
Then Reacher's waiter turned suddenly and pointed straight at him. The compact man in the gray suit stared over. Reacher stared back, over his shoulder, through the window. Eye contact was made. Without breaking it the man in the suit mouthed thank you to the waiter and started back out the way he had entered. He stepped through the door and made a right inside the low canvas screen and threaded his way down to Reacher's table. Reacher let him stand there mute for a moment while he made up his mind. Then he said "Yes," to him, like an answer, not a question.
"Yes what?" the guy said back.
"Yes whatever," Reacher said. "Yes I'm having a pleasant evening, yes you can join me, yes you can ask me whatever it is you want to ask me."
The guy scraped a chair out and sat down, his back to the river of traffic, blocking Reacher's view.
"Actually I do have a question," he said.
"I know," Reacher said. "About last night."
"How did you know that?" The guy's voice was low and quiet and his accent was flat and clipped and British.
"The waiter pointed me out," Reacher said. "And the only thing that distinguishes me from his other customers is that I was here last night and they weren't."
"You're certain about that?"
"Turn your head away," Reacher said. "Watch the traffic."
The guy turned his head away. Watched the traffic.
"Now tell me what I'm wearing," Reacher said.
"Green shirt," the British guy said. "Cotton, baggy, cheap, doesn't look new, sleeves rolled to the elbow, over a green T-shirt, also cheap and not new, a little tight, untucked over -flat--front khaki chinos, no socks, English shoes, pebbled leather, brown, not new, but not very old either, probably expensive. Frayed laces, like you pull on them too hard when you tie them. Maybe indicative of a -self--discipline obsession."
"OK," Reacher said.
"OK what?"
"You notice things," Reacher said. "And I notice things. We're two of a kind. We're peas in a pod. I'm the only customer here now who was also here last night. I'm certain of that. And that's what you asked the staff. Had to be. That's the only reason the waiter would have pointed me out."
The guy turned back.
"Did you see a car last night?" he asked.
"I saw plenty of cars last night," Reacher said. "This is Sixth Avenue."
"A Mercedes Benz. Parked over there." The guy twisted again and pointed on a slight diagonal at a length of empty curb by a fire hydrant on the other side of the street.
Reacher said, "Silver, four-door sedan, an S-420, New York vanity plates starting OSC, a lot of city miles on it. Dirty paint, scuffed tires, dinged rims, dents and scrapes on both bumpers."
The guy turned back again.
"You saw it," he said.
"It was right there," Reacher said. "Obviously I saw it."
"Did you see it leave?"
Reacher nodded. "Just before eleven -forty--five a guy got in and drove it away."
"You're not wearing a watch."
"I always know what time it is."
"It must have been closer to midnight"
"Maybe," Reacher said. "Whatever."
"Did you get a look at the driver?"
"I told you, I saw him get in and drive away."
The guy stood up.
"I need you to come with me," he said. Then he put his hand in his pocket. "I'll buy your coffee."
"I already paid for it."
"So let's go."
"Where?"
"To see my boss."
"Who's your boss?"
"A man called Lane."
"You're not a cop," Reacher said. "That's my guess. Based on observation."
"Of what?"
"Your accent. You're not American. You're British. The NYPD isn't that desperate."
"Most of us are Americans," the British guy said. "But you're right, we're not cops. We're private citizens."
"What kind?"
"The kind that will make it worth your while if you give them a description of the individual who drove that car away."
"Worth my while how?"
"Financially," the guy said. "Is there any other way?"
"Lots of other ways," Reacher said. "I think I'll stay right here."
"This is very serious."
"How?"
The guy in the suit sat down again.
"I can't tell you that," he said.
"Goodbye," Reacher said.
"Not my choice," the guy said. "Mr. Lane made it -mission--critical that nobody knows. For very good reasons."
Reacher tilted his cup and checked the contents. Nearly gone.
"You got a name?" he asked.
"Do you?"
"You first."
In response the guy stuck a thumb into the breast pocket of his suit coat and slid out a black leather business card holder. He opened it up and used the same thumb to slide out a single card. He passed it across the table. It was a handsome item. Heavy linen stock, raised lettering, ink that still looked wet. At the top it said: Operational Security Consultants.
"OSC," Reacher said. "Like the license plate."
The British guy said nothing.
Reacher smiled. "You're security consultants and you got your car stolen? I can see how that could be embarrassing."
The guy said, "It's not the car we're worried about."
Lower down on the business card was a name: John Gregory. Under the name was a subscript: British Army, Retired. Then a job title: Executive Vice President.
"How long have you been out?" Reacher asked.
"Of the British Army?" the guy called Gregory said. "Seven years."
"Unit?"
"SAS."
"You've still got the look."
"You too," Gregory said. "How long have you been out?
"Seven years," Reacher said.
"Unit?"
"U.S. Army CID, mostly."
Gregory looked up. Interested. "Investigator?"
"Mostly."
"Rank?"
"I don't remember," Reacher said. "I've been a civilian seven years."
"Don't be shy," Gregory said. "You were probably a lieutenant colonel at least."
"Major," Reacher said. "That's as far as I got."
"Career problems?"
"I had my share."
"You got a name?"
"Most people do."
"What is it?"
"Reacher."
"What are you doing now?"
"I'm trying to get a quiet cup of coffee."
"You need work?"
"No," Reacher said. "I don't."
"I was a sergeant," Gregory said.
Reacher nodded. "I figured. SAS guys usually are. And you've got the look."
"So will you come with me and talk to Mr. Lane?"
"I told you what I saw. You can pass it on."
"Mr. Lane will want to hear it direct."
Reacher checked his cup again. "Where is he?"
"Not far. Ten minutes."
"I don't know," Reacher said. "I'm enjoying my espresso."
"Bring it with you. It's in a foam cup."
"I prefer peace and quiet."
"All I want is ten minutes."
"Seems like a lot of fuss over a stolen car, even if it was a Mercedes Benz."
"This is not about the car."
"So what is it about?"
"Life and death," Gregory said. "Right now more likely death than life."
Reacher checked his cup again. There was less than a lukewarm -eighth--inch left, thick and scummy with espresso mud. That was all. He put the cup down.
"OK," he said. "So let's go.
Excerpted from The Hard Way by Lee Child
> Copyright (c) 2005 by Lee Child.
Wrap...
Title:
The Hard Way
Author: Lee Child
Fiction - Thrillers>
Imprint: Delacorte Press> # of pages: 384 Price: $ 25.00
READ AN EXCERPT:> > CHAPTER 1> >
JACK REACHER ORDERED espresso, double, no peel, no cube, foam cup, no china, and before it arrived at his table he saw a man's life change forever. Not that the waiter was slow. Just that the move was slick. So slick, Reacher had no idea what he was watching. It was just an urban scene, repeated everywhere in the world a billion times a day: A guy unlocked a car and got in and drove away. That was all.> >
But that was enough.> >
The espresso had been close to perfect, so Reacher went back to the same cafe exactly -twenty--four hours later. Two nights in the same place was unusual for Reacher, but he figured great coffee was worth a change in his routine. The cafe was on the west side of Sixth Avenue in New York City, in the middle of the block between Bleecker and Houston. It occupied the ground floor of an undistinguished -four--story building. The upper stories looked like anonymous rental apartments.
The cafe itself looked like a transplant from a back street in Rome. Inside it had low light and scarred wooden walls and a dented chrome machine as hot and long as a locomotive, and a counter. Outside there was a single line of metal tables on the sidewalk behind a low canvas screen.
Reacher took the same end table he had used the night before and chose the same seat. He stretched out and got comfortable and tipped his chair up on two legs. That put his back against the cafe's outside wall and left him looking east, across the sidewalk and the width of the avenue.
He liked to sit outside in the summer, in New York City. Especially at night. He liked the electric darkness and the hot dirty air and the blasts of noise and traffic and the manic barking sirens and the crush of people. It helped a lonely man feel connected and isolated both at the same time.
He was served by the same waiter as the night before and ordered the same drink, double espresso in a foam cup, no sugar, no spoon. He paid for it as soon as it arrived and left his change on the table. That way he could leave exactly when he wanted to without insulting the waiter or bilking the owner or stealing the china. Reacher always arranged the smallest details in his life so he could move on at a split second's notice. It was an obsessive habit. He owned nothing and carried nothing. Physically he was a big man, but he cast a small shadow and left very little in his wake.
He drank his coffee slowly and felt the night heat come up off the sidewalk. He watched cars and people. Watched taxis flow north and garbage trucks pause at the curbs. Saw knots of strange young people heading for clubs. Watched girls who had once been boys totter south. Saw a blue German sedan park on the block. Watched a compact man in a gray suit get out and walk north. Watched him thread between two sidewalk tables and head inside to where the cafe staff was clustered in back. Watched him ask them questions.
The guy was medium height, not young, not old, too solid to be called wiry, too slight to be called heavy. His hair was gray at the temples and cut short and neat. He kept himself balanced on the balls of his feet. His mouth didn't move much as he talked. But his eyes did. They flicked left and right tirelessly. The guy was about forty, Reacher guessed, and furthermore Reacher guessed he had gotten to be about forty by staying relentlessly aware of everything that was happening around him. Reacher had seen the same look in elite infantry veterans who had survived long jungle tours.
Then Reacher's waiter turned suddenly and pointed straight at him. The compact man in the gray suit stared over. Reacher stared back, over his shoulder, through the window. Eye contact was made. Without breaking it the man in the suit mouthed thank you to the waiter and started back out the way he had entered. He stepped through the door and made a right inside the low canvas screen and threaded his way down to Reacher's table. Reacher let him stand there mute for a moment while he made up his mind. Then he said "Yes," to him, like an answer, not a question.
"Yes what?" the guy said back.
"Yes whatever," Reacher said. "Yes I'm having a pleasant evening, yes you can join me, yes you can ask me whatever it is you want to ask me."
The guy scraped a chair out and sat down, his back to the river of traffic, blocking Reacher's view.
"Actually I do have a question," he said.
"I know," Reacher said. "About last night."
"How did you know that?" The guy's voice was low and quiet and his accent was flat and clipped and British.
"The waiter pointed me out," Reacher said. "And the only thing that distinguishes me from his other customers is that I was here last night and they weren't."
"You're certain about that?"
"Turn your head away," Reacher said. "Watch the traffic."
The guy turned his head away. Watched the traffic.
"Now tell me what I'm wearing," Reacher said.
"Green shirt," the British guy said. "Cotton, baggy, cheap, doesn't look new, sleeves rolled to the elbow, over a green T-shirt, also cheap and not new, a little tight, untucked over -flat--front khaki chinos, no socks, English shoes, pebbled leather, brown, not new, but not very old either, probably expensive. Frayed laces, like you pull on them too hard when you tie them. Maybe indicative of a -self--discipline obsession."
"OK," Reacher said.
"OK what?"
"You notice things," Reacher said. "And I notice things. We're two of a kind. We're peas in a pod. I'm the only customer here now who was also here last night. I'm certain of that. And that's what you asked the staff. Had to be. That's the only reason the waiter would have pointed me out."
The guy turned back.
"Did you see a car last night?" he asked.
"I saw plenty of cars last night," Reacher said. "This is Sixth Avenue."
"A Mercedes Benz. Parked over there." The guy twisted again and pointed on a slight diagonal at a length of empty curb by a fire hydrant on the other side of the street.
Reacher said, "Silver, four-door sedan, an S-420, New York vanity plates starting OSC, a lot of city miles on it. Dirty paint, scuffed tires, dinged rims, dents and scrapes on both bumpers."
The guy turned back again.
"You saw it," he said.
"It was right there," Reacher said. "Obviously I saw it."
"Did you see it leave?"
Reacher nodded. "Just before eleven -forty--five a guy got in and drove it away."
"You're not wearing a watch."
"I always know what time it is."
"It must have been closer to midnight"
"Maybe," Reacher said. "Whatever."
"Did you get a look at the driver?"
"I told you, I saw him get in and drive away."
The guy stood up.
"I need you to come with me," he said. Then he put his hand in his pocket. "I'll buy your coffee."
"I already paid for it."
"So let's go."
"Where?"
"To see my boss."
"Who's your boss?"
"A man called Lane."
"You're not a cop," Reacher said. "That's my guess. Based on observation."
"Of what?"
"Your accent. You're not American. You're British. The NYPD isn't that desperate."
"Most of us are Americans," the British guy said. "But you're right, we're not cops. We're private citizens."
"What kind?"
"The kind that will make it worth your while if you give them a description of the individual who drove that car away."
"Worth my while how?"
"Financially," the guy said. "Is there any other way?"
"Lots of other ways," Reacher said. "I think I'll stay right here."
"This is very serious."
"How?"
The guy in the suit sat down again.
"I can't tell you that," he said.
"Goodbye," Reacher said.
"Not my choice," the guy said. "Mr. Lane made it -mission--critical that nobody knows. For very good reasons."
Reacher tilted his cup and checked the contents. Nearly gone.
"You got a name?" he asked.
"Do you?"
"You first."
In response the guy stuck a thumb into the breast pocket of his suit coat and slid out a black leather business card holder. He opened it up and used the same thumb to slide out a single card. He passed it across the table. It was a handsome item. Heavy linen stock, raised lettering, ink that still looked wet. At the top it said: Operational Security Consultants.
"OSC," Reacher said. "Like the license plate."
The British guy said nothing.
Reacher smiled. "You're security consultants and you got your car stolen? I can see how that could be embarrassing."
The guy said, "It's not the car we're worried about."
Lower down on the business card was a name: John Gregory. Under the name was a subscript: British Army, Retired. Then a job title: Executive Vice President.
"How long have you been out?" Reacher asked.
"Of the British Army?" the guy called Gregory said. "Seven years."
"Unit?"
"SAS."
"You've still got the look."
"You too," Gregory said. "How long have you been out?
"Seven years," Reacher said.
"Unit?"
"U.S. Army CID, mostly."
Gregory looked up. Interested. "Investigator?"
"Mostly."
"Rank?"
"I don't remember," Reacher said. "I've been a civilian seven years."
"Don't be shy," Gregory said. "You were probably a lieutenant colonel at least."
"Major," Reacher said. "That's as far as I got."
"Career problems?"
"I had my share."
"You got a name?"
"Most people do."
"What is it?"
"Reacher."
"What are you doing now?"
"I'm trying to get a quiet cup of coffee."
"You need work?"
"No," Reacher said. "I don't."
"I was a sergeant," Gregory said.
Reacher nodded. "I figured. SAS guys usually are. And you've got the look."
"So will you come with me and talk to Mr. Lane?"
"I told you what I saw. You can pass it on."
"Mr. Lane will want to hear it direct."
Reacher checked his cup again. "Where is he?"
"Not far. Ten minutes."
"I don't know," Reacher said. "I'm enjoying my espresso."
"Bring it with you. It's in a foam cup."
"I prefer peace and quiet."
"All I want is ten minutes."
"Seems like a lot of fuss over a stolen car, even if it was a Mercedes Benz."
"This is not about the car."
"So what is it about?"
"Life and death," Gregory said. "Right now more likely death than life."
Reacher checked his cup again. There was less than a lukewarm -eighth--inch left, thick and scummy with espresso mud. That was all. He put the cup down.
"OK," he said. "So let's go.
Excerpted from The Hard Way by Lee Child
> Copyright (c) 2005 by Lee Child.
Wrap...
Monday, April 24, 2006
Think Fast's bits and pieces...
From American Progress:
Think Fast
With little more than a month left until hurricane season begins, the levees in New Orleans remain "flawed." "Flood walls are too weak in some places; earthen levees are too short in others. Locals say the only thing that will save the low-lying region from more flooding this summer is not getting hit with a strong storm."
A review of "at least six joint U.S.-Iraqi inspections of detention centers, most of them run by Iraq's Shiite Muslim-dominated Interior Ministry," found evidence of prisoner abuse at all of them. Some of the abuse was "severe," including cigarette burns and missing toenails, but unlike in the past, abused detainees were not removed from the centers, "prompting concerns that they could be victims again."
$2.91: The national average gas price for self-serve regular. Gas prices have shot up nearly 25 cents per gallon over the past two weeks. As crude oil hovers around $75 per barrel, Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Nuaimi said, “You know and I know that the reason for the price being where it is not shortages of supply.” Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) explained that oil companies "get together, reduce the supply of oil, and that drives up prices."
"House Republican leaders have stripped out language" from the ethics bill "forcing lobbyists to provide detailed disclosure of fundraising activities and contacts with lawmakers," Roll Call reports.
2,000. Estimated number of Iraqi women who have been victims of sex trafficking since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003.
Arthur Schlesinger Jr., noted presidential historian and former adviser to President John F. Kennedy, warns of the final thousand days of Bush’s presidency - “days filled with ominous preparations for and dark rumors of a preventive war against Iran.”
No excuse for media's failure to cover genocidal violence in Chad. The New York Times's Nicholas Kristof: "[Unlike in Sudan,] we can get visas to Chad, and now there are more than 200,000 people who have fled Darfur and are in Chad and are telling their stories to anybody who will talk to them. I must say that newspapers and magazines, I think, have done a better job in covering this. The people who have really dropped the ball, frankly, is television."
After almost two years of reports of human-trafficking by contractors of foreign workers on U.S. bases, the U.S. military has ordered changes. Among other reforms, contractors can no longer confiscate worker passports and must provide workers with a signed copy of their employment contract.
A medical services company headed by former Bush Veteran Affairs Secretary Anthony Principi "could receive fees exceeding $1 billion from the Veterans Administration, much of it on contracts approved and amended while he ran the government agency."
And finally: Political polarization seeps into the last bastion of "bipartisan civility" - the Congressional Softball League. Conservative teams have accused the league commissioner "of running a socialist year-end playoff system that gives below-average teams an unfair chance to win the championship," and have started their own league. Teams include the "traditional Republican powerhouse Fat, Drunk & Awesome from the House Homeland Security Committee" and Moderately Sober from Rep. Sherwood Boehlert's (R-NY) office.
Wrap...
Think Fast
With little more than a month left until hurricane season begins, the levees in New Orleans remain "flawed." "Flood walls are too weak in some places; earthen levees are too short in others. Locals say the only thing that will save the low-lying region from more flooding this summer is not getting hit with a strong storm."
A review of "at least six joint U.S.-Iraqi inspections of detention centers, most of them run by Iraq's Shiite Muslim-dominated Interior Ministry," found evidence of prisoner abuse at all of them. Some of the abuse was "severe," including cigarette burns and missing toenails, but unlike in the past, abused detainees were not removed from the centers, "prompting concerns that they could be victims again."
$2.91: The national average gas price for self-serve regular. Gas prices have shot up nearly 25 cents per gallon over the past two weeks. As crude oil hovers around $75 per barrel, Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Nuaimi said, “You know and I know that the reason for the price being where it is not shortages of supply.” Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) explained that oil companies "get together, reduce the supply of oil, and that drives up prices."
"House Republican leaders have stripped out language" from the ethics bill "forcing lobbyists to provide detailed disclosure of fundraising activities and contacts with lawmakers," Roll Call reports.
2,000. Estimated number of Iraqi women who have been victims of sex trafficking since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003.
Arthur Schlesinger Jr., noted presidential historian and former adviser to President John F. Kennedy, warns of the final thousand days of Bush’s presidency - “days filled with ominous preparations for and dark rumors of a preventive war against Iran.”
No excuse for media's failure to cover genocidal violence in Chad. The New York Times's Nicholas Kristof: "[Unlike in Sudan,] we can get visas to Chad, and now there are more than 200,000 people who have fled Darfur and are in Chad and are telling their stories to anybody who will talk to them. I must say that newspapers and magazines, I think, have done a better job in covering this. The people who have really dropped the ball, frankly, is television."
After almost two years of reports of human-trafficking by contractors of foreign workers on U.S. bases, the U.S. military has ordered changes. Among other reforms, contractors can no longer confiscate worker passports and must provide workers with a signed copy of their employment contract.
A medical services company headed by former Bush Veteran Affairs Secretary Anthony Principi "could receive fees exceeding $1 billion from the Veterans Administration, much of it on contracts approved and amended while he ran the government agency."
And finally: Political polarization seeps into the last bastion of "bipartisan civility" - the Congressional Softball League. Conservative teams have accused the league commissioner "of running a socialist year-end playoff system that gives below-average teams an unfair chance to win the championship," and have started their own league. Teams include the "traditional Republican powerhouse Fat, Drunk & Awesome from the House Homeland Security Committee" and Moderately Sober from Rep. Sherwood Boehlert's (R-NY) office.
Wrap...
1st: Illinois. 2nd: California. Both: IMPEACH!!!
From Information Clearing House:
California Becomes Second State to Introduce Bush Impeachment
By David Swanson
04/24/06
Joining Illinois, California has become the second state in which a proposal to impeach President Bush has been introduced in the state legislature. And this one includes Cheney as well.
California Assemblyman Paul Koretz of Los Angeles (where the LA Times has now called for Cheney's resignation) has submitted amendments to Assembly Joint Resolution No. 39, calling for the impeachment of President George W. Bush and Vice President Richard Cheney. The amendments reference Section 603 of Jefferson's Manual of the Rules of the United States House of Representatives, which allows federal impeachment proceedings to be initiated by joint resolution of a state legislature.
The resolution, in the words of Koretz's press release, "bases the call for impeachment upon the Bush Administration intentionally misleading the Congress and the American people regarding the threat from Iraq in order to justify an unnecessary war that has cost billions of dollars and thousands of lives and casualties; exceeding constitutional authority to wage war by invading Iraq; exceeding constitutional authority by Federalizing the National Guard; conspiring to torture prisoners in violation of the 'Federal Torture Act' and indicating intent to continue such actions; spying on American citizens in violation of the 1978 Foreign Agency Surveillance Act; leaking and covering up the leak of the identity of Valerie Plame Wilson, and holding American citizens without charge or trial."
Koretz submitted amendments gutting AJR No. 39, a resolution unrelated to impeachment, to the Assembly Rules Committee. The Rules Committee may take up the bill this week for referral, allowing him to formally introduce the amended resolution.
AJR 39 is a bill introduced in January by Koretz calling for a moratorium on depleted uranium:http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/bill/asm/ab_0001-0050/ajr_39_bill_20060104_introduced.html
"At both the state and national levels," Koretz said, "we will be paying for the Bush Administration's illegal actions and terrible lack of judgment and competence for decades—not only in the billions of dollars wasted on the war and welfare for the rich, but in the worldwide loss of respect for America and Americans. Bush and Cheney must be impeached and removed from office before they undertake even deadlier misdeeds, such as the use of nuclear weapons. There are no bounds to their willingness to ignore the Constitution and world opinion—we can't afford to wait for the next disaster and hope that we can survive it."
For more information and to thank this American hero, contact Paul Michael Neuman in Koretz's District Office: (310) 285-5490 paul.neuman@asm.ca.gov or go here: http://democrats.assembly.ca.gov/members/a42/Contact.htm
Here is a kit to help with promoting this resolution and with passing others in your towns and cities and states. Also on this page is information on activities in other states and localities:
http://www.impeachpac.org/resolutions
Get organized in California to pass this bill!
http://pdamerica.org/statecaucus.php?s=CA
Illinois Legislators Were First to Introduce Bill for Bush Impeachment
Three members of the Illinois General Assembly have introduced a bill that urges the General Assembly to submit charges to the U. S. House of Representatives to initiate impeachment proceedings against the President of the United States, George W. Bush, for willfully violating his Oath of Office to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States and if found guilty urges his removal from office and disqualification to hold any other office in the United States.
The Jefferson Manual of rules for the U.S. House of Representatives makes clear that impeachment proceedings can be initiated by a state legislature submitting charges. The state of Illinois is on its way toward forcing on the House what not a single one of its members has yet had the courage to propose: Articles of Impeachment.
The text of the Illinois bill and information on its status are available here: http://tinyurl.com/nhs3r
The bill takes up the issues of illegal spying, torture, detentions without charge or trial, manipulation of pre-war intelligence, and the leaking of classified information.
Please thank these sponsors of the bill:
Rep. Karen A. Yarbrough, phone (217) 782-8120 or (708) 615-1747; fax (708) 615-1745
Rep Sara Feigenholtz , phone (217) 782-8062 or (773) 296-4141; fax (217) 557-7203 or (773) 296-0993
Rep. Eddie Washington phone (217) 558-1012 or (847) 623-0060, fax (847) 623-6078
Here is a kit to help with promoting this resolution and with passing others in your towns and cities. Also on this page is information on activities in other states and localities: http://www.impeachpac.org/resolutions
Get organized in Illinois to pass this bill! http://pdamerica.org/statecaucus.php?s=IL
Wrap...
California Becomes Second State to Introduce Bush Impeachment
By David Swanson
04/24/06
Joining Illinois, California has become the second state in which a proposal to impeach President Bush has been introduced in the state legislature. And this one includes Cheney as well.
California Assemblyman Paul Koretz of Los Angeles (where the LA Times has now called for Cheney's resignation) has submitted amendments to Assembly Joint Resolution No. 39, calling for the impeachment of President George W. Bush and Vice President Richard Cheney. The amendments reference Section 603 of Jefferson's Manual of the Rules of the United States House of Representatives, which allows federal impeachment proceedings to be initiated by joint resolution of a state legislature.
The resolution, in the words of Koretz's press release, "bases the call for impeachment upon the Bush Administration intentionally misleading the Congress and the American people regarding the threat from Iraq in order to justify an unnecessary war that has cost billions of dollars and thousands of lives and casualties; exceeding constitutional authority to wage war by invading Iraq; exceeding constitutional authority by Federalizing the National Guard; conspiring to torture prisoners in violation of the 'Federal Torture Act' and indicating intent to continue such actions; spying on American citizens in violation of the 1978 Foreign Agency Surveillance Act; leaking and covering up the leak of the identity of Valerie Plame Wilson, and holding American citizens without charge or trial."
Koretz submitted amendments gutting AJR No. 39, a resolution unrelated to impeachment, to the Assembly Rules Committee. The Rules Committee may take up the bill this week for referral, allowing him to formally introduce the amended resolution.
AJR 39 is a bill introduced in January by Koretz calling for a moratorium on depleted uranium:http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/bill/asm/ab_0001-0050/ajr_39_bill_20060104_introduced.html
"At both the state and national levels," Koretz said, "we will be paying for the Bush Administration's illegal actions and terrible lack of judgment and competence for decades—not only in the billions of dollars wasted on the war and welfare for the rich, but in the worldwide loss of respect for America and Americans. Bush and Cheney must be impeached and removed from office before they undertake even deadlier misdeeds, such as the use of nuclear weapons. There are no bounds to their willingness to ignore the Constitution and world opinion—we can't afford to wait for the next disaster and hope that we can survive it."
For more information and to thank this American hero, contact Paul Michael Neuman in Koretz's District Office: (310) 285-5490 paul.neuman@asm.ca.gov or go here: http://democrats.assembly.ca.gov/members/a42/Contact.htm
Here is a kit to help with promoting this resolution and with passing others in your towns and cities and states. Also on this page is information on activities in other states and localities:
http://www.impeachpac.org/resolutions
Get organized in California to pass this bill!
http://pdamerica.org/statecaucus.php?s=CA
Illinois Legislators Were First to Introduce Bill for Bush Impeachment
Three members of the Illinois General Assembly have introduced a bill that urges the General Assembly to submit charges to the U. S. House of Representatives to initiate impeachment proceedings against the President of the United States, George W. Bush, for willfully violating his Oath of Office to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States and if found guilty urges his removal from office and disqualification to hold any other office in the United States.
The Jefferson Manual of rules for the U.S. House of Representatives makes clear that impeachment proceedings can be initiated by a state legislature submitting charges. The state of Illinois is on its way toward forcing on the House what not a single one of its members has yet had the courage to propose: Articles of Impeachment.
The text of the Illinois bill and information on its status are available here: http://tinyurl.com/nhs3r
The bill takes up the issues of illegal spying, torture, detentions without charge or trial, manipulation of pre-war intelligence, and the leaking of classified information.
Please thank these sponsors of the bill:
Rep. Karen A. Yarbrough, phone (217) 782-8120 or (708) 615-1747; fax (708) 615-1745
Rep Sara Feigenholtz , phone (217) 782-8062 or (773) 296-4141; fax (217) 557-7203 or (773) 296-0993
Rep. Eddie Washington phone (217) 558-1012 or (847) 623-0060, fax (847) 623-6078
Here is a kit to help with promoting this resolution and with passing others in your towns and cities. Also on this page is information on activities in other states and localities: http://www.impeachpac.org/resolutions
Get organized in Illinois to pass this bill! http://pdamerica.org/statecaucus.php?s=IL
Wrap...
Mick Jagger to Bush: Forget it!
From The Sun.co.uk :
Mick beats George to suite
Forty licks ... Jagger refuses to give up room for Bush
REUTERS
FULL NEWS INDEX
By THOMAS WHITAKER
Showbiz Reporter
PRESIDENT George Bush can’t get no satisfaction — after Mick Jagger grabbed his hotel room.
The Rolling Stone splashed out £3,600 a night for the suite days before the US leader tried to book it.
Now Mick, 62, who has been a fierce critic of the Bush-led war in Iraq, is refusing to give it up.
The veteran rocker hired the luxury Royal Suite at the five-star Imperial Hotel in Vienna, Austria, for June when the Stones are due to play a gig in the city.
Bush’s aides then tried to book it to tie in with a summit meeting.
But Mick put his foot down and insisted he was keeping the booking.
A source close to the millionaire singer said last night: “White House officials had wanted to reserve the suite and all the other rooms on the first floor.
“But Mick and the Stones had already booked every one of them.
“Bush’s people seemed to be under the impression that they would just hand over the suites but there was no way Mick was going to do that.”
The classically-designed suite is said to be among the top 100 hotel rooms in the world. It boasts a 7ft 4in bed, chandeliers and oil paintings.
Former presidents Ronald Reagan, John Kennedy and George Bush Sr all stayed there while they were in office.
The hotel last night admitted US secret service agents vetted the accommodation — and confirmed that Bush would no longer be staying there.
An American Embassy official refused to say where he was now staying for “security reasons”.
Mick takes a swipe at Bush, 59, on the latest Stones album A Bigger Bang, savaging his Iraq War policy.
Wrap...
Mick beats George to suite
Forty licks ... Jagger refuses to give up room for Bush
REUTERS
FULL NEWS INDEX
By THOMAS WHITAKER
Showbiz Reporter
PRESIDENT George Bush can’t get no satisfaction — after Mick Jagger grabbed his hotel room.
The Rolling Stone splashed out £3,600 a night for the suite days before the US leader tried to book it.
Now Mick, 62, who has been a fierce critic of the Bush-led war in Iraq, is refusing to give it up.
The veteran rocker hired the luxury Royal Suite at the five-star Imperial Hotel in Vienna, Austria, for June when the Stones are due to play a gig in the city.
Bush’s aides then tried to book it to tie in with a summit meeting.
But Mick put his foot down and insisted he was keeping the booking.
A source close to the millionaire singer said last night: “White House officials had wanted to reserve the suite and all the other rooms on the first floor.
“But Mick and the Stones had already booked every one of them.
“Bush’s people seemed to be under the impression that they would just hand over the suites but there was no way Mick was going to do that.”
The classically-designed suite is said to be among the top 100 hotel rooms in the world. It boasts a 7ft 4in bed, chandeliers and oil paintings.
Former presidents Ronald Reagan, John Kennedy and George Bush Sr all stayed there while they were in office.
The hotel last night admitted US secret service agents vetted the accommodation — and confirmed that Bush would no longer be staying there.
An American Embassy official refused to say where he was now staying for “security reasons”.
Mick takes a swipe at Bush, 59, on the latest Stones album A Bigger Bang, savaging his Iraq War policy.
Wrap...
Sunday, April 23, 2006
CIA stops TJ Waters' book, Class 11....
As readers of this blog know, I pre-ordered TJ Waters' book, Class 11, wherein he writes about the first CIA class held/formed after 9/11....last October 1st....and it's publication been postponed more than once. Now I've learned what's been going on, and I am totally torqued.
From the New York Times, an excerpt wherein TJ's book is discussed:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/24/washington/24leak.html?hp&ex=1145851200&en
The renewed emphasis on the culture of secrecy has included a tightening of the review process for books and articles by former agency employees, said Mark S. Zaid, a lawyer who represents many authors who once worked for the C.I.A.
Authors say the agency's Publications Review Board has been removing material that would easily have been approved before. While the board in the past has generally worked with retirees to make manuscripts publishable, it now more often appears to be trying to block publication, the authors say. And reprimands for violations have become more stern, including letters warning of possible Justice Department investigations.
A C.I.A. spokeswoman, Jennifer Millerwise Dyck, denied that the Publications Review Board's standards had changed.
"The only rule is that they are not allowed to have classified information in their manuscripts," Ms. Millerwise Dyck said.
But Mr. Zaid said: "There's been a fundamental shift in practice at the Publications Review Board. There's literally been a reinstitution of the 1950's attitude that what happens at C.I.A. stays at C.I.A."
Mr. Zaid said the shift in the agency's approach to publications under Mr. Goss was most clearly illustrated by its handling of a book by Thomas Waters Jr., who wrote about his experiences as a recent agency recruit.
He said the manuscript of Mr. Waters's book, titled "Class 11: Inside the CIA's First Post-9/11 Spy Class," was approved by the Publications Review Board in September 2004 with several modest changes. Mr. Waters then sold the book to Dutton, made the changes and submitted the galleys for a final review.
In February, Mr. Zaid said, the board returned the galleys with nearly half their contents marked as classified and not approved for publication. Mr. Waters, who left the agency after two years for family reasons, has sued the agency to permit publication, and the case is pending.
"What's ironic is that it's a very positive book," Mr. Zaid said. "He had a great experience and he thought this book would be a great recruiting tool."
In other cases, Mr. Zaid said, an acquaintance was recently refused permission to publish an op-ed article that drew on material from the agency's Web site. Another client's book was turned down because, the author was told, even though no single chapter was classified, the whole manuscript revealed enough information that it had to be classified. This so-called mosaic theory of classification, Mr. Zaid said, is being used more often to prevent publication.
Another former employee with long experience having publications approved agreed that reviews had become tougher. "It takes longer and there's a much more conservative approach," the former employee said, adding that he believed that some of the deletions had crossed the admittedly fuzzy boundary between protecting classified information and censoring personal opinions.
Another retiree agreed, saying he believed the agency had begun pressing authors to excise some unclassified material from manuscripts. "It's a more complex process than it used to be," he said. "Now, they question a lot more things."
Yet another agency retiree, who has in the past received warning letters from the C.I.A. after occasionally publishing articles without seeking approval, said he had recently gotten a far more strongly worded letter. This one informed him that a file had been opened to document his transgressions that could be forwarded to the Justice Department, he said.
Mr. Goss's effort to lower the profile of the agency has apparently been extended to the Web site of its Center for the Study of Intelligence, which for years has carried unclassified articles about the history and practice of spying from the in-house journal Studies in Intelligence.
Max Holland, who has written two articles for the C.I.A. journal, recently reported in The American Spectator that the online posting of unclassified excerpts from an agency review of the failure to assess Iraq's unconventional weapons accurately had been delayed for seven months. The last issue represented on the C.I.A. Web site is from mid-2005.
Wrap....
From the New York Times, an excerpt wherein TJ's book is discussed:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/24/washington/24leak.html?hp&ex=1145851200&en
The renewed emphasis on the culture of secrecy has included a tightening of the review process for books and articles by former agency employees, said Mark S. Zaid, a lawyer who represents many authors who once worked for the C.I.A.
Authors say the agency's Publications Review Board has been removing material that would easily have been approved before. While the board in the past has generally worked with retirees to make manuscripts publishable, it now more often appears to be trying to block publication, the authors say. And reprimands for violations have become more stern, including letters warning of possible Justice Department investigations.
A C.I.A. spokeswoman, Jennifer Millerwise Dyck, denied that the Publications Review Board's standards had changed.
"The only rule is that they are not allowed to have classified information in their manuscripts," Ms. Millerwise Dyck said.
But Mr. Zaid said: "There's been a fundamental shift in practice at the Publications Review Board. There's literally been a reinstitution of the 1950's attitude that what happens at C.I.A. stays at C.I.A."
Mr. Zaid said the shift in the agency's approach to publications under Mr. Goss was most clearly illustrated by its handling of a book by Thomas Waters Jr., who wrote about his experiences as a recent agency recruit.
He said the manuscript of Mr. Waters's book, titled "Class 11: Inside the CIA's First Post-9/11 Spy Class," was approved by the Publications Review Board in September 2004 with several modest changes. Mr. Waters then sold the book to Dutton, made the changes and submitted the galleys for a final review.
In February, Mr. Zaid said, the board returned the galleys with nearly half their contents marked as classified and not approved for publication. Mr. Waters, who left the agency after two years for family reasons, has sued the agency to permit publication, and the case is pending.
"What's ironic is that it's a very positive book," Mr. Zaid said. "He had a great experience and he thought this book would be a great recruiting tool."
In other cases, Mr. Zaid said, an acquaintance was recently refused permission to publish an op-ed article that drew on material from the agency's Web site. Another client's book was turned down because, the author was told, even though no single chapter was classified, the whole manuscript revealed enough information that it had to be classified. This so-called mosaic theory of classification, Mr. Zaid said, is being used more often to prevent publication.
Another former employee with long experience having publications approved agreed that reviews had become tougher. "It takes longer and there's a much more conservative approach," the former employee said, adding that he believed that some of the deletions had crossed the admittedly fuzzy boundary between protecting classified information and censoring personal opinions.
Another retiree agreed, saying he believed the agency had begun pressing authors to excise some unclassified material from manuscripts. "It's a more complex process than it used to be," he said. "Now, they question a lot more things."
Yet another agency retiree, who has in the past received warning letters from the C.I.A. after occasionally publishing articles without seeking approval, said he had recently gotten a far more strongly worded letter. This one informed him that a file had been opened to document his transgressions that could be forwarded to the Justice Department, he said.
Mr. Goss's effort to lower the profile of the agency has apparently been extended to the Web site of its Center for the Study of Intelligence, which for years has carried unclassified articles about the history and practice of spying from the in-house journal Studies in Intelligence.
Max Holland, who has written two articles for the C.I.A. journal, recently reported in The American Spectator that the online posting of unclassified excerpts from an agency review of the failure to assess Iraq's unconventional weapons accurately had been delayed for seven months. The last issue represented on the C.I.A. Web site is from mid-2005.
Wrap....
William Pitt interviews Sen John Kerry...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/042306A.shtml
Deadlines and Dissent
By William Rivers Pitt
t r u t h o u t Perspective
Sunday 23 April 2006
[excerpt: the interview]
The following interview was conducted via telephone on Saturday evening.
PITT: Are there other Senators who will sign on or have signed on to your May 15th deadline you have put forward?
KERRY: I think we have a few, but I haven't gotten the latest word from the staff down in Washington. I don't know yet what the final number is going to be. We've been out on the Easter break for the last two weeks, so my colleagues have been sort of moving around.
One of the problems is that I proposed the May 15th date about three or four weeks ago, so there would be a six-week period of time where the ultimatum could be given. The president hasn't publicly, and as far as we know, hasn't privately given them an ultimatum. So some colleagues will say, oh God, it's only two weeks from now, how do we do that?
The point is not the date, so much as it is giving them the ultimatum of about four weeks or five weeks, and tell them they've got to do this or else. That's really the key.
PITT: How do you respond to those who say a US withdrawal from Iraq under any circumstances will cause that nation to collapse into chaos?
KERRY: There is no military resolution, anyway, so they have to stand up for themselves. You're in a civil war. The fact is that 242,000 members of the security forces have been trained, according to the administration. If 242,000 have been trained, and the basis for this policy is that we will stand down as soon as they stand up, their target goal for the full stand-up was 270,000. So we're only 30,000 away from where they supposedly said was our final security goal, and we haven't been standing down at all.
I'm not suggesting that, if they form the government, we're out of there overnight. We're out of there over the course of a year. A year is enough time for them to stand up and take control. Moreover, I've said we will maintain an "over-the-horizon" capability, precisely to avoid having al Qaeda and chaos to take over.
I think it's a red-herring argument, it's a phony argument, it doesn't recognize the realities of what they said their own policy is.
PITT: 60 Minutes is going to report Sunday night that the CIA informed both George W. Bush and Dick Cheney that Iraq was not in possession of weapons of mass destruction a full six months before the invasion took place, and that both Bush and Cheney dismissed their analysis because the decision for regime change had already been made. What is your response to this revelation?
KERRY: If it is true, it confirms more and more of what we've heard from the British memos, from the Downing Street memo, from different statements by people in the administration and out, that they had made up their mind to go to war, and that they misled the Congress and the American people.
PITT: How do you see the odds of the Democrats retaking one or both chambers of Congress?
KERRY: I think we have a shot. I can't predict. I know that if the real issues are on the table, and I hope they will be and that's what we'll be fighting for, I think there's a terrific chance. Most of my focus is going into that. I've helped over 140 different candidates around the country in 33 states. I'm working very hard on '06, because I believe '06 is the real battle.
PITT: You have said that no decision on a 2008 presidential run will be forthcoming soon, and that you are looking hard at the possibility. My question, therefore, is this: if you do decide to run again, what if anything will you do differently in this campaign?
ERRY: Let me just say that I learned a lot of lessons, and we made some mistakes, which I completely take responsibility for. I learned what we have to do, and if I decide to run, I'm going to do it, and I will know how to win.
But I'm not going to get into all of that at this point in time. I'll go into those things if and when the time comes. The bottom line is that we came within 60,000 votes, and I think I know how to cure the issues that were not properly addressed in the course of the campaign.
William Rivers Pitt is a New York Times and internationally bestselling author of two books: War on Iraq: What Team Bush Doesn't Want You to Know and The Greatest Sedition Is Silence.
Wrap...
Deadlines and Dissent
By William Rivers Pitt
t r u t h o u t Perspective
Sunday 23 April 2006
[excerpt: the interview]
The following interview was conducted via telephone on Saturday evening.
PITT: Are there other Senators who will sign on or have signed on to your May 15th deadline you have put forward?
KERRY: I think we have a few, but I haven't gotten the latest word from the staff down in Washington. I don't know yet what the final number is going to be. We've been out on the Easter break for the last two weeks, so my colleagues have been sort of moving around.
One of the problems is that I proposed the May 15th date about three or four weeks ago, so there would be a six-week period of time where the ultimatum could be given. The president hasn't publicly, and as far as we know, hasn't privately given them an ultimatum. So some colleagues will say, oh God, it's only two weeks from now, how do we do that?
The point is not the date, so much as it is giving them the ultimatum of about four weeks or five weeks, and tell them they've got to do this or else. That's really the key.
PITT: How do you respond to those who say a US withdrawal from Iraq under any circumstances will cause that nation to collapse into chaos?
KERRY: There is no military resolution, anyway, so they have to stand up for themselves. You're in a civil war. The fact is that 242,000 members of the security forces have been trained, according to the administration. If 242,000 have been trained, and the basis for this policy is that we will stand down as soon as they stand up, their target goal for the full stand-up was 270,000. So we're only 30,000 away from where they supposedly said was our final security goal, and we haven't been standing down at all.
I'm not suggesting that, if they form the government, we're out of there overnight. We're out of there over the course of a year. A year is enough time for them to stand up and take control. Moreover, I've said we will maintain an "over-the-horizon" capability, precisely to avoid having al Qaeda and chaos to take over.
I think it's a red-herring argument, it's a phony argument, it doesn't recognize the realities of what they said their own policy is.
PITT: 60 Minutes is going to report Sunday night that the CIA informed both George W. Bush and Dick Cheney that Iraq was not in possession of weapons of mass destruction a full six months before the invasion took place, and that both Bush and Cheney dismissed their analysis because the decision for regime change had already been made. What is your response to this revelation?
KERRY: If it is true, it confirms more and more of what we've heard from the British memos, from the Downing Street memo, from different statements by people in the administration and out, that they had made up their mind to go to war, and that they misled the Congress and the American people.
PITT: How do you see the odds of the Democrats retaking one or both chambers of Congress?
KERRY: I think we have a shot. I can't predict. I know that if the real issues are on the table, and I hope they will be and that's what we'll be fighting for, I think there's a terrific chance. Most of my focus is going into that. I've helped over 140 different candidates around the country in 33 states. I'm working very hard on '06, because I believe '06 is the real battle.
PITT: You have said that no decision on a 2008 presidential run will be forthcoming soon, and that you are looking hard at the possibility. My question, therefore, is this: if you do decide to run again, what if anything will you do differently in this campaign?
ERRY: Let me just say that I learned a lot of lessons, and we made some mistakes, which I completely take responsibility for. I learned what we have to do, and if I decide to run, I'm going to do it, and I will know how to win.
But I'm not going to get into all of that at this point in time. I'll go into those things if and when the time comes. The bottom line is that we came within 60,000 votes, and I think I know how to cure the issues that were not properly addressed in the course of the campaign.
William Rivers Pitt is a New York Times and internationally bestselling author of two books: War on Iraq: What Team Bush Doesn't Want You to Know and The Greatest Sedition Is Silence.
Wrap...
Saturday, April 22, 2006
What Wang REALLY yelled at Chairman Hu...
From http://www.mykeru.com/weekly/2006_0416_0422.html#ahole_listers
[an excerpt]:
Problem is that Wang also said, in Mandarin, "Chairman Hu, your days are not many".
Yes, it's stupid to consider that as a threat, because telling someone that "their days are numbered", as it would be phrased in English, can be taken more than one way. However, when bloggers either don't know, or don't care through some form of ethnocentrism, what was also said in another language they are, in practice, engaging in a sort of cherry picking. Or, more likely, saying Wang is being charged with intimidation for making an English-phrased clarion call for freedom and tolerance, rather than including a phrase that could be taken by idiots as a threat, makes for better outrage. In which case, the people doing the picking don't give a shit about some language like Mandarin that only a handful of people speak. If, by "handful" you mean "the plurality of people on the planet". *
Even ABC News was more accurate:
Wang did not break the law when she yelled "Stop oppressing the Falun Gong" at Hu or even when she unfurled a red-and-yellow banner of the Falun Gong, a religious movement banned in China. Wang broke the law — crossing from First Amendment protected speech to criminality — according to government prosecutor Angela George, when she yelled "Your time is running out," to Hu, and later, when she screamed "Anything you have done will come back to you in this life."
Considering that intimidation is idiotic. Any number of wingnut bloggers and talk radio whores make more overt threats on a daily basis. But the phrasing has to be acknowledged.
Characterizing the entirety of Wang's remarks as "Stop him from killing" is simply ignorance or selectivity.
Also, acknowledging what Wang said in Mandarin raises an interesting question of translation. According to media reports, the Secret Service claims Wang said to Hu "Your time is running out" when, in fact, she said "Hu Zhu xi ni de rizi bu duo le" which transliterates as "Hu Chairman your days not many", Chinese and English being similar in syntax.
What Wang said would commonly be understood in Chinese, as well as English, as "your days are numbered" in the same way the days of the lame duck Bush presidency are "numbered".
The Secret Service translation seems to be oddly just a little more threatening than the phrase would normally be rendered. Claiming that Wang said "Your time is running out" isn't translation, it's literary license.
I'll even break it down: "Hu (his name) Zhu Xi (Chairman) ni de (your) rizi (days) bu (not) duo le (many)".
"Your time is running out" isn't even close.
Read the full WaPo article on the charges against Wang for some, well, interesting and trite legalese pseudo-reasoning:
During yesterday's court hearing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Angela George argued that Wang's statements were not protected by the First Amendment.
"She was yelling at the president," George said. "You can't walk into a theater and yell 'Fire!' The First Amendment does not permit her to engage in criminal conduct.
She was yelling at the president, which is ostensibly criminal. However, the charges were brought against Wang based on what she said in Chinese. President Bush is barely articulate in English. I doubt he speaks Chinese.
[Read whole post at link on top]
Wrap...
[an excerpt]:
Problem is that Wang also said, in Mandarin, "Chairman Hu, your days are not many".
Yes, it's stupid to consider that as a threat, because telling someone that "their days are numbered", as it would be phrased in English, can be taken more than one way. However, when bloggers either don't know, or don't care through some form of ethnocentrism, what was also said in another language they are, in practice, engaging in a sort of cherry picking. Or, more likely, saying Wang is being charged with intimidation for making an English-phrased clarion call for freedom and tolerance, rather than including a phrase that could be taken by idiots as a threat, makes for better outrage. In which case, the people doing the picking don't give a shit about some language like Mandarin that only a handful of people speak. If, by "handful" you mean "the plurality of people on the planet". *
Even ABC News was more accurate:
Wang did not break the law when she yelled "Stop oppressing the Falun Gong" at Hu or even when she unfurled a red-and-yellow banner of the Falun Gong, a religious movement banned in China. Wang broke the law — crossing from First Amendment protected speech to criminality — according to government prosecutor Angela George, when she yelled "Your time is running out," to Hu, and later, when she screamed "Anything you have done will come back to you in this life."
Considering that intimidation is idiotic. Any number of wingnut bloggers and talk radio whores make more overt threats on a daily basis. But the phrasing has to be acknowledged.
Characterizing the entirety of Wang's remarks as "Stop him from killing" is simply ignorance or selectivity.
Also, acknowledging what Wang said in Mandarin raises an interesting question of translation. According to media reports, the Secret Service claims Wang said to Hu "Your time is running out" when, in fact, she said "Hu Zhu xi ni de rizi bu duo le" which transliterates as "Hu Chairman your days not many", Chinese and English being similar in syntax.
What Wang said would commonly be understood in Chinese, as well as English, as "your days are numbered" in the same way the days of the lame duck Bush presidency are "numbered".
The Secret Service translation seems to be oddly just a little more threatening than the phrase would normally be rendered. Claiming that Wang said "Your time is running out" isn't translation, it's literary license.
I'll even break it down: "Hu (his name) Zhu Xi (Chairman) ni de (your) rizi (days) bu (not) duo le (many)".
"Your time is running out" isn't even close.
Read the full WaPo article on the charges against Wang for some, well, interesting and trite legalese pseudo-reasoning:
During yesterday's court hearing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Angela George argued that Wang's statements were not protected by the First Amendment.
"She was yelling at the president," George said. "You can't walk into a theater and yell 'Fire!' The First Amendment does not permit her to engage in criminal conduct.
She was yelling at the president, which is ostensibly criminal. However, the charges were brought against Wang based on what she said in Chinese. President Bush is barely articulate in English. I doubt he speaks Chinese.
[Read whole post at link on top]
Wrap...
CIA Intel Officer, McCarthy: her firing smells....
From NoQuarter.typepad.com :
April 22, 2006
The Firing of Mary McCarthy
byLarry C Johnson
The case against the CIA Intelligence Officer, Mary McCarthy, fired for her alleged role in leaking information about secret prisons to the Washington Post's Dana Priest smells a little fishy. Let me state at the outset that the officer in question, Mary McCarthy, is an old acquaintance. I hasten to add that I do not consider her a friend. She was my immediate boss in 1988-89 and was instrumental in my decision to leave the CIA and take a job at the State Department's Office of Counter Terrorism. Mary, in my experience, was a terrible manager. I left the CIA in 1989 despite having received two exceptional performance awards during my last eight months on the job because I could not stand working under her.
That said, I take no delight in the news that she was fired. In fact, there are some things about the case that puzzle me. For starters, Mary never worked on the Operations side of the house. In other words, she never worked a job where she would have had first hand operational knowledge about secret prisons. She worked the analytical side of the CIA and served with the National Intelligence Council. According to press reports, she subsequently worked at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) from 2001 thru 2005. That is a type of academic/policy wonk position and, again, would not put her in a position to know anything first hand about secret prisons.
Sometime within the last year she returned to CIA on a terminal assignment. I've heard through the grapevine that she was attending the seminar for officers who are retiring while working with the Inspector General (IG). Now things get interesting. She could find out about secret prisons if Intelligence Officers involved with that program had filed a complaint with the IG or if there was some incident that compelled senior CIA officials to determine an investigation was warranted. In other words, this program did not come to Mary's attention (if the allegations are true) because she worked on it as an ops officer. Instead, it appears an investigation of the practice had been proposed or was underway. That's another story reporters probably ought to be tracking down.
I am struck by the irony that Mary McCarthy may have been fired for blowing the whistle and ensuring that the truth about an abuse was told to the American people. There is something potentially honorable in that action; particularly when you consider that George Bush authorized Scooter Libby to leak misleading information for the purpose of deceiving the American people about the grounds for going to war in Iraq. While I'm neither a fan nor friend of Mary's, she may have done a service for her country. She was a lousy manager in my experience, but she is not a traitor and has not betrayed the identity of an undercover intelligence officer. That dirty work was done by the minions of George Bush and Dick Cheney. It is important to keep that fact in the forefront as the judgment on Mary McCarthy's acts is rendered.
Posted by Larry Johnson on April 22, 2006 at 08:07 AM
Wrap...
April 22, 2006
The Firing of Mary McCarthy
byLarry C Johnson
The case against the CIA Intelligence Officer, Mary McCarthy, fired for her alleged role in leaking information about secret prisons to the Washington Post's Dana Priest smells a little fishy. Let me state at the outset that the officer in question, Mary McCarthy, is an old acquaintance. I hasten to add that I do not consider her a friend. She was my immediate boss in 1988-89 and was instrumental in my decision to leave the CIA and take a job at the State Department's Office of Counter Terrorism. Mary, in my experience, was a terrible manager. I left the CIA in 1989 despite having received two exceptional performance awards during my last eight months on the job because I could not stand working under her.
That said, I take no delight in the news that she was fired. In fact, there are some things about the case that puzzle me. For starters, Mary never worked on the Operations side of the house. In other words, she never worked a job where she would have had first hand operational knowledge about secret prisons. She worked the analytical side of the CIA and served with the National Intelligence Council. According to press reports, she subsequently worked at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) from 2001 thru 2005. That is a type of academic/policy wonk position and, again, would not put her in a position to know anything first hand about secret prisons.
Sometime within the last year she returned to CIA on a terminal assignment. I've heard through the grapevine that she was attending the seminar for officers who are retiring while working with the Inspector General (IG). Now things get interesting. She could find out about secret prisons if Intelligence Officers involved with that program had filed a complaint with the IG or if there was some incident that compelled senior CIA officials to determine an investigation was warranted. In other words, this program did not come to Mary's attention (if the allegations are true) because she worked on it as an ops officer. Instead, it appears an investigation of the practice had been proposed or was underway. That's another story reporters probably ought to be tracking down.
I am struck by the irony that Mary McCarthy may have been fired for blowing the whistle and ensuring that the truth about an abuse was told to the American people. There is something potentially honorable in that action; particularly when you consider that George Bush authorized Scooter Libby to leak misleading information for the purpose of deceiving the American people about the grounds for going to war in Iraq. While I'm neither a fan nor friend of Mary's, she may have done a service for her country. She was a lousy manager in my experience, but she is not a traitor and has not betrayed the identity of an undercover intelligence officer. That dirty work was done by the minions of George Bush and Dick Cheney. It is important to keep that fact in the forefront as the judgment on Mary McCarthy's acts is rendered.
Posted by Larry Johnson on April 22, 2006 at 08:07 AM
Wrap...
Truth...from Kerry's mouth to BushCo's deaf ears...
From truthout.org :
Patriotism Is Truth, Today as in Vietnam
By John F. Kerry
The Boston Globe
Saturday 22 April 2006
Thirty-five years ago today, I testified before the United States Senate. I was a 27-year-old Vietnam veteran who believed the war had to come to an end.
It was 1971.
Three years earlier, Richard Nixon had been elected president with a secret plan for peace - a plan he kept secret from the American people as young Americans continued to die for a mission high-ranking officials of two administrations had decided was unwinnable.
We would watch the Nixon administration lie, break the law, and work overtime to squash dissent - all the while claiming absurdly they were prolonging war to protect our troops as they withdrew. We were a country deeply divided. World War II fathers split with Vietnam generation sons over a war that was tearing us apart - and split, particularly, over our responsibilities during a time of war.
Many people did not understand or agree with my act of public dissent. To them, supporting the troops meant continuing to support the war, or at least keeping my mouth shut.
But I couldn't remain silent. I felt compelled to speak out about what was happening in Vietnam, where the children of America were pulled from front porches and living rooms and plunged almost overnight into a world of sniper fire, ambushes, rockets, booby traps, body bags, explosions, sleeplessness, and the confusion created by an enemy who was sometimes invisible and firing at us, and sometimes right next to us and smiling. It was clear that thousands of Americans were losing their lives in Vietnam while politicians in Washington schemed to save their political reputations.
Thirty-five years later, in another war gone off course, I see history repeating itself. It is both a right and an obligation for Americans today to disagree with a president who is wrong, a policy that is wrong, and a course in Iraq that weakens the nation. Again, we must refuse to sit quietly and watch our troops sacrificed for a policy that isn't working while Americans who dissent and ask tough questions are branded unpatriotic.
Just as it was in 1971, it is again right to make clear that the best way to support the troops is to oppose a course that squanders their lives, dishonors their sacrifice, and disserves the American people and our principles.
True patriots must defend the right of dissent and listen to the dissenters. Dissenters are not always right, but it is always a warning sign when they are accused of unpatriotic sentiments by politicians trying to avoid accountability or debate on their own policies. We should know by now that those who are right should never fear scrutiny of their policy and thorough debate.
In World War I, America's values were degraded, not defended, when dissenters were jailed and the teaching of German was banned in some public schools. It was panic and prejudice, not true patriotism, that brought the internment of the Japanese-Americans during World War II, a measure upheld by Supreme Court justices who did not uphold their oaths to defend the Constitution. We are stronger today because no less a rock-ribbed conservative than Robert Taft stood up at the height of World War II and asserted, "The maintenance of the right of criticism in the long run will do the country maintaining it a great deal more good than it will do the enemy, and will prevent mistakes which might otherwise occur."
In recent weeks, a number of retired high-ranking military leaders have publicly called for the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. And from the ranks of this administration and its conservative surrogates, we've heard these calls dismissed as acts of disloyalty or as a threat to civilian control of the armed forces. We have even heard accusations that this dissent gives aid and comfort to the enemy. That line of attack is shameful, especially coming from those who have never worn the uniform.
Generals and others who call for recognizing the facts on the ground in Iraq are not defeatists, they are patriots. At a time when mistake after mistake is being compounded by the very civilian leadership in the Pentagon that ignored expert military advice in the invasion and occupation of Iraq, those who understand the price being paid for each mistake by our troops, our country, and Iraq itself must be heard. At a time when our nation is imprisoned in a failed policy and we are being told once again that admitting the mistakes, not the mistakes themselves, will provide our enemies with an intolerable propaganda victory, that we literally have no choice but to stay the course even to a bitter end, those who seek to reclaim America's true sovereignty and freedom of action must be respected.
Iraq is not Vietnam, and the war on terrorism is not the Cold War. But the threat of jihadist extremism is another "long, twilight struggle," as President Kennedy said in his inaugural, and the threat is very real, but we will never defeat terrorists by trampling our own freedom and democracy. The Swift Boat-style attacks that have been aimed at dissenters from Gold Star mothers to decorated veterans like Jack Murtha hurt our democracy even more than they wound their target.
I still believe as strongly as I did 35 years ago that the most important way to support our troops is to tell the truth. Patriotism does not belong to those who defend a president's position - it belongs to those who defend our country, in battle and in dissent. That is a lesson of Vietnam worth remembering today.
John F. Kerry is speaking at Faneuil Hall today on the 35th anniversary of his Senate testimony on the Vietnam War.
Wrap...
Patriotism Is Truth, Today as in Vietnam
By John F. Kerry
The Boston Globe
Saturday 22 April 2006
Thirty-five years ago today, I testified before the United States Senate. I was a 27-year-old Vietnam veteran who believed the war had to come to an end.
It was 1971.
Three years earlier, Richard Nixon had been elected president with a secret plan for peace - a plan he kept secret from the American people as young Americans continued to die for a mission high-ranking officials of two administrations had decided was unwinnable.
We would watch the Nixon administration lie, break the law, and work overtime to squash dissent - all the while claiming absurdly they were prolonging war to protect our troops as they withdrew. We were a country deeply divided. World War II fathers split with Vietnam generation sons over a war that was tearing us apart - and split, particularly, over our responsibilities during a time of war.
Many people did not understand or agree with my act of public dissent. To them, supporting the troops meant continuing to support the war, or at least keeping my mouth shut.
But I couldn't remain silent. I felt compelled to speak out about what was happening in Vietnam, where the children of America were pulled from front porches and living rooms and plunged almost overnight into a world of sniper fire, ambushes, rockets, booby traps, body bags, explosions, sleeplessness, and the confusion created by an enemy who was sometimes invisible and firing at us, and sometimes right next to us and smiling. It was clear that thousands of Americans were losing their lives in Vietnam while politicians in Washington schemed to save their political reputations.
Thirty-five years later, in another war gone off course, I see history repeating itself. It is both a right and an obligation for Americans today to disagree with a president who is wrong, a policy that is wrong, and a course in Iraq that weakens the nation. Again, we must refuse to sit quietly and watch our troops sacrificed for a policy that isn't working while Americans who dissent and ask tough questions are branded unpatriotic.
Just as it was in 1971, it is again right to make clear that the best way to support the troops is to oppose a course that squanders their lives, dishonors their sacrifice, and disserves the American people and our principles.
True patriots must defend the right of dissent and listen to the dissenters. Dissenters are not always right, but it is always a warning sign when they are accused of unpatriotic sentiments by politicians trying to avoid accountability or debate on their own policies. We should know by now that those who are right should never fear scrutiny of their policy and thorough debate.
In World War I, America's values were degraded, not defended, when dissenters were jailed and the teaching of German was banned in some public schools. It was panic and prejudice, not true patriotism, that brought the internment of the Japanese-Americans during World War II, a measure upheld by Supreme Court justices who did not uphold their oaths to defend the Constitution. We are stronger today because no less a rock-ribbed conservative than Robert Taft stood up at the height of World War II and asserted, "The maintenance of the right of criticism in the long run will do the country maintaining it a great deal more good than it will do the enemy, and will prevent mistakes which might otherwise occur."
In recent weeks, a number of retired high-ranking military leaders have publicly called for the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. And from the ranks of this administration and its conservative surrogates, we've heard these calls dismissed as acts of disloyalty or as a threat to civilian control of the armed forces. We have even heard accusations that this dissent gives aid and comfort to the enemy. That line of attack is shameful, especially coming from those who have never worn the uniform.
Generals and others who call for recognizing the facts on the ground in Iraq are not defeatists, they are patriots. At a time when mistake after mistake is being compounded by the very civilian leadership in the Pentagon that ignored expert military advice in the invasion and occupation of Iraq, those who understand the price being paid for each mistake by our troops, our country, and Iraq itself must be heard. At a time when our nation is imprisoned in a failed policy and we are being told once again that admitting the mistakes, not the mistakes themselves, will provide our enemies with an intolerable propaganda victory, that we literally have no choice but to stay the course even to a bitter end, those who seek to reclaim America's true sovereignty and freedom of action must be respected.
Iraq is not Vietnam, and the war on terrorism is not the Cold War. But the threat of jihadist extremism is another "long, twilight struggle," as President Kennedy said in his inaugural, and the threat is very real, but we will never defeat terrorists by trampling our own freedom and democracy. The Swift Boat-style attacks that have been aimed at dissenters from Gold Star mothers to decorated veterans like Jack Murtha hurt our democracy even more than they wound their target.
I still believe as strongly as I did 35 years ago that the most important way to support our troops is to tell the truth. Patriotism does not belong to those who defend a president's position - it belongs to those who defend our country, in battle and in dissent. That is a lesson of Vietnam worth remembering today.
John F. Kerry is speaking at Faneuil Hall today on the 35th anniversary of his Senate testimony on the Vietnam War.
Wrap...
Friday, April 21, 2006
Nuke attack...Bush has only to say, "Go".....
From Information Clearing House:
1 Million Dead Iranians
By Chris Floyd
04/21/06
"ICH"
Twelve hours. One circuit of the sun from horizon to horizon, one course of the moon from dusk to dawn. What was once a natural measurement for the daily round of human life is now a doom-laden interval between the voicing of an autocrat's brutal whim and the infliction of mass annihilation halfway around the world.
Twelve hours is the maximum time necessary for American bombers to gear up and launch an unprovoked sneak attack -- a Pearl Harbor in reverse -- against Iran, The Washington Post reports. The plan for this "global strike," which includes a very viable "nuclear option," was approved months ago and is now in operation. The planes are already on continuous alert, making "nuclear delivery" practice runs along the Iranian border, The New Yorker reports, and waiting only for the signal from President George W. Bush to drop their payloads of conventional and nuclear weapons on some 400 targets throughout the condemned land.
And when this attack comes -- either as a stand-alone "knock-out blow" or as the precursor to a full-scale, regime-changing invasion, like the earlier aggression in Iraq -- there will be no warning, no declaration of war, no congressional hearings, no public debate. The already-issued orders governing the operation put the decision solely in the hands of the president. He picks up the phone, he says, "Go," and in 12 hours' time, up to 1 million Iranians will be dead.
This potential death toll is not pacifist hyperbole; it comes from a National Academy of Sciences study sponsored by the Pentagon itself, as The Progressive reports. The NAS study calculated the kill rate from "bunker-busting" tactical nukes used to take out underground facilities -- such as those housing much of Iran's nuclear power program.
Another simulation using Pentagon software was even more specific, measuring the aftermath from a "limited" nuclear attack on the main Iranian underground site in Esfahan. The result? Three million people killed by radiation in just two weeks.
Bush now has about 50 nuclear "earth-penetrating weapons" at his disposal.
Nor is the idea of a nuclear strike on Iran mere "liberal paranoia." Bush himself has made the use of nuclear weapons a centerpiece of his "National Security Strategy of the United States," issued last month, The Progressive notes. While reaffirming the criminal principle of "pre-emptive" attacks on perceived enemies who may or may not be threatening America with weapons they may or may not possess, Bush declared that "safe, credible and reliable nuclear forces continue to play a critical role" in the "offensive strike systems" that are now a key part of America's "deterrence."
In the depraved jargon of atomic warmongering, a "credible" nuclear force is one that can and will be used in the course of ordinary military operations. It is no longer to be regarded as a sacred taboo.
This has long been the dream of the Pentagon's nuclear priesthood and its acolytes, going back to the days of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. For decades, a strong faction within the U.S. power structure has been afflicted with a perverted craving to unleash these weapons once more. An almost sexual frustration can be discerned in their laments as time and again, in crisis after crisis, their counsels for "going nuclear" were rejected -- often at the very last moment.
They have relentlessly demonized an ever-changing array of "enemies," painting each one as an imminent, overwhelming threat, led by "madmen" in thrall to pure evil, impervious to reason, fit only for destruction. Evidence for the threat is exaggerated, manipulated, even manufactured; this ritual cycle has been enacted over and over, leading to many wars but never to that ultimate, orgasmic release.
Now this paranoid sect has at last seized the commanding heights of power. Two of its most venerable and faithful adherents are central players in the court of the Crawford Caligula: Vice President Dick Cheney and Pentagon warlord Donald Rumsfeld, and they've found an eager disciple in the peevish dullard strutting in the Oval Office.
Under their tutelage, Bush has eviscerated 40 years' worth of arms control treaties; officially "normalized" the use of nuclear weapons, even against non-nuclear states; and rewarded outlaw proliferators like India, Israel and Pakistan. Now, he is destroying the last, most effective restraint on the spread of nuclear weapons: the Nonproliferation Treaty.
The treaty guarantees its signatories, such as Iran, the right to establish nuclear power programs in exchange for rigorous international inspections. But Bush has arbitrarily decided that Iran -- whose nuclear program has been subjected to perhaps the most extensive inspection process in history -- must end its lawful activities. Why? Because the country is led by "madmen" in thrall to pure evil, impervious to reason, who one day may or may not threaten America with weapons they may or may not have.
So the treaty is dead.
Like the Geneva Conventions and the U.S. Constitution, it now means only what Bush says it means. Force of arms, not rule of law, is the new world order. The attack on Iran is coming. And Bush insists that the nuclear option remain in the war plans, despite resistance from top military officers, The New Yorker reports.
The obvious, murderous insanity of such a move in no way precludes its implementation by this gang -- as their invasion of Iraq clearly shows.The nuclear sectarians have waited decades for this moment. Such a chance may never come again. Will they let it pass, when with just a word, in just 12 hours, they can see their god rising in a pillar of fire over Persia?
Wrap...
1 Million Dead Iranians
By Chris Floyd
04/21/06
"ICH"
Twelve hours. One circuit of the sun from horizon to horizon, one course of the moon from dusk to dawn. What was once a natural measurement for the daily round of human life is now a doom-laden interval between the voicing of an autocrat's brutal whim and the infliction of mass annihilation halfway around the world.
Twelve hours is the maximum time necessary for American bombers to gear up and launch an unprovoked sneak attack -- a Pearl Harbor in reverse -- against Iran, The Washington Post reports. The plan for this "global strike," which includes a very viable "nuclear option," was approved months ago and is now in operation. The planes are already on continuous alert, making "nuclear delivery" practice runs along the Iranian border, The New Yorker reports, and waiting only for the signal from President George W. Bush to drop their payloads of conventional and nuclear weapons on some 400 targets throughout the condemned land.
And when this attack comes -- either as a stand-alone "knock-out blow" or as the precursor to a full-scale, regime-changing invasion, like the earlier aggression in Iraq -- there will be no warning, no declaration of war, no congressional hearings, no public debate. The already-issued orders governing the operation put the decision solely in the hands of the president. He picks up the phone, he says, "Go," and in 12 hours' time, up to 1 million Iranians will be dead.
This potential death toll is not pacifist hyperbole; it comes from a National Academy of Sciences study sponsored by the Pentagon itself, as The Progressive reports. The NAS study calculated the kill rate from "bunker-busting" tactical nukes used to take out underground facilities -- such as those housing much of Iran's nuclear power program.
Another simulation using Pentagon software was even more specific, measuring the aftermath from a "limited" nuclear attack on the main Iranian underground site in Esfahan. The result? Three million people killed by radiation in just two weeks.
Bush now has about 50 nuclear "earth-penetrating weapons" at his disposal.
Nor is the idea of a nuclear strike on Iran mere "liberal paranoia." Bush himself has made the use of nuclear weapons a centerpiece of his "National Security Strategy of the United States," issued last month, The Progressive notes. While reaffirming the criminal principle of "pre-emptive" attacks on perceived enemies who may or may not be threatening America with weapons they may or may not possess, Bush declared that "safe, credible and reliable nuclear forces continue to play a critical role" in the "offensive strike systems" that are now a key part of America's "deterrence."
In the depraved jargon of atomic warmongering, a "credible" nuclear force is one that can and will be used in the course of ordinary military operations. It is no longer to be regarded as a sacred taboo.
This has long been the dream of the Pentagon's nuclear priesthood and its acolytes, going back to the days of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. For decades, a strong faction within the U.S. power structure has been afflicted with a perverted craving to unleash these weapons once more. An almost sexual frustration can be discerned in their laments as time and again, in crisis after crisis, their counsels for "going nuclear" were rejected -- often at the very last moment.
They have relentlessly demonized an ever-changing array of "enemies," painting each one as an imminent, overwhelming threat, led by "madmen" in thrall to pure evil, impervious to reason, fit only for destruction. Evidence for the threat is exaggerated, manipulated, even manufactured; this ritual cycle has been enacted over and over, leading to many wars but never to that ultimate, orgasmic release.
Now this paranoid sect has at last seized the commanding heights of power. Two of its most venerable and faithful adherents are central players in the court of the Crawford Caligula: Vice President Dick Cheney and Pentagon warlord Donald Rumsfeld, and they've found an eager disciple in the peevish dullard strutting in the Oval Office.
Under their tutelage, Bush has eviscerated 40 years' worth of arms control treaties; officially "normalized" the use of nuclear weapons, even against non-nuclear states; and rewarded outlaw proliferators like India, Israel and Pakistan. Now, he is destroying the last, most effective restraint on the spread of nuclear weapons: the Nonproliferation Treaty.
The treaty guarantees its signatories, such as Iran, the right to establish nuclear power programs in exchange for rigorous international inspections. But Bush has arbitrarily decided that Iran -- whose nuclear program has been subjected to perhaps the most extensive inspection process in history -- must end its lawful activities. Why? Because the country is led by "madmen" in thrall to pure evil, impervious to reason, who one day may or may not threaten America with weapons they may or may not have.
So the treaty is dead.
Like the Geneva Conventions and the U.S. Constitution, it now means only what Bush says it means. Force of arms, not rule of law, is the new world order. The attack on Iran is coming. And Bush insists that the nuclear option remain in the war plans, despite resistance from top military officers, The New Yorker reports.
The obvious, murderous insanity of such a move in no way precludes its implementation by this gang -- as their invasion of Iraq clearly shows.The nuclear sectarians have waited decades for this moment. Such a chance may never come again. Will they let it pass, when with just a word, in just 12 hours, they can see their god rising in a pillar of fire over Persia?
Wrap...
Forget Kansas...what the hell is wrong with the Dems in Louisiana?
From truthout.org :
Louisiana Committee OKs Ban on Most Abortions
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/042106T.shtml
Senate Bill 33 by Senator Ben Nevers, D-Bogalusa, cleared the Senate Committee on Health and Welfare after the provision was added. The bill is expected on the Senate floor next week and would allow abortions only to save the life of the mother.
But Senator Diana Bajoie, D-New Orleans, said she wanted to "make it more pro-life" by not allowing any exceptions.
Wrap...
Louisiana Committee OKs Ban on Most Abortions
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/042106T.shtml
Senate Bill 33 by Senator Ben Nevers, D-Bogalusa, cleared the Senate Committee on Health and Welfare after the provision was added. The bill is expected on the Senate floor next week and would allow abortions only to save the life of the mother.
But Senator Diana Bajoie, D-New Orleans, said she wanted to "make it more pro-life" by not allowing any exceptions.
Wrap...
Ex Green Beret: What the hell are they thinking?!!!
Note: I'm thinking that they're thinking that soldiers are dispensible but giving $$$$ to corporate cronies isn't.
From military.com :
Bill Shorts Gear for Troops
Associated Press
April 21, 2006
WASHINGTON - A Senate measure to fund the war in Iraq would chop money for troops' night vision equipment and new battle vehicles but add $230 million for a tilt-rotor aircraft that has already cost $18 billion and is still facing safety questions.
President Bush's request for the emergency appropriations to cover costs of the continuing war and Hurricane Katrina recovery operations included no money for the troubled V-22 Osprey, which takes off and lands like a helicopter but flies like a plane.
The Marine Corps, however, followed up with a letter to lawmakers endorsing additional V-22s, noting that it is the only active production line capable of replacing four Vietnam War-era CH-46 choppers lost since Sept. 11, 2001.
Critics maintain that it's still a curious choice to be funded in a bill whose defining purpose is to replace equipment worn out or destroyed in Iraq.
The Osprey, manufactured by Bell Helicopter, a subsidiary of Textron Inc., has been in development since the 1980s and has cost the government $18 billion so far. It has suffered numerous setbacks over the years, including two crashes in 2000 that killed 23 people.
The Marine Corps says the program has gotten back on track since then despite an incident last month in which a V-22 momentarily took flight on its own.
To pay for the Ospreys, the Senate Appropriations Committee - guided by the Corps - cut into funding for night vision goggles, equipment for destroying mines and explosives, fire suppression systems for light armored vehicles and new vehicles that can be transported into battle inside the V-22.
The panel insists the equipment cuts won't affect readiness. [to which I say BULLSHIT!]
Vice President Cheney, as secretary of defense in the first Bush administration, tried to kill the V-22, to no avail. The aircraft is popular with lawmakers, especially those from Pennsylvania and Texas, which host the manufacturing plants.
"They've hijacked the bill to spend money on their toys," said Steve Ellis of Taxpayers for Common Sense, a budget watchdog group. "You have the V-22, which isn't even ready for fielding and it's getting money in the supplemental."
The V-22 is but one example of the Pentagon and lawmakers using the mammoth bill to skirt limits on the already rapidly growing defense budget.
For example, there's more than $3 billion in funding for an ongoing overhaul of the Army that the Pentagon admits isn't directly related to fighting the war.
Meanwhile, senators have added $228 million to procure seven C-17 Air Force cargo planes that can't be completed until 2008 at the earliest - and would eventually cost a total of almost $2 billion.
The C-17 cargo plane is manufactured in Long Beach, Calif., by Boeing Co. The line there is now slated to close in 2008 with the completion of a 180-plane inventory. Instead, the $228 million would purchase parts as a downpayment for building seven more planes. It would take at least another $1.6 billion to finish the job.
"If it goes through, you basically force the Air Force to buy another seven planes," said a lobbyist for a rival defense contractor.
The Senate will take up the $106.5 billion Iraq funding bill - which includes $27.2 billion for additional hurricane relief along the Gulf Coast - on April 25. The House passed a companion $92 billion measure last month.
Generally speaking, emergency war funding bills get less scrutiny than the Pentagon's regular budget. And since they provide crucial funding for U.S. troops and equipment, most lawmakers are reluctant to criticize the bills.
However, Senate Budget Committee Chairman Judd Gregg, R-N.H., is taking aim at $3.5 billion the Army requested for creating smaller, independent fighting units. Gregg wants to use some of the money to finance border security initiatives and the Coast Guard's ongoing upgrade of ships, planes and helicopters.
"There's a fair amount of money in this supplemental that is not an emergency. It's essentially an attempt to pick up operational and core needs outside the usual budgeting process," Gregg said. "It's certainly in the multiple billions."
The Pentagon says restructuring the Army belongs in the Iraq spending because it would accelerate transforming 5,000-man brigades into independently functioning units and facilitate troop rotations in and out of Iraq.
But Gregg and others say the Army restructuring should be part of the regular budget and the Pentagon tacitly agrees; next year it will be funded that way.
For now, the inclusion of the expensive restructuring project in the war funding bill is a way to avoid cutting other defense programs.
Wrap...
From military.com :
Bill Shorts Gear for Troops
Associated Press
April 21, 2006
WASHINGTON - A Senate measure to fund the war in Iraq would chop money for troops' night vision equipment and new battle vehicles but add $230 million for a tilt-rotor aircraft that has already cost $18 billion and is still facing safety questions.
President Bush's request for the emergency appropriations to cover costs of the continuing war and Hurricane Katrina recovery operations included no money for the troubled V-22 Osprey, which takes off and lands like a helicopter but flies like a plane.
The Marine Corps, however, followed up with a letter to lawmakers endorsing additional V-22s, noting that it is the only active production line capable of replacing four Vietnam War-era CH-46 choppers lost since Sept. 11, 2001.
Critics maintain that it's still a curious choice to be funded in a bill whose defining purpose is to replace equipment worn out or destroyed in Iraq.
The Osprey, manufactured by Bell Helicopter, a subsidiary of Textron Inc., has been in development since the 1980s and has cost the government $18 billion so far. It has suffered numerous setbacks over the years, including two crashes in 2000 that killed 23 people.
The Marine Corps says the program has gotten back on track since then despite an incident last month in which a V-22 momentarily took flight on its own.
To pay for the Ospreys, the Senate Appropriations Committee - guided by the Corps - cut into funding for night vision goggles, equipment for destroying mines and explosives, fire suppression systems for light armored vehicles and new vehicles that can be transported into battle inside the V-22.
The panel insists the equipment cuts won't affect readiness. [to which I say BULLSHIT!]
Vice President Cheney, as secretary of defense in the first Bush administration, tried to kill the V-22, to no avail. The aircraft is popular with lawmakers, especially those from Pennsylvania and Texas, which host the manufacturing plants.
"They've hijacked the bill to spend money on their toys," said Steve Ellis of Taxpayers for Common Sense, a budget watchdog group. "You have the V-22, which isn't even ready for fielding and it's getting money in the supplemental."
The V-22 is but one example of the Pentagon and lawmakers using the mammoth bill to skirt limits on the already rapidly growing defense budget.
For example, there's more than $3 billion in funding for an ongoing overhaul of the Army that the Pentagon admits isn't directly related to fighting the war.
Meanwhile, senators have added $228 million to procure seven C-17 Air Force cargo planes that can't be completed until 2008 at the earliest - and would eventually cost a total of almost $2 billion.
The C-17 cargo plane is manufactured in Long Beach, Calif., by Boeing Co. The line there is now slated to close in 2008 with the completion of a 180-plane inventory. Instead, the $228 million would purchase parts as a downpayment for building seven more planes. It would take at least another $1.6 billion to finish the job.
"If it goes through, you basically force the Air Force to buy another seven planes," said a lobbyist for a rival defense contractor.
The Senate will take up the $106.5 billion Iraq funding bill - which includes $27.2 billion for additional hurricane relief along the Gulf Coast - on April 25. The House passed a companion $92 billion measure last month.
Generally speaking, emergency war funding bills get less scrutiny than the Pentagon's regular budget. And since they provide crucial funding for U.S. troops and equipment, most lawmakers are reluctant to criticize the bills.
However, Senate Budget Committee Chairman Judd Gregg, R-N.H., is taking aim at $3.5 billion the Army requested for creating smaller, independent fighting units. Gregg wants to use some of the money to finance border security initiatives and the Coast Guard's ongoing upgrade of ships, planes and helicopters.
"There's a fair amount of money in this supplemental that is not an emergency. It's essentially an attempt to pick up operational and core needs outside the usual budgeting process," Gregg said. "It's certainly in the multiple billions."
The Pentagon says restructuring the Army belongs in the Iraq spending because it would accelerate transforming 5,000-man brigades into independently functioning units and facilitate troop rotations in and out of Iraq.
But Gregg and others say the Army restructuring should be part of the regular budget and the Pentagon tacitly agrees; next year it will be funded that way.
For now, the inclusion of the expensive restructuring project in the war funding bill is a way to avoid cutting other defense programs.
Wrap...
Thursday, April 20, 2006
S/F Author, David Brin, has plenty to say about the Generals & Rumsfeld...
From www.davidbrin.blogspot.com :
THE HISTORIC IMPORTANCE OF THE U.S. OFFICER CORPS
Few civilians can appreciate how difficult this step has been for military men who spent their professional lives steeped in a tradition of stoical, apolitical silence and submission to civilian authority. Reluctance to interfere in the nation’s political affairs. That tradition, virtually unprecedented in the history of armies and nations, should be revered and respected.
It OUGHT to be hard for officers to do what these generals have done. That alone explains why their agonized decision took so long in coming.It also explains why their focus has been so specific, targeted singly and narrowly at Defense Secretary Rumsfeld. By aiming their bullets only at him, the generals are saying “we choose the monster who is closest to us in the chain of command.”
True, they are perfectly aware that any damage to Rumsfeld will carry through, politically, to Bush and Cheney and the GOP. But this approach maintains, to the maximum degree possible, an appearance of veneration to civilian authority. It also expresses a moderate and restrained will toward using “minimum effective force.”
Again, this should be understood and respected. (Indeed, military men are painfully aware of something never mentioned in the press, that Donald Rumsfeld occupied the exact same office thirty years ago, the LAST time we were humiliated in an ill-conceived ground war-of-attrition in Asia. A startling historical coincidence whose relevance is limited. Yet, it is chilling, just the same.)
If we were to pay attention to these senior military men, we might even learn a thing or two.
For example, would it surprise most liberals to realize that the U.S. Officer Corps is, in fact, the 3rd best-educated clade in America today, just after college professors and medical doctors? These senior leaders know an awful lot about history, about the world and its dangers. Would it hurt to listen?
For example, their complaints don’t ONLY have to do with the tactical conduct of the Iraq War, as blithering and imbecilic as that ill-conceived adventure has been, featuring micromanagement by petty armchair Napoleans that would “make Robert MacNamara look like a hands-off kind of guy.” There are other issues afoot, some that cut even deeper, such as the demolition of America’s alliances, the misuse of our reserves, and an incredible, almost unprecedented decline in our actual readiness to respond to any kind of large scale surprise.
Click the link on top to continue reading Brin's post.
Wrap...
THE HISTORIC IMPORTANCE OF THE U.S. OFFICER CORPS
Few civilians can appreciate how difficult this step has been for military men who spent their professional lives steeped in a tradition of stoical, apolitical silence and submission to civilian authority. Reluctance to interfere in the nation’s political affairs. That tradition, virtually unprecedented in the history of armies and nations, should be revered and respected.
It OUGHT to be hard for officers to do what these generals have done. That alone explains why their agonized decision took so long in coming.It also explains why their focus has been so specific, targeted singly and narrowly at Defense Secretary Rumsfeld. By aiming their bullets only at him, the generals are saying “we choose the monster who is closest to us in the chain of command.”
True, they are perfectly aware that any damage to Rumsfeld will carry through, politically, to Bush and Cheney and the GOP. But this approach maintains, to the maximum degree possible, an appearance of veneration to civilian authority. It also expresses a moderate and restrained will toward using “minimum effective force.”
Again, this should be understood and respected. (Indeed, military men are painfully aware of something never mentioned in the press, that Donald Rumsfeld occupied the exact same office thirty years ago, the LAST time we were humiliated in an ill-conceived ground war-of-attrition in Asia. A startling historical coincidence whose relevance is limited. Yet, it is chilling, just the same.)
If we were to pay attention to these senior military men, we might even learn a thing or two.
For example, would it surprise most liberals to realize that the U.S. Officer Corps is, in fact, the 3rd best-educated clade in America today, just after college professors and medical doctors? These senior leaders know an awful lot about history, about the world and its dangers. Would it hurt to listen?
For example, their complaints don’t ONLY have to do with the tactical conduct of the Iraq War, as blithering and imbecilic as that ill-conceived adventure has been, featuring micromanagement by petty armchair Napoleans that would “make Robert MacNamara look like a hands-off kind of guy.” There are other issues afoot, some that cut even deeper, such as the demolition of America’s alliances, the misuse of our reserves, and an incredible, almost unprecedented decline in our actual readiness to respond to any kind of large scale surprise.
Click the link on top to continue reading Brin's post.
Wrap...
Military's torqued, the CIA's torqued, Nation is too...
From Harper's.org :
The CIA “Wehrmacht”
Posted on Wednesday, April 19, 2006.
By Ken Silverstein.
With the war in Iraq an utter debacle and public opinion turned against the White House, anger within the armed forces towards Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and the Administration is growing, and the Pentagon is fighting back (see “Pentagon Memo Aims to Counter Rumsfeld Critics” in the April 16 New York Times). But what's been little noted thus far is what looks to be a similar revolt brewing at the CIA.
An ex-senior agency officer who keeps in contact with his former peers told me that there is a “a big swing” in anti-Bush sentiment at Langley. “I've been stunned by what I'm hearing,” he said. “There are people who fear that indictments and subpoenas could be coming down, and they don't want to get caught up in it.”
This former senior officer said there “seems to be a quiet conspiracy by rational people” at the agency to avoid involvement in some of the particularly nasty tactics being employed by the administration, especially “renditions”—the practice whereby the CIA sends terrorist suspects abroad to be questioned in Egypt, Syria, Uzbekistan, and other nations where the regimes are not squeamish about torturing detainees.
My source, hardly a softie on the topic of terrorism, said of the split at the CIA: “There's an SS group within the agency that's willing to do anything and there's a Wehrmacht group that is saying, 'I'm not gonna touch this stuff'.”
Scott Horton, a human rights activist who has become a principal spokesman for the New York City Bar Association in evaluating the Bush Administration's tactics, said that he's also hearing stories of growing dissent at the CIA. “When the shit hits the fan,” he explained, “the administration scapegoats lower-level people. It doesn't do a lot in terms of inspiring confidence.”
The expanding revolt against Rumsfeld is nothing new. I received a note way back on June 22, 2004 from a source at the Naval War College that put the situation in sharp perspective:
From my vantage point...cracks definitely have developed in the Administration's relationship with the Armed Forces. Most recently, several active duty senior commanders who spoke on the record at the “Current Strategy Forum” that ended here last week were critical to a point that walked a fine constitutional line of disloyalty to the political leadership. It was clear that many of the officers in the audience agreed with them and admired them for telling it like it is...[W]hat I think is going on here is serious concern among officers to protect the integrity of the institution. After unquestionably following policy, as we would expect, the increasing strains on the military plus the devolution in Iraq seem to have retrieved a collective wisdom from the shadow of Vietnam.
Other signs of serious military anger toward the administration were apparent by the spring of 2004 when a group of very senior officers from the Judge Advocate General's Corps, the legal arm of the U.S. armed forces, were so upset about the administration's loosening of rules against torture that they complained in private to Horton, who was then a committee chair at the New York City Bar Association. Horton and the Bar subsequently prepared a groundbreaking report on U.S. interrogation tactics, “Human Rights Standards Applicable to the United States' Interrogation of Detainees,” which challenged the Pentagon's actions. Horton and the Bar also were involved in publishing the “torture memoranda” and used them to disprove Rumsfeld's claims that the abuses at Abu Ghraib resulted from a few low-ranking “bad apples” (to use the administration's phrase).
Today's “Wehrmacht” officers at the CIA are right to be worried about subpoenas: a legal analysis prepared by a senior FBI attorney in 2002 deemed that renditions to countries that torture detainees were illegal. The attorney concluded that such actions were designed to circumvent American laws against torture and that anyone even discussing such a plan could be found criminally liable. If the political winds shift, some “bad apples” in the CIA could find themselves indicted for torture.
Wrap...
The CIA “Wehrmacht”
Posted on Wednesday, April 19, 2006.
By Ken Silverstein.
With the war in Iraq an utter debacle and public opinion turned against the White House, anger within the armed forces towards Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and the Administration is growing, and the Pentagon is fighting back (see “Pentagon Memo Aims to Counter Rumsfeld Critics” in the April 16 New York Times). But what's been little noted thus far is what looks to be a similar revolt brewing at the CIA.
An ex-senior agency officer who keeps in contact with his former peers told me that there is a “a big swing” in anti-Bush sentiment at Langley. “I've been stunned by what I'm hearing,” he said. “There are people who fear that indictments and subpoenas could be coming down, and they don't want to get caught up in it.”
This former senior officer said there “seems to be a quiet conspiracy by rational people” at the agency to avoid involvement in some of the particularly nasty tactics being employed by the administration, especially “renditions”—the practice whereby the CIA sends terrorist suspects abroad to be questioned in Egypt, Syria, Uzbekistan, and other nations where the regimes are not squeamish about torturing detainees.
My source, hardly a softie on the topic of terrorism, said of the split at the CIA: “There's an SS group within the agency that's willing to do anything and there's a Wehrmacht group that is saying, 'I'm not gonna touch this stuff'.”
Scott Horton, a human rights activist who has become a principal spokesman for the New York City Bar Association in evaluating the Bush Administration's tactics, said that he's also hearing stories of growing dissent at the CIA. “When the shit hits the fan,” he explained, “the administration scapegoats lower-level people. It doesn't do a lot in terms of inspiring confidence.”
The expanding revolt against Rumsfeld is nothing new. I received a note way back on June 22, 2004 from a source at the Naval War College that put the situation in sharp perspective:
From my vantage point...cracks definitely have developed in the Administration's relationship with the Armed Forces. Most recently, several active duty senior commanders who spoke on the record at the “Current Strategy Forum” that ended here last week were critical to a point that walked a fine constitutional line of disloyalty to the political leadership. It was clear that many of the officers in the audience agreed with them and admired them for telling it like it is...[W]hat I think is going on here is serious concern among officers to protect the integrity of the institution. After unquestionably following policy, as we would expect, the increasing strains on the military plus the devolution in Iraq seem to have retrieved a collective wisdom from the shadow of Vietnam.
Other signs of serious military anger toward the administration were apparent by the spring of 2004 when a group of very senior officers from the Judge Advocate General's Corps, the legal arm of the U.S. armed forces, were so upset about the administration's loosening of rules against torture that they complained in private to Horton, who was then a committee chair at the New York City Bar Association. Horton and the Bar subsequently prepared a groundbreaking report on U.S. interrogation tactics, “Human Rights Standards Applicable to the United States' Interrogation of Detainees,” which challenged the Pentagon's actions. Horton and the Bar also were involved in publishing the “torture memoranda” and used them to disprove Rumsfeld's claims that the abuses at Abu Ghraib resulted from a few low-ranking “bad apples” (to use the administration's phrase).
Today's “Wehrmacht” officers at the CIA are right to be worried about subpoenas: a legal analysis prepared by a senior FBI attorney in 2002 deemed that renditions to countries that torture detainees were illegal. The attorney concluded that such actions were designed to circumvent American laws against torture and that anyone even discussing such a plan could be found criminally liable. If the political winds shift, some “bad apples” in the CIA could find themselves indicted for torture.
Wrap...
"Faith-based funding"....BushCo suckers....
From American Progress:
RELIGION -- FAITH-BASED DIRECTOR LEAVES AN OFFICE THAT SERVED POLITICS OVER POLICY:
While the White House shake-up stories in the press this week have focused largely on Karl Rove, Scott McClellan, and new chief of staff Josh Bolten, a less-noticed departure was that of Jim Towey, the outgoing White House director of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.
Kevin Drum at the Washington Monthly writes, "Towey was a good man...[but] he always chose to mouth the Bush administration's fiction that government discriminated against faith-based groups until George W. Bush came to save them."
John DiIulio, the director of the faith-based office who preceded Towey, proclaimed that the White House focus on faith-based issues was more driven by a concern for politics. "It's the reign of the Mayberry Machiavellis," declared DiIulio of the White House political operation.
Towey's former deputy at the White House, David Kuo, similarly said there was "minimal commitment" from the White House on the faith-based agenda. Kuo argued the White House never really wanted the "poor people stuff."
Loyal conservative allies of the administration have declared the faith-based agenda little more than a political showpiece. Towey's departure shifts the focus from him, who was personally well-liked by the religious community, to "the White House's actual faith-based accomplishments, which are few and far between."
Wrap...
RELIGION -- FAITH-BASED DIRECTOR LEAVES AN OFFICE THAT SERVED POLITICS OVER POLICY:
While the White House shake-up stories in the press this week have focused largely on Karl Rove, Scott McClellan, and new chief of staff Josh Bolten, a less-noticed departure was that of Jim Towey, the outgoing White House director of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.
Kevin Drum at the Washington Monthly writes, "Towey was a good man...[but] he always chose to mouth the Bush administration's fiction that government discriminated against faith-based groups until George W. Bush came to save them."
John DiIulio, the director of the faith-based office who preceded Towey, proclaimed that the White House focus on faith-based issues was more driven by a concern for politics. "It's the reign of the Mayberry Machiavellis," declared DiIulio of the White House political operation.
Towey's former deputy at the White House, David Kuo, similarly said there was "minimal commitment" from the White House on the faith-based agenda. Kuo argued the White House never really wanted the "poor people stuff."
Loyal conservative allies of the administration have declared the faith-based agenda little more than a political showpiece. Towey's departure shifts the focus from him, who was personally well-liked by the religious community, to "the White House's actual faith-based accomplishments, which are few and far between."
Wrap...
2nd Novel: Thirteen Moons, coming in October!
From the NY Times via Publishers Lunch...
Charles Frazier, Still Writing
The Cold Mountain author is close to finishing revisions for his second novel THIRTEEN MOONS, which Random House has announced for an October 3 pub date. The house is announcing a planned first printing of 750,000 copies. As today's NYT piece notes, though Grove/Atlantic was a couple of million dollars short in the bidding for the book in 2002, their paperback license with Vintage for Cold Mountain has expired, and they will issue a new paperback edition in September.NYT
Wrap...
Charles Frazier, Still Writing
The Cold Mountain author is close to finishing revisions for his second novel THIRTEEN MOONS, which Random House has announced for an October 3 pub date. The house is announcing a planned first printing of 750,000 copies. As today's NYT piece notes, though Grove/Atlantic was a couple of million dollars short in the bidding for the book in 2002, their paperback license with Vintage for Cold Mountain has expired, and they will issue a new paperback edition in September.NYT
Wrap...
Navy SEALs' Riverine Force/The Navy today...
From: Dept of Defense :
TRANSCRIPT from the United States Department of Defense DoD News Briefing
Radio Interview with Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Mullen on the G. Gordon Liddy Show
Wednesday, April, 19, 2006 - 00:00 AM EDT
LIDDY: Admiral Mike Mullen, he is the Chief of Naval Operations, and as you might imagine he is a Naval Academy Graduate -- of the music -- and admiral, thanks so much for joining us.
ADM. MULLEN: How are you?
LIDDY: Well, thank you, and I've got a question for you.
ADM. MULLEN: Sure.
LIDDY: Last year in the Pentagon, my son, Commander Jim Liddy retired. He was at the time assigned working with the Assistant SECDEF for counter terrorism and low intensity warfare. So I knew he was doing that, but for the 20 years prior to that as a SEAL he was in 37 different countries, and all he will tell me is that he was working in the war on terror. Will you please tell me what you were doing with my son for 15 years?
ADM. MULLEN: Well, I can say that your son served exceptionally well and he served in a wonderful part of our Navy with our Navy SEALs who are heavily involved -- one of the parts of the Navy they're heavily involved in, the current effort of what we call the long war, this global war on terror, and they're having a great impact. So I'm proud to say that I am able to associate myself with young men and women like your son.
LIDDY: Well, thank you, sir. Now I was last on extended active duty in the army, sorry about that, but 53 years ago, so I'm not really up to speed on what you all are doing these days, especially in the Navy, but I understand that you have ordered the establishment of a new Riverine Force for the Navy, and I know that in Vietnam those people played a very vital role.Can you tell us what these days you can use that force for?
ADM. MULLEN: Yes, sir, I can. Actually, we have put in place a newRiverine Force to initially, to actually create a squadron that will go to Iraq and relieve the Marines in a critical dam there called Haditha Dam, but that'll be the initial squadron that will go out in about a year. They will be part of what is today, almost 4,000 Sailors that we have on the ground in Iraq and in that theater what we call the CENTCOM theater that we've got almost 10,000 Sailors on the ground throughout the theater, including the 4,000 that I mentioned in Iraq. So in the Riverine Force that will be an initial place that we'll go, but down the road it will not be unlike the force that we had in Vietnam. It's to provide the kind of security and capability in the rivers and in the waters close to shore, in ports and harbors and countries all over the world with whom we think we need to engage both, in particular, in a friendly way.
LIDDY: Well, Admiral Mullen, I remember the Second World War very, very well because I was 15 when it ended, and I know what a huge Navy we had at that time. The Navy's down to 281 ships right now, which I think is far too few, although nobody has actually said in the White House. I thought that Reagan's idea of a 600 ship Navy was about right these days. Are there plans or do you have plans to seek more ships for the Navy, which I think you really need?
ADM. MULLEN: Well, actually I do have plans to do that. I've been in this job since last July, and as I returned I went on a tour over in Europe for only about 7 months, but as I returned to Washington our Navy was down, as you said to 281 ships, and I think that is too small. I've actually submitted a plan to Congress to bring that number up to 313 and we're headed in that direction. My goal is to create some stability in how we build ships and really how we build fleets. I also remember the goal of a 600-ship Navy. We don't need that many ships right now. In fact, the ships that we're building and the airplanes that we're building are much more capable than the ships that we had back in the 1980s or were thinking about in the 1980s. That said, we do have to have enough and we have a global responsibility, and we have relationships all over the world that we have to sustain. And it takes a certain number of ships to do that. So we need to get the number back up above 300 and we need support from Congress, we need support from our industry, but most of all this is the American people's Navy, and we need support out there for this approach.
LIDDY: But Admiral, speaking of this being the American people's Navy, it is now, as are all our military forces, a very highly selective all volunteer force. How is the Navy doing on recruiting? Are you meeting your goals? Are you getting the quality of people that is necessary to operate all this gee-whiz high tech stuff that you've got?
ADM. MULLEN: Well, I know you said it's been a long time since you've been in. I've actually been in myself since the late sixties, so I came up through Vietnam and then through the establishment of the all-volunteer force. I think that was an incredibly important decision that this country made, and I support it fully. The quality of the young men and women that are in the United States Navy today are the best I've ever seen. They are, and our recruiting numbers right now, are very, very good. They've stayed good. Our retention numbers well over half of those who come in decide to make to basically reenlist or stay in after their first hitch, which is a significant achievement, and those numbers are staying up. I was aboard one of our aircraft carriers about a month ago, and in walking around the carrier talking to young Sailors, the number of young Sailors that ask me how they could -- cause they know we're sending Sailors to Iraq and Afghanistan -- how could they volunteer and get in the queue to go do that, because that's where they know the need is, that really buoyed my spirits in terms of the kind of young people that we have and the recognition of what they have to do and where the fight is and their eagerness to contribute to it. So right now we're in great shape and these things change over time, but it's a very positive environment in the Navy right now.
LIDDY: Okay, thank you. I was just recently over in Iraq and I was discussing the standing up of the Iraqi army, and one of the problems that we have with the Iraqis there is they have really no concept of a non-commissioned officer corps. I think you'll agree with me and everyone who's ever been an officer will agree that it's the non-coms that really run the services and they just let the officers think that they do. How has the Navy's non-commissioned officer corps, the chiefs and what have you?
ADM. MULLEN: Well, I grew up -- as you certainly stated -- I grew up and I was trained by the chiefs that I was working with, and while theoretically they were working for me, in the end I was really working for them. I'm very fond of saying that in the Navy the chiefs run the Navy and they do. They are not in charge of it, but they make it run. That has been true for almost four decades that I've been in the Navy, and it continues to be true today. I'm heartened by what I see. They are dedicated, outstanding professionals, and they are incredibly well supported by their families, not just the chiefs -- but all our families support our Sailors which is really critical in these times. I'm fond of saying that overall readiness is tied directly to our family readiness and I've put a lot of emphasis on making sure our families are in good shape. But the chiefs, our non-coms, are in great shape, and they're running it.
LIDDY: But Admiral, all on the Quadrennial Defense Review, which is called for by Congress, calls for the Navy to shift some of your submarine force and other forces to the Pacific, and I wonder if you care to comment if that has anything to do with the perceived threat proposed by the big military buildup of China? Are they thinking long term?
ADM. MULLEN: I think that's a fair question, and it's a concern that we all have. Clearly, the Pacific is a vital part of our future, an awful lot of trade. Over 90 percent of our trade comes in and out of this country by the sea. So having a secure environment at sea is really critical and the stability in that part of the world, the Western Pacific, is also critical. And China has clearly invested heavily. They've got an economy, which is booming. They've also invested heavily on the military side, so we're watching both. We would certainly welcome a China that is economically sound would be a very positive addition to the world economy and peace and stability. On the other hand, if there are other motivations there, that certainly would be a concern, and it's those motivations that I think we need to understand for the Navy because it's such a heavily maritime area. There's so much water out there. That theater is a big theater for the Navy. ThePacific Ocean is big, as I'm sure you know, and getting from point A to point B takes time, and you have to have the assets, the ships and airplanes out there to be able to do that. So that's the reason for the shift.
LIDDY: Admiral, one last question. It's a technical one, like one reads about a number of different navies fielding, these are electric submarines these days.
ADM. MULLEN: Right.
LIDDY: Are there advantages to those or are they just cheaper?
ADM. MULLEN: Well, they are clearly less expensive. My position with our own Navy is that we stay in nuclear powered submarines and it's tied to sustaining it. It's tied to you know we are a maritime nation and we are around the world, and having the kind of sustained capability that nuclear power gives you in a submarine is a great advantage to us. That said, other nations who develop diesel submarines develop them for their own reasons and they're very good submarines. They just don't have some of the assets that our submarines have, so that, as far as our future is concerned, I would continue to expect us to stay in the nuclear world.
LIDDY: Admiral, well, thank you so much for joining me. I know you're an extremely busy man. We are really grateful that you chose to give us some of your (inaudible).
ADM. MULLEN: Thank you, Mr. Liddy. I appreciate the time.
LIDDY: Thank you, sir.
Wrap....
TRANSCRIPT from the United States Department of Defense DoD News Briefing
Radio Interview with Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Mullen on the G. Gordon Liddy Show
Wednesday, April, 19, 2006 - 00:00 AM EDT
LIDDY: Admiral Mike Mullen, he is the Chief of Naval Operations, and as you might imagine he is a Naval Academy Graduate -- of the music -- and admiral, thanks so much for joining us.
ADM. MULLEN: How are you?
LIDDY: Well, thank you, and I've got a question for you.
ADM. MULLEN: Sure.
LIDDY: Last year in the Pentagon, my son, Commander Jim Liddy retired. He was at the time assigned working with the Assistant SECDEF for counter terrorism and low intensity warfare. So I knew he was doing that, but for the 20 years prior to that as a SEAL he was in 37 different countries, and all he will tell me is that he was working in the war on terror. Will you please tell me what you were doing with my son for 15 years?
ADM. MULLEN: Well, I can say that your son served exceptionally well and he served in a wonderful part of our Navy with our Navy SEALs who are heavily involved -- one of the parts of the Navy they're heavily involved in, the current effort of what we call the long war, this global war on terror, and they're having a great impact. So I'm proud to say that I am able to associate myself with young men and women like your son.
LIDDY: Well, thank you, sir. Now I was last on extended active duty in the army, sorry about that, but 53 years ago, so I'm not really up to speed on what you all are doing these days, especially in the Navy, but I understand that you have ordered the establishment of a new Riverine Force for the Navy, and I know that in Vietnam those people played a very vital role.Can you tell us what these days you can use that force for?
ADM. MULLEN: Yes, sir, I can. Actually, we have put in place a newRiverine Force to initially, to actually create a squadron that will go to Iraq and relieve the Marines in a critical dam there called Haditha Dam, but that'll be the initial squadron that will go out in about a year. They will be part of what is today, almost 4,000 Sailors that we have on the ground in Iraq and in that theater what we call the CENTCOM theater that we've got almost 10,000 Sailors on the ground throughout the theater, including the 4,000 that I mentioned in Iraq. So in the Riverine Force that will be an initial place that we'll go, but down the road it will not be unlike the force that we had in Vietnam. It's to provide the kind of security and capability in the rivers and in the waters close to shore, in ports and harbors and countries all over the world with whom we think we need to engage both, in particular, in a friendly way.
LIDDY: Well, Admiral Mullen, I remember the Second World War very, very well because I was 15 when it ended, and I know what a huge Navy we had at that time. The Navy's down to 281 ships right now, which I think is far too few, although nobody has actually said in the White House. I thought that Reagan's idea of a 600 ship Navy was about right these days. Are there plans or do you have plans to seek more ships for the Navy, which I think you really need?
ADM. MULLEN: Well, actually I do have plans to do that. I've been in this job since last July, and as I returned I went on a tour over in Europe for only about 7 months, but as I returned to Washington our Navy was down, as you said to 281 ships, and I think that is too small. I've actually submitted a plan to Congress to bring that number up to 313 and we're headed in that direction. My goal is to create some stability in how we build ships and really how we build fleets. I also remember the goal of a 600-ship Navy. We don't need that many ships right now. In fact, the ships that we're building and the airplanes that we're building are much more capable than the ships that we had back in the 1980s or were thinking about in the 1980s. That said, we do have to have enough and we have a global responsibility, and we have relationships all over the world that we have to sustain. And it takes a certain number of ships to do that. So we need to get the number back up above 300 and we need support from Congress, we need support from our industry, but most of all this is the American people's Navy, and we need support out there for this approach.
LIDDY: But Admiral, speaking of this being the American people's Navy, it is now, as are all our military forces, a very highly selective all volunteer force. How is the Navy doing on recruiting? Are you meeting your goals? Are you getting the quality of people that is necessary to operate all this gee-whiz high tech stuff that you've got?
ADM. MULLEN: Well, I know you said it's been a long time since you've been in. I've actually been in myself since the late sixties, so I came up through Vietnam and then through the establishment of the all-volunteer force. I think that was an incredibly important decision that this country made, and I support it fully. The quality of the young men and women that are in the United States Navy today are the best I've ever seen. They are, and our recruiting numbers right now, are very, very good. They've stayed good. Our retention numbers well over half of those who come in decide to make to basically reenlist or stay in after their first hitch, which is a significant achievement, and those numbers are staying up. I was aboard one of our aircraft carriers about a month ago, and in walking around the carrier talking to young Sailors, the number of young Sailors that ask me how they could -- cause they know we're sending Sailors to Iraq and Afghanistan -- how could they volunteer and get in the queue to go do that, because that's where they know the need is, that really buoyed my spirits in terms of the kind of young people that we have and the recognition of what they have to do and where the fight is and their eagerness to contribute to it. So right now we're in great shape and these things change over time, but it's a very positive environment in the Navy right now.
LIDDY: Okay, thank you. I was just recently over in Iraq and I was discussing the standing up of the Iraqi army, and one of the problems that we have with the Iraqis there is they have really no concept of a non-commissioned officer corps. I think you'll agree with me and everyone who's ever been an officer will agree that it's the non-coms that really run the services and they just let the officers think that they do. How has the Navy's non-commissioned officer corps, the chiefs and what have you?
ADM. MULLEN: Well, I grew up -- as you certainly stated -- I grew up and I was trained by the chiefs that I was working with, and while theoretically they were working for me, in the end I was really working for them. I'm very fond of saying that in the Navy the chiefs run the Navy and they do. They are not in charge of it, but they make it run. That has been true for almost four decades that I've been in the Navy, and it continues to be true today. I'm heartened by what I see. They are dedicated, outstanding professionals, and they are incredibly well supported by their families, not just the chiefs -- but all our families support our Sailors which is really critical in these times. I'm fond of saying that overall readiness is tied directly to our family readiness and I've put a lot of emphasis on making sure our families are in good shape. But the chiefs, our non-coms, are in great shape, and they're running it.
LIDDY: But Admiral, all on the Quadrennial Defense Review, which is called for by Congress, calls for the Navy to shift some of your submarine force and other forces to the Pacific, and I wonder if you care to comment if that has anything to do with the perceived threat proposed by the big military buildup of China? Are they thinking long term?
ADM. MULLEN: I think that's a fair question, and it's a concern that we all have. Clearly, the Pacific is a vital part of our future, an awful lot of trade. Over 90 percent of our trade comes in and out of this country by the sea. So having a secure environment at sea is really critical and the stability in that part of the world, the Western Pacific, is also critical. And China has clearly invested heavily. They've got an economy, which is booming. They've also invested heavily on the military side, so we're watching both. We would certainly welcome a China that is economically sound would be a very positive addition to the world economy and peace and stability. On the other hand, if there are other motivations there, that certainly would be a concern, and it's those motivations that I think we need to understand for the Navy because it's such a heavily maritime area. There's so much water out there. That theater is a big theater for the Navy. ThePacific Ocean is big, as I'm sure you know, and getting from point A to point B takes time, and you have to have the assets, the ships and airplanes out there to be able to do that. So that's the reason for the shift.
LIDDY: Admiral, one last question. It's a technical one, like one reads about a number of different navies fielding, these are electric submarines these days.
ADM. MULLEN: Right.
LIDDY: Are there advantages to those or are they just cheaper?
ADM. MULLEN: Well, they are clearly less expensive. My position with our own Navy is that we stay in nuclear powered submarines and it's tied to sustaining it. It's tied to you know we are a maritime nation and we are around the world, and having the kind of sustained capability that nuclear power gives you in a submarine is a great advantage to us. That said, other nations who develop diesel submarines develop them for their own reasons and they're very good submarines. They just don't have some of the assets that our submarines have, so that, as far as our future is concerned, I would continue to expect us to stay in the nuclear world.
LIDDY: Admiral, well, thank you so much for joining me. I know you're an extremely busy man. We are really grateful that you chose to give us some of your (inaudible).
ADM. MULLEN: Thank you, Mr. Liddy. I appreciate the time.
LIDDY: Thank you, sir.
Wrap....
Gen Janis Karpinski, Abu Ghraib fall guy....talks...
From The Village Voice:
The Interview
There Had to Be a Fall GuyBut it was a woman: An interview with the only senior officer blamed for Abu Ghraib
by Michael Roston
April 13th, 2006 3:33 PM
Janis Karpinski was the senior most female officer in the Iraq war, commanding the 800th Military Police brigade and 17 prisons, including Abu Ghraib. After those infamous photos were released, President Bush ordered Karpinski's demotion, and she later retired from service. She is still the only senior officer held to account for what happened at Abu Ghraib, a fact she will likely discuss on Friday when she addresses "Torture on Trial," a symposium organized by students of Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs and Law School.
The Interview:
Do you think the military is over the hump with its detainees problems in Iraq?
I don't think we're any closer today to resolving it. The people at the highest levels still have taken no responsibility but they're certainly putting the policies in place to allow it to happen.
Senator McCain thinks he can improve the military's treatment of detainees with clearer instructions and a new Field Manual.
No, no. Military Police personnel, in the Reserves and the National Guard, understand the Geneva Conventions, and they understand the appropriate treatment of prisoners. McCain can be anybody's hero because he was a prisoner of war himself but nothing's changed. What I'm trying to say is that the rules were always in place.
Were any lives saved because of interrogations at Abu Ghraib?
It was not unusual at Abu Ghraib, I'd have people speaking perfectly good English to me, they were doctors trained in the United States or Germany or England, lawyers, teachers, students, and pleading, holding onto this concertina wire, saying please general, please we're not guilty of anything. [Major General Barbara Fast, senior military intelligence officer's] real fear was she did not want to release the next Osama Bin Laden.
Was there any change in your relationship with the soldiers under your command after the Abu Ghraib investigation began?
They knew the truth and I knew the truth and because we haven't gotten to the point of having this resolved yet, I think some of it was their fear that they would have to go back again and have to be placed in a similar situation.
Did you have people [worrying] that they were going to get in trouble soon?
Soldiers asked, do you think we're being set up? Then the word came that they were going to be extended, and in the process, they sat together and if they were going to be sent back up to Abu Ghraib for four months, what they believed, whether it was based on logic or anything else, [is] they were going to be housed in one building, and somehow it would be blown up, and that's how they would be silenced. In the course of the investigation, from the first time I saw the photographs, General Sanchez ordered me—ordered me—not to discuss it with anyone.
How did you come to the decision to leave the military?
It was very clear to me when I got out of Iraq, there was no plan for nation-building, no plan for sustainment operations, no plan for securing peace so Iraqis could get back to building the country the way they felt was appropriate. There was absolutely no support for me or my soldiers. And it starts with the chief of the army reserve, a three star, he never spoke to me, not one minute of conversation, not once, no one in the chain of command above me so much as called me, notified me, or had a discussion with me. It was an absolute abandonment by my so-called leaders. I said I cannot serve in a military like this anymore. I can do a better job on the outside.
What do you think of all the Iraq war veterans who are now running for office?
I say it's about time, we need to have more people who are coming back from this, if we hope to get to the truth, or if we hope to prevent it from happening like this ever again, we need people who were on the ground, who learned lessons the hard way.
Wrap...
The Interview
There Had to Be a Fall GuyBut it was a woman: An interview with the only senior officer blamed for Abu Ghraib
by Michael Roston
April 13th, 2006 3:33 PM
Janis Karpinski was the senior most female officer in the Iraq war, commanding the 800th Military Police brigade and 17 prisons, including Abu Ghraib. After those infamous photos were released, President Bush ordered Karpinski's demotion, and she later retired from service. She is still the only senior officer held to account for what happened at Abu Ghraib, a fact she will likely discuss on Friday when she addresses "Torture on Trial," a symposium organized by students of Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs and Law School.
The Interview:
Do you think the military is over the hump with its detainees problems in Iraq?
I don't think we're any closer today to resolving it. The people at the highest levels still have taken no responsibility but they're certainly putting the policies in place to allow it to happen.
Senator McCain thinks he can improve the military's treatment of detainees with clearer instructions and a new Field Manual.
No, no. Military Police personnel, in the Reserves and the National Guard, understand the Geneva Conventions, and they understand the appropriate treatment of prisoners. McCain can be anybody's hero because he was a prisoner of war himself but nothing's changed. What I'm trying to say is that the rules were always in place.
Were any lives saved because of interrogations at Abu Ghraib?
It was not unusual at Abu Ghraib, I'd have people speaking perfectly good English to me, they were doctors trained in the United States or Germany or England, lawyers, teachers, students, and pleading, holding onto this concertina wire, saying please general, please we're not guilty of anything. [Major General Barbara Fast, senior military intelligence officer's] real fear was she did not want to release the next Osama Bin Laden.
Was there any change in your relationship with the soldiers under your command after the Abu Ghraib investigation began?
They knew the truth and I knew the truth and because we haven't gotten to the point of having this resolved yet, I think some of it was their fear that they would have to go back again and have to be placed in a similar situation.
Did you have people [worrying] that they were going to get in trouble soon?
Soldiers asked, do you think we're being set up? Then the word came that they were going to be extended, and in the process, they sat together and if they were going to be sent back up to Abu Ghraib for four months, what they believed, whether it was based on logic or anything else, [is] they were going to be housed in one building, and somehow it would be blown up, and that's how they would be silenced. In the course of the investigation, from the first time I saw the photographs, General Sanchez ordered me—ordered me—not to discuss it with anyone.
How did you come to the decision to leave the military?
It was very clear to me when I got out of Iraq, there was no plan for nation-building, no plan for sustainment operations, no plan for securing peace so Iraqis could get back to building the country the way they felt was appropriate. There was absolutely no support for me or my soldiers. And it starts with the chief of the army reserve, a three star, he never spoke to me, not one minute of conversation, not once, no one in the chain of command above me so much as called me, notified me, or had a discussion with me. It was an absolute abandonment by my so-called leaders. I said I cannot serve in a military like this anymore. I can do a better job on the outside.
What do you think of all the Iraq war veterans who are now running for office?
I say it's about time, we need to have more people who are coming back from this, if we hope to get to the truth, or if we hope to prevent it from happening like this ever again, we need people who were on the ground, who learned lessons the hard way.
Wrap...
Wednesday, April 19, 2006
Privatizing Los Alamos...
From ABQJournal via Lanl-the-real-story blog:
LANL Changes Lead to Lawsuit
By John Arnold
Journal Staff Writer
LOS ALAMOS— The current and incoming Los Alamos National Laboratory managers are forcing lab workers "to make truly impossible and coerced" decisions about their future at the lab, a LANL labor union is alleging.
The University Professional and Technical Employees union, along with four individual lab employees, filed a class-action lawsuit in California Superior Court Tuesday challenging the legality of the ongoing management transition at the lab.
The lab's current contractor, the University of California, is scheduled to hand over management duties June 1 to Los Alamos National Security— a private company whose partners include engineering giant Bechtel National, UC, Washington Group International and BWX Technologies.
Wrap...
LANL Changes Lead to Lawsuit
By John Arnold
Journal Staff Writer
LOS ALAMOS— The current and incoming Los Alamos National Laboratory managers are forcing lab workers "to make truly impossible and coerced" decisions about their future at the lab, a LANL labor union is alleging.
The University Professional and Technical Employees union, along with four individual lab employees, filed a class-action lawsuit in California Superior Court Tuesday challenging the legality of the ongoing management transition at the lab.
The lab's current contractor, the University of California, is scheduled to hand over management duties June 1 to Los Alamos National Security— a private company whose partners include engineering giant Bechtel National, UC, Washington Group International and BWX Technologies.
Wrap...
Australian: Lock up BushCo...
From The Australian:
Lock him away to stop the next war
With his presidency reduced to a mess, George W. Bush may just decide to lash out wildly at Iran
By Phillip Adams
04/18/06
"The Australian "
WE cannot wait any longer for the impeachment of George W. Bush. Far more efficient to have Bush certified. There is no need for further debate on his mental state. The US President is bonkers.
Having turned the White House into a madhouse, having taken more lunatic positions on more issues than any head of state since GeorgeIII (are they, perchance, related?). GWB needs a long rest and a change of medication. And it shouldn't be too hard to guide him into a padded cell. Just tell him it's the presidential bomb shelter. Let's examine the symptoms of his mental decline.
First, Bush convinced Americans that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11. This is something the poor fool might have believed, given a tenuous grasp of geography, history and political reality. He then began to hallucinate about weapons of mass destruction, despite the evidence of Hans Blix and a multitude of others that there weren't any. And he finally organised a tatty little alliance to join him in the silliest war since Vietnam, one guaranteed to recruit terrorists in unprecedented numbers.
Like Vietnam, the Iraq war was launched with presidential lies. Like Vietnam, the Iraq war descended into a moral and military quagmire. And if Iraq seems to be less of a stuff-up, consider this fact: it's taken just three years in Iraq for US deaths to equal the body count after six years in Vietnam.
Little wonder six retired senior generals have joined ranks with the American public in condemning the war, or that the guru of neo-conservatism, Francis Fukuyama, has broken ranks with the likes of Charles Krauthammer and William Kristol in denouncing it. Or that many in the Republican hierarchy have joined left-wing critics denouncing the invasion as a mistake and a failure, calling for immediate withdrawal.
When Bush was re-elected in 2004, this column suggested the President would go on to blast Iran or have the job done by Israeli surrogates. Both scenarios were dismissed as absurd and alarmist. Now journalist Seymour Hersh's revelations of a US plan to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities, perhaps with nuclear bunker-blasters, are causing national and international dismay.
They've also provoked anger among the Pentagon's highest-ranking officers already enraged by Donald Rumsfeld's stewardship of the Iraq invasion and occupation. Given Rumsfeld's clear contempt for their opinions, they might well feel mutinous should he and the Commander-in-Chief show further signs of strategic insanity.
But would that prevent air strikes by the Israelis? Given the sabre-rattling by that ratbag in Tehran, what could hold Israel back?
Bush is attempting to hose things down, but the world recalls his endlessly repeated mantra before the invasion of Iraq. Military intervention wasn't inevitable, just an option. Now bleeding in the polls with mid-term elections looming, isn't it possible that Bush might go for broke? Double or nothing? A final, desperate throw of the dice?
Condoleezza Rice might join the Pentagon in trying to talk him down. So, one hopes, would Tony Blair and John Howard. But did Bush listen to reasoned argument last time? With a reckless, irrational President, you've the perfect set-up for the tail to wag the dog. As with 9/11, here's an opportunity for reality to follow a Hollywood script.
Last week I discussed this scenario with Fukuyama. His initial response was that Bush's political situation is too perilous for such a tactic, that the US public and its media wouldn't tolerate another Iraq. But bombing Iran's nuclear facilities could be characterised as surgical. It might not need troops on the ground and would certainly seem more relevant to the war on terror than the neo-con adventure in Iraq. Fukuyama conceded that such a strategy was possible.
And that possibility is more than enough. A lame-duck President with the eagle as his symbol once again takes the role of hawk. With his presidency a total mess, what's there to lose? So it's time to certify the President. Yes, you'd have to certify his equally deranged Vice-President as well. And toss in Rumsfeld to keep them company. Along with anyone else in the administration, the Congress, the Senate or the Australian parliament mad enough to think Iraq a sane decision.
© The Australian
Wrap...
Lock him away to stop the next war
With his presidency reduced to a mess, George W. Bush may just decide to lash out wildly at Iran
By Phillip Adams
04/18/06
"The Australian "
WE cannot wait any longer for the impeachment of George W. Bush. Far more efficient to have Bush certified. There is no need for further debate on his mental state. The US President is bonkers.
Having turned the White House into a madhouse, having taken more lunatic positions on more issues than any head of state since GeorgeIII (are they, perchance, related?). GWB needs a long rest and a change of medication. And it shouldn't be too hard to guide him into a padded cell. Just tell him it's the presidential bomb shelter. Let's examine the symptoms of his mental decline.
First, Bush convinced Americans that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11. This is something the poor fool might have believed, given a tenuous grasp of geography, history and political reality. He then began to hallucinate about weapons of mass destruction, despite the evidence of Hans Blix and a multitude of others that there weren't any. And he finally organised a tatty little alliance to join him in the silliest war since Vietnam, one guaranteed to recruit terrorists in unprecedented numbers.
Like Vietnam, the Iraq war was launched with presidential lies. Like Vietnam, the Iraq war descended into a moral and military quagmire. And if Iraq seems to be less of a stuff-up, consider this fact: it's taken just three years in Iraq for US deaths to equal the body count after six years in Vietnam.
Little wonder six retired senior generals have joined ranks with the American public in condemning the war, or that the guru of neo-conservatism, Francis Fukuyama, has broken ranks with the likes of Charles Krauthammer and William Kristol in denouncing it. Or that many in the Republican hierarchy have joined left-wing critics denouncing the invasion as a mistake and a failure, calling for immediate withdrawal.
When Bush was re-elected in 2004, this column suggested the President would go on to blast Iran or have the job done by Israeli surrogates. Both scenarios were dismissed as absurd and alarmist. Now journalist Seymour Hersh's revelations of a US plan to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities, perhaps with nuclear bunker-blasters, are causing national and international dismay.
They've also provoked anger among the Pentagon's highest-ranking officers already enraged by Donald Rumsfeld's stewardship of the Iraq invasion and occupation. Given Rumsfeld's clear contempt for their opinions, they might well feel mutinous should he and the Commander-in-Chief show further signs of strategic insanity.
But would that prevent air strikes by the Israelis? Given the sabre-rattling by that ratbag in Tehran, what could hold Israel back?
Bush is attempting to hose things down, but the world recalls his endlessly repeated mantra before the invasion of Iraq. Military intervention wasn't inevitable, just an option. Now bleeding in the polls with mid-term elections looming, isn't it possible that Bush might go for broke? Double or nothing? A final, desperate throw of the dice?
Condoleezza Rice might join the Pentagon in trying to talk him down. So, one hopes, would Tony Blair and John Howard. But did Bush listen to reasoned argument last time? With a reckless, irrational President, you've the perfect set-up for the tail to wag the dog. As with 9/11, here's an opportunity for reality to follow a Hollywood script.
Last week I discussed this scenario with Fukuyama. His initial response was that Bush's political situation is too perilous for such a tactic, that the US public and its media wouldn't tolerate another Iraq. But bombing Iran's nuclear facilities could be characterised as surgical. It might not need troops on the ground and would certainly seem more relevant to the war on terror than the neo-con adventure in Iraq. Fukuyama conceded that such a strategy was possible.
And that possibility is more than enough. A lame-duck President with the eagle as his symbol once again takes the role of hawk. With his presidency a total mess, what's there to lose? So it's time to certify the President. Yes, you'd have to certify his equally deranged Vice-President as well. And toss in Rumsfeld to keep them company. Along with anyone else in the administration, the Congress, the Senate or the Australian parliament mad enough to think Iraq a sane decision.
© The Australian
Wrap...
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