Dreams Into Lightning

Hopeful Signs

Denmark MPs: Iranian regime "must be nuts". Judith Apter Klinghoffer:

This time the Danes are more united and more determined to defend their own freedoms. This time the Danish press acted as one. 23 newspapers reprinted the cartoons on the same day. The message of defiance was clear and inhibited the ability of politicians to kow tow to Muslim "sensitivities."

Iranian failure to take this into account led to its humiliating rebuff. The Foreign Affairs Committee of the Danish parliament was about to visit their Iranian counterparts. The Iranian Parliamentarians notified their future guests that they will refuse to meet with them unless an apology for the republication of the cartoons precedes the Danish MPs. The Danes responded by canceling the visit. Cultural understanding, they insisted, is a two way street.

Judith's friend further reports that 'the committee unanimously refused to deliver an apology for what Danish free media prints, and has canceled the planed trip to Iran, and has on public TV said that the Iranians must be nuts (Yes, these were the words), to come up with such demands, and that there's no way Danish politicians are going to visit the country under such conditions.' Arutz Sheva reports similarly blunt language from the Danes: 'Ten members of Denmark’s Parliament have cancelled a trip to Iran following Iran’s insistence that they apologize for the publication in Danish newspapers of cartoons depicting the founder of Islam, Mohammed. A member of the Danish Foreign Policy Committee explained Saturday that the lawmakers had been asked to condemn the cartoons. “They can’t and they won’t,” she said.' Meanwhile, dozens of Danish newspapers have reprinted the cartoons in a show of support for free speech.

Progress in Iraq. And even the New York Times admits it. Sunni extremism is now in retreat.

France may boycott Durban over anti-semitic, anti-Israel propaganda. JTA: 'Nicolas Sarkozy said France would not participate in the Durban II racism conference if it repeated the 2001 anti-Semitic debacle. "France will not allow a repetition of the excesses and abuses of 2001," the French president told CRIF, the umbrella body of French Jewish groups, in an address this week.'

European book fairs to honor Israel. The good news from France doesn't stop with Durban. Turning back to A7, we learn that the largest book fairs in France and Italy are honoring Israel: 'In recognition of its 60th year of independence, the State of Israel will be the "guest of honor" at two of Europe's largest book fairs this year. Dozens of Israeli authors have been invited to France and Italy for the events. The two fairs, each of which regularly draws upwards of 200,000 people, will feature displays and activities about Hebrew literature and the culture of the Jewish State. French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert are expected to open the five-day Paris Book Fair on March 14 ...' And in Italy, the Turin International Book Fair will open on May 8 - the Hebrew anniversary date of Israel's independence - and will feature Israeli books and films.

Patriots demonstrate at Silver Spring. Tom the Redhunter reports on counter-demos against the leftists at the Silver Spring, Maryland recruiting station.

At US-Islamic World Forum, keynote speakers sound a new tone. The Belmont Club:

Tamara Cofman, who's attending the annual 5th Annual U.S.-Islamic World Forum notices that anti-US rhetoric is way down this year. Instead of fire-breathing anti-American keynote speakers, "the opening keynote was instead delivered by President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, who argued that Muslims in Afghanistan and Bosnia were right to expect and accept American military intervention to relieve their suffering, and America was just in coming to their aid."

The reason for the change in tone has been a grudging respect for successes in American foreign policy and Washington's new focus on Iran.

Read the post to find out where a certain well-known American fits in the picture.

"As usual, the conventional wisdom is wrong."

Michael Totten sets the record straight.

Free Mark Steyn!

Free Mark Steyn!

Belmont Club on NIE

The Belmont Club:

I guess the Europeans were content to play the "good cop" as long as Washington played the "bad cop". Now that the current NIE has made that role harder to play, that essential role must be fulfilled by someone else. Which just goes to show that a lot of the criticism directed at Washington simply goes with the turf of being the leading power in the world.

Read the rest at the link.

Remarks. Once again, Richard "Wretchard the cat" Fernandez says it more clearly and succinctly than I can. I'll just remind readers that I suspect the Bush Administration is very adept at playing the game of "be careful what you wish for, you might get it" with its adversaries. I linked The American Thinker's article arguing that

[the NIE] will cause a fuss in the media in Israel (which is under the gun most directly), but also in Saudi, the Gulf States, Europe, the United States, and even Russia, where everybody has been happily demagoguing W for ages, secure in the knowledge that Uncle Sam would help them if they encountered real danger from the martyrdom brigade.

It's very clever. Some countries are suddenly getting serious about Tehran's nukes. The UK Guardian (!) has been writing about the danger, the same folks who've been blowing superheated steam like Old Faithful ever since the overthrow of Saddam. The Brits, Germans and French have told the press that the Americans are just wrong again, just like with Saddam, but now in the opposite way. With Saddam, the myth goes, there were no WMDs, but now Iran has them coming for sure.

In Israel, people are going bananas, realizing that the danger is very real, and that the US can't pull their chestnuts out of the fire without some painful compromises with the Arabs.

In Saudi, according to Max Boot's recent article in the WSJ, they're sounding like neocons about Iran. Everybody is shaking in their boots, and rightly so.

In my own post on the NIE, I compared the new document to last year's Baker-Hamilton report on Iraq. The New York Sun had similar ideas:

It's the return of Baker-Hamilton. A year ago, this newspaper was the first to alert Americans to the dangers of this panel's recommendations regarding Iraq. We ran the first report that these congressionally-appointed "wise" men were fashioning a call to retreat from the Battle of Iraq and to appease those states sabotaging the nation-building there. Our Eli Lake also broke the story of the commission's scheme to press for Israel's relinquishment of the Golan Heights in hopes of stabilizing Iraq.

A month after the release of the commission's report, President Bush brushed aside the council of defeatists. Instead of offering a "diplomatic surge," whereby Secretary Rice would visit — hat in hand — Tehran and Damascus asking what we might be able to do to get them to stop terrorizing our soldiers and Iraq's civilians, the president led with a military surge. He announced that we were going to disrupt the supply lines of the enemy, and he ordered General Petraeus to protect Baghdad from confessional cleansers block by block. ...

It'll be interesting to see what happens next. As the Belmont Club observes, nothing scares the Left more than the prospect of having to face real threats on their own.

Related.
The National Intelligence Estimate.

Victor Grayevsky

Michael Ledeen:

He was a Polish Jew, born Victor Spielman, which he changed to Victor Grayevsky after he found that “Spielman” was just too Jewish for an ambitious young Pole. He went to school in Kazakhstan, then returned to Poland at the end of the war, where he joined the Communist Party and made a bit of a name for himself as a journalist. In the mid-fifties he followed his parents and sister to Israel, where he ran a lot of the broadcasting to the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.
And so? And so, he was arguably one of the most important men of the twentieth century, for he was the person who obtained the advance text of Khrushchev’s Secret Speech, the one delivered in February, 1956, the one that laid out the crimes of Stalin for the leaders of the Soviet Communist Party. That text was a turning point in the Cold War. Grayevsky gave it to the Israeli Embassy, where it was copied and sent to Israel. The Shin Bet intelligence service delivered it by courier to James Jesus Angleton, the head of CIA counterintelligence (and the CIA’s liaison with the Israelis), who gave it to CIA chief Allen Dulles, who gave it to President Eisenhower.
The speech made headlines around the world, and Khrushchev’s revelations were vigorously exploited by the United States, shocking the Communist faithful. ...

The Khrushchev Report was mentioned prominently in Neo-Neocon's review of 'Radical Son' by David Horowitz:

But right now I want to concentrate on the tie-in between these two events in Horowitz’s life. The first event was one that rocked the American leftist world in a way I hadn’t quite realized till I read Horowitz’s book, while the second was an event that hardly made a ripple, except for sparking change in Horowitz himself.

The first event was the publication of what became known as the Khrushchev Report. Horowitz had been the quintessential “red diaper baby.” His parents were not just leftists, they were committed and devoted Communists, as were most, if not all, of their friends. They had pooh-poohed any criticism of the Soviets, and revered Stalin. For them, and for their generation of American Communists, this was a watershed event, the great dividing line which occurred in 1956, when Horowitz was in his freshman year at Columbia. He writes:

…the Times had published a report from the Kremlin describing a secret speech by the new Soviet premier, Nikita Khrushchev. It had been smuggled out of the Kremlin by the Mossad, the Israeli secret service [quite a fascinating detail, that]. The speech made headlines all over the world because it was about crimes that Stalin had committed. Until then, Communists and progressives everywhere had denied such crimes ever took place, and had denounced the reports as “anti-Soviet” propaganda. Over the next months the story was confirmed, even by Communist sources, and in June the full text was published in the Times, and then in the Daily Worker itself…..

When my parents and their friends opened the morning Times and read its text, their world collapsed–and along with it their will to struggle. If the document was true, almost everything they had said and believed was false. Their secret mission had led them into waters so deep that its tide had overwhelmed them, taking with it the very meaning of their lives.

According to Horowitz, this was how Peggy Dennis, a woman who was a Party leader, recounted the event in her autobiography:

The last page crumpled in my fist. I lay in the half darkness and I wept…For the years of silence in which we buried doubts and questions. For a thirty-year life’s commitment that lay shattered. I lay sobbing low, hiccoughing whimpers.

Horowitz describes the split that followed:

In the American community of the faithful, the Khrushchev Report was a divisive force. Forty-year friendships disintegrated overnight, and even marriages dissolved as one partner would decide to quit the Party, the other to keep its faith…In the two years that followed, more than two-thirds of the Party membership dropped from its lists….My parents were among those who struggled to find solace in the thought that while “mistakes” had been made, remedies were being taken. But…they were stunned by a blow from which they could never recover…although they remained faithful in their hearts to the radical cause, they were never really active in politics again.

Passages in italics are excerpts from 'Radical Son'. Horowitz himself was horrified, but remained loyal to the left for almost 20 more years, convinced that the left could and must be purged of its violent shadow side. It took a brutal murder within the Black Panther community to convince him otherwise. But the seeds must already have been planted by Grayevsky's revelation.

Here is a portion of The Australian's account:

Grayevsky's girlfriend Lucia Baranowska was executive secretary to the most powerful man in communist-ruled Poland, party chief Edward Ochab. When Grayevsky arrived at Baranowska's office that morning, she said she couldn't get away: "Things are just too hectic."

As he prepared to leave, he noticed a document on the desk with the Russian words "top secret" and "state secret" on its red cover. At the bottom it read "Comrade Khrushchev's speech to the 20th Party Congress".

He picked it up and riffled through it. "Would you mind if I take this for an hour or so?" he asked. ...

Go to the link for the rest.

All of this happened a bit before my time, but I find it fascinating to read how one article shaped the mindset of a generation, and destroyed so many illusions. We have Victor Grayevsky to thank for the revelation that brought so many out of the spell of communism.

Rest in peace, Victor Grayevsky.

Report: Israeli Special Ops Troops Captured NK Nuclear Material

Jerusalem Post:

Soldiers from an elite Israeli unit captured nuclear material originating in North Korea from a secret Syrian military installation before IAF jets bombed it, a report by Britain's Sunday Times wrote Saturday night, quoting "informed sources in Washington and Jerusalem."

According to the sources quoted by the report, the alleged IAF attack was sanctioned by the US on September 6, after the Americans were given proof that the material was indeed nuclear related. ...

The report said that the commandos, from the legendary General Staff's Reconnaissance Unit (Sayeret Matkal), may have been disguised in Syrian army uniforms. It also stated that Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who used to head the unit, personally oversaw the operation.

Related.
Israel to Syria: Let's talk peace.
Israel-Syria overflight.

Lethal and Non-Lethal Action

Psyop Cop at OpFor:

World War Two was won through sheer industrial might and brute force. It was the conventional warrior’s wet dream and something that will probably never be seen again (and thank God for it).

The War on Terror is something entirely different. Inasmuch lethal action has a role to play (because, as they say, “some men you just can’t reach”), non-lethal action has to be the driving force in this war. Otherwise, logic demands that you must wipe out vast swaths of population to convince them they’re wrong and we’re right (essentially the driving strategy behind WW2). ...

What's on Psyop's mind? This article -
Ahmed al-Shayea renounces terrorism:

The last time Ahmed al-Shayea was in the news, he was in the hospital at the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad, being treated for severe burns from the truck bomb he had driven into the Iraqi capital on Christmas Day, 2004.

Today, he says, he has changed his mind about waging jihad, or holy war, and wants other young Muslims to know it. He wants them to see his disfigured face and fingerless hands, to hear how he was tricked into driving the truck on a fatal mission, to believe his contrition over having put his family through the agony of believing he was dead.

At 22, the new Ahmed Al-Shayea is the product of a concerted Saudi government effort to counter the ideology that nurtured the 9/11 hijackers and that has lured Saudis in droves to the Iraq insurgency. ...

Ahmed concluded that “There is no jihad. We are just instruments of death.”

Psyop continues:

The trouble is that, in the Arab world, you cannot communicate with another person without referencing Islam. It is as much a part of those people’s culture and mindset as oil is a part of the ground there. And, by simply refusing to play, the Army allows the extremists to dominate the field and convince the fence-sitters that Allah commands them to go and kill Americans and those who support them. Without another opinion to listen to on the matter, the issue is pretty much decided for them.

A low literacy rate contributes to this. It is not unlike the Catholic church in Europe during the Middle Ages. Liturgy was in Latin only, as was the Bible. Because the local priest was the only man who could speak or write Latin, he could pretty much tell the people whatever he wanted and, because it was the “church” speaking, it was the truth. Burn a heretic, send your kids on a crusade, give me money… you get the idea. Imams in many of the towns and villages across the Arab world have that same power.

Convincing detainees (or EPWs or whatever you want to call them) of the wrongness of their actions can be done. This story proves it. However, it has to be done through the venue of Islam and Arab culture, not the progressive, western, Christian way of doing things.

Instead of locking ‘em up and throwing away the key, which will ultimately NOT pass a Constitutional litmus test, they could be turned and then let loose to spread their new ideology.

Meanwhile, another battle on the ideological front goes down in Britain, reports the Counterterrorism Blog:

In yet another landmark legal case in the United Kingdom regarding Internet-based terrorism, a judge in London has sentenced a group of five British-born youngsters to a total of 13 years in prison for conspiring to use the web in order to accumulate vast amounts of terrorist propaganda in hopes of eventually traveling to Pakistan and joining Al-Qaida's forces there. The convicted defendants--Mohammed Irfan Raja, Usman Malik, Aitzaz Zafar, Awaab Iqbal, and Akbar Butt--were all between the ages of 17-21 and had made contact with each other through an Internet chatroom. In explaining his decision, Judge Peter Beaumont admonished the defendants: "Each of you is British. You were born here, your families lived here, you went to school and university here, you hold British passports. You live under the protection of its laws, which give you freedom of speech and religious observance, yet each of you were prepared to break its laws. Why? Because in my judgment you were intoxicated by the extremist nature of the material each one of you collected - the songs, images and the language of violent jihad - and so carried away by that material were you that each of you crossed the line. That is exactly what the people that peddle this material want to achieve and exactly what you did... To stop them and you and to protect this country and its citizens abroad, a message has to be sent."

Speaking of messages, M. Zhuhdi Jasser of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy will be on the air in Arizona tonight. Here's the release:

M. Zuhdi Jasser, AIFD Chairman will be a guest today with William Wolf on "Middle East Radio Forum" on KKNT 960AM from 12PM-1PM PST. They will discuss Islam vs Islamists. Topics will include the controversial PBS documentary (see www.freethefilm.net ) which is set to appear locally on Channel 8 KAET on August 14, 2007 at 10 PM and other national and global issues related to the topic of Islam and Islamism.

For those outside Arizona, the program can be heard online at:

http://www.middleeastradioforum.org

Jasser sounds a cautionary note in this NRO symposium on the apparent erosion of support for suicide terrorism in the Muslim world:

This week’s Pew study results are dangerously oversimplified. Improvements in economics and moods in the developing world are in no way reason enough for the sharp decline in support for suicide bombing. The recent 45-doctor plot in London and Glasgow told us that much. For now, it is not only too early, but downright irresponsible to have a collective sigh of relief.

As we have often seen, Pew avoids the why. In their latest report, they again ignore the most central global question: Islamism and its conflict with America and the West.

What if, in fact, the general support for the tactic of terror was decreasing simply because the Islamist enemy was beginning to achieve their ideological goals in their native countries? What if the Islamists were actually sensing a general global retreat of the uniquely American ideologies of pluralism?

Terror is only a means to the ends of political Islam. If political Islam is on the rise, doesn’t it stand to reason that apologetics for terrorism may then actually decrease?

Certainly freer markets, economic growth, and education may ultimately drive Muslim populations away from autocracy and corruption. But to where will it drive them? What alternative Muslim narratives are available in this war of ideas? With the current American mainstream-media (MSM) distractions, Islamists are free to control Arab and Muslim media alongside their dictators and monarchs and spread political Islam in the Middle East and in the West.

Our private and governmental resources have yet to hardly focus on the anti-Islamists and anti-Wahhabist Muslims. The Bush administration and MSM would similarly rather avoid any critical ideological engagement of Islamist movements around the world. Our public diplomacy has actually turned into “Islamist facilitation.”

Manifestations of Islamist fascism (i.e. terrorism) may wax and wane depending upon how threatened the Islamist ideologues are with extinction. The underlying disease — political Islam— however, will never go away without a direct ideological counter-jihad and counter-Islamism from within the faith. ...

Muslim reformer Irshad Manji is doing her part. Here's an excerpt from an e-mail conversation:

"I'm an Iraqi agnostic that lives in the UAE. I was part of an online community where everybody was free to share his ideas. Until I started talking about the Israeli-Arab conflict. I said that Arabs were making a lot of massacres, as well as the other side. I was insulted and kicked out.

After that, a lot of users asked me make another free Arab forum. The forum is now in the design phase. I have a handful of thinkers, believers and non-believers. I am now looking for Arab Israelis who can give their side. I grant full freedom of speech, providing that everything is supplied with evidence. Looking forward your help, Irshad." - The Free Arab

NOTE: Irshad put The Free Arab in touch with with another Arab dissident, who wrote this to him:

"In agreement with what you said, here are only some examples of Arab/Muslim atrocities committed against our own which we are too proud to admit:
Pakistan’s General Yahya Khan slaughtering Bengali Muslims in 1971.
Iraq’s Saddam Hussein slaughtering the Kurds and Iranians using chemical weapons.
The Taliban slaughtering Shi'a Hazaras, committing war crimes comparable to the Serbs killing the Bosnians.
Jordan’s King Hussein and Pakistan’s General Zia ul Haq slaughtering Palestinians during Black September.
Syria’s President Hafez al-Assad slaughtering 40,000 Muslims and leveling the city of Hama.
The Amman bombings of November 2005 when Zarqawi even proudly claimed responsibility for the attacks.
On-going ethnic cleansing in Darfur...

Remarks. Some men you just can't reach. But there are some people who can be reached, and that's where the real action is in this war.

It's Easy if You Try

Tony Blair stepped into his new position as Quartet Middle East envoy Thursday with hopes and dreams and told worldwide diplomats in Lisbon, "Just imagine for a moment if this process were moving forward again, just think how much hope there would be."

Mad In America - Independence Day Post

"They keep sending our jobs away."

Here's a great song from the brother of an old friend of mine.

Troubled by the rising tied of offshoring around the country musician and CSEA Local 2001 member Steve Dube put pen to paper and wrote an anthem called “Mad in America” for his band ETX.

[Dube]: The song was written as a protest basically, just because of all of the engineering and IT jobs going away.

Dube is now trying to bring that protest via song to music lovers everywhere by landing on ITunes top 100 on July 4. How? Dube is calling on everyone to log into their ITunes player on the Independence Day holiday and download the song. If enough people do it, the song should hypothetically find a place among the Avril Lavignes and Fall Out Boys of the world.

[Dube2]: We’d like to just get a grassroots effort going where the song could become like an anthem for American workers just to show Washington in an election year that we don’t want the middle class to go away and we want jobs in the United States.

I've just downloaded the song to iTunes and I can personally and enthusiastically recommend it. "Mad in America" raises important questions about globalization and the outsourcing of American jobs. And it's a great song, too.

My friend Chuck comes from a family of patriots and is also a musician, having performed with Leigh Gregory. Go have a listen to Mad in America by ETx - and you can download the whole thing for just 99 cents.

Ummm, dude? They already did.

Bush says terrorists can't be allowed to win in Gaza.

A Fourth Possibility

The Belmont Club:

I will propose a 4th possibility. That a few hundred years ago tribal and incessant warfare was in fact the norm, even in Europe. Especially in Europe, but that somehow many societies have learned how to live in relative peace and freedom; yet somehow this eludes certain societies in the Middle East.

Czech Mates: Pro-Democracy Gathering in Prague

Also from the indispensable Gateway Pundit, a gathering of freedom activists in Prague boasted an all-star cast:

An Iraqi political leader, a Russian democracy activist and chess champion, a Former Spanish Prime Minister, a Former Czech Dissident-President, and a former Russian prisoner and former Israeli Deputy Prime Minister held a press conference in Prague today.

A local Czech leader introduces the members of the Democracy and Security Conference who will be answering questions from the local press: Left to right- Jose Maria Asnar (behind camera), Vaclav Havel, Natan Sharansky, an aide to Sharansky, Garri Kasparov (in tan jacket) and the Czech political leader. The press in the Czech Republic was very enthusiastic to have this historic event held in Prague.

Go read the rest at the link, and check out the press release (Word document).
And as a native Yankee, I'm proud to say that Connecticut's Senator Joseph Lieberman was there too. As quoted in the Standard:

The outcome of the struggle in Iraq will go a long way towards determining whether our future in Europe, and America, and throughout much of the world belongs to these totalitarians, or to democrats who seek the consent and consensus of the governed.

Iraq is about the survival and success of the very ideal of freedom not only in Iraq, but in Iran, and Syria, and the rest of that region, and in a very real way, in the rest of the world.

There are some in America today who acknowledge the stakes at play in Iraq, but who then claim that the war there has been too costly, the burden too great, for us to continue to shoulder it. They claim that they support democracy, but just not in Iraq, just not right now.

The truth of the matter, however, is that freedom is not divisible. You cannot claim to support the spread of democracy, but profess ambivalence about its fate in Iraq.

On the contrary, we have a responsibility to support the forces of freedom not only when it is easy, but when it is hard.

Full text of Senator Lieberman's speech is here.

Thank you so much for that kind introduction, Natan. I cannot tell you how grateful I am for all of your work, and the work of Vaclav Havel and Jose Maria Aznar, to bring together the remarkable group of individuals who are assembled in this room, these fighters for freedom, from around the globe.

I know that many of you traveled here at great personal risk and in the face of great obstacles. It is a privilege and an honor for me to stand with you.

The existence of this conference is itself a testament to the transformative power of the ideals that have brought us together, to the power of brave people of principle to change history. Who would have dreamed two decades ago that democratic dissidents from all over the world would be able to gather in Prague, at the invitation of men who were themselves prisoners of the totalitarian regime that had long ruled this half of Europe, and that many assumed would do so forever. Instead, today, Stalin and Brezhnev are in the dustbin of history, and Havel and Sharansky survive and flourish! ...

Go to the link for the rest. And President Bush was there:

In this room are dissidents and democratic activists from 17 countries on five continents. You follow different traditions, you practice different faiths, and you face different challenges. But you are united by an unwavering conviction: that freedom is the non-negotiable right of every man, woman, and child, and that the path to lasting peace in our world is liberty. (Applause.)

This conference was conceived by three of the great advocates for freedom in our time: Jose Maria Aznar, Vaclav Havel, and Natan Sharansky. I thank them for the invitation to address this inspiring assembly, and for showing the world that an individual with moral clarity and courage can change the course of history. ...

Go read the rest.

Bush meets with political dissidents in Prague.

Gateway Pundit has all the details.

Nowruz Greetings from President Bush

The White House:

I send greetings to those celebrating Nowruz.

Nowruz is a special time of thanksgiving and celebration when millions of people around the world who trace their heritage to Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Turkey, Pakistan, India, and Central Asia welcome the New Year. For thousands of years, it has been an occasion when family, friends, and loved ones come together to reflect on the blessings of the past year and look forward with a spirit of renewal and hope.

America is strengthened by the rich cultural diversity of our people, and we are blessed to be a Nation that welcomes individuals of all races, religions, and cultural backgrounds. Celebrating Nowruz honors the values of family and tradition and helps preserve the unique fabric that makes up our country.

Laura and I send our best wishes for health and happiness in the coming year.

GEORGE W. BUSH

Related. Chaharshenbe Souri dar Iran.

Tammy: A Perverse Threesome

Tammy Bruce:

So when is the president going to rename the Axis of Evil to the evil Axis of Ménage à Trois? Was if Ahmadinejad's Members Only jacket from 1973 that was so appealing, or Kim Jong Il looking like a lost little pot bellied pig? One thing I do know is this--under Condi Rice and President Bush's apparent acquiescence to her approach, we are now legitimizing and negotiating with countries that how vowed to, or have been, murdering millions of people. ...

Today it is announced that on March 5-6, we will be meeting in New York with a representative from North Korea to "normalize" relations with them. In other words, the policy of the State department under Condi Rice is to reward genocidal regimes who lie and cheat their way to a nuclear bomb. Not only are they not punished, they are rewarded with normalized relations and international legitimacy. ...

Read it all here.

Related, from Debka:

Syria to send an aide to Baghdad conference of Iraq’s neighbors while Iran is reviewing the invitation.

In a sharp policy reversal, the US joined Iraq in a new initiative to invite Iran and Syria to a “neighbors meeting” in Baghdad next month.

Iran’s supreme national security council head Ali Larijani said Wednesday: “We support solving problems by Iraq by all means and will attend the conference if it is expedient.” He added: Iraq’s security is related to all its neighbors.

US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice said Tuesday, Feb. 27: “We hope that all governments seize this opportunity to improve their relations with Iraq and to work for peace and stability in the region.”

Until now, the Bush administration had resisted calls to include Iran and Syria in diplomatic efforts to stabilize Iraq.

In Baghdad, the Iraqi government announced the meeting would take place in mid-March with the participation of members of the Arab League and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council. Rice said it would be held at sub-ministerial level, to be followed perhaps in April by a full ministerial-level meeting of the same countries, plus G-8 Group members.

Meanwhile, Michael Ledeen reports a possible defection by an Iranian spy. The Turkish Press: 'Ankara’s diplomatic and political circles are currently filled with gossip over a missing Iranian, thought by some to be a spy. Iranian citizen Ali Rızari Asqhari, 63, who recently retired from the Iranian Defense Ministry, disappeared in Istanbul on Feb. 7, daily Hürriyet reported on Monday. Iran has made a diplomatic move, yesterday sending a delegation to Turkey to obtain more information on the missing man.' Ledeen adds: 'So a guy from the Iranian Defense Ministry goes missing in Istanbul, and the mullahs are concerned enough to send a team to investigate. Let’s hope the guy’s in Langley, and that he knows something useful.' Amen.

Update. For another view of the proposed talks, here's Neo-Neocon:

So, if the present proposed talks contain two elements: (1) a strategically viable "big stick" threat from the US; and (2) Iran's awareness that the talks are not a cover for a planned precipitous US retreat from Iraq--then I think talking to Iran and Syria would not be a particularly dangerous thing to do. Although I still doubt the productivity of any such talks, they would no longer be especially risky, as long as we remain realistic about their chances of success, and continue to pressure Iran in other ways.

Whether these two needed elements are fully in place right now, I'm not sure. ...

Read the rest here.

We're doomed.

Least comforting headline of all time.

BBC Interviews Ayaan Hirsi Ali

The Spirit of Man reports: 'BBC News Hardtalk program interviewed the Islamic critic Ayaan Hirsi Ali and I advise you to watch it as well. She is such a courageous woman and I admire her brave stance against Islam.'

And don't miss Ayaan Hirsi Ali's new book, Infidel.

NMJ: "American Hiroshima" Connection in Litvinenko Death

Paul Williams and Jeffrey Epstein at New Media Journal:

New evidence has come to light that Alexander Litvinenko may have been involved with Islamic terrorists in the preparation of tactical nuclear weapons for use in the jihad against the United States and its NATO allies.
Litvinenko, a former KGB agent, died in London on November 23 after ingesting a microscopic amount of polonium-210.

Investigators have now uncovered the following:

▪ Litvinenko was a Muslim convert with reported ties to radical Islam.

▪ The former Soviet spy masterminded was responsible for the smuggling of radioactive material to Zurich in 2000. This finding was corroborated by Mario Scaramella, one of Litvinenko's business associates.

▪ Litvinenko became closely allied with Boris Berezovsky, a Russian billionaire who established close ties with the Chechen leaders, and Chechen leader Ahmed Zakayev. Both men served as pallbearers at the funeral. Several years ago, Berezovsky boasted to the press that the Chechen separatists had acquired a portable nuclear weapon that lacked one "minor" component. That component, Scotland Yard officials now believe, was polonium-210.

In a deathbed statement, Litvinenko blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin for the poisoning -- an accusation which the Kremlin has vehemently denied.

The denial was supported by the fact that polonium-210 is a rare radiological substance that is man-made by bombarding Bismuth-209 with neutrons within a nuclear reactor. It is expensive to produce and difficult to handle. Polonium-210 is also rare -- fewer than four ounces are produced annually. All of the reported production comes from Russian reactors. This amount is purchased annually by the United States, simply to keep the substance from leaking into the black market. Several rogue nations have been suspected of clandestinely producing polonium-210 for nefarious purposes. ...

Related: "American Hiroshima" plot.
Canada Free Press: Next attack imminent.
Adnan Shukrijumah, nuclear terrorist.
Morning Report: October 18, 2006.

Middle East: Exposing Hezbollah, helping Iraqis, confronting Iran's regime.

Hezbollah war crimes. Clifford D. May at FDD:

Last summer, Lebanese-based Hezbollah commandos invaded Israel where they both killed and kidnapped Israeli soldiers, setting off a 34-day-long war. During that conflict, photographs of what were said to be Lebanese civilian victims were distributed around the world. But photographs of Hezbollah fighters, living or dead, were virtually impossible to find.

That’s because Hezbollah fighters wore no uniforms and hid among Lebanon’s civilian population. These illegal practices were not extensively reported. For Western journalists in Lebanon, distinguishing between combatants and civilians would have been difficult. Many did not try, choosing instead to report what they were told by Hezbollah spokesmen.

The truth began to emerge after a ceasefire was reached in mid-August. Upon completing an investigative mission to Lebanon, U.K. Foreign Office Minister Kim Howell told a parliamentary committee that Hezbollah had extensively hidden caches of arms and rockets in schools, mosques, apartment blocks and homes.

“What I saw out there begs many questions about the way we try to define what constitutes a war crime,” Howell said. “Every time the Israelis responded [to a missile attack] and smashed a building down, every picture of a burnt child and every picture of a building that had housed people [where] there was now pancake on the ground was propaganda for Hezbollah.”

... Nevertheless, it has been Israel, rather than Hezbollah, that has been persistently accused of war crimes by such organizations as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the U.N. Human Rights Council. Now, however, a study produced by the Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, an Israeli think tank, is utilizing newly declassified military intelligence materials, including aerial photographs, videotapes, and the testimony of Hezbollah detainees, in an attempt to prove once and for all Hezbollah egregiously violated the laws of war by targeting both Israeli and Lebanese civilians.

“This study,” writes Dr. Reuven Erlich, the Center’s director, “analyzes two central concepts of Hezbollah's warfare. … The first is the broad use of the Lebanese civilian population as a living shield; the second, viewing the Israeli civilian population as the primary target for the enormous rocket arsenal Hezbollah built up over a period of years. Both acts are considered war crimes under international law.”

The report and its accompanying photos and videos show Hezbollah rocket launchers hidden in Lebanese villages, alongside schools, mosques and hospitals; also rockets being launched from near U.N. outposts.

One Hezbollah detainee acknowledges on videotape that he transported missiles while carrying a white flag – used when Lebanese non-combatants wanted to signal Israelis that they were attempting to flee the battlefield. Other Hezbollah prisoners talked openly of using private homes both to store weapons and launch missiles.

Asked by The New York Times whether the Israeli report implies that Hezbollah should be seen as responsible for the deaths of Lebanese civilians, Elias Hanna, a retired Lebanese Army general, replied: “Of course Hezbollah is responsible. But these people are ready to sacrifice their lives for Hezbollah.”

That raises two questions that apparently did not occur to the Times: 1) If a Lebanese civilian was not ready to sacrifice his life for Hezbollah, how would he safely communicate that to Hezbollah leaders? And 2) if a civilian voluntarily turns his home over to Hezbollah to be used for rocket launches, does his home not become a military target – even if he and his family remain in it?

Bill Roggio: Message from Fallujah. Bill Roggio at Spirit of America:

Bill Roggio is a journalist embedded with the Marines in Al Anbar, Iraq. He's been meeting with some of the Marines Spirit of America has helped. ... Following is a message from Bill after his meeting with Major Britt Rosenberry:

Since of Fallujah was wrested from the control of al-Qaeda and the insurgency in November of 2004, the Coalition and Iraq government have worked to restore security and basic services the warn-torn city. Major Britt Rosenberry, stationed in Camp Fallujah, has 3-man teams who patrol with the Army and Marine Infantry throughout the entire Al Anbar Province. They interact with the citizens and concerned with their plight.

This generation of kids are the key to Iraq's future success. Al-Qaeda and the insurgency has been conducting a "Taliban-like campaign" to close down schools, keep children uneducated. They harass and intimidate principals (called headmasters) and teachers. This year, a headmaster was kidnapped in front of the students and later assassinated.

One of Major Rosenberry's highest priorities is the children. They are highly susceptible to insurgent propaganda, and ripe for recruitment by the insurgents. "Schools are easy targets," said Major Rosenberry. "The Iraqi Police and Iraqi Army patrol the city, but are not always providing overwatch to fixed locations." To counter the intimidation of al-Qaeda closing schools, they are secretly opened in homes. But this comes at a cost. Some children may travel up to two hours a day for two hours of instruction. And the provincial schools, whether they are established or clandestine, need supplies. School books, notebooks, pens pencils and other school items are in short supplies.

To fill this need, Major Rosenberry asked for help from home. "Don't send the fat pill," the care package filled with candy, Major Rosenberry told friends and family back home. "Send us notebooks and pens."

Not only do the school supplies help the Iraq children, but they help to defeat al-Qaeda and insurgency. "When fighting an information war, it is important to back up words with actions," said Major Rosenberry. Providing the school supplies allows the Coalition and Iraqi security forces to live up to their commitment to keeps schools open. The mission also introduces the children to the Iraqi security forces and U.S. soldiers and Marines. "They get to see we are human. They laugh, we makes jokes. We take off the gear and by the time we leave we're exchanging hugs. When we return, they recognize us."

You can be part of the good news by making a donation online at the Spirit of America site. And go visit Bill Roggio's blog, The Fourth Rail.

Merkel takes stand against nuclear Iran, unhappy with results of FM's Syria visit. JTA: 'Germany’s chancellor said the world must prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons.
“It is time that the U.N. Security Council address sanctions,” Angela Merkel said after meeting Tuesday with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, according to a release issued by the German Embassy in Washington. Merkel reportedly also vowed to stand by Israel against Iran. “Israel will never face Iran alone. Germany will be beside it like a fortified wall,” Yediot Achronot quoted Merkel as telling Olmert. ... Merkel also expressed disappointment about the results of a recent visit to Syria by her foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, describing them as “not positive.”'

Remarks. There's always something you can do. Here's a list of Free Muslim organizations from Stop the Project. I mentioned some of these groups two years ago in my post on the real peace movement. Never heard of them? They've never heard of you, either ... maybe it's time to introduce yourself with a donation.

Sudanese-Israeli Friendship Association

Via Big Pharaoh, at MEMRI-TV.

Condi: Not much to talk about.

Condi cool to Iran, Syria talks - Reuters.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Tuesday said neither Iran nor Syria appeared interested in helping stabilize Iraq or the Middle East as she played down the idea of direct talks.

"There is no lack of opportunity to talk to the Iranians. I think the question is: is there anything about Iranian behavior that suggests that they are prepared to contribute to stability in Iraq and I have to say that at this point, I don't see it," Rice told reporters as she flew to Hanoi for the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation regional summit.

Remarks. Well, now. This is more like it.

Just in time for Halloween ...

... Wretchard scares the bejeezus out of us again.

North Korea: Nuclear Bomb Test?

Little Green Footballs is following the story.
The Belmont Club is reporting here.
Seismic data from Inchon.
Fox News:

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea said Monday it has performed its first-ever nuclear weapons test and the blast had been successfully set off underground with no radioactive leakage from the site.

An official at South Korea's seismic monitoring center confirmed a magnitude-3.6 tremor felt at the time North Korea said it conducted the test was not a natural occurrence. The official spoke to The Associated Press on condition his name not be used, because he was not authorized to talk about the sensitive information to the media.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said that information still needs to collected and analyzed to determine whether North Korea truly conducted its first nuclear test.

UPDATE: Fox News confirms.

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea successfully completed a test of a nuclear weapon late Sunday night, a senior Bush administration official confirmed to FOX News.

The official said, however, that the underground blast only measured a registered a 3.58 seismic reaction, which was smaller than the 400-kiloton explosion the Axis of Evil nation sought.

"North Korea may not have got what they wanted," the official said.

Possibly related: Syria, Iran gearing up for Syrian strike on Israel - Debka.

Tehran and Damascus are gearing up for a pre-emptive Syrian attack on Israel to ward off a US strike on Iran’s nuclear sites. Our military and Washington sources read as preparatory justification the Syrian ruler Bashar Asad’s statement Saturday, Oct. 7, that he expects an Israeli attack. He was speaking in an interview to Kuwaiti paper al-Anba. Asad’s Iranian-backed war plan would serve the purpose of forcing the Americans to divide their military assets between a strike against Iran and the defense of their allies in the Persia Gulf, Israel and US forces in Iraq. Both are seriously looking at a Syrian attack on the Golan which would escalate into a full-blown Syrian-Israeli war and a second Hizballah assault from Lebanon. ... According to DEBKAfile’s sources, Asad and Iran’s supreme ruler Ayatollah Ali Khamenei are prompted by the following motives: 1. Tehran is not prepared to wait passively for the Americans to build up their assault force in the Gulf and strike its nuclear facilities. A pre-emptive attack would suit them better. 2. Tehran and Damascus have not missed the debilitating crisis in which Israel’s political and military leadership are sunk since the Lebanon war. They do not propose to wait until the IDF pulls itself together enough to handle fresh aggression. 3. Both accept Israel’s deputy prime minister Shimon Peres’ assessment that Israel’s cities are not prepared for missile attack. Iran and Syria take it for granted that Israeli leaders understand they cannot afford to launch missiles against either one of them for fear of reprisal in kind. 4. Syria believes that if Hizballah could stand up to the Israeli army in Lebanon, its commandoes can capture sections of the Golan and walk off with an easy victory. 5. Tehran figures that the Bush administration is coming to the end of its patience in Iraq and preparing for a major review of its position there. The influential U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman, John Warner, said Friday that Iraq`s government had 60 to 90 days to control the violence that threatens civil war or the United States would have to reconsider its options. This gives the Maliki government in Baghdad up to December or January to de-escalate if not halt the sectarian war engulfing the country. Iran, Syria and Hizballah would not be averse to disrupting the American Iraq timeline by attacking Israel and putting the Bush administration on the spot, forced to address three warfronts simultaneously.

Or four warfronts, if you include North Korea. Whether or not a successful nuclear test took place, I think it's likely that Pyongyang is co-ordinating with Damascus and Tehran to try to stretch US defense resources.

UPDATE via Gateway Pundit. Korea Liberator:

First, that North Korea tested a nuke is not confirmed. The could have merely detonated a large amount of conventional explosives in deep (est. ~2km) mine to simulate a nuclear test; after all, the Taepodong 2 ICBM was an abject failure. It’s a possibility, but I doubt it as satellites will probably be able to differentiate between the two. Second, militarily I don’t see any action coming soon; Pakistan/India, but with more sanctions. Seoul didn’t even raise the military alert level. Third, mid-to-long term, UN sections are on the way that may finally topple the Kim regime; let’s hope so. Fourth, North Korea once again a) made China look the fool for conveying its offer not to test, and b) showed that it makes such offers in bad faith to begin with.

Bill Roggio at The Fourth Rail:

The implications for North Asia and beyond are dire. Not only will the armed forces of Japan and South Korea be placed on high alert, but these nations will be forced to seriously consider building their own nuclear deterrent. Defensive measure such as AEGIS cruisers may not be enough. The United States will be forced to devote additional diplomatic and military assets to deal with the threat, siphoning resources away form the conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia and the looming crisis with Iran.

Cross-posted at Dreams Into Lightning - Blogger.

Islam is not the enemy ...

... Islamic fascism is. Ralph Peters has a column on "Islam-Haters: An Enemy Within":

Islamist fanatics attacked us and yearn to destroy us. The Muslim civilization of the Middle East has failed comprehensively and will continue to generate violence. The only way to deal with faith-poisoned terrorists is to kill them.

And the world's only hope for long-term peace is for moderate Muslims - by far the majority around the globe - to recapture their own faith.

But a rotten core of American extremists is out to make it harder for them.

The most repugnant trend in the American shouting match that passes for a debate on the struggle with Islamist terrorism isn't the irresponsible nonsense on the left - destructive though that is. The really ugly "domestic insurgency" is among right-wing extremists bent on discrediting honorable conservatism. ...

Tom the Redhunter:

I agree with Peters that this sort of thing is wrong, and here's why.

Let me say right now that I am not talking about things like stopping or reducing Muslim immigration. I think that the Europeans should slow down or stop immigration into their countries by Muslims, and need to work hard to assimilate those that have. Nor, heaven knows, am I saying that the way Islam is practiced by many is not evil. Further, I am disgusted at how moderate Muslims (and yes they exist) have not done more to confront and counter the radicals. Many Mosques in Western countries are infiltrated by radicals and the Muslim community is not doing nearly enough to root them out.

But none of this the same as saying that Islam is evil. I am a Christian, and as such believe that Islam is a false religion. But it is not evil.

Tammy Bruce:

We do not need to think about wiping out Islam to defeat the enemy--we do need to democratize the Middle East, giving the people control, which should isolate and marginalize fascists. Once people get freedom, they like it. Fascists, of course, by their very definition, require totalitarian control.

For those who say I'm wrong, and it's Islam that needs to be wiped away and how all this is folly, I'll use WWII as an example. We did not need to "wipe away" all Germans or Japanese to win that war. Yes, we needed to defeat them completely, but we also forced democracy on them and forced the Japanese to westernize. But there is also one other thing we did to both countries that today's bending to political correctness precludes--banning state religion.

With the Japanese, we banned Shinto, and the with Germans we banned Nazism (which, of course, was the worship of Hitler and so-called Aryanism). When it comes to the Middle East, the equivalent for Afghanistan and Iraq would not to ban Islam, but to require a secular government, secular constitutions, and to ban the Wahabbist (the modern Shinto/Nazi problem) sect/interpretation/practice of Islam.

The Redhunter adds another post:

I've [seen] several right-wing (I won't call them conservative) sites in which the authors and commenters are convinced that Islam is a religion of hate, violence, it is evil, unreformable, the whole bit. Anyone who dares to disagree is a dhimmi. Once I see where the comments are going I usually don't chime in, as there's no point.

Anyone who's read more than this post knows that I believe that Islam as it is currently practiced [emphasis in original - aa] by all too many Muslims has a problem with violence. Far too many Muslims are completely hypocritical on the issue of military force, unable or unwilling to understand the difference between direct attacks on civilians and attacks on military targets where civilians are killed as an unfortunate byproduct (hmm, many Western liberals are confused there too). They excuse terrorism with weasel words. Abuse of women and total lack of civil rights are the hallmarks of most Islamic societies. I could go on but you get the point.

And he names names. Go to the link to read the rest, and to find out where he (slightly) disagrees with Ralph Peters.

Tony Blair: Not regime change, but values change.

Tony Blair's speech in California.

It would be pointless to excerpt this. Just go read it all.

Latest on the Tammuz War

Up the escalator. New developments in the war suggest that long-dormant forces are now gathering momentum.

Belmont Club: Three developments. Wretchard discerns three key developments in recent hours: 'The first is that the US has vetoed a UN Security Council Resolution condemning Israel's incursions into Gaza. Note: Gaza, not Lebanon, which is suggestive. Second, Ynet reports that "Israeli aircraft struck the main highway linking Beirut to the Syrian capital Damascus early on Friday, a Lebanese security source said." Third, but not last, is the official speculation that the missiles which landed in Haifa were Iranian-manufactured Fajers, with a range of 70 km.' There are also indications that Iranian personnel are already involved in the fighting.

Melanie Phillips: Israel is at war with Iran and Syria. Melanie Phillips writes: 'Israel is now at war with Iran and Syria, which are waging war against Israel through their proxies Hezbollah and Hamas in pursuit of their declared aim to exterminate it. The 1000-plus rocket attacks from Gaza, the incursions into Israel and murder and kidnap of its soldiers, the murder and kindap of more of its soldiers in northern Israel and the shelling of Israel’s northern towns from Lebanon, with two killed in Nahariya and Safed and more injured, and now the rocket attacks on Haifa, all are acts of war — in the latest of which which Lebanon itself is complicit — to which Israel has no option but to respond with force.' She goes on to note the "sickening role" the BBC has played in the enemy's propaganda. She concludes: 'The world will not be safe unless and until Iran and Syria are stopped. And there is only one country that can do that, and it is not Israel.' Read it all at the link.

Tammy Bruce on India. Tammy: 'Every day there is more and more evidence that the evil visited upon us on September 11th is indeed part of a worldwide jihad. Ours is indeed a world war against Radical Islam, which views everyone who does not subscribe to the Wahhabist doctrine as infidel. As the people of India are well aware, they have been targets of Islamist terrorists since before 2001, and remain a high priority for death by the al-Qaida death cult and its agents.' Go to the post for a link to Walid Phares.

US kills UN resolution on Gaza. As Wretchard says: Gaza, not Lebanon. Vital Perspective: 'The U.S. has rejected a Security Council resolution put forward by Qatar on behalf of Arab states that would have condemned Israel's two-week military incursion into Gaza. The vote on the draft resolution was 10-1, with the U.S. voting no and four countries abstaining: Britain, Denmark, Peru and Slovakia. A resolution requires at least nine votes and no vetos from any of the P-5 members. It was John Bolton's first veto since arriving at the UN.' Bolton, quoted in the article, spoke of the need to "focus our attention not just on Hamas, but on the state sponsors of terror who back them -- particularly Syria and Iran."

Peretz has plans for Hezbollah. JPost: 'Defense Minister Amir Peretz said Thursday night that, "We expected Hizbullah to break the rules, and now we intend to break them." '

Saudis blame Hezbollah. JPost: 'In an official statement, the Saudi government said that a distinction must be drawn between "legitimate resistance" and "adventurous, irresponsible acts" committed by groups in Lebanon who don't recognize the government and don't coordinate with other Arab nations.'

Commentary. Robert Avrech at Seraphic Secret writes: 'Karen just stepped into my office and said to me: "This war has no name. It needs a name, Robert." As always, Karen is right. My gut instinct was: The War of Tammuz. ... As we all know, names contain souls. By naming this war, we give it a specific historical and Jewish identity.' You might wonder: Can a war have a soul? But I believe Avrech's point is this: By giving the war an identity, we also give it meaning. This is the key. A war without meaning is simply a lot of dead bodies. With a name comes meaning, and with meaning comes the possiblity of redemption.

Jack Straw is Out as British Foreign Secretary

Free Iran News reports, with no great sorrow, that Jack Straw has been dismissed as the Blair government's foreign secretary:

Dears,

Our most dangerous enemy His Excellency! Jack (Without) Straw got the boot that he deserved.
Please read the following.

Hashem
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: Ramin EtebarSent: Friday, May 05, 2006 4:44 PM
To: Subject: Tony Blair Fires Foreign Secretary-Jack Straw
Importance: High

Jack Mo-Straw is fired

Ex-Marxist and one of the Leftover Neo-Liberal Old Europe anti-US diplomat who provided direct and indirect support to Islamists terrorists occupied Iran and other anti-American radicals, is now down to toilet of the history. During his time in the office, most of the terrorist groups and groups responsible for 9/11 disaster, were flourished in England.

The UK - and the left faction of the Labour party in particular - are seen by many Iranian activists as collaborators with the islamist regime in Tehran.

AP via Yahoo:

Stung by an election defeat, Tony Blair shuffled his Cabinet on Friday and replaced Foreign Secretary Jack Straw in an attempt to save his own political future and shore up support to tackle crises in Iran and Iraq.

Straw had privately expressed doubts about the Iraq war to his boss and publicly took a different stance on Iran. He described military action against Tehran as "inconceivable," something neither Blair nor President Bush would say, and called reports that the Bush administration has contingency plans for a tactical nuclear strike "nuts."

Margaret Beckett, a Blair loyalist who has been serving as environment secretary, takes over the Foreign Office, becoming Britain's first female foreign secretary.

BBC:

Charles Clarke has been sacked as home secretary in the biggest Cabinet reshuffle of Tony Blair's career. The prime minister is trying to regain momentum after one of the worst local election results in Labour's history.

Mr Clarke will be replaced by Defence Secretary John Reid. Margaret Beckett is the new foreign secretary, with Jack Straw becoming Commons leader.

Debka:

Jack Straw was shunted sideways as Commons leader in a massive reshuffle by Tony Blair after his Labor’s worst rout ever in local elections. The ballot was widely seen as a referendum on his government. The opposition Conservatives under its new leader David Cameron was the winner. In other changes, Home secretary Charles Clarke was removed following furor over his failure to deport 1,023 foreign criminals, to be replaced by defense secretary John Reid. Clarke’s offer to resign ten days earlier was rejected by Blair. Des Browne was promoted from chief secretary at the Treasury to defense. Dep. PM John Prescott lost his department after admitting to an extra-marital affair.

Russian Bombers Penetrated US Airspace

Maybe the Russians have invisible planes too?

The Intelligence Summit:

Moscow, Russia(Rai Novosti): Russian military planes flew undetected through the U.S. zone of the Arctic Ocean to Canada during recent military exercises, a senior Air Force commander said Saturday.

The commander of the country's long-range strategic bombers, Lieutenant General Igor Khvorov, said the U.S. Air Force is now investigating why its military was unable to detect the Russian bombers.

"They were unable to detect the planes either with radars or visually," he said.

Khorov said that during the military exercises in April, Tu-160 Blackjack bombers and Tu-95 Bears had successfully carried out four missile launches. Bombing exercises were held using Tu-22 Blinders.

By the end of the year, two more Tu-160s will be commissioned for the long-range strategic bomber fleet, Khorov said.

Both new planes will incorporate numerous upgrades from the initial Soviet models, the commander said. The bombers will be able to launch both cruise missiles and aviation bombs, and communicate via satellite.

Cross-posted at Dreams Into Lightning - Blogger.

State vs. Defense

Originally published May 6, 2004.

When you first read the article linked at my post “Chalabi Aiding Iranian Mullahs?”, didn’t you think it was just a tiny bit curious that “intelligence agencies” (meaning the CIA) were suddenly concerned about about those Iranian insurgents in Iraq? Especially when the Agency has never said peep about them? I know, it sounded odd to me too. But, according to the Newsweek piece, “the State Department and the CIA are using the intelligence about his Iran ties to persuade the president to cut him loose once and for all” [my emphasis – aa]. While “Chalabi still has loyal defenders among some neoconservatives in the Pentagon,” according to the article. (Those pesky neoconservatives! That damn Pentagon!)

In an April 30 article, Barbara Lerner addresses criticisms of what has been termed “Rumsfeld’s occupation” of Iraq. “First,” she says, “it’s not Rumsfeld’s occupation; it’s Colin Powell’s and George Tenet’s.” And second, that’s the problem. And one more thing: now there’s talk of handing Iraq over to the United Nations and Lakhdar Brahimi.

There are two factions at work in Washington: one, led by the White House and the Defense Department, and the other, led by the CIA and the State Department. According to Lerner, “Rumsfeld’s plan was to equip – and then transport to Iraq – some 10,000 Shia and Sunni freedom fighters led by Shia exile leader Ahmed Chalabi” to join Kurdish freedom fighters led by Jalal Talabani and Massoud Barzani. General Garner would have then handed power over to these three, and six others, in “a matter of weeks – not months or years” thus greatly enhancing the legitimacy of the new Iraqi government.

But State and the CIA had other ideas. Garner was replaced with State man Paul Bremer. The Iraqi exile force was slashed to a few hundred, while Rumsfeld’s trio was inflated to a total of 25, with the result that “Bremer’s face [was] the only one most Iraqis saw.”

In Bemer’s GC, many Iraqis “saw a foreign occupation occupation of potentially endless length” led by untrustworthy Americans, while Syria and Iran set about trying to carve up the newly liberated Iraq.

Now check out David Frum’s new piece (May 6). Money quote: “Those inside the government pushing the line that Mr. Chalabi has divulged secrets to the Iranians come from the same bureaucracies, the State Department and CIA, that have also advocated for the inclusion of Iraqi parties with more open links to Tehran in the Iraqi Governing Council, such as the Dawa Party.” Attention, Department of Pots and Kettles.

And speaking of Foggy Bottom and Tehran, read this from Frum’s May 5 post:
“And those intrepid foes of Iranian imperialism at the State Department? What have they done? In March 2004, Colin Powell agreed with the European allies to drop US demands for Security Council action against Iran. US policy is now one of “engagement” with Iran – even as Iran hosts al Qaeda on its territory and supports terrorism inside Iraq.” For Frum’s devastating analysis, read the whole post at the link.

But I digress. Back to the original question: Is the Iraq occupation Powell’s or Rumsfeld’s? With the horrifying revelations that have come to light since Barbara Lerner’s article was published, Rumsfeld’s reputation is now badly tarnished. But in any event, Lerner is adamant that the occupation must not be Brahimi’s. “The UN as a whole is bad; Lakhdar Brahimi is worse,” she writes. “Men like Chalabi, Talabani, and Barzani have nothing but contempt for Mr. Brahimi, the UN, and the Old Europe.” These are the ones we must support – regardless of where Rumsfeld’s career may take him.