at-Largely

Pakistan goes political kaboom...

This is looking worse and worse:

"Pakistan's six-week-old coalition is unraveling because of a dispute over whether to remove President Pervez Musharraf, undermining efforts to rein in surging food prices and maintain stability.    

Nine ministers from Nawaz Sharif's party withdrew from the cabinet today after the former Prime Minister failed to win the reinstatement of justices who might force Musharraf's ouster. Sharif's senior coalition partner, Asif Ali Zardari, favors leaving the former army general as president while stripping away powers he seized during eight years of military rule.    

The stalemate has hampered government efforts to control inflation, which jumped last month to its highest rate in at least 25 years, and to ensure food for the poorer half of Pakistan's 160 million people. The struggle between Sharif's Pakistan Muslim League and Zardari's Pakistan Peoples Party is helping Musharraf regain influence after his supporters lost half of their National Assembly seats in the February election.    

``The country is on the brink of a social upheaval because of food prices and the fact that people are struggling to survive,'' said Ishtiaq Ahmed, a political scientist at Quaid-i- Azam University in Islamabad. The division ``strengthens the hand'' of Musharraf's camp, ``which keeps power through a strategy of divide and rule,'' Ahmed said."

The good news is in this mess (if such a mess can have good news) is that at least in Pakistan someone  is willing to fight for the people. In the US, extremely high gas prices have made Congress stand up and...  and... and ... engage in bipartisan finger-pointing. 

Oh, and the firing of justices in Pakistan? Well that too appears to be part of someone in Pakistan fighting for the people. In the US, the firing of US Attorneys who would not engage in political prosecutions (and the retaining of US Attorneys who did) has gotten Congress to... to... write more letters demanding answers.

Yes,  in a third-world country - falling apart and infested with terrorists of the actual al Qaeda variety - government officials of two parties whose leaders have either been assassinated or have had an assassination attempt on their life still seem to be fighting for the people.

The bad news is that with this much instability and with Bush throwing nuclear-war hopes toward Iran, the failed war on terror will implode into an all out free-for all. If only we had a Congress who might stop funding the Iraq war and actually have some concern for our national security. 

Freedom is on the farce!

Enemies Foreign, Enemies Domestic

by Jeff Huber

“I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.” – from the U.S. military officer oath

In an April 10 speech at the White House, Mr. Bush stated that, “two of the greatest threats to America in this new century” are “al Qaeda and Iran.”  For once in his presidency, Mr. Bush is probably right.  Al Qaeda and Iran, in fact, may be America’s only two remaining foreign threats. 

Russia and China won’t try to beat us militarily; they’ll take us down economically.  Europe doesn’t even need to take us down economically because it already has: The European Union’s gross domestic product surpassed ours by about $600 billion in 2007.  Australia’s happy the way it is; Japan won’t rock the boat.  South America is too corrupt.  Africa is far too hot and Canada’s too cold, as the song by Randy Newman says. 

Yep, as far as significant foreign enemies go, Iran and al-Qaeda are about it: a country with an gross domestic product and defense budget barely six percent of America’s, and an “organization” with no economy or navy or air force at all, and no proper army to speak of.

Mr. Bush was telling us, in the Freudian fashion he so often utilizes, that the enemies we really need to worry about are of the domestic variety. 

Rovewell, USA

Posted by Jeff Huber

I’ve said more than once that America’s most profound strategic casualty in the woebegone war on terror has been its information environment.  The recent military operation in Iraq against Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr’s organization once again illustrates how we have entered a post-modern Orwellian (Rovewellian) age of dissonant dystopia. 

The Horse’s Mouthpiece

General David Petraeus, George W. Bush’s “main man” in Iraq, reacted to the March 23 shelling of the Green Zone in Baghdad by doing what he does best: he blamed the Iranians.  Petraeus trying to make Iran responsible for his own failures has become so commonplace it’s barely worth noting; but the manner in which the media portrayed his accusation warrants further scrutiny.

The BBC, Fox News, ABC News, Voice of America and other major news outlets reported that Petraeus said he has “evidence” that the elite Quds Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps was behind the Green Zone attack.  None of those outlets, however, mentioned what that evidence consisted of, or if Petraeus mentioned what it might be, or whether any of them bothered to ask him about it.  In fact, it’s hard to find evidence in any of the reports that Petraeus actually said he had any evidence. 

Jeff's Week Endnotes

Posted by Jeff Huber

Here are the stories that got my attention this week.

1. Robin Wright and Joby Warrick, “U.S. Steps Up Unilateral Strikes in Pakistan,” Washington Post, Thursday. 
Wright and Warrick note that U.S. strikes on al Qaeda sites (i.e., “villages”) in Pakistan are taking place in accord with “a tacit understanding with Musharraf and Army chief Gen. Ashfaq Kiyani that allows U.S. strikes on foreign fighters operating in Pakistan.”  My question is, and has been, who in the U.S. is ordering these operations and under what authority?  I’ve also asked this question about Somalia, where we’re also bombing selected al Qaeda villages. 

I’ve heard the answer that the host governments have invited us in, and that’s dandy.  But host governments don’t order U.S. troops into hostilities; the president does that, and he does it with either a) a declaration of war from Congress or b) specific statutory authority of Congress.  One can reasonably argue that the original Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) of September 2001 covers our activities in Afghanistan, and the separate Iraq AUMF authorizes combat actions there.  But there is no AUMF for Pakistan or Somalia.  No one in Congress or, that I can find, the mainstream media is raising an eyebrow over this, although plenty of these folks are screaming about other executive branch abuses of constitutional authority.

McQaeda

Posted by Jeff Huber

It must be a kick in the head to base your claim to the presidency on your savvy in foreign affairs only to have it get out that Joe Lieberman knows more about them than you do. I bet it’s a lot like how I feel when my dog corrects my grammar in front of people.

One would like to think that Senator John McCain misspoke when he said in Jordan during his tour of the Middle East that the Iranians have been “taking Al Qaeda into Iran, training them and sending them back.” He is, after all, the ranking Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee and the GOP’s designated crown prince, so you’d think he’d be aware that the official rant is that Iran is training Shiite Iraqi militants, not the Sunni al Qaeda guys. But no, McCain made the Iran-al Qaeda accusation four times in just over three weeks, and it wasn’t until Lieberman cooed something in his ear that he said, “I’m sorry. The Iranians are training extremists, not Al Qaeda.”

More Saudi Censorship Ploys...

Saudi billionaire and terrorist financier, Khalid bin Mahfouz, is a bit upset because a new book documents his role... wait for it... as a terrorist financier.

Mahfouz is so upset about the publication of Funding Evil: How Terrorism  is Financed and How to Stop It, that he is willing to make sure the book's author, Rachel Ehrenfeld, serves as an example to others who are interested in following the money to his doorstep.

"Rachel Ehrenfeld writes about terrorism for a living. But now she is the one who feels targeted. Her modest midtown Manhattan apartment is filled to the ceiling with books, most having to do with global terror networks and Mideast conflict. Sitting at her desk, she gazes out at the Hudson River. She says she has a hard time placing her work. She says she has been blacklisted. If she travels to England, she fears she will be arrested.

"I feel like a leper," she said.

Ehrenfeld faces a $225,000 judgment obtained in a British court in a libel suit brought by a former banker to the Saudi royal family, billionaire Khalid bin Mahfouz. "That's the Damocles sword effect. He's holding it above my head to intimidate me and others," she said.

The source of the trouble is Ehrenfeld's book, "Funding Evil: How Terrorism is Financed and How to Stop It," published by Bonus Books. In it, she named bin Mahfouz as a financier of Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda. Bin Mahfouz responded by suing Ehrenfeld -- not in the U.S., but in England, which is friendlier to libel claims.

Bin Mahfouz maintains Ehrenfeld's statements about him are false and reckless and says she is perpetuating myths that have followed him around the globe, endangering his business affairs."

I think Mahfouz protests too much. The reality of his involvement in terrorism networks is undeniable. Let's focus on just on, of many, ties that Mahfouz has to terrorism - let's focus on the Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI) scandal. I warn you now that you will need to do some reading, because this is far too complex for a summary.

• Congressional Investigation (Senator Kerry's report) on the BCCI scandal
• BCCI Overview
• FAS's excellent overview of the players in the BCCI scandal, as well as the role of the ruling family of Abu Dhabi
• The Pakistani ISI's funding (BCCI)

Report On Saddam - Al Qaeda Non-Connection Buried

Posted By Cernig

Over at Newshoggers, my co-blogger Fester mentioned just yesterday a new Pentagon report that, after a review of 600,000 pages of documents, concluded there was no meaningful connection between Saddam and Al Qaeda - contradicting the statements of Bush, Cheney, Rummie, Colin Powell and others?

Well, it's been buried.

This morning, the Pentagon cancelled plans to send out a press release announcing the report's release and will no longer make the report available online.

The report was to be posted on the Joint Forces Command website this afternoon, followed by a background briefing with the authors. No more. The report will be made available only to those who ask for it, and it will be sent via U.S. mail from Joint Forces Command in Norfolk, Virginia.

It won't be emailed to reporters and it won't be posted online.

Asked why the report would not be posted online and could not be emailed, the spokesman for Joint Forces Command said: "We're making the report available to anyone who wishes to have it, and we'll send it out via CD in the mail."

Another Pentagon official said initial press reports on the study made it "too politically sensitive."

As long as this report isn't widely available, wingnuts can console themselves with their fevered dreams of Al Qaeda conspiring with Saddam, just as they keep recycling delusional fantasies about Saddam's WMDs being spirited away to Syria.

Steve Benen adds:

And if asked, I’m certain Dana Perino would insist, with a mostly straight face, that the White House never contacted the Pentagon about this, and it was solely the decision of military officials, who, for whatever reason, preferred to hide its own report.

And no one will believe her.

Except Bush and the loyal base, who have so much psychologically invested in believing all this claptrap that their world view might collapse like a house of cards if they ever looked outside their echo chamber.

US bombs Somalia...

We are fighting them over "there," but where that "there" is, no one really knows. Al Qaeda's power is in Pakistan and Afghanistan, funded by the Saudi regime. But we are not "there" (in Pakistan) and we are not there (in Saudi Arabia), and we have long since let Afgahnistan slide into chaos, so we are technically not "there" either.

Apparently the "there" is Iraq and Somalia (and a covert war against Iran). So if we are not fighting Al Qaeda at their epicenter or at their second base of power or even their source of funding, then who the hell are we fighting (them) over "there" and why?

I give you the latest from the "war of terror" front where the "there" is not really where it should be and therefor, we seem not to be fighting the "them" as we should be. Somalia, emphasis mine:

America  has launched a missile attack on southern Somalia against a suspected terrorist with links to al-Qa'eda. Three Tomahawk missiles fired from a submarine hit the town of Dobley, five miles from Somalia's border with Kenya, destroying a house and injuring at least six people.

A Pentagon official said it was a "deliberate and precise strike" aimed at a specific target - believed to have been Hassan Turki, the head of the hardline Shebab youth organisation - at a meeting of militant Islamists. "This attack was against a known al-Qa'eda terrorist," said Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman.

"As we have repeatedly said, we will continue to pursue terrorist activities and their operations wherever we may find them." It was unclear last night if the attack had achieved its objective.

It was the fourth air strike by US forces in Somalia in 14 months, all targeted at hardliners who Washington believed were linked to al-Qa'eda."

You found "them" in Pakistan. So why are you not "there?" You found "them" in Afghanistan, so why did you leave "there" to go to Iraq? And "they" are certainly in and funded by Saudi Arabia, but you did not go "there" either. So what makes Somalia so special as to rouse the attention of our military industrial complex?

The most interesting part about this, however, is that Brian Whitman still has a job after his propaganda debacle. Let's recall Brian's excellent service to this country, shall we?

Let's look at what the brilliant Gareth Porter reports today on the Iranian-US Navy non-event that nearly caused WWIII. From his Asia Times article:

"WASHINGTON - Senior Pentagon officials,  evidently reflecting a broader administration  policy decision, used an off-the-record Pentagon briefing to turn the January 6 US-Iranian incident  in the Strait of Hormuz into a sensational story   demonstrating Iran's military aggressiveness, a reconstruction of the events following the  incident shows.

The initial press stories on the incident, all of which can be traced to a  briefing by deputy assistant secretary of defense  for public affairs in charge of media operations, Bryan Whitman, contained similar information that has since been repudiated by the navy itself."

So Bryan Whitman held an off-the-record briefing (which technically means that information provided could not be used on the record... but it was used, meaning that Whitman only wanted his name off the record), in which he provided the Pentagon press corps with propaganda and asked that his name not be used.  The reporters who cover this beat are not meant to investigate, they are wire reporters. So the story is planted just in time for President Bush's visit to Israel. The Navy now repudiates the incident, do they? Back to the article:

"Then the navy disseminated a short video into which was spliced the audio of a phone call warning that US warships would "explode" in "a few seconds". Although it  was ostensibly a navy production, Inter Press Service (IPS) has learned that the ultimate decision on its content was made by top officials of the Defense Department.

The encounter between five small and apparently unarmed speedboats, each carrying a crew of two to four men, and the three US warships occurred very early  on Saturday January 6, Washington time. No information was released to the public about the incident for more than 24 hours, indicating that  it was not viewed initially as being very urgent. "

Do you feel good about the Somalia attack on "Al Qaeda" when the person telling you these "facts" is Bryan Whitman?

Pakistan Bananastan

Posted by Jeff Huber

Pakistan, it appears, has replaced Afghanistan as the world's top Bananastan.

You may remember "Afghanistan bananastan" from the 1972 film The Hot Rock, in which thief Robert Redford uses the phrase to put vault guards into a hypnotic trance.  Today, a "Bananastan" is (largely by my decree) a South Asian equivalent of a South American Banana Republic.  Don't confuse a Bananastan with a Bananaraq, which is a Southwest Asian Banana Republic, or with the Barbecue Republic, which is the United States. 

Like a Banana Republic, Pakistan is rife with corruption and has been ruled of late by a puppet of the Barbecue Republic who has run roughshod over his country's constitution and judicial system; which, come to think of it, makes the Bananastan a lot like the Barbecue Republic, too.  In many ways, in fact, Pakistan objectifies all that has failed in American foreign policy, and in America itself, over the past seven years and change. 

BAE, Bandar, Blair - And Bulls**t

Posted By Cernig

The UK government's excuses for halting corruption investigations into an arm deal with Saudi Arabia just took an overly-dramatic turn.

Previously secret files describe how investigators were told they faced "another 7/7" and the loss of "British lives on British streets" if they pressed on with their inquiries and the Saudis carried out their threat to cut off intelligence.

Prince Bandar, the head of the Saudi national security council, and son of the crown prince, was alleged in court to be the man behind the threats to hold back information about suicide bombers and terrorists. He faces accusations that he himself took more than £1bn in secret payments from the arms company BAE.

He was accused in yesterday's high court hearings of flying to London in December 2006 and uttering threats which made the prime minister, Tony Blair, force an end to the Serious Fraud Office investigation into bribery allegations involving Bandar and his family.

The threats halted the fraud inquiry, but triggered an international outcry, with allegations that Britain had broken international anti-bribery treaties.

Lord Justice Moses, hearing the civil case with Mr Justice Sullivan, said the government appeared to have "rolled over" after the threats. He said one possible view was that it was "just as if a gun had been held to the head" of the government.

The government's lawyer said the threat to national security was a clear one:

Philip Sales QC, appearing on behalf of the director of the SFO, Robert Wardle, said that since Saudi Arabia was not subject to British law, nothing could be done.

He said it was legitimate for Wardle to take into account the fact the state "did not have the resources to meet the threat in the ordinary way".

..."What you are saying is that the law is powerless to protect our own sovereignty - the law cannot be deployed as a weapon to protect the sovereignty of this country," said Lord Justice Moses.

Yesterday, Moses asked why the Saudis had not been told, "You can't talk to us like that", and said the threats would have been a criminal offence in British law.

Today, Moses asked Sales if he thought nothing could be done to resist such threats from powerful foreign states.

Sales said: "Correct - we cannot compel Saudi Arabia to adopt a different stance." He said it was "a fact of life" and said the director could not "magic this situation away".

"The director has made it clear how important he thought the security implications were," Sales said. "He accepted what he was advised as to the imminence of the threat. It cannot be said that he acted irrationally."

Hang on. We're expected to believe that such serious threats caused the government to order bribe investigations dropped - - but that the government then pressed ahead anyway with a 40 billion pound sale of advanced Eurofighter Typhoon fighters to the nation that had just threatened Britain's security. What an amazing admission.

Either these "secret papers" are utter BS or Blair himself was amazingly, criminally, incompetent in continuing the sale. I'm personally betting the former - possibly both. Especially considering the many cash for honours scandals that surround Blair's time in office and his obvious avarice nowadays.

And before my American friends write this off as a purely British scandal - recall that much of the bribe money Prince Bandar is alleged to have received from the UK over the years was funnelled through the now-defunct Riggs Bank in Washington. Let's also not lose sight of the certainty that Bush would certainly have been told about the Saudi threats to Britain but went ahead anyway with his own massive arms sale to a nation that had so threatened an ally and fellow NATO member. This one is shaping up to be the scandal that keeps giving.