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NUCLEAR
A Nuclear Mixed Message
Use of uranium is scandalous
The Hidden and Unseen
The perfect weapon
Iranians wary of program to build nukes
Draft 'deficient' on nuke rebuke
Russia ID'd As an Iran Atomic Supplier
Europe Strengthens Iran Resolution to Satisfy U.S.
Nuclear Board Said to Rebuff Bush Over Iran
North Korea Reactor Seen Doomed, But KEDO Said Useful
Bush Poised to Sign Bill Funding New Nuke Research
Kucinich: Regain 'essential American optimism'
MILITARY
Warring Afghan factions prepare to hand over heavy weapons
Heady Days for Contractors in Race for Iraq Deals
U.S. Army Awards Compact Kinetic Energy Missile Contract
Fort Greely missile system on target for completion
Bill includes $20 million for Redstone project
Recipe for Terror
French, German firms banned from rebuilding Iraq
Israeli army, air force chief accused of lying over deadly Gaza raid
Army used "banned weapon" in deadly Gaza raid: Arab Israeli lawmaker
NATO condemns Istanbul blasts as attack on democracy
US troops in Iraq to get fortified battle gear by year's end: Pentagon
GEORGIA TV chief quits amid protests
POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
Fraction of Iraq costs could feed world poor - WFP
ENERGY AND OTHER
GM Pitches Hydrogen Cars in Oil-Thirsty China
Critics Question Intent of U.S. Hydrogen Initiative
ACTIVISTS
Protesters, Miami cops clash during FTAA demonstrations
Official warns anti-U.S. mood is growing
-------- NUCLEAR
A Nuclear Mixed Message
By MICHAEL A. LEVI
November 20, 2003
NY Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/20/opinion/20LEVI.html?pagewanted=print&position=
WASHINGTON - When the Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency meets in Vienna today, there will probably be a fight over Iran's suspected nuclear weapons program. The United States wants Iran hauled before the United Nations Security Council for violating the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. The European members, however, want to negotiate with Iran.
But even if the United States and Europe were able to agree on procedure, it's unlikely that the board would be able to answer the more important question before it: what should Iran be allowed to do?
The difficulty in answering this question reflects an underlying problem with the organization. Its two-part structure - it both supports nuclear energy and controls nuclear weapons - increasingly gets in the way of multilateral efforts to stop weapons programs. This weakness cannot be addressed through incremental reforms. The solution may require splitting the agency in two.
At the time of the agency's creation, in 1957, a two-part mission made sense. It grew out of the belief that the world had a very limited supply of uranium that could be used to meet either civilian or military needs, but not both. By promoting civilian nuclear energy, the agency would direct precious resources away from military nuclear programs, thereby limiting the advance of atomic weapons. Today, though, we know that there is plenty of uranium to go around; increased consumption of uranium in nuclear energy programs, therefore, does nothing to blunt the advance of nuclear weapons.
Moreover, when the nuclear agency was created, atomic energy was the power source of the future, considered potentially too cheap to meter. Western leaders imagined that by offering developing countries access to inexpensive nuclear energy, they could entice them to forswear nuclear weapons. But again, the underlying theory is no longer valid. Nuclear energy has turned out to be no cheaper than other energy sources; the promise of access to atomic energy is no longer plausible as an incentive to keep countries from experimenting with nuclear weapons.
For most of its history, the International Atomic Energy Agency's dual missions worked fine. But as recent experience in Iran and North Korea shows, the structure is now a recipe for ineffectiveness and, possibly, disaster. Because of the agency's dual purpose, roughly half the members of its 35-member board are more interested in preserving their own states' access to nuclear technology than in enforcing a strict nonproliferation regime. This has led to an uncomfortable balance, where states are allowed to develop nuclear technology as long is it is monitored by the agency.
It has also led to a dangerous loophole, one that North Korea has exploited and Iran might take advantage of, too: Under the guise of a civilian energy program, a state can openly develop most of a nuclear weapons program under agency supervision. It can then eject the agency and go on to build nuclear weapons.
Take the case of Iran. In a report this month, Mohammed ElBaradei, the agency's director, pointed out that investigators found no evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program. But it's difficult to imagine circumstances under which the agency might have come up with something different. After all, it has no explicit mandate to discern a country's capacity and intent to assemble nuclear materials into a nuclear bomb - nor does it have the mandate to infer ill intent based on a nation's behavior over time. The agency simply monitors nuclear materials and, if given special permission, hunts for their illicit production. In the absence of bulletproof evidence, it judges states innocent of pursuing nuclear weapons. All this makes sense for an agency with twin aims. But in an age with the potential for nuclear terrorism, don't we need an entity whose sole aim is to stop the spread of nuclear weapons?
The only solution may be to break the International Atomic Energy Agency in half: one dedicated to nonproliferation, the other to the advance of energy technology.
The first new agency would focus its resources on mischievous countries and issue clear and regular verdicts on compliance. It would have a mandate to search not only for weapons materials, but also for the nonnuclear components of weapons themselves. Ultimately, it would issue guidelines on the regulation and availability of specific nuclear technologies. And ideally, its board of governors would be re-balanced in order to provide a strong stake for those states put at greatest risk by the spread of nuclear weapons and terrorism.
The second new agency would help countries, particularly those in the developing world, figure out which energy technologies best suit their needs. By helping nations develop gas, coal or even atomic energy, the agency could effectively induce states into a new nonproliferation bargain.
Persuading the United Nations to follow this course won't be easy: any change would require a vote by member states and the agency's board of governors. Still, as the United Nations struggles to make itself a force for stability in an unstable world, this could be the place to start.
Michael A. Levi, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, specializes in science, technology and security issues.
-------- depleted uranium
Use of uranium is scandalous
Atlantic City Press Herald
Opinion,
November 20, 2003
http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/news/columns/112003LETTERSNOV20.html
I was shocked by Robert Koehler's Nov. 10 column about the hazards of depleted uranium munitions. I have read other articles about how dangerous this stuff is but was actually swayed by the Pentagon's vociferous insistence that it is not toxic.
If what Koehler says is true, then vast parcels of Iraq are contaminated beyond re-demption. Also, a large percentage of our fighting forces, as well as many Iraqis, are likely to develop cancer from exposure to that contamination. If the Department of Defense is lying about the danger, then a monstrous crime has been committed and has been rather successfully covered up.
I hope that President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and the rest of those responsible for ramming this war down the world's throat are unaware of the reported dangers of depleted uranium. If they are not, then one wonders how much of a plum Iraq can be, oil wealth notwithstanding, if it's all poisoned.
And if the instigators of the war knew of the peril, and still allowed depleted uranium to be a component of our bombardments, then they are truly callous individuals, and it's small wonder why the Bush administration insisted upon Americans not being subject to the judgments of an International Criminal Court.
JOHN HIGBEE
Smithville
----
The Hidden and Unseen: The Reality of Bush's Iraq
Part I: The Dead & Wounded
by Manuel Valenzuela
DissidentVoice.org
November 20, 2003
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Articles9/Valenzuela_Iraq1.htm
Autumn leaves continue to fall inconspicuously throughout the United States just like our cannon fodder troops fall dead, maimed and scarred in the Mesopotamian deserts of Iraq. Throughout our nation, lawns surrounded by white-picket fences and small blotches of green in concrete jungles are covered by dry and dead brown leaves signaling the change in the seasons, as warmth and comfort gives way to the dreaded doldrums of winter. As each day passes, more leaves fall to the ground, leaving bare the skeletons of wood around and above us, a stark reminder of the hibernation of life in the natural world.
In similar ways, the loss of life and limb of our soldiers in Iraq continues unabatedly in a far away land. Like our leaves, soldiers continue to fall and die, their bodies devoid of a life once so full of energy. More than 400 have died, and the number of injured is eight times that, conveniently hidden from Americans' view, lest we see the horrors that our little war for oil has spawned. They might be called lucky to have escaped the claws of explosives, flying shrapnel or bullets whizzing by their heads were it not true that many will have to continue living without hands, arms, legs and feet or with severe burns, scars, brain damage and handicaps that will forever traumatize their lives.
Of course the hidden and much more debilitating scars, the psychological, emotional and mental ones will linger perpetually in the minds of thousands who will never be able to escape the terror of war. These demons will haunt them for the rest of their lives. And, lest not we forget, thousands of these brave and young men and women will carry with them back to their homes the pulverized remnants of depleted uranium from our bombs, missiles, ordinances and munitions, creating in them diseases and sicknesses that act like a time bomb, ready to afflict and decimate over the course of time.
Much like Gulf War I, where anywhere from 8000 to 9000 of its veterans have already died from mysterious illnesses including numerous cancers, and where hundreds of babies have been born dead or deformed in ways never seen before, today's troops may suffer similar fates. One need only look inside Iraq, where thousands upon thousands of civilians alive in the early 1990's have died from cancers and other diseases, and where thousands of babies have suffered the same fate as those born to those of our own soldiers. Knowing that tens of thousands of tons of bombs, ordinances, munitions and missiles made of depleted uranium have been used on Iraq in Gulf War II, it is a good bet that many more thousands of Iraqi civilians and American troops will suffer the same fate. The remains of depleted uranium are literally scattered throughout Iraq, - and lets not forget Afghanistan as well - contaminating land, air, water and humans. And we can't seem to find WMD's. I know where these WMD's are: stockpiled in our bases, right inside our country. Right in front of our noses, and we attack Iraq with them. Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Iraq. Fertile Crescent no more. Are we such hypocrites?
Over 7000 soldiers already injured in some way, shape or form, but how quickly they are forgotten by an administration that will not dare go to funerals or hospitals for fear of awakening the presently placid storm called the American public. Men and women of the underclass, from rural and urban homes, their families supporting this adventure in empire building with their hard earned wages, fight for the interests of the upper class. What a dishonor to these fallen heroes to sweep them away into a dark closet, without mention or acknowledgement, used as nothing more than expendable pawns in Bush's war. The United Corporations of America and the Military Industrial Complex are at it again, lying and manipulating, warmongering and profiteering, once more terrorizing the planet.
The administration bans cameras from showing dead soldiers returning in their flag-draped coffins. It uses its powers to hinder the media from showing armless and legless privates. This is done for the sake of brushing clean the horrors of war and anesthetizing a Hollywood conditioned citizenry into believing that this is just another PG-13 movie or violent video game where the good guys always win and never suffer anything but cuts and bruises. Quite simply, it is yet another fantasy that gets absorbed into our psyche. This is called the art of sanitized warfare, a good news-only policy of selling death and destruction to American citizens. Everything is airbrushed to give the illusion that Iraq is a nation on the brink of a renaissance, that what combat does exists is insignificant, that it is under control and that a few "terrorists" are nothing more than bothersome pests. Nothing could be further from the truth. This is politics at its worst, cynically gone mad, a way to keep Bush's poll numbers up in light of his re-election campaign, a way to keep citizens supportive of the war and designed to maintain the country ignorant to a reality that is the wickedness of war.
If we cannot see the reality of war, and are only allowed to see a fictional delusion of it then we will never empathize with the dead or wounded, we will never see death, blood and gore, its violent sounds or putrid smells nor the inextricable agony and suffering of a dying soldier or a maimed Iraqi child crying out in terror for her mother. In short, we will never see war, thus becoming immune to the all too real, chilling and sobering effects of man killing man with the most violent of weapons. War is made an abstract mirage, allowing the war machine to ravage foreign lands and innocent civilians with impunity and with little care for accountability. Meanwhile, the American public, unaware of what is being done in their name thanks to government propaganda and corporate media filtering, remains dangerously incurious and passive while their loved ones in Iraq are subjected to a cruel game of Russian roulette. Congratulations George, you and your shadowy cast of characters have succeeded in curtailing outrage and furor by conditioning us through television shows, movies, video games, media lies, charades and delusion.
The thousands of physically wounded and mentally scarred survivors that return to our safe shores from the oil-filled deserts half a world away are swept under the rug of apathy by an administration concerned more for the President's image than the sacrifices of those who left blood and limb in the sands of Mesopotamia. Stealthfully brought back into the country, mostly in the black envelope of night when we lay asleep so as to sneak in below the radar of attention, these men and women, along with their dead brethren, are quickly wished away, becoming not returning heroes but discarded statistics that are for the President more a liability than a symbol of what makes America great.
There is something rather perverse when a sitting President gives more importance to attending almost-daily $2000 a plate fund raising dinners around the country than to reassuring, sympathizing and helping to put at ease the thousands of walking wounded and hundreds of families of those whose spirit was unexpectedly taken away. Raising $200 million for his campaign from the wealthiest Americans seems to be of much more importance than showing compassion to middle and lower income citizens sacrificing both wages and loved ones to a war whose purpose and reason are not yet fully understood.
In these cold and dark days our dead citizen soldiers return home with eyes closed, never again to breathe the sweet crisp autumn air emanating from coast to coast. For these brave sons and daughters of our nation, America's splendors, from its highest peaks to its magnificent valleys, will never be seen again as their once splendid energy, having been so deceitfully taken from them, exits the parameters of this great Earth in their journey to the unknown.
Meanwhile, our Commander in Chief, following not his heart but rather self-serving political decision-making interests, nonchalantly, purposefully and unapologetically forfeits a leader's duty to help strengthen those who mourn and ail, comfort those children left without a parent and stand proudly next to the flag-draped coffins of the men and women he sent to die as they are forever laid to rest. This man should be forced to witness the sad tears and incredible pain and sorrow of those who have seen their loved ones for the last time. He should be forced to touch the frigid coffins of those whose bright lights have been extinguished. Perhaps then he will finally realize that the consequences of his actions come not in wrapping himself up victoriously in the flag but in seeing it draped over a coffin on a cold wet day and having it slowly folded up and handed to a bereaved wife or daughter as trumpets wail and thundering rifles roar homage to those whose ultimate sacrifices lie at his feet.
Manuel Valenzuela is an attorney, consultant, freelance writer and author of Echoes in the Wind, a novel that will be published in 2004. He lives in Madison, Wisconsin and can be reached at manuel@valenzuelas.net
----
The perfect weapon
Our love affair with depleted uranium masks a war crime in progress
By ROBERT C. KOEHLER
Tribune Media Services
Common Wonders
November 20, 2003
http://www.commonwonders.com/archives/col215.htm
"You can't clean it up!"
Doug Rokke, a career soldier who describes himself variously as a peace warrior and the ultimate garbage man, repeats this phrase with escalating amazement, lest anyone fail to get it.
When he speaks, he burns like a flare. He knows too much; it's eating him alive. He has seen the future of war crime - he has breathed it into his own lungs. You can't clean it up.
"It" is depleted uranium - the perfect weapon.
At 1.6 times the density of lead, DU shells are the last word in penetration power: locomotives compressed to the size of bullets. The shells ignite the instant they're fired and explode on impact.
"I mean it's absolute kill," Rokke said. "Inside the vehicle is a giant firestorm."
What's not to love, if you're the Pentagon? We pounded Saddam's army with DU ammo in Gulf War I and destroyed it on the ground. Maybe you've seen pictures of what we did to it; GIs cleaning up afterward coined the term "crispy critters" to describe the fried corpses they found inside Iraqi tanks and trucks.
Talk about kill power. DU's awesome; it laughs at steel. Nothing stops it.
For good reason, then, the Defense Department's standing order about this stuff is simple: See no evil.
So, OK, "depleted uranium" isn't really depleted of anything. It's dirty: U-238, the low-level radioactive byproduct of the uranium enrichment process. And when the ammo explodes, poof, it vaporizes into particles so fine - a single micron in diameter, small enough to fit inside red blood cells - that, well, "conventional gas mask filters are like a barn door."
Rokke knows what he's talking about; indeed, he knows as much about DU as anyone alive. In 1991, he was Gen. Schwarzkopf's go-to guy for environmental messes: the garbage man.
A specialist in preventive medicine (nuclear, chemical, biological), he was tapped to head up cleanup efforts in Kuwait. A number of U.S. tanks and troop transports had been taken out by friendly fire and Rokke and his team of several hundred men - a good 30 of whom are now dead of cancer, with many more, like Rokke himself, seriously ill - were supposed to ready them to be sent back to the States.
"We were scraping brains off Abrams tanks." The garbage man.
He doesn't mince words. To hear him speak - as I did the other day in Chicago - you get the feeling there's no time for it. He was one of the presenters at a conference at the University of Illinois/Chicago on war and health, sponsored, appropriately enough, by the School of Nursing. His message is so urgent it's incandescent.
And his message is this: War is obsolete. Its technology is out of control. And nothing, short of all-out nuclear war, is more dangerous than the widespread use of depleted uranium. Some 375 tons of it were left in the desert and cities of Iraq in '91, and a dozen years later, a quarter of a million vets, more than a third of Gen. Schwarzkopf's army, including Schwarzkopf himself, are combat-disabled, battling cancer and neurological and respiratory illnesses. More than 10,000 are dead.
Since then, we've sewn pulverized DU across Kosovo and Afghanistan, andnow, once again, Iraq. This time, 2,000 tons of it. "That's the solid estimate."
Two thousand tons. And you can't clean it up.
This is a long-term public health disaster of fearful proportions for Iraqis. But even those of you who have a hard time caring about their fate surely see that it is also an imminent disaster for our own men and women in uniform. They are utterly unprotected from DU contamination. To take precautions would be to concede that DU is dangerous; if the Pentagon did that, its perfect weapon would become "politically unacceptable."
Ergo, it ain't dangerous. If you hear otherwise, it's Iraqi propaganda.
Meanwhile, 7,000 GIs have been sent home on medical evacuation, Rokke says; 30 percent of the women are experiencing gynecological problems. And the barracks where many of our sick and wounded are warehoused are a disgrace - "so bad I wouldn't put a hog in there," he says.
DU rounds are going off right this moment. This is a war crime in progress.
ABOUT BOB KOEHLER Robert Koehler, an award-winning, Chicago-based journalist, is an editor at Tribune Media Services and nationally syndicated writer. You can respond to this column at bob@commonwonders.com
-------- iran
Iranians wary of program to build nukes
November 20, 2003
By Borzou Daragahi
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20031119-092652-8283r.htm
TEHRAN - Just out of jail, a dissident Iranian intellectual has an urgent message for Europeans compromising with Iran on its nuclear ambitions: Don't do it.
"We Iranians see the nuclear program not as a way of ensuring the security or future of our nation, but as insurance to maintain the political power of the clerical government," he said, asking that his name not be used.
"We see the potential for nuclear weapons as weapons against [the people], rather than weapons against other countries."
Iran's nuclear ambitions have come under increased international scrutiny in recent months, with the United States and Europeans both pressuring the country to come clean on its attempts to develop nuclear weapons.
Today, the United Nations' atomic-watchdog agency meets in Vienna, Austria, to discuss Iran's failure to disclose elements of its nuclear program.
Iran insists its program - begun in the 1970s under Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, who was deposed in a 1979 Islamist revolt - is a peaceful one. It recently admitted, however, that it had enriched small quantities of uranium, a step toward developing nuclear weapons.
The nation of 70 million remains far from united about the prospect of obtaining nuclear power, much less the nuclear weapons prohibited under international agreements.
Even within Iran's fractious government - where a weak, reform-minded elected body led by President Mohammed Khatami is overwhelmed by hard-line clerics who control the judiciary, intelligence and military branches - a classic guns-vs.-butter debate has raged.
"On the one hand, some were saying, 'No way. We won't accept these conditions and will continue our efforts at nuclear development,' " said Muhammad Reza Dehshiri, a professor of international relations in Tehran.
"On the other hand, there were others who were saying it's better to concentrate on ameliorating living conditions of ordinary Iranians instead of spending the public budget on nuclear development. The latter group won the debate."
Among Iranians, too, there remain differences of opinion. Some, such as the dissident intellectual, see Iran's nuclear ambitions as an effort to gain international legitimacy.
----
Draft 'deficient' on nuke rebuke
November 20, 2003
By Tom Carter
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20031119-092701-5884r.htm
The leader of the United Nations' nuclear watchdog agency sided with the United States yesterday by calling a European resolution on Iran's nuclear-weapons program "deficient," while stopping short of backing U.S. efforts to involve the U.N. Security Council.
In Vienna, Austria, where the headquarters of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is located, diplomats said the agency's chief, Mohamed ElBaradei, called a proposed resolution by France, Germany and Britain too weak.
"Dr. ElBaradei has expressed his concern that the draft resolution as it stands does not sufficiently support the agency," a Western diplomat told Reuters news agency.
The European resolution reportedly praises Iran for agreeing to halt its efforts to make weapons-grade nuclear material and for agreeing to let international inspectors into the country.
Earlier this month, the IAEA issued a report that found Iran had been involved in a covert nuclear program, including processing uranium and plutonium, in violation of its nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty obligations for at least 18 years.
However, the report also found no evidence that Iran's nuclear program was a covert weapons program. The IAEA board of governors will consider the report today.
A diplomat familiar with Mr. ElBaradei's thinking said he was looking for "a strongly worded report" but one that stops short of asking for Security Council involvement.
In a related development, an Iranian opposition group that helped expose clandestine efforts to make weapons-grade uranium and plutonium released documents yesterday purporting to show that Iran is on the verge of assembling its first atomic bomb.
The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) said the documents demonstrated that Iran could have weapons capability in as little as two months.
NCRI also said that a site previously inspected by the IAEA was a fake.
"Information from within the clerical regime made it clear that they had been taken to a site, similar to the site in question and that they were not shown the actual site," said NCRI documents released yesterday in Vienna and Washington.
"The whole thing is a weapons program. In two months to two years, the Iranian regime will have the capability of building a bomb," a NCRI spokesman said by telephone yesterday.
In August last year, the NCRI exposed Iran's secret nuclear program, revealing that the regime was building an underground uranium-enrichment plant at Natanz, 150 miles south of Tehran, and a heavy-water-production facility at Arak, about 120 miles southwest of Tehran.
The exposure forced Iran to open these sites to the IAEA, leading to Mr. ElBaradei's visit in February to Tehran.
The NCRI has been branded a "terrorist" organization by the U.S. State Department, forcing it to shut down its extensive Washington lobbying organization.
----
Russia ID'd As an Iran Atomic Supplier
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
November 20, 2003
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Nuclear-Agency-Iran.html?pagewanted=print&position=
http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/N/NUCLEAR_AGENCY_IRAN?SITE=DCTMS&SECTION=HOME
VIENNA, Austria (AP) -- The International Atomic Energy Agency has identified Russia, China and Pakistan as probable suppliers of some of the technology Iran used to enrich uranium in its suspect nuclear programs, diplomats told The Associated Press on Thursday.
The disclosure came as the IAEA board discussed how to react to Iran's nuclear activities. The board is debating the wording of a resolution that would satisfy both U.S. calls for strong condemnation of Iran's past cover-ups and European desires to keep Iran cooperating by focusing on its recent openness.
While Iran has acknowledged nearly two decades of concealment, it has recently begun cooperating with the agency in response to international pressure.
As part of that cooperation, it has suspended uranium enrichment -- an activity that the United States had linked to what it says was Iran's nuclear weapons agenda. Iran insists it enriched uranium only to produce power.
While acknowledging that some of its enrichment equipment had traces of weapons-grade highly enriched uranium, it insists those traces were inadvertently imported on material it purchased abroad.
Iran has said it cannot identify the countries of origin because it bought the centrifuges and laser enrichment equipment through third parties.
The Vienna-based IAEA needs to establish where the equipment came from, however, to ascertain whether Iran is telling the truth about the source of the traces.
The diplomats, speaking on condition of anonymity, declined to say how the agency established the probable origin of the equipment.
For its part, Pakistan has denied all involvement in Iran's enrichment program.
Moscow's public nuclear link with Tehran is a still-to-be-finalized $800 million deal to help build Iran's first nuclear reactor. The United States says the facility in Bushehr on the Persian Gulf could help Iran develop weapons. The Kremlin has said it shares some of the U.S. concerns and has prodded Tehran to accept tighter IAEA controls.
The IAEA meeting lasted less than two hours, with discussions set to continue Friday. The discussions were being held behind closed doors but the Vienna-based agency released a copy of the opening remarks by Director-General Mohamed ElBaradei.
ElBaradei told the agency's 35-nation board of governors that he expected it to address ``the bad news and the good news.''
``The bad news is that there have been failures and breaches. The good news is that there has been a new chapter in cooperation,'' he said. ``There is an intensive discussion right now on the draft resolution. The latest version being discussed is quite strong.''
Still, the agency doesn't know if Iran has tried to build nuclear weapons. That, he told the board, ``will take some time and much verification effort.''
But he welcomed Tehran's recent cooperation with the agency.
``The situation has changed significantly since the middle of last month, when a new chapter of implementation of safeguards in Iran seems to have begun, a chapter that is characterized by active cooperation and openness on the part of Iran,'' he said.
The United States had hoped the IAEA board would find Tehran in noncompliance with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty at its meeting. Diplomats described Thursday's talks as ``very fluid,'' suggesting there was an effort to close the gap between the U.S. and European approaches on how to deal with Iran.
On Wednesday, Washington rejected a proposed European draft resolution that would urge Iran to continue cooperation with the agency but refrain from harshly condemning it for concealing parts of its nuclear program, saying it was prepared to opt for no resolution rather than a toothless one.
Drawn up by France, Germany and one of Washington's closest allies, Britain, the rough draft minimized nearly two decades of covert nuclear programs that the U.S. administration says point to an effort to develop nuclear weapons.
Instead, it focused on positive steps taken by Iran over the past few weeks to deflect international suspicions, including suspending uranium enrichment and agreeing to inspections on demand by IAEA inspectors.
A senior diplomat, who reported on the meeting on condition of anonymity, said a compromise resolution satisfying both sides was now in the works.
Whereas the initial European wording chastised Iran for ``failure to fulfill its obligations,'' new discussion focused on stronger language -- either including past ``noncompliance'' of IAEA agreements by Iran, or finding it in ``breach of its obligations.''
Both would be more acceptable to the United States and its allies, the diplomat said.
On the Net:
IAEA, www.iaea.org
----
Europe Strengthens Iran Resolution to Satisfy U.S.
By REUTERS
November 20, 2003
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-nuclear-iran.html?pagewanted=print&position=
VIENNA, Austria (Reuters) - France, Britain and Germany revised a draft U.N. nuclear resolution Thursday in an attempt to satisfy Washington's demand that the U.N. strongly condemn Iran for hiding its atomic program for two decades.
The head of the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency urged its board to pass a resolution on Iran's violations of its non-proliferation obligations that both ``strengthens my hand'' and reacts to the ``the bad news and the good news'' about Iran's activities.
``The bad news is that there have been failures and breaches and the good news is that there is a new chapter in cooperation with Iran,'' Mohamed ElBaradei said, adding that there was ``a new spirit'' of cooperation in Tehran.
France, Germany and Britain originally circulated a resolution that chided Iran for ``failures to meet safeguards obligations,'' a phrasing too mild for the United States.
Under pressure from Washington, ElBaradei and the eight other present and future EU countries on the 35-nation IAEA board, Europe's ``big three'' changed the wording to say the board ``strongly deplores (Iran's) breaches,'' a Western diplomat close to the negotiations said.
This was closer to Washington's thinking, but not close enough, diplomats said.
In a recent report on Iran, the IAEA said that over the last two decades Tehran had failed to comply with obligations under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty by -- among other things -- secretly producing plutonium and enriching uranium.
While ElBaradei's report said there was no clear evidence to support U.S. allegations that Iran had a secret atomic weapons program, he said the jury was still out on whether Tehran's nuclear ambitions were entirely peaceful as it insists.
``(Iran's) breaches and failures are, of themselves, a matter of deep concern and run counter to both the letter and spirit of the (NPT) Safeguards Agreement,'' he told the IAEA board.
Washington, which has labeled Iran part of an ``axis of evil'' with North Korea and pre-war Iraq, wants the board to find Iran in ``non-compliance'' with its NPT obligations and report Tehran to the U.N. Security Council, which can impose sanctions.
The United States also wants the resolution to include some kind of ``trigger mechanism'' in the event of further breaches by Iran. But it has only a few allies on the board -- Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
TOUGHER INSPECTIONS
Iran recently agreed to sign an Additional Protocol to the NPT, which gives the IAEA the right to conduct more intrusive, snap inspections of atomic sites.
Although Tehran has yet to sign the document, ElBaradei said the IAEA had begun conducting its inspections as if it had been signed and ratified.
``We are acting as if the protocol is in force and we have been getting all the access we need, both to locations and to information,'' he said.
Former U.N. weapons inspector David Albright, now head of the Institute for Science and International Security, a U.S.-based think-tank, told Reuters he feared a weak resolution would send the wrong signal to Tehran.
He also predicted there would be more revelations about Iranian nuclear secrets in the months to come, especially with regard to its uranium-enrichment program, which it started in the 1980s and kept secret from the IAEA for nearly two decades.
``It's hard to believe they didn't have a weapons program at some point,'' Albright said.
----
Nuclear Board Said to Rebuff Bush Over Iran
By DAVID E. SANGER
November 20, 2003
NY Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/20/international/middleeast/20IRAN.html?hp=&pagewanted=print&position=
IENNA, Nov. 19 - The board of the International Atomic Energy Agency appears prepared to approve a resolution on Iran's 18 years of secret work on a nuclear program that will stop short of recommending United Nations Security Council action, a setback to President Bush, senior officials from several countries said here Wednesday.
Only hours after Mr. Bush, in Britain, declared that the agency must hold Iran to its obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, officials here said that the board was likely to adopt a European-sponsored resolution that was being strengthened on Wednesday to include wording that would likely "deplore" Iran's deceptions and declare that they amounted to a "breach" of its obligations.
But Secretary of State Colin L. Powell was unable to persuade more than three of the board's 35 member countries - Canada, Australia and Japan - to vote for a formal censure of Iran. Even the government of Prime Minister Tony Blair, Mr. Bush's host, sided with France and Germany and said that the best way now to deal with Iran is to encourage its sudden conversion to openness.
"What I would like to see is a resolution that strengthens my hand," the director general of the atomic energy agency, Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, said in an interview in his office here on Wednesday, without discussing specifics. Dr. ElBaradei sided with Mr. Powell in urging a strengthening of the language of the proposed resolution but stopped short of recommending any sanction against Iran. Dr. ElBaradei angered Bush administration officials last week when he issued a report that described in great detail Iran's deceptions, including its attempt to use an exotic laser technology to enrich uranium, but concluded there was not sufficient evidence to prove that the country was seeking a nuclear weapon. Mr. Powell said he believed the evidence inevitably led to the conclusion that Iran intended to build a weapon, even if it had not yet succeeded.
"I told him I cannot verify intentions," Dr. ElBaradei said on Wednesday, as representatives of some of the countries on the agency's board met nearby to work out compromise language. The formal session begins on Thursday.
Iran has maintained that its nuclear work has been for peaceful purposes, and President Mohammad Khatami has said the report showed that his nation has complied with the Nonproliferation Treaty.
Turning to Iraq, Dr. ElBaradei said that based on what he has read and heard since Mr. Bush declared in May that major combat operations had ended, American inspectors have been unable to contradict his conclusion before the war that there was no evidence that Iraq had an active nuclear weapons program.
At the time, those statements enraged some hawkish members of the Bush administration, and they directly contradicted statements by President Bush and Vice President Cheney. It was the international atomic agency that first concluded that the evidence Mr. Bush cited in his State of the Union speech in January, saying that Saddam Hussein had tried to obtain nuclear material in Africa, was based on forged documents.
"We were right after all" to declare to the United Nations that the Bush administration was overstating the evidence, Dr. ElBaradei said. "We said there was no evidence, and it turned out to be true."
He said his agency, which has been blocked from returning to Iraq, should be allowed to "go back and finish this," and he added that the United States was spending a billion dollars on a search effort his staff could do more efficiently.
Officials here note that the budget for the international agency's operations to safeguard nuclear programs around the world is about a tenth of what the United States is spending on the search.
The argument over how to handle Iran's nuclear revelations has echoes of the debate in the United Nations earlier this year about confronting Iraq - though in this case, the administration appears to be working toward building diplomatic pressure rather than moving to military action.
The question is whether Iran will open up more fully if it feels the constant pressure of threatened United Nations sanctions or whether that threat would be counterproductive, undercutting the country's recent announcement to freeze the enrichment of uranium and open itself to full inspections.
Mr. Powell has argued that Iran only revealed details of its nuclear program because the pressure on it was overwhelming. Other senior officials around Mr. Bush said that the agency had a statutory responsibility to report breaches of the Nonproliferation Treaty and that failure to go to the Security Council would send a message around the world that there is little penalty for secretly working on nuclear weapons. But the Europeans and Russia and China argued that Iran should not be punished for finally telling some part of the truth.
The first draft of their proposed resolution played down the 18-year-long covert program and congratulated Iran for its recent turnaround. Dr. ElBaradei objected, as did the United States.
But the drafts circulating Wednesday night included stronger proposed language, including a statement that Iran was in "breach of its obligations."
The last time the board referred a country to the Security Council for action was this year, when North Korea threw out the agency's inspectors and announced it would withdraw from the Nonproliferation Treaty and restart the production of bomb-grade plutonium. The Security Council has not acted, keeping the issue in abeyance until the outcome of six-nation talks on the issue scheduled to reconvene in Beijing in December.
-------- korea
North Korea Reactor Seen Doomed, But KEDO Said Useful
Story by Paul Eckert
REUTERS NORTH KOREA:
November 21, 2003
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/22909/story.htm
SEOUL - An international nuclear reactor project in North Korea probably won't survive the latest crisis with Pyongyang, but the consortium that is building it remains useful for dealing with the North, experts said yesterday.
The consortium - the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization, or KEDO - is expected to formally announce on Friday a decision to suspend the light-water reactor project for one year while diplomats try to persuade Pyongyang to abandon all of its nuclear weapons programs.
Diplomats are shuttling around the region this week to try to set a date for six-way talks aimed at halting North Korea's nuclear arms programs. The talks involve the two Koreas, the United States, China, Russia and Japan, who met inconclusively in Beijing in August and are expected to meet again in December.
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly, Washington's point man in the nuclear dispute, said he was working to line up six-way talks next month, but a December meeting was not certain.
Many analysts and U.S. officials say the light water reactor (LWR) project will probably be killed off and perhaps replaced with a non-nuclear energy scheme because of widespread doubts that North Korea can be trusted with fissile material.
But KEDO - with long experience in North Korea and multilateral leadership by Japan, South Korea, the European Union and the United States - should be preserved, said Charles Pritchard, until recently a U.S. board member of the group.
"It makes eminent sense that KEDO would be called upon to adjust itself, either in the continuation of the LWR program - which I personally believe is doubtful - or to some other conventional energy needs," he told a forum in Seoul.
"KEDO was certainly able to accomplish things a lot of us individual countries were not able to do," added Pritchard.
CLOSE LOOPHOLES
Pritchard, now a fellow at Brookings Institution, said KEDO kept channels open with the North even after a 1998 Pyongyang missile test and other actions had strained ties with Japan and with South Korea.
The KEDO project is based on a 1994 agreement under which the North Koreans froze their nuclear arms program in return for two light-water reactors and fuel oil to meet energy needs.
KEDO froze oil shipments a year ago, after the United States announced that Pyongyang was secretly enriching uranium to make bombs. In response, North Korea reactivated its plutonium-based program, giving it two routes to bomb-making.
Testsuya Endo, a former Japanese diplomat involved in nuclear diplomacy with North Korea, said any new agreement with Pyongyang must first fill in "missing points" in the 1994 deal, such as its lack of an explicit ban on uranium enrichment.
"They can develop new logic of their own, and they can interpret treaties and agreements rather freely and arbitrarily in their own interest," he said of North Korean negotiators.
"Any agreement should be very precise and exact (so that) North Korea cannot make use of shortcomings and loopholes," said Endo. He suggested expanding KEDO to include Russia and China.
Robert Carlin, KEDO Assistant Director for Policy Planning and North Korea Affairs, said it would be wasteful to cast aside the fruits of eight years of tough negotiations with the North.
"It has already a legal framework with North Korea. If that's junked, it's all going to have to be negotiated again," he said.
Pyongyang has responded to the planned suspension of the project by threatening to seize equipment and materials at the reactor site at Kumho on the eastern coast of North Korea.
-------- u.s. nuc weapons
Bush Poised to Sign Bill Funding New Nuke Research
WASHINGTON, DC, (ENS)
November 20, 2003
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/nov2003/2003-11-20-09.asp#anchor1
Congress has approved funding for research into new nuclear weapons within a $27 billion appropriations bill for energy and water programs. The fiscal 2004 spending bill contains $7.5 million for research into nuclear "bunker buster" weapons and $6 million for low yield nuclear weapons less than five kilotons.
The funds come on the heels of a decision by Congress earlier this month to lift a decade old ban on researching new low yield nuclear weapons - a five kiloton nuclear weapon is about half the size of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945. Congress has also approved a Bush administration request to shorten the time required to prepare for a full scale nuclear test from 24 months to 18 months.
The Bush administration says research into these new nuclear weapons will make the nation's nuclear arsenal into a more effective deterrent, because these kinds of weapons could reduce the potential for causing civilian casualties and could improve the effectiveness of nuclear weapons in destroying deeply buried and hardened targets.
Republicans stressed that the funding is only for research - the administration would have to ask Congress for authority to develop the new nukes.
But critics are concerned that the Bush administration's plan blurs the line between the use of nuclear and conventional weapons and could undermine the international effort to contain the world's development of nuclear weapons.
"Congress and the Bush administration have made a mistake by opening the door to a new wave of global nuclear weapons competition," said Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association. "This sends a dangerous message that will hamper U.S. efforts to prevent other nations from developing nuclear weapons."
Opponents of the policy changes and new research efforts noted that Congress did scale back the administration's plans. The $7.5 million of bunker buster nuclear weapons is half the administration's request and $4 million of the $6 million approved for low yield nuclear weapons is contingent on the Energy Department submitting a report on U.S. nuclear stockpile requirements.
Critics say the administration's concept of modifying or developing nuclear weapons for use against deeply buried and hardened targets is not only misguided, but fundamentally flawed.
A nuclear weapon exploded just beneath the Earth's surface would create a massive crater and would throw more radioactive dirt and particles into the air than one detonated above the target, according to Sidney Drell, a nuclear physicist with Stanford University.
For fallout to be contained, even a 0.5 kiloton nuclear weapon would have to penetrate at least 150 feet into the Earth in order for fallout to be contained.
But there is no known material that could be used to encase a bomb that could penetrate more than 50 feet, Drell said, "even if we slam them in at supersonic speeds."
"Nuclear weapons should not be considered just another weapon in our arsenal," said Drell. "They are mass terror weapons whether used by the United States or another country."
-------- us politics
Kucinich: Regain 'essential American optimism'
11/20/2003
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2003-11-19-kucinich_x.htm
U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio says his blue-collar Cleveland background helps him stand out in the crowd of Democratic presidential contenders and allows him to connect with Americans' practical aspirations: jobs, housing, health care and decent educations. But Democratic voters aren't connecting yet with Kucinich, 57, who remains at the back of the pack of his party's aspirants. (Related audio: Kucinich ready to take on Bush)
In another of an occasional series of interviews with presidential candidates, Kucinich this week discussed his positions and political insights with USA TODAY's editorial board. Some excerpts, edited for length and clarity:
I reject where the Democratic Party has gone. I think the Democratic Party has abandoned its roots. ... I'm ready to help redefine the party.
Q: Are Democrats turning away from President Clinton's 'new Democrat' ideology and back to more traditional Democratic credentials?
A: The Democratic Party doesn't have a compass. What does the party stand for? The only reason why people would want to vote Democratic is if there were real alternatives offered. What's the alternative being offered by some of the Democratic front-runners? President Bush would keep us in Iraq; many of the Democratic front-runners would keep us in Iraq. Bush would keep a privately run health care system; many of the Democratic front-runners would keep a privately run health care system. Bush would keep us in the World Trade Organization and the North American Free Trade Agreement and let the trade deficit grow, and many of the Democratic front-runners would do the same.
I reject where the Democratic Party has gone. I think the Democratic Party has abandoned its roots. I think it has abandoned the cities. I think it has abandoned people of color. I think it has abandoned blue-collar workers, and it has abandoned the practical aspirations of people for peace. I'm ready to help redefine the party. Frankly, if we don't do that, there's no way this party is going to be able to defeat Bush.
Q: Do Democrats need to embrace the issue of gay marriage, even if it costs some votes?
A: It's a civil rights issue, pure and simple. The Democrats ought to stand for everyone's civil rights - and that includes gays.
Q: If Democrats don't choose you to lead them, will you run as an independent?
A: No, I have no interest in doing that.
Q: Your critics say you spend too much time focusing on the impossible at the expense of getting things done. A Cabinet-level department of peace comes to mind. How do you respond?
A: I wonder what the Founders heard a couple of hundred years ago when they were thinking about creating a new America. We're forgetting the kinds of dreams that help found a nation. I don't think there's anything impractical about advocating a full economy, about advocating that everyone in this country have health care, about advocating that every young person be entitled to go to public college or university tuition-free, about advocating that young families have a chance to send their children to a five-day-a-week day-care program for free. It can be paid for. The question is what our priorities are. If our priorities are war, then we don't have resources for the things that need to be done. I come from the inner city; I lived in a car when I was a kid. No one can tell me that you can't achieve something with the resources of this country. But as long as we give tax cuts to people in the top bracket, as long as we give $87 billion - and more - for a war, as long as we have a Pentagon budget that is $400 billion, totally driven by fear, then you can say that all of this is impossible. But it isn't a question of whether someone's a dreamer or not. The question is: Is someone ready to address the practical aspirations of people? Everything I talk about is practical. I can't think of anything more impractical than this war. I can't think of anything more impractical than continuing the occupation of Iraq. I can't think of anything more impractical than a draft. What to me is practical is nuclear abolition, working cooperatively with the world community.
So I consider myself the most practical politician in the whole contest. Am I a dreamer? You bet I am. But my dreams are informed by the reality of our conditions, which can be changed through the human heart and the human spirit.
Q: You say you're a pragmatist, even as you talk of your dream for world peace. As a pragmatist, how would you get North Korea to give up nuclear weapons? And how would you deal with India and Pakistan?
A: Let's start with North Korea. Let's go inside Kim Jong Il's skin for a minute. ...
Q: Scary thought.
A. ... But we need to do that. As president, I need to be able to see how that other person views the world so I can understand what I need to do to meet his fears and resolve these questions. Kim heard the United States' president describe North Korea as part of an axis of evil. Remember, during the Korean War that country was leveled. To have the United States making bellicose statements about North Korea has to be pretty scary. As president, I'd have a new policy of engagement. Go talk to him! Not isolate him and make him believe that he has no ability to deal with the United States other than to rattle a nuclear saber.
In our development of new nuclear weapons, we're not only breaking our own pledge in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, but we're also creating a basis for nuclear proliferation - which brings us to India and Pakistan. We have no credibility telling the Asian subcontinent not to go ahead and arm with nuclear arms when we ourselves are doing that.
Q: You want to end American involvement in Iraq. How would you do that without causing more problems?
A: The presence of the United States in Iraq is a source of instability, not stability. The conflict is deepening, not lessening. The casualties are increasing, and the cycle of violence is spreading. Not only did America make a mistake by going in, but we have separated from the world community. The United Nations wants no part of this. We need to take a new approach.
I would go to the U.N. with a resolution with the following principles: First, the U.S. would turn over to the U.N., on a transitional basis, responsibility for handling the oil assets of Iraq and the contracting process in Iraq. The U.S. would turn over to Iraq the responsibility for helping the Iraqi people develop governance.
That kind of resolution would indicate a profound shift of U.S. policy. It would gain the support of the member nations, who would then be asked to commit troops - again, on a transitional basis so we could rotate the U.N. troops in and the U.S. troops out. The U.N. would have to stay there until such time that the Iraqis can be self-governing and self-sufficient.
Alternatively, we face a deepening struggle and a long-term commitment that can lead only to more loss of life and tremendous loss of U.S. integrity, not to mention a continued drain on our financial resources.
Q: What is your top priority for the nation?
A: My priority would be a domestic agenda that would really be met. We're not asking the right questions. We just accept that war is inevitable, and that this fear that's over the country is something we're stuck with. My presidency would be about the end of fear and the beginning of hope - to try to regain that essential American optimism that really gives us that can-do attitude. We've lost a little bit of that since 9/11. I think I can help the country regain it.
-------- MILITARY
-------- afghanistan
Warring Afghan factions prepare to hand over heavy weapons
MAZAR-I-SHARIF, Afghanistan (AFP)
Nov 20, 2003
http://www.spacewar.com/2003/031120143751.ihlb36c0.html
Feuding militias loyal to two rival warlords in northern Afghanistan are to start handing over their heavy weapons Friday, a defence ministry official said.
"The removal of the heavy weapons from the 7th and 8th army corps will begin tomorrow (Friday) at 9:30 am," deputy chief of staff General Ishaq Noori told reporters in the main northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif on Thursday.
After collection the weapons will be stored in two locations and guarded by non-partisan Afghan national army troops who have arrived in the troubled city, he said.
The disarmament drive is expected to collect more than 100 tanks and heavy weapons from the 7th and 8th corps which are loyal to ethnic Tajik General Atta Mohammad and his Uzbek rival General Abdul Rashid Dostam, respectively.
Serviceable weapons and armoured vehicles would be later taken to Kabul for use by the new Afghan national army, Noori said.
The removal of the heavy weapons will be observed by defence ministry officials, UN representatives and troops from the local British-run provincial reconstruction team (PRT), the general said.
"The PRT in Mazar-i-Sharif fully supports the programme for the removal of the heavy weapons," PRT commander Colonel Dickie Davies said.
Some 80 British army soldiers, mostly Gurkhas, are based in Mazar-i-Sharif as the backbone of the PRT helping with security sector reforms in the north.
Removal of the weapons is a local initiative and is not linked to the national disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration (DDR) drive launched last month which is expected to moved to northern Balkh province following the removal of the heavy weapons, General Noori explained.
Fighting between Dostam's Junbish and Mohammad's Jamiat faction has claimed dozens of lives this year.
A UN Security Council mission described last month's clashes near Mazar-i-Sharif as "the heaviest factional fighting since the start of the Bonn process" after the fall of the Taliban two years ago.
Reining in powerful warlords and disarming some 100,000 militiamen are among the major challenges facing President Hamid Karzai as he attempts to extend his authority to the provinces.
-------- business
Heady Days for Contractors in Race for Iraq Deals
Thu November 20, 2003
By Sue Pleming
(Reuters)
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=reutersEdge&storyID=3863750
WASHINGTON - Prospective bidders are salivating over new Iraqi business worth up to $18.7 billion, from sellers of trucks and power generators to construction giants and oil refinery specialists.
A sold-out Pentagon conference for contractors at an Arlington, Virginia, hotel on Wednesday had the heady feeling of a Gold Rush.
More than 1,300 people from hundreds of U.S. and foreign companies stalked procurement officials in hallways and pitched their competence to work in Iraq. A follow-on conference is being held in London on Friday, targeting non-U.S. firms.
"There is just so much money that we can tap into. It's just wonderful to have this opportunity," one prospective bidder gushed to the Defense Department's director of procurement, Deidre Lee.
A new U.S. office established in Baghdad to supervise and oversee contracts has set an aggressive timetable, awarding up to $18.7 billion in 25 contracts over the next 10 weeks to rebuild Iraq.
Some draft tenders could be released by Friday for work funded by money already appropriated from Congress. Official bidding will begin from Dec. 5, with contracts awarded by Feb. 3, 2004.
The handling of the first batch of contracts for Iraq came under heavy criticism abroad and domestically, with charges of cronyism in some of the larger deals, which were awarded without competition even before the war began.
Retired Rear Adm. David Nash, who is in charge of the new Program Management Office, has promised full and open competition this time. But many prospective bidders question how far the U.S. government is willing to go.
"There are people here who can do great things, but will the government be prepared to take them on rather than the Halliburtons and Bechtels who they know from previous jobs?" asked one contractor.
Halliburton, the oil services company once run by Vice President Dick Cheney, has the prime contract to rebuild Iraq's oil fields, while San Francisco-based Bechtel has the main infrastructure contract.
New prime contracts are expected to be awarded only to companies from countries that helped in the war effort. That excludes firms from Germany, France and other nations that strongly opposed the U.S. occupation of Iraq.
TOUTING CLIENTS
Smaller companies hope to cash in on 2,000 projects soon to be announced that will cover a range of areas, from building police stations and prisons to providing furniture and trucks.
Deal-makers, consultants and lawyers are having a field day knitting together partnerships, stomping the halls of the Defense Department and other government offices to tout their clients.
"One of my clients is interested in any of the oil refinery deals coming up and I have another who is a specialist in ordinance demolition," said one consultant.
Contractors complain of unanswered phone calls and e-mails and say it is difficult to break into a market that seems to favor tried and tested companies.
"We are ready to take an order and despite many calls have not been able to get any meetings with the decision-makers. I'm here to try and find out who we can deal with," said Joe St. Pierre, a manager of a gas turbine company.
Michael Mele, Iraq program manager for the Army Corps of Engineers, had advice for prospective bidders. While price and efficiency are important, he said, security is the key issue.
Procurement staff are working massive overtime, canceling holidays to get the work done. "The strain on the government contracting community is a major concern of mine," said Mele. "We have never seen anything like this and won't again."
----
U.S. Army Awards Compact Kinetic Energy Missile Contract
Nov 20, 2003
SpaceWire
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/missiles-03u.html
Huntsville - A team consisting of Northrop Grumman Corporation and Miltec Corporation has received a contract for the advanced technology development phase of the U.S. Army's Compact Kinetic Energy Missile (CKEM) program.
CKEM is the Army's next-generation hypervelocity missile intended for deployment from lightweight, highly mobile manned and unmanned ground vehicles. It will be smaller, lighter, and faster than the current-generation kinetic energy missile but capable of overwhelming lethality against advanced armor, complex bunkers, and other highly hardened targets. A kinetic energy weapon carries no explosive warhead, defeating its target solely through the force of impact.
Awarded by the Army's Aviation and Missiles Command, Redstone Arsenal, Ala., the contract is potentially worth $71.2 million if all options are exercised. Work will be performed in Huntsville and is expected to be complete by September 2006. The team is competing against one other contractor for an eventual system development and demonstration award.
"This win enables Northrop Grumman and Miltec to combine their domain expertise to develop an outstanding capability for future Army forces: a lightweight, multimission, hypervelocity system that will prove highly lethal against armor, bunkers and fortified emplacements," said Dr. William H. Forster, vice president, Northrop Grumman Land Combat Systems.
Ivy Pinion, president of Miltec Missiles and Space Co., added, "Our approach to this program has allowed us to provide superior technology advancement by leveraging the niche capability of a small business with the depth, breadth and facilities of a major defense contractor."
Under an existing pre-advanced technology development program, the Miltec/Northrop Grumman team will conduct a flight test in December 2003 to demonstrate hypervelocity flight of the five-foot-long, 100-pound missile with all subsystems functional.
----
Fort Greely missile system on target for completion
Jason Moore,
Anchorage, Alaska KTUU.com
http://www.msnbc.com/local/ktuu/m340299.asp?0ct=-302&cp1=1
Fort Greely, Alaska, Nov. 19 - A massive construction project is under way at Fort Greely, bringing to Alaska cutting-edge missile technology intended to protect the entire country from an enemy missile strike.
About five miles south of the community of Delta Junction, a transformation is taking place at Fort Greely -- an Army post that used to train soldiers in below-zero combat. Now it's become ground zero in the development of a missile defense system.
Security checkpoints stand between the Richardson Highway and a 500-acre patch of land now under construction. You can't see it from the road but, behind two and a half miles of security fences, new buildings stand, the ground is clear, and work is continuing despite the frigid conditions.
"We're about 90 percent complete with the construction phase," says Col. Kevin Norgaard, director of the site activation command. "We then go into the phase of installing mission equipment."
"We're confident in the technology," says Col. Kevin Norgaard, who's in charge of the construction project.
Norgaard is in charge of building the nation's first missile defense system. Six missile silos have already been constructed. The silos extend down 80 feet into the ground, beneath clamshell doors. In the second phase of the project, the missiles themselves as well as the computer technology will be installed.
As Norgaard says, the workers are building history. "If you look out at Fort Greely, you can see two things. You can either see a fairly substantial construction project or you can see history in the making."
By the end of next year, the system will be operational, meeting the president's mandate, Norgaard says.
But will it really protect America?
"Most people who oppose missile defense do so because they recognize there is, indeed, a very serious nuclear threat," says Stacey Fritz of No Nukes North. "We all agree that nuclear proliferation is probably the most dangerous threat that faces the United States."
Fritz wrote her master's thesis on the subject at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and now heads Fairbanks' anti-nuclear effort.
"The problem with nuclear defense is that it focuses on the least likely threat. If a terrorist organization or another nation had a nuclear weapon and they wanted to nuke the United States, the last way they would do that is via an ICBM," she says, referring to the Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles against which Fort Greely would defend. "They would smuggle it into the country, launch it from offshore, build it here, bomb a nuclear power plant, or instead (use) another low-tech method of terrorism."
Other concerns come from the scientific community about deploying a system before it's been rigorously tested.
"It's not proven technology," says Ivan Oelrich of the Federation of American Scientists, based in Washington, D.C. "It's ferociously expensive. There are other ways that we could spend that money that would enhance our security more. And, moreover, even if you wanted to have missile defense, it might very well be worse than nothing if it makes people believe that we have a system that works when in fact we don't."
Col. Norgaard admits the system may not be perfect, but says it will improve over time. "We're confident in the technology," he says. In the last four out of five tests, it hit its targets.
"I view it this way," Norgaard says. "We have zero capability today to defend the United State from long-range ballistic missile attacks. We have a system. We have tested a system. We can put into the field a system that has a capability to defend against those ballistic missiles."
There are numerous other concerns. The United States has withdrawn from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty in order to build the Fort Greely system, which some fear may trigger a renewed arms race.
Stacey Fritz wrote her master's thesis on missile defense, and now heads No Nukes North.
"We have given up our main defense, which is a hard-won, long-fought series of arms-control treaties," says Fritz. "And now we've replaced them with a system that doesn't work."
And the cost -- $9 billion this year, with about $300 million of that funding the Fort Greely construction. Some 700 workers were at the site this summer, and 250 remain at work even amid November's blowing snow and subzero temperatures.
When this system is in place and operational by the end of next year, citizen-soldiers from the Alaska National Guard will take on the role of operating it and keeping the site secure.
That means about 100 full-time positions on post. In fact, the Guard is expected to activate a special battalion next month that will fill that important role.
The missile defense project is giving an incredible economic boost to the small town of Delta Junction. Just a few years ago, Fort Greely was being downsized as part of the series of nationwide base closures, shutting down the town's main economic engine.
The community was bitterly divided over the idea of turning the old Army post into a private prison, but has largely united behind the missile defense project, which has brought millions of dollars into the area, as well as hundreds of jobs now and into the future.
The military also has given Delta $25 million for several different projects.
Elsewhere in Alaska, other sites are being readied as part of the missile defense system. Radar will be upgraded in Shemya at the end of the Aleutian Chain. A special X-band radar on a floating platform is expected to be based out of Adak, with operations set to begin in 2005. Some test launches also are planned for the currently existing base in Kodiak.
----
Bill includes $20 million for Redstone project
Staff Reports, Madison Record,
Thursday, November 20, 2003
http://www.madisoncountyrecord.com/articles/2003/11/20/news/news3.txt
Efforts to ensure the future of Redstone Arsenal in Madison County got a boost last week.
The U.S. House of Representatives approved the Military Construction Appropriations Committee Report. Including in the bill is $20 for the design and initial construction for Phase III of the Von Braun Complex.
"This is good news for Redstone Arsenal," U.S. Rep. Bud Cramer, D-Alabama, said. "It is important that we continue to invest in the infrastructure at Redstone. This vote strengthen's Redstone's position for the next BRAC."
BRAC is procedure the Army used to determine what commands will be located at certain bases.
The Von Braun Complex will be used as the Administration and Operations building for the Missile Defense Agency Ground Missile Defense Joint Program Office. The legislation also includes $5.5 million for the Vibration Dynamic Test Facility that will be used to support AMCOM.
The bills are part of a $401.3 billion defense package. The bill's main provision provided a raise for military personnel, including hostile fire pay from $150 to $225 per month and family separation allowances from $100 to $250 per month.
Also included in the bill were:
# $4 million for Close-in Active Protection (CIAPS) prototype which will be developed by Phase IV of Huntsville.
# $3 million for Army Airborne Command and Control System (A2C2S), a Raytheon product in Huntsville.
# $90 million in advanced seeker work for 30 missiles that will be produced by the Huntsville's Boeing plant. The PAC3 program will remain under the control of the Army's Program Executive Officer for Air and Missile Defense, Major General John Urias.
The bill now goes to President George W. Bush, who is expected to sign it shortly.
-------- iraq
Recipe for Terror
by Felicity Arbuthnot
Thursday, November 20, 2003
by CommonDreams.org
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/1120-04.htm
If Tony Blair is making a list of topics to discuss with President Bush, 'accountability' should be well near the top. The lack of it, at US Administration level, is stunning.
"It is just not worth characterizing by numbers", said Brigadier General Vincent Brooks, when asked how many Iraqis had died during the invasion. But from Guantanamo Bay to America's own casualties, 'life, liberty' - yet alone the 'pursuit of happiness' has become frighteningly endangered under the neo-cons pulling George W's strings.
At the recent World Uranium Weapons Conference in Hamburg, Dr Doug Rokke, former senior Pentagon advisor charged with the 1991 uranium clean up of Kuwait, described how injured US troops are being flown 'in their hundreds, in the dead of night' back to US bases 'throughout Europe', in order to disguise the magnitude of casualty figures. Public photographs of coffins of the dead have been proscribed and in stark contrast to the public honoring and grief of the Italian nation for their nineteen soldiers and carabinieri, killed in a suicide bombing in Nassiriyah, southern Iraq last week, the US military shuffles its fallen as quietly as possible into their final resting place.
With the death toll of US soldiers having exceeded, in just seven months, that of the first three years of Vietnam it is worth asking if even these figures are the full truth. Many of those who have joined the military in Iraq, do not hold American passports, but were, broadly, promised that they would be given them on return, for their efforts against the 'war on terrorism'. According to Dr Rokke, should they die, their deaths are not factored in to 'U.S.' casualties. Further, Mazen Dana, the Award winning Reuters camera man, shot dead by US troops whilst filming outside Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison in August - with full permission and press accreditation from the US Authorities in Baghdad - told his brother Nazmi, a chilling tale days before he died.
"Mazen told me by phone few days before his death that he discovered a mass grave dug by U.S. troops to conceal the bodies of their fellow comrades killed in Iraqi resistance attacks," Nazmi said.
"He also told me that he found U.S. troops covered in plastic bags in remote desert areas and he filmed them for a TV program. We are pretty sure that the American forces had killed Mazen knowingly to prevent him from airing his finding."
"All international and local news agencies sent cables of condolences to his family, lauding his ...... determination to uncover the truth wherever it was", recorded veteran Middle East correspondent Awed Al Ragoub.
Truth is becoming increasingly difficult for journalists to record in Iraq. Last week, reported the Boston Globe, thirty major news gathering outlets wrote to the Pentagon complaining of intimidation, arrest, destruction of note books, video tape, recorders and film. The circumstances of the death of ITN's Terry Lloyd and disappearance of his colleagues is still obscured by the US Administration as has been the US tank attack on the Palestine Hotel with deaths of three journalists. Journalists' protection, under the Geneva Convention is absolute.
Iraq is now a vast Guantanamo Bay, with the disappeared unaccounted for, which was why Mazen Dana was filming outside Abu Ghraib. Even prisoners under Saddam, were more accounted for. The full number of both prison camps and prisoners are simply unknown. With the bombing of the Red Cross building in Baghdad and resultant pull out of staff, the last shred of accountability for the detained has been removed. The Red Cross is enshrined in the Geneva Convention as the neutral body who can interview and account for prisoners in war, held as hostage or in conflict zones. The tragedy of the Red Cross attack had a coincidental convenience for a U.S. human rights time bomb.
The Geneva Convention also has emotive words regarding environmental destruction. Viet Nam with Agent Orange, torching of villages, rapes and even the decapitation of a baby by a US soldier to steal her necklace, has been recently chillingly revisited by a stunning, painstaking two year investigation by journalists at the extraordinarily committed but relatively small town Toledo Blade newspaper.
'Will this be another Viet Nam?' has been a frequent haunting, relating to American body bags. Maybe. But little addressed is : environmentally, it is. Distraught reports have come out of Iraq of fauna, flora, wheat, barley, agriculture, bushes being torched by US soldiers with, like Viet Nam, music blaring and redolent of Palestine's olive groves, Iraq's great dates palms being mown down. Iraq has maybe six hundred different kinds of dates, is the worlds biggest producer. Nothing is wasted: sugar syrup is made, the stones are polished and made into beads, the fronds become anything from brooms to intricate, evocative bird cages. The date harvest (about now) is a vivid, beautiful celebration; towns and cities display them in markets in their vibrant colors: from sand and gold to brown and near vermillion, in great, intricately woven baskets - made of the fronds. Date palms are near sacred. Asking the way to a home, people will deliberate the location of the house and then , invariably say: "the garden has the tallest (smallest, most twisted etc) palm ..."
The full horror and lack of accountability is outside the scope of an article, but was starkly outlined by an Iraqi academic - old friend, rabidly anti- Saddam - I met recently. She told me of a beloved alter-ego, the sister she never had, who had gone to find medication for one of her two children. The two kids were in the back of the car and she trawled the pharmacies for the medicine. (Hospitals are now , say Iraqi doctors, worse equipped than after the 1991 war, but under the new freedom no journalists are allowed to visit to record.) Finally, she found what she was needing. Driving back over the 14th of July Bridge (hugely emotive and named after another revolution against the British) she was shot at by US troops, the car burned out and she and her children burned to the unrecognizable. Baghdad, being a village of five million people, her husband quickly learned what had happened and ran across the town with friends and blankets, to cover and succor them in death. They were shot at, as they returned repeatedly, for three days, by the troops as wife and childrens' remains stayed in the car, before they could be collected and interred.
"For telling you this, I await the knock at the door, any day, like all academics do who speak out in this occupation", said my friend. Academics are being disappeared at stunning speed in Iraq. "You know" she said quietly, her eyes meeting mine: "many of us say we want Saddam and our country back."
Felicity Arbuthnot has written and broadcast widely on Iraq and with Denis Halliday was senior researcher for John Pilger's Award winning documentary: 'Paying the Price - Killing the Children of Iraq.'
----
French, German firms banned from rebuilding Iraq
By Jon Steinman and Tony Capaccio
BLOOMBERG NEWS
Thu, Nov. 20, 2003
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/cctimes/7307222.htm
French and German firms can't bid to be prime contractors on reconstruction work in Iraq worth as much as $18.6 billion, said a Pentagon official.
"We expect it to be Iraqi, coalition partners and American contractors," said Retired Navy Admiral David Nash, director of the Pentagon office that will administer the contracts. "There's lots of opportunity for everyone in the subcontracting." France and Germany led opposition to the U.S.-led war and were among the countries refusing to contribute last month at a conference in Madrid aimed at raising funds for postwar reconstruction. Only nations that supported the war can bid for 25 prime contracts the U.S. plans to award by Feb. 1.
Nash delivered this decision Tuesday to nearly 1,400 people attending an "Iraq Industry Day" in Arlington, Va. Prospective contractors were given information on schedules and contract award criteria plus a detailed breakdown of the work ahead and project management needs.
"This is your opportunity," Nash said. "We have over 650 firms represented here -- both small and large businesses."
The work includes rebuilding Iraq's electrical power grid, water works and government ministries.
The longest contracts could be up to four years. Congress approved the money last month as part of the Bush administration's $87 billion emergency spending bill to finance the war on terrorism.
Nash directs the Pentagon's new office of Infrastructure Reconstruction in Iraq. The office is scheduled to sponsor a similar Industry Day on Friday in London where the issue of contractor eligibility likely will be discussed.
Nash said he's unsure whether non-coalition partners will have an opportunity to team with U.S. firms to bid as prime contractors.
"How we determine exactly the nature of the company, I'll put something out on that," Nash said. "We'll need some policy. There are opportunities for joint ventures and we'll have to review each one of them."
Award of the contracts will be monitored by the Defense Contract Audit Agency and the Coalitional Provisional Authority's Inspector General, a newly created post, he said.
Nash's group will have contract selection boards comprised of acquisition experts from the military services and the office responsible for rebuilding the Pentagon after it was hit by a hijacked airliner on Sept. 11, 2001.
Bidders must first submit examples of their finances and past work so those can be evaluated quickly, even as they craft their technical proposals. That will facilitate awards by Feb. 1, Nash said in an interview Monday.
Most contracts will be of the cost-reimbursement type with a fixed fee that also contains bonus incentives, he said. "The numbers will be driven by the projects we put into them rather than any predetermined total cost -- 'no matter what happens, you get $2 billion' -- there will be none of that," Nash said.
A major criteria for contract awards will likely be the extent of subcontracts planned for Iraqi firms, Nash said.
"I have insisted that be a consideration not only in the selection of the contractors but over the life of the contract," Nash said. "Part of the incentive evaluation will be how are they doing in building future Iraqi capabilities," he said.
"When you get the security situation is stabilized, it will become a real economic powerhouse in the Middle East," Nash said of Iraq.
-------- israel / palestine
Israeli army, air force chief accused of lying over deadly Gaza raid
JERUSALEM (AFP)
Nov 20, 2003
http://www.spacewar.com/2003/031120140937.oi2x89xs.html
The Israeli army was under fire again Thursday over accusations by two opposition MPs that it had used banned weapons during a devastating air raid on a Palestinian refugee camp in the Gaza Strip last month.
The scandal, in which the army is accused of lying to the public and the press over the type of munitions used in the raid, also deals a personal blow to Israeli air force commander Dan Halutz, often tipped as a possible successor to Chief of Staff Moshe Yaalon.
"Air Force Commander in Deep Trouble" was the headline splashed across the front page of the Israeli tabloid Maariv.
On October 20, the day after three Israeli soldiers were killed in a Palestinian ambush in the West Bank, Israel launched a series of five deadly air raids on the Gaza Strip.
Twelve Palestinians, including two wanted militants, were killed in an air raid on the central Gaza Strip refugee camp of Nusseirat.
The next day, Halutz invited Israeli journalists to a press conference during which he screened video footage of the raid showing that there were no civilians gathered on the scene and accused the Palestinians of beefing up the death toll.
Halutz then said that the Hellfire missiles fired by Apache helicopters have an effect equivalent to "two assault grenades", said the Maariv military correspondent who attended the briefing.
Puzzled by the high number of victims reported by Palestinian medical sources, left-wing Meretz MP Yossi Sarid demanded that Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz provide further details on the munitions used.
After Mofaz refused to speak, Sarid threatened to unveil "confidential information" over the Nusseirat raid. According to him, the army used "powerful munitions with an unusually large range of impact".
On Wednesday, opposition MP Ahmad Tibi said the army had used a "secret banned weapon" in the raid and accused it of employing military censorship to stop the publication of details related to the issue.
Following a meeting with Halutz on Wednesday, Sarid said it was "obvious that the initial information provided by the army was incomplete."
"Today it is clear that in regard to the IDF's attempted assassination in the Nuseirat refugee camp, journalists were given erroneous information, primarily by way of IAF Commander Maj. Gen. Dan Halutz," wrote Maariv editor Amnon Dankner.
"The future chief of staff cannot lie. The commander of the army has to know when to hesitate," Maariv said.
"Halutz, his defenders will say, tried to protect the secret strategic weapons of the state of Israel. That is his right. Even his duty... Why lie? He could have not related to the matter," it added.
In a statement, an army spokesman said that it was "not possible for operational and security reasons to provide all the details of what went on at Nusseirat.
"The version of the facts which we have given was exact.. but it could be, because of the sensitive nature of the operation, that we were mistaken in the manner in which we chose to describe the methods used in this operation," the spokesman continued.
Sarid for his part plans to take the matter as far as he can. "If he reaches the conclusion that it is his duty to publicise the information he holds, he will do it," his spokesman Roi Yelin told AFP.
----
Army used "banned weapon" in deadly Gaza raid: Arab Israeli lawmaker
JERUSALEM (AFP)
Nov 20, 2003
http://www.spacewar.com/2003/031120005226.m952sw6t.html
An Arab Israeli lawmaker Wednesday accused the Israeli military of using a "banned weapon" in a deadly raid in the Gaza Strip in October, as another deputy threatened to reveal confidential information on the attack.
Opposition MP Ahmad al-Tibi said the army had used a "secret banned weapon" in the raid and accused it of employing military censorship to stop the publication of details related to the issue.
"This concerns banned munitions whose explosion had an impact that extended over several dozen metres (yards)," he said in a statement.
Twelve Palestinians, including two wanted activists, were killed in the Israeli raid on October 20, which targeted a car in the Gaza Strip refugee camp of Nusseirat.
"Air Force commander Dan Halutz lied in public when he said after the raid that the Air Force used Hellfire missiles that were fired by Apache helicopters. It was not Apaches that launched the banned weapon," he charged.
Meanwhile fellow member of parliament Yossi Sarid, of the left-wing Meretz party, threatened to unveil "confidential information" over the Nusseirat raid.
Sarid made his threat after Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz refused to tell him the type weapons used in the raid, during a meeting of parliament's defence and foreign affairs committee, according to the Haaretz daily.
According to Sarid, the army used "powerful munitions with an unusually large range of impact".
Israeli public radio said the army had admitted that arms other than Hellfire missiles had been used in the Nusseirat attack.
According to public radio, the army is now admitting that it used munition in the raid other than the Hellfire missile.
In a statement and army spokesman said that it was "not possible for operational and security reasons to provide all the details of what went on at Nusseirat.
"The version of the facts which we have given was exact.. but it could be, because of the sensitive nature of the operation, that we were mistaken in the manner in which we chose to describe the methods used in this operation," the spokesman continued.
"It is above all important to stress that there was never any wish to misinform the media."
-------- nato
NATO condemns Istanbul blasts as attack on democracy
BRUSSELS (AFP)
Nov 20, 2003
http://www.spacewar.com/2003/031120144132.ncb7k2ll.html
NATO Secretary General George Robertson condemned Thursday the attacks in Istanbul as an outrageous attack on democratic values, vowing the Alliance's solidarity in the face of the "scourge" of terrorism.
"I wish to express my shock and outrage at the horrific bombings in Istanbul today," he said, noting that the attacks came less than a week after attacks on two synagogues in the city which killed 25 people.
"The perpetrators have a clear goal: to sow fear among innocent civilians," he said. "They constitute an attack on the democratic values that NATO stands for and I condemn this action in the strongest terms."
At least 26 people were killed and more than 450 injured in the two powerful bomb attacks against British interests in Istanbul, according to the Turkish interior ministry.
Meanwhile the NATO-Russia Council -- which embodies diplomatic ties between the Alliance and Moscow, and which was formed in the wake of the September 11 attacks -- also condemned the Istanbul blasts.
"NATO allies, Russia and all civilized peoples will stand together, determined to work shoulder-to-shoulder in eradicating the scourge of terrorism, which is a threat to us all regardless of religion, culture or nationality."
Robertson added: "The terrorists who carry out such barbarities will receive the contempt of all civilised people ... Our solidarity is only reinforced by the latest tragic events."
-------- us
US troops in Iraq to get fortified battle gear by year's end: Pentagon
WASHINGTON (AFP)
Nov 19, 2003
http://www.spacewar.com/2003/031119182608.dha8tflq.html
As attacks on US forces in Iraq increase in intensity and frequency, the Pentagon has stepped up its efforts to equip US troops with reinforced body armour and other protective battlefield equipment, military officials told a Senate defense panel Wednesday.
Senator John Warner, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, took military planners to task for not having made reinforced protective gear available to all troops before the start of the war.
"These reports of a shortage of body armor, these reports of ill-equipped ground vehicles and air vehicles, in terms of the armor, are just totally unacceptable," Warner said.
"It's an error made in planning to send those troops to forward-deployed regions -- and the conflict in Iraq particularly -- without the adequate numbers of body armor and vehicles," the Virginia Republican said.
Les Brownlee, Acting Secretary of the US Army, told the Senate panel that production glitches led to shortages in the reinforced equipment.
"Our intention initially was to ensure that all of our combat troops -- those infantry troops that would be most closely engaged in the fight that we could anticipate -- were the first priority in equipping them with this body armor," he said.
"We simply did not have enough at that time to equip everyone," he said.
Brownlee said that with those problems ironed out, he expected all US troops in Iraq to be outfitted with body armour by year's end.
"We have taken steps to increase the production of these things," he said.
"At the current rate of production we should have all the soldiers in Iraq ... equipped with this kind of body armor by the end of December."
Reinforced Humvee vehicles, however, will probably not be available to all US ground forces in Iraq for several more months, he said.
"With the up-armored Humvee ... it could be as late as the summer of '05 before we would have them all," Brownlee said.
-------- propaganda wars
GEORGIA TV chief quits amid protests
November 20, 2003
Washington Times
http://www.washtimes.com/world/worldscene.htm
TBILISI - A key figure in President Eduard Shevardnadze's administration resigned yesterday amid a political crisis in which thousands of protesters have called for the Georgian leader to resign.
Zaza Shemdiliya, the head of state radio and television who was seen as the government's chief ideologue, submitted his resignation after Mr. Shevardnadze criticized the way state television was covering the crisis, saying it had not been supportive enough of the government.
-------- POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
-------- human rights
Fraction of Iraq costs could feed world poor - WFP
REUTERS BELGIUM:
November 20, 2003
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/22897/story.htm
BRUSSELS - A fraction of the cost of the Iraq war would be enough to feed the world's poor and help boost peace and security, the head of the United Nations food agency said yesterday.
"We look at tens of billions being spent today in Iraq, the conflict... (With) even a small percentage of the commitment that the world has made to Iraq, you could feed every hungry child in the world," James Morris, executive director of the World Food Programme (WFP), told a news conference.
He said people who were hungry and "at their wit's end" were more susceptible to the message of people wishing to harm the world.
"The message of those who would do the world harm does not resonate as well with people who are not hungry as it does with those at their wits' end," he said.
Morris was in Brussels to launch a joint appeal with the European Commission for $3 billion as part of the U.N.'s annual global appeal, which is focusing on helping more than 45 million people in 21 crisis-hit countries.
The appeal focuses on nations suffering violence, hunger and drought including Sudan, Tajikistan and Uganda.
"What we are talking about today are these dozens and dozens of silent crises the world needs to focus on with equal intensity," he said. "The two crises each year that get the media attention get two-thirds of the humanitarian support."
Morris said the WFP received 90 percent of its funding from only 10 donors, the United States being by far the biggest. Other top donors were the Commission, some European Union member states, Japan, Norway, Australia and Canada.
"There are another 25-40 countries that ought to be very concerned about the humanitarian agenda. They now have the resources and surpluses and ways of being helpful," he said.
Morris also urged donors to shift their focus from providing emergency relief for crises and emphasise long-term development investment, which would boost peace and help prevent disasters.
The WFP is undertaking its biggest-ever emergency operation in Iraq and food aid to the country totalled two million tonnes in October.
-------- ENERGY AND OTHER
-------- alternative energy
GM Pitches Hydrogen Cars in Oil-Thirsty China
Story by Scott Hillis
REUTERS CHINA:
November 20, 2003
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/22888/story.htm
BEIJING - China, guzzling petrol at a furious pace amid breakneck economic growth and car buying, should wean itself off oil by promoting vehicles powered by hydrogen, General Motors executives said this week.
Executives from the U.S. auto maker will show off their latest concept cars to Chinese officials including Zeng Peiyan, minister of the powerful State Development and Reform Commission.
The centerpiece of the GM Tech Tour that has included stops in San Francisco and Tokyo is the Hy-wire concept car that is powered by a hydrogen fuel cell and uses electronic steering, acceleration and braking.
Unlike a traditional internal combustion engine that burns petrol to drive pistons and turn a car's wheels, fuel cells generate electricity from a reaction between hydrogen and oxygen, with water being the only byproduct.
"We see markets like China as potentially an excellent entry point for the technology," said Julie Beamer, GM's director of fuel cell commercialization.
Chinese officials will have a chance to climb in the video game-like cockpit of the futuristic Hy-wire, twisting grips on the steering wheel to send the silvery car scooting down a test track with a soft electric whine.
But fuel cell technology is not without its drawbacks.
Hydrogen is highly flammable and leaks easily, making it tough to transport and store safely.
Creating enough pure hydrogen to power a fleet of cars could require big processing facilities. Critics say those plants would likely be powered by oil or coal, simply shifting the pollution from tailpipes to smokestacks.
IS HYDROGEN KEY?
Wang Hongwei, director of corporate planning for Shell China, said promoting hydrogen could cost China from $6 billion to $19 billion to build processing plants and distribution networks.
The hydrogen industry in China was "effectively zero," Wang told reporters, adding: "China is still not in the picture yet."
GM's fuel cell promoters aim to convince China of the company's belief that it can make fuel cells commercially viable by 2010.
"There is no country for which this technology is more relevant or for which the opportunity is greater than China," Phil Murtaugh, GM's China chief executive, told reporters.
China's car production surged in the first three quarters of the year to 1.44 million cars, up 87 percent from a year earlier. GM's China sales rose 38 percent in the period.
That has helped fuel petrol demand and also sparked worries over pollution and traffic congestion.
Lester Brown, head of the Earth Policy Institute, said fuel cells were preferable to combustion engines, but said there were other drawbacks to promoting a fuel cell in every Chinese garage.
"If China were to develop the U.S.-style auto-centric economy and auto-centered transport system, it would have to pave over an area equal to about 60 percent of the riceland in the country," Brown said. (Additional reporting by Tamora Vidaillet)
----
Critics Question Intent of U.S. Hydrogen Initiative
By J.R. Pegg
WASHINGTON, DC, (ENS)
November 20, 2003
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/nov2003/2003-11-20-10.asp
U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and ministers from 14 nations and the European Commission today signed an agreement formally establishing the International Partnership for the Hydrogen Economy. Abraham says the initiative will help jumpstart an environmentally clean hydrogen economy, but critics contend that under the Bush administration's leadership, the program threatens to undermine the much heralded environmental promise of hydrogen.
At today's signing Abraham said the launch of the partnership "marks a significant advancement in countries from around the globe working together for a safe and environmentally benign hydrogen economy."
Representatives from Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, European Commission, France, Germany, Iceland, India, Italy, Japan, Korea, Norway, Russia, and the United Kingdom joined Abraham in signing the accord, which creates an international mechanism to coordinate hydrogen research, technology development and deployment.
The vision of the partnership, Abraham said, is that a participating country's consumers will have the practical option of purchasing a competitively priced hydrogen power vehicle, and be able to refuel it near their homes and places of work, by 2020.
Abraham told the ministers at today's meeting that the "move to hydrogen will be the defining point of a new era of energy, economic, and environmental security."
"The global transformation we envision is breathtaking in its scope," Abraham said.
There is little dispute that hydrogen has the potential to be the next great energy revolution. It can be easily produced by splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen, and when used for power, the only byproducts from hydrogen are water and heat.
But the key to the environmental friendliness of the hydrogen economy is how the fuel is produced - and this is where critics say the Bush administration has got it all wrong.
They believe the administration is keen to use fossil fuels and nuclear power to produce hydrogen, a policy that environmentalists say will lock the United States into a "black hydrogen" future.
"Getting hydrogen from dirty or unsafe sources makes no sense," said Dan Becker, director of the Sierra Club's Global Warming and Energy Program. "It is like trying to lose weight by jogging to McDonalds."
Environmentalists say the administration should be encouraging "green hydrogen" - fuel made from renewable energy sources, such as wind, solar and biomass. Becker's organization, along with eight other environmental consumer and public policy organizations, this week announced the formation of The Green Hydrogen Coalition, which seeks to educate the public about green hydrogen and to encourage nations to embrace the concept.
The coalition includes Friends of the Earth, The Foundation on Economic Trends, Global Resource Action Center for the Environment, Greenpeace, the League of Conservation Voters, MoveOn.org, Public Citizen, the Sierra Club and the U.S. Public Interest Research Group (PIRG).
"While this international program of hydrogen research is laudable, the Bush administration should consider itself on notice that a mere photo op does not constitute a progressive global energy policy," said Deb Callahan, president of the League of Conservation Voters. "Hydrogen related research should focus on renewable energy sources, not old, discredited, polluting technologies."
In his speech today, Abraham said the goal of the Bush administration is "to make hydrogen from clean energy sources."
"But we must recognize that a diversity of sources for hydrogen is inevitable," the Energy Secretary said. "All over the planet people have different ideas about their hydrogen sources."
Abraham says these ideas range from natural gas - the source of most hydrogen produced today - to nuclear energy, coal and renewable sources.
"The United States intends to pursue and substantially fund research in all of the above areas, because we do not as yet know what the best answer is," Abraham said, ".... and because the best answer may be having a competitive marketplace for hydrogen production."
The Bush administration believes natural gas will be the initial source of hydrogen, but it is clearly eying coal and nuclear power as future sources.
More than $1 billion has been earmarked to develop "clean coal technologies" - such technologies could allow the production of green hydrogen from coal if a commercially effective way can be found to sequester carbon dioxide.
The White House also supports using nuclear energy to help drive the hydrogen economy - as do some in Congress. The energy bill provides $3.25 billion over the next five years for hydrogen projects, with $1.1 billion is earmarked for a for a nuclear reactor in Idaho to demonstrate hydrogen production technologies.
"By using renewable energy, nuclear energy, and fossil energy, combined with carbon sequestration technologies, to produce our hydrogen, we can totally eliminate air emissions from our light duty transportation systems," Abraham said.
Critics are supportive of the goal, but skeptical of the administration's intent.
"The Bush plan could lock the global economy into the old energy regime for much of the 21st century, and deny the world the benefit of truly green hydrogen," says Katherine Morrison, senior staff attorney with PIRG.
Morrison and others say natural gas - because the supply is finite and it produces CO2 emissions - is not the long term answer. They contend coal production has other severe environmental impacts and many believe carbon sequestration is far from the silver bullet the White House predicts.
The concept of using nuclear power could be the worst of all, some critics say.
"It is both fiscally and environmentally irresponsible to use the most expensive, and potentially most lethal, energy source to develop hydrogen fuel," Morrison said.
And despite comments by Bush administration officials, their commitment to the renewable energy is a hollow one, says Jeremy Rifkin, president of the Foundation on Economic Trends.
Rifkin points out that the White House has refused to set benchmark targets for renewable energy, unlike the European Union, for example, which has committed to ensuring 22 percent of its electricity and 12 percent of its energy comes from renewable sources by 2010.
"As long as the White House is unresponsive to benchmarks and targets, all the talk about renewables is meaningless," said Rifkin. "The Bush administration unfortunately has highjacked hydrogen and is using it as a Trojan horse to bolster the interest of the fossil fuel and nuclear interests."
The Green Hydrogen Coalition recommends a phase in approach to the hydrogen economy - short term conservation, increased fuel efficiency standards, incentives for hybrid vehicles - along with deep subsidies for renewable energy.
The United States has incredible potential to develop renewables - in particular, wind and solar energy, says Kert Davies, research director of Greenpeace, USA, but it needs to invest in the technology.
He notes that a trillion dollars of subsidies have been given to support the nuclear industry since the 1950s, and the pending energy bill contains twice the subsidies for fossil fuel and nuclear compared to renewables.
"If we invest more money in the wrong forms of energy like nuclear and coal, we waste money towards a clean energy path," Davies said.
-------- ACTIVISTS
Protesters, Miami cops clash during FTAA demonstrations
November 20, 2003
The Associated Press & sun-sentinel.com
http://www.ctnow.com/news/custom/newsat3/sfl-1120ftaatalks,1,4982211.story?coll=hc-headlines-newsat3
MIAMI -- Police officers in riot gear fired rubber bullets and bean bags and used long batons, plastic shields, concussion grenades and stun guns in clashes Thursday with hundreds of demonstrators opposed to ongoing talks aimed at creating a hemisphere-wide free trade zone.
The clashes came before and after a peaceful march organized by the nation's labor unions, which are also opposed to the proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas. An estimated 8,000 to 10,000 marchers took part, saying the 34-nation FTAA would take thousands of jobs to other countries, reduce workers' rights by exploiting cheap labor and drain natural resources.
Soon after the march ended, several dozen protesters resumed battling with police, pushing up against police lines and throwing water bottles at officers. The demonstrators had tear gas and rubber bullets fired at them by officers after they set small trash fires in the street. Thirty six protesters were arrested.
Tear gas and rubber bullets were fired in the late afternoon when some protesters began pelting police with rocks.
Police set up a perimeter around the protesters, marching toward them in waves and firing more rubber bullets to force them back. The protesters tried to establish their own barricades with wooden boards, cement parking blocks, trash bins and other materials.
Protester Orlando Mendez was bleeding from an abrasion he said was caused when a rubber bullet hit him in the chest. ``I was just taking pictures and they fired at me,'' he said. Several others were also struck by rubber bullets. It was not immediately known how many people were injured.
During earlier clashes, at least 1,000 protesters _ many wearing bandannas across the bottom half of their faces, surgical masks and blue batting helmets _ battled with officers who used their batons mostly to push the demonstrators back, but occasionally used them to strike the protesters.
The officers also used a spray that smelled like rotten eggs to disperse protesters and displayed stun guns. The demonstrators sprayed a cream on at least one officer and tossed objects at others. Some officers were struck by a white substance. Police had at least two armored vehicles at the scene.
Police said two officers suffered minor injuries during the early clashes and were transported to a hospital. Injured protesters were also seen.
Jackson Memorial Hospital received one of the officers and three female demonstrators with injuries related to the protest, hospital spokeswoman Lorraine Nelson said. One of the women was released, and the other two were in good condition, she said.
Thirty-six demonstrators were arrested on charges including obstruction, battery, aggravated assault, unlawful assembly, resisting arrest, trespassing and burglary.
Miami police chief John Timoney said the ``rough start'' to the day's protests came because police were trying to clear non-permitted demonstrators from blocking streets.
``The result was certainly, initially, it caused a bit of a headache, but once we got the parade started,'' tensions calmed down, Timoney said. He was not immediately available to discuss the later clashes.
But Lance Stelzer, a Miami lawyer who works on police-related issues, said authorities overreacted to the protests because of rioting outside the 1999 World Trade Organization meetings in Seattle and at other free-trade meetings worldwide.
``When you have that kind of police presence dressed up in storm trooper garb and a mentality of `Let's close off the entire city because we had rowdies in another city' ... it has a tendency to incite problems that might not otherwise exist,'' Stelzer said.
Arrested demonstrator Michael McLean, 20, of Bergen County, N.J., said he was walking into an amphitheater, which was filling up with union protesters before the parade, when he tripped and was zapped with a stun gun.
``They haven't told me what I did,'' said McLean, who sat with plastic handcuffs around his wrists. An armed officer watched him closely as onlookers shouted ``Let him go.''
``Anybody that doesn't look like they're in the union were targeted. I think I was,'' he said.
A protester who called himself an anarchist and identified himself only as Worm, carried a hammer and spray paint under his jacket and wore a gas mask as he roamed the streets.
``I'm tired of things that have been forced upon us, like the FTAA,'' he said. Police said no significant vandalism was reported during the early clash.
Indeed, most of the protesters were peaceful, carrying puppets, holding signs and chanting ``This is what a police state looks like.''
Protester Joshua Xander, 21, of Cincinnati, said the police are ``totally doing what they feel necessary. We are doing what we think is necessary _ conflict of interests.'' He was tapping on a Djembe, an African drum.
A man who gave his name as Paul Revere wore a minuteman's hat while riding a large tricycle festooned with American flags and a sign with a photo of President Bush holding his hand out with the words: ``What's wrong with corporate greed?''
``We have to make the point to these people that people, cultures, labor and especially the environment are more important than corporate profits,'' the man said.
The clashes delayed the start of the AFL-CIO's march, and its leaders complained that police were preventing buses carrying marchers, some of them elderly, from reaching the staging area. The labor group has designated 800 parade marshals who it said would help authorities make sure the parade is peaceful.
``Everybody is just letting their feelings known in a peaceful way,'' said William Vargas, a member of the Federation of Public Employees in Fort Lauderdale who served as a parade marshal.
The labor protest included huge puppets of dolphins and sunflowers, people walking on stilts and many chanting slogans such as ``Just Say No Way to George Bush's FTAA.''
Bob Wessell, a 49-year-old member of the steel workers union from Batesville, Ind., said his job making hospital beds may be lost because of cheaper manufacturing in China.
``I am here to save American jobs and make the world a safer place to live,'' Wessell said.
----
Official warns anti-U.S. mood is growing
11/20/2003
(AP)
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2003-11-20-anti-americanism_x.htm
PULLACH, Germany - Anti-American and anti-Western sentiment is growing out of anger at the U.S.-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Germany's foreign spy chief said Thursday.
August Hanning, head of the Federal Intelligence Service, said the U.S. occupation of Iraq has become a new rallying point for a resurgent al-Qaeda.
"Successes on the military front alone will not lead to a solution," Hanning said in a speech to a conference on the Middle East in Pullach, near Munich, where his agency is based.
"We are in the process of losing the battle for people's minds."
Thursday's deadly bombings of the British consulate and the offices of a British-based bank in Istanbul, Turkey, bore the hallmarks of an al-Qaeda attack, Hanning later told a news conference.
Al-Qaeda has "regenerated" after being scattered and weakened by the war that<br> drove the Taliban from power in Afghanistan and the capture of key members, Hanning said.
"Now they are once again able to carry out attacks on a major scale," he said.
Bin Laden's day-to-day role in planning attacks by his terror network is hard to pin down, he said.
"But we believe he still plays an important role in the background," he said. "He communicates with his supporters through his messages. He tries to mobilize them, and of course he uses the situation in Iraq."
Iraq "risks becoming a crystallization point" for the radical Islamic cause, Hanning said. "Much depends on how things develop in Iraq."
But he warned the U.S.-led coalition against pulling out.
"That would be a victory for the Islamists," he said.
Hanning noted that intelligence officials believe Islamic activists eager to fight the occupying forces have been trickling from Europe to Iraq in recent months.
He refused to give details, saying only that the number was "relatively small."
Intelligence agencies also see a growing threat that parts of Southeast Asia - notably Indonesia - and East Africa are becoming terrorist bases, Hanning said.
But he expressed particular alarm about Turkey - a secular Muslim country, NATO member and ally of Israel - after Thursday's blasts and a pair of synagogue bombings in Istanbul last Saturday.
"These are clear signals that targets are being attacked that signal Turkey's cooperation with the West and with Israel," Hanning told the news conference.
Turkey's image of "relative stability" may have been deceptive because of its closeness to the Middle East and Chechnya, he said.
"In that sense, Turkey is strategically very exposed," Hanning said.
In his speech, he portrayed the Arab world as explosive because of its social inequalities and growing pool of alienated young people.
Western governments must promote social and economic progress along with democracy, Hanning said.
"Otherwise, the preachers of hate will surge into the void," he said.
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