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NUCLEAR
China, U.S. to resume suspended military links
China's Guangdong nuclear plant to issue bonds
Depleted Uranium: UN addresses issue
Speaker blasts possible war on Iraq
Greens attack EU Commission's nuclear proposals
Israel shows off anti-missile system
North Korea Softens Its Tone on Nuclear Arms Agreement
No N.Korea Impunity on Nukes, Pentagon Says
U.S.: N. Korea Debates Are Intense
Bunker-busters set to go nuclear
Re: NPP Containment Dome Thickness Lies By Nuclear Industry
US intelligence: seeing what it wants to see in Iraq
Bush Says He's Confident U.N. Will Pass Resolution on Iraq
MILITARY
Report of Arms Sale to Iraq Roils Ukraine Politics
U.S. and China Agree to Ship Visit
Oil after Saddam: All bets are in
Saddam Urges World to Stop 'Evil' US - British Plans
US, British Jets Strike Southern Iraq Again
Netanyahu Starts Cabinet Job
Israel Bares Arrow Missile in Warning to Iraq
Israel Unveils Anti - Missile System
U.S. jets to patrol skies over NATO summit in Prague
U.S. Warning on Pakistan
Pakistan: Army Moves Against Pro-Taliban Element
Retired ICBMs Still Useful, U.S. Air Force Official Says
U.S., Reacting to Pentagon Spy Case, Expels 4 Cuban Envoys
Indonesians Say They Suspect C.I.A. in Bali Blast
Sweden May Expel Russian in Ericsson Spy Probe
U.S. Gives U.N. an Iraq Measure, Seeks a Council Vote
Pentagon Moving B-2 Bombers to New Roosts Closer to Baghdad
POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS
U.S. Raids Foil Plots to Send Arms to Al Qaeda and Others
Indonesian Police Say Suspect Admits Role in Bali Bombing
ENERGY AND OTHER
Zero Energy Home Being Built In Tucson
The oil question
White House sees better prospects for energy bill
Dangerous Pathogen Found in Arizona Town's Water
Two Plague Patients in New York Hospital
ACTIVISTS
Australia: Ellison to pull plug on protest websites
Stop Nuclear Fuel Company from Hijacking the NRC Licensing Process!
Massive Convergence at Fort Benning: Only One Week Away!!
Ramsey Clark to defend Plowshares nun
Conservation Groups Fear Republican Congress
-------- NUCLEAR
-------- china
China, U.S. to resume suspended military links
November 7, 2002
ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20021107-20234462.htm
In signs of improving U.S.-Chinese military relations, Beijing has agreed to let a U.S. Navy ship visit a mainland port this month, and the United States will host a group of Chinese generals next month.
Pentagon officials also said yesterday that the admiral who commands all U.S. forces in the Pacific will visit China in December.
Those three events will be the first of their kind since U.S.-Chinese military relations were ruptured by political fallout from the collision of a U.S. Navy surveillance plane with a Chinese fighter jet over the South China Sea in April 2001.
In addition, the Pentagon announced that senior-level defense talks not held since November-December 2000 will resume Dec. 9 in Washington. The decision to proceed with those talks was made during President Bush's meeting in Texas last month with Chinese President Jiang Zemin, but no date had been set.
The Pentagon delegation to the Washington talks will be led by Douglas Feith, the undersecretary of defense for policy. U.S. officials said the Chinese delegation will be led by Mr. Feith's counterpart, Gen. Xiong Guang Kai.
Although Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld never officially severed military-to-military contacts with China after the surveillance plane incident, he ordered a case-by-case review of contacts. The practical effect was that only low-level activities such as talks on military maritime safety have been held since 2001.
Mr. Rumsfeld was livid at China's accusation that the Navy's EP-3 surveillance plane violated Chinese sovereignty by landing at a Chinese airfield after the aerial collision. He also was angered that China detained the crew for 11 days and refused to allow the United States to repair and fly the plane off the airfield.
In recent months, however, the two countries have taken steps to repair military-to-military relations.
A Pentagon spokesman, Lt. Cmdr. Jeff Davis, said China and the United States have enough mutual interests, including concern over North Korea's nuclear-weapons program and the war on terrorism, to justify closer relations.
"Progress on the overall U.S.-China bilateral relationship supports having strategic and policy dialogue between our two militaries," Cmdr. Davis said in announcing the Navy ship visit and the Chinese generals' U.S. tour.
Some Pentagon officials feared that announcing both the ship visit and the Chinese generals' visit at the same time would give the impression that the Pentagon was rushing to normalize relations.
"We are taking a measured, pragmatic approach to conducting military contacts with China," Cmdr. Davis said.
He said Mr. Rumsfeld's policy of reviewing proposed exchanges on a case-by-case basis is still in effect.
----
China's Guangdong nuclear plant to issue bonds
REUTERS CHINA:
November 7, 2002
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/18486/story.htm
SHANGHAI - China's Guangdong Nuclear Power Holding Co Ltd will begin issuing four billion yuan ($483 million) in 15-year corporate bonds next Monday, a company official said yesterday.
The central bank had approved an annual interest coupon of 4.5 percent on the domestic bonds, the official said.
"Everything is ready now for the issue," he said.
The company said in a statement last week it would issue the bonds to domestic institutional and retail investors but it did not give a timetable for the launch.
Proceeds would be used to expand the Ling Ao nuclear power station based in the southern province of Guangdong, the announcement said. The State Development Bank is the lead underwriter, it said.
The company issued 2.5 billion yuan in seven-year bonds last year for the construction of the Ling Ao station.
The official said the first generator started operation in May with an installed capacity of 984,000 kilowatt-hours and a second generator with the same capacity was scheduled to start in March 2003.
The Ling Ao nuclear power station is Guangdong's second after the Daya nuclear station. Construction of the Ling Ao plant began in 1997.
Guangdong Nuclear Power Holding Co, with registered capital of 10.2 billion yuan, specialises in building, operating and making research in nuclear power stations.
The company had a net profit of 1.89 billion yuan in 2001 verses 1.85 billion yuan a year earlier and had assets of 49.86 billion yuan at the end of 2001.
-------- depleted uranium
Depleted Uranium: UN addresses issue
2002-11-07
Timothy BANCROFT-HINCHEY
PRAVDA.Ru
http://english.pravda.ru/main/2002/11/07/39269.html
In a message to the international community on the occasion of the International day for Preventing the Exp+loitation of the Environment in War and Armed Conflict, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan specifically referred to Depleted Uranium yesterday, stating that it was damaging to the environment.
It will be remembered that US military aircraft deployed tonnes of weapons coated or tipped with depleted uranium in southern Iraq and in Yugoslavia during conflicts in the 1990s. Systematic claims by the Iraqi Health Authorities, published in Pravda.Ru, were scorned or ignored and constant complaints by the Yugoslav authorities concerning alarmingly high clusters of cancerous diseases among civilians living near areas in which DU weaponry was deployed, were investigated - but met wqith systematic denial by the Pentagon and by NATO.
In his speech, Kofi Annan stated that "While environmental damage is a common consequence of war, it should never be a deliberate aim...although international conventions govern nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, new technologies, such as depleted uranium ammunition, threaten the environment".
----
Speaker blasts possible war on Iraq
By Hayes Hickman,
Knox News-Sentinel staff writer
November 7, 2002
http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/local_news/article/0,1406,KNS_347_1529924,00.html
Dr. Rania Masri repeatedly posed the question of "where is the threat?" as she made her case against a U.S. invasion of Iraq during a University of Tennessee guest lecture Wednesday night.
And when Masri eventually opened the floor to questions from the audience, she encouraged anyone who disagreed with her to speak up.
There were few takers.
She attacked the Bush administration's call for a regime change in Iraq, as well as contentions of the Middle Eastern power's possible production of weapons of mass destruction.
Rather than self-defense, America's real interest is oil, Masri contended.
"We're not talking democracy," she said. "We're talking about taking control of other people's resources."
Masri, a national board member of the Education for Peace in Iraq Center, blamed United Nations sanctions and U.S. bombing attacks since the Gulf War for causing widespread disease and hunger among the Iraqi people.
"Morphine, for God's sake, is banned by the sanctions," she said.
She also accused the United States of using depleted uranium bombs during the previous war, which she said were responsible for leukemia cases that continue to rise among Iraqi people.
"What if they use them again?" she asked. "These are questions that we're not asking."
Masri went on to say that the war now being proposed in U.N. resolutions would affect Americans, too, in terms of monetary expense and personal freedoms.
The cost could be better spent on health care for the uninsured and improvements in public education, she said.
And as she argued that the war on terrorism already has threatened personal freedoms, she said that a new war would only heighten such a cost.
"Yes, we suffered on 9-11, yes it was an act of terrorism. But will this war make us safer?" she asked. "The CIA says our chances of being attacked will increase if we go to war - not some beatniks in Berkley, but the CIA. Is Bush even reading these reports?"
The free event at the University Center was sponsored by the UT Muslim Student Association, which hosted a similar lecture by Masri last year.
She concluded the Wednesday night speech by describing her own experiences as an American who was raised to believe she should be willing to die for her country.
And then Masri asked the audience of about 150 attendees, "What will you risk for peace?"
Hayes Hickman may be reached at 865-342-6323 or hickman@knews.com.
-------- europe
Greens attack EU Commission's nuclear proposals
Story by Patrick Lannin
REUTERS EU:
November 7, 2002
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/18493/story.htm
BRUSSELS - Europe's top energy official unveiled proposals yesterday to boost safety at nuclear plants and provide funds for decommissioning old reactors, sparking a furious response from foes of atomic power.
EU Energy Commissioner Loyola de Palacio proposed common safety standards and cross-border monitoring, timetables for European Union countries to decide on burial sites for the most radioactive waste, and talks with Russia on nuclear fuel supplies to future EU members in eastern Europe.
The Commission also said it wanted to boost the cash available to the EU nuclear authority Euratom by two billion euros ($1.99 billion) to pay for safety measures and help the decommissioning of old plants in former Soviet bloc countries, both EU candidates and others.
"It is our responsibility to ensure a common approach to nuclear safety and waste management," de Palacio said. "European citizens would never forgive us for inaction by the EU in this field," she added in a statement.
But Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and members of the European Parliament from Green parties - all hostile to nuclear power, which they regard as unsafe and a threat to the environment - strongly opposed the initiative.
"De Palacio, the pro-nuclear energy commissioner behind the nuclear package, wants to show that problems perceived by opponents of nuclear power, like safety and radioactive waste, are gone," said Claude Turmes, a Green parliament member from Luxembourg.
"But the details of the package show clearly that the only purpose is to revitalise the nuclear industry in an enlarged EU," Turmes added.
DIVERGENT POLICIES
Some EU countries, such as Sweden and Italy, bar nuclear power, while others, such as France, greatly depend on atomic energy. Finland recently decided to build the first new nuclear plant in western Europe in more than a decade.
De Palacio said she wanted an independent nuclear safety authority monitoring each EU country but opposed creating EU inspectors or conducting spot checks of nuclear plants.
The commissioner also urged EU states to decide by 2008 on a timetable for building sites to bury highly radioactive waste, which should be operational by 2018. For less radioactive waste, disposal arrangements should be ready by 2013, she said.
Because of fierce resistance by environmental groups, many EU countries lack long-term storage facilities for spent fuel and store nuclear waste at power plants or temporary sites.
De Palacio said eastern European states, many of which still run Soviet-era nuclear reactors, needed a secure supply of fissile material, which the talks with Moscow would seek.
The Commission said its proposal to raise Euratom's borrowing ceiling to six billion euros from four billion euros would cover nuclear safety and decommissioning projects.
Greens called such funding "cheap and dirty" nuclear loans.
-------- israel
Israel shows off anti-missile system in attempt to discourage any Iraqi attack
Thu Nov 7, 2002
By GREG MYRE,
Associated Press Writer
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=524&u=/ap/20021107/ap_wo_en_po/israel_arrow_missiles_1&printer=1
PALMACHIM AIR FORCE BASE, Israel - Israel's defense against a potential Iraqi missile attack was on full display Thursday: Arrow anti-missile batteries were pointed skyward amid the sand and scrub brush, confidently displayed to reporters as part of a public relations blitz aimed at discouraging Saddam Hussein from firing his Scuds.
Reuters Photo Reuters Slideshow Slideshow: Israel Anti-Missile System
AP Video Israel Unveils Anti-Missile System (AP Video)
Israel's Arrow system is the most advanced in the world currently deployed, and the air force expresses full faith that it has closed a window of vulnerability that allowed Iraq to rain 39 missiles on Israel during the 1991 Gulf War.
"I'm sure we are better prepared today," said Brig. Gen. Yair Dori, head of the military's Air Defense Forces. "In 1991, we had almost nothing. Now we have a very active, robust defense."
Israel and the United States have spent upward of US$2 billion to develop the Arrow, first deployed two years ago at the Palmachim Air Force Base to protect nearby Tel Aviv and surrounding areas.
A second battery has been deployed outside the northern coastal city of Hadera to shield that part of the country. A third battery is being built.
Officials would not say how many actual Arrow missiles exist. Each costs about US$3 million.
For Israel, having the system is only part of the battle. The military also believes that advertising the Arrow will deter Saddam from striking if he comes under attack from the United States.
U.S. President George W. Bush has said the United States is prepared to invade Iraq if Saddam does not allow United Nations (news - web sites) weapons inspectors to dismantle any weapons of mass destruction that Iraq may posses.
Israel on Thursday brought a bus load of journalists for briefings and a view of the four dun-colored missile launchers, each loaded with six Arrow missiles, air force officials said. The launchers are set about 100 yards (meters) apart from each other in the otherwise empty flatlands a short distance from the sea.
"I'm sure (Saddam's) motivation is to bring Israel into this conflict," Dori said as he stood next to a 25-foot tall Arrow. "But I'm also sure that fewer missiles will fall into Israel."
In the Gulf War, the United States rushed Patriot missile defense batteries to Israel. But the Patriots, built as an anti-aircraft system and modified to guard against incoming missiles, had little success against the Iraqi Scuds.
A Patriot can only knock out an incoming missile near the end of its flight, when the unstable Scud missiles started to break apart. On Israeli radar screens, the disintegrating missiles would appear as a clouds of debris, making it impossible for Israeli air defense teams to determine which part was the warhead, Israeli officials said.
In contrast, the Arrow is designed specifically to intercept an incoming missile at a high point.
Israel officers said it would be realistic for an Arrow to intercept an incoming Scud at least 50 kilometers (31 miles) above the ground and 100 kilometers (62 miles) from the Arrow's launch site. That means the Arrow would in theory hit Scuds while they were still high over neighboring Jordan.
In the Gulf War, all the Iraqi missiles had conventional warheads - but the main fear now, as then, is the possibility of a nonconventional attack, including biological and chemical war heads.
However, Martin van Creweld, a leading military historian, said Saddam was much less likely to fire missiles at Israel in a coming conflict.
Last time, the effort was intended to break up the U.S.-led coalition in 1991, but failed. No such alliance exists today, and Saddam, who was believed to have hundreds of Scud missiles during the Gulf War, now has a much smaller arsenal.
Van Creweld described the Arrow system as a significant technological advance, but sees it as extremely expensive and wasteful for the level of threat Israel faces.
"If it were me, I would rely on the threat of retaliation," said van Creweld, an Israeli. "There is no defense system that is 100 percent effective."
The Israeli air force believes it would now shoot down more than 90 percent of incoming missiles from Iraq, but acknowledges it won't know the level of effectiveness unless there is real fire.
Officials have said eight of nine tests of the Arrow system were successful.
Iraq's Scud missiles must be fired from the country's far western desert to reach Israel, about 600 kilometers (370 miles) away. Despite this limited launch area, U.S. and British troops were unable to find and destroy a single Scud missile launcher during the 1991 war.
In the early stages of any new U.S. assault, American forces are expected to carry out an intensive search of western Iraq to track down missiles and launchers.
The Iraqi missiles can reach Israel in less than eight minutes. Last time around, the wildly inaccurate Scuds were aimed at Tel Aviv and other densely populated cities and towns along Israel's Mediterranean coast. They caused extensive damage and injures, but no deaths.
Saddam did not risk targeting Jerusalem, where the eastern part of the city has many Arab residents and Muslim holy sites that could be struck inadvertently.
During the Gulf War, Israel relied on U.S. satellite information about Scud missile launches and often did not get warnings until a missile was less than five minutes away.
U.S.-Israeli cooperation has been stepped up today, and Israel now has the Green Pine radar system, which should be able to pinpoint Iraqi missile launches. Israel hopes to have a minimum of five minutes to respond to any attack, and needs about two to three minutes to launch an Arrow that intercepts the incoming missile, according to air force officials.
Israel still has Patriot batteries that would be used as a second line of defense. Israel carried out two successful tests of upgraded Patriots on Wednesday, air force officials said.
-------- korea
THE ASIAN FRONT
North Korea Softens Its Tone on Nuclear Arms Agreement
November 7, 2002
New York Times
By DON KIRK
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/07/international/asia/07KORE.html
SEOUL, South Korea, Nov. 6 - A former American ambassador to South Korea said today that during a four-day visit to Pyongyang, a senior North Korean official had told him the 1994 Geneva framework agreement under which the North promised to stop developing nuclear weapons was "hanging by a thread."
The language, while dire-sounding, is actually a step down from North Korea's earlier stance that the agreement had been "nullified."
The former ambassador, Donald Gregg, who arrived here on Tuesday after his visit to the North Korean capital, was describing his conversations with Deputy Foreign Minister Kang Sok Ju.
James A. Kelly, assistant secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific, visited Pyongyang in early October. He was the first high-level American envoy to visit North Korea since President Bush's election. He reported that Mr. Kang had declared the Geneva agreement "nullified," language that was repeated in a North Korean statement released at the United Nations late last month. Mr. Kelly has also said that, at those meetings, North Korea acknowledged that it was developing nuclear warheads with highly enriched uranium. Mr. Gregg, who served as ambassador to South Korea during the presidency of Mr. Bush's father, said that in nearly 10 hours of discussions with three senior North Korean officials, they also took a different stance. "The North Koreans said they had adopted a `neither confirm nor deny' policy toward the uranium issue," Mr. Gregg said. Some of their comments came "close to admission they had a program under way," he said, but none went beyond that.
Mr. Gregg, who is president of the Korea Society in New York, was accompanied on the visit by Don Oberdorfer, a journalist and author who has written extensively about North Korea and is now a professor at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies in Washington.
Mr. Gregg said that the North Korean officials emphasized the need for a nonaggression agreement that did not have to be as complex as a formal peace treaty. "They would like the United States to give some assurance we do not intend to blow them out of the water," he said.
--------
No N.Korea Impunity on Nukes, Pentagon Says
November 7, 2002
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/politics/politics-korea-north-usa.html
SEOUL (Reuters) - Allowing North Korea to conduct business as usual with the world while it violates international nuclear agreements will send the wrong message to the communist state, a senior U.S. defense official said on Thursday.
Visiting U.S. Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith said Washington was working with South Korea and other allies to forge a diplomatic solution to the uranium enrichment program which Pyongyang admitted to having last month.
``The challenge that we have is ensuring that the North Koreans do not conclude that business as usual can proceed when they are doing something that is, first of all, very dangerous, and secondly is a violation of an international agreement,'' Feith told a small group of reporters in Seoul.
North Korea made a shock admission to the United States that it was enriching uranium to support a nuclear weapons program -- in breach of the 1994 Agreed Framework pact that had defused an earlier North Korean nuclear crisis.
PENALTIES NOT REWARDS
South Korea has joined its allies the United States and Japan as well as other regional powers in demanding that the North halt its program. But Seoul says maintaining exchanges with Pyongyang is the best way to ensure a peaceful outcome.
Feith's visit to Seoul came as North and South Korea opened economic talks in Pyongyang, underscoring the fact that exchanges continue apace despite the nuclear dispute.
Asked about South Korea's policy so far of continuing to help North Korea, Feith said Washington understood that each actor in Korean peninsula diplomacy had multiple interests that must be balanced along with efforts to disarm Pyongyang.
``No country of course has a more complex set of interests than the Republic of Korea,'' he said, referring to the South.
But Feith said that, beyond the security threat posed by the communist state brandishing nuclear arms, ``the broader problem is the problem of North Korea believing that it can violate an international agreement with impunity.''
``If a country violates an international agreement, there should be a penalty for that and not a reward,'' he said, but stopped short of suggesting ways to penalize Pyongyang.
KEY FUEL DECISION AWAITS
In mid-November the United States, the European Union, Japan and South Korea are to meet in New York to decide on the fate of oil shipments to North Korea under the Agreed Framework.
The 1994 deal called on North Korea to freeze its nuclear weapons programs in exchange for the delivery of 500,000 tons of fuel oil annually and the construction of two light-water nuclear reactors which cannot easily be converted to produce weapons material.
Feith held talks Wednesday with South Korean Defense Minister Lee Jun and Foreign Minister Choi Sung-hong. He was due to have similar meetings with Japanese officials in Tokyo Friday as part of intensifying U.S. diplomacy on North Korea.
The North-South economic talks in Pyongyang aim at finalizing plans to build a huge South Korean industrial park in North Korea to marry the South's capital and technology with the North's cheap labor and help revive North Korea's decrepit economy.
The 35-member South Korean mission led by Vice Finance Minister Yoon Jin-Shik told their North Korean hosts that the project would not go forward until the nuclear issue was settled, according to South Korean media pool reports from Pyongyang.
--------
U.S.: N. Korea Debates Are Intense
November 7, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Koreas-US-Nuclear.html
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- There is no ``easy and obvious'' solution to concerns about North Korea's nuclear weapons program, and Washington is engaged in intense debates with other countries about how to deal with the problem, a top U.S. official said Thursday.
U.S. Undersecretary of Defense Doug Feith also said during a visit to Seoul that the United States does not have a full picture of North Korea's nuclear program, including whether the communist country has succeeded in enriching uranium.
``There is much about the program that we don't know,'' Feith said in a meeting with journalists. ``I cannot answer with precision exactly what they have accomplished with their uranium enrichment program to date.''
In talks with Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly last month, North Korea admitted it had a uranium enrichment program in violation of nuclear pacts, including a 1994 deal in which it agreed to freeze a plutonium-based nuclear program in return for two light-water nuclear reactors to meet its energy needs. Construction of the reactors is years behind schedule.
Under terms of the 1994 Agreed Framework, a shipment of fuel oil has left Singapore for North Korea. But the fate of the deal is uncertain, and the United States and its allies are debating whether futures shipments should continue.
In Pyongyang on Thursday, South Korean negotiators told their North Korean counterparts that the second nuclear program could jeopardize joint economic projects. The North Koreans said they were ``seriously contemplating'' the issue, according to South Korean journalists.
Feith said U.S. officials were conducting ``intense and broad-ranging'' discussions with South Korea, Japan and other countries over how to persuade North Korea to abandon its nuclear program.
``This is an authentically difficult subject,'' he said. ``It is not a problem that presents an easy and obvious solution. There are debates about the best way to proceed and how to make diplomacy effective.''
North Korea has said it will alleviate U.S. security concerns if the United States signs a nonaggression pact.
U.S. officials want the North to scrap its nuclear program before any talks can take place.
South Korean is anxious to avoid the collapse of joint projects with North Korea, which has accused the United States of trying to undermine reconciliation efforts on their peninsula.
Feith said there was no ``fundamental disagreement'' between the United States and South Korea about the need for effective diplomacy on the North Korean nuclear issue.
Feith, who visited the Demilitarized Zone that separates the two Koreas, flew to Japan later Thursday. About 37,000 U.S. troops are stationed in South Korea, a legacy of the 1950-53 Korean War.
-------- u.s. nuc weapons
Bunker-busters set to go nuclear
07 November 02
New Scientist,
by David Hambling
http://www.newscientist.com/news/print.jsp?id=ns99993016
The US government is set to fund research into a new type of nuclear weapon that is designed to penetrate and obliterate deeply buried targets such as underground weapons bunkers.
Coming 50 years after the world's first hydrogen bomb was detonated in the Pacific, the news has alarmed scientists opposed to nuclear proliferation. They say the thousands of tonnes of radioactive debris produced by a bunker-busting nuclear weapon would not be contained within the rock, concrete and soil above the target, but would contaminate a wide area around it.
Funding of $15 million has been proposed for research into the so-called Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator (RNEP), as part of the government's draft Defense Authorisation Bill for 2003. But the bill has not yet been passed by the Senate Committee on Armed Services. While a decision has been delayed until after this week's Congressional elections, a source close to the committee says the RNEP will get the green light.
Research into the nuclear bunker-buster follows the Bush administration's leaked Nuclear Posture Review, which in part set out the circumstances under which nuclear weapons might be used. It says the RNEP could be used in pre-emptive strikes against rogue states using deeply buried facilities to store weapons of mass destruction, for example.
"Mini-nukes"
The RNEP would be used on targets that may be immune to conventional weapons. Its backers claim it would create little contamination above ground, but critics say that it would produce huge amounts of nuclear fallout. The RNEP may also remove the distinction between a nuclear deterrent and conventional weapons, increasing the risk of a nuclear exchange.
US law prevents development of new "mini-nukes" that have an explosive yield of less than 5 kilotons. But the RNEP falls outside this ban because it is not a new weapon.
Rather, it will be a modification of an existing nuclear bomb, probably a highly modified B61, sources say, a weapon whose explosive yield can be set from anything between 0.3 and 340 kilotons. The bomb uses fission at low yields but is a fusion (hydrogen) bomb at high yields. The Hiroshima fission bomb had a yield of 12 kilotons.
Underground explosions are 10 to 15 times as effective against buried facilities as airbursts. A conventional bunker-buster is dropped from high altitude and hits the ground at enormous speed. It penetrates earth, rock and concrete before exploding. A nuclear version has the advantage of a far more powerful shock wave, increasing the depth of its destructive effect.
The US already has around fifty 'penetrating' nuclear weapons in its stockpile, but these can only reach a depth of six metres in earth. David Wright, a nuclear-weapons expert at the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington DC, says this would not be nearly enough to contain the radioactivity.
"Even for a 0.3-kiloton explosion, you would need a burial depth of about 70 metres in dry soil and about 40 metres in dry, hard rock to contain the blast," Wright says. An explosion at the maximum depth achievable so far would throw thousands of tonnes of highly radioactive debris into the air.
Velocity threshold
Moreover, Wright's calculations show that a warhead of this size at the depths currently possible would only destroy a hardened target buried less than 10 to 20 metres deep in rock. Some Iraqi facilities are said to be under 60 metres of rock, requiring a warhead of hundreds of kilotons, which would cause unacceptable devastation above ground.
But a study by the Federation of American Scientists concludes that greater penetration with the RNEP is unlikely, as there is a threshold at which increasing impact velocities simply cause the warhead to deform and melt.
Attempting to make the RNEP and its warhead robust enough to withstand impact will require extensive research and development. Weapons designers at three Department of Energy labs - Lawrence Livermore in California, and Los Alamos and Sandia in New Mexico - will have to come up with the new ground-penetration technology. Sandia has already patented a new penetrator (see graphic).
While the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty bars any test with a live warhead, this would not prevent the RNEP's use untested.
-------- u.s. nuc facilities
Re: NPP Containment Dome Thickness Lies By Nuclear Industry
From: "Raymond Shadis" shadis@prexar.com
I am an "environmentalist" working on the decommissioning of Maine Yankee Atomic Power Station (810 MWe), a pretty typical 1970's PWR. The containment (dome) walls are four (4) feet thick at the base and taper to less than two (2) feet thick at the top. The walls are heavily reinforced with steel rebar and the containment is lined with sheet steel about 1/4 inch thick. Radiation exposure to the containment is not high enough to cause any sort of deterioration of the steel; never mind the concrete. Typically, the reactor is all but buried in massive concrete structures and most of it below grade.
That said, a review of the literature will show that a number of containments were poured with faults and voids in the concrete and over defective ground preparation and foundations.
An NRC Staff Technical Report, "Spent Fuel Pool Accident Risk at Decommissioning Nuclear Power Plants" , October 2000 and January 2001, says that the Mark I containment, featured on most of the nation's BWRs, would present no substantial barrier to aircraft penetration. Oyster Creek (NJ), Pilgrim (Ma.), Millstone I (Ct.) , and Vermont Yankee (Vt), all feature Mark I containments.
It is likely that activists working on individual plants may possess a copy of the plant's Final Safety Analysis Report and could peel out containment dimensions for you. Some containments were built heavier than the Maine Yankee dome, some, undoubtedly were built lighter.
Ray
Raymond Shadis Staff Advisor
New England Coalition
207-882-7801
-------- us politics
US intelligence: seeing what it wants to see in Iraq
Pat M. Holt
November 07, 2002
Christian Science Monitor
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/1107/p11s01-coop.html
WASHINGTON - The CIA and Defense Department are at it again. As usual, this is about their different approaches to the analysis of intelligence. CIA analysts tend to call it like they see it. Defense analysts tend to call it like they want to see it, or sometimes more to the point, how they want Congress and the public to see it. The subject this time is Iraq.
Dissatisfied with what the CIA is telling the White House, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has set up his own unit to analyze reports from the CIA and other agencies. He is relying on this process for justification of his bellicose policy toward Iraq - something he thinks he is not getting from the CIA. Rumsfeld starts with a policy and looks for intelligence to support it. The CIA (most of the time anyway) stays with what it thinks the intelligence shows and leaves it to policymakers to come up with answers on what to do about it.
It is typical of presidents to want the CIA to report what they want to hear. When Lyndon Johnson sent troops to intervene in the Dominican Republic in 1965, he said publicly it was to prevent a communist takeover. When the CIA reported that it could find no communists, he went to the FBI, which found plenty.
During the first Bush administration, when CIA director William Webster told the House Armed Services Committee that the collapse of Soviet and Warsaw Pact military power was irreversible, Dick Cheney, then secretary of defense, now vice president, complained that such statements made it more difficult for him to persuade Congress to approve the defense budget.
With respect to Iraq, there is evidence that Saddam Hussein has used poison gas against Kurds, but not that he is likely to make unprovoked attacks using chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear weapons. President Bush has nonetheless said that the danger of such use demands there be no delay in removing Mr. Hussein from power. When asked for evidence, the White House pleads that it must protect intelligence sources and methods. Frequently, this is more an excuse than a reason for not saying out loud what the government knows or thinks it knows. The United States does acquire some intelligence from sources or with methods that should not be publicly known.
For example, we might have bribed a foreign official or broken a foreign code. If the intelligence is disclosed, the foreign government will recognize the source and take steps to ensure that we cannot use it again. Maybe it executes the person who told us; maybe it changes the code. This is what is meant by protecting sources and methods.
Sometimes, however, there is no such intelligence; there are no secrets being protected. What is happening is that a government official (sometimes the president himself) has made an assertion that is unsupported by evidence.
During the cold war, Defense and CIA consistently differed in their estimates of Soviet military strength. Whenever this happened, liberals accused Defense analysts of inflating intelligence estimates; conservatives accused the CIA of minimizing them. Finally, it was agreed that outside experts would be brought in to provide independent judgments. They were organized into Team A and Team B, one examining Defense data and methodology, the other that of the CIA. The Senate Intelligence Committee made its own review and reported that the exercise was inconclusive. When the end of the cold war opened Soviet files to some extent, it was found that both Defense and CIA had overestimated Soviet military spending, Defense more so.
Aside from the different approaches to intelligence by Defense and CIA, there are other reasons for this deep-seated rivalry. One is money. The director of the CIA is charged by law with coordinating the government's intelligence work, but most of the money (an estimated 80 percent) is concealed in the Defense Department appropriation. In addition, a great deal of the actual collection and analysis of intelligence is done by the Defense Department. This includes the operation of spy satellites as well as the tactical intelligence of the armed forces.
It should be said that interpreting intelligence (what do hundreds, perhaps thousands, of reports, some of them conflicting, mean, if anything?) is no simple task. The question of bias applies alike to the analyst and the policymaker to whom he reports. Does either or both have an ax to grind? The informed observer can never be sure. He can only identify with experience some telltale signs to look for.
• Pat M. Holt is former chief of staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
----
Bush Says He's Confident U.N. Will Pass Resolution on Iraq
November 7, 2002
New York Times
By DAVID STOUT
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/07/politics/07WIRE-BUSH.html
WASHINGTON, Nov. 7 - President Bush expressed confidence today that the United Nations Security Council would pass a resolution on Friday to ``bring the civilized world together to disarm Saddam Hussein.''
Mr. Bush, appearing in public for the first time since the Republicans recaptured the Senate and strengthened their hold on the House of Representatives in Tuesday's elections, said he was optimistic that the resolution on Iraq would gain the crucial support of France.
The president spoke of ``when the resolution passes,'' not if it would. The United Nations resolution was revised to draw the support of France, which has a veto power as one of the Security Council's permanent members.
Mr. Bush was by turns cheerful and somber and took care not to bask publicly in the victory glow emanating from the White House and other Republican circles since Tuesday. He offered general congratulations to the election victors, Republicans and Democrats alike, and pledged to work with both parties in the new Congress.
He also prodded the lawmakers who will reconvene next Tuesday in the lame-duck Congress, saying that creation of a homeland security department is ``the single most important item of unfinished business on Capitol Hill.''
The president wants a homeland security bill that would give him broad hiring-and-firing powers, a concept that the Republican-controlled House has endorsed in principle but that the Senate, which has been in Democratic hands, has resisted.
The prospects for Mr. Bush's homeland security vision will improve in the new Congress, when Republicans take over the Senate leadership, but the president insisted that a bill should be passed before then.
``I want it done,'' Mr. Bush said, raising his voice slightly. ``It's a priority.''
While sounding conciliatory toward Democrats, Mr. Bush signaled that he intended to use his strengthened position on Capitol Hill to advance the causes he holds dear - the appointment of conservatives to the federal judiciary, for instance, and Republican tax-cutting policies, which he described as ``being wise with the people's money.''
Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, who has been in the Senate for 40 years to the day, delivered a Democratic response to the president's 45-minute news conference. The senator praised Mr. Bush's ``positive tone'' and said there was plenty of room for the White House and Congressional Democrats to work together. But Mr. Kennedy warned of Democratic resistance if the White House nominated ``right-wing ideologues'' for judgeships.
Iraq dominated Mr. Bush's news conference, and he reiterated time and again that he intended to see Iraqi regime of Mr. Hussein disarmed - peacefully, if possible, but disarmed regardless.
``If he's not going to disarm, we'll disarm him,'' the president said. ``The risk of inaction is not a choice as far as I'm concerned.''
``War is not my first choice,'' Mr. Bush said at another point. ``It's the last choice.'' But he added pointedly, ``It's an option.''
Congress has already passed a resolution of support for Mr. Bush in dealing with Iraq, so in that sense the president has all the legislative backing he needs. But the election results have, by general agreement in the capital, made Mr. Bush a stronger president nonetheless.
``The debate on whether we're going to deal with Saddam Hussein is over,'' Mr. Bush declared. A moment earlier, he had accused Mr. Hussein of ``dealing with Al Qaeda.'' Mr. Bush has never accused the Iraqi leader of having a role in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and he did not do that today.
But the president has made it clear that he thinks Mr. Hussein and Al Qaeda followers are of the same ilk. Yet Mr. Bush has also said he holds no anger for the Iraqis under Mr. Hussein's rule. Today, he said he dreams of ``freedom for the Iraqi people.''
Mr. Bush jousted good-naturedly with his questioners, as when he was asked if he would ``take fewer cues from conservatives'' in an attempt to claim a broader swath of the political center for his Republican Party.
``I don't take cues from anybody,'' he said. ``I just do what I think is right. I won't change my political philosophy. I am who I am.''
-------- MILITARY
-------- arms sales
Report of Arms Sale to Iraq Roils Ukraine Politics
November 7, 2002
New York Times
By MICHAEL WINES
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/07/international/europe/07KIEV.html
MOSCOW, Nov. 6 - Some Ukrainian legislators expressed consternation today and President Leonid D. Kuchma called for a United Nations inquiry after a new report reinforced suspicions that Ukraine secretly sold advanced air-defense equipment to Iraq more than two years ago.
The still unreleased report, by American and British investigators who visited Ukraine last month, concludes that the government there offered only mixed cooperation with the inquiry, the State Department said today.
The department's spokesman, Richard A. Boucher, said Ukraine had "failed to provide the team with satisfactory evidence" that the air-defense system, known as Kolchuga, had not been smuggled to Iraq. "As a result, the question of whether Ukraine transferred or is transferring Kolchugas to Iraq must remain open," he added.
At a news conference today in Kiev on unrelated issues, Mr. Kuchma called for a special commission of the Security Council to undertake its own inquiry into the allegations.
"This is the first instance in which a country itself turns to the highest body of the U.N. to deal with such problematic issues," he said. "We have never supplied Iraq with any arms or any weapons at all."
The smuggling charge has cast a deep shadow over Ukraine's relations with the West, which had already been strained as Mr. Kuchma's government tried unsuccessfully to cope with charges of political corruption and civil-liberties violations.
The United States said last month that it believed Mr. Kuchma personally approved a plan in July 2000 to sell Iraq an advanced Kolchuga radar system, which can pinpoint attacking aircraft without the pilots' knowledge.
Last month, the State Department said it would suspend a $55-million-a-year part of its foreign aid to Ukraine until the controversy surrounding the radar system was resolved.
The charge is rooted in recordings of Mr. Kuchma's private conversations, secretly taped and smuggled to the United States more than a year ago by a presidential security guard. In one conversation, made public last spring, Mr. Kuchma is heard to approve a proposal by the director of Ukraine's weapons exports to sell four Kolchuga systems to Iraq through a Jordanian contact. "Just watch that the Jordanian keeps his mouth shut," Mr. Kuchma is quoted as saying.
The Kolchuga system is a complex of four receivers that is billed as capable of detecting aircraft as far away as 500 miles and ground targets up to 370 miles away. Because it sends out no signals on its own, it cannot be detected by outsiders.
Mr. Kuchma has denied authorizing the sale of the devices. But the United States raised the charge publicly last month after its experts examined the original recording of the conversation and concluded that he had indeed approved the sale.
An American official said then that the United States also had "some indications," that the radar system were now in Iraq. If it is, that could trigger more severe punishment under both American law and the international arms embargo imposed on Iraq by the United Nations.
In Washington, the State Department said Ukraine had been open in giving investigators data on some items relating to production of the system, but had not cooperated with questions about Mr. Kuchma's authorization of its sale to Iraq.
-------- china
U.S. and China Agree to Ship Visit
November 7, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-US-China.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- In signs of warming U.S.-China relations, the Chinese are welcoming a U.S. Navy ship this month and the United States will host nearly two dozen touring Chinese generals next month, U.S. officials said.
Also, the admiral who commands all U.S. forces in the Pacific will visit China in December.
Those three events will be the first of their kind since U.S.-China military relations were ruptured by political fallout from the collision of a U.S. Navy surveillance plane with a Chinese fighter jet over the South China Sea in April 2001.
In addition, the Pentagon announced that senior-level defense talks not held since November-December 2000 will resume Dec. 9 in Washington. The decision to proceed with those talks was made during President Bush's meeting in Texas last month with Chinese President Jiang Zemin, but no date had been set.
The Pentagon delegation at the Washington talks will be led by Douglas Feith, the undersecretary of defense for policy. U.S. officials said the Chinese delegation will be led by Feith's counterpart, Gen. Xiong Guang Kai.
Although Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld never officially severed military-to-military contacts with China after the spy plane incident, he ordered a case-by-case review of contacts. The practical effect was that only low-level activities, such as talks on military maritime safety, have been held since 2001.
Rumsfeld was angered by China's accusation that the Navy's EP-3 surveillance violated Chinese sovereignty by landing at a Chinese airfield after the aerial collision. He also was unhappy that China detained the crew for 11 days and refused to allow the United States to repair and fly the plane off the airfield.
In recent months, however, the two countries have taken steps to repair military-to-military relations.
A Pentagon spokesman, Lt. Cmdr. Jeff Davis, said China and the United States have enough mutual interests, including concern over North Korea's nuclear weapons program and the war on terrorism, to justify closer relations.
``Progress on the overall U.S.-China bilateral relationship supports having strategic and policy dialogue between our two militaries,'' Davis said in announcing the Navy ship visit and the Chinese generals' U.S. tour.
Citing security concerns, Davis declined to provide details on the ship visit, saying only that it would take place this month at a mainland China port. It probably will visit either Shanghai or Qingdao. The last U.S. Navy ship visit to a mainland China port was in March 2001 by the USS Blue Ridge, Davis said.
In December, Adm. Thomas Fargo, commander of the U.S. Pacific Command, will visit China. He will be the highest ranking U.S. military officer to visit China since the EP-3 incident.
Also, 23 Chinese general officers are to visit several U.S. cities Dec. 2-8, Davis said. The visit is under the auspices of a National Defense University fellowship program involving exchange visits between the two countries.
Although three groups of American officers have visited China this year under the program, the December visit will be the first for Chinese officers to this country since the April 2001 spy plane incident. They are to visit New York, Washington, Atlanta, Las Vegas, Fort Leavenworth, Kan., San Francisco and Monterey, Calif.
On the Net:
Defense Department: http://www.defenselink.mil
-------- iraq
Oil after Saddam: All bets are in
A great but quiet rush is on for a stake in Iraq's huge reserves
By Michael Moran and Alex Johnson
MSNBC,
Nov. 7, 2002
http://www.msnbc.com/news/823985.asp
UNITED NATIONS - The American campaign to overthrow Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, even as al-Qaida's terrorism thrives around the world and the national economy falters, has many people in America and abroad asking: What's really motivating Washington to take on Saddam? His record of perfidy and willingness to inflict damage beyond his borders is a matter of record. For many, particularly in post-9/11 America, that is argument enough. But others believe that Saddam and his lust for ever more powerful weaponry is only part of the story. Largely missing from the debate is a simple fact: Iraq sits atop the world's second-largest reserves of oil - a resource that translates into hundreds of billions of dollars and enormous economic power.
WITHIN AMERICA, street protests accusing the administration of yearning to launch an "oil war" occur occasionally, but they pale in comparison to the vehemence of that charge in foreign capitals and newspapers. In European and Asian capitals, and in the restive Muslim world in particular, an "imperialistic quest for oil," as Saddam himself frames it, is taken by many to be the ultimate goal of American policy toward Iraq. Even friendly Arab nations see it so. Al Ahram, the government-controlled newspaper of record in Egypt, led its editorial page recently with a piece by Palestinian-American Professor Edward Said, who wrote:
"Second to Saudi Arabia, Iraq has the largest oil reserves on earth, and the roughly 1.1 trillion dollars worth of oil - much of it already committed by Saddam to Russia, France and a few other countries ... is a crucial aim of U.S. strategy."
'NOT A FACTOR'
The Bush administration vigorously denies this. "It is not a factor," President Bush's press secretary, Ari Fleischer, said last month. "This is about preserving the peace and saving the lives of Americans."
But evidence suggesting the opposite is easy to find. Early last month, for instance, as American diplomats twisted Security Council arms to win maximum maneuverability for a strike against Baghdad, the American undersecretary of commerce, Grant Aldonas, told a business forum hungry for good economic news that a war in Iraq "would open up this spigot on Iraqi oil, which certainly would have a profound effect in terms of the performance of the world economy for those countries that are manufacturers and oil consumers."
FACTS AND FIGURES
No reputable analyst denies the windfall that might result for Western energy firms and the economies they power from an extended American occupation of Iraq. While Iraq's political landscape is complex and potentially explosive, many see a post-Saddam Iraq as an opportunity to ensure that Iraq's vast potential as an oil supplier, long retarded by Saddam's aggression and U.N. sanctions, can be used to stabilize or even lower world oil prices for decades to come.
"It is not necessarily easy, but the scenario exists whereby Britain and the United States, by handling Iraq's oil resources a certain way, could carve out the ultimate 'strategic petroleum reserve,' " says Dr. F.J. Chalabi, a former Iraqi deputy oil minister who left in 1976 and now runs an energy consulting firm in London. "It is certainly feasible." Interactive: Conflict with Iraq - A look at the ongoing standoff with Saddam
Such speculation about long-term American motives is bolstered by the deep ties between senior Bush administration officials, including the president and vice president, and the energy industry.
Among the facts that raise eyebrows:
- The president, vice president and national security adviser all claim a stunning pedigree. Bush is a former director of Harken Energy Corp.; Cheney served as chief executive officer of Halliburton Energy Services Corp.; and National Security Council Director Condoleezza Rice served on the board of directors of Chevron, which later named a super-tanker after her.
- Financial disclosure forms reviewed by the Center for Public Integrity, a non-partisan watchdog group, report that the top 100 officials in the Bush administration have the majority of their personal investments, almost $150 million, in the traditional energy and natural resource sectors. For instance, Rice holds $225,000 worth of Chevron stock in a blind trust.
- Cheney's commission on energy policy, which submitted a report last year recommending that the United States "conduct an immediate policy review toward Iraq" that includes "military ... assessments."
Added to all this is a key geo-political fact of the post 9/11 world: America's deep displeasure with Saudi Arabia, currently America's largest oil supplier in the Middle East and the nation that, by and large, controls the world's oil markets through its own enormous reserves and its lock on the internal politics of the oil cartel, OPEC - the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.
LEVERAGING THE RESOURCE
A war against Iraq may or may not happen, of course. Even if war did begin, there is no guarantee the United States would be able to prevent Iraq from sparking a larger Mideast conflict with its chemical or biological weapons, or from splintering into ethnic chaos in the scramble to divvy up what Saddam leaves behind.
Iraqi oil clearly is part of the discussion at the United Nations, where the Security Council is debating how to disarm Iraq. While the five permanent Security Council members - each of whom can veto any new Iraq resolution - reject the idea that oil is playing a role in their maneuvers, a three-way struggle has emerged. This competition pits Saudi Arabia and its OPEC allies, concerned about seeing their leverage diminished by a sudden deluge of Iraqi oil, against Russia, France and other Iraqi creditors, and finally the United States, which with its American oil companies would be perched in the cat-bird seat in a war that ousted Saddam from power.
"I think the French and the Russian ought to be told, not so much by the U.S., but by the Iraqi opposition to Saddam, that they are right on the edge of dealing themselves out of any hand in post-Saddam Iraq by the way they are trying to protect Saddam," says James Woolsey, a former CIA director who has been a prominent voice in favor of toppling Saddam. "If the new Iraqi government should ask us for advice after Saddam, I think I would have a very hard time finding those French and Russian telephone numbers."
VESTED INTERESTS
Understanding this dynamic is essential to understanding the alignment of the Security Council. Russian and French oil companies have billions of dollars at stake if a post-Saddam Iraq tears up oil agreements and IOUs. Russia is owed some $8 billion dating to the 1980s, and is contracted to be the leading source of Iraq's technical know-how and heavy equipment if U.N. sanctions are ever lifted.
"The Russians and the French may think that with a new government in Baghdad, they may lose the opportunity to have access to this really abundant and cheap oil," says Chalabi. "Iraq is the only country in the world that could, conceivably, replace Saudi Arabia as the guarantor of world oil price stability. Given America's feelings about Saudi Arabia right now, it is not hard to imagine how a U.S.-backed government will deal with oil policy."
AMERICA'S OIL GIANTS
Sitting on the sidelines ever since the United Nations slapped sanctions on Iraq in 1990 are the giant American oil companies, which have watched enviously over the past decade as Saddam signed deals with Russian, Chinese, European and other firms to exploit new oil fields once sanctions are lifted.
Oil industry representatives largely declined to talk on the record, because, an official at one company explained, the industry is horrified at the prospect of being associated with talk of war in Iraq.
But privately, industry leaders are furious at the accusation that, somehow, they are part of a pro-war conspiracy.
"To argue that Bush is driven by his history in the oil industry is just silly," said an officer of one industry trade group, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "It just doesn't add up. It's not how it works."
Industry leaders said that if anything, freeing up Iraq's estimated 112 billion barrels of crude oil for export would damage their bottom lines. They said there is no shortage of oil and that Iraq's reserves would flood the market, further driving down demand and, with it, prices.
A NEW DAY?
That is hardly the consensus among independent analysts. Samer Shehata, a Middle East expert at the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies in Washington, notes that well before Sept. 11, 2001, the Bush administration was pushing "to make energy security a priority of our trade and foreign policy," as the President's National Energy Policy report said.
"Russia, China, France have the highest stakes in the Iraqi oil industry," Shehata said. "Once Saddam is out, everything becomes null and void and there is no legal authority to enforce those claims." Then, she said, "the U.S. oil industry will post a major challenge to Saudi Arabia's position as market leader."
Over the next week, MSNBC.com will explore each side of this complex story. In a series of reports from around the world, our correspondents will look at:
- Russia's drive to guarantee its interests in Iraq while setting itself up as a viable alternative source of oil for the United States as Washington seeks to reduce its dependency on the Middle East.
- The stakes for American oil companies, which have relied for price stability on an accommodation with the Saudis for three decades but now appear to be positioning themselves for maximum benefit if the ground suddenly shifts.
- The dilemma facing the Saudis, whose relationship with the United States is in tatters after Sept. 11 but who will fight furiously to maintain their hold on world oil markets.
- The frustration of American environmentalists, who say the political system is rigged to ensure that, regardless of the costs, oil and other fossil fuels remain the country's energy of choice despite the promise of other energy sources to wean America from its foreign dependency.
----
Saddam Urges World to Stop 'Evil' US - British Plans
November 7, 2002
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/news-iraq-saddam.html
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - President Saddam Hussein urged the world Thursday to take a ``just'' position to stop the United States and Britain from achieving their ``evil'' schemes in a new U.N. resolution on arms inspections in Iraq.
He said Washington and London were ``exerting pressure on the Security Council to take resolutions that contradict international law and the United Nations charter.''
``Any just position by the world against the evil wishes of these countries will not be in the interest of Iraq alone but also in the interest of the countries of the world,'' Iraqi television quoted Saddam as telling visiting Malaysian Information Minister Khalil Yaacob.
Saddam was referring to a new British-backed U.S. draft resolution now under debate at the United Nations. The resolution, expected to be adopted Friday, will set tough terms for the return of U.N. arms inspectors to Iraq.
``If these two American and British administrations are able to achieve their wishes, the world would return to a new law, which is the law of evil based on power and opportunity rather than the law of love and justice,'' Saddam said.
The United States says the resolution is a last chance for Iraq to get rid of weapons of mass destruction or face war, but veto-holders France and Russia have yet to agree to the text.
The six-page draft gives U.N. arms inspectors far-reaching powers, including unrestricted rights to enter Saddam's palace compounds in their drive to scrap any chemical, biological or nuclear weapons Iraq may have.
Saddam said Baghdad, accused of breaching U.N. resolutions on disarmament, would not have had any conflict with the Security Council had it not been for the interference of the United States and Britain.
Saddam has repeatedly said that President Bush's real motive behind his declared aim of ``regime change'' in Iraq is to control Baghdad's vast oil reserves.
Iraq's leading al-Thawra newspaper said China, France and Russia should oppose any wording in the U.S. draft that might be used to justify a military assault.
``America wants the resolution to include texts that it uses afterward as a pretext or a cover for committing aggression against Iraq,'' it said in a front-page editorial.
France has opposed any ``hidden triggers'' that would give the United States the right to attack Iraq, topple Saddam and then claim the United Nations had authorized it.
The draft says Iraq has ``a final opportunity'' to scrap weapons of mass destruction or face ``serious consequences.''
Once the resolution is adopted, Iraq has seven days to accept its terms and 30 days to submit a declaration of all programs to develop nuclear, chemical, biological or ballistic weapons and all related materials.
--------
US, British Jets Strike Southern Iraq Again
November 7, 2002
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/news-iraq-usa-warplanes.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - American and British warplanes bombed air defenses in southern Iraq for the second straight day on Thursday in response to attempts to shoot down the jets policing a ``no-fly'' zone, the U.S. military said. The Western aircraft attacked an air defense operations center near al Kut, about 95 miles southeast of the capital Baghdad and left the area safely, the U.S. military's Central Command said in a statement.
Iraq said four people were wounded when Western planes attacked civilian targets in southern Iraq on Thursday.
According to the U.S. Central Command, the strike, which took place at around 2:20 p.m. in Iraq, followed attacks on Wednesday against two anti-aircraft missile sites near al Kut and a military air defense command post in Tallil in southern Iraq.
The number of incidents involving U.S. and British air patrols over no-fly zones in northern and southern Iraq has risen sharply in recent months as speculation has grown that the United States could launch an invasion to topple Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.
An Iraqi military spokesman was quoted by the official Iraqi News Agency (INA) as saying on Thursday that U.S. and British planes flew 46 sorties from bases in Kuwait, flying over Nassiriya, al Kut, Basra, Qalat Sukar and Diwaniya in the south.
``American and British warplanes attacked our civilian and service installations in Wassit province, injuring four civilians,'' the spokesman said, putting the time of the attacks at 18:10 p.m.
The warplanes have now attacked Iraqi air defenses in the zones 55 times this year. Forty-two of those attacks have come in the southern zone.
Earlier, an Iraqi military spokesman said Wednesday's attacks were against ``civilian installations'' in the provinces of Wassit and Dhi qar. Al Kut is in Wassit province.
Iraq does not recognize the zones, set up after the 1991 Gulf War to protect a Kurdish enclave in the north and Shi'ite Muslims in the south from attack by Saddam's military.
Iraq often accuses Western patrols of attacking civilian targets and killing innocent people. Washington and London deny the charge.
-------- israel / palestine
Netanyahu Starts Cabinet Job, Vowing to Help Sharon Before Beating Him
November 7, 2002
New York Times
By JOEL GREENBERG
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/07/international/middleeast/07ISRA.html
JERUSALEM, Nov. 6 - Benjamin Netanyahu was sworn in today as Israel's foreign minister, and he promised to work with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon even while campaigning to unseat him.
Mr. Netanyahu agreed to join the government after Mr. Sharon called early elections on Tuesday, but the two men are girding for political battle. Mr. Netanyahu is challenging Mr. Sharon for leadership of the Likud Party, hoping to lead it to victory in the national vote that is now expected for late January.
After the Parliament approved his appointment and he took the oath of office today, Mr. Netanyahu, a former prime minister, predicted that he would be able to serve in harmony with Mr. Sharon. A party primary is to be held in the next few weeks.
"We have worked excellently together, and we will work excellently today as well," Mr. Netanyahu said, recalling that Mr. Sharon had been foreign minister in his own cabinet. Mr. Netanyahu said he was quite capable of pursuing two seemingly contradictory tasks: defending Mr. Sharon's policies as foreign minister while running against him for the Likud Party leadership.
The campaign is effectively under way, and Mr. Netanyahu lost no time today in stating his ultimate goal.
"The public is looking for a way out of the country's quagmire and the man to lead it out," he told Israeli radio. "I believe I have the way and the solution, and that most of the public knows this, so my assessment is that I will be able to lead the country in the future."
Mr. Netanyahu took over the Foreign Ministry from Shimon Peres after Mr. Peres and other ministers from the Labor Party resigned from Mr. Sharon's coalition government last week, forcing him to call early elections. Labor is embroiled in its own primary contest, where the party leader, Benjamin Ben-Eliezer, is facing two challengers with more dovish tendencies.
Arriving at the Foreign Ministry today, Mr. Netanyahu, known for his polished television appearances, portrayed his task as a public relations battle. "You can't win victory in the international political battlefield without persuading international public opinion, and you can't persuade international opinion to support us without convincing them of the justice of our cause," he said.
In a television appearance Tuesday night, Mr. Netanyahu said that resolving the conflict with the Palestinians was not a priority. "Our immediate problem today isn't the political problem with the Palestinians, because there we simply need to complete the process of conquering terror," he said. "Afterward, we can deal with the political issue."
He said he regretted that Israel had not expelled Yasir Arafat, the Palestinian leader, in retaliation for suicide attacks, but that it could be possible during an American strike on Iraq. Such an attack would "enable us to get rid of Saddam Hussein and provide a good opportunity to get rid of Arafat," he said.
The remark drew a response today from Mr. Arafat. "No one can depart me from my homeland," he said in English to reporters in Ramallah. "They have to remember, they are dealing with Arafat."
In the Gaza Strip this morning, a Palestinian farm laborer shot and killed two Jewish settlers before he was killed by a security officer. The Palestinian, from the town of Khan Yunis, fatally shot his employer at the settlement of Rafiah Yam, then burst into a sewing factory and killed a second Israeli. The settlement's security officer arrived and shot and killed the attacker as he prepared to hurl a grenade.
The militant group Hamas claimed responsibility for the killings, saying they were a retaliation for Israeli Army killings of Palestinians in the Rafah refugee camp in the Gaza Strip and in the West Bank city of Nablus.
The army, in a rare step, announced disciplinary measures today against an officer whose unit shot and killed a 15-year-old Palestinian boy at the West Bank village of Nazlat Zeid on Oct. 4. The officer was dismissed from his post and will not serve in a command position for at least three years, the army said.
--------
Israel Bares Arrow Missile in Warning to Iraq
November 7, 2002
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-iraq-israel-arrow.html
PALMACHIM AIR BASE, Israel (Reuters) - Israel put its $2.2 billion Arrow anti-ballistic missile system on rare display on Thursday in an apparent warning to Iraq should it target the Jewish state again in retaliation for any U.S. attack.
Shocked by the failure of U.S. Patriot missiles to intercept 39 Iraqi Scuds fired at it during the 1991 Gulf War, Israel has conceived the first custom-designed anti-ballistic missile in time for a possible U.S. winter campaign to disarm Iraq.
``It is like a bullet able to hit a bullet,'' Arrow chief engineer Boaz Zevi told reporters given a tour of Palmachim Air Base where four mobile launchers containing six missiles each point at the sky from desert near the Mediterranean coast.
Aside from a steering defect since corrected, the 23-foot-long Arrow has passed seven tests showing it can detect, track and destroy a missile in under three minutes at altitudes of more than 30 miles, a senior military briefer said.
He said the Arrow's Green Pine radar -- a 50-by-17-foot dish at Palmachim -- had enabled Israel to slash the time between the launch and detection of a hostile missile by 70 percent since 1991.
An Iraqi Scud would take about eight minutes to slam into Israel from launch pads Israeli and U.S. officials believe are in western Iraq, around 400 miles from the Jewish state.
Briefers said the Arrow marks a quantum advance from the Patriot, an anti-aircraft system imperfectly adapted to down missiles traveling at far higher speeds than planes and unable to reach space, the flight path of ballistic weapons like Scuds.
``We have reached huge capability in the past year, building up the very unique Arrow and a lower layer of air defense provided by upgraded Patriots,'' said Brigadier General Yair Dori, commander of Israel's air defense system.
``In 1991, we had almost nothing. We'd only begun building air defenses. After just 10 years, we have a very robust, active air defense. We can give Israeli civilians a safe feeling about the next conflict,'' he told reporters.
ARROW YET TO FACE 'SALVO' TEST
Military sources said the Arrow had not yet been tested against a ``salvo'' of missiles fired at once -- the stiffest challenge for any missile defense system and a possible scenario if Iraq targets Israel again -- but would be soon.
Independent Israeli air defense experts estimate the Arrow's success rate at 95 percent.
The other five percent unsettles Israelis because they fear Iraq might tip missiles with lethal anthrax spores or sarin and VX gases, weapons Baghdad denies it possesses.
But the Arrow was geared to wipe out threats at outer-space altitudes, reducing the risk of chemical or biological residue falling to Earth, the senior military official said.
Iraq, its military clout eroded by defeat in 1991 and international trade sanctions since, is thought to have no more than a few dozen ready missiles in contrast with its 1991 arsenal.
Military sources said Israel could answer with more than 200 Arrows -- costing $3 million apiece -- based at Palmachim and at a recently established second base in central Israel.
``I'm sure (Iraqi President) Saddam Hussein has the motivation to bring Israel into the next conflict. I think he will try. But I'm sure less missiles will fall into Israel, and I want to believe none will,'' Dori said.
Half the Arrow's research, development and production costs from the project's inception in 1988 have been borne by the United States, Israel's guardian ally. State-owned Israel Aircraft Industries Ltd. developed the Arrow.
Soldiers demonstrated hoisting an Arrow launcher from horizontal transport mode to battle-ready upright. Four launch pads, each with six tubes, stood on trailers a few hundred yards from the coastline.
In the Fire Control Room nearby, air defense officers simulated a response to an attack on monitors showing green maps of the Middle East with Iraq at one end and Israel the other.
Like a war game, black blips depicting Scuds streaked westward over Jordan or Syria and blue blips denoting Arrows beelined eastward from the Mediterranean coast. ``Kill'' impacts sparkled over northern Israel's Galilee region or the West Bank.
Officials said the Arrow network covered not just Israel but the West Bank and Gaza Strip, where Palestinians are fighting Israeli occupation and where 200,000 Jews live in 145 settlements.
--------
Israel Unveils Anti - Missile System
November 7, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Israel-Arrow-Missiles.html
PALMACHIM AIR FORCE BASE, Israel (AP) -- Israel's defense against a potential Iraqi missile attack was on full display Thursday: Arrow anti-missile batteries, pointed skyward amid the sand and scrub brush, were shown to reporters as part of a public relations blitz aimed at discouraging Saddam Hussein from firing his Scuds.
Israel's Arrow system is the most advanced in the world currently deployed, and the air force expresses full faith that it has closed a window of vulnerability that allowed Iraq to rain 39 missiles on Israel during the 1991 Gulf War.
``I'm sure we are better prepared today,'' said Brig. Gen. Yair Dori, head of the military's air defense forces. ``In 1991, we had almost nothing. Now we have a very active, robust defense.''
Israel and the United States have spent upward of $2 billion to develop the Arrow, first deployed two years ago at the Palmachim Air Force Base to protect nearby Tel Aviv and surrounding areas.
A second battery has been deployed outside the northern coastal city of Hadera. A third battery is being built.
Officials would not say how many Arrow missiles exist. Each costs about $3 million.
For Israel, having the system is only part of the battle. The military also believes that advertising the Arrow will deter Saddam from striking if he comes under attack from the United States.
President Bush has said the United States is prepared to invade Iraq if Saddam does not allow United Nations weapons inspectors to dismantle any weapons of mass destruction that Iraq may possess.
Israel on Thursday brought a bus load of journalists for briefings and a view of the four dun-colored missile launchers, each loaded with six Arrow missiles, air force officials said. The launchers are set about 100 yards apart in the otherwise empty flatlands a short distance from the sea.
``I'm sure (Saddam's) motivation is to bring Israel into this conflict,'' Dori said as he stood next to a 25-foot-tall Arrow. ``But I'm also sure that fewer missiles will fall into Israel.''
In the Gulf War, the United States rushed Patriot missile defense batteries to Israel. But the Patriots, built as an anti-aircraft system and modified to guard against incoming missiles, had little success against Iraqi Scuds.
A Patriot can only knock out an incoming missile near the end of its flight, when the unstable Scud missiles started to break apart. On Israeli radar screens, the disintegrating missiles would appear as clouds of debris, making it impossible to locate the warhead, Israeli officials said.
In contrast, the Arrow is designed to intercept an incoming missile at a high point.
Israel officers said it would be realistic for an Arrow to intercept an incoming Scud at least 30 miles above the ground and 60 miles from the Arrow's launch site. That means the Arrow would in theory hit Scuds while they were high over neighboring Jordan.
In the Gulf War, all the Iraqi missiles had conventional warheads -- but the main fear now, as then, is the possibility of a nonconventional attack, including biological and chemical warheads.
However, Martin van Creweld, a military historian, said Saddam was much less likely to fire missiles at Israel in a coming conflict.
Last time, the effort was intended to break up the U.S.-led coalition in 1991, but failed. No such alliance exists today, and Saddam, who was believed to have hundreds of Scud missiles during the Gulf War, now has a much smaller arsenal.
Van Creweld described the Arrow system as a significant technological advance, but sees it as extremely expensive and wasteful for the level of threat Israel faces.
``If it were me, I would rely on the threat of retaliation,'' said van Creweld, an Israeli. ``There is no defense system that is 100 percent effective.''
Officials have said eight of nine tests of the Arrow system were successful.
Iraq's Scud missiles must be fired from the country's far western desert to reach Israel, about 370 miles away. Despite this limited launch area, U.S. and British troops were unable to find and destroy a single Scud missile launcher during the 1991 war.
In the early stages of any new U.S. assault, American forces are expected to search western Iraq for missiles and launchers.
The Iraqi missiles can reach Israel in less than eight minutes. Last time around, the Scuds were aimed at Tel Aviv and other cities along Israel's Mediterranean coast, causing extensive damage and injuries, but no deaths.
Saddam did not risk targeting Jerusalem, where the eastern part of the city has many Arab residents and Muslim holy sites.
During the Gulf War, Israel relied on U.S. satellite information about Scud missile launches and often did not get warnings until a missile was less than five minutes away.
Israel now has a radar system that should be able to pinpoint Iraqi missile launches. Israel hopes to have a minimum of five minutes to respond to any attack, and needs two to three minutes to launch an Arrow, air force officials said.
Israel has Patriot batteries, and the air force said it carried out two successful tests of upgraded Patriots on Wednesday.
-------- nato
U.S. jets to patrol skies over NATO summit in Prague
Bruce I. Konviser
November 7, 2002
Washington Times
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20021107-26280176.htm
PRAGUE - The Czech parliament this week is expected to approve an unprecedented plan for U.S. fighter jets to patrol the skies over Prague for terrorist threats during the upcoming NATO summit.
The plan was finalized by governments of both nations over the weekend and submitted to the Czech legislature ahead of the Nov. 21-22 summit, during which NATO plans to admit seven new members.
"The protection of the foreign airspace is an absolutely unprecedented matter which is connected with an enormous risk and immense responsibility," Defense Minister Jaroslav Tvrdik told the Czech News Agency.
In a special session beginning today, lawmakers are expected to give their approval.
U.S. Air Force officials will command a clutch of F-16 and F-15 fighters in an operation officially called a CAP, for Combat Air Patrol. The Czech government will bear ultimate responsibility for any attack order.
The 15 jets will be supported by round-the-clock AWACS patrols, designed to detect radar from enemy aircraft.
The Czech air force will support the U.S. patrols in their aging, Russian-made MiG-21s.
The U.S. and Czech air forces have held joint exercises recently to prepare for the operation, which will include 250 U.S. military personnel.
No threats have been made, according to Czech Sen. Michal Zantovsky, who chairs the committee on Foreign Affairs and Defense and Security, but the fear is that a hijacked plane could try to crash into a strategic building or, perhaps, even into another plane carrying a head of state.
"It's a remote contingency for an event that probably won't occur," he said in a telephone interview.
President Bush, along with 45 other leaders from 19 NATO countries and 27 Partnership for Peace countries, are expected to descend on this East European capital for the two-day meeting.
They will be supported by a phalanx of staffers, and as many as 3,000 journalists are expected to cover the event.
The event will mark the first time such a meeting has been held in a former Warsaw Pact country. Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic joined NATO in 1999, a decade after communism collapsed across Eastern Europe.
The summit is expected to extend membership invitations to seven more countries: Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Slovenia, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.
The Partnership for Peace program was initiated during the Clinton administration to develop ties with former Soviet bloc countries as a potential prelude to NATO membership.
As many as 12,000 anti-globalization demonstrators are expected in Prague during the summit.
Two years ago demonstrators clashed with police at the annual meeting of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund in Prague. Scores of protesters and police were injured.
-------- pakistan
U.S. Warning on Pakistan
November 7, 2002
By THE NEW YORK TIMES
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/07/international/asia/07WARN.html
WASHINGTON, Nov. 6 - The State Department warned tonight of possible terrorist attacks on American interests overseas. In a statement, it said that the planned execution on Nov. 14 in Virginia of Mir Aimal Kasi, an anti-American extremist from Pakistan, "may trigger retaliatory attacks." Mr. Kasi was convicted of the 1993 shootings outside the Central Intelligence Agency's headquarters , which left two people dead and three wounded.
The statement said that civilians could be targets. "As security is increased at official U.S. facilities, terrorists and their sympathizers will seek softer targets," it said.
----
Pakistan: Army Moves Against Pro-Taliban Element
NewsMax Wires
Thursday, Nov. 7, 2002
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2002/11/7/64630.shtml
WASHINGTON -- Pakistan's military government is now trying to form a government of national consensus to prevent an anti-American Muslim cleric from becoming the country's prime minister, Pakistan government sources told United Press International Thursday.
The sources said that one of the senior leaders of the opposition Pakistan People's Party -- Makhdoum Amin Fahim -- is likely to head this government as prime minister.
On Wednesday evening, Pakistan's military ruler President Gen. Pervez Musharraf chaired an emergency Cabinet meeting, which decided to delay the inaugural session of the new parliament for a week. The parliament was scheduled to meet on Friday to administer oath to the 342 lawmakers elected in the Oct. 10 elections.
The decision to delay the session followed a move by the main opposition leader, and former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, to back a pro-Taliban cleric as the country's future prime minister.
Maulana Fazlur Rahman is one of the key leaders of a six-member religious alliance called MMA, which fought the election on an anti-American stance. It emerged as the largest parties in the provinces of Northwest Frontier and Balcuhistan, both bordering Afghanistan where anti-American feelings are high.
Bhutto, who heads the PPP, decided to back Rahman after Musharraf refused to allow her to return home and lead her party. Before making her move, Bhutto also traveled to Washington where she tried to convince U.S. officials to dump Musharraf and support democratic forces instead.
Sources close to Bhutto say that the Americans appeared reluctant to abandon Musharraf who is considered a key ally for supporting the U.S.-led war against terrorism.
But Bhutto's move to back the pro-Taliban cleric, the sources said, forced both Islamabad and Washington to take the Pakistani leader more seriously.
U.S. Embassy Has Role
Senior aides to Musharraf told journalists in Islamabad that the U.S. embassy in Islamabad is now helping Musharraf negotiate the deal for forming a government of national consensus.
Besides Fahim, the new government would also include several senior members of Bhutto's party.
The pro-army faction of the Pakistan Muslim League party will also get a major share in the new government. The faction has the largest number of seats in the new parliament, 118 in a house of 342.
Bhutto's PPP has 81 seats followed by the religious alliance MMA, which has 60.
Even with Bhutto's support and the PPP's 81 seats, Rahman is 31 short of the required 172 parliamentary votes to be elected prime minister.
But the move caused concern in Islamabad and the United States. If he succeeds, Rahman would be the first cleric ever to head a government in Pakistan.
Political pundits in Pakistan, however, described Bhutto's support for the cleric as a political move aimed at strong-arming Musharraf.
Before announcing support for Rahman, Bhutto sent demands to the president, urging him to withdraw corruption charges against her, release her husband Asif Zardari -- who was imprisoned for corruption -- and ensure she will not be arrested when she returns to Pakistan.
Bhutto has been living in exile in London and Dubai for the past four years and a Pakistani court sentenced her to prison in absentia on corruption charges.
In return, Bhutto offered to support Musharraf for the next five years.
Apparently, it was after her "not so successful" meetings with U.S. officials in Washington that Bhutto decided to back Rahman, PPP sources say.
Bhutto could still shift her stance if Islamabad and Washington show interest in her demands and allow her to return home safely, these sources stressed.
According to the new deal, being finalized in Islamabad, MMA will be allowed to form the government in the Northwest Frontier Province where it has a clear majority.
The provinces of Punjab will be given to the pro-Musharraf faction of the Pakistan Muslim League while Bhutto's party will rule the southern Sindh province with the help of a secular but violent ethnic group called MQM.
The MQM will also share power with the PPP and the pro-army PML in the center.
In Baluchistan, the military government is trying to put together a coalition of political and tribal groupings to prevent the MMA from forming government in another province bordering Afghanistan.
Government sources in Islamabad said that if the negotiations with the PPP succeed, Bhutto's husband may also be released on bail. He has already spent more than three years in prison on corruption charges.
They said that other party leaders, facing similar charges, may also be pardoned but Bhutto may still have to stay away from Pakistan for two years.
-------- space
United States II:
Retired ICBMs Still Useful, U.S. Air Force Official Says
Thursday, November 7, 2002
Global Security Newswire
http://www.nti.org/d_newswire/issues/newswires/2002_11_7.html#4
A senior U.S. Air Force official has said that retired intercontinental ballistic missiles have several uses, including satellite launches and the development of the U.S. missile defense system, Space & Missile reported today (see GSN, Oct. 4).
The Air Force Space and Missiles Systems Center's Rocket Systems Launch Program manages the retired ICBMs, which are refurbished for use as space launch vehicles and target launch vehicles, said Col. James Neumeister, head of Detachment 12 of the center, which oversees the program. To ensure that the retired missiles are available for use, the program stores them in environmentally controlled conditions, monitors them and performs X-ray tests and firing tests on their motors, he said.
The program currently manages stocks of retired Minuteman and Minuteman 2 ICBMs, Neumeister said, adding that it is also expected to oversee stocks of retired Peacekeeper ICBMs. The Peacekeepers present new opportunities for U.S. defense contractors, he said.
"We are in the process of source selection for our follow-on orbital/suborbital program contract," Neumeister said. "This is to pick a couple of contractors who will have responsibility for working with us to take those Minuteman assets - and now Peacekeeper assets, because we are prepared for Peacekeeper deactivation - and build those up into both target launch vehicles as well as space launch vehicles to meet the needs of our customers" (Ray Nelson, Space & Missile, Nov. 7).
-------- spy agencies
U.S., Reacting to Pentagon Spy Case, Expels 4 Cuban Envoys
November 7, 2002
New York Times
By TIM GOLDEN
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/07/international/americas/07CUBA.html
The Bush administration has ordered the expulsion of two Cuban diplomats from Washington and has moved to expel two others at the United Nations for what American officials described yesterday as serious espionage activities against the United States.
State Department officials called the action against the two envoys in Washington retaliation for the case of Ana B. Montes, a senior Pentagon intelligence analyst who pleaded guilty earlier this year to spying for Fidel Castro's government.
"Even in normal times we don't accept this kind of activity, and these are not normal times," said Otto J. Reich, assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs. "Cuba is very active in their espionage activities and propaganda activities, and we decided that this was an appropriate response to the Montes case."
A State Department spokesman, Charles Barclay, described the move to expel the two Cuban diplomats from the United Nations as a "separate action" based on a pattern of unofficial activities "deemed harmful to the United States."
American intelligence officials have said that Ms. Montes's spying was directed in part from the Cuban Mission to the United Nations, a crucial outpost of undercover officers from the Cuban intelligence service. But officials would not say whether the two United Nations diplomats, Francisco González García and Carlos Augusto Suárez Flexas, had worked directly with Ms. Montes.
The Cuban Interests Section, the country's mission in Washington, and its mission to the United Nations, did not respond to telephone calls yesterday requesting comment.
All four Cuban diplomats declared "persona non grata" were instructed on Friday to leave the United States within 10 days, or by Nov. 11. Under international agreements, the United States cannot unilaterally expel diplomats assigned to the United Nations, but officials said the Cubans had little recourse to appeal.
The more prominent of the two diplomats stationed in Washington, Gustavo Machín Gómez, flew back to Cuba before the expulsion order because his wife was having a baby, officials said.
Mr. Machín, son of a Cuban revolutionary who died in Che Guevara's campaign in Bolivia in 1967, had been in Washington for about five years. He was known as an engaging, can-do official who worked primarily as a liaison to American companies seeking business with Cuba.
"For five years, Gustavo Machín has generally been the first point of contact with Cuba for representatives of U.S. companies," said John S. Kavulich, president of the U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council, a group that provides information to American companies seeking to do business in Cuba. "And during the last three years, he has assumed the same kind of role with Congressional staffs. He was their go-to guy."
Intelligence and defense officials are still working to assess the damage that Ms. Montes did to American national security. The diplomats' expulsions were among a series of responses recommended by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
At her sentencing last month, Ms. Montes said she had turned over a trove of top-secret information on United States defense and intelligence activities to help Cuba defend itself against what she called unjust American policies.
A couple of days later, after months of Cuban silence, Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque praised her lavishly, saying she had been moved by "ethics and by an admirable sense of justice."
--------
CONSPIRACY TALES
Indonesians Say They Suspect C.I.A. in Bali Blast
November 7, 2002
New York Times
By JANE PERLEZ
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/07/international/asia/07BALI.html
JAKARTA, Indonesia, Nov. 3 - The American ambassador here, Ralph L. Boyce, does not have to venture far from his heavily fortified embassy to be challenged about who was responsible for the Bali bombings that killed more than 180 people.
The perception among many of the educated elite in this largely moderate Muslim country is that it was not, as the United States has suggested, a radical Islamic group with links to Al Qaeda.
Instead, they blame the Central Intelligence Agency. Some have argued that the United States prompted the Bali attack as a way of prodding Indonesia to join a possible war against Iraq.
Yet again, Mr. Boyce told a news conference - this time in Bali several days ago - that Indonesians should stop "pointing fingers elsewhere."
"The country needs to come together behind the leadership here and address the issue of terrorism," he said.
For many Indonesians, and especially moderate Muslim leaders, it is proving difficult to accept the idea that a homegrown radical Islamic organization - Jemaah Islamiyah, headed by a frail-looking cleric, Abu Bakar Bashir, who lies ailing in a hospital bed in police custody - could have had a hand in a terrorist act on its own soil.
But given the history of the United States in Indonesia during the cold war, it is not illogical to blame Washington for the Bali violence, some Muslim leaders said.
"People see the hand of the United States in the fall of Sukarno," said Nurcolish Madjid, the most prominent Indonesian Muslim scholar. He was referring to the covert support in 1958 by the Central Intelligence Agency of dissident Indonesian generals ouster of Indonesia's founding president in 1965 after he incurred Washington's displeasure for many years.
Further, during the three decades of authoritarian rule under Suharto, Mr. Sukarno's successor,many Indonesians viewed the United States as supporting the government efforts to repress Islamic expression, Mr. Madjid said.
"They take that as a precedent for this kind of thing," Mr. Madjid said in an interview.
Remarkably, there have been no strong stirrings against the arrest of Mr. Bashir. The absence of protests is an encouraging sign, American officials said, illustrating the idea that the vast majority of Indonesia's approximately 180 million Muslims are indeed of moderate persuasion. Threats by some Muslim leaders that Mr. Bashir's detention would inflame emotions have not been borne out so far.
The police have said Mr. Bashir was being questioned about a series of bomb attacks in Jakarta, including one at the city's biggest mosque, in 2000. Mr. Bashir, who was arrested in the days after the Bali bombing, is not a suspect in that case, the police said.
But while the lack of public protests over Mr. Bashir's arrest is a relief for Washington, American officials say they are dismayed by the reluctance of moderate Muslim leaders to discredit radical Islam in Indonesia and its connections to terrorism.
The Americans ask why mainstream Indonesian Muslims will not say in public what they say in private: that radical Islam's connection to terror is un-Islamic. They also wonder why conspiracy theories about the United States are so prevalent in Indonesia. Is it ignorance or arrogance, one American official asked this week, that makes Indonesians blind to the threat of radical Islam?
Mr. Madjid, 64, a graduate of the University of Chicago who is considered an elder statesman of moderate Muslim thought in Indonesia, cautioned, "If the government, especially, is too quick to point the finger to Muslims, that will feed the radicals."
Americans should recall, he said, that initial suspicions in the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City "were that Muslims did it," and that those suspicions "turned out not to be true."
Mr. Madjid said it was not clear to him that a radical Islamic group was the instigator of the Bali attack, which hit a nightclub filled with Western tourists drinking and dancing on a Saturday night.
He doubted, he said, that an Indonesian group would have "strong" links to Al Qaeda, as the United States is asserting.
Rather, he said, he believed that the attack had more to do with Indonesia's "internal politics." He said he suspected that some elements in the Indonesian Army, anxious to take advantage of the weak leadership of President Megawati Sukarnoputri, might have been involved in the bombing.
"In an underdeveloped country like this, to be in power is everything," Mr. Madjid said. "The military is out of power. For some of the military people to be out of power is unacceptable. Military factions could have had a hand in this."
Another Muslim leader, younger and more politically involved is Din Syamsuddin, secretary general of the Indonesian Council of Ulama. He said he strongly objected to the American focus on radical Islam as a source of terrorism.
He said he believed that the United States was behind the attack. "There is no logic that it was done by an Islamic group in Indonesia," Mr. Syamsuddin said. "Muslims don't deny there are terrorists in this country. But there is no fact that there are Indonesian Muslims doing it." Indeed, Mr. Syamsuddin, 44, who has a doctorate from the University of California at Los Angeles, said logic dictated that the United States directed the Bali operation.
He said he based his conclusion on his interpretation of the following events: the deportation of a Qaeda operative, Omar al-Faruq, who worked with Jemaah Islamiyah, from Indonesia to American custody in Afghanistan in June; the dispatch of Indonesian police officials to see Mr. Faruq around the time of the Bali bombing; and the arrest of Mr. Bashir, several days after the bombing.
American officials have said the Indonesian police were sent to question Mr. Faruq as part of an effort to persuade the Indonesian government that Jemaah Islamiyah was indeed connected to Al Qaeda.
American officials dismissed Mr. Syamsuddin's account as one of the "conspiracy theories" now going the rounds in Indonesia.
Mr. Syamsuddin, who organized three meetings between Ambassador Boyce and Indonesian Muslim groups this year, said the United States could do one thing to show its sincerity in determining who is responsible for terrorism in Indonesia.
He said there was "an insistence that al-Faruq should be brought back from United States custody, to make a fair trial here" for Mr. Bashir.
That would allow the accuser and the accused to face off in court, he said, adding, "If Bashir is found guilty, no one will support him."
--------
Sweden May Expel Russian in Ericsson Spy Probe
November 7, 2002
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/technology/tech-tech-ericsson-espionage.html
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - A Russian diplomat is likely to be expelled from Sweden in connection with a possible case of industrial espionage against telecoms equipment giant Ericsson, an intelligence source said on Thursday.
Police said on Wednesday they had detained three Swedes on suspicion of passing secret documents to a foreign intelligence service, which they did not identify. An Ericsson company source alleged a Russian was involved.
Loss-making Telefon AB LM Ericsson is the world's biggest producer of mobile phone networks, but is also involved in developing radar and missile guiding systems for the high-tech JAS 39 Gripen fighter plane. The Gripen is Sweden's main strike warplane.
The Ericsson source would not say what documents had been leaked, but said they did not appear to have been linked to any military projects.
``It was a specific technology which the Russians don't have themselves that they tried to get, and as far as I know it was not from the defense unit,'' the source said.
Sweden's Foreign Ministry and Justice Ministry declined to comment on reports that a Russian diplomat might be expelled. No one was available for comment at the Russian embassy or in Moscow because of a public holiday in Russia.
Asked if a Russian diplomat was likely to be expelled, the intelligence source said: ``That would be a reasonable conclusion.'' The intelligence source declined to be identified.
Ericsson has said the three people detained were either employees or former employees. The three have not been named.
The company has recently laid off staff as part of a cost-cutting package designed to put it back in the black some time in 2003.
The Ericsson source, who also declined to be named, said the leaking of the documents had caused limited damage, but was believed to have been going on for some time.
Swedish officials said a prosecutor would ask a court on Friday for the three Swedes to be detained until police had completed investigations because they might escape.
The hearing would take place in a high security room at Stockholm's district court, the officials said.
The prosecutor, Tomas Lindstrand, said in a court application -- a copy of which was obtained by Reuters -- that the three were suspected of serious espionage or industrial espionage.
Swedish security sources said police working on the case had mounted a month-long surveillance operation.
-------- un
DIPLOMACY
U.S. Gives U.N. an Iraq Measure, Seeks a Council Vote
November 7, 2002
New York Times
By JULIA PRESTON
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/07/international/middleeast/07NATI.html
UNITED NATIONS, Nov. 6 - The United States presented the Security Council today with a proposal for a resolution, revised to draw the support of France, that would give Iraq a last chance to accept rigorous weapons inspections and disarm or face an American-led war.
France did not immediately accept the draft today. President Jacques Chirac agreed in a telephone conversation with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia to try to "remove certain ambiguities" about the use of force, a spokeswoman in Paris said.
But the French ambassador here, Jean-David Levitte, acknowledged that "very important progress has been achieved" with the new text, and said France's goal was to win the broadest possible support for the measure on the 15-member Council.
Ambassador John D. Negroponte put the draft on the Council table after Bush administration officials decided that they had gone as far as they could to attract the support of France, which has steadfastly opposed an immediate authorization of military force. He called for a vote on Friday on the draft, which was also sponsored by Britain.
The latest draft, an intricate work of diplomatic filigree, preserves the United States' prerogative to attack if Iraq fails to comply with the United Nations inspections and also allows for the second round of Council decision-making that France sought, diplomats said.
In introducing the draft, Mr. Negroponte emphasized Washington's commitment to the inspections. Addressing the qualms of war-wary Council nations, he called the resolution "the best way to achieve the disarmament of Iraq by peaceful means."
In Washington, President Bush's spokesman, Ari Fleischer, aimed his comments at a domestic audience, emphasizing that the administration had not compromised its core goals.
"Nothing in this resolution handcuffs the president," Mr. Fleischer said. But in a nod to France, he said Mr. Bush "has committed to" another Council debate if Iraq did not cooperate with the inspectors.
Russia, another permanent veto-bearing Council nation that has been even more skeptical than France, made no shift today. American officials say they believe that China, the fifth permanent member, may vote for the resolution if France does.
The six-page draft, the third since the negotiations began in mid-September, conserved the administration's bottom line, placing no constraint on Mr. Bush's right to decide when to send American troops to topple Mr. Hussein. But it also showed movement by the administration, in the face of the resistance of its allies, toward accepting the arms inspections as a means to force President Saddam Hussein to relinquish weapons of mass destruction. The president has repeatedly said he does not believe that the Iraqi leader will allow the inspectors to complete their work.
The new draft says the Council has decided "to afford Iraq, by this resolution, a final opportunity" to abandon its prohibited weapons.
In the first draft, presented to the five permanent Security Council members in late September, the United States and Britain demanded to use "all necessary means" - shorthand for war - to disarm Baghdad regardless of the progress of inspections. In the new text, the words "all necessary means" have been buried in the preamble, where they have no operational effect.
The compromise intended to give both Washington and Paris what they want comes in adroit, if arcane, turns of phrase in the action passages of the resolution.
In the fourth paragraph, the Council would resolve that any failure by Iraq to cooperate, including "false statements or omissions" in a weapons declaration it must submit, will "constitute a further material breach" of its obligations. This breach alone would give the United States legal grounds for a military assault, American diplomats said.
But the same clause, reflecting France's demand for a second stage of deliberations, also stipulates that the new breach "will be reported to the Council for assessment." Later, one of the closing paragraphs directs the chief United Nations weapons inspectors to "report immediately to the Council any interference" by Iraq with their work. The Council would "convene immediately to consider the situation"
The draft concludes by recalling that the Council has "repeatedly warned Iraq of serious consequences" for its violations, a clear threat of war. Iraq has barred the return of the inspectors since they withdrew in 1998.
The new resolution would set up an inspections program far more intrusive than in the past. It retains the authorization for the inspectors to interview Iraqi scientists in or outside of Iraq and to remove their families from Iraq, but leaves those decisions to the inspectors. Iraq is required to provide the names of all its weapons experts.
The resolution eliminates special procedures established in the past for inspecting Mr. Hussein's palaces and other presidential sites. Under the resolution, the inspectors would have immediate access to any sites they choose.
A provision proposed by Washington for security guards from Council nations to accompany the inspectors has been removed. But the draft still calls for "exclusion zones," with no air flights or ground movement, around sites that the inspectors want to "freeze" for examination.
The resolution would allow inspectors to travel freely and without Iraqi searches in and out of the country, move around in aircraft, and use pilotless reconnaissance drones as well. The Council would call upon foreign governments to provide the inspectors with intelligence data to guide their efforts. They can destroy any illegal weapons they find, the draft says.
Once the resolution is adopted, Iraq has seven days to declare whether it intends to comply.
Within 30 days of the resolution, Iraq must present a comprehensive declaration of all its programs to develop chemical, biological or nuclear weapons or long-range missiles.
Hans Blix, the head of the United Nations chemical and biological weapons team, today reiterated to the Council that he thought that it would be difficult for Iraq to report on all of its civilian petrochemical industries as well as its weapons programs within 30 days. American and British diplomats said they would take his comments into account.
Mr. Blix said an advance group of inspectors would leave for Baghdad within 10 days after the resolution is approved.
Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said this week that the administration expected to know from the weapons declaration whether Iraq was being fully candid. He indicated that if Iraq concealed anything, another debate here and in Washington about war could come as early as mid-December.
But American and British diplomats used no warlike words today.
"This is about the disarmament of Iraq through inspections and by peaceful means," said Sir Jeremy Greenstock, the British ambassador. "It is a resolution that sets out two stages," he said, seeking to assuage France.
"This is not about triggers," he said. "This is not about the use of force."
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Pentagon Moving B-2 Bombers to New Roosts Closer to Baghdad
Hangars will be built on an Indian Ocean island and in Britain to shorten the distance the aircraft would have to fly in case of a war with Iraq.
November 7 2002
By John Hendren, Staff Writer,
Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/la-fg-stealth7nov07004454,0,4381367.story
KNOB NOSTER, Mo -- KNOB NOSTER, Mo. -- The Pentagon is moving the jet that fired the opening salvos of the last two U.S. wars to within easy striking distance of Iraq, erecting tent-like portable hangars for the batwinged B-2 bomber on the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia.
Four of the new $2.5-million maintenance hangars, each serving two planes, will be built on the British-held isle and one at Fairford, England. It will be the first time B-2s will be stationed overseas instead of here at Whiteman Air Force Base.
The foreign positioning of the radar-deflecting aircraft has been in the works for years, officials say. But the timing suggests the key role the B-2 is likely to play if there is a second war in the Persian Gulf, military analysts say.
If the U.S. launches war on Iraq, the B-2s will be critical in taking out an antiaircraft system that has been improved with fiber-optic communications and updated equipment and has had a decade to adapt to the tactics of U.S. and British planes patrolling "no-fly" zones over Iraq.
Diego Garcia is a five-hour flight from Baghdad. B-2s based there could each make three sorties every two days, military analysts say. It took nearly two days for the B-2s to reach Afghanistan from central Missouri.
The futuristic bomber -- housed at the same base the Enola Gay left to drop the first atomic bomb, on Hiroshima in 1945 -- was created to carry nuclear weapons into the Soviet Union. But by the time the first plane, the Spirit of Missouri, touched down at Whiteman in 1993, that enemy was gone.
In both Kosovo and Afghanistan, military analysts say, the B-2 adapted well to its new mission: carrying conventional weapons in the opening strike of a war.
"The B-2 bomber was designed specifically to kick the door down and kill targets," said Col. Doug Raaburg, commander of the 509th Bomb Wing at Whiteman.
The Pentagon has long planned to station B-2s at three sites from which they can strike trouble spots throughout the world within 24 hours: Guam for Asian targets, Britain for European targets and Diego Garcia for the Middle East.
Military officials wouldn't say exactly when the B-2s bound for Diego Garcia and Britain -- as many as 16, some of them housed in permanent hangars, out of a fleet of 21 -- will be in position. But they will be ready "in case we get the call," Raaburg said.
Even many B-2 advocates concede that the aircraft played no more than a cameo role in Afghanistan, where air defenses were few.
But Iraq has one of the most dense air defense systems in the world. It is a hodgepodge of technology from Russia, Yugoslavia and France. Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's regime has installed fiber-optic communications systems that are redundant, in case one is destroyed.
The Iraqis have built new facilities, reinforced others and added radar, experts say. How much of it has been destroyed by U.S. and British planes patrolling the country's northern and southern no-fly zones remains unclear, but those areas do not include Baghdad, where Hussein has placed his best air defenses.
"We didn't have to use the B-2s in Afghanistan because you didn't need it," said Rep. Norman D. Dicks (D-Wash.), an unabashed B-2 aficionado. "You're going to need it in Iraq."
After its introduction in 1993 at a cost of $2 billion each, the B-2 was criticized as too delicate -- critics erroneously said it couldn't fly in the rain -- and too expensive. But since the devastating opening bombing runs in Kosovo, analysts say, it has become the Pentagon's first-strike weapon.
Eight B-2s could drop as many as 576 bombs on Iraqi air defenses in the first three days of a war, seizing control of the airspace. It takes three minutes for a B-2 to drop 16 satellite-guided "smart" bombs. It is the only plane that can carry the 5,000-pound explosive that crew members call "the crowd pleaser," which burrows up to 20 feet into rock and destroys underground bunkers with massive force.
Some analysts predict that after the first few days of an assault on Iraq, the B-2s would be shuttled off to the sidelines, as they were after performing just six missions in Afghanistan.
But others note that during the entire 1991 Persian Gulf War, the plane that Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf used most to bomb targets in Baghdad was the earlier-generation stealth fighter, the F-117, because it could evade detection. With a second war likely to focus far more firepower on the Iraqi capital, the B-2 would be the weapon of choice, perhaps along with F-117s, said John Pike, a defense analyst at GlobalSecurity.org, an Alexandria, Va., research group.
"Baghdad is the center of gravity in this war, so I would suspect that the B-2s would be going downtown until the war is over," Pike said.
Placing B-2s at Diego Garcia frees up bases nearer Iraq to host shorter-range bombers and fighters in Qatar, Kuwait, Turkey and Jordan. The U.S. Central Command recently made room for the B-2s by moving B-1 bombers from Diego Garcia to Amman, Jordan.
After the introduction of the B-2, which was built in Palmdale by Northrop Grumman, war planners were skittish about using it. They feared that losing a $2-billion plane would cause a political backlash at home.
No one knew for certain how well it would work in combat, where the pilots are extremely vulnerable if spotted. Flying a B-2 is something of an act of faith.
It has no high-speed afterburner, no missiles to return fire -- nothing to protect it but stealth.
It is called the stealth bomber because its sleek shape helps it evade radar. Maintaining the shape of the smooth composite skin is such a delicate endeavor that maintenance crews cover seams, rivets and any dents from bugs or birds with radar-absorbing tape after each mission.
The painstaking maintenance, which would be done at Diego Garcia in the new portable hangars, can mean the difference between life and death.
One kink in the body could tip off ground radar to the bomber's location. Air Force officials believe that the only stealth fighter to be shot down, an F-117, was struck in Yugoslavia because radar on the ground bounced off the open bomb bay doors.
Whatever the risk to the pilots, any missions from Diego Garcia to Baghdad would be over in the wink of an eye, comparatively speaking.
B-2 pilots fly missions never envisioned before -- a record 44 1/2 hours to Afghanistan, by circuitous routes -- and they have forged their own on-board lifestyle. The trips are so long that pilots consulted sleep therapists. (They were advised to load up on carbohydrates and sleep either less than 45 minutes or more than two hours to avoid the drowsiness brought on by waking during a deep sleep.)
Pilots steal naps in lounge chairs from Kmart that they stash behind the two seats.
After a lengthy trek to the target, they turn around and head home without ever seeing the ground.
"At no other time in the world are you so removed yet so involved," said a B-2 captain who asked to be identified by his codename, Pita. If you want other stories on this topic, search the Archives at latimes.com/archives. For information about reprinting this article, go to www.lats.com/rights.
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WASHINGTON
U.S. Raids Foil Plots to Send Arms to Al Qaeda and Others
November 7, 2002
New York Times
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/07/international/asia/07HONG.html
WASHINGTON, Nov. 6 - Federal law enforcement officials said today that they had broken up two major drug operations aimed at furnishing weapons to terrorists, including Al Qaeda.
In an indictment unsealed today in San Diego, two Pakistanis and an American were charged with plotting to trade heroin and hashish for four Stinger antiaircraft missiles. The men are accused of telling F.B.I. undercover agents in Hong Kong that they were planning to sell the Stingers to Al Qaeda, which has been said to favor surface-to-air missiles.
In a second case brought in Houston, four men linked to a Colombian rightist paramilitary organization were arrested on charges that they sought to trade $25 million in cash and cocaine for five containers of Warsaw Pact weapons, including 9,000 assault rifles, 300 pistols, 53 million rounds of ammunition, rocket-propelled grenade launchers, and almost 300,000 grenades.
Two of the men arrested in Costa Rica on Tuesday in connection with the scheme, César López and a second man known as Commander Emilio, were suspected of being leaders of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia. United States officials have the group listed as a terrorist organization and hold it responsible for thousand of killings and kidnappings in Colombia in recent years.
Two Houston residents who allegedly helped broker the deal with the Colombians were also charged in the conspiracy and are in custody, officials said. All four could be sentenced to life in prison if convicted.
The Colombian plan, like the one in Hong Kong, was stymied by F.B.I. undercover agents alerted to the plot, who were able to move in before the plans could be carried out, authorities said.
Federal authorities pointed to the two cases as evidence of the dangerous overlap between drug trafficking and groups that the United States considers terrorist.
"We have learned and we have demonstrated that drug traffickers and terrorists work out of the same jungle, they plan in the same cave, and they train in the same desert," Asa Hutchinson, director of the Drug Enforcement Administration, told reporters in announcing the arrests alongside the attorney general, John Ashcroft, and the F.B.I. director, Robert S. Mueller III.
The F.B.I. has shifted several hundred employees away from narcotics investigation as it focuses on counterterrorism operations. But Mr. Mueller and Mr. Ashcroft said drug interdiction remained a high priority for the administration - particularly when it crosses paths with terrorist operations.
"I just would like to be on record and clear that we have not abandoned that," Mr. Ashcroft said. "Today's indictments indicate that we are pursuing it with intensity."
In the Colombian paramilitary case brought today in Houston, an F.B.I. agent, Mark C. Kirby, said in a criminal affidavit that the investigation began 13 months ago, when a confidential informant told the F.B.I. that two men in Houston had approached him about providing Russian-made weapons to Colombia in exchange for cocaine.
The F.B.I. set up a sting operation, with agents posing as arms dealers, and months of meetings and negotiations began in spots around the world, according to the affidavit. The Colombian operatives and their liaisons in Houston were told that the arms dealers had five cargo containers of weapons waiting for them in Cuba in exchange for $19 million in cash and cocaine.
The deal was nearing a close in Houston two months ago, authorities said, when one of the defendants, Uwe Jensen of Houston, gave a confidential informant a sealed enveloped with a summary of an initial order from the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, or A.U.C., officials said. The order was for 300 AK-47 assault rifles at $150 each, 300,000 rounds of AK-46 ammunition at 10 cents each, and 500,000 F-1 grenades at $5 each, for a total cost of $725,000. Officials arrested the four suspects this week.
In the San Diego case, federal prosecutors brought conspiracy charges against an American, Ilyas Ali, and two Pakistanis, Syed Mustajab Shah and Muhammad Abid Afridi, in connection with their alleged plot to buy Stinger missiles.
Mr. Ali, who has a Minnesota ad