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NUCLEAR
Signs of Nuclear Regulatory Shortcomings Proliferate
Calculating Disaster
US presses Russia over nuclear cooperation with Iran
Abductees, Nukes on Japan - N.Korea Summit Agenda
KEDO holds board meeting on suspension of N Korea nuclear project
The North Korean Conundrum
Uranium mining company may face criminal charges
Catalyst - Mini Nukes
UC faculty backs weapons labs
Nevada Nuclear tests might resume
Proposed Nuke Railroad Divides Nev. Town
Republican Demands More NRC Safety Regulation
Nuclear-waste talks being held in private
Canadian UN envoy to aid nuke talks
Plutonium Waste Fight Stalls Defense Bill
MILITARY
Orbital Flight Tests Supersonic Sea-Skimming Target Missile
To Get Weapons Away From Iraqis, the Army Sets Up an Arms Bazaar
Czech Republic backs down on radar sale to China
Who really smuggled weapons to Rafah?
Japan passes laws spelling out how to cope with military attack
Senate Approves Bioterror Provisions
Boeing Chief Says Tanker Lease Plan Is Still Alive
Iraq War Strains U.S. Business
United Industrial Training Soldiers To Use Raven UAV System
Senate OKs $5.6B for Chemical Defense
Taiwan's President Is Sworn In
Sharp Words From China for Leader of Taiwan
No imminent military crisis in Taiwan Strait
Dozens Killed in U.S. Attack Near Syria
Bush to Detail Transition Monday
Officials Seize Files of Top Iraqi Leader Once Backed by U.S.
Disputed Strike by U.S. Military Leaves at Least 40 Iraqis Dead
US troops in Iraq kill more than 40
Israel Attack Kills 10 at Gaza Protest
White House Criticizes Israel on Attack
Israel Continues Offensive Despite Outcry
Brazil to send 1,200 troops to Haiti
NATO Moves Ahead On MEADS Development
Belgium pledges more troops for NATO in Afghanistan
Sergeant Says Intelligence Directed Abuse
Iraq's Chalabi, former Pentagon protege, splits with US allies
Pentagon investigates 'brutal' deaths of 5 Iraqi prisoners
Reuters Stands by Iraq Abuse Reports
Soldier Gets 1 Year In Abuse of Iraqis
G.I. Pleads Guilty in Court-Martial for Iraqis' Abuse
Air Force Radios Jam Garage Door Openers
Military denies pattern
Soldier court-martialed for refusing to fight in 'oil-driven war'
IVINS: How Fascism Starts
POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
In some US prisons, echoes of Abu Ghraib
Material Given to Congress in 2002 Is Now Classified
POLITICS
House Approves $422 Billion Defense Bill
House Defies Bush on Military Base Closings
9/11 Report Praises Arlington Response
No Pattern of Prisoner Abuse, General Says
System Failures Cited for Delayed Action on Abuses
Bush Invokes 'War on Terror' in Energy Debate
The Religious Warrior of Abu Ghraib
White House's Medicare Videos Are Ruled Illegal
Dogged Reporter's Impact, From My Lai to Abu Ghraib
ENERGY
California Senate OKs New Home Solar Power Bill
ACTIVISTS
Award is first formal thanks to man who may have saved the world
Accused U.S. Army Deserter Says
Bush Administration Case Against Greenpeace Dismissed
Greenpeace cleared in U.S. ship-boarding case
Judge Dismisses Greenpeace Charges
Protesters Hit Blair With Flour in Parliament
Ashcroft Loses Controversial Prosecution Against NGO
Activists and MPs renew call for British hunt ban
Two Charged in Flour Attack on Tony Blair
-------- NUCLEAR
-------- accidents and safety
Signs of Nuclear Regulatory Shortcomings Proliferate
May 20, 2004
By J.R. Pegg
WASHINGTON, DC, (ENS)
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/may2004/2004-05-20-10.asp
Two reports released this week present scathing indictments of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC) oversight of the nation's aging nuclear reactors and its handling of the events that led to the shutdown of the Davis-Besse nuclear power plant in Ohio. One report by Congressional investigators and another by a watchdog group warn of lax oversight.
A study of the nation's 103 commercial nuclear reactors by the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) warns that many of these facilities are entering, if not already in, the most dangerous phase of their life cycles.
Many reactors are now in their third decade of operation, a phase "where safety system failures, unplanned reactor shutdowns, and accidental releases of radioactivity are becoming more likely," said Dave Lochbaum, a nuclear safety engineer with UCS and author of the report.
In response, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission should step up its monitoring procedures in order to safeguard the American public from potential failures at nuclear power plants, the report recommends.
Twenty-seven nuclear reactors have been shut down in the past two decades for safety problems that took a year or longer to fix demonstrates that errors are abundant and margins for error still necessary, Lochbaum said.
On March 6, 2002, workers repairing a cracked control rod drive mechanism nozzle at the FirstEnergy Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station discovered a football sized hole in the reactor vessel head. It was later determined to have resulted from reactor cooling water laden with corrosive boric acid leaking onto the reactor vessel head.
Industry representatives say many reactors have been upgraded and note that accident rates and shutdowns have decreased in the past decade - even as the overall output of U.S. nuclear plants has increased some 25 percent. The nation's 103 nuclear power plants produce 20 percent of the electricity used in the United States. (Photo courtesy Tennessee Emergency Management Agency) But it would be expected that reactors would have the least problems during the middle phase of their operational lives, the Union of Concerned Scientists says, a phase that is ending for many during the next few years.
And the fact these plants will remain a key part of the U.S. energy equation is reason enough for better oversight by the federal government, the UCS report says.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has already renewed licenses for 12 sites - 23 reactors - and is considering an additional 11 sites with 19 reactors.
License renewal adds 20 years onto the original 40 year operational life of each unit - virtually all of the nation's nuclear plants are expected to apply for license renewals.
The UCS report cautions neither the Commission nor its regulations are adequately assessing or monitoring the safety of commercial reactors - it cites several near mishaps, in particular the problems unveiled at Davis-Besse.
"Nuclear plants seeking license renewal conform not to today's safety standards, but to a unique assortment of regulations dating back nearly 40 years, with countless exemptions, deviations and waivers granted along the way," Lochbaum wrote.
The Union of Concerned Scientists says Congress needs to step up pressure on the Commission to reform and provide ample funding for increased inspections.
The research group is not the only one to question NRC's oversight - concerns have been repeatedly sounded by the agency's own internal investigators and by the U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO).
And a new report released Monday by the GAO, the investigative arm of the U.S. Congress, casts further criticism on the NRC's handling of problems at the Davis-Besse nuclear power plant.
The Commission failed to identify or prevent the corrosion at Davis-Besse because its oversight did not generate accurate information on plant conditions, the GAO said.
The report finds the NRC was aware of the potential for cracked tubes and corrosion at plants like Davis-Besse but did not view them as an immediate concern and did not modify its inspections to identify potential problems at similar plants. Besse reactor vessel head insulation showing the damage caused by boric acid (Photo courtesy NRC) The GAO study echoed many of the findings by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Office of the Inspector General, which judged the agency's actions as improper, and also supported the findings of an NRC task force.
In October 2002, the task force reported that a web of misinformation, poor regulatory oversight and operator negligence allowed a preventable problem to become a serious safety hazard.
Operators and regulators, for example, had noted evidence of boric acid deposits in 1998 but did not take the finding seriously.
The GAO found that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission considered FirstEnergy a "good performer," a bias that resulted in fewer NRC inspections and questions about plant conditions.
The Commission established a December 31, 2001 deadline for full shutdown of the plants that it believed were of highest risk - including Davis-Besse.
But the federal agency granted FirstEnergy's request for a delay and did not issue a shutdown order for Davis-Besse until February 16, 2002, when the plant was scheduled for routine maintenance.
In March 2002 plant operators discovered that boric acid from a leaking nozzle had created a hole six inches deep and nearly five inches wide in the reactor lid.
The report detailed that the Commission's process for deciding to allow the Davis-Besse to delay its shutdown lacks credibility.
The NRC had no guidance specifically for making a decision on whether a plant should shut down, so it used guidance for deciding whether a plant should be allowed to modify its operating license, the GAO said.
But the Congressional investigators found that the agency did not follow always this guidance and generally did not document how it applied the guidance.
In addition, the risk estimate the Commission used to help decide whether the plant should shut down was also flawed and underestimated the amount of risk that Davis-Besse posed. Even though it underestimated this risk, the estimate still exceeded risk levels generally accepted by the agency, according to the GAO.
The NRC allowed the plant to restart, after forcing FirstEnergy to spend millions on remodifications, in March 2004. The Davis-Besse plant has become the poster child for what is wrong with the NRC for agency critics. (Photo courtesy Ottawa County Emergency Management) FirstEnergy is now the subject of a federal grand jury investigation stemming from charges that the company falsified safety data regarding the Davis-Besse plant.
The GAO said the federal agency still has not taken all of its planned actions and has no plans to address the three systemic weaknesses underscored by the incident.
It has proposed no action to help it better identify early indications of deteriorating safety conditions at plants, decide whether to shut down a plant, or monitor actions taken in response to incidents at plants.
"Both NRC and GAO had previously identified problems in NRC programs that contributed to the Davis-Besse incident, yet these problems continue to persist," the General Accounting Office said in its report.
In its response to the report, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission disagreed with the recommendations that it needs develop additional means to better identify safety problems early and guidance for making decisions whether to shut down a plant.
The NRC will defend its actions today at a Senate hearing on the agency's oversight of the nuclear industry.
The Bush administration and some Congressional Republicans are eager to jumpstart the nation's nuclear industry - no new plant has been built since the 1979 accident at Three Mile Island.
A key part of the effort to encourage the industry to build new plants is the Price Anderson Act, a 1957 amendment to the Atomic Energy Act that caps the cost of liability insurance coverage for any nuclear power plant accident.
Critics say it skews the real cost of nuclear power and potentially leaves taxpayers liable for damages from a severe accident.
It is still in effect for existing plants, but must be reauthorized for new plants - such reauthorization is included in the stalled energy bill.
And on Wednesday the Nuclear Regulatory Commission renewed the operating license of the R.E. Ginna Nuclear Power Plant for an additional 20 years. Located 20 miles from Rochester, New York the plant is operated by Rochester Gas and Electric Corporation. The renewal extends R.E. Ginna's license from September 18, 2009 to September 18, 2029.
--------
Calculating Disaster
Accidents at Puget Sound's Trident installation cast doubt on Navy and Lockheed safety claims
by Glen Milner,
May 20, 2004
Washington Free Press
http://washingtonfreepress.org/basil/accidentsPugetSound.htm
The below article was first offered to the Seattle Times and Bremerton's Sun newspaper, but these two dailies were apparently uninterested in printing it. Because this article has extreme importance for the welfare of the region, the WA Free Press is filling in where the mainstream papers are amiss. --ed.
There is no weapon system in the US arsenal with the operational risks of a Trident submarine. No weapon has as much explosive material, in the form of solid rocket propellant, and the number of nuclear warheads tightly packed in a confined vessel.
On November 7, 2003 a missile handling crew at Bangor, WA hoisted a Trident C-4 missile into a ladder that was left inside the launch tube. A nine-inch hole was made in the nose cone as the ladder came within inches of a live nuclear warhead.
All missile handling operations at the Strategic Weapons Facility were stopped for nine weeks until Bangor could be recertified for handling nuclear weapons. The top three commanders were dismissed.
When the accident became public in March 2004, many acknowledged the Navy's concern for safety but failed to recognize one critical fact--the design of the missile is inherently flawed.
The critical issue at the Bangor Explosives Handling Wharf in November 2003 was not how close the ladder had come to the nuclear warhead, but instead, how close it had come to the third stage rocket motor. Lockheed Martin and the Navy consider the Trident propellant to be 1.25 percent more explosive than conventional TNT. Some tests show it to be twice as volatile at TNT. The propellant is capable of detonating upon impact.
Had the ladder struck the third stage rocket motor with sufficient force, the resultant explosion would have detonated the much larger first and second stage rocket motors and spread the plutonium across Puget Sound. Safety studies of the Trident missile system have been conducted through a process of "fault tree analysis", in which every identified hazardous event in deployment operations were analyzed. Based upon analysis by Lockheed Martin and the Navy, the chance of an accident leading to the dispersal of plutonium is better than the acceptable number of "one in a million." The analysis, however, is dependent upon correctly identifying every causative event that could lead to a catastrophic failure.
In July 2003, a federal lawsuit, Milner v. US Department of the Navy [of which the writer is the plaintiff], brought the public release of the Navy's Trident missile accident review and propellant hazard analysis. While issues such as tornadoes and crane failure were considered in the safety reviews, no mention was made of missile technicians leaving for coffee break and forgetting the ladder in the missile launch tube. A number of other causative events, such as falling objects and electrical fires, were not studied because the chances of such an event at the Explosives Handling Wharf at Bangor were considered too remote.
The Space Shuttle program is similar in complexity to the Trident submarine system. NASA, with the assistance of Lockheed Martin and other prime contractors, had concluded the chances of a catastrophic accident involving a Space Shuttle to be 1 in 100,000. Actual operations resulted in two tragic accidents in 113 launches, giving the program a 1 in 57 failure rate.
The cause of the last Shuttle disaster, light-weight foam on an external fuel tank, had never been considered a potential problem.
A Freedom of Information Act response in September 2003 brought the release of documents from the Bangor Submarine Base safety office showing three accidents at Bangor involving Trident missiles. One accident, in November 2001, involved a cover that was pulled off the side of a Trident first stage rocket motor in a scenario the Navy had not thought was possible. The report concluded, "...we need to understand how the contact could have happened..."
One Trident submarine, loaded with the newer D-5 missile, has enough solid rocket propellant to equal 3.7 million pounds of TNT. This conventional explosive is equal to a small 1.8 kiloton nuclear bomb. Add to this the nuclear reactor and up to 192 nuclear warheads on one Trident submarine.
In June 2001, a coalition of two environmental and three peace organizations filed a federal lawsuit against the D-5 missile upgrade at Bangor. The case, focusing on the risks involved in missile handling operations at Bangor, is now in the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. The risks of a catastrophic accident at Bangor are enormous. The Navy could lose the operational base for approximately 25 percent of our nation's deployed nuclear arsenal. Citizens of Puget Sound could lose their homes and their lives.
Glen Milner lives in Seattle and is a member of the Ground Zero Center for Nonviolent Action in Poulsbo, Washington. Please see www.gzcenter.org .
-------- iran
US presses Russia over nuclear cooperation with Iran
MOSCOW (AFP)
May 20, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040520105629.0cl9q3ep.html
The United States pursued its efforts Thursday to persuade Russia to interrupt its controversial nuclear cooperation with Iran as the top US arms control official held high-level discussions in Moscow.
But it apparently failed to have Moscow agree to a Washington-sponsored agreement that would allow for the interdiction of missiles and other potential components of weapons of mass destruction while they are being transferred at sea or in the air.
US Under Secretary of State for Arms Control John Bolton met Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Kislyak for talks focusing on the spread of weapons of mass destruction and the potential threats posed by North Korea and Iraq.
"The United States plans to focus on issues of the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and all issues linked to this," the ITAR-TASS news agency quoted Bolton as saying before the meeting.
He was due to brief reporters on his visit later Thursday.
However Kislyak told the Interfax news agency after the meeting that no agreement had been reached on Russia signing up to Proliferation Security Initiative -- also known as PSI -- proposed by US President George W. Bush last year.
"As to the PSI agreement, we are continuing to discuss this question," Kislyak said.
Russia has argued that the PSI agreement would open the way for unilateral military action from Washington and wants such deals to be negotiated through the United Nations, where it has veto power.
The hawkish Bolton regularly visits Russia, though he is not always well-received here, and has become one of Washington's top pointmen on issues dealing with Moscow's potential military trade and the spread of weapons of mass destruction.
Bolton was one of the key figures who helped negotiate a May 2002 arms reduction treaty signed by Presidents Bush and Vladimir Putin in Moscow that was meant to reduce the two sides' nuclear arsenals by two-thirds over 10 years.
But that treaty -- to Russia's immense displeasure -- now appears to have been dropped as Washington used a legal loophole to ignore the deal.
The United States has since aired plans to develop miniature nuclear weapons, a military potential that Russia does not yet have and which Washington argues are needed for regional conflicts in the post Cold War era.
Iran has remained a sore point in Russia-US relations despite a new wave of cooperation following the September 11 attacks.
Russia's Bushehr nuclear reactor project is frowned on by Washington amid fears that the Islamic state is using it as a guise to develop a weapons program.
Moscow has since appeared to have put the breaks on the project and delivered strong pressure on Iran to submit to open United Nations inspections of its potential military sites.
Iran's first nuclear reactor is now not due to become operational until 2005 -- years after schedule -- in a deal worth nearly one billion dollars (1.2 billion euros) to Moscow that Russian authorities appear to have used several strategies to push back to appease US concerns.
Under US and Israeli pressure, Moscow is demanding that all of the fuel provided for the reactor is sent back to Russia, and has called for a guarantee that the fuel is delivered safely across Iran.
It is now negotiating a new treaty on the fuel's safe return.
-------- japan
Abductees, Nukes on Japan - N.Korea Summit Agenda
May 20, 2004
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-korea-north-koizumi.html
TOKYO (Reuters) - Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi heads for Pyongyang on Saturday for a summit he hopes will reunite families of Japanese kidnapped decades ago and break a deadlock in talks over North Korea's nuclear arms program.
Resolving the dispute over the abductees, a highly emotive matter in Japan, would be a political coup ahead of a July election for parliament's upper chamber.
But the Japanese leader also needs to make progress on the nuclear crisis to win plaudits from the international community.
``I don't think the Japanese government thinks that it is okay to compromise with North Korea just because the abduction issue alone is resolved,'' Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba told Reuters in an interview this week.
It will be Koizumi's second summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, a rarity for countries with no diplomatic ties.
A breakthrough would open the way to a resumption of talks on normalizing ties -- a prerequisite for Japan to provide substantial aid for the communist state's struggling economy.
Paik Hak-soon at Sejong Institute, a think tank in Seoul, felt there would be at least some positive developments.
``Both Japan and North Korea need to normalize their relationship,'' he said.
``For Koizumi, he has to solve abductee issues and, from Japan's East Asia strategic viewpoint, it is necessary to talk with North Korea. For Kim, economic problems are so urgent that Japan's economic cooperation is needed.''
Kim acknowledged at the September 2002 summit with Koizumi that Pyongyang's agents had kidnapped 13 Japanese in the 1970s and 1980s. North Korea said then that eight of those were dead.
Japan says North Korea has kidnapped at least 15 Japanese to train Pyongyang's spies.
Five of the abductees returned to Japan in October 2002, more than a quarter century after being spirited away to North Korea, but their seven North Korean-born children and the American husband of one of them were left behind in the communist state.
The summit has raised expectations that Koizumi would be able to reunite the five with the relatives they left behind, possibly even bringing the latter back to Japan with him on Saturday.
FINDING OUT THE TRUTH
Lawmakers involved in talks with North Korea have said that Pyongyang was willing to hand over the abductees' seven children, now in their teens and twenties.
But some Japanese worry that their return could end any hope of finding out the truth about other abductees.
``This has to be the beginning, not the end,'' Toru Hasuike, brother of former abductee Kaoru Hasuike, told Reuters.
North Korea is keen to get aid for its struggling economy and Japanese officials have said humanitarian assistance was possible, depending on the outcome of the summit.
Koizumi also wants to bring to Japan Charles Robert Jenkins, a former U.S. army sergeant who married abductee Hitomi Soga in North Korea. But the outlook is complicated by Washington's insistence that Jenkins defected to North Korea 40 years ago.
Tokyo wants Washington to consider pardoning Jenkins, now 64, who would otherwise face a court martial.
U.S. Ambassador to Japan Howard Baker told reporters he felt sympathy for Jenkins but that did not change his status in the eyes of the U.S. government.
``The position of the United States is that if he is returned to the United States or the custody of the United states, he will be dealt with according to the provisions of our military justice,'' he said, but added he had no idea what would happen.
NUCLEAR DEADLOCK
Koizumi will also try to break an impasse in talks on the crisis over North Korea's nuclear weapons program.
Working level talks in Beijing last week failed to break the deadlock between the two main protagonists, the United States and North Korea. The other participants were South Korea, Japan, China and Russia.
Analysts said Kim was unlikely to accept U.S. demands -- echoed by Tokyo -- to abandon his nuclear arms program at the summit, but some said he may try to show some flexibility.
The United States wants North Korea to abandon completely both a program to make weapons-grade plutonium and a uranium enrichment program that Pyongyang now says does not exist.
North Korea wants compensation for giving up its nuclear arms program, with a deal for a freeze as a first step, and says it has the right to pursue nuclear projects for peaceful purposes.
The latest crisis over North Korea's nuclear ambitions dates from October 2002, when U.S. officials said Pyongyang had admitted to pursuing a project to enrich uranium for weapons.
-------- korea
KEDO holds board meeting on suspension of N Korea nuclear project
NEW YORK (AFP)
May 20, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040520212924.16jaq2sc.html
The international consortium in charge of a frozen plan to build two nuclear power plants for North Korea held an executive board meeting Thursday, one day after Washington said the project had no future.
The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organisation (KEDO) board, which groups the United States, European Union, South Korea and Japan, discussed the management of the project's suspension, as well as financial issues, spokesman Roland Tricot told reporters.
"The organisation continues to implement suspension measures, and is conducting preservation and maintenance activities" at the construction site in North Korea, Tricot said.
He also said the board did not enjoy the unanimity required to resume construction of the reactors when the one-year suspension expires on December
The multi-billion dollar plan to build two 1,000 megawatt light water nuclear reactors, deemed less suitable for weapons grade plutonium production, arose from a 1994 anti-nuclear deal between Washington and Pyongyang.
But the United States considers the deal, known as the Agreed Framework, ruptured after accusing Pyongyang in 2002 of launching a prohibited program to enrich uranium for weapons production.
Since then Pyongyang has thrown out international inspectors, unfrozen its Yongbyon nuclear plant and pulled out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation treaty.
The KEDO board announced the suspension of its project -- effective December 1, 2003 -- in November last year.
On Wednesday, the US State Department confirmed reports that North Korea had offered, during talks in Beijing last week, to freeze its own nuclear activities in exchange for a resumption of the reactor project.
"It's not something that we entertained," said the department's deputy spokesman, Adam Ereli.
"I would also add as a matter of policy that we do not see a future for the light water reactor project," he said.
Construction work on the reactors began in 1998 and is only one-third finished, although completion of the project was scheduled for 2003, according to the North Koreans. Experts say it would take at least five more years to finish the complex.
----
The North Korean Conundrum
by SELIG S. HARRISON,
May 20, 2004
The Nation
http://www.thenation.com/docprint.mhtml?i=20040607&s=harrison
North Korea: Another Country by Bruce Cumings
The North Korean Revolution: 1945-1950 by Charles K. Armstrong
Nuclear North Korea: A Debate on Engagement Strategies by David Kang and Victor Cha
Crisis on the Korean Peninsula: How to Deal With a Nuclear North Korea by Michael O'Hanlon and Mike Mochizuki
North Korea/South Korea: U.S. Policy at a Time of Crisis by John Feffer
[from the June 7, 2004 issue]
In the prevailing American stereotype, North Korea is a failing Stalinist dictatorship held together only by the ruthless repression of a mad ruler who dreams of firing nuclear weapons at Los Angeles. Sooner or later, in this imagery, the Kim Jong Il regime, strangled in its Communist straitjacket, will crumble economically, and the only issue is whether its collapse will come in the form of an implosion or an explosion.
For George W. Bush, who says he "loathes" Kim Jong Il and wants to "topple" his regime, the assumption that Kim's power rests solely on repression has shaped the current US policy response to the much-discussed North Korean nuclear weapons program. Given patience and enough pressure on Pyongyang, Bush and his advisers appear to believe, the Kim regime will fall. Thus, it is neither necessary nor desirable to reward Kim for denuclearization with economic quid pro quos and security assurances that would merely help to keep him afloat.
What accounts for the emotional intensity of the Bush Administration's desire for "regime change" in Pyongyang? More broadly, does the conventional wisdom in the United States about the nature of the North Korean system, reflected in US policy, rest on an informed assessment of what enables Kim to survive?
The President's own explanation is that Kim is loathsome because he presides over an Orwellian totalitarian system. But one can agree that the North Korean system is indeed Orwellian while disputing the wisdom of a policy of confrontation. Moreover, there are other reasons why Pyongyang is demonized in Administration policy. North Korea challenges two American articles of faith: that the United States is entitled to be treated with deference as the "only superpower," and that Western-style democracy, together with economic globalization based on market principles, is now the natural, universal order of things.
Pyongyang refuses to defer to the United States and seeks to deal with Washington on a basis of sovereign equality despite its inferior power position. Although eager to obtain foreign capital and technology, it is seeking to do so selectively, on its own terms, resisting pressure for wholesale political and economic reforms, all at once, that might weaken the control of the Korean Workers Party regime. Above all, what exasperates many Americans about North Korea, no doubt including the President, is the very fact that it continues to exist at all and has not gone the way of the Soviet Union and the Eastern European Communist states, thus finally confirming the ideological victory of the West in the cold war.
Media coverage of the nuclear negotiations with North Korea generally places Pyongyang in the position of the defendant at the bar in a judicial proceeding, with the United States in the role of judge, jury and executioner. Rarely does a journalist go beyond what is spoon-fed at State Department or White House briefings to examine the assumptions underlying US policy or make a serious effort to present the North Korean side of the story. This is partly because North Korea often smothers its position in a flood of crude anti-imperialist rhetoric that is painful to wade through and difficult to evaluate even for the journalist seeking to be objective. But it is also because most journalists facing a deadline are not given the time necessary to seek out elusive North Korean diplomats, or to read books about North Korea.
In any case, even if they did do their homework, much of the literature on North Korea has until recently reinforced simplistic, negative stereotypes. Most of the authors writing about North Korea have never been there and have had to base their assessments on interviews with defectors who were generally beholden, during the cold war, to South Korean intelligence agencies, or by working within the parameters defined by North Korea's propaganda output, much as Kremlinologists did in earlier decades. One of the more carefully researched books of this genre--North Korea Through the Looking Glass, by Kongdan Oh and Ralph Hassig--advertised its limitations with its title.
The media hype generated by the nuclear negotiations has now led to a spate of new books about North Korea and how to deal with it. Two of these, North Korea: Another Country, by Bruce Cumings, and The North Korean Revolution: 1945-1950, by Charles K. Armstrong, make powerfully clear why the Kim regime is not on the verge of collapse.
Cumings, the doyen of US historians of contemporary Korea, is best known for his definitive two-volume study of the origins of the Korean War. To understand the nationalistic ethos that gives North Korea its political cohesion and staying power, he writes, it is necessary to recognize the traumatic impact of the US role in the war. In September 1950, Harry Truman made his fateful decision to enlarge the conflict, even though North Korean forces had been successfully pushed out of South Korea. The proper response to North Korean aggression, Cumings argues, would have been to "reestablish the 38th Parallel and claim a victory for the containment doctrine." Instead, Truman and Dean Acheson "decided to transform their undeclared war into a campaign to liberate North Korea."
American soldiers marched northward toward the Yalu River border with China, provoking Chinese intervention, and the US Air Force rained destruction on North Korea until the armistice was concluded, in 1953. To escape from American planes, any one of which, in North Korean eyes, might have dropped an atomic bomb, most of the population lived and worked in hastily excavated underground caverns complete with their own schools, hospitals and small factories. The South suffered brutal but relatively brief anguish from air attacks during the latter part of 1950, with Pyongyang using little close air support in its operations there. The North, by contrast, endured three years of heavy US bombing in addition to the Yalu offensive. This unremitting assault from the air, plus a bloody US-South Korean occupation, left a deeply rooted siege mentality in the North that persists today.
Appealing for support in the name of a continuing US threat, North Korean leaders point to the many reminders that the Korean War is not yet over: the maintenance of most of the economic sanctions imposed during the war; the presence of US forces in the South, still operating under the same UN command structure used during the war; and above all, the legal reality that the armistice has not been transformed into a peace treaty.
It was John Foster Dulles's threat of using nuclear weapons that broke the impasse in the armistice negotiations, Cumings reminds us, and in the decades thereafter the United States "has consistently based its deterrence on threats to use them...in Korea," threats backed up by the presence of US tactical nuclear weapons in the South until 1991. The invasion of Iraq and the explicit US assertion of the right to take pre-emptive military action elaborated in the Bush Administration's National Security Strategy of September 17, 2002, is progressively hardening support within North Korea for nuclear weapons--not to strike Los Angeles, which would invite US retaliation, but to deter a US attack.
Many Western historians writing about North Korea during the cold war depicted Kim Jong Il's father, the late Kim Il Sung, as a supine puppet installed by Soviet forces, likened the new North Korean state to Eastern European Communist satellites and belittled North Korean accounts of Kim Il Sung's role as a guerrilla hero who fought Japanese forces in Manchuria during the Korean anticolonial struggle.
Cumings shows that Kim did in fact earn legitimacy as "a classic Robin Hood figure" who helped poor Korean farmers in the Kapsan area bordering Manchuria during the Japanese colonial period and as a fervent nationalist who led guerrilla attacks against Japanese forces in southern and southeastern Manchuria from 1933 to 1940. His extensive citations from the latest scholarly research include recently unearthed Japanese intelligence reports describing Kim as the "most famous" and a "particularly popular" leader of Korean émigrés in Manchuria, with "a great reputation and a high position," a "Korean hero" in the struggle against Japan.
As for Kim's installation by Soviet forces, Cumings establishes that the Russians had "no clear-cut plan or predetermined course of action" during the early months of the occupation and had someone else in mind to head the new Pyongyang regime. However, precisely because Kim had such a tight-knit following among the guerrilla cohort who had fought with him in Manchuria, "after the guerrillas returned, they pushed [him] forward as first among equals." Kim was no mere stooge of the Russians, in short, and he began playing off Moscow and Beijing against each other to suit Korean nationalist purposes as soon as Soviet forces departed.
Charles K. Armstrong demolishes the analogy between North Korea and the erstwhile Communist regimes of Eastern Europe with incontestable evidence drawn from 1.6 million pages of declassified North Korean documents captured during the Korean War.
Instead of "working through a small, elite vanguard party in the typical Leninist fashion" exemplified in Eastern Europe, Armstrong shows, Kim Il Sung built a "powerful support base...among the poor and marginal elements of [Korean] society," especially the poor peasant majority, workers and women, as he had done in mobilizing popular resistance in Manchuria. During Japanese colonial rule, the number of landless farm laborers had multiplied. Rapacious landlords oppressed their tenant farmers, who were forced to pay crushing rents that often exceeded 60 percent of their total crop and lived on a bare subsistence diet. In March 1946, just a month after emerging as the leader of the Provisional People's Committee, which later evolved into the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), Kim Il Sung pushed through sweeping land reforms that gave the Workers Party its strong rural foundations.
Although the new state initially called itself Communist, Communism in Korea was soon "absorbed and transformed" by the hierarchical structure and Confucian social values that had characterized Korea over the centuries. "Communism took root in North Korea," Armstrong concludes, precisely because Korean society was so conservative. On the one hand, "the possibility of breaking down old hierarchies was deeply attractive to many at the bottom of the social ladder," while at the same time, Korea's Confucian heritage enabled Kim Il Sung to create "new hierarchical structures even more rigid than the old, and just as resistant to change." Or, as a South Korean scholar cited by Cumings puts it, North Korea became "a new Confucian society or family-state that is well integrated as an extension of filial piety, expressed through strong loyalty to its leader."
"An odd aspect of the DPRK's belief in the family as the core unit of society," Cumings observes, is that prisoners are generally sent to labor camps together with their families, and mutual family support enables many to survive the ordeal. Cumings does not minimize the ugly horror of North Korea's gulag. Indeed, he accepts the higher estimates of the number of prisoners, citing a South Korean intelligence figure of 150,000, half criminals and half political cases. The gulag symbolizes the dark side of a repressive system that stifles unrest resulting primarily from continuing economic failures, especially in agriculture. Although only 14 percent of North Korea's mountainous terrain is arable, the government has made matters worse with collective farming; the floods of 1995 and 1996 led to near-famine conditions in many provinces. As the New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof has observed, "The best metaphor for North Korea is the medieval church. Much of the population consists of genuine believers, and no one pays enormous attention to the minority of heretics who are tortured and killed, the way witches or Christians of a dissident sect were killed during the Middle Ages."
Like most advocates of accommodation with Pyongyang, Cumings suggests that external pressure on the Kim regime will only reinforce internal repression and delay the liberalizing trends now being stimulated by growing contacts with the outside world.
Both Armstrong and Cumings present evidence relevant to the current policy debate about how to deal with North Korea. But Armstrong's book is specialized academic fare, too rigorous and detailed for the general reader. Cumings, by contrast, resting on his long-established scholarly laurels, writes in a lively, readable, argumentative, often delightfully irreverent style. His book should be read by anyone seriously interested in an authoritative antidote to the bias and superficiality in most of what is written about North Korea.
North Korea: Another Country indicts not only the Bush policy toward North Korea but also the entire US role in Korea dating back to the US-Soviet division of the peninsula in 1945. Significantly, however, Cumings questions one of the key arguments made by some other critics of US policy: that Kim Jong Il would move toward sustained economic reforms as the result of an accommodation with Washington. "North Korea is neither muddling through toward some sort of postcommunism, the way other socialist states did after 1989," he argues, "nor is it seriously reforming like China and Vietnam.... Any kind of coordinated reform seems difficult for the regime to accomplish." In addition to the "paralysis and immobilism" resulting from warfare between bureaucratic and provincial fiefdoms, the drag of a vast party apparatus, the privileged position of the armed forces and intense generational conflict, he finds the leadership "deeply frightened by the consequences of opening up the economy."
This assessment, made with little elaboration, is challenged effectively in a detailed analysis by Professor David Kang of the Dartmouth Business School, who presents the case for accommodation in Nuclear North Korea: A Debate on Engagement Strategies, written with Victor Cha. North Korea has already come "very far" from its command economy of 1989, Kang says, citing the upsurge of private markets since the 1996 famine, a package of economic reforms enacted in July 2002, including a new pricing system, and an overall growth of the private sector in the past five years from less than 4 percent to perhaps 25 percent of the economy. Continuing signs of reform are accompanied by "growing evidence that North Korea is serious about opening to the West," notably its efforts to provide a legal framework for foreign investment. Significant reforms cannot succeed without such an opening, Kang emphasizes, and "a hardline policy of pressure and threats from the United States will not start a war but will jeopardize" the gains that have been made.
In contrast to Kang's empirically based argument, Cha is didactic, relying on doctrinaire assumptions and fancy political science jargon. An advocate of what he calls "hawk engagement," he spells out in revealing detail why the Bush Administration refuses to deal directly with North Korea and what it hopes to gain through multilateral negotiations like those recently conducted in Beijing. Rejecting Kang's contention that Kim Jong Il no longer poses a military threat and wants to open up to the West, Cha maintains that Pyongyang, desperate for a way out of a systemic crisis, is likely to use "other forms of violence short of all-out war," such as a "limited but forceful frontal assault into the South" designed to strengthen its bargaining position with Seoul. A cold war-style policy of "containment and isolation" in response to this danger, he says, might lead to an undesired war. "Conditional engagement" would be less provocative. It would "make clear to...regional powers that the U.S. [has] exhausted all efforts at cooperation" and would "rally the coalition to coerce the regime through force and economic sanctions into nonproliferation compliance and/or regime collapse." Such a policy can only succeed, he concedes, with the cooperation of China, Russia, Japan and South Korea.
"Hawk engagement," he tells us frankly, is not designed to achieve a diplomatic settlement but is rather "an exit strategy that builds a coalition for punishment," "an instrument to reveal the DPRK's true, unchanged intentions" and a way to exacerbate tensions within the North Korean elite, "contributing to possible...clashes or coup attempts that might precipitate the regime's crumbling from the top." If North Korea continues to develop its nuclear weapons program, the United States and those allies willing to help would "intercept any vessels suspected of carrying nuclear- or missile-related materials in and out of the North."
Far from building a coalition to isolate North Korea, however, "hawk engagement" is increasingly damaging US relations with China, Russia, South Korea and Japan, all of whom, to varying degrees, put much of the blame for the impasse with Pyongyang on US rigidity, as they have made clear in recent weeks. All of them are opposed to the interdiction of North Korean vessels and other coercive measures proposed by Cha, because they recognize that such muscle-flexing could trigger a chain reaction of escalation, leading to another Korean war.
If John Kerry is elected and reshapes Korea policy next January, he should carefully consider some of the ideas in Crisis on the Korean Peninsula: How to Deal With a Nuclear North Korea. Michael O'Hanlon and Mike Mochizuki propose a "grand bargain" in which North Korea would get $2 billion in aid per year for a decade, mostly from Japan but including some $300 million from the United States. In return, it would agree to complete and verifiable denuclearization over "a course of years"; an end to the testing, production, deployment and export of medium- and long-range missiles; and sweeping cuts of at least 50 percent in all major types of its heavy weaponry, as part of a broad arms control agreement in which the United States and South Korea would also cut their conventional forces in Korea.
O'Hanlon and Mochizuki's arms control proposal is their most valuable contribution, though the terms suggested would have to be modified to make the deal equitable and acceptable to North Korea. For example, it is the qualitative superiority of US air power based in Korea that makes North Korea vulnerable to a US pre-emptive attack, and explains its massive forward deployment of tanks and artillery as a deterrent. Yet the proposed cuts in aircraft are frankly designed to retain this superiority. "For allied forces," they suggest, "the net loss in capability as a result of the arms control proposal would be less in percentage terms" than that of the North. This is calculated to make their proposal more palatable to the Pentagon, but it makes it a nonstarter in Pyongyang.
As described by O'Hanlon and Mochizuki, their "grand bargain" goes beyond "carrots and sticks" to what they call "steaks and sledgehammers." But this approach is simply a new and more sophisticated variant of US efforts for the past decade to use the normalization of relations with Pyongyang as a reward for the cessation of its nuclear program. After repeated failures, it is clearly time to reassess this approach, which is what John Feffer does in his lucid, hard-hitting overview, North Korea, South Korea: U.S. Policy at a Time of Crisis. Feffer visited both North Korea and South Korea frequently and represented the American Friends Service Committee in Northeast Asia. He has produced a perceptive, gracefully written book placing the nuclear crisis in a broader policy perspective that embraces the peninsula as a whole, all in 173 easily digestible pages.
The United States should uncouple normalization and denuclearization, Feffer concludes, and "immediately begin the process of establishing diplomatic relations with North Korea. Rather than a bargaining chip, normalized relations thus become a framework for addressing all outstanding U.S.-North Korean issues." My own visits to North Korea, eight since 1972, support his view that "North Korea will not likely feel secure enough to relinquish its nuclear deterrent if it forever remains an outlier, and normalization is an important step toward a future in which North Korea is unlikely to use whatever weapons of destruction it possesses." The idea of uncoupling the nuclear issue from normalization has also been suggested by an influential Japanese security expert, Masashi Nishihara, director of the National Defense Academy in Tokyo.
With six other Americans, including two former US ambassadors to South Korea, I recently participated in a three-day dialogue with a high-level North Korean delegation headed by Jo Sung Ju, American Affairs director in the Foreign Ministry. Repeatedly, the North Koreans emphasized that "coexistence" is the key to resolving the nuclear crisis. What North Korea wants above all, they said, is a formal security guarantee that would not only revoke the threat of a pre-emptive US attack but would also pledge to "respect the sovereignty" of North Korea by abandoning the often-stated goal of regime change.
"Why would we need nuclear weapons if we no longer feel threatened?" asked one. "Why would we give up our right to have them if you keep talking about regime change? It's as simple as that."
-------- pacific
Uranium mining company may face criminal charges for water contamination, Australian minister says
Thursday, May 20, 2004
By Associated Press
http://www.enn.com/news/2004-05-20/s_24071.asp
A mining company may face criminal charges after the water supply at its mine was contaminated with uranium, a senior official said Wednesday.
The Northern Territory's Mines and Energy Minister Kon Vatskalis said a state government report found that Rio Tinto subsidiary Energy Resources Australia broke the law when the mine's drinking water supply was accidentally polluted with uranium and other chemicals. The report recommended that charges be laid.
Officials closed the Ranger Mine in Kakadu National Park in March after workers complained of nausea, stomach cramps, and vomiting after drinking and showering with the tainted water. The mine resumed operations two weeks later.
The incident occurred when processed mine water was mistakenly connected to the drinking water supply by a hose. In total 28 workers have complained of illnesses from drinking the water, and some are considering civil action.
"It's such a fundamental mistake, such a stupid error, but it happened," Vatskalis said.
He said the territory's Justice Department was expected to decide on how to move forward with a criminal case in the coming weeks.
"Before we proceed to prosecution, we want to make sure that whatever we do is going to stick," said Vatskalis.
An ERA spokeswoman said the company "will cooperate fully with the Northern Territory government and the Commonwealth government in any inquiries into this incident."
The Australian Conservation Foundation said charges against the mining company are long past due. Spokesman Dave Sweeney said the uranium mine had more than 120 leaks since opening in 1981.
"During that time it has never been prosecuted, and it is now well overdue for Australia's largest national park to be given some active protection from the impacts and threats of uranium mining," he said.
-------- u.s. nuc weapons
Catalyst - Mini Nukes
Thursday, 20 May 2004
Australian Broadcasting,
by Graham Phillips
http://www.abc.net.au/catalyst/stories/s1112492.htm
A new generation of nuclear weapons - mini nukes is being planned by America. According to the US military, they need miniature nukes in the war against terrorism So they're designing bunker busting weapons that can burrow down into the earth carrying a mini- nuke which would wipe out some rogue dictator's control centre or destroy stores of chemical and biological weapons. And the military says, because these mini-nuke bunker busters will go off underground, the nuclear fall out from them will never escape. But the mini nukes have a lot of critics amongst them physicist Richard Slakey who says they won't be able to burrow deep enough and more worryingly that the radiation fallout cannot be contained.
Full Program Transcript:
Narration: Nuclear bombs are the most devastating weapons...which is why there's been a steady move away from them since the end of the cold war. But guess what...it seems nukes are back in fashion. The reason is September 11, says Francis Slakey. He's a physicist at Georgetown University in Washington, where one of the 9-11 planes crashed.
Dr Francis Slakey: It came straight overhead and came down and into the Pentagon about a mile away.
Narration: September 11 made Americans realise, the cold war may be over, but they're still vulnerable.
Dr Francis Slakey:Which is what September 11th did. It focussed the mind on what the vulnerabilities were and where the dangers exist and they imagine that dangers exist in bunkers.
Narration: Underground bunkers are ultimately the danger, because that's where the terrorists can hide and that's where they can conceal their biological and chemical weapons of mass destruction, if they have them. So now the US wants to develop new nuclear devices to bust bunkers.
Graham Phillips, Reporter: This is the Department of Energy building where the guy in charge of all of America's nuclear weapons resides. We're going to ask him why there is this renewed interest in nuclear bombs.
Narration: Everet Beckner, who holds a PhD in physics himself, confirmed that new nuclear devices were on the agenda, for one very good reason - conventional weapons can't bust bunkers.
Dr Everet Beckner: You just can't do it with a few thousand pounds of high explosive. Where as you can get the equivalent of a few thousand tonnes of high explosive, if you choose to, with a nuclear device.
Narration: Everet Beckner agrees, using a standard nuclear device would be disastrous, but a bunker buster would be safer, he says, because it requires only a small nuke, and much of the radioactive fallout would be trapped in the ground.
Narration: A nuclear bunker buster is essentially an atomic bomb encased in a hardened metal shell that can pierce the ground.
The time-delayed bomb only goes off when it reaches the right depth.
It will take out a bunker 300 feet down and its heat and radiation will sterilise all the biological and chemical weapons there.
Narration: At least that's the dream being sold in Washington. But many physicists say this dream is simply unrealistic.
Narration: As it happens, while bunker-busting nukes are the military's latest interest, exploding nuclear bombs under ground is actually old research...done back in the 1950s and 60s, when atom bombs were really in fashion. Engineers then were going to use them to make the world a better place.
Clip: Excavations of new harbours, big dams, canals, passes through rugged mountainous terrain. These and other massive imaginative earth moving projects may soon be ours, created in seconds, through the tremendous energy of the peaceful atom.
Narration: It's hard to believe now, but nuclear excavation was taken very seriously in those days, and many experiments were actually done. And their results have serious implications for building a bunker-busting nuke. In fact they contradict the military line, and indicate the radioactive fallout would be far from safe. That's according to Princeton University physicist Rob Nelson, who recently reworked the old data.
Dr Rob Nelson: We showed that if you use the smallest yield nuclear weapon that we have right now on a bunker buried hypothetically in Bagdad it would kill somewhere between 10,000 and 50,000 people just from the radioactive fallout alone.
Graham Phillips, Reporter: Would any of the radioactive fallout be contained?
Dr Everet Beckner: Yes, much of it will be contained. Trouble is not all of it. You can't assure people that it would be all that would not be correct but some large percentage and again it would depend on how deep you get it and-and the geology but typically you're looking for containment of eight or ninety or so percent of the radio activity.
Narration: Francis doesn't agree with those figures.
Dr Francis Slakey: If the target you're imagining is a bunker three hundred feet deep, to get at that you're gonna need a forty kiloton explosion, that's just the laws of physics and you can't get around that and a forty kiloton explosion is gonna spread radiation out over a ten mile area.
Graham: It won't be contained?
Dr Francis Slakey: It can't be contained.
Graham Phillips, Reporter: Would 90% of it be contained?
Dr Francis Slakey: Ninety percent of it will fall within the ten-mile area.
Narration: Everet Beckner agrees the blast will burst up through the ground but he says most of the radioactivity will fall back into the crater.
Dr Everet Beckner: There will be a crater after this event. It's just that you will contain a lot of the radio activity locally due to the d-, you know, the debris will sort of rise and then fall again and much of the radio activity will be contained in that event
Dr Francis Slakey: Well what does he mean by contained? If you believe that having 90% of the fall out within a ten-mile area it's containing then it was contained.
Narration: And the physicists don't agree with that other selling point of bunker-busting nukes either...that their heat and radiation will destroy biological and chemical weapons. Imagine this New York subway is a terrorist's bunker.
Graham Phillips, Reporter: So what if I had my store of biological weapons stored here in the underground? Could you get those with a bunker buster?
Dr Rob nelson: All you'd do is spread them around. You'd eject them along with the radioactive fallout and disperse them over a wide area.
Narration: The problem is a bomb produces only a very short burst of intense heat...and even very hot short bursts don't kill bacteria.
Dr Francis Slakey: Alright, so this is 1300 degrees. I just run my hand over it. My hand isn't burnt in fact the bacteria that may have been on my hand isn't even destroyed.
Narration: To kill biological weapons you'd need 15 minutes at 1300 degrees.
Dr Francis Slakey: Now a nuclear explosion isn't going to last 15 minutes; it's only going to last about 50 milliseconds.
Narration: As for the radiation, it's only strong enough to kill bio chem. weapons right near the centre of the blast. So you'd need almost a direct hit.
As for the radiation, it's only strong enough to kill bio chem weapons right near the centre of the blast. So the bomb would have to be very accurate.
Dr Rob Nelson: The weapon would have to detonate right here.
Graham Phillips, Reporter: Right on the spot?
Dr Francis Slakey: If you're off a little bit off to the side and you end up exploding the rock before you actually get to the bunker the radiation will be absorbed by the rock and it won't neutralise the chem and bio.
Narration: Even though killing off biological and chemical weapons is one of the great selling points of nuclear bunker busters, Evert Beckner himself didn't really want to comment.
Dr Everet Beckner: Attacking biological targets is very tricky and I think everyone would-would agree that right now you would approach that with a great deal of caution and I'm not I don't - I don't personally [clears throat] know enough about it I probably couldn't talk about it if I did know about it but I think we all agree those are most difficult targets to deal with.
Narration: Whether today's bunker-buster advocates turn out to be as blindly optimistic as engineers in the 50s we'll have to wait and see. But even if an effective bunker busting nuke is developed, to justify its use, our intelligence would have to be much better than it has been.
Dr Francis Slakey: Let's suppose in 2002 we had a bunker buster, we had a weapon that could destroy biological and chemical weapons we had the whole arsenal, and now in 2003 the United states decides to go to war against Iraq and we use them. We used them on where we think the weapons are hidden. What would the result be. Well two things. We would have radiated large swaths of Iraq and we would have been wrong about every single one of those weapons that we dropped.
Story Contacts: Dr. Francis Slakey Physicist and Science Policy Expert Georgetown University
Dr Rob Nelson Physicist and Science Policy Expert Princeton University
Dr Everet Beckner Public Relations National Nuclear Security Administration
Bryan Wilkes Deputy Administrator for Defense Programs National Nuclear Security Administration
Related Sites:
# National Nuclear Security Administration (USA) http://www.nnsa.doe.gov
# Rob Nelson's Website http://www.princeton.edu/~rnelson/
# Council on Foreign Relations (USA) http://www.cfr.org
# Rob Nelson's Power Point Presentation http://www.princeton.edu/~rnelson/papers/cornell.ppt
# Chuck Pena's articles http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-499es.html
# Michael May: "Effectiveness of Nuclear Weapons against Buried Biological Agents" June 2003 http://iis-db.stanford.edu/viewpub.lhtml?pid=20216&cntr=cisac
# DOE Earth Penetrator Weapon Test Films http://www.nv.doe.gov/news&pubs/photos&films/testfilms.htm
-------- u.s. nuc facilities
UC faculty backs weapons labs
Professors vote to support operating Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore facilities
By Ian Hoffman,
Tri-Valley Herald
Thursday, May 20, 2004
http://www.trivalleyherald.com/Stories/0,1413,86~10669~2160399,00.html
By more than three to one, University of California faculty have voted in favor of keeping the nation's largest public university at the helm of two federal labs that design all U.S. nuclear explosives.
In the second such vote in less than a decade, a majority of professors on all 10 campuses reaffirmed support for continuing UC's more than 60 years operating Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore national labs, which invented and maintain thermonuclear devices at the heart of every bomb and warhead in the U.S. arsenal.
Leaders of the Academic Senate reported Wednesday to the university's Board of Regents that 67 percent of faculty voted in favor of UC bidding to keep operating the two labs, with 21 percent opposed and the remainder undecided.
It is the strongest faculty support to date on UC's weapons lab work and removes one of the final political obstacles to continuing that work, if university regents decide to bid.
Several regents signalled that they still want a broad debate on the lab bids. The U.S. Department of Energy is expected to list its draft demands of potential lab managers in early summer, with a formal request for bids in late fall or early winter. Bidders will have only 45-60 days to apply.
The faculty vote capped decades of vacillation and debate over whether the largely classified job of inventing weapons of mass destruction is in keeping with university traditions of academic freedom and open dissemination of information.
"This very clear result is something which very few of us expected," said Regent Peter Preuss, chairman of a regent's committee overseeing the labs.
The clash of secret, military and open, academic cultures -- coupled with the Reagan administration pursuit of new nuclear arms and "Star Wars" missile defenses -- turned UC faculty sharply against operation of the weapons labs in 1990, when 64 percent voted against continued lab management.
But Bush administration policies calling for new and modified nuclear weapons designs and for contingency attack plans against rogue nations appeared to have figured very little in the electronic polling of UC faculty.
George Blumenthal, a UC-Santa
Cruz astrophysics professor who analyzed the polling results, said faculty favoring the bids saw the weapons labs mostly as opportunities for joint research and havens for high-quality, unclassified science.
Faculty were wary, however, of the shift toward weapons production at Los Alamos, which has inherited the tools, engineers and assignment to make plutonium fission cores or "pits" from the defunct Rocky Flats plant outside Boulder, Colo. Livermore also plans to start exploring robotic manufacturing for plutonium pits.
"An overwhelming majority of faculty are not in favor of UC overseeing manufacturing at these laboratories," Blumenthal told the regents.
Taking each lab separately, only 1 percent of faculty favored bidding for Los Alamos alone, and 9 percent wanted to bid for Livermore alone, though the Livermore-only vote was higher -- 13 percent -- among UC's northern campuses.
MIT cultural anthropologist Hugh Gusterson has studied UC and its weapons scientists for two books.
"In 1990, they were reacting against Reagan's nuclear policy and the end of the Cold War, and now they see the labs as this treasure trove that they get access to," Gusterson said.
The vote seemed to reflect both a new vision of the weapons labs as key players in the technological war on terrorism, as well as a common trend in research universities toward finding new sources of research funding, he said.
"Post-9/11, in the war on terror, people tend to value a lot more of the work done in these labs. But the primary motive seems to be UC researchers wanting access to funding and technology at the labs and access to collaboration," Gusterson said.
Faculty did suggest that UC, with its strong insistence on external peer review of science and technology at the labs, was better able to run them than private contractors and other universities that are eyeing lab bids.
But it was unclear to regents that UC as lab manager would have major influence over national nuclear policy calling for new weapons and testing.
"Do we have the chance to say that's a piece of this thing we don't want to do?" asked Regent Richard Blum, whose wife, Dianne Feinstein, has led Senate Democrats in opposition to the Bush administration's new weapons research.
"It is not the role of the national laboratories to make public policy," said UC vice president for lab management Robert Foley.
"On the other hand," said UC president Robert Dynes, "having a lot of experience and presence in this area, having a lot of knowledge, can put you in a position where your association with the labs puts you in a policy-making position."
Contact Ian Hoffman at ihoffman@angnewspapers.com .
-------- nevada
Nevada Nuclear tests might resume
By Joe Bauman and Lee Davidson
Deseret Morning News
Thursday, May 20, 2004
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,595064453,00.html
New projects planned for the Nevada Test Site are raising concern that nuclear bomb testing may resume there.
Local and national military watchdogs say all indications are that President Bush, if re-elected, would begin testing some types of nuclear weapons before the end of the decade at the NTS, located about 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas and upwind of Utah.
"You put all the pieces of the puzzle together," said Steve Erickson, director of the local Citizens Education Project, "and it leads to the conclusion that yes, we may very well be on the road to a resumption of nuclear testing."
Those concerns had Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, trying to amend the annual Defense Authorization Act this week to require clear permission from Congress before such testing could resume. The GOP-controlled Rules Committee blocked consideration of it.
"If this country is going to resume the testing of nuclear weapons, the people's representatives — the U.S. Congress — should be involved," Matheson complained Wednesday in a speech to the full House.
Often, during above-ground nuclear testing in the 1950s and early 1960s, radioactive fallout swept from the NTS into Utah and other regions. This contamination led to some cancer deaths and illness among downwind residents, said a later court ruling.
Although more-recent tests were conducted underground, sometimes accidental venting released radioactive material. All nuclear-explosion tests were halted in 1992.
Frank von Hippel, who teaches public and international affairs and works on nuclear weapons issues at Princeton, was a White House adviser on national security, concerned with science and technology policy, and was one of those responsible for arranging the present moratorium on nuclear testing.
He told the Deseret Morning News on Monday that a Defense Department official told him earlier this year that "based on the way he saw things going inside the administration, that if the Bush administration is re-elected that we would resume testing in 2007 or 2008."
The latest federal budget request calls for funding to improve the NTS so it could resume testing, if needed, in 18 months instead of the present 36 months. Also, researchers were working on new types of nuclear weapons that presumably would need testing before they could be added to the stockpile.
However, Linton F. Brooks, chief of the National Nuclear Security Administration, said in a March Senate hearing the administration had no plans to resume nuclear tests in the foreseeable future. Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, has indicated he might attempt to write that into law.
Democrats are also pushing an amendment to short-circuit nuclear work in Nevada by transferring $36.6 million for it toward improving conventional "bunker buster" capabilities. Matheson vowed to support that and to seek other opportunities to require congressional approval for any nuclear testing.
Von Hippel refused to name the Defense Department official but said he believes his informant was reflecting high-level opinion in the DOD. He added, "But I think this would be very controversial, and therefore I told him, 'We'll cut you off at the pass.' " That is, opponents would try to thwart new testing.
In another indication of action at the NTS, in April the U.S. Department of Energy released a proposed draft environmental assessment covering "activities using biological simulants and releases of chemicals" there.
It said that after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the government found a need "for more operational testing, contamination and decontamination testing, forensics testing, personal protective equipment (PPE) testing, enclosed environment detection and decontamination testing and counter-terrorism training as they relate to biological or chemical agents."
The NTS provides a remote, secure setting for such defensive testing, it added. Chemicals in low concentration and harmless biological simulants would be released on the NTS. About five to 20 test series per year would be carried out, and no more than two new employees would be required, it said.
However, defensive research against chemical and biological threats already is carried out on the Army's Dugway Proving Ground, located in the western Utah desert. In 2002, Dugway issued a proposal to substantially increase chemical and biological defenses and counterterrorism training.
Erickson said sometimes simulants can cause illness but that would be a minor problem, unless the exposed person was in compromised health. If simulants were used at the NTS, he does not think dangerous concentrations could reach Utah.
As far as Erickson is concerned, the larger concern is the test site's future.
"What's the public policy decision here?" he asked.
The possibility of resuming tests is "more than talk," he said. "They're funding preparations for it. No decision has been made to proceed with tests."
In addition to funding for nuclear testing, the Bush administration has requested funding to research and develop earth-penetrating nuclear bombs, he said. These bunker-busters are "what they call mini-nukes, or small-yield nuclear weapons."
As part of the newly proposed program, test site officials would like to place caches of simulants in tunnels and blow them up, he added. Instruments would be checked to see whether they could sniff out the underground simulants.
"One of the purposes of the robust nuclear earth penetrator, the bunker buster, is to dig its way down into the earth hundreds of feet before detonation of the nuclear warhead," Erickson said.
Such a weapon could be used to vaporize any chemical or biological weapon stored in an underground bunker, he added.
Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, based in Washington, D.C., said the Bush administration "has taken some steps that have eroded the legal and technical barriers to the resumption of testing."
The group is dedicated to controlling arms, and von Hippel has contributed to its Web site.
Kimball said a reason for thinking the Bush administration wants to resume testing is that it opposes ratification of the comprehensive test-ban treaty.
E-mail: bau@desnews.com
----
Proposed Nuke Railroad Divides Nev. Town
May 20, 2004
ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Nuclear-Railroad.html
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=Nuclear%20Railroad
CALIENTE, Nev. (AP) -- Mayor Kevin Phillips is a walking, talking version of his city's welcome sign -- ``Prepared for Your Business'' -- as he watches a freight train rumble past his hardware store on rails that may decide the community's future.
The U.S. Energy Department has proposed making this little Nevada town a crossroads for highly radioactive nuclear waste being transported to a dump carved out of the rock underneath Yucca Mountain. ``I want to face reality,'' Phillips said. ``It's going to happen. Here sitteth the Union Pacific Railroad. Here cometh the shipments.''
Under the Energy Department proposal, the government would build an $880 million, 319-mile rail spur that would branch off from the Union Pacific main line at Caliente and end at Yucca Mountain. Phillips also hopes a transfer station could be built nearby where radioactive waste casks could also be taken off rail cars and put onto trucks for the trip to the dump.
Caliente, population 1,184, is in a notch of the rugged Delamar Mountains, not far from the Utah state line. It is 275 miles to Salt Lake City and 150 miles to Las Vegas, but worlds away from those two growing cities of the West.
While the rest of Nevada saw a 50 percent boom in jobs from 1993 to 2003, Caliente and surrounding Lincoln County reported a sharp 33 percent decline in people working or looking for work.
A railroad to Yucca Mountain -- along with a rail maintenance center in Caliente -- might stem the exodus out of town and bring 100 construction jobs and about 60 permanent jobs, according to the Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
``I'm for jobs,'' the 53-year-old mayor said, ``because I know this can be done safely.''
The proposal, like the railroad tracks that run through town, has split the community.
Across the tracks from the town's hardware store, Dorothy Phillips, the mayor's 81-year-old aunt, acknowledged jobs are scarce, but dismissed assurances that nuclear material can be handled without risk.
Her father died of leukemia in 1963 at age 67. He used to scrub dust from trains that passed by the nearby Nevada Test Site after mushroom-cloud nuclear explosions. The family received $50,000 in ``downwinder'' government benefits after he died, she said.
``My sister died of brain cancer,'' Phillips said, recalling other Caliente families who lost three, four or more members to cancer. ``My brother, he was a brakeman on the trains. He died of cancer. I had cancer, but I survived.''
Steve Rowe -- Caliente's fire chief and hospital board chairman -- said the town's 25 volunteer firefighters would probably be trained to handle a radiological mishap, and some even might be hired full-time. The 20-bed Grover C. Dils Medical Center would be expanded, he said, maybe doubled, with a special wing for radiation injuries.
``If this goes through, we would have to get more money,'' he said.
Lincoln County covers an area larger than the state of Vermont, with 98 percent of the land owned by the federal government. Vast tracts are leased for ranching and grazing. With most mines closed and many railroad jobs lost to automation, the biggest employers are schools and government.
Caliente, the county's only city, shows some signs of growth along the Union Pacific tracks and U.S. Highway 93, the two-lane road that doubles as Front Street. A billboard across from the neat, white-spired Mormon church marks the future site of an industrial park.
The Energy Department hopes to open the Yucca Mountain repository 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas in 2010 and entomb 77,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel building up at reactors in 39 states. A department decision on transportation routes could be a couple of years away.
Polls show most Nevada residents oppose storing the nation's nuclear waste, and the state has six federal lawsuits pending against the project.
The rail route would loop north around the Test Site and the vast Nellis Air Force Base bombing range, avoiding Las Vegas casinos, 130,000 hotel rooms and 1.6 million residents.
``Would we want to have a radiological accident? No. But people can be trained to handle it,'' the Caliente mayor said.
Dorothy Phillips said she will never be convinced.
``The mayor's my nephew,'' she said. ``Even though I love him as a relative, I'm against him on this nuclear issue. He's shoving this down our throats.''
``I think we have to go down fighting,'' she added, ``or we're not true to our families and all we've lost.''
On the Net:
Yucca Mountain project: http://www.ymp.gov
Nuclear Regulatory Commission: http://www.nrc.gov
Nevada's Agency for Nuclear Projects: http://www.state.nv.us/nucwaste
-------- ohio
Republican Demands More NRC Safety Regulation
May 20, 2004
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/politics/politics-utilities-nuclear.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Republican head of a Senate panel warned U.S. nuclear regulators on Thursday that he would introduce legislation if they fail to shore up oversight gaps that led to severe corrosion at an Ohio nuclear plant.
Congress' investigative arm, the General Accounting Office, earlier this week criticized the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for failing to act quickly after spotting leaking boric acid that nearly chewed through the reactor at the plant owned by Akron, Ohio-based FirstEnergy Corp. .
Ohio Sen. George Voinovich, head of a Senate subcommittee on nuclear safety, asked NRC Chairman Nils Diaz to explain why the agency didn't do more to address safety standards at the 103 U.S. commercial nuclear plants it regulates.
Diaz called the incident at the Davis-Besse plant an ``unacceptable failure'' by the NRC and FirstEnergy. But imposing specific ``safety culture'' rules is the responsibility of plant owners, not the NRC, Diaz said.
``We do not believe that's the role of the commission,'' Diaz said at a hearing of the Senate subcommittee. FirstEnergy ``did not meet its own definition of safety culture,'' Diaz said.
Voinovich rebuked Diaz. ``If you won't do it, I'll get legislation passed to get it done,'' the senator said.
The General Accounting Office study found the NRC ``should have, but did not, identify or prevent the corrosion at Davis-Besse because its oversight did not generate accurate information on plant conditions.'' Other problems could occur because the NRC hasn't done enough to monitor safety, it said.
Leaking boric acid, used as a coolant, ate a cantaloupe-sized hole in the outer hull of the reactor in Oak Harbor, Ohio, about 35 miles east of Toledo.
No radiation was released into the air, but it was a serious safety violation. The NRC ordered the plant shut in early 2002.
FirstEnergy returned the plant to full power last month after it spent $600 million to repair the damage.
-------- washington
Nuclear-waste talks being held in private
By LISA STIFFLER
The Seattle Post Intelligencer
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/5018549/
May. 20 - The fate of thousands of truckloads of radioactive and hazardous waste potentially destined for Eastern Washington is being hashed out between state and federal regulators in closed-door discussions.
The U.S. Department of Energy wants to haul radioactive debris from nuclear-cleanup projects nationwide for permanent and temporary disposal at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. The action is needed, Energy Department authorities say, to finish other cleanup projects around the country.
Officials with Gov. Gary Locke's office and the Ecology Department are in discussions over the conditions of how existing and incoming waste will be handled and stored.
The talks have outraged a local watchdog group and prompted a letter from Rep. Jay Inslee, D-Wash., urging the state not to agree to take the waste.
"It would be a major mistake to allow the importation of nuclear waste ... in exchange for a simple affirmation that the (Energy Department) will comply with its existing legal obligations," Inslee wrote in a letter Tuesday addressed to Locke, his chief of staff, Tom Fitzsimmons, and the head of Ecology.
State and Energy Department officials say the talks are being mischaracterized.
We are "not in process of trying to make any sort of quid pro quo deal," Fitzsimmons said. Rather, the state is providing its input to the Energy Department on plans for importing waste.
"The suggestion that deals are being cut behind closed doors is just really not fair," he said.
"Addressing the concerns of the state of Washington and the state of Oregon is what we ought to be doing," said Colleen Clark, an Energy spokeswoman.
Up to 70,000 truckloads, or about 12.7 million cubic feet of waste, would be driven across the country. The debris includes items such as clothing, tools and soil contaminated with dangerous chemicals and long-lived radioactive material -- including plutonium -- known as transuranic waste.
Considering all of the dangerous waste already buried at Hanford, "they would more than double the amount of radioactive waste," said Gerald Pollet, executive director of Heart of America Northwest, a watchdog group.
But Ecology officials argue that a compromise is possible in which some waste does come to the site temporarily or for permanent burial with assurances of faster cleanup and the end of the use of unlined trenches that could allow dangerous materials to leak into the soil.
"We have never blocked the idea of shipments to Hanford," said Sheryl Hutchison, an Ecology spokeswoman. "We wanted to tie it to cleanup."
The talks are over the language of a record of decision being completed by the Energy Department. It is the final result of an environmental impact statement released in January.
Hutchison and Fitzsimmons said the public has had numerous opportunities to weigh in on the issue and that many actions that arise from the record of decision will be subject to further public comment.
The Washington Attorney General's Office hasn't taken a position on the talks, but David Mears, chief of the office's ecology division, said the Energy Department still needs to make the case that it's essential to the cleanup effort nationally that more waste comes to the former bombing-making site. The state and watchdog groups are still fighting the Energy Department in federal court over the importing of transuranic waste. For approximately four months beginning in December 2002, the Energy Department trucked this kind of waste into Hanford until stopping the shipments in March 2003, around the time the suits were filed. The sides disagree over whether the state has authority over the shipments.
Other types of waste are still being imported to Hanford.
Also at question is whether the talks could undermine Initiative 297, which would prohibit importing more waste until current waste storage is improved and brought into line with regulations. The measure, which will be on the November ballot, bans the use of unlined trenches, creates an advisory board to oversee waste issues and requires disclosure of waste budget information.
"It's clear to us that the Energy Department motivation here is to try to deflect I-297 or to have the state strike a deal and issue permits before I-297 takes effect," said Pollet, whose organization is a primary supporter of the initiative.
It's unclear whether the record of decision would trump the initiative should it pass.
Fitzsimmons said the concerns are moot.
"It isn't connected," he said. "The initiative is a separate process."
P-I reporter Lisa Stiffler can be reached at 206-448-8042 or lisastiffler@seattlepi.com
-------- united nations
Canadian UN envoy to aid nuke talks
May 20, 2004
(AP)
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/2004/05/18/464012-ap.html
UNITED NATIONS - UN envoy Maurice Strong arrived in North Korea on Tuesday to support six-country talks aimed at settling a standoff over Pyongyang's nuclear program as well as other problems on the divided Korean peninsula, a UN spokesman said.
The Canadian diplomat and businessman is scheduled to remain in North Korea until Saturday for meetings with government officials and will also discuss possible ways in which UN Secretary General Kofi Annan might help the talks as well as related humanitarian and economic issues, spokesman Fred Eckhard said.
Last week, the parties held low-level talks in Beijing aimed at resolving technical issues and helping create an agenda for a third round of high-level negotiations.
Two previous rounds of talks have failed to settle the standoff, which flared in October 2002 when the United States said North Korea admitted operating a secret nuclear program in violation of a 1994 agreement.
A key sticking point is the issue of uranium technology, which the U.S. claims the North uses in a second secret program. Pyongyang has said it has only one nuclear weapons program based on plutonium.
Washington has demanded that Pyongyang commit to giving up both projects as part of a comprehensive settlement - a condition North Korea rejects.
The six nation talks began last August and include North Korea, the United States, South Korea, Japan, China and Russia.
Strong told a panel at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in late January that North Korea is ready to make a deal but it won't abandon its nuclear-weapons program unless it gets significant security guarantees and long-term economic aid.
The North has accused the West of reneging on earlier promises of economic aid and says it fears possible invasion since anti-North rhetoric heated up in Washington with the election of the Bush administration.
Strong said that the United States and North Korea both have a sense that time is on their side - but that he thinks they are wrong and that "the crunch will come this year."
-------- us nuc waste
Plutonium Waste Fight Stalls Defense Bill
May 20, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Nuclear-Waste.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- A Bush administration plan to cover nearly 1 million gallons of highly radioactive sludge with grout has run into obstacles in the Senate, where Democrats say grout is for bathrooms, not leftovers from Cold War weapons.
Senate action on a defense bill stalled Thursday because of disagreement over the Energy Department's plan to leave the sludge in South Carolina, Washington and Idaho, with a protective coating over it.
``For most Americans grout is something they see in their bathrooms and not something used to deal with nuclear waste,'' said Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash. ``...I do not believe you can grout over it, put sand in a tank and say we've cleaned up the waste.''
The administration wanted to use the broad defense bill to change a 1982 law requiring that the wastes left from reprocessing plutonium for weapons be shipped to a central repository in Nevada.
The Energy Department contends the new administration plan would shorten by years the time it takes to clean up the wastes and save billions of dollars, while still protecting the environment.
Provisions in a defense bill would let the government reclassify the sludge in tanks in South Carolina so it could be treated as low-level waste. The bill also would allow the department to withhold cleanup funds for Energy Department facilities in Washington and Idaho until they also agree to keep the wastes.
An amendment by Cantwell to get the nuclear waste provision out of the defense bill was debated throughout the day Thursday, but a vote on it was delayed until Congress returns in June from a Memorial Day vacation.
``Who wants to save money by leaving nuclear waste in the ground?'' Cantwell asked.
But Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-S.C., who had the language inserted into the defense bill during a closed meeting, argued that South Carolina still will have final say in assuring that any cleanup meets state water regulations. He has argued some of the sludge should never have been viewed as high-level waste and that reclassifying it would save $16 billion and shorten cleaning of storage tanks at the government's Savannah River facility near Aiken, S.C., by 23 years.
That didn't satisfy the state's other senator.
``This is a highly dangerous procedure,'' complained Sen. Fritz Hollings, D-S.C., predicting environmental disaster hundreds of years from now if the waste is kept in the tanks and leaks into the nearby Savannah River.
There are 34 million gallons of waste in underground tanks at Savannah River, 53 million gallons in tanks at DOE's Hanford site near Richland, Wash., and 900,000 gallons in tanks at the INEEL facility in Idaho.
Energy Department officials argue that 1 percent of the tank waste -- residual sludge adhering to the bottom and sides of the tank -- would be extremely expensive to remove. So, they want to cover it with cement-like grout and keep it in place.
A federal judge in Idaho has ruled that would violate the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act. The provision in the defense bill would change the 1982 law and, according to Idaho and Washington officials, could jeopardize the Idaho court ruling.
The Energy Department maintains that by mixing the waste with grout the residual sludge would lose radioactive intensity and qualify as low-level waste.
-------- MILITARY
-------- arms
Orbital Flight Tests Supersonic Sea-Skimming Target Missile
"This critical test represents first the US flight of a solid-fuel ducted rocket ramjet."
spacedaily
May 20, 2004
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/missiles-04z.html
Orbital Sciences said Tuesday that it successfully flight-tested the GQM-163A "Coyote" Supersonic Sea-Skimming Target (SSST) system for the United States Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) on May 18, 2004.
The flight test, conducted at the Navy's missile test range in southern California, is part of a series of flights Orbital will conduct under the company's SSST Engineering and Manufacturing Development (EMD) contract from NAVAIR.
Orbital was awarded the EMD contract in 2000 to meet the Navy's requirement for an affordable SSST to simulate supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles for fleet training and weapon systems research, development, test and evaluation.
The GQM-163A Coyote target missile design integrates a four-inlet, solid-fuel ducted rocket ramjet propulsion system into a compact missile airframe 18 feet long and 14 inches in diameter.
Ramjet supersonic takeover speed is achieved using a decommissioned Navy MK 70 solid rocket motor for the first stage. Rail-launched from Navy test and training ranges, the highly maneuverable GQM-163A Coyote achieves cruise speeds of Mach 2.5+ following the separation of the MK 70 first-stage booster. The range of the target vehicle system is approximately 50 nautical miles at altitudes of less than 20 feet above the sea surface.
The flight test of the GQM-163A Coyote had several primary objectives, all of which were achieved. They included verification of booster ignition and stable first stage flight; the verification of the transition of the ducted rocket ramjet from booster separation to inlet start; and the verification of the ducted rocket ramjet ignition and powered flight performance.
In addition, the test target missile was heavily instrumented in order to collect flight environment data to refine aerodynamic and guidance models in preparation for follow-on guided flight tests to be carried out later this year.
Mr. Ron Grabe, Orbital's Executive Vice President and General Manager of its Launch Systems Group, said, "We are extremely pleased with the results of this flight test of the GQM-163A Coyote. The test results provide our team with valuable data as we prepare for other flights later this year and progress toward the delivery of production units in late 2004."
The GQM-163A Coyote flight test represented a significant milestone for the American aerospace industry: the first successful U.S. flight of solid-fuel ducted rocket ramjet. It also was the first successful flight test of a new domestic ramjet missile configuration in over ten years.
Orbital is the only U.S. Department of Defense prime contractor to be both developing and operating ramjet-powered missile systems. In addition to developing the GQM-163A Coyote, Orbital provides the Navy with launch services for the MQM-8 VANDAL SSST. The MQM-8 VANDAL is based on the liquid-fuel ramjet-powered Talos missile and provides the Navy with a legacy SSST until the more capable GQM-163A Coyote is operational.
Orbital is developing and manufacturing the GQM-163A Coyote at its launch vehicle engineering and production facility in Chandler, Arizona. Orbital's major subcontractors include Aerojet Corporation in Gainesville, Virginia and Sacramento, California for the solid-fuel ducted rocket motor and Cei in Sacramento, California for the vehicle's avionics system.
--------
DISARMAMENT
To Get Weapons Away From Iraqis, the Army Sets Up an Arms Bazaar
May 20, 2004
By CHRISTINE HAUSER
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/20/international/middleeast/20WEAP.html
BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 19 - In the year since Saddam Hussein was overthrown, American-led troops have used a wide range of force to combat insurgents opposed to the military occupation. This week the army tried a new approach to silence Iraqi guns:
Buy them.
In their first program of its kind in Baghdad, American troops engaged in a weapons buyback program. It began on Saturday and was so popular that it was extended for another two days.
By Tuesday night hundreds of Iraqis had been paid $761,357 for 56,536 items, from bullets to assault rifles to mortars and rocket-propelled grenade launchers, according to the military. The soldiers set up well-guarded sales tables at three locations - a field, a cigarette factory and a soccer stadium surrounded by an empty lot.
"This is probably the only place in Baghdad where they can walk up with an R.P.G. launcher and not have a coalition soldier shoot at them," said Col. Robert Abrams, commander of the troops carrying out the program on a dusty lot outside Baghdad.
"We are trying to get as many weapons as possible out of their hands and into ours," said Capt. Bill Williams.
Around him, soldiers wandered among hundreds of AK-47 assault rifles piled up in the old soccer stadium, just outside of the slum of Sadr City, one of Baghdad's worst areas of fighting between insurgents and American forces.
Iraqi forces formed the first line of defense at the stadium, forcing men into line and making sure that the weapons were not loaded before their owners were allowed past the barbed wire to wait their turn.
Inside the walled stadium, American soldiers sat behind portable tables.
Iraqis carried their rifles in old sugar and rice sacks. One little boy carried a plastic bag full of bullets. Another clutched a handful of explosives primers. "Scrap," an American soldier said after he examined those, and flung them into a garbage heap.
An Iraqi man was shown to an American soldier seated behind the grenades table.
"One grenade," said the man.
"Just one grenade?" said the soldier incredulously.
The man handed it over and received a voucher for $20.
The Americans had to draft their price list based on what the Iraqi police had told them were above the black-market rates.
"It's not like you can go to WalMart and find out what the prices are," Captain Williams said.
A Strella antiaircraft missile, complete with a launcher and sights, earned $500. AK-47's, the weapon of choice in Iraq, sold for $200 the first few days, but by Tuesday the price was down to $125 to narrow the margin above the black-market price.
But rocket-propelled grenade launchers that sold for $160 in the first few days rose to $220 by Tuesday at the Sadr City cigarette factory because the Americans found that Iraqis were not interested enough to sell them at the lower price.
In addition to the economy of supply and demand, prices were negotiable in the true spirit of Middle Eastern market bargaining.
A man named Ali was not satisfied with the price of $160 quoted by Sgt. First Class John Westcott for his brand new Russian RPK machine gun.
"This is new!" he said, peeling back the wrapping further on the weapon, which was shiny with oil. "I want $200 for it."
Sergeant Westcott reflected. "O.K.," he said. "Bump up the RPK to $200!"
Ali walked away a satisfied man, pocketing $600 for his two AK-47's and his RPK, and $75 for an old BKC machine gun that if it had not been broken and rusty would have earned him $500.
"I have two kids," said Ali, a 38-year-old satellite engineer. "It would take me four months to earn this."
The weapons program highlighted the type of conflict the American forces are fighting in Baghdad and other cities. Claylike rolls of PE-4A explosive were turned in for $40 each. Insurgents pack Pepsi cans with the explosive to booby trap convoys, soldiers said.
There were tank-mounted machine guns that could be fired from cars. Mortars suggested a hit-and-run force.
"They pretty much fight urban guerrilla tactics with any weapons they have," said First Sgt. Corey Sanders at the Sadr City cigarette factory program. "They'll put the mortar system in the trunk of a car."
Many Iraqis would not give their names to a reporter, because they were afraid of retaliation from militias. Some men sent the women of their household or their children to turn in the weapons because they feared arrest.
After the Iraqis received their vouchers and stood on another line to be paid, they complained about the prices.
"This mortar is a heavy weapon," said Karim Abdel-Selim, a middle-aged man in the payment line. "It is worth twice as much as the $200 I am getting for it. But there are many more where it came from."
A little girl approached an American soldier, asking for more than the $20 she had gotten for ammunition rounds. "Just write in another $5 on the voucher," an Iraqi bystander urged her.
Iraqi men are allowed to keep one weapon each. Pistols are not allowed, because they are easily concealed, but one AK-47 is permissible for household security.
Some Iraqi men said that with the money they had made they could go out and buy more weapons from the black market.
"We sell them the old ones and buy new ones on the black market," said Ali Mohsin. "I sold one AK-47 that I did not need, but what I am really good at is firing a rocket-propelled grenade launcher."
--------
Czech Republic backs down on radar sale to China
PRAGUE (AFP)
May 20, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040520165952.2472vi23.html
The Czech Republic on Thursday withdrew authorization for a deal to sell Czech radars capable of detecting stealth aircraft to China.
Prime Minister Vladimir Spidla told CTK Czech news agency that it was not in his country's interests to conclude the sale.
The decision was taken on Wednesday in a closed-door ministerial session, and ministries were ordered to revoke the export license needed for the sale.
The company Omnipol was granted the export license in January by the ministry of industry and trade.
The move comes days after a press report here said the United States was ready to bid on the Vera radar system in order to keep it from falling in the hands of the Chinese.
The radar system is an updated version of the Tamar system which was reportedly used by Serb forces to shoot down a US F-117A stealth fighter in March 1999.
Czech media say Washington has repeatedly expressed its concern over the granting of a Czech export license for the Chinese deal, said to be worth about 1.5 billion korunas (47 million euros, 56 million dollars).
The sale was also criticized by some Czech parties, in particular the Freedom Union (US-DEU), a member of the ruling coalition.
A government spokeswoman questioned by AFP declined to comment on the matter on Thursday
--------
Who really smuggled weapons to Rafah?
The Electronic Intifada,
Arjan El Fassed,
20 May 2004
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article2721.shtml
Israel's ongoing assault on human lives and property, killing civilians and demolishing homes is, according to Israeli spokespersons, "aimed at preventing a huge shipment of arms from being smuggled". According to Israeli spokespersons, Israel launched "Operation Rainbow", its largest military raid on Palestinian civilians since "Operation Defensive Shield", in a bid "to rid the border zone of its tunnels and capture the militants using them."
The past four days, Israeli forces have killed 39 Palestinians. Its military assault on Palestinians in Rafah includes extensive house demolitions along the so-called "Philadelphi route" that runs along the border.
Original caption (19 May 2004, 11:20 AM ET): "An Israeli Apache helicopter fires a missile towards the Gaza Strip refugee camp of Rafah. The United States is 'very concerned' about the number of Palestinians killed in Israel's major military raid in the Gaza Strip and has sought answers from Israel, the White House said. (AFP/Yoav Lemmer) What no one asks, however, is the question who supplies Israel's military occupation of Gaza, a strip of land, slightly more than twice the size of Washington DC, housing at least 1.2 million Palestinians and 6,000 Israeli settlers. It is not hard to guess that the U.S. administration is the largest supplier of arms and aid to Israel. The common figure given for U.S. aid to Israel is $3 billion per year-$1.2 billion in economic aid and $1.8 billion in military aid, representing about one-sixth of total U.S. foreign aid. Israel is one of the U.S.' largest arms importers.
In the last decade, the U.S. has sold Israel $ 7.2 billion in weaponry and military equipment, $762 million through Direct Commercial Sales (DCS), more than $6.5 billion through the Foreign Military Financing (FMF) program. In fact, Israel is so devoted to U.S. military hardware that it has the world's largest fleet of F-16s outside the U.S., currently possessing more than 200 jets. The U.S. also gives Israel weapons and ammunition as part of the Excess Defense Articles (EDA) program, providing these articles completely free of charge. Examples of U.S. weaponry being used by the Israeli army against Palestinian civilians and their property are AH-64 Apache and Cobra attack helicopters, missiles and other heavy arms. White House spokesman Scott McClellan called the Israel's assault on Rafah "troubling" and said: "The Israelis have told us they will make every effort to minimize the impact on Palestinians not involved in acts of terrorism or arms smuggling." While he had learned that U.S. delivered Apache helicopters fired missiles in a peaceful demonstration, he said: "We understand their explanation but we still find the violence troubling."
Israel not only uses arms transferred from the U.S., despite restrictive policies on arms exports to states that violate human rights, Israel also uses arms being transferred and exported from the EU.
A week ago, on May 14, Amnesty International reported that EU arms, security equipment and services are contributing to grave human rights abuses and that the scale of potential abuse is now enormous. The major EU arms exporting countries - France, Germany, Italy, Sweden and the United Kingdom - account for one third of the world's arms deals. In its report, Undermining Global Security: the European Union's arms exports, Amnesty International highlights serious flaws in the European Union's key arms control agreements, especially the 1998 EU Code of Conduct on Arms Exports.
France
Today France is one of Israel's main suppliers after the US and Germany. According to SIPRI, France exported major conventional weapons worth $50m to Israel between 1996 and 2000. This included a delivery of seven AS-565SA Panther helicopters between 1996 and 1998 which were ordered through and partly funded by the US.
Germany
According to figures from SIPRI, Germany supplied Israel with major conventional weaponry worth $765m between 1996 and 2000. In 2000 alone, the last year for which figures are available, Germany sold about $170m in military equipment, including parts for tanks and armoured cars. This included key parts for the Israeli Merkava tank, which are currently being used in Rafah. Israel is Germany's seventh largest military client.
Ireland
The US Data Device Corporation (DDC), which has production facilities in Cork, Ireland (DDC Ireland Ltd) states on its website that its MIL-STD-1553 Data Bus products are used in the AH-64 Apache Attack Helicopters. Its MIL-STD-1553 data bus, the life line of the aircraft, include a lethal array of armaments, including a mix of up to 16 Hellfire missiles or 76 70mm aerial rockets and 1,200 rounds of 30mm ammunition for its M230 Chain Gun automatic canon.
The Netherlands
A large part of Dutch exports are components for incorporation into larger weapon systems, mainly to be assembled in the U.S. which, in turn, is the major supplier of arms to Israel. In compensation orders Dutch companies are involved producing components for Apache attack helicopters and F-16 fighter planes to the U.S.. In general is not announced who the end-user of these aircrafts will be. In 2001 transfers of components were worth EURO 87 million. The Dutch company Stork Special Products produces components for Hellfire rockets, which are frequently used by the Israeli airforce in extra-judicial executions and to shell Palestinian residential areas. The missile is produced by Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman and a number of subcontractors and exported to thirteen countries, including Israel.
At least one Dutch company is open about the end-user of its products, on its ethical policy page: "In principle, Philips companies do not produce products or render services specially designed or developed for the military, except for the following products: F16 parts and Apache parts supplied to NATO countries and Israel (under compensation agreements US/Netherlands)." Eventhough information on end-users remains largely secret, Philips announced that its components are incorporated into Apaches that are in action in Israel. Additionally, in 2002 the Netherlands granted Israel export licences worth 1.46 million euros, approximately half of the licensed Dutch transit trade. The licences were granted for goods under the category A2, which are those connected with armoured vehicles. This is despite the consistent reporting by human rights organisations of the misuse of such equipment by the Israeli security forces. Since 22 August 2002, the Dutch Central Service Import and Export received 24 "notifications" to transit small arms and light weapons from Israeli Airways for shipments originating in the United States with destination Israel.
The United Kingdom
The UK has sold Israel equipment and components for tanks, combat aircraft, combat helicopters, missiles, ammunition, mines, machine guns, tear gas, and electronic equipment for military use. UK companies with known connections with Israel include: the Airtechnology Group, which supplies parts to IMI for the Merkava tank, BAE Systems, which has provided head-up displays for US-built F16s214 and whose subsidiary Rokar International is the current sole-source supplier of counter-measure dispensing systems for the Israeli airforce, and Smiths Group which has supplied missile triggering systems for Apache helicopters.
Israeli Merkava tanks had been equipped with a cooling system made by the Surrey-based Airtechnology Group, and UK components, including missile trigger systems made by Smiths Group, are used in US-made Apache helicopters supplied to Israel, both in action killing and injuring Palestinian civilians in Rafah.
In March 2002, Junior UK Foreign Office Minister, Ben Bradshaw, disclosed that the Israeli armed forces had modified UK Centurion tanks, exported between 1958 and 1970, and were using them as armoured personnel carriers. He stated that this contradicted a written assurance from the Israeli government on 29 November 2000 that "no UK-originated equipment nor any UK-originated systems/ sub systems /components are used as part of the defence force's activities in the territories". The UK government has continued to supply arms and equipment to the Israeli security forces. Such transfers continue despite reports that generic types of such equipment have been used by the Israeli security forces in Rafah to commit human rights violations and breaches of international humanitarian law.
The European Union: What Code of Conduct?
The situation in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories should be foremost on the minds of European officials when they carry out their reviews of the EU Code of Conduct for Arms Exports. The code was adopted in 1998 with the aim of "setting high common standards" over arms exports. Criteria include respect of human rights in the country of final destination; in particular, member states will "not issue an export license if there is a clear risk that the proposed export might be used for internal repression", including, inter alia, torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment, summary or arbitrary executions, arbitrary detentions and other major violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms as set out in relevant international human rights instruments.
Human rights organisations and various bodies of the United Nations have documented such major violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the case of Israel. Other criteria include the existence of tensions or armed conflicts, and whether there is a clear risk that the intended recipient would use the proposed export aggressively against another country or to assert by force a territorial claim. Political and military experts can provide the necessary assessment that, indeed, Israel would fail the test on this item. Moreover, an assessment includes "the behavior of the buyer country with regard to the international community", in particular with regard to respect for international law, "its compliance with its international commitments, in particular the non-use of force, including under international humanitarian law applicable to international and non-international conflicts".
The world has seen and condemned Israel's human rights record. The transfer of arms to Israel is inconsistent with the criteria provided in the EU Code of Conduct. Export licenses should therefore be refused. Taking into account the volume and gravity of human rights violations and breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention, including acts of war crimes, that have been documented by various human rights organisations and United Nations bodies, and the volume of Israeli forces and military equipment stationed in the occupied Palestinian territories, and since there is no common system of monitoring the end-use of European arms by the Israeli forces in the Palestinian territories, only a full arms embargo will prevent European arms from being used to commit war crimes and other human rights abuses. The European Union, therefore, should renew its arms embargo against Israel, which it lifted in 1994.
-------- asia
Japan passes laws spelling out how to cope with military attack
TOKYO (AFP)
May 20, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040520103805.tz2gm9wv.html
Japan's lower house of parliament on Thursday passed seven bills spelling out how the country and US forces stationed here would cope with a military attack or major terrorist strike on the nation.
The bills, which supplement contingency laws passed last year providing a clear legal basis for military mobilization, were voted through the lower house of the Diet and now await rubberstamping by Japan's upper house.
If Japan were to be attacked, one of the bills would allow US forces to use privately-held lands or buildings for their activities with the authorization of a Japanese prime minister.
"It is to help the US military operate smoothly in the event of a military attack against Japan," said the official for the Cabinet Office.
Some 47,000 US troops are stationed in Japan under a Japan-US security alliance.
The bill also allows the US and Japanese armed forces to share supplies including water, food and ammunition, in case of a military attack, the official said.
Apart from cooperation with the US military, the seven bills also cover treatment of prisoners of war, extend the Japanese navy's powers to inspect ships in its territorial waters, and deal with the government's handling of terrorist attacks.
If Japan faced "a large-scale terrorist attack," the cabinet could decide on how to deal with the threat and then retroactively obtain parliament's authorization for its methods within 20 days, the official said.
Following the passage by the lower house, the bills were sent immediately to the upper house and are expected to be enacted by early June.
Japan's contingency laws, enacted in June last year, established for the first time the legal framework under which the government can mobilize Japan's armed forces and the powers the military would have in an emergency to requisition land and other property including private vehicles, fuel and food.
They also outline the responsibilities of central government and its power to order local governments in wartime, and expand the size and scope of the Security Council headed by the prime minister in national emergencies.
Although Japan's post-war constitution renounces war in settling international disputes, it has long been generally accepted that Japan retains the right to self-defence.
-------- biological weapons
Senate Approves Bioterror Provisions
Billions Allotted for Medical Measures
By Helen Dewar and Justin Gillis
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A27
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41230-2004May19.html
The Senate yesterday unanimously approved a $5.6 billion, 10-year program to speed development and stockpiling of vaccines, antidotes and other medical measures to help protect the United States from the consequences of a bioterrorist attack.
The House approved a similar "Project BioShield" bill last year and plans to accept minor changes made by the Senate, putting the legislation on track for final passage later this week or in early June, House leadership aides said.
Although Congress has approved other bioterrorism initiatives, none is as ambitious in its investment in countermeasures to protect the nation from a threat that lawmakers have experienced in the form of letters to their offices that were laced with anthrax and ricin.
The legislation, approved 99 to 0, provides $5.6 billion over the next decade, including $885 million appropriated for this year, for purchase and stockpiling of new vaccines, medicines and diagnostic devices for which a commercial market does not now exist.
The government will guarantee purchase of these products, providing an incentive for private companies to invest the capital needed to develop them.
Among the threats covered by the bill are anthrax, smallpox, botulism, plague and Ebola virus, along with radiation generated by a nuclear device or "dirty bomb."
The bill also seeks to streamline and speed research on defenses against bioterrorism by giving the National Institutes of Health new flexibility in funding its projects, including expedited peer reviews in awarding of grants and faster hiring of technical experts. and greater latitude in procurement of supplies.
In the case of a health emergency, it would allow the government to use vaccines, treatments and products that have not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Patients would have to be informed that no government approval has been given, along with potential risks and benefits. Patients would have the right to refuse treatment.
The legislation -- proposed by President Bush in his 2003 State of the Union address -- is needed because the country is "less than adequately prepared" to protect itself from bioterrorist attack, Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) told the Senate as it prepared to vote.
Frist recalled that letters containing anthrax spores were received in congressional offices in 2001 and that ricin, a deadly poison, turned up in the mailroom of his office this February. "Bioterror is here. It's on our own soil, hit this nation, hit this Capitol, hit the entire East Coast, and indeed it was deadly," he said.
In a measure of the strong bipartisan support for the bill, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), who worked with Frist and Judd Gregg (R-N.H.) in drafting the legislation, described the bill as "a major step toward giving the nation's health care professionals the support they need to respond to attacks with biological, chemical or nuclear weapons." But he said it must be followed by more funding for hospitals, health agencies and homeland security.
Senate passage of the measure was greeted enthusiastically by the biomedical industry. "Project BioShield is a critical first step toward the development of the drugs and vaccines needed to protect our nation's citizens and military personnel," said Carl B. Feldbaum, president of the Biotechnology Industry Organization.
The Senate vote ignited a minor rally in the shares of companies seen as likely to benefit from the bill. Some of these companies have been working since shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to develop defenses against biological agents and radiation, but they have struggled to convince investors there is likely to be a sustained market for the products. The Senate's action made that seem more likely. For instance, shares of Hollis-Eden Pharmaceuticals Inc. rose 32 percent to close at $10.40 in heavy trading yesterday. The San Diego firm is testing a radiation drug that it hopes to sell to the government under Project BioShield.
-------- business
Boeing Chief Says Tanker Lease Plan Is Still Alive
May 20, 2004
By LESLIE WAYNE
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/20/business/20boeing.html
The Boeing Company's chief executive, Harry C. Stonecipher, said yesterday that the $20 billion deal with the Air Force to lease 767's for use as aerial refueling tankers "is not dead" and that the Air Force remains committed to the proposal. "We are trying to get ready to supply a tanker to them," Mr. Stonecipher said at a New York conference for analysts and investors that was closed to the media except through a Web broadcast. "The customer has not changed its mind one iota about the 767 tanker program."
Still, Mr. Stonecipher made a few concessions to the controversy surrounding the deal, saying, for instance, that "the moment that the customer says, 'Hey Boeing, we're not interested,' we will quit."
He also took aim at the criticism that the tanker proposal has received in Washington, where Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican, has called it a "Boeing bailout" at taxpayer expense.
"This is politics at its finest form," Mr. Stonecipher said.
At the moment, a decision on the tanker deal is before Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. "We're waiting on him," Mr. Stonecipher said, adding that a delay in a decision has already cost Boeing business with the Australian government, which recently bought aerial tankers from rival Airbus instead.
Boeing shares gained 1.3 percent yesterday, closing at $43.38.
Mr. Stonecipher's comments came as yet another in a series of studies that Mr. Rumsfeld had ordered on the tanker lease program was reported yesterday in The Washington Post. In that study, the National Defense University, a military education center at Fort McNair in Washington, found that the Air Force bypassed the normal competitive process for acquisitions in negotiating the tanker deal with Boeing.
However, the study did advocate an immediate modernization of the tanker fleet, now 40 years old.
Other government reports circulating in Washington, some requested by Congress and some by the Pentagon, have portrayed the proposed tanker-lease arrangement, under which the Air Force would lease up to 100 Boeing 767's, as being more costly than buying the airplanes. Still others have questioned the need for the 767's at all, saying that existing tankers could be overhauled or that there are other alternatives to acquiring new Boeing planes, whether through lease or purchase.
At the conference yesterday, Mr. Stonecipher also addressed the ethics problems Boeing was facing in Washington.
He said he had expected that a suspension imposed on Boeing by the Air Force that bars the company from bidding on military rocket launches, valued at $1 billion, would have been lifted by now.
The suspension was imposed after the Air Force found that Boeing had violated federal law by stealing more than 25,000 documents from the Lockheed Martin Corporation as the two companies competed for a rocket launch contract in 1998.
According to Mr. Stonecipher, the lifting of the suspension has been delayed by an investigation, led by the United States attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, into conflicts of interest of a former Boeing employee involved in the tanker deal.
The former employee, Darleen A. Druyun, recently pleaded guilty to conspiracy for meeting with a Boeing executive and negotiating a job with Boeing while she was still an Air Force official, overseeing the tanker deal. That episode initiated a chain of events resulting in the firing of Boeing's chief financial officer, Michael M. Sears, and the resignation of its chief executive, Philip M. Condit.
Mr. Stonecipher, who had been Boeing's president, came out of retirement in December to fill in after Mr. Condit resigned.
"This company is committed to the highest standards of integrity," Mr. Stonecipher said. "Can you imagine how our people feel" about the continued reports of Boeing wrongdoing.
Mr. Stonecipher also touched on other topics at yesterday's conference. He said he wanted to "raise the rhetoric" on European government subsidies given to Airbus. And he said that candidates to succeed him had been identified to the Boeing board.
"I am not going to work one day longer than I have to," he said.
--------
Iraq War Strains U.S. Business
Titan Corp. Struggles With Military's Need For Arabic Translation
By Renae Merle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page E01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A41155-2004May19?language=printer
It should have been a simple $10 million contract for Titan Corp. Recruiting translators for the military hardly rivals the complicated, and sometimes classified, software and engineering problems the company usually tackles for the Pentagon.
But that was before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the war in Iraq created an unrelenting military demand for Arabic speakers. The low-tech specialty is now San Diego-based Titan's largest source of revenue and one of its most difficult management challenges.
It was not an easy transition. Titan has been forced to choose between taxi drivers, medical students and accountants for interpreters, according to competitors and industry groups. They say many of Titan's interpreters have fallen below professional standards.
Titan officials declined requests for an interview for this article and have refused to discuss the contract in detail, but a company spokesman said its translators are qualified. "We hire translators who are professionally competent in the language or dialect that we're looking to work in Iraq or Afghanistan at assignments that are established by the military which address a wide variety of needs," said Wil Williams, a company spokesman. Williams has said the company confirms applicants' abilities with written and oral tests.
Titan has 4,200 translators around the world, according to Army Intelligence and Security Command.
In recent weeks, as a result of its translation contracts, Titan has become part of the scandal of Iraqi detainees being abused at a prison outside Baghdad. At least one Titan interpreter at the prison, Adel Nakhla, has been identified as a suspect, and John Israel, who works for a Titan subcontractor, has been accused of lying to Army investigators.
Titan was founded in 1981 during the Reagan administration defense buildup. The increase in defense spending encouraged the company's founders -- including a nuclear engineer, physicist and astrophysicist -- to follow a new model of defense companies that do not make weapons. Titan focused on such things as getting different weapons to communicate, developing software for the military, and information technology. One of its first contracts was work on a communications system for Minuteman missiles.
In the early 1990s, Titan decided to adapt its military technology to the commercial market, and it set up an international communications business. But as the economy began to deteriorate after the tech bubble burst, Titan turned its focus back to the defense sector. Since 2000, it has made 10 defense-related acquisitions. In 2002, the firm took a $218.1 million charge to discontinue its commercial operations and reorganized to concentrate on national-security-related contracts.
Now, 99 percent of Titan's revenue is from government contracts.
One of the company's most significant acquisitions was the 2001 purchase of Reston-based BTG Inc., another systems integration company that specialized in information collection and analysis and network design. BTG's $10 million contract to supply translators to the Army "was barely considered" when negotiating the deal, said Jon B. Kutler, chief executive of Quarterdeck Investment Partners LLC, which represented BTG in the deal.
But the contract was modified to keep up with the growing demand for translators after the 9/11 attacks and the war in Iraq. It is now capped at $657 million.
Hiring for the contract has not been easy, sources close to the company said. Arabic is not widely taught in public schools and until recently wasn't a popular language at colleges or military training centers, said an industry official familiar with the contract. That meant Titan had to hire from the limited pool of native speakers and even then had to discern which spoke the right dialects, the official said.
In April, Titan held an open house in Arlington to recruit Arab speakers at a salary of $70,000 to $107,000 a year, plus a bonus for every six months of service, according to a listing on the Monster.com Web site. On RecruitMilitary.com the firm posted a position for an "NSA Crisis Arab Linguist" who would be responsible for quality control on Arabic translations and transcriptions.
Complicating Titan's task is the fact that its competitors were also trying to hire more interpreters. For example, the staff of Worldwide Language Resources Inc., based in Andover, Maine, grew from fewer than 50 translators before the 9/11 attacks to more than 500 now, including 200 to 250 in Iraq and Afghanistan.
With its thousands of translators, Titan developed a reputation as a wholesaler in the translation business, where boutique firms have reigned for years, according to its competitors. Titan's primarily requirement for a translator is that the applicant be fluent in certain languages. That upset industry officials who spent years lobbying the Labor Department to include translation among the recognized professions. "It takes years of training and experience to be able to [do this] well. It's not just being able to speak two languages," said Kevin Hendzel, spokesman for the American Translation Association.
ASET International Services Corp. often spends 30 to 60 days evaluating an applicant, said Hendzel, the company's chief operating officer. "The question is not just whether the person knows Arabic," he said.
ASET provides Arabic speakers to the military but has shied away from responding to the military's need for translators in Iraq, Hendzel said. The effort is "pre-doomed for failure because there are not enough qualified, trained linguists to do the job," he said.
But in Iraq, the military may not necessarily need translators with a technical background. Instead it needs those who can help soldiers communicate with the general population, said an industry source familiar with the contract. Those performing sensitive duties have the needed security clearances and the technical know-how to perform those jobs, that source said.
In the company's 2003 annual report, the only reference to the contract is an acknowledgement that it accounted for 7 percent of its $1.8 billion in revenue.
A Titan translator stationed in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, was charged last year with mishandling sensitive information and making false statements to federal officials. The Pentagon later acknowledged to Congress that some translators were brought in without complete evaluations. "In our rush to meet the requirements, the more numerical requirements, I think folks were brought on based on those initial checks [by the contractor] and then the more detailed checks followed as time permitted," Charles S. Abell, the Pentagon's principal deputy undersecretary for personnel and readiness, told a committee.
A Pentagon spokesman said Abell was not available for comment on whether the Guantanamo Bay case had been resolved. In a written statement, the Army Intelligence and Security Command said Titan translators are required to undergo background screening but not to have security clearances. Some have interim clearances based on "minimum investigative requirements," the agency said.
In Iraq, the company's hiring of local translators occasionally raised concerns, said Jason Ayres, who worked as a site manager for Titan last year. "The majority are pretty good" but the military sometimes questioned whether a few had ulterior motives and were putting soldiers in danger, he said.
Titan is in the process of being acquired by Lockheed Martin Corp., the Pentagon's largest contractor, but the acquisition has been delayed pending the outcome of an unrelated Justice Department investigation.
Titan's income for the first quarter was $3.1 million, compared with $7 million for the first quarter of 2003. The reduction in earning reflected merger-related costs, legal costs and money set aside for potential liabilities related to the government inquiry.
Meanwhile, the Army Intelligence contract is back up for bids and has attracted interest from much of the defense contracting industry, including Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman Corp. and L-3 Communications Holdings Inc., as well as niche players such as McNeil Technologies Inc. Proposals are due Friday, and the five-year contract is expected to be awarded shortly afterward.
--------
United Industrial Training Soldiers To Use Raven UAV System
spacedaily
May 20, 2004
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/uav-04zb.html
United Industrial Corporation announced Tuesday that its wholly-owned subsidiary AAI Corporation, a leading manufacturer and provider of support services for unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) systems, has been selected to train U.S. Army soldiers in the operation of the service's new Raven UAV system.
Valued at approximately $3 million, the contract provides in-theatre training for the small UAV systems to be operated by deployed U.S. Army soldiers. AAI will deliver a series of 10-day "school house" training courses. The training unit will be staffed by 11 instructors and support personnel.
AAI currently provides an array of in-theatre support services, including training and forward-based logistics, for the U.S. Army's RQ-7A Shadow Tactical Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (TUAV) systems, which the company manufactures.
Raven UAVs, manufactured by AeroVironment Inc., are small, hand-launched unmanned aerial vehicles.
The Raven contract expands AAI's role of providing training and logistics support services to the U.S. Army in support of deployed UAV systems.
AAI's Shadow TUAV is the U.S. Army's front-line, unmanned surveillance and reconnaissance system. Shadow systems in service with forces in Operation Iraqi Freedom have flown more than 1,400 sorties and over 5,000 flight hours. Additional Shadow systems are deployed elsewhere for intelligence-gathering support of U.S. Army forces.
-------- chemical weapons
Senate OKs $5.6B for Chemical Defense
By JESSE J. HOLLAND
Associated Press Writer
May 20, 2004
http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/B/BIOSHIELD?SITE=SCCOL&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The discovery of sarin gas in Iraq and the use of anthrax and ricin against Congress spurred the Senate Wednesday to approve $5.6 billion to help prepare for possible germ or chemical attacks on American soil.
The Senate, on a 99-0 vote, approved "Project BioShield" legislation to pay for research, production and stockpiling of vaccines and antidotes for bioterror agents. The House already has approved the legislation, and lawmakers on both sides say they hope to soon have it to President Bush for his signature.
Bush commended the Senate for passing the legislation. "BioShield will speed the development of new vaccines and treatments that would help prevent harm to Americans in a terrorist attack," the president said in a statement.
Lawmakers are moving quickly on the legislation because America is not prepared for a major bioterror attack, said Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn. The sarin gas discovered in a roadside bomb Monday in Iraq, and the ricin and anthrax attacks on the Capitol complex "demonstrated that bioterror is here," said Frist, whose office was mailed a letter containing ricin last fall. "It's on our own soil, it's hit this nation, hit this Capitol, hit the entire East Coast, and indeed it was deadly."
The legislation, covering the next 10 years, would provide incentives to the pharmaceutical industry to research and develop bioterrorism countermeasures, accelerate the approval process for antidotes and, in an emergency, allow the government to distribute certain treatments before the Food and Drug Administration approved them.
"The bill before the Senate guarantees that any company which develops a successful new product for these threats will find a willing buyer in the federal government," said Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass. "With that guarantee, companies will make the investments needed to prepare for any attack."
Added Tommy Thompson, head of the Health and Human Services Department: "We're going to be able to push the industry in order to do research in particular areas and then we're going to be able to provide them with a market after they find the kind of remedies and solutions that we need."
Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H, said the effort will be expensive. But, he said, "we had to set up a structure where we make it viable for our private-sector pharmaceutical industries and biotechnology industries to invest the extraordinary amount of money it takes to invest in the production of this type of response capability," he said.
In cases where the private sector does not respond, the bill allows the government to operate emergency programs to research and produce vaccines.
Bush has been calling for the legislation since his 2003 State of the Union address.
"Project BioShield is critical for strengthening the nation's ability to protect Americans against biological, chemical, nuclear, and radiological terrorist threats," the White House said in a statement Wednesday.
Among the agents to be included in Project BioShield are smallpox, anthrax, botulism toxin, plague and Ebola.
The House overwhelmingly passed a version of the bill last year, and now the two sides will have to come to a compromise before it heads to the White House for Bush's signature.
But Gregg said, "I expect the House to take our bill and move it on to the president." House Homeland Security chairman Chris Cox, R-Calif., also said he expected the legislation to go to the president without a formal House-Senate conference.
Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, D-Mass., did not vote.
The Senate bill number is S.15 and the House bill is H.R. 2122.
On the Net:
Congress: http://thomas.loc.gov/
-------- china
Taiwan's President Is Sworn In
Chen Vows to Avoid Steps Toward Independence
By Edward Cody
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A16
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A40991-2004May19.html
TAIPEI, Taiwan, May 20 -- Present Chen Shui-bian, in closely watched inaugural address, pledged Thursday to avoid any steps during his next four-year term that would alter the status quo in Taiwan's tense relationship with mainland China.
Chen, 53, was sworn in under a relentless downpour in a ceremony attended by representatives of the 26 nations that still maintain diplomatic relations with the Republic of China, as this self-governed island is formally known.
Chen, in his hour-long address, nevertheless vowed to press forward with his program to give Taiwan "a new version of the constitution."
The Chinese government in Beijing has depicted Chen's constitutional reform plans as steps designed to move this island and its 23 million inhabitants toward independence from the mainland, something the Communist government has vowed to prevent, by force if necessary.
Chen said his constitutional changes would be designed only to improve the efficiency of Taiwan's government and would not touch on the issues of sovereignty, territory or Taiwan's political status, that Beijing has defined as red lines not to be crossed under threat of war.
Chen's renunciation of steps leading toward formal independence for Taiwan appeared to respond to pressure from the United States and other nations that he refrain from exacerbating his tense relationship with the mainland, which has deployed about 500 short-range missiles on the other side of the 100-mile Taiwan Strait.
He called on Beijing to reciprocate by moving with him to renew contacts and diplomatic dialogue, adding that threats of force, such as the one issued in a Chinese statement on Monday, would only impede the process.
"This will only serve to drive the people of Taiwan farther away and widen the gap across the Taiwan Strait," he said.
Chen reaffirmed the commitments he made in his inaugural address four years ago not to take any initiatives that would alter Taiwan's status and move it formally toward independence, that Chen's comments have led many to believe are his ultimate goal.
"Those commitments have not changed, nor will they change over the next four years," he said.
At the same time, Chen emphasized that in the 55 years since nationalist Chinese fled to Taiwan and set up the Republic of Taiwan, this island has developed along a separate path from the Communist mainland. In particular, he said, in recent years, Taiwan has developed a vibrant democracy with direct presidential elections and a political tradition that separates Taiwanese from their mainland cousins.
"This is a fact," he declared. "History has given rise to the development of two very different political systems as well as two dissimilar ways of life on either side of the Taiwan Strait."
As the inauguration ceremony began, hundreds of opposition supporters gathered for a protest at a park in the eastern part of the capital, Taipei.
Chen was reelected March 20 after campaigning on a China-bashing platform and claiming that he could best protect Taiwan from China's plans to swallow up the tiny island.
This week, China issued a new series of warnings that Taiwan would trigger a war if it rejected eventual unification.
China "will never tolerate Taiwan independence," the Communist Party newspaper People's Daily and other state media said in a series of bellicose commentaries Wednesday. They warned that China was ready to use "non-peaceful means" to keep Chen from trying to make the self-ruled island's de facto independence permanent.
A day before the inauguration, the China Daily newspaper wrote that China wants Chen to soften his "radical separatist stance in his inauguration speech," that China would view as a blueprint for Chen's second term.
In a statement Monday, China vowed to "firmly and thoroughly" crush any moves toward independence, but urged Chen to resume talks on unification. The statement for the first time called for "mutual trust in the military field" but did not elaborate.
--------
Sharp Words From China for Leader of Taiwan
May 20, 2004
By JOSEPH KAHN and CHRIS BUCKLEY
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/20/international/asia/20chin-long.html?pagewanted=all&position=
BEIJING, Thursday, May 20 - China stepped up its attacks on Taiwan's president, Chen Shui-bian, even as he was sworn into office for a second term on Thursday, warning that it would force Taiwan to remain part of China even if that resulted in international isolation and severe economic pain.
Militant statements in the official media and stark warnings by several of China's leading Taiwan experts appeared designed to discount in advance some mildly conciliatory comments Mr. Chen made Thursday morning in his inaugural address, while emphasizing Beijing's readiness to attack if he pursued a course toward formal independence.
Mr. Chen, delivering his address in a downpour in front of Taiwan's presidential palace, said he would undertake constitutional reform, as he has long promised. But he ruled out using the reform process to effect changes to the country's sovereignty and left the door open to reunification down the road, if Taiwan's 23 million people choose to support it.
"This is my responsibility to history that I present to the Taiwan people and government a new constitution before my term ends on 2008," Mr. Chen said, following through on a campaign promise.
But at least in part to alleviate Chinese concerns that a new Taiwanese constitution would result in a formal severing of Taiwan's remaining ties to the mainland, Mr. Chen vowed to exclude questions of sovereignty.
"I am fully aware that consensus has yet to be reached on national sovereignty, territory and the subject of unification and independence," he said. "I clearly state here that such issues will not be included in the scope of constitutional reforms."
Despite those comments, which were largely anticipated, mainland Chinese leaders appear to have reached a new consensus that there is little prospect of negotiating with Mr. Chen, who narrowly won re-election in a disputed poll in March, and that Beijing must eliminate doubts that it is prepared to attack to enforce its will.
"No one will pay any attention to his words, even if he talks at great length," said Xu Shiquan, one of China's most senior advisers on Taiwan affairs, said of Mr. Chen. "China will pay any price to prevent independence."
The rising tensions underscore the risks for the United States, which has been cast as an intermediary between China and Taiwan. Washington recognizes China's sovereignty but has also vowed to defend the island, a democracy, against any attack from China. It is Taiwan's main supplier of weapons.
China took the unusual step of briefing the United States on the text of a new Taiwan policy before its publication on Monday morning. Mr. Chen sent emissaries to Washington earlier this month to discuss his inaugural address, American and Taiwanese officials said.
A senior Bush administration official said mediation "had reduced the chances of miscalculation" at a difficult time. But he also acknowledged that the two sides had become increasingly antagonistic and political tensions had increased even as economic ties flourished.
A former American government official who discussed Taiwan policy with civilian and military leaders in Beijing last week said China had determined that Mr. Chen had already "crossed the red line" after campaigning on a platform that China felt amounted to supporting independence. The former official said he was repeatedly warned that China had little choice but to attack if Mr. Chen fulfilled past pledges to solidify Taiwan's national identity.
"I don't think they want to use force," the former official said. "But the pessimism is striking. There's a sense they have no choice now."
On Monday, China released its highest level statement on Taiwan policy in several years, outlining a variety of benefits Taiwan might receive, including closer economic ties, reduced military tensions and more diplomatic "living space," but only if Taiwan fully accepted the "One China" principle under which Beijing claims sovereignty.
At the same time, Prime Minister Wen Jiabao said the Communist Party would "seriously consider" enacting a law that would require Taiwan and China to reunify by a certain date, either voluntarily or by force.
Mr. Chen has sent conflicting signals in the past about whether he intends to try to formalize Taiwan's de facto independence. But he has repeatedly rejected the "One China" policy, and his aides made clear this week that he was not prepared to discuss China's sovereignty claims at this time.
The most delicate issue is how Mr. Chen carries out constitutional reform and whether he will adhere to his promise to steer clear of sovereignty questions. Mr. Chen said his plan for "constitutional re-engineering" will focus mainly on the structure of Taiwan's government and enforcing rule of law and human rights.
American officials have said they expect Mr. Chen to promise not to seek independence through constitutional reform. Yet Mr. Chen must respond to broad support among his core constituency for concrete steps to show that Taiwan is realizing its national identity, and to broad opposition to accepting Chinese rule.
Members of his own Democratic Progressive Party and the Taiwan Solidarity Union, Mr. Chen's hardline, pro-independence ally, have called for him to revise the Constitution, while the opposition Nationalists have urged caution. "I see confrontation, and confrontation may take precedence over negotiation," said Ho Szu-yin, a professor of Political Science at National Chengchi University and an adviser to the Nationalists.
He said the Nationalist Party may have done more to ease China's anger if it had won the election. But he also said it was unlikely a majority of people would ever support the position China says is non-negotiable: acceptance that Taiwan is part of "one China." "I don't think the pendulum will swing that far," he said.
On the other side, Lee Shang-Ren, who run the policy research center of the Taiwan Solidarity Union, said pressure will grow on Mr. Chen to show concrete progress toward independence. He said he did not think military threats would deter Taiwan's people from taking their own course. "Our judgment is that China can't possibly launch a major military attack," he said. "The current international setting won't allow for a large-scale invasion."
Partly for that reason, Beijing is arguing that it is less focused on economic growth and international prestige than many assume.
Joseph Kahn reported from Beijing for this article and Chris Buckley from Taipei, Taiwan.
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No imminent military crisis in Taiwan Strait: US military chief in Asia
WASHINGTON (AFP)
May 20, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040520011655.kpx3schj.html
The top US military commander in the Asia-Pacific region said Wednesday he does not see any imminent security crisis in the Taiwan Strait amid tensions ahead of Thursday's inauguration of Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian.
"We are watching very closely events associated with" the recent Taiwan elections and inauguration, "and so far have seen no indication of an imminent military crisis," said Admiral Thomas Fargo, the chief of the US Pacific Command.
Speaking at a gathering of the US Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Business Council, Fargo said among his concerns in the region were "miscalculation" resulting in conflict in the Taiwan Strait and between nuclear rivals India and Pakistan.
"Such conflicts would be devastating in their own right, and would have the potential to expand into much wider regional conflicts," he warned.
Chen will be inaugurated for a second term as president Thursday against the backdrop of a bitter legal row over his election victory and threats from China to crush any moves towards independence "firmly and thoroughly, at any cost."
Chen has enraged China by repeatedly rejecting Beijing's offers of a "one country, two systems" formula for reunification, and describing Taiwan as a sovereign state.
The White House on Wednesday bluntly condemned China's warning, saying such harsh language has "no place in international civilized discourse."
China, which views Taiwan as part of its territory awaiting reunification with the mainland by force if necessary, has unleashed a wave of rhetoric this week warning it would never accept the island's independence.
Fargo reminded that the Taiwan issue was "the largest friction point" between the United States and China.
"We seek a peaceful resolution of Taiwan's status, free from the threat or use of force, as the only acceptable solution," he said, citing US support for the one-China policy and commitments under the Taiwan Relations Act.
The United States acknowledges Beijing's position that Taiwan is part of China and does not have official relations with the island.
However, Washington is bound by law to provide weapons to help Taiwan defend itself if its security is threatened.
China has threatened to invade Taiwan if it moves toward formal independence.
Fargo said it was clear China was using its rapid economic growth to fuel "unprecedented" military modernization, "which of course is concerning, because we don't know their intent."
He said he had found dialogues with China over the last two years to be much improved, adding such discussions could be "helpful to ensuring they get their assumptions right."
Fargo, who has been US military commander in the Asia Pacific for the last five years, said his "top concern" in the region was the potential for conflict on the Korean pensinsula.
He said "obviously the stakes in Northeast Asia would be particularly high if war occurred, and even higher if North Korea pursues its nuclear capability."
-------- iraq
Dozens Killed in U.S. Attack Near Syria; Target Disputed
By Scott Wilson and Sewell Chan
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A40848-2004May19?language=printer
BAGHDAD, May 19 -- U.S. ground forces and aircraft attacked a village in Iraq's western desert before dawn Wednesday, striking what Iraqi witnesses said was a wedding celebration but U.S. officials called a way station for foreign infiltrators. More than 40 civilians, most of them women and children, were killed, according to witnesses, Iraqi police officers and provincial health officials.
Video footage from the scene showed fresh graves and the corpses of several children. A man in a red-and-white head scarf told the Associated Press Television Network: "The planes came in and shot the whole family. They kept shooting until the morning, until they destroyed all the houses. They didn't leave anything."
The images of civilian casualties, broadcast widely on Arab television, are likely to further inflame anti-American sentiment in Iraq at a time when U.S. forces are confronting armed resistance on multiple fronts.
U.S. officials acknowledged that their troops attacked in the area, saying they were responding to hostile fire. They later recovered weapons, large amounts of cash and other evidence of an insurgent supply route, officials said.
The attack on the village of Makr al-Deeb occurred at about 2:45 a.m. in the desert region near the border with Syria, the deputy police chief of the city of Ramadi, Lt. Col. Ziyad Jabouri, told the Associated Press. Jabouri said between 42 and 45 people died, including 15 children and 10 women.
For months, U.S. forces have waged a largely clandestine war in the region in an attempt to interdict foreigners who cross the largely unguarded Syrian border to join in attacks against the U.S.-led occupation. The U.S. government classifies Syria as a state sponsor of terrorism and last week imposed sanctions on it.
Regarding Wednesday's attack, "our sense is that this was a legitimate military target," said a U.S. military official in Baghdad, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "We suspect that this was a smuggler or foreign-fighter" route, the official said. "It's our estimation right now that the personnel involved in this matter were part of the foreign-fighter safe house."
In a separate action, U.S. soldiers battled the Mahdi Army, a militia group loyal to the rebel Shiite Muslim cleric Moqtada Sadr, in Karbala through much of the afternoon. In the evening, soldiers fought Sadr's militiamen in the sacred cemetery on the outskirts of Najaf after a day of relative calm.
The fighting in the two holiest cities of Iraq's Shiite majority came a day after Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the most influential Shiite cleric in the country, called on all armed groups to leave Najaf. He also appealed to potential Sadr supporters beyond Najaf and Karbala to ignore the young cleric's call to join the uprising.
U.S. officials, who have charged Sadr with the April 2003 killing of a moderate rival cleric, had hoped Sistani's order would defuse one of the most serious security challenges that U.S.-led forces must address before an interim Iraqi government assumes limited authority June 30. Instead, the order appeared to open new divisions among Iraqi Shiites, once largely supportive of the U.S. invasion after suffering for decades under Saddam Hussein's Sunni Muslim-led government.
Sadr's supporters demonstrated in front of Sistani's headquarters in Najaf and the shrine of Imam Ali, the city's holiest site, which has been threatened by recent fighting. Before the afternoon fighting, Sistani's supporters demonstrated peacefully in Karbala.
Hasan Azawi, a Sadr representative in Baghdad, issued a statement calling for Iraqis to attend a Thursday demonstration at Sadr's office in Najaf -- a direct rejection of Sistani's call not to enter the city.
Also Wednesday, the military announced the death of a soldier from the Army's 1st Infantry Division. The soldier was killed by gunfire around 4:30 p.m. Tuesday while on patrol near Miqdadiyah, northeast of Baghdad.
In a statement concerning the disputed attack in western Iraq, the U.S. military said its forces came under fire during an operation in the western desert at 3 a.m. Ground troops moved against a suspected safe house used by foreign fighters and were fired on, the statement said. A Defense Department official said U.S. warplanes provided close air support.
In the aftermath, U.S. soldiers found "numerous weapons," large amounts of Iraqi and Syrian currency, foreign passports and a two-way satellite radio, the statement said. U.S. officials suggested that the village, 16 miles east of the Syrian border, had been a focus of intelligence efforts for some time.
Villagers shown on the television broadcasts said the attack came during a wedding celebration.
Among the first U.S. military decrees following the April 2003 fall of Baghdad was a prohibition on celebratory gunfire, an age-old custom in tribal areas across the Middle East and Central Asia. The sight of tracer bullets streaking through the night sky can lead U.S. forces to believe they are under attack.
But few Iraqis have heeded the rule. Celebratory fire rang out over Baghdad last week after the Iraqi soccer team qualified for the Olympics.
In July 2002, 48 people were killed and more than 100 others were wounded after U.S. warplanes flying over Afghanistan bombed and strafed the village of Miandao and three nearby villages in Uruzgan province during a wedding celebration. U.S. officials, while expressing condolences to the victims, said they were responding to hostile ground fire.
The Associated Press video from Iraq showed about 40 people digging or gathered around a set of dirt graves. A man who wore a white shirt said 26 people from one family were killed and five others were in serious condition.
Several people could be heard shouting anti-American slogans in Arabic. "Those Americans, they don't believe in God, they don't believe in anything," one man said.
Nine people surrounded a wooden coffin covered in cloth, loudly wailing and moaning. A tearful man dressed in white lunged toward the prone body of another man before being pulled away by others.
The body of a boy, who appeared to be 4 or 5 years old, was shown wrapped in a brown blanket, flies buzzing about his head. People around him identified him as Hamza Rikad. "Come here, help us," a man said on the video as they lifted the boy. "Take him by the hand."
"The U.S. planes dropped more than 100 bombs on us," one man, who said he was from the village, told the al-Arabiya satellite television network. "They hit two homes where the wedding was being held and then they leveled the whole village. No bullets were fired by us, nothing was happening."
Staff writer Thomas E. Ricks in Washington contributed to this report.
--------
Bush to Detail Transition Monday in First of Several Iraq Speeches
By Robin Wright and Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A18
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41081-2004May19.html
President Bush will lay out details of the U.S. plan for the Iraq transition at a major speech Monday in a bid to counter mounting public anxiety over the escalating violence and uncertainty less than six weeks before the handover of political power in Baghdad, according to U.S. officials.
Beginning with Monday's address at the Army War College, Bush will give a major speech on Iraq every week through June 30, when the U.S.-led coalition is due to turn over limited authority to a new interim Iraqi government. "We're entering a critical phase, and the president will be speaking out each week to discuss with the American people, and the world, the way forward in Iraq," said a White House official.
"Some speeches will have more details than others, and will be given at different places and times. All have the important goal of explaining the essential tasks at hand and the significance of June 30," the official added.
After discussions with his top foreign policy team and a Cabinet meeting to go over strategy, Bush conceded that the United States faces "hard work" in the weeks ahead but insisted that the administration is making "a lot of progress." U.N. special envoy Lakhdar Brahimi is expected to name the new interim government -- including a president, prime minister, two vice presidents and more than two dozen cabinet ministers -- within the next two weeks, he told reporters.
"I told my Cabinet we've got hard work to do. After all, we saw the vivid savagery of the enemy. The decapitation of a U.S. citizen reminds us all about the barbaric nature of those who are trying to stop progress toward freedom," Bush told reporters, referring to the slaying of Nicholas Berg.
Yet U.S. officials are increasingly concerned about the backlash at home and abroad from a string of recent setbacks, most recently the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, the assassination of the Iraqi Governing Council president and the attack yesterday that killed more than 40 people. Iraq and Arab media reported that the victims were at a wedding party.
"As we get closer to the transfer of sovereignty, a lot of people are nervous as a result of violence they see in Iraq every day and wild speculation about what may or may not happen next. From our point of view, there's remarkable consistency and there's a useful purpose in repeating what is guiding our actions and our commitment to Iraq and Iraqis. It's important in light of ongoing developments to get across that message and provide a steadying hand," said a senior State Department official who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
In his first speech, Bush will discuss the transfer of sovereignty -- and what it means -- plus the new U.N. resolution that the United States and Britain will seek next month before the transfer of power, U.S. officials say. "He also wants to talk about what we're prepared to do for the Iraqis and the importance of staying the course," the official said.
A major point of contention between the United States and key U.N. members is the amount of power the United States will retain after June 30, because Washington will still provide advisers for Iraqi ministries and about 135,000 U.S. troops will be in charge of providing security in Iraq and training new Iraqi police and security forces.
In another sign of the developing campaign to win wider support for the U.S. strategy, Bush is also considering meeting in New York with the U.N. Security Council and senior representatives of countries in the U.S.-led coalition, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi told reporters after meeting with Bush.
The meeting would help bestow legitimacy on the new Iraqi government and generate international cooperation in the next phase of the transition between July 1 and January 2005, when Iraqis will go to the polls for the first time to elect a national assembly, Berlusconi added.
Last night, a White House official would only say that it is an "idea being discussed."
-------
Officials Seize Files of Top Iraqi Leader Once Backed by U.S.
May 20, 2004
By DEXTER FILKINS and KIRK SEMPLE
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/20/international/middleeast/20CND-CHAL.html?hp=&pagewanted=all&position=
BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 20 - The offices and home of Ahmad Chalabi, the Iraqi politician once favored by the Pentagon but now at odds with the American authorities, were raided by the authorities today and computers and documents were seized.
Witnesses said the raiding party involved about 100 American and Iraqi law enforcement officers, including officials believed to be from the F.B.I. and the C.I.A.
A spokesman for the American occupation authorities said that the Coalition Provisional Authority and its top official, L. Paul Bremer III, had not been involved in the raids, and he referred all questions to the Iraqi police, which, the spokesman said, had planned and conducted the operations.
Mr. Bremer, the spokesman said, "did not know the operation was occurring today" and was notified only after it had been completed. He did not confirm witness accounts that American troops were involved.
Reporters who entered the office compound after the raid found a scene of destruction. Computers had been seized, furniture had been overturned, doors broken down and framed photographs of Mr. Chalabi smashed. Aides to Mr. Chalabi said members of the raiding party had helped themselves to food and beverages from the refrigerator.
"My house was attacked," Mr. Chalabi said during a televised news conference in Baghdad. "We avoided by a hair's breadth a clash with my guards."
He held up a framed picture with its glass cracked - the work of the raiding party, he said - and accused the soldiers and the police of ransacking and "vandalizing" his office.
Mr. Chalabi blamed the American occupation authorities for ordering the raid, saying they were angry about his recent criticism of the coalition authority and the Bush administration's plans for the transition back to Iraqi governance.
He enumerated several possible reasons for the raids, including differences with the American authorities over how to conduct an investigation into corruption in the United Nations' oil-for-food program in Iraq, and over how much power the Iraqis should assume when the country regains sovereignty on June 30.
"When America treats its friends this way, then they are in big trouble," he said. "My relationship with the Coalition Provisional Authority now is nonexistent."
According to Mr. Chalabi's aides, the searchers were looking for two men close to the Iraqi politician, one of whom is Mr. Chalabi's security chief and presides over a vast intelligence network.
"Bremer," said one Chalabi aide, "has lost his mind."
Dan Senor, chief spokesman for Mr. Bremer, said the raids had been aimed at "individuals" who work for the Iraqi National Congress but had nothing to do with the investigations into the oil-for-food program.
Whatever the purpose, the raids illuminated a huge rupture in what had been the Bush administration's most important personal and political relationship in Iraq. Mr. Chalabi, a longtime exile leader and now a member of the Iraqi Governing Council, played a crucial role in persuading the administration that Saddam Hussein had to be removed from power. But he has since become a lightning rod for critics of the Bush administration, who say the United States relied on him too heavily for prewar intelligence that has since proved faulty.
In recent weeks, the relationship has further soured as Mr. Chalabi has openly criticized Mr. Bremer and has advocated a more expansive definition of the sovereignty which Iraq will assume on June 30, including full Iraqi control of its armed forces and oil revenue.
In recent months, Mr. Chalabi has also criticized Lakhdar Brahimi, the United Nations official who is organizing an Iraqi government to take control of the country on July 1 and whose efforts have been embraced by the White House. And he has objected to Mr. Bremer's efforts to leave the governing council out of an investigation of alleged corruption in the United Nations oil-for-food program for Iraq.
Aides close to Mr. Chalabi say the animosity between him and Mr. Bremer has grown so severe that the Iraqi has taken to skipping Iraqi Governing Council meetings that Mr. Bremer attends.
The Iraqi National Congress disclosed earlier this week that the American government had decided to halt monthly $335,000 payments to the group.
Mr. Chalabi's group has received at least $27 million in United States financing in the past four years, an Iraqi National Congress official said this week. That includes $335,000 a month as part of a classified program through the Defense Intelligence Agency, since the summer of 2002, to help gather intelligence in Iraq.
Internal reviews by the United States government have found that much of the information provided as part of the classified program before American forces invaded Iraq last year was useless, misleading or even fabricated.
The official from Mr. Chalabi's group said the classified program had originally been scheduled to end Sept. 30, 2003, but was extended twice - to Dec. 31, 2003, and then again, to June 30, 2004. The official said he did not know why the government decided not to extend the program again.
Salem Chalabi, nephew of Mr. Chalabi and head of the Iraqi war crimes tribunal, told The A.P. that his uncle had told him by telephone that Iraqi and American authorities "entered his home and put the guns to his head in a very humiliating way that reminds everyone of the conduct of the former regime."
Ali Sarraf, the finance director of the Iraqi National Congress, described a tableau of brutality. "We offered them the keys and they showed us guns," he said. "They kicked the door down."
Standing amid the debris in the organization's offices, he said: "Bremer is panicking. This is about settling things with Dr. Chalabi."
In ongoing fighting across Iraq, two American soldiers were killed and several were wounded in two separate incidents, a military spokesman said today.
One soldier from the First Cavalry Division was killed and three were wounded in a grenade attack in Baghdad today, the spokesman said. Another soldier was killed and one was wounded when a roadside bomb exploded on Wednesday near their convoy in Samarra, 60 miles north of the capital.
Dexter Filkins reported from Baghdad for this article and Kirk Semple contributed reporting from New York for this article.
--------
THE MILITARY
Disputed Strike by U.S. Military Leaves at Least 40 Iraqis Dead
May 20, 2004
By DEXTER FILKINS and EDWARD WONG
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/20/international/middleeast/20IRAQ.html?pagewanted=all&position=
BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 19 - About 40 Iraqis were killed Wednesday by American forces in an attack near the volatile border with Syria. American officials said they had fired on a suspected guerrilla safe house, but Iraqis said the Americans had strafed civilians at a wedding party.
American military officials said the attack occurred in the open desert on Wednesday evening, about 15 miles from the Syrian border and southwest of the town of Qusaiba. In a statement, American officials said they had called in air support after an American military operation in the area had come under hostile fire.
After the attack, the Americans said they had recovered "numerous weapons," cash and foreign passports.
Associated Press Television News broadcast film, said to be taken at the scene, showing a truck heaped with bloody bodies, many of them wrapped in blankets. Several of the bodies shown appeared to be those of children.
Both the American and the Iraqi accounts agreed that about 40 people had died. But some Iraqis and several reports in the Arab press said the attack had killed civilians, not insurgents.
Al Arabiya, a television network based in Dubai, quoted witnesses as saying American planes had bombed a wedding party in Makr al-Deeb, a village near the Syrian border. The film included pictures of shrouded bodies and scenes of men digging graves.
On the broadcast, an unidentified man told Al Arabiya, "The American planes dropped more than 100 bombs on us. They destroyed the whole village. We didn't fire any bullets."
The Associated Press quoted Lt. Col. Ziyad al-Jbouri, the deputy police chief of Ramadi, as saying that between 42 and 45 people had died, including 15 children and 10 women.
The Associated Press also quoted Dr. Salah al-Ani, a hospital worker in Ramadi, as saying 45 people were dead.
Ramadi is the capital of the province of Al Anbar, which includes the area around Qusaiba.
Iraqis interviewed by Associated Press Television said revelers had fired volleys of gunfire into the air in a traditional wedding celebration just before the American attack. American troops have mistaken celebratory gunfire for hostile fire at least once before. In July 2002, officials in Afghanistan said that at least 48 civilians at a wedding party were killed and 117 wounded by an American airstrike in the province of Oruzgan.
A report released afterward by the United States Central Command said the airstrike was justified because American planes had come under fire.
In Iraq, it was impossible to sort out the conflicting claims late Wednesday.
The area near the strike is a vast, desolate place crisscrossed by smugglers. American officials have long suspected the area to be a transit point for foreign and Iraqi guerrillas and have condemned the Syrian government for not cracking down on the traffic.
Last June, American commandos attacked a convoy of cars and trucks in the area, engaging in firefights with Syrian border guards. American officials said the convoy appeared to contain high ranking members from Saddam Hussein's government. But the results of the raid were inconclusive.
The conflicting reports of the attack near the Syrian border came as up to 300 people marched through the streets of Karbala to protest fighting between American forces and militiamen loyal to a rebel Shiite cleric, and battles continued near revered shrines in the downtown area.
The protesters gathered after a request on Tuesday from the office of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, which called for a demonstration against the presence of American and insurgent forces in the holy cities of Karbala and Najaf. The ayatollah also issued a statement demanding a military withdrawal from both cities.
It was the strongest criticism that Ayatollah Sistani, the most influential Shiite in Iraq, had made against the fighting in recent weeks, though no commander on either side has heeded him.
The protesters in Karbala gathered in the morning at the Hussein Hospital. The protest was significantly smaller than those others called for by the ayatollah, possibly because of firefights raging in the middle of the city. As the protesters marched toward the golden-domed Shrine of Hussein, they asked that tribal sheiks and police forces be given responsibility for security in the city.
American F-16 fighter jets, called in to provide surveillance of the city, swooped overhead as the marchers spilled into the streets.
For more than two weeks, the First Armored Division has been fighting insurgents here led by Moktada al-Sadr, the 31-year-old rebel cleric who lives in Najaf. The battles have crept closer and closer to two of the holiest sites in Shiite Islam, the Shrine of Hussein and the Shrine of Abbas, dedicated to Shiite martyrs.
Early Monday morning, the American military called in an airstrike from an AC-130 gunship, which fired 40-millimeter cannons at a group of insurgents clustered about 160 feet from the Shrine of Hussein. The F-16's did not take part in firing, the military said.
On Wednesday, American tanks were parked about 600 feet from the shrine. One Iraqi witness said they appeared to be encircling the building.
There were firefights throughout the day in the alleys of the downtown area. American forces have occupied the Mukhaiyam Mosque since May 12, after a pitched battled with insurgents. The mosque now comes under daily attack from militiamen firing mortar rounds and rocket-propelled grenades.
At least eight insurgents were killed in fighting, said Capt. Noel Gorospe, a spokesman for the First Battalion, 37th Armor, of the First Armored Division. There were no American casualties, he said. Polish forces also fought militiamen.
By evening, insurgents had fired at least 3 mortar rounds and 13 rocket-propelled grenades at American soldiers, Captain Gorospe said. He added that soldiers had come under sniper fire five times. One especially skilled sniper has killed two American soldiers and wounded four since the American forces took over the Mukhaiyam Mosque.
In total, 4 American soldiers have been killed and at least 52 wounded during the two-week offensive against Mr. Sadr's forces here.
Col. Pete Mansoor, commander of the First Brigade of the First Armored Division, said rocket-propelled grenades had been fired at least once from the Shrine of Hussein at tanks. A Predator drone flying overhead at the time recorded the projectiles originating from the shrine, he said.
But on Wednesday, it appeared that the militia forces, called the Mahdi Army, had been barred from entering the shrine by armed guards appointed by the offices of the marjaiah, the four grand ayatollahs living in Najaf. Mahdi fighters stood about 150 feet from the Shrine of Hussein, while about 80 men armed with automatic rifles and working for the Shrines Protection Force stood inside the two central shrines.
Members of the Badr Organization, the armed wing of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, a powerful Shiite political party, were nowhere to be seen. American commanders said the group had promised to secure the shrines. But the group is apparently not popular among residents of Karbala and would have little support if it went into battle against the Mahdi Army.
Dexter Filkins reported from Baghdad, Iraq, for this article, and Edward Wong from Karbala.
--------
US troops in Iraq kill more than 40 in air strike, Chalabi HQ raided
BAGHDAD (AFP)
May 20, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040520203931.o99p9com.html
The US military said it killed over 40 people in an airstrike in the Iraqi desert, as a top politician cut ties with the US-led coalition Thursday, clouding hopes for a smooth transfer of power next month.
Meanwhile, fierce clashes broke out between US troops and militiamen loyal to firebrand cleric Moqtada Sadr in the Shiite holy city of Najaf, an AFP correspondent witnessed.
Piling yet more controversy on top of a damaging prison abuse scandal, the coalition acknowledged that 41 people were killed in Wednesday's attack in western Iraq, saying the target was a safe house used by foreign fighters.
But Iraqis who said they lost friends and relatives claimed the attack hit homes in a village just outside the town of Qaim, on the Syrian border, after a wedding party.
A US marine general responsible for Al-Anbar province where the raid was conducted, ridiculed claims those killed were wedding guests, saying "I don't have to dignify their allegations."
But one well-off family told AFP that it lost 26 people in the attack.
"The wedding started at midday. At 10:00 pm (1800 GMT), I returned to my house, about one kilometres (less than a mile away). At around 3:00 am I heard heavy bombing," said Taleb al-Harun, whose wife, sister and nephew were killed.
"I was crazy with fear. I ran out and saw everyone dead. They were lying in the street," he said at Ramadi hospital, where the wounded were taken.
US Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, deputy director of coalition military operations, told a Baghdad news conference the military will investigate the incident.
"Certainly because of the interest that has been shown by the media we're going to have an investigation," he said.
The attack was based on "significant" intelligence that armed insurgents were gathering in the remote area, Kimmitt added.
In the wake of the attack, a spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross expressed concern that the "excessive" use of US force was violating international human rights".
Meanwhile, Ahmed Chalabi dealt a heavy blow to chances of a smooth handover to an Iraqi transitional government on June 30, saying he had cut his ties with the coalition after Iraqi police and US soldiers raided his home and office.
Speaking after the attack, Chalabi, once the darling of the Pentagon, said his relationship with the Coalition Provisional Authority was "non-existent".
"I am America's best friend in Iraq; if the CPA finds it necessary to direct an armed attack against my home you can see the state of relations between the CPA and the Iraqi people," said Chalabi.
The US-installed Governing Council, of which he is a member, will hold an emergency meeting Friday to discuss its response, capping a catastrophic week after the assassination of its president, Ezzedine Salim, on Monday.
One colleague said he would resign from the council unless the coalition took steps to stop such "abuses", jeopardising government stability just weeks before the coalition returns sovereignty on June 30.
Coalition spokesman Dan Senor distanced himself from the raids, saying they had been "Iraqi-led".
But Chalabi slammed them as politically motivated, and he called on US President George W. Bush to hand over sovereignty to Iraqis without delay.
"My message to the CPA is let my people go, let my people be free. We are grateful to President Bush for liberating Iraq but it is time for the Iraqi people to run their affairs," he said.
Police and US forces confiscated documents, Chalabi's personal files, computers, weapons and personal belongings, the Iraqi National Congressleader said.
The Shiite banker has fallen from grace in Washington amid claims that his party provided false information before the 2003 invasion of Iraq, justified by allegations that the former regime had weapons of mass destruction programs.
US Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said Wednesday the Pentagon had halted its monthly payments of 340,000 dollars to Chalabi's party and would seek other intelligence sources on Iraq.
Violence continued across Iraq, with fresh fighting breaking out in Najaf late Thursday. An AFP correspondent reported the sound of explosions and gunfire coming from the direction of the 1920 Revolution Square area and the city's vast cemetery.
US tanks and troops are stationed at Iraqi police headquarters off the square, which is less than two kilometers (one mile) from the Imam Ali shrine in centre of the city, 160 kilometres (100 miles) south of Baghdad.
The area has come under nightly attack over the past week from mortars and rocket-propelled grenades fired by militia loyal to radical cleric Moqtada Sadr.
Red tracers were seen flying over the cemetery, which was the scene of a fierce battle one week ago between US troops and Sadr's men in which at least 10 militiamen were killed.
Nine civilians were killed overnight in Karbala, where a shrine caretaker said bombs were dropped near Shiite holy sites, while the US military said two soldiers died in a pair of attacks.
A roadside bomb in the northern city of Mosul which was apparently intended for a US convoy killed a woman and wounded four people, police said.
And a police officer and two civilians were wounded in another blast there, a local official said.
-------- israel / palestine
Israel Attack Kills 10 at Gaza Protest
Army Says Shots Were Warning; Children Among Dozens of Wounded
By Glenn Frankel
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A38959-2004May19?language=printer
RAFAH, Gaza Strip, May 19 -- An Israeli helicopter gunship and a tank fired rockets and artillery shells at Palestinian protesters Wednesday as they marched toward a heavily populated neighborhood in the southern Gaza Strip. At least 10 Palestinians were killed and dozens wounded, many of them children, as explosives and shrapnel ripped through the crowd.
Witnesses and survivors said soldiers gave no warning before opening fire. After what witnesses described as deafening explosions, children screamed amid the blood and body parts. Some of the crowd panicked and ran, while others tried to sweep up the wounded and drag them to safety. Men raced through the crowd, cradling wounded boys in their arms and searching desperately for an ambulance or medical assistance.
Senior Israeli military officials confirmed that a rocket and tank shells were fired but insisted they were meant as warning shots and were not aimed at the demonstrators walking from the center of this city toward the Tel Sultan neighborhood, which was sealed off by Israeli forces for the second consecutive day.
The officials conceded that one or more of the rounds might have gone off-target, and the army chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon, and a large number of cabinet ministers and official spokesmen took to the airwaves within hours to express regret and sorrow over the incident.
An army spokesman, Capt. Jacob Dallal, said that soldiers in the tank that opened fire believed their lives were endangered and that intelligence sources asserted there were gunmen in the crowd. But Palestinian witnesses insisted there were no fighters or weapons among the marchers and that the tank was more than 200 yards away.
Five more Palestinians were killed in Tel Sultan on Wednesday as the army continued its house-to-house hunt for militants and weapons. Soldiers ordered all male residents from age 16 to age 50 to report to a police station, while members of militant factions were called on to surrender by waving white flags or risk being shot.
[In two incidents early Thursday, five more Palestinians were killed, the Associated Press reported. Three militants were killed in a missile strike in the Rafah refugee camp around midnight, doctors said. The military said a helicopter fired at gunmen approaching Israeli forces. Before daybreak, two militants were killed by a tank shell near the border, doctors said.]
The killings brought the Palestinian death toll to at least 39 in the past two days, the largest toll in a single military operation in Gaza in several decades. There were no reports of Israeli casualties.
Although Israeli tanks and snipers have ringed Rafah since early Monday, cutting off the city and the adjacent refugee camp from the rest of Gaza, most of the area had remained tranquil until Wednesday afternoon, when the Palestinian Authority and various militant factions issued a joint call for protest.
A crowd of demonstrators began gathering outside a mosque in the city center. Young boys waving flags and banners of the various militant factions were in front as the crowd started moving northwest on Bahar Street toward Tel Sultan, swelling in numbers and anger as it went.
By the time it reached the Zourob intersection, witnesses said, nearly 2,000 people were chanting slogans and shouting "Jihad!" and "God is great!" At a bend in the road, they spotted an Israeli tank in the distance and many hesitated, but those in front kept walking. Some threw stones toward the tank that fell well short of their target.
Suddenly, the tank opened fire, according to witnesses and survivors. The shell hit an electrical support and detonated, they said, sending razor-sharp fragments of the support structure and the shell casing through the demonstrators.
Said Zourob, 20, said he was with the group when the firing began. Five people fell from the first round, he said. Then the tank fired another shell, which was followed by missiles from a helicopter hovering overhead. "I was amazed I wasn't hit," said Zourob, whose blue denim shirt was dark with bloodstains.
"Everyone was in a state of shock," said Kahamis Shaer, 18, also part of the group. "I saw a guy with his head chopped off and another with his intestines hanging out. Some people ran away; others came to help."
In the chaos that ensued, victims were dragged back toward the intersection and piled into ambulances and cars. The vehicles raced to Najar Hospital, which for two days has functioned as a combination combat-zone field hospital and mortuary.
The Israeli military reported that seven people were killed, but hospital officials reported 10 fatalities, five of them children or teenagers.
The dead were placed in the hospital's overcrowded morgue, while most of the wounded were rushed to other medical facilities. Thirteen were taken directly to the European Gaza Hospital in nearby Khan Younis, most of them age 15 or younger, according to officials there.
The youngest was Ibrahim Awedin, 8, who had been hit in the left eye and was sobbing quietly. His 11-year-old brother, Nouh, lay in the next bed, with a shrapnel wound in his left leg. Attah Breaqa, 10, who was hit in both legs, lay in an adjacent ward, alongside Yousef Fadel, 15, whose stomach had been gouged by shrapnel.
The army's version of events, which officials stressed was based on a preliminary investigation, differed markedly from that of the witnesses. Its statement said a helicopter fired a single missile as a warning shot into an open area. Soldiers then set off warning flares, and when the crowd kept coming, fired machine guns and four tank shells at an abandoned building. "It is possible," the statement said, that the casualties "were a result of the tank fire on the abandoned structure."
Dallal, the army spokesman, said soldiers had not anticipated facing such a large crowd of demonstrators and were not armed with nonlethal riot-control weapons such as tear gas and rubber bullets. "It's not typical of the type of combat activity we usually see," he said.
Dallal said soldiers had spotted armed men in the crowd. He and other Israeli spokesmen also raised the possibility that one of the tank shells had inadvertently set off an explosive charge planted by Palestinians along the road, which he said was the scene of frequent exchanges of fire.
Yaalon, the chief of staff, defended the army, telling Israeli reporters at a briefing that no soldier had received orders to fire into the crowd. He said the incursion in Tel Sultan, known as Operation Rainbow, would continue. But senior army sources told Israeli television that the incident had been a tragic mistake that could force the army to reassess the mission.
Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, a former chief of staff, said Palestinian terrorists had often used civilians for cover. "I'm deeply sorry about today's incident," he told reporters, "but no other army could conduct a 3 1/2-year campaign against terror and have fewer casualties."
But Naomi Chazan, a member of parliament from the opposition Meretz party, was one of many politicians who predicted that the incident would give fresh impetus to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to unilaterally pull out of Gaza.
"My feeling is it will be very difficult for the government to justify inaction," she said. "This is a confirmation of the fact that the occupation is a prescription for tragedy. It cannot go on."
Correspondent Robin Shulman and researcher Samuel Sockol in Jerusalem contributed to this report.
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White House Criticizes Israel on Attack
Gaza Incursion Does Not 'Serve the Purposes of Peace and Security,' U.S. Says
By Glenn Kessler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A25
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41115-2004May19.html
In rare public criticism of Israel, the White House rebuked the Jewish state yesterday for its deadly incursion into Gaza, saying it did not "serve the purposes of peace and security" and had "worsened the humanitarian situation."
The statement came one day after President Bush equated the United States' struggle against terrorism with Israel's in a speech before a pro-Israel lobbying group that was interrupted by applause 67 times, and four days after Secretary of State Colin L. Powell first called on Israel to stop the destruction of Palestinian homes. Since Sunday, more than 40 Palestinians have been killed, prompting a storm of worldwide criticism, including from the U.N. Security Council.
The council adopted a resolution yesterday condemning Israel's killing of Palestinian civilians and calling for an end to the destruction of homes. The resolution passed 14 to 0 in the 15-member council. The United States, which usually vetoes resolutions criticizing Israel, abstained.
Bush had initially hesitated yesterday to criticize Israel after an Israeli helicopter gunship and tank fired rockets and artillery shells at Palestinian protesters, saying he wanted more information. Israel released a statement expressing regret for the "tragic event."
The White House statement, issued in the name of press secretary Scott McClellan, stopped short of condemning Israel and did not ask for a stop to the incursion. The statement urged Israel to "exercise maximum restraint now." It also called on the Palestinian Authority to consolidate its security forces and "act to stop smuggling and halt terrorism."
The White House added that events "serve as a grim reminder of the wisdom of Israel disengaging from Gaza," the plan proposed by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon but recently rejected by his Likud Party.
Powell first signaled the administration's change of heart when he told reporters late yesterday that Israel's actions "have caused a problem and have worsened the situation and I think made it more difficult for us to move forward and get back into the peace process." The White House statement was released about an hour later.
The administration's criticism of Israel came after Arab television stations broadcast reports that U.S. aircraft had attacked a wedding party in Iraq that killed dozens of people near the Syrian border. U.S. military officials said the fighting involved insurgents, and a senior administration official in Washington said the reports of the U.S. attack played no role in the rebuke of Israel for its attack on civilians.
At the United Nations, Secretary General Kofi Annan condemned Israel's killing of Palestinian demonstrators and appealed to Powell and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice to use their influence to bring the situation in Gaza "under control."
Annan said he also received a personal appeal from Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat for international assistance -- "pleading with the U.N. and the international community to do something."
"I appeal to the Israeli government to halt this action and exercise much more restraint," he said. "They have an obligation, as an occupying power, for the protection of civilians."
Powell said he and Rice had held a conference call with Dov Weisglass, Sharon's chief of staff, to express the administration's concern over the Gaza operation, which Israeli officials said is to close down smuggling tunnels and capture terrorists.
The administration official, speaking on condition that he not be named, said Powell and Rice acknowledged Israel's right to act in self-defense but warned that there is a "calculus" involved: "What is the action and the reaction? What does the operation get you? What is the proportionality here?" He said U.S. officials believe the operation is "inflammatory and provocative, and it is hard to see how this operation serves a useful purpose."
The official rejected the idea that Bush's speech Tuesday before the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, in which he said Israel "has every right to defend itself from terror," represented any sort of green light. "If anyone read that as a green light, I would say they are colorblind," he said.
"We're just devastated by this loss of innocent life," Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage said on al-Jazeera television. "The president has called on both parties to exercise restraint, and this is what happens when restraint is not exercised."
Israeli Ambassador Danny Ayalon said Israeli officials have listened carefully to U.S. officials' concerns. He said Israel had faced an "onslaught" of terrorist activities since Sharon's plan to leave Gaza had been proposed -- resulting in the deaths of 13 Israeli soldiers -- and needed to act.
"We take it very seriously what they told us and we are using restraint," Ayalon said. "It is not a rosy picture, but sometimes you do what you need to do and we want to end it as soon as possible."
Staff writer Colum Lynch at the United Nations contributed to this report.
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Israel Continues Offensive Despite Outcry
May 20, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Israel-Palestinians.html?pagewanted=all&position=
RAFAH, Gaza Strip (AP) -- Israeli troops pushed deeper into the Rafah refugee camp Thursday in search of gunmen and weapons smugglers, killing seven Palestinians and demolishing several buildings despite an international outcry over a deadly tank attack on a group of protesters.
At least eight Palestinians, many of them children, were killed by Israeli fire Wednesday as they demonstrated against the military operation. The sight of bloodied children and reports of overwhelmed doctors treating dozens of wounded people on blood-drenched hospital floors added to world anger.
Israel apologized for the deaths, saying its troops did not deliberately fire on marchers. A preliminary army investigation concluded that a warning shot fired by a tank flew through a building and hit the crowd, security sources said on condition of anonymity.
Israel also blamed the Palestinians, saying gunmen infiltrated the crowd of about 3,000 people protesting the incursion into the Rafah refugee camp. Witnesses denied militants were among the marchers, and Palestinian leaders denounced the incident as a massacre.
The U.N. Security Council passed a resolution condemning the loss of life and Israel's demolition of homes. The United States abstained, the first time in nearly two years it did not exercise its veto on a resolution sharply critical of Israel.
Also Thursday, an Israeli court in Tel Aviv convicted Palestinian uprising leader Marwan Barghouti of overseeing militant attacks that killed five people. Barghouti, a potential successor to Yasser Arafat, was acquitted of planning other attacks in which 21 Israelis died.
Barghouti's sentencing is set for June 6, and prosecutors asked for five consecutive life terms.
Brig. Gen. Ruth Yaron, the army's chief spokeswoman, said Thursday the Rafah offensive -- dubbed ``Operation Rainbow,'' it is the largest in Gaza in years -- would continue until troops obliterate weapons-smuggling tunnels and round up militants along the Gaza-Egypt border.
By Thursday, the army moved into five neighborhoods in the camp, which is home to about 90,000 Palestinians. Exchanges of gunfire were reported, and Israeli Apache helicopters flew overhead.
Residents said Israeli troops demolished eight homes overnight and bulldozers moved into a street Thursday, knocking down two homes and a shop.
``I saw women and children running in the street,'' resident Mofed Matar said. ``They were not able to evacuate any of their belongings.''
The army, which said it was checking the report, said it only destroyed homes to uncover tunnels or flush out gunmen using them to attack Israelis.
Matar said the army ordered Palestinian men between the ages of 16 and 45 to surrender at a local school, waving white flags. The army said it was checking that report, too.
A similar mass surrender was ordered in another part of the camp Wednesday. The army said Thursday it had no Rafah men in custody.
Early Thursday, an Israeli missile strike killed three militants in the Rafah camp. The army said the gunmen were approaching Israeli forces.
Hours later, troops fired a tank shell and killed two militants, Palestinian doctors said.
Elsewhere, Rafah hospital director Dr. Ali Mousa said a 37-year-old man died from a gunshot wound to the head and two others, ages 29 and 22, were wounded. Relatives said the men were shot when they ventured onto the roof of their apartment building to check a water tank.
Another body was brought to the hospital Thursday, and the army said troops shot a gunman when he approached Israeli forces in the Tel Sultan area of Rafah
Also, a New York Times correspondent covering the invasion of the Rafah camp escaped a kidnapping attempt by Palestinians, raising concerns that foreign journalists may be facing a new danger in covering Israeli-Palestinian violence.
In the incident Wednesday night, assailants tried to grab James Bennet and force him into a car. Bennet said he screamed for help, and that Palestinian police arrived to help him. After a scuffle, the assailants fled, Bennet said.
Israel raided the Rafah camp less than a week after Palestinian militants killed 13 soldiers in Gaza, including seven along the Egyptian border.
Since Israel launched its operation early Tuesday, 39 Palestinians, including several children, have been killed. Dozens have been wounded, and refugee camp residents have faced power outages and a lack of water.
Local officials warned of a looming humanitarian crisis unless electricity and water supplies were restored.
Water from a well in Tel Sultan could not reach other parts of Rafah because there was no power, said Ashraf Ghonem of the Rafah water department. Israeli tanks prevented workers from repairing generators, he said, and he asked the army to guarantee safe passage to the workers.
``We want water to save our life. Is that too big to ask?'' said Tel Sultan resident Salman Abu Jazar, 30. ``My wife boiled the lavatory water to prepare the milk for our 11-month-old son.''
Humanitarian groups called on Israel to ease its grip on Rafah. The International Committee of the Red Cross called on Israel to exercise ``the greatest restraint'' and ensure the wounded had access to adequate medical facilities.
Physicians for Human Rights said it petitioned Israel's Supreme Court to allow medical personnel to move freely and let the wounded be evacuated from Rafah.
It also accused the army of using a bulldozer to bury an ambulance that was headed to treat a mother and three children wounded by tank fire.
The army said the bulldozer was trying to clear the way for the ambulance, and it was working ``24 hours a day'' to facilitate humanitarian aid.
Near the West Bank town of Tulkarem, the army said it killed a Palestinian gunman after a shootout. Palestinian hospital workers confirmed that one man had been killed.
Palestinian officials also said a 13-year-old was shot dead by troops near the West Bank town of Hebron. The army said it fired on a Palestinian throwing a firebomb at soldiers.
In the West Bank town of Qalqilya, the army said troops killed an armed fugitive who tried to flee. It said it wounded a second militant who threw a firebomb, but it had no details on his condition.
-------- latin america
Brazil to send 1,200 troops to Haiti
Brazil (Reuters)
Thursday, May 20, 2004
http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/americas/05/20/brazil.haiti.reut/index.html
BRASILIA, -- Brazil's Senate agreed late Wednesday to send 1,200 troops to Haiti to lead a U.N peacekeeping mission as Brazil seeks to build a role as a regional crisis mediator.
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who has championed the interests of the world's poorest nations since taking office, offered Brazil's biggest ever U.N. peacekeeping force to head the mission.
The Senate vote was the last hurdle for deployment. It was approved with 38 votes for and 10 votes against.
Lula, who objected to the U.S.-led war on Iraq last year, conditioned Brazilian leadership of the mission on international support to build a democracy in Haiti after two U.S. interventions within ten years.
Leadership of the U.N. mission to Haiti would showcase Brazil's push for regional stability as it seeks a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council, diplomats said.
The U.N. peacekeeping mission will take over from a U.S.-led multinational force on June 1. President Jean-Bertrand Aristide resigned in February and fled Haiti under international pressure as an armed rebellion threatened the capital Port-au-Prince.
The U.N. Security Council unanimously approved on April 30 the new mission of up to 5,700 U.N. troops and as many as 1,622 civilian police.
Brazilian Senators also voted to increase Brazil's peacekeeping force in East Timor -- a Portuguese-speaking country like Brazil -- to 125 from 75.
-------- nato
NATO Moves Ahead On MEADS Development
Munich (SPX)
May 20, 2004
Space Daily
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/missiles-04za.html
MEADS International and the NATO MEADS Management Agency today announced the successful completion of the final system demonstration requirement for the Medium Extended Air Defense System (MEADS), clearing the way for the program to enter design and development later this year. The demonstration took place at Practica di Mare Air Base, outside Rome, May 6.
Through a series of tests and demonstrations witnessed by representatives of NATO and the governments of Germany, Italy and the United States, MI successfully demonstrated technical progress of the MEADS prototype hardware and software under control of the system's battle management prototype. MEADS successfully demonstrated its ability to acquire, track and destroy live targets using simulated PAC-3 hit-to-kill missiles.
The selected mission scenario for the demonstration involved MEADS defending against multiple targets, and an injected tactical ballistic missile target. MEADS successfully identified the ballistic missile and hostile aircraft from the multiple target set, which included non-combatant aircraft, and engaged and destroyed the threats.
MEADS, under development by Germany, Italy and the United States, includes a lightweight launcher, 360-degree fire control and surveillance radars and plug-and-fight battle management command and control abilities not found in current systems. With its enhanced mobility and advanced technologies, MEADS will offer warfighters significant improvements over existing systems.
Following the final system demonstration, visitors from sponsoring defense agencies in Germany, Italy and the United States were invited to witness three principal activities: roll-on and roll-off of the MEADS launcher demonstrator into and out of a C-130J transport aircraft; operation and performance of the MEADS prototype Multifunction Fire Control Radar (MFCR) using its 360-degree rotation capabilities; and a full end-to-end operational demonstration of the system. The final system demonstration satisfied the final technical requirement of the MEADS risk reduction contract.
"This successful final system demonstration is a result of the dedication, perseverance and abilities of an outstanding group of professionals from Germany, Italy and the United States who comprise the MEADS International team," said MI president Jim Cravens.
"Their efforts have proven that a 21st Century air and missile defense system design is feasible, and will lead to an open architecture system that can be tailored with varying sensors and shooters to meet specific mission needs.
"Our distinguished visitors witnessed a successful demonstration of MEADS prototype hardware, software and systems integration products in a comprehensive proof-of-principle operation. This achievement significantly reduces the technical risks associated with the next phase of MEADS -- design and development."
The primary requirement of the MEADS RRE contract was to demonstrate a prototype MEADS system that combines essential hardware, software and system integration elements. The final system demonstration successfully met the objective of demonstrating the full functionality of the MEADS fire control systems and its capability to control missile flight.
These demonstrations proved that the critical elements of the battle management, command, control, communications, computers and intelligence (BMC4I), and that the MFCR had been successfully developed and integrated with the PAC-3 missile. In addition, the demonstration verified BMC4I capability to control and display surveillance radar, MFCR and launcher functions.
"We are highly pleased that our integration efforts have come together so well," said MI chief engineer Pietro Ragonese. "You must appreciate that a share of this hardware and software work originated in each country, then a multinational team cooperated to complete the preliminary test effort here in Italy. Our technical success is a credit to their teamwork, and it demonstrates another requirement for success in the MEADS design and development phase."
"With the successful conclusion of this demonstration, MEADS International has also proved out the management systems that we will use during design and development," said MI Executive Vice President Dr. Axel Widera. "Not only have we shown that the technological approach to MEADS is solid, but we continue to demonstrate that we can work together successfully to develop MEADS on a shared basis."
MEADS is a mobile air defense system designed to replace Patriot systems in the United States and Germany and Nike Hercules systems in Italy. It also meets the requirements of Germany's "capabilities oriented" air defense concept.
MEADS incorporates the proven hit-to-kill PAC-3 missile in a system that includes surveillance and fire control sensors, battle management/communication centers and high firepower launchers. The system will combine superior operational capability with unprecedented flexibility, allowing it to protect maneuver forces and to provide homeland defense against tactical ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, unmanned aerial vehicles and aircraft.
MEADS will provide capabilities beyond any other fielded or planned air and missile defense system. It is easily deployed to a theater of operations and, once there, can keep pace with fast-moving maneuver forces.
When completed, MEADS will be the only air defense system able to roll off tactical transports with the troops and immediately begin operations. More importantly, its open architecture provides for 21st century air defense system-of-system integration capabilities that allow operational mission- tailoring for homeland defense or defense of maneuver forces. MEADS also provides greater firepower with less manpower than current systems, producing dramatic operation and support cost savings.
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Belgium pledges more troops for NATO in Afghanistan
Reuters
By Sayed Salahuddin
20 May 2004
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/ISL174453.htm
KABUL, May 20 (Reuters) - Belgium pledged on Thursday to send more troops to reinforce NATO-peacekeepers in Afghanistan, where growing attacks by remnants of the vanquished Taliban regime have raised fears over plans to hold landmark elections in September.
President Hamid Karzai, who met Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt at the presidential palace in Kabul, voiced determination to go ahead with presidential and parliamentary elections -- though he has already put them off once from June.
"The enemies of Afghanistan will try very, very hard to make it difficult for the Afghan people to have elections," Karzai told a joint news conference.
"But we will go ahead," he said, adding that Afghans were "adamant to have elections conducted on time in September". Taliban guerrillas have already claimed responsibility for several attacks on officials trying to register voters, including the killing this month of two British security contractors employed by the United Nations.
Verhofstadt said the number of Belgian peacekeepers in the NATO-led forces would be doubled to 600 ahead of the polls, making his country one of the first to answer a call by Washington to help shoulder the burden.
More than 6,500 foreign peacekeepers are mostly stationed in Kabul, in the first major deployment of NATO troops outside the alliance's traditional areas of influence.
Karzai and aid agencies have repeatedly asked for the expansion of NATO-led peacekeeping operations beyond the capital, not only to counter the Taliban, but also to weaken regional warlords grip over parts of the strife torn country.
In addition, the United States and its allies have about 20,000 troops hunting for al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and his followers, along with the Taliban who protected them until the U.S.-led invasion in late 2001.
Verhofstadt said proposals to send more troops to Afghanistan would be on NATO's agenda when members of the military alliance meet next month in Istanbul.
"We need really to help you to stabilise the situation and to help you to organise the elections in the next months," Verhofstadt said.
"It is not only a question of stability of Afghanistan, it is also a question of stability and the fight against terrorism everywhere in the world."
U.S. Ambassador to NATO Nicholas Burns last month named Spain, Turkey and Germany among 10 NATO allies who had "excess troop capacity" that could help relieve the alliance's stretched forces in Afghanistan.
Karzai, who was backed by Washington after Afghanistan's former Taliban rulers were put to flight in late 2001, is expected to contest and win the presidential election.
-------- prisoners of war
Sergeant Says Intelligence Directed Abuse
By Josh White and Scott Higham
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41035-2004May19.html
Military intelligence officers at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq directed military police to take clothes from prisoners, leave detainees naked in their cells and make them wear women's underwear, part of a series of alleged abuses that were openly discussed at the facility, according to a military intelligence soldier who worked at the prison last fall.
Sgt. Samuel Provance said intelligence interrogators told military police to strip down prisoners and embarrass them as a way to help "break" them. The same interrogators and intelligence analysts would talk about the abuse with Provance and flippantly dismiss it because the Iraqis were considered "the enemy," he said.
The first military intelligence soldier to speak openly about alleged abuse at Abu Ghraib, Provance said in a telephone interview from Germany yesterday that the highest-ranking military intelligence officers at the prison were involved and that the Army appears to be trying to deflect attention away from military intelligence's role.
Since the abuse at Abu Ghraib became public, senior Pentagon officials have characterized the interrogation techniques as the willful actions of a small group of soldiers and a failure of leadership by their commander. Provance's comments challenge that, and attorneys for accused soldiers allege that the techniques were directed by military intelligence officials.
In an interview, Brig. Gen. Janis L. Karpinski, the commander of U.S. detention facilities in Iraq at the time of the alleged abuse, claimed that military intelligence imposed its authority so fully that she eventually had limited access to the interrogation facilities. And an attorney for one of the soldiers accused of abuse said yesterday that the Army has rejected his request for an independent inquiry, which could block potentially crucial information about involvement of military intelligence, the CIA and the FBI from being revealed.
Provance was part of that military intelligence operation but was not an interrogator. He said he administered a secret computer network at Abu Ghraib for about six months and did not witness abuse. But Provance said he had numerous discussions with members of the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade about their tactics in the prison. He also maintains he voiced his disapproval as early as last October.
"Military intelligence was in control," Provance said. "Setting the conditions for interrogations was strictly dictated by military intelligence. They weren't the ones carrying it out, but they were the ones telling the MPs to wake the detainees up every hour on the hour" or limiting their food.
The 205th Military Intelligence Brigade's top officers have declined to comment publicly, not answering repeated phone calls and e-mail messages. Provance, a member of the 302nd Military Intelligence Battalion's A Company, signed a nondisclosure agreement at his base in Germany on Friday. But he said he wanted to discuss Abu Ghraib because he believes that the intelligence community is covering up the abuses. He also spoke to ABC News on Sunday for a program that was to air last night.
Provance was interviewed by Maj. Gen. George R. Fay -- who is looking into the military intelligence community's role in the abuse -- and testified at an Article 32 hearing, the military equivalent of a pretrial hearing, for one of the MPs this month. But Provance said Fay was interested only in what military police had done, asking no questions about military intelligence.
Gary R. Myers, a civilian lawyer representing one of seven MPs charged in the alleged abuse, Staff Sgt. Ivan L. "Chip" Frederick II, said his client does not claim he was ordered to abuse detainees, just that military intelligence outlined what should be done and then left it up to the MPs.
"My guy is simply saying that these activities were encouraged" by military intelligence, Myers said yesterday. "The story is not necessarily that there was a direct order. Everybody is far too subtle and smart for that. . . . Realistically, there is a description of an activity, a suggestion that it may be helpful and encouragement that this is exactly what we needed."
Myers says he fears that officials are covering up the involvement of senior military officers, and that military officials have dissected the investigation into several separate inquiries run by people who have potential conflicts of interest. Earlier this month Myers asked Lt. Gen. Thomas F. Metz, commander of the Army's III Corps in Iraq, to order a special "court of inquiry" to offer an outside, unbiased look at the scandal, as was done when a U.S. Navy submarine collided with a Japanese fishing boat near Hawaii in 2001.
In a short letter dated May 5, Metz declined. Provance said when he arrived at Abu Ghraib last September, the place was bordering on chaos. Soldiers did not wear their uniforms, instead just donning brown shirts. They were all on a first-name basis. People came and went.
Within days -- about the time Maj. Gen. Geoffrey D. Miller paid a visit to the facility and told Karpinski, the commanding officer, that he wanted to "Gitmo-ize" the place -- money began pouring in, and many more interrogators streamed to the site. More prisoners were also funneled to the facility. Provance said officials from "Gitmo" -- the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba -- arrived to increase the pressure on detainees and streamline interrogation efforts.
"The operation was snowballing," Provance said. "There were more and more interrogations. The chain of command was putting a lot of resources into the facility."
Even Karpinski, who commanded the facility as the head of the 800th MP Brigade, had to knock on a plywood door to gain access to the interrogation wing. She said that she had no idea what was going on there, and that the MPs who were handpicked to "enhance the interrogation effort" were essentially beyond her reach and unable to discuss their mission.
It was about that same time that Karpinski felt that high-ranking generals were trying to separate military intelligence away from Abu Ghraib and the military police operation, so it would be even more secluded and secret. Karpinski said in a recent interview that she visited three sites in and around Baghdad with military intelligence officials who were scouting a new compound.
"They continued to move me farther and farther away from it," Karpinski said. "They weren't extremely happy with Abu Ghraib. They wanted their own compound."
-------- spies
Iraq's Chalabi, former Pentagon protege, splits with US allies
BAGHDAD (AFP)
May 20, 2004
http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040520200320.04mk7hr1.html
Ahmed Chalabi, who Thursday cut ties with the US-led coalition in Iraq, was a long-time Pentagon protege whose intelligence reports bolstered Washington's claims that Saddam Hussein stockpiled weapons of mass destruction.
Chalabi, who amassed a banking fortune and was convicted in absentia by Jordan for fraud, has been increasingly critical of US policy in Iraq as Washington has gradually distanced itself from him.
The prominent Shiite has recently come under the US microscope over claims his Iraqi National Congress (INC) party fed false information to the US government and media before the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
US Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said Wednesday the Pentagon had halted its monthly payments of 340,000 dollars to Chalabi's party and would seek other intelligence sources on Iraq.
The scion of a wealthy banking clan, Chalabi cosied up to US Vice President Dick Cheney and to influential hawks at the Pentagon, despite his dubious record in Jordan, becoming a leading light in the exiled Iraqi political opposition.
Born in 1945, the Ahmed was 13 years old when his family fled Iraq after the 1958 revolution deposed the British-controlled King Faisal II.
Chalabi, with degrees from the University of Chicago and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has lived more time in London and the United States than in his native Iraq.
His life in relative luxury abroad has been used as a prime argument by his detractors who say he lacks a solid power base in Iraq.
In 1992, he tried to unite Arab Shiites, Sunnis and Iraqi Kurds under his INC banner.
From a base in Iraqi Kurdistan he enjoyed a large degree of autonomy and, backed by the Central Intelligence Agency, he engineered an uprising against Saddam in 1995. The operation failed and the CIA dumped him.
By 1998, his political networking became successful enough to persuade former US president Bill Clinton's administration to list "regime change" in Iraq as one of its objectives, paving the way towards the 2003 war.
In 1992, he was sentenced to 22 years in prison in bsentia Jordan for fraud after his Petra Bank folded, bankrupt 12 years after he set it up.
Chalabi has dismissed the case as a conspiracy orchestrated by the Saddam regime, the Jordanian government and Mohammed Said Nabulsi, head of the Jordanian central bank.
Two of his brothers, implicated in the liquidation of other financial institutions and suspected of having a hand in the Petra case, were found guilty of fraud in Switzerland in September 2000.
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Pentagon investigates 'brutal' deaths of 5 Iraqi prisoners
Report: 75 cases of Iraqi prisoner abuse being examined
csmonitor.com
by Tom Regan
May 20, 2004
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0520/dailyUpdate.html
The Denver Post reported Wednesday that Pentagon records show "brutal interrogation techniques" used by US military personnel are being investigated in the deaths of five Iraqi prisoners who were held in war zone detention camps. The Post says the details of the deaths of the prisoners provide the "clearest view" yet of the kind of tactics used to "coax secrets from Iraqis."
The deaths include the killing in November of a high-level Iraqi general who was shoved into a sleeping bag and suffocated, according to the Pentagon report. The documents contradict an earlier Defense Department statement that said the general died "of natural causes" during an interrogation. Pentagon officials declined to comment on the new disclosure. Another Iraqi military officer, records show, was asphyxiated after being gagged, his hands tied to the top of his cell door. Another detainee died "while undergoing stress technique interrogation," involving smothering and "chest compressions," according to the documents.
Documents obtained during the Post's investigation show that 75 allegations of prisoner abuse are being investigated in Iraq - more than twice as many as previously reported. Twenty-seven of those allegations involve the death of a prisoner, and eight of those 27 are "believed to be homocides."
ABC News reported Tuesday that a former US intelligence staffer at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad says the Army concealed its involvement in abuse scandal. "There's definitely a cover-up," the witness, Sgt. Samuel Provance, said. "People are either telling themselves or being told to be quiet." The Washington Post reports that Sgt. Provance ran a top secret computer network at the Iraqi prison. While Provance did not see any of the alleged abuse take place, he said military interrogators talked freely about the tactics they used.
According to Provance, some of the physical abuse that took place at Abu Ghraib included US soldiers "striking [prisoners] on the neck area somewhere and the person being knocked out. Then [the soldier] would go to the next detainee, who would be very fearful and voicing their fear, and the MP would calm him down and say, 'We're not going to do that. It's OK. Everything's fine,' and then do the exact same thing to him." Provance also described an incident when two drunken interrogators took a female Iraqi prisoner from her cell in the middle of the night and stripped her naked to the waist. The men were later restrained by another MP.
Provance is also concerned about the possibility of being punished by military authorities for being honest and reporting the abuse. He said that if he had pretended that he had seen nothing, as many other have, his life would be "just fine right now."
An editorial in The Christian Science Monitor, however, says it important for people like Provance, and Army Reserve Spc. Joseph Darby, who first brought the allegations of abuse at Abu Ghraib to the military authorities, to show this kind of "moral courage."
Moral courage derives its strength from the ability to not just have values, but to practice and live them. When values get turned into action, mountains can be moved. Luminaries such as Nelson Mandela and Vaclav Havel have proven that, but so have everyday individuals like Darby, as well as three soldiers in the Abu Ghraib prison who actually refused to go along with the abuse, or tried to stop it, despite the threat of ridicule and court-martial.
Top US commanders acknowledged Wednesday that US military doctrine for imprisoning and interrogating prisoners is "flawed, confusing and desperately in need of fixing." Gen. John Abizaid, top US military commander in Iraq, told a US Senate Committee investigating the abuse of Iraqi prisoners that "our doctrine is not right." Newsday reports that Gen. Abizaid, who was accompanied by Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, commander of US-led coalition forces in Iraq, and Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who is in charge of US-run prisons in Iraq, denied authorizing "brutal" interrogation techniques, and said that reports from the Red Cross about these tactics "never reached him."
But the New York Times reported Tuesday that Army officials in Iraq responded late last year to a Red Cross report of abuses at Abu Ghraib by trying to curtail the international agency's spot inspections of the prison. The Times says Tuesday the information came from a senior Army officer who served in Iraq.
Meanwhile, the Red Cross said Wednesday that it is still worried about the conditions at Abu Ghraib. The Evening Standard of London reports that conditions have improved since the Red Cross's highly critical February report detailed a catalogue of "unacceptable" practices. But delegates who visited the prison in March demanded further measures to meet the Geneva Conventions, said Red Cross director of operations Pierre Kraehenbuehl.
"We felt that some of the findings and recommendations that we submitted have been taken seriously, that on some issues corrective measures were taken but they remained areas of concern for which we did request further measures to be taken and would continue to look at and follow up visits regularly."
The Red Cross says it wants to return to visit Abu Ghraib again, but the security situation in Baghdad has caused to a delay.
The Shanghai Daily reports that the head of the Washington office of the Red Cross has resigned for "personal reasons." Sources in the community of non-governmentl organizations that work with the Red Cross said they believed Christophe Girod was unhappy with his own organization and with the US government. "My reading of it is that he felt they (the Red Cross) should have gone public with their report. He never told me he was quitting, but I think he was very upset about the situation,"one source said.
Lt. Col. Gordon Cucullu, a former Army Green Beret, writes in FrontPageMag.com that it is critical to acknowledge that as "ugly as this incident may turn out to be it is strictly that: an aberration, an anomaly in the way American soldiers conduct themselves." Lt. Col. Cucullu says that we don't need to be worry so much about the "good will" of the Arab street (which he says is almost non-existent anyway) but need to focus on the long term.
Meanwhile, we have our own house cleaning to do. While we go about it, it may be necessary to remind everyone, we are still fighting a war against worldwide terrorism. We need to fix what is broken but keep focused on the ultimate mission of defeating the terrorists.
But Stuart Taylor asks in The National Journal if it is necessary for us to become "like the barbarians" in order to save ourselves. And he writes that the stage for the brutality of Abu Ghraib may have been set by the White House's negative attitude towards international law.
But the Bush-Rumsfeld presumption that our prisoners (at least those at Guantanamo) are guilty until proven innocent may have been seen by some as a green light for indiscriminate brutalization of any and all prisoners who might possibly be terrorists. No cause-and-effect connection has been established, and the military's written interrogation rules for Iraq do require high-level authorization for the tougher techniques. But the signals from the commander-in-chief have surely communicated little respect for international law or for the presumption of innocence.
And columnist Barbara Ehrenreich writes at Alternet.org that the photos of abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib by US military personnel had another effect: the end of the feminist idea that women are somehow morally superior to men.
What we have learned from Abu Ghraib, once and for all, is that a uterus is not a substitute for a conscience. This doesn't mean gender equality isn't worth fighting for its own sake. It is. If we believe in democracy, then we believe in a woman's right to do and achieve whatever men can do and achieve, even the bad things. It's just that gender equality cannot, all alone, bring about a just and peaceful world.
Finally, after months of saying that the security situation in Iraq would improve after the handover of power from the US-led coalition to Iraqi authorities on June 30, the US is now saying the level of violence in Iraq might actually get worse. The Associated Press reports that President Bush on Wednesday acknowledged that Iraq could remain dangerous and unstable after the transfer of political power. Earlier this month, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld had said that the current high level of violence could continue until December of this year, or longer. Gen. Abizaid also said Wednsday that he would need more troops in Iraq after the handover to maintain security.
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Reuters Stands by Iraq Abuse Reports, Releases Timeline on Incident
editorandpublisher.com)
By Greg Mitchell
May 20, 2004
http://199.249.170.220/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000515956
NEW YORK Despite official military statements denying any wrongdoing -- and an announcement today that the case is "closed" -- Reuters is standing by allegations that three of its employees were abused by U.S. soldiers while confined near Falluja in January.
A chronology produced by Reuters detailing events surrounding the alleged abuse of three of its staffers in Iraq, obtained by E&P today, appears to support the agency's contention that it has repeatedly pressed the military for a full and objective probe of this incident from the beginning, with sometimes disquieting results.
The detailed chronology reveals that the agency's Baghdad bureau chief, Andrew Marshall, received an e-mail from the military on Jan. 29 containing an executive summary of the U.S. investigation and its final results, which claimed no abuse of the staffers -- while the investigation, according to the Pentagon, was still underway. And none of the three Reuters detainees had been interviewed by the military.
The military said the summary had been sent in error, but when the final report was sent to Reuters nearly a month later, the executive summary had not changed.
On Wednesday, General Ricardo Sanchez reiterated his belief that the investigation of this case was "thorough" and he stood by the military's conduct in the matter. (The official military report on the incident was posted today at Raleigh's newsobserver.com.)
"Our investigation found no abuse of any kind," Maj. Jimmie Cummings, spokesman for the 82nd Airborne Division, which was responsible for detaining the Reuters' employees, told the Associated Press today. "This is a closed case."
Reuters told E&P today that it had "no reason to doubt" the testimony of its staffers.
Responding to questions about why Reuters seemingly "waited" until now to press this issue, Stephen Naru, Reuters' global head of media relations, said, "The suggestion that Reuters has not been prepared to go public on this story until now is just not true. Since the incident first occurred in early January, we have been open about and consistent in our efforts to secure a fair and independent investigation into the incident. ... Reuters took significant steps to provide information and evidence to the Pentagon and field commanders in this case. This includes testimonies of the three individuals, which we have no reason to doubt. These testimonials took place many months before any prisoner abuse claims became public.
"Suggestions that the three are motivated by 'anti-coalition' motives are totally unfounded. Given the awful experiences these individuals went through these kind of remarks are regrettable. Until the U.S. army takes the time to interview the three individuals as part of a thorough investigation it is not really in a position to evaluate the veracity of their evidence."
Here is the internal timeline, created by Reuters, and obtained by E&P, that details the agency's version of its reaction to the alleged abuse of its staffers in early January, and the response from the U.S. military since:
Jan. 2: First indication of detentions of three Iraqis working for Reuters and an Iraqi working for NBC in Falluja following the shooting down of a U.S. helicopter. Military spokesman Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt tells a Baghdad news briefing that "enemy personnel" posing as journalists had fired on U.S. forces and had later been detained. Baghdad bureau informs 82nd Airborne and other military personnel of identity and status of the detainees within first hours of their detentions.
Jan. 3-4: Baghdad Bureau Chief Andrew Marshall working with [Combined Joint Task Force] and [Coalition Provisional Authority] officials in Baghdad and 82nd in Falluja/Ramadi to try to secure employees' release.
Marshall and Baghdad office manager Khaled al-Ramahi travel to [Forward Operating Base]Volturno near Falluja but are not allowed inside and not allowed to see the detainees. Captain Ryan Deruoin tells Marshall outside the base that the detainees are well and are being properly treated.
Jan. 4: Marshall and NBC Bureau Chief Karl Bostic meet Kimmitt in Baghdad to seek releases. Kimmitt said the detainees would be released the following day.
Jan. 5: Marshall provides 82nd Airborne, at its request, with footage shot in Falluja on 2 Jan by Salem Ureibi. Footage is of worshippers in Falluja at Friday prayers at a mosque and demonstrates that there is no basis for U.S. assertion that Ureibi and others were seen in the area where the helicopter was shot down.
Jan. 5: Washington Bureau Chief Rob Doherty, Reuters Global Managing Editor David Schlesinger and Reuters Americas Television Editor John Clarke meet with [Chief Pentagon spokesman Lawrence] Di Rita and [Pentagon spokesman Bryan] Whitman at Pentagon. Detainees released shortly before meeting. Reuters party says it is seeking retraction of Kimmitt statement alleging "enemy personnel" posing as journalists fired on US forces.
Jan. 5: Reuters runs first story on the detainees.
Jan. 6: Reuters seeks clarification at a Baghdad press briefing on the statement about "enemy personnel posing as media."
Maj. Gen. Charles Swannack, [Commanding Officer] of 82nd Airborne, tells reporters in Baghdad the detainees had probably been in the wrong place at the wrong time and says there is no credible evidence they were involved in wrongdoing.
Jan. 8: Marshall obtains disturbing taped testimony from released three detainees detailing specifics of physical and emotional abuse. Schlesinger and Doherty meet Di Rita and Whitman again in order to detail abuse verbally and express Reuters concerns.
Jan. 9: Formal letter of complaint from Schlesinger to Gen. [Ricardo] Sanchez (copied to Paul Bremer) urging a full investigation, seeking retraction of the statement on "enemy personnel posing as media" and offering full assistance to the military to facilitate an investigation. Letter also raises Jan. 6 remarks by Kimmitt to Marshall and protests them.
Jan. 12: Reuters receives a response to its Jan. 9 letter from HQ 82nd Airborne, Ramadi, signed by Staff Judge Advocate Lt. Col. Thomas Ayres advising that Swannack has ordered a division-level investigation of the allegations by a field-grade officer. "In our view, evidence still exists for the U.S. to reasonably suspect these three individuals of involvement in the downing of the U.S. helicopter on January 2, 2004," the letter states, adding the three remain under investigation. The letter contains a request to Reuters to hand over all documents in its possession related to the incident, as well as employment records or contracts of the three. It is accompanied by a list of 25 questions to answer, relating to the three, their background, relationship with Reuters, work practices and "any indication at all of their leaning/feelings about the Coalition".
Jan. 16 Jan: Schlesinger responds to Lt. Col. Ayres. The 42-page reply answers the 25 questions, appends the Reuters Trust Principles and medical reports and provides full transcripts of the taped testimony of the three. It also offers to make available copies of the tapes of the testimony, video footage, cameras and other equipment. Letter says Reuters agrees that the military may conduct further interviews with the three, as well as question Reuters driver Alaa Noury, who witnessed the events, in the presence of Marshall.
Jan. 16: [Another] Reuters story about detainees and abuse.
Jan. 16: U.S. military press office in Baghdad releases statement announcing that Sanchez has ordered a criminal investigation into reported incidents of detainee abuse at an undisclosed Coalition detention facility in Iraq (the first word of events that would later be exposed at Abu Ghraib).
Jan. 23: Reuters outside counsel Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering writes to William (Jim) Haynes, [Department of Defense] General Counsel, about the Falluja abuse and suggesting that he may wish to take up the matter with Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz as "an institutional imperative".
Jan. 27 Schlesinger writes to Di Rita, copied to Sanchez and Bremer, noting it has been over three weeks since the detentions. Letter repeats call for a retraction or correction of the "enemy personnel" statement and for a full investigation into the treatment of the detainees, with all the evidence to be made available to Reuters. The letter states: "It has become clear that the military either does not yet appreciate the significance of the matters we have raised or -- even worse -- fully understands their seriousness but is deliberately attempting to downplay them or ignore them."
Jan. 27: Reuters issues a press release and story on the letter and the news agency's concerns at the apparent lack of action.
Jan. 29: Marshall in Baghdad receives an e-mail from 82nd [Public Affairs Officer] Cpt. Tammy Galloway containing an unclassified executive summary of the military investigation and its results. Galloway then again contacts by e-mail Marshall asking to "recall" the document. In subsequent e-mail exchanges, she advises first that the document was sent in error, then states that it was sent prematurely. She then says it is not intended for public use.
Simultaneously, Sanchez tells a news conference in Baghdad in response to questions from a Reuters reporter that the investigation should be completed within a week and "is right on the verge of being released".
Jan. 29: Schlesinger writes to Di Rita about receipt of the executive summary and requesting an urgent telephone conversation to ascertain whether the executive summary is the final word. Letter states, among other criticisms of the investigation, that the military's failure to interview the staff detained raises questions about its seriousness and credibility.
Feb. 3: Schlesinger receives a fax ... from Whitman ... The Whitman fax says the Pentagon takes the matter seriously, is "looking into each of your requests" and will respond shortly. Around the same time, Kimmitt tells a Reuters reporter at a news briefing in Baghdad that "most of the conclusions" of the investigation have already come out in the executive summary. Schlesinger again contacts Whitman by e-mail asking how the two assertions can be reconciled and follows up with a message to Whitman's Blackberry seeking an urgent conversation and advising that Reuters intends to go public with its concerns.
Feb. 3: In light of Kimmitt's comments, Schlesinger sends a letter to Di Rita, copied to Bremer, Sanchez, Haynes and Whitman about Reuters concerns with the investigation and advising that Reuters intends to issue a press statement about those concerns. The letter describes the investigation as "woefully inadequate" and criticizes gratuitous speculative conclusions in the summary that two of the detainees may have purposefully exaggerated their allegations for anti-coalition purposes. It repeats earlier criticisms of its conduct and demands a reopening of the investigation in a more thorough and objective manner at senior levels in the DoD.
The letter also states: "Moreover, many of the allegations are startlingly similar to allegations made by detainees at other U.S.-controlled facilities, and there is no indication that our staff were aware of these reports."
Feb. 3: Whitman calls Schlesinger soon after the Reuters story runs. According to Schlesinger's, note, Whitman says he has contacted Kimmitt, who advised him that while the executive summary contained "conclusions" the investigation had not been completed and the outcome needed to be vetted by the chain of command. Schlesinger quotes Whitman as telling him that "Mr. Di Rita, Larry, is very adamant to getting to the bottom of this ... Those are appalling allegations that we take very seriously." Whitman adds: "Regardless of what has been provided you to date, we don't consider this a closed matter by any means."
Feb 20: Marshall receives e-mail from Major Harper of the 82nd Airborne with the same executive summary sent to him "prematurely" on Jan. 29. Harper characterizes the attachment as the "final executive summary," implying the 82nd considers the investigation closed.
Feb. 20: Schlesinger speaks with Whitman about the Harper e-mail and the Dana report. On Falluja, Schlesinger minutes Whitman as telling him off the record: "This does not sufficiently address the issues you have raised and we know that." Schlesinger quotes Whitman as saying Sanchez himself is involved in the issue now and he and Sanchez have discussed it. Whitman said the e-mail represented the fact that the 82nd has finished its work, but now Sanchez was looking into the issue. "I'm confident this will work faster than your other issues," Whitman said.
Feb. 23: U.S. Army announces that 17 military personnel have been suspended pending investigations into reports of the mistreatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib. Reuters story also refers to investigations into the treatment of the Falluja detainees.
March 11: Reuters CEO Tom Glocer and Schlesinger visit Pentagon to meet Di Rita and Whitman ... Schlesinger minutes quote Di Rita as saying that the Sanchez investigation into Falluja is "nearly complete". (Note this is SIX days after the date on the letter we ultimately received from Sanchez declaring the matter closed.)
March 20: Kimmitt announces that six soldiers have been charged with offences stemming from the alleged abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib. "The coalition takes all reports of detainee abuse seriously and all allegations of mistreatment are investigated. We are committed to treating all persons under coalition control with dignity, respect and humanity," Kimmit says. Reuters story makes reference to the Falluja detainees.
April 28: CBS "60 Minutes II" airs graphic photographs of prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib, triggering widespread international condemnation and a crisis in the U.S. military.
May 2: Schlesinger resends his Feb. 3 letter to Di Rita. In a cover e-mail, Schlesinger states: "In light of the recent reports and pictures detailing the conditions for some prisoners held by the U.S. military in Abu Ghraib, I think it is imperative that our staffs' complaints, which were independent of and predate the current public reports, be reviewed thoroughly, objectively and with a new view towards their veracity."
May 12: Marshall advises the Reuters Iraq Security Group in an e-mail of his view that Reuters should consider another statement and story if the May 2 e-mail/letter to Di Rita fails to elicit a response. He advises that the Reuters detainees may want to go public.
May 14: Doherty speaks by telephone to Whitman to press for a report on the detentions and a response to Schlesinger's May 2 e-mail/letter. Whitman tells Doherty that he had been advised by CJTF-7 that a response from Sanchez had been sent to Reuters several weeks earlier. Doherty again advises Whitman that no correspondence has been received. Whitman says he has requested a copy of the Sanchez letter and is awaiting it.
May 17: Marshall e-mails [Political and General News Editor Paul] Holmes and [Middle East and Africa Editor Barry] Moody informing them that the Reuters detainees are now prepared to go public with specific details of the abuse and requesting advice on how to proceed. Holmes and Moody advise they support issuing a story on news grounds.
May 17: Whitman e-mails [Washington Bureau Chief Rob] Doherty a copy of the Sanchez letter, dated March 5. The Sanchez letter, addressed to Schlesinger, states that the general is confident the investigation was thorough and objective and that its conclusions, clearing military personnel of any wrongful conduct, was sound. Iraq Security Group decides to go ahead with story detailing the abuse.
May 18: Reuters issues story, bylined Andrew Marshall in Baghdad, detailing the abuse. An [update] to the story quotes Di Rita as saying: "The commander in Iraq reviewed the investigation in this matter and was persuaded that it was thorough and appropriate. Should there be new information provided sufficient to cause reconsideration of these particular allegations, such information would be reviewed and acted upon as appropriate."
May 19: Reuters issues story, bylined Vicki Allen in Washington, detailing General Sanchez's defense of the investigation. He tells reporters: "My belief is that the investigations that were conducted as a result of those allegations were thorough and the decisions were made at that time." Sanchez spoke to reporters after testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee.
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Soldier Gets 1 Year In Abuse of Iraqis
'I Let Everybody Down,' He Says After Guilty Plea
By Jackie Spinner
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A38672-2004May19?language=printer
BAGHDAD, May 19 -- An Army judge sentenced Spec. Jeremy C. Sivits to one year in prison Wednesday for his role in abusing Iraqis at Abu Ghraib prison, closing out the first prosecution of an American in the scandal. Sivits, who provided a detailed account of the mistreatment he witnessed, tearfully apologized in court to the Iraqi people and the victims, saying: "I let everybody down."
Sivits was sentenced after pleading guilty to four criminal counts and agreeing to testify against six other accused Americans.
About 150 angry Iraqis rallied near the makeshift military courtroom, denouncing as a whitewash the start of a judicial process that U.S. officials have said they hoped would demonstrate their resolve to punish all Americans who committed crimes in the prison and mollify widespread Arab anger.
During a four-hour hearing, Sivits testified that he witnessed repeated acts of violence the night of Nov. 8 when he was summoned to help fellow members of the 372nd Military Police Company receive custody of seven Iraqi inmates.
Sivits, who was a mechanic attached to the company and not a prison guard, told the court that during a 30-minute period, he saw military police officers from the unit stomp on the toes and fingers of a pile of detainees, strip them of their blue and orange jumpsuits and civilian clothes and force them to simulate and perform sexual acts with one another. He said the soldiers also hit two prisoners, one so hard that he blacked out.
Answering a question from the judge, Col. James Pohl, Sivits said he did not know why the soldiers had behaved the way they had. But Sivits said a person present that night told him that members of U.S. military intelligence had encouraged them to "keep doing what they were doing to the inmates because it was working. They were talking." Sivits said he did not believe that was true.
The basics of Sivits's allegations had become public through statements he made to investigators. But his testimony Wednesday presented a lengthy start-to-finish description of behavior in one of the cellblocks where the photos now known around the world were taken.
Three other members of his unit were arraigned Wednesday in the same courtroom before his hearing. Three others have been charged, but their cases have not been referred to courts-martial.
Sivits broke down on the stand repeatedly. "I'd like to apologize to the Iraqi people and to those detainees," he said. "I let everybody down. I should have protected those detainees that night.
"You have to stand up for what's right," he told the court. "You can't let people abuse people like that. It was wrong. It shouldn't have happened."
With members of the news media, some from Arab countries, looking on, Sivits, 24, pleaded guilty to dereliction of duty and three other counts related to failure to stop the abuse and to taking a photograph of the abuse that night.
Sivits begged the judge not to expel him from the Army. Breaking down in tears, the defendant said: "I want to stay in. I love the Army. It's all I wanted to be, an American soldier."
But in sentencing Sivits to a year of confinement, Pohl ordered that he be discharged from the Army for bad conduct and that his rank be reduced to private.
Under a deal with prosecutors, Sivits agreed to testify against six other soldiers in exchange for what is known as a special court-martial, which carries a maximum one-year jail sentence.
Photographs of abuse at the prison have prompted at least five military investigations and congressional probes of the U.S. military's prison and military intelligence operations. Officials have promised to determine how high up the chain of command people were aware of the behavior.
The uproar has created new tensions for U.S. occupation officials preparing to return limited authority to Iraqis at the end of next month.
Outside the courtroom at the Baghdad Convention Center, about 150 people marched up traffic-clogged Shawaf Street at 11 a.m. toward the complex where the court-martial was in session. Shopkeepers and tea vendors watched as the crowd, led by drummers and a horn player, passed waving a series of banners.
"A Public Trial Against Those Who Committed Crimes Against Detainees Is a Just Demand for All Iraqis," read one. Another said: "We Reject Mass Arrests."
Aloft at the head of the column bobbed the now famous picture of Pfc. Lynndie R. England, an Iraqi prisoner at her feet attached to a dog leash in her hand. Under the close watch of U.S. soldiers on rooftops and checkpoints, the protesters demonstrated peacefully in an intersection at the entrance to the convention center for nearly an hour.
"We have to protest against the terrorist ways the Americans use against the prisoners," said Abdul Razzaq Helfi, a poet and member of the Nasserite Socialist Party. "We'll demonstrate until the torture and oppression in the prisons ends."
Bakhtiar Amin, Iraq's new human rights minister, attended Sivits's court-martial with the new president of the Iraqi Governing Council, Ghazi Yawar, Interior Minister Samir Shakir Mahmoud Sumaidy and Dara Noureddine, a prominent Iraqi judge and council member.
Amin said he was pleased that the court-martial was public. "This is a very good sign," he said. "This is an awful crime, and I condemn it firmly. All we asked is these are tried in a fair manner, that the victims . . . are seen as if they were American citizens."
The three other soldiers arraigned Wednesday were Spec. Charles A. Graner Jr., Staff Sgt. Ivan L. Frederick and Sgt. Javal S. Davis. They appeared in court one after the other but declined through their military attorneys to enter pleas. Pohl set pre-trial hearings on June 21 for all three.
England and Specs. Sabrina D. Harman and Megan M. Ambuhl have been charged but have not been referred to a court-martial. Sivits's account alleges wrongdoing by the other defendants except for Ambuhl.
Sivits testified Wednesday that the 372nd had been assigned to Abu Ghraib for about a month when the abuse took place, but up until that time he had had no contact with the prisoners because he was not a guard.
On the night of Nov. 8, he said, the guards were processing seven detainees who had been sent from another part of the prison for allegedly taking part in a riot.
He said he was relaxing in the common area when Frederick asked him to follow him to the prison so they could continue a conversation. It was then that Frederick asked whether he would like to escort one of the detainees to another tier, and he said yes.
As he led the hooded but still clothed detainee by the arm, Sivits said, he rounded a corner and saw a pile of prisoners on the floor. He said England and Davis were stomping on the prisoners' feet and hands.
At some point, Sivits said, a platoon sergeant called down for Davis to stop. "That's enough," the sergeant yelled out. Davis left the room then. Sivits said Harman later wrote "rapeist" on the leg of one of the detainees.
After the prisoners were stripped, Sivits said, England pointed at and made fun of their genitals.
In another incident, Sivits said he saw Frederick strike a detainee in the chest so hard that someone had to get an inhaler to help the man breathe.
Sivits choked up as he recounted how he told the prisoner to watch his chest and imitate his own calm breathing. Sivits said a medic checked the man and said he was fine.
Later, Sivits said, Graner punched a prisoner in the head and complained his wrist hurt. "I told Corporal Graner, I said, 'I think you might have knocked this guy out.' "
Sivits said he watched as the soldiers put the detainees into a pyramid. He acknowledged photographing Graner kneeling on prisoners with his arm cocked back as if about to strike one.
"It was bad enough," he said in court. "They were embarrassed to be in there, what we were doing to them. They didn't see the picture, but they could hear the click and see the flash through the sandbags" that covered their heads.
Sivits said he left when Frederick and Graner forced the prisoners to masturbate. After hearing the account, Yawar and Sumaidy left the courtroom.
"When that started, I had enough and left," Sivits said.
As he was leaving the area, Sivits said, Frederick called out to him: "You didn't see" anything.
Correspondent Scott Wilson and special correspondent Naseer Nouri contributed to this report.
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THE COURT-MARTIAL
G.I. Pleads Guilty in Court-Martial for Iraqis' Abuse
May 20, 2004
By DEXTER FILKINS
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/20/international/middleeast/20TRIA.html?pagewanted=all&position=
BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 19 - Specialist Jeremy C. Sivits, a soldier from a small Pennsylvania town who said he walked in on an orgy of abuse at Abu Ghraib prison and snapped a photograph of it, pleaded guilty Wednesday for his role in humiliating Iraqi detainees.
He was demoted, sentenced to a year in prison and ordered expelled from the Army.
In an agreement reached with the court, Specialist Sivits, 24, agreed to testify against other soldiers in the case, those accused of beating and torturing Iraqi prisoners.
Specialist Sivits pleaded guilty to four charges, including dereliction of duty, stemming from an incident on Nov. 8 in which prisoners were stripped, hooded, beaten and forced into humiliating sexual positions.
His sentence was the harshest possible in a special court-martial; had he been tried in a general court-martial, the penalties could have been much harsher.
Specialist Sivits was not regarded as a primary instigator of the abuse. He was accused of escorting an Iraqi detainee to the cellblock where the mistreatment was occurring, handing him over to a group of soldiers as they violated other detainees and taking a photograph of a pile of naked and hooded Iraqi men.
His court-martial, carried out deep inside the American compound here and in full view of the Arab press, was the first case in which an American soldier involved in the abuse was convicted and sentenced.
More trials are on the way: three of the principal figures in the scandal, Sgt. Javal S. Davis, Staff Sgt. Ivan L. Frederick II and Specialist Charles A. Graner Jr., were arraigned Wednesday on charges stemming from their suspected abuse of Iraqi prisoners and face general courts-martial.
They postponed entering pleas, indicating that they intend to mount defenses.
Fighting back tears, Specialist Sivits pleaded with the Iraqi people and his comrades in the Army to forgive him, saying he had made a terrible mistake in failing to stop the abuse he saw unfolding that night in November. He told the judge, Col. James Pohl, that he regarded himself as a good solider, a small-town innocent thrust into the horrific confines of Abu Ghraib.
"I would like to apologize to the Iraqi people and to the detainees," Specialist Sivits said in a heavy drawl. "I want to apologize to the Army, to my unit, to the country. I want to apologize to my family. I let everybody down. This is not me. I should have protected the detainees. I shouldn't have taken that picture. I've learned a huge lesson: You have to stand up for what is right."
Specialist Sivits choked several times when he begged Judge Pohl to let him stay in the Army, to spare him what he regarded as a single transgression in an otherwise admirable career as a reservist.
"I love the Army," Specialist Sivits said from the witness stand. "I love the flag. All I ever wanted was to be an American soldier. I want to stay in. I think I can teach other soldiers the difference between right and wrong. I am truly sorry. I am truly sorry for what I did."
Unlike the other soldiers charged so far, Specialist Sivits was not a military policeman. He was a mechanic at the prison, servicing gasoline-powered generators. But he said that at least one of the soldiers whom he saw abusing Iraqis told him that the group had been instructed by military intelligence officers, commonly known as M.I., to abuse Iraqi prisoners to enhance the chances for a successful interrogation.
"They told me later they were asked to do this," Specialist Sivits said.
"Who told you that?" Judge Pohl asked.
"One of the six," Specialist Sivits replied, referring to six of the soldiers who he said were abusing Iraqis that night. "They told me they were told by M.I. to keep doing what they were doing. It was working. They were talking."
Specialist Sivits painted especially grim portraits of Sergeant Frederick and Specialist Graner, who he said savagely beat or humiliated the naked prisoners, often laughing as they did so. As Specialist Sivits left the scene of the abuse, he said Sergeant Frederick made it clear to him that he should keep his mouth shut.
Specialist Sivits did keep quiet, deciding against reporting what he witnessed to his superiors, and waiting until he was approached by investigators to tell his story.
For all the day's drama, the court-martial went largely unnoticed by ordinary Iraqis. The 40 or so people who filled the front rows were nearly all American soldiers. Armed guards lined the walls. In the rear sat about 35 reporters, about a third of whom were from Iraq and other Arab countries. No cameras were allowed inside, nor any tape recorders.
Of all the witnesses who took the stand Wednesday, none were Iraqi.
Among the handful of Iraqis present were Samir Shakir Mahmoud Sumaidy, Iraq's interior minister, and Sheikh Ghazi Ajil al-Yawar, a member of the American-appointed Iraqi Governing Council who took over as president after the assassination of Ezzedine Salim on Monday.
"I think this could have been seen on television," said Baktiar Amin, the Iraqi Human Rights Minister.
Mr. Amin, who described the crimes committed by Americans at Abu Ghraib as "awful, horrible," recalled that much greater ones had been carried out by Iraqis in the same prison under Saddam Hussein. Mr. Amin mentioned one incident that took place in the 1980's, in which, he said, 281 Iraqi Shiites were shot to death in the camp for complaining about the conditions.
"There are no images of this," Mr. Amin said, referring to the massacre. "That there can be a trial for criminals who perpetrate these kinds of things is new in this country. It's a lesson in democracy."
Outside the courtroom, about 100 Iraqis gathered, with one holding a large photograph showing one of the accused, Pfc. Lynndie R. England, leading a naked inmate on a leash.
In describing the abuse at Abu Ghraib, Specialist Sivits demonstrated his potential force as a prosecution witness. The prison, he said, was a nightmarish place: overcrowded, out of control and under constant attack.
"It was hell, it honestly was," he told the court. "We were being attacked by mortars, rockets and small arms. It was dark. The prison was overcrowded. It was like hell, sir."
Detail by detail, he took the courtroom audience through the night of Nov. 8, which began when Sergeant Frederick asked him to escort an Iraqi inmate to Cellblock 1.
When he got there, Specialist Sivits said, he found what amounted to a free-for-all abuse of prisoners. Some were lying naked on the floor, some were hooded; some were simulating oral sex.
In one corner, there was Private England, cigarette dangling from her mouth, posing in a now famous photo in front of a masturbating, hooded detainee. In another, there was Specialist Graner, Specialist Sivits said, punching an Iraqi detainee in the chest with a terrifying ferocity.
"After that, the detainee went down," Specialist Sivits said. "I think I he may have put him in cardiac arrest."
With that, Specialist Sivits began to fight back sobs.
"Excuse me," he said, gasping for breath.
"Take your time," Judge Pohl said.
Specialist Sivits said he was so concerned for the fallen Iraqi that he began taking exaggerated deep breaths, hoping the Iraqi prisoner would do likewise.
Judge Pohl actively questioned the defendant, prodding him to take responsibility for what he had done. One telling moment came when Specialist Sivits described one of the crimes for which he was charged, taking a photograph of Specialist Graner cradling an inmate's head while pretending to wind up for a punch.
"You knew it was wrong to treat people that way, didn't you?" the judge asked.
"Yes, Your Honor," Specialist Sivits replied.
"No doubt in your mind?" asked the judge.
"No doubt in my mind."
--------
Air Force Radios Jam Garage Door Openers
U.S. National
AP
Thu May 20
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=519&ncid=757&e=10&u=/ap/20040520/ap_on_re_us/brf_doors_jammed
EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. - A new military radio system is jamming remote-control garage doors in communities near this Florida Panhandle base.
During testing last week of the $5.5 million two-way radio system at Eglin, homeowners in Niceville, Valparaiso and the Crestview area reported that their garage door openers failed to work.
Air Force officials said Tuesday the contractor, Motorola Inc., will try to minimize the problem. Technicians will run the system at slightly different frequencies from those used by garage door openers when another test is conducted Friday through Monday.
"I want my garage door opener to work, too," said Col. Russell F. Miller, commander of the 96th Communication Group.
Lauren Van Wazer, a spokeswoman for the Federal Communication Commission, said if the Air Force has been running the system within its licensed frequencies - the Air Force said it has - then users of garage door openers may have to change theirs.
A similar radio system has been requested for Pensacola Naval Air Station and other nearby installations, according to a Navy spokesman.
-------
Military denies pattern
The Christian Science Monitor
By Peter Grier and Faye Bowers
May 20, 2004
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0520/p01s02-usmi.html
WASHINGTON - Abuse of prisoners happened - but it wasn't part of a pattern.
The Red Cross complained about it - but top US commanders didn't always see those reports.
Military intelligence was in charge of Abu Ghraib prison - but only for the purpose of defending it.
Those are among the key assertions of US military leaders. In Washington they are attempting the difficult task of limiting damage from a prison scandal that gets more complicated by the day - while at the same time convincing the US public and world at large that justice is being done.
"This is a huge policy challenge to the military leadership," says a retired high-ranking officer who requested anonymity.
At a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Wednesday the top commanders of troops in Iraq discussed the chain of responsibility for prison abuses in more detail than has previously been made public.
Gen. John Abizaid, head of US Central Command, told senators that systemic problems did contribute to the events at Abu Ghraib. In other words, the abuses can't all be blamed on a few rogue soldiers acting in the dead of night.
Further investigations are now underway, General Abizaid noted.
"We will follow the trail of evidence wherever it leads," he said.
On the other hand a probe launched in February by the Army's inspector general, Lt. Gen. Paul Mikolashek, found no pattern of abuse of prisoners held in Iraq and Afghanistan, said Abizaid. Instead, it found problems in training and organization for detention operations.
"There was also, clearly, criminal misconduct that took place, and that criminal misconduct is not the subject of any order or policy that I believe exists anywhere," said Abizaid.
At the same time, Abizaid and his fellow panel members struggled with an issue that has become hot in Washington in recent days: Red Cross reports complaining about prison conditions that were forwarded to US military commanders last year.
Senior US officials saw a Red Cross report detailing abuses at Abu Ghraib as early as last November, but didn't launch an investigation for months, according to published reports. Reportedly some officials went so far as to try to curtail Red Cross access to prisons after seeing the group's complaints.
Such reports move erratically through the US chain of command, the generals admitted to the Senate. Abizaid said that he did not see a negative report from February of this year until this month.
"We have a real problem with [Red Cross] reports and the way that they're handled . . . I'll just said that we don't all see them," said Abizaid.
The generals admitted that the chain of command at Abu Ghraib had become tangled, with military intelligence officers in charge of some functions, and military police in charge of others.
But that was done not to increase the flow of intelligence, but for the base's own protection, said Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, commander of the multinational forces in Iraq.
The base had been receiving a large amount of fire from insurgents, said General Sanchez.
"I issued a fragmentary order that placed all elements at Abu Ghraib under the tactical control of [military intelligence]," said Gen. Sanchez. "The specific order states that this was for forward operating base protection and for security of detainees."
On another chain of command issue, Sanchez said he had never seen a document called "interrogation rules of engagement" until shown it at a previous Senate hearing.
"I had no role in preparing it or approving it," he said.
In general, the military commanders seemed to be trying to contain the effects of the scandal, say some experts.
"It looks to me like they're trying to build a firebreak as low as possible to keep this from spreading up the chain of command," says Pat Lang, former head of Middle East intelligence at the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Assigning responsibility for such misdeeds by underlings is a difficult issue for the chain of command, note other experts.
Commanders are supposed to be responsible for everything troops under them do. Yet the military hierarchy is not one of unquestioning obedience and clear orders.
James Jay Carafano, a retired Army officer who is now a security expert at the Heritage Foundation, says that it's possible that someone at some point said something along the lines of "you know what I want done. I don't want to hear how you do it."
That could be a prescription for abuse, he says.
But at the same time. soldiers are taught that they are not supposed to follow illegal orders. Asked to "take care" of a prisoner, a soldier is within his rights to ask whether he is being expected to break the rules of the Geneva Convention.
The commander "will say 'of course not,' " says Carafano. "That's all it takes."
Conversely, even if Abu Ghraib guards contained some abusers, things went on too long for responsibility to be contained.
"This doesn't happen if you don't have some command failure," says Carafano.
--------
Soldier court-martialed for refusing to fight in 'oil-driven war'
INDEPENDENT NEWS
By Andrew Buncombe in Washington
20 May 2004
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=522968
Lawyers for a US soldier being court-martialed because he refused to fight in an "oil driven war" yesterday asked a military judge to dismiss the case against him.
Louis Font, the attorney for Staff Sergeant Camilo Mejia, said a 19th-century treaty with Costa Rica - of which the soldier is a citizen - means his client should not have been forced to do "compulsory military service". There are many Hispanics who sign up for the US military, often to further their applications for citizenship.
Sgt Mejia, 28, a member of the Florida National Guard, is charged with desertion after failing to return to his unit in Iraq after a two-week break last October. He surrendered in to the army in March, saying he did not want to fight in what he considered a war driven by oil.
Sgt Mejia faces a year in prison and a bad-conduct discharge if convicted of desertion, which military law defines as leaving the military with no intention to return or to "avoid hazardous duty or to shirk important service". But at the hearing at Fort Stewart, Georgia, Mr Font said the military had illegally extended Sgt Mejia's service when it ordered his unit to stay in Iraq beyond the March 2003 deadline his client's had agreed to serve .
"It is really clear-cut," he told the military judge, Colonel Gary Smith. "My client was wrongfully subjected to the [extension] under the Costa Rican treaty. In respect to this case, the court lacks jurisdiction." The army's lead prosecutor, Captain A J Balbo, said Sgt Mejia had never requested an exemption before his court-martial and voluntarily went to fight in Iraq, where he accepted a promotion.
"We're talking conscription, impressment, draft," he said. "This is not what we have here, someone who enlisted twice, served eight years and enjoyed the benefits." He said that because Sgt Mejia joined voluntarily his service did not count as "compulsory".
Sgt Mejia has said his experiences in Iraq had made him a conscientious objector and he had been upset by seeing civilians shot during an ambush on his unit. The case continues.
-------- war crimes
IVINS: How Fascism Starts
By Molly Ivins,
AlterNet
May 20, 2004
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=18746
AUSTIN, Texas - It's pretty easy to get to the point where you don't want to hear any more about Abu Ghraib prison and what went on there. But there are some very good reasons why Americans should take a look at why this happened.
I suspect the division here is not between liberals and conservatives (except for a few inane comments made by some trying to be flippant), but between those who are following the story closely and those who are not. I particularly recommend both Sy Hersh's follow-up piece in the current issue of The New Yorker and the investigative piece in the current issue of Newsweek. What seems to me more important than the "Oh ugh" factor is just how easy it is for standards of law and behavior to slip into bestiality.
The problems go all the way back to the administration's refusal to abide by the Geneva Conventions. President Bush, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Attorney General John Ashcroft "signed off on a secret system of detention and interrogation that opened the door to such methods. It was an approach that they adopted in order to sidestep the historical safeguards of the Geneva Convention, which protect the rights of detainees and prisoners of war," according to Newsweek.
Secretary of State Colin Powell and the military's lawyers objected. You may recall the military's objections (broadcast, as usual, by retired officers) were on the excellent grounds that if we didn't observe the Geneva Conventions neither would our enemies - the very reason they were signed in the first place.
The Pentagon still insists that "suspected Al Qaeda followers" have no rights under Geneva III, as they are "enemy combatants" rather than POWs. Geneva III also has procedures for what to do if the status of a detainee is in doubt - full Geneva rights apply until "a competent tribunal" decides. We have been holding 595 prisoners at Guantanamo for two and half years, not counting those we have already let go, in conditions in violation of Geneva. Only now are a few of these prisoners being assigned lawyers, and the lawyers are raising hell about the whole process.
The legal rationale came from White House counsel Alberto Gonzales, including the line, "In my judgment, this new paradigm renders obsolete Geneva's strict limitations on questioning of enemy prisoners and renders quaint some of its provisions."
According to Newsweek, Bush first signed a secret order granting new powers to the CIA, a directive authorizing it to set up secret detention facilities outside the United States and to question those held in them with unprecedented harshness. The agency also schlepped suspected terrorists off to other countries known to practice torture.
In addition to the fact that torture is morally repulsive, it also doesn't work. Of course, you can torture information out of people. What you can't do is torture accurate information out of people who don't have it. The Defense Department's JAGs were so concerned they finally went to a New York lawyer who specializes in international human rights law and told him, "There is a calculated effort to create an atmosphere of legal ambiguity" about how Geneva should be applied.
These military lawyers named Assistant Secretary Douglas Feith and the Pentagon's general counsel William Haynes, since nominated for an appeals court judgeship by Bush.
Meanwhile, Gitmo had been taken over by Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, under whose loving care the "72-point matrix for stress and duress" was developed, laying out as ugly a set of rules for of-course-it's-torture-stupid as anyone could dream up.
You may recall Rumsfeld testifying before Congress that Miller had been sent to "inspect" Abu Ghraib in September 2003, as though that had been some step toward responsible oversight. In fact, Miller told the general then running the prison the place should be turned over to military intelligence.
Normally, something like Abu Ghraib can be blamed in part on the Downward Communication Exaggeration Spiral, which afflicts most organizations. Someone at the top makes a mild suggestion, and by the time it reaches the troops, it's iron-clad law. This appears to be a rare case of a reverse spiral, with the orders coming from the very top and questions being raised about them all the way down, until finally Army Spc. Joseph Darby spoke out and set off the Taguba investigation.
In this case, there is more than sufficient evidence pointing to the culpability of those at the top. But at the same time, the Pentagon is putting out the word that it was "only a few bad apples," six low-level soldiers who have already been charged, with no one else involved. This just stinks of cover-up. Damned if I think these six low-level soldiers should be hung out there to take the blame for a set of explicitly written and signed policies made by people wearing expensive suits, getting paid big bucks and bearing some of the highest titles in the land.
You can read all the memos and documents for yourself. It's important to know how fascism starts.
Molly Ivins writes for the Texas Observer.
-------- POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
-------- prisons / prisoners
In some US prisons, echoes of Abu Ghraib
csmonitor.com
May 20, 2004
http://csmonitor.com/2004/0520/p02s01-usju.html
Complaints of prisoner abuse crop up at home as well as in Iraq - and may now get attention. By Alexandra Marks and Daniel B. Wood | Staff writers of The Christian Science Monitor "Simply stated, the culture of sadistic and malicious violence that continues to pervade the ... prison system violates contemporary standards of decency."
That conclusion, written by Judge William Wayne Justice, does not describe Abu Ghraib in Iraq last fall, but the Texas prison system in 1999 when George W. Bush was still governor there.
As courts-martial get under way in Baghdad for the prison-abuse scandal, critics are urging Americans to look inside their own criminal justice system for the root of the problems in Iraq.
On the surface, there are appear to be several parallels. One of the Abu Ghraib defendants, Spc. Charles Graner, is a former guard at a maximum-security prison in Pennsylvania that has a history of prisoner abuse. Although accused, he was never found guilty. And Lane McCotter, a senior contractor brought in to reopen Abu Ghraib and train guards, was forced to resign as the head of corrections in Utah: A mentally ill inmate died there after being strapped naked to a restraining chair for more than 16 hours.
Indeed, inmates, human rights activists, and even some corrections officials contend that abuse, humiliation, and gang rape are common in some US prisons.
But after a generation of litigation and concerted efforts to increase the professionalism in the corrections establishment, American prisons have, in general, become far more humane. Few believe that the kind of extreme sexual humiliation that occurred in Abu Ghraib would be tolerated in most US prisons - at least not for long.
"I don't think abuse is common in American prisons, but there are some abuses in all American prisons," says Robert Johnson, a professor at American University in the department of Justice Law and Society. "And in some cases, the abuses can be widespread."
The renegades
It is in the so-called renegade prisons, and whole renegade jurisdictions, where some abuses may be even worse than those in Iraq. And there, experts say, the same factors will be at play that led to the Abu Ghraib scandal.
"If you find one of those renegade prisons, you'll find there's a problem with leadership, that there are either abused or flawed policies or procedures, little or no training, and poor supervision," says Chase Riveland, a former corrections commissioner in Colorado and Washington State. "And when you combine that with a deviant culture, then you have problems like we saw in Iraq."
Prisons by nature are volatile, difficult places no matter where they are. People are held in cells, essentially cages, against their will by others who are charged with trying to keep them in line.
Overcrowding, a problem that has escalated in American prisons over the past 25 years as the prison population has quadrupled to more than 2.1 million, has intensified that tension between guards and inmates. It's also created fiscal pressures, leaving less experienced guards dealing with larger populations and fewer resources for education, rehabilitation, and recreation. And then there are cultural and racial gaps: Most US inmates are people of color from urban areas, while most prisons are in predominantly white rural areas.
Many of these same dynamics were at work in Abu Ghraib, where inexperienced American reservists were charged with guarding large numbers of Iraqi detainees. "In Iraq, on top of those huge gaps in race and culture increasing tensions, you get language barriers that for the most part are insurmountable," says Marc Mauer, assistant director of the Sentencing Project, a criminal-justice reform think tank in Washington. "In the day-to-day interactions, the prisoners become dehumanized because there's no communication, and much less sympathy or compassion for anyone's plight."
Such dehumanization is usually a key ingredient when abuse occurs, say experts. In California, where allegations of widespread abuse throughout the system have prompted a state Senate investigation, experts blame overcrowding, a gang culture, and a poorly educated workforce for creating a culture of dehumanization. That has been exacerbated by guards protecting one another.
"There is a code of silence in California prisons that turns good officers to bad," says Richard Steffen, staff director for the Senate Government Oversight Committee looking into the abuse. "They are forced not to report wrongdoing because if they do, they could be ostracized."
Prison accreditation
California is one of a handful of states where no prisons are accredited by the American Correctional Association (ACA), the national organization of professional correctional officials. Out of the nation's almost 1,600 prisons, about half are fully ACA accredited. To win that designation, correctional officers have to be fully trained, and the facilities must be fully transparent - which means community members have access so that if there are abuses, they can be addressed.
"I believe that when abuses are brought to the attention of directors of corrections, wardens, and jail managers, they're fully investigated, and appropriate sanctions are taken, including dismissal from position and prosecution, when appropriate," says James Gondles, executive director of the ACA.
But plenty of inmates in places like Texas, which since the 1999 court ruling has been working to reform its prisons, still find too many correctional officials uninterested in abuse allegations. While Roderick "Keith" Johnson was serving time for passing a bad check in the Allred prison in Wichita Falls, Texas, he claims he was made a sex slave by rival gangs of inmates. He pleaded for help from all levels of the prison system, right up to the commissioner, but claims he was ignored.
He's now suing, and his case will be heard in July. "Seeing those pictures of those people in Iraq and the way they were abused, I saw a lot of similarities with what goes on here," says Mr. Johnson, who's out of prison and helping other ex-offenders reenter local communities. "At least there you've got pictures to show what was happening, but here we don't, so it harder to prove."
Even Mr. Gondles admits that abuses do occur in US prisons. "But I don't believe that it's endemic in American jails and prisons," he says. "And what happened in one institution in Iraq is not representative of what goes on in America."
-------- secrecy
Material Given to Congress in 2002 Is Now Classified
May 20, 2004
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/20/politics/20classify.html
WASHINGTON, May 19 - The Justice Department has taken the unusual step of retroactively classifying information it gave to Congress nearly two years ago regarding a former F.B.I. translator who charged that the bureau had missed critical terrorist warnings, officials said Wednesday.
Law enforcement officials say the secrecy surrounding the translator, Sibel Edmonds, is essential to protecting information that could reveal intelligence-gathering operations. But some members of Congress and Congressional aides said they were troubled by the move, which comes as critics have accused the Bush administration of excessive secrecy.
"What the F.B.I. is up to here is ludicrous," Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, said in an interview. "To classify something that's already been out in the public domain, what do you accomplish? It does harm to transparency in government, and it looks like an attempt to cover up the F.B.I.'s problems in translating intelligence."
F.B.I. officials gave Senate staff members two briefings in June and July of 2002 concerning Ms. Edmonds, who said the F.B.I.'s system for translating intelligence was so flawed that the bureau missed chances to spot terrorist warnings.
But the F.B.I. now maintains that some of the information discussed was so potentially damaging if released publicly that it is now considered classified, according to a memorandum distributed last week within the Senate Judiciary Committee. The material could also play a part in pending lawsuits, including Ms. Edmonds's wrongful termination suit and a lawsuit brought by hundreds of families of Sept. 11 victims who have sought to take testimony from her.
"Any staffer who attended those briefings, or who learns about those briefings, should be aware that the F.B.I. now considers the information classified and should therefore avoid further dissemination,'' the Judiciary Committee memorandum said.
An F.B.I. official who spoke on condition of anonymity said the decision to classify the material was made by the Justice Department, which oversees the bureau. The Justice Department declined to comment on Wednesday.
The F.B.I. told Congressional officials that it was classifying topics including what languages Ms. Edmonds translated, what types of cases she handled, and what employees she worked with, officials said. Even routine and widely disseminated information - like where she worked - is now classified.
Ms. Edmonds, who is Turkish-American, began working for the F.B.I. shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks as a translator in the F.B.I.'s Washington field office with top-secret security clearance, but she was let go in the spring of 2002. She first gained wide public attention in October of that year when she appeared on "60 Minutes'' on CBS and charged that the F.B.I.'s translation services were plagued by incompetence and a lack of urgency and that the bureau had ignored her concerns. The Justice Department's inspector general is investigating her claims.
The F.B.I. has taken steps to improve its translation operations, including hiring more linguists. But Senator Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, wrote in March to the Justice Department that he still had "grave concerns'' about the F.B.I.'s ability to translate vital counterterrorism material.
Ms. Edmonds testified in a closed session this year before the Sept. 11 commission, and she has made increasingly vehement charges about the F.B.I.'s intelligence failures, saying the United States had advance warnings about the attacks. Families of the Sept. 11 victims - who are suing numerous corporate and Saudi interests whom they accuse of having links to the attacks - have sought to depose her as a witness, but the Justice Department has blocked the move by saying her testimony would violate "the state secret privilege.'' Her lawyer could not be reached for comment on Wednesday.
While some Congressional officials said they were confident the Justice Department had followed proper procedure in classifying the information, others said they could not remember any recent precedents and were bothered by the move.
"I have never heard of a retroactive classification two years back,'' said an aide who spoke on condition of anonymity because the subject is classified.
"It would be silly if it didn't have such serious implications,'' the aide said. "People are puzzled and, frankly, worried, because the effect here is to quash Congressional oversight. We don't even know what we can't talk about.''
Senator Grassley said, "This is about as close to a gag order as you can get."
The F.B.I. denied the accusation.
"We're not imposing a gag order,'' the F.B.I. official said. Members of Congress have the information, but have to treat it as classified, the official said. "The problem is that while these pieces of information may look innocuous on their own, you put them all together and it reveals a picture of sensitive intelligence collection, and that's a security problem.''
-------- POLITICS
-------- budget
House Approves $422 Billion Defense Bill
May 20, 2004
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Base-Closings.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The House broke with the Bush administration over military base closings Thursday, disrupting the otherwise smooth passage of a massive defense bill aimed at securing the nation's military strength and winning the war in Iraq.
The House voted 259-162 to delay base closings, now set for next year, by two years. Within minutes. the White House issued a statement repeating that the defense secretary would recommend the president veto any bill that ``weakens, delays or repeals'' the base closing authority.
That was one of the few trouble spots before the House voted 391-34 to pass the $422 billion bill that authorizes defense programs for next year and adds $25 billion to pay for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan during the first months. The new budget year begins in October.
There was relatively little debate on Iraq war policy, although earlier in the day President Bush traveled to Capitol Hill to rally Republicans on the war effort and House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi criticized what she said was the president's ``incompetence'' in leading the nation to war.
The Democrats tried unsuccessfully to add language to the bill calling for a select congressional committee to investigate the prisoner abuse issue in Iraq, but were defeated on a mainly partyline 224-202 vote.
The Senate, also debating its version of the defense bill, put off a final vote until after next week's Memorial Day recess.
There have been four previous rounds of base closings from 1988 and 1995, in each case over the objections of lawmakers concerned about the economic losses a closure would bring to their districts. The Pentagon argues that it still has more than 20 percent excess capacity and could save billions by closing unneeded facilities.
This time, opponents said the timing was bad because of the war on Iraq. The Pentagon, said Rep. Joel Hefley, R-Colo., ``is experiencing too many stresses and changes to make effective base closing decisions by May of 2005.''
Under the ``base realignment and closure,'' or BRAC, authority, the Pentagon draws up a list of excess capacity facilities and an independent commission picks which bases to close. Congress can accept or reject, but cannot change, that decision.
Rep. Mark Kennedy, R-Minn., offered the amendment to the defense bill that would have eliminated language delaying the 2005 round of closings by two years. He argued that the money saved from closing excess facilities could be used to modernize weapons systems and improve the military quality of life.
There's still a long way to go before President Bush has to decide whether to veto a record-breaking defense bill during wartime. The Senate, also considering its version of the authorization bill, earlier this week defeated, 49-47, an amendment to delay the closings, and the House provision could be removed when the two chambers negotiate a compromise version.
The White House issued another veto threat over language in the House bill that would restrict Pentagon flexibility on ``competitive sourcing,'' or contracting out to private companies some Pentagon jobs.
Otherwise there was widespread agreement on the bill that would approve increases in spending by almost $21 billion over the current budget year and emphasizes programs that improves the combat safety and financial well-being of troops.
The House bill, generally mirrored by the Senate version, includes an across-the-board 3.5 percent pay raise for military personnel and raises the hazardous pay for troops facing hostile fire from $150 to $225 a month. It also increases separation pay for those stationed overseas and improves health care programs for reservists.
To answer complaints that U.S. troops are not adequately protected from insurgent strikes, the bill contains more than $1 billion for better armored Humvees and add-on ballistic protection for vehicles in Iraq and Afghanistan.
It requires that the Army add 30,000 troops over the next three years and the Marines 9,000.
On Thursday the House defeated, 214-204, an amendment proposed by Rep. Ellen Tauscher, D-Calif., and others that would have eliminated some $36.5 million in the bill for the Department of Energy to study a tactical nuclear weapon known as the ``bunker buster.''
Tauscher, argued that even the small nuclear weapon could cause massive collateral damage and ``undermine decades of United States leadership'' in stopping nuclear proliferation. Her proposal would have shifted the money to improving intelligence on deeply buried targets and improving conventional bunker-busting capabilities.
Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Wash., won approval of an amendment that requires the Air Force to complete negotiations by March 1 next year on purchasing 80 Boeing 767 tankers to replace its aging fleet of 707 refueling tanker aircraft. The Air Force is also to lease 20 tankers from Boeing.
The House bill is H.R. 4200
On the Net:
Congress: http://thomas.loc.gov/
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House Defies Bush on Military Base Closings
May 20, 2004
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/politics/politics-arms-congress.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Defying a veto threat, the House of Representatives on Thursday passed a mammoth bill for next year's defense programs that delays for two years the Bush administration's plans to reduce U.S. military bases across the country.
The Republican-led House by a broad 391-34 vote cleared a $422 billion bill authorizing defense and nuclear weapons programs that also lays the groundwork to send the Pentagon an extra $25 billion for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Lawmakers also narrowly backed the administration's plan to continue study of so-called ``bunker-buster'' and low-yield nuclear weapons, despite charges that just considering such weapons could spark an arms race.
While the bill meets most of President Bush's demands, Republicans and Democrats joined forces to try to stall the administration's plan to start closing and downsizing military bases.
The economic blow to communities near the bases on the list is a hot political issue that crosses party lines this election year. House critics also said it was the wrong time to close bases, with conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The House on a 259-162 vote rejected an amendment that would have kept this round of military base closures on track for 2005, despite the Republican White House threat to veto the bill if the final version delayed the base realignment.
The Pentagon said the plan will save tens of billions of dollars by eliminating excess capacity of installations and better focus the military against post-Cold War threats.
SENATE BACKS BUSH PLAN
The Senate, also debating its version of the defense authorization bill, on Tuesday narrowly defeated an amendment that would have blocked the administration's base closure and consolidation plan. The Senate is to resume work on its bill when it returns from next week's recess.
Given the political stakes in producing the wartime Pentagon bill, the House will be under pressure to relent on the base closure issue when differences are worked out in a House-Senate conference before the final bill is sent to Bush.
On a tight 214-204 vote, the House defeated an amendment pushed by Democrats to strip $36 million the administration wanted for a program to study low-yield and earth-penetrating nuclear weapons.
The White House has said it needs to keep open the option to develop such weapons. But critics said it was wasting money on weapons that could not be used, and would only encourage other countries to pursue tactical nuclear weapons.
``You cannot preach temperance from a bar stool,'' said Rep. Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat. ``If we want other countries to disavow the desire to develop nuclear weapons we cannot be developing new nuclear weapons.''
The House also voted to require high-level military exchanges for military training and education programs for Taiwan, despite objections from some lawmakers that it would tilt the United States' delicate balance between China and Taiwan. The State Department opposed the amendments.
The House bill, $21 billion above current levels, provides a 3.5 percent across-the-board military pay raise and includes the $10.2 billion Bush wanted to develop a missile defense system.
It authorizes $25 billion for a reserve fund the Pentagon wants to finance operations in Iraq and Afghanistan until Congress passes a larger emergency spending bill next year, after the November presidential and congressional elections. But that money will actually be allocated in a spending bill Congress will consider later.
-------- investigations
9/11 Report Praises Arlington Response
By Elaine Rivera
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A03
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41367-2004May19.html
The Arlington County fire department's emergency response to the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, was "mainly a success," overcoming inherent complications that arise when numerous local, state and federal jurisdictions are involved, according to a report released yesterday by the commission investigating the terrorist attacks.
The county's fire department, the lead agency overseeing the massive operation -- simultaneously a plane crash, a fire and a partial building collapse -- benefited from having a formalized management structure, or Incident Command System, in place when terrorists slammed American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon's west wall, the report stated.
"On any other day, the disaster at the Pentagon would be remembered as a singular challenge, an extraordinary national story," the report stated. "Yet the calamity at the World Trade Center included catastrophic damage 1,000 feet above the ground that instantly imperiled tens of thousands of people. Nonetheless, broader lessons in integrating multi-agency response efforts are apparent in analyzing the Pentagon response."
The success in Arlington can also be traced to strong, professional relationships and trust previously established among emergency workers responding from across the Washington area, as well as the pursuit of a regional approach to response, the report said.
Arlington County Manager Ron Carlee said the commission report reaffirms the findings of an independent federal review released last year. The after-action report also concluded that Arlington fire officials worked well with other agencies, and together they handled the aftermath of the attack successfully.
"We worked very hard as an emergency team and not as individual, separate departments," said Carlee, who added that preparation for the possible millennium computer glitch on Dec. 31, 1999 -- known as Y2K -- helped lay the foundation for jurisdictions working together.
"Y2K helped with the whole contingency planning," he said. "We practiced it in another context."
While it was harshly critical of the emergency response by New York fire and police officials when the World Trade Center was attacked, the commission report illuminated the major differences in the two attacks, stating that the "two experiences are not comparable."
The report said that in New York, the problem had less to do with "turf battles" and "more to do with command systems designed to work independently."
Arlington County Fire Chief Edward P. Plaugher, who received national praise for his role overseeing the fire and rescue operation, said the findings reflected the long-running procedures of the region.
"We have built on strong relationships with our neighbors," said Plaugher, who is retiring next month. "And we're continuing to reaffirm those relationships."
The commission report cited serious problems with communications equipment as one major flaw during the response to the Pentagon attack, a criticism also raised in the after-action report. Cell phones were of little value, and radio channels were initially saturated, according to the report, which said pagers were most reliable. All that has changed, Plaugher said.
"The entire region has bought into the same system -- we can all talk to each other," he said.
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No Pattern of Prisoner Abuse, General Says
All Who Are Found Guilty Will Be Held Accountable, Abizaid Tells Senators
By Bradley Graham
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A23
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A41106-2004May19.html
A broad Army investigation of military detention facilities in Iraq and Afghanistan has found no pattern of abuse, Army Gen. John P. Abizaid, the top commander of U.S. forces in the region, testified yesterday.
Abizaid disclosed the preliminary finding during a Senate hearing in which he acknowledged that overcrowding and other "systemic problems" at Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad may have contributed to the abuse of detainees there. But he rejected a suggestion by Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.) that a "culture of abuse" existed under his command.
"I believe that we have isolated incidents that have taken place," the general said.
Abizaid said he was briefed Tuesday on the Army investigation, which was launched in February and is being led by the Army's inspector general, Lt. Gen. Paul T. Mikolashek. "I specifically asked the IG of the Army, did he believe that there was a pattern of abuse of prisoners in the Central Command area of operation," Abizaid said. "And he looked at both Afghanistan and Iraq, and he said no."
The testimony came during the third of a series of hearings planned by the Senate Armed Services Committee to examine the causes of the prison scandal sparked three weeks ago by the emergence of photographs showing detainees at the Abu Ghraib facility being sexually humiliated and abused in other ways.
Both Abizaid and the senior commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, accepted responsibility for the misconduct in opening remarks. But they made clear they were not yet aware of everyone who might be implicated in the scandal because a number of criminal and administrative investigations are underway.
Abizaid promised to hold accountable those eventually found guilty and said some officers and sergeants who so far have received only administrative reprimands for their involvement may yet face criminal charges.
Sanchez strongly defended his decision to put a military intelligence officer in charge of security at the Abu Ghraib facility last November -- a move that Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba sharply criticized in his report on the abuses. Taguba said it violated Army doctrine and helped set the stage for misconduct by making the military guards there subordinate to an intelligence unit responsible for interrogations.
Sanchez said he had not intended to place the guards under the control of the intelligence officer for anything other than actions involving the protection of the prison against attacks by Iraqi insurgents. Command of the prison had become "dysfunctional," he said.
The question of the extent to which traditional lines of command were blurred at the prison between the military police, who guard detainees, and military intelligence personnel, who run interrogations, has also come up in connection with recommendations by Maj. Gen. Geoffrey D. Miller.
At the urging of top Pentagon officials, Miller, who was commander of the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, visited Iraq late last summer to assess interrogation practices. He advised that military police join in "setting the conditions" for interrogations. Taguba's report objected to this, saying it ran counter to Army doctrine and to "the smooth operation of a detention facility."
But Miller, appearing yesterday with Abizaid and Sanchez, disputed Taguba's finding. He said he had urged only "passive intelligence gathering" by the guards on the behavior of detainees, not active participation in the interrogation process.
Miller said Sanchez and other senior officers in Iraq understood the recommendations, although some prison guards implicated in the abuses have said they were following the orders of interrogators to prepare detainees for questioning.
"There must have been a breakdown somewhere," said Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), addressing Miller.
"Sir, in my estimation, it's a breakdown in leadership on how that the follow-on actions may have occurred," Miller replied.
Abizaid said that traditional Army doctrine governing how military police and military intelligence personnel relate at detention centers needs to be changed. He said this is one conclusion to emerge from the investigation by the Army's inspector general.
"Our doctrine is not right, it's just not right," Abizaid said. "What do the MPs do, what do the military intelligence guys do, how do they come together in the right way? And this doctrinal issue has got to be fixed if we've ever going to get our intelligence right to fight this war and defeat this enemy."
Reviewing the overall military situation in Iraq, Abizaid predicted that violence could well intensify, even after the planned transfer of limited sovereignty to an interim Iraqi government June 30, because of lingering political uncertainty until elections can be held. He said more U.S. forces might be needed, but reiterated his hope that additional countries would contribute troops. He said Iraq's new security forces should be fully functioning by next April.
During the hearing, committee Chairman John W. Warner (R-Va.) announced that the Pentagon had sent word of the discovery of another disk of photographs depicting abuse by U.S. soldiers. The Pentagon said the disk contains 24 photographs, 13 of which had surfaced previously. The other 11 "may not be original or true photographs" and are being reviewed by criminal investigators, according to a Pentagon letter to Warner.
In Afghanistan, the top U.S. commander, Lt. Gen. David Barno, announced a "top to bottom" assessment of all detention facilities in that country. He said the review would be led by a general who would visit every facility to "ensure internationally accepted standards of handling detainees are being met."
--------
System Failures Cited for Delayed Action on Abuses
By Peter Slevin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A19
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A41082-2004May19?language=printer
Poor coordination of U.S. operations in Iraq and persistent divisions among Bush administration policymakers contributed to the failure of President Bush and his national security team to address an array of serious detention issues, U.S. officials and analysts said.
Long before the Abu Ghraib prison scandal became public, the U.S. civilian administrator of Iraq and a number of American diplomats warned that aggressive roundups and indefinite captivity were endangering U.S. success.
Officials now acknowledge that those warnings did not prompt urgent action from the White House or the Defense Department, which was focused on containing an increasingly violent insurgency. Nor did action follow early reports about the Abu Ghraib abuses by the International Committee of the Red Cross.
Gen. John P. Abizaid, commander of U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf, acknowledged yesterday that he knew of broader problems in the way U.S. troops arrested and imprisoned Iraqis, from rough treatment at the time of capture to delays in evaluating evidence against them. He also conceded "systemic problems" at Abu Ghraib.
But Abizaid and Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, the top U.S. officer in Iraq, testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee that they knew nothing about events at Abu Ghraib until January -- three months after the Red Cross alerted lower-level military officers to abuses they would later say were "tantamount to torture."
"We have a real problem with ICRC reports and the way that they're handled and the way that they move up and down the chain of command," Abizaid said. ". . . We've got a problem there that's got to be fixed."
"How did it happen so long and so deep and we not know?" asked Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.).
Abizaid pointed to "failures in people doing their duty" and "failures in systems."
"And we should have known," he said. "And we should have uncovered it and taken action before it got to the point that it got to."
While the broad outline of the administration's handling of detention issues began to emerge soon after the abuse scandal erupted, interviews, testimony and a review of documents provide a fuller portrait of how persistent troubles within the Iraq prison system failed to capture the administration's attention. The administration's response was tempered by the huge demands on U.S. troops, as well as by differences among military commanders and civilian U.S. authorities in Iraq about the importance of the detainee issue. Those differences were mirrored in Washington in jockeying between the departments of State and Defense, officials said.
Recent testimony by military and civilian Defense Department leaders indicates that U.S. commanders transmitted through the ranks a demand for more aggressive interrogations, but reacted less quickly when the Red Cross and others questioned their methods of arrest and detention.
Even when the Red Cross uncovered abuses in October, it took three months and Spec. Joseph M. Darby's tip for the Pentagon to open an investigation.
"It should have been obvious to anyone who spent 15 minutes on this problem, and who knew of the severity of the allegations last winter, that it was a very big deal that required immediate remedial action," Brookings Institution analyst Michael E. O'Hanlon said.
When the Iraq war began in March 2003, the Red Cross put U.S. authorities on notice that the Geneva Conventions should be honored. Bush described his expectations when discussing the capture of U.S. prisoners by Iraqi forces.
"We expect them to be treated humanely, just like we'll treat any prisoners of theirs that we capture humanely," Bush told reporters. "If not, the people who mistreat the prisoners will be treated as war criminals."
Yet complaints soon surfaced. On May 15, five weeks after major combat operations ended, Amnesty International publicized what it considered cases of ill treatment and raised its evidence with U.S. military personnel.
That month, the Red Cross also sent a memo to U.S. Central Command documenting more than 200 allegations of mistreatment. Abizaid, then the deputy commander, testified yesterday that he did not recall "having a lot to do with this particular report or paying much attention to it."
On June 26, Amnesty met with officials from the State Department and the Pentagon and wrote a follow-up letter to U.S. civilian coordinator L. Paul Bremer. The next month, Amnesty delivered to Bremer's Coalition Provisional Authority a "memorandum on concerns" detailing alleged abuses.
In early July, the Red Cross sent reports to the U.S. military command in Qatar alleging mistreatment of about 50 Iraqis in the military intelligence section of Camp Cropper at Baghdad International Airport.
U.S. diplomats and other civilian CPA officials scattered in Iraqi cities began hearing that the detention policy was hurting the U.S.-led mission. Growing numbers of Iraqis were angered by arrests without clear evidence of wrongdoing and the lack of a system for notifying relatives.
"We look like Saddam," a senior U.S. official in Baghdad recently said, speaking on the condition of anonymity. "We pick up people and they disappear for a while. Wives, mothers, brothers -- they try to find their relatives and they can't."
Military intelligence officials would later tell the Red Cross that 70 percent to 90 percent of prisoners had been wrongly arrested, yet a senior aide to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said the most basic screening and notification systems were missing: "We didn't have a system for differentiating between the dangerous ones and those we just picked up in a sweep."
Bremer and other civilians pressed Sanchez to streamline the detention system, the Baghdad official said. Although Sanchez promised to make changes, the official recalled, many of the occupation authority's requests were never implemented, while others took months.
"Our handling of detainees has been a steadily rising source of irritation that has most certainly become a contributing cause of violence," the official said. "This one lays at Sanchez's feet."
Bathsheba Crocker, part of a review team sent to Iraq by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld last year, said the detention issue fit a pattern of the State Department and the Pentagon "not playing well together in the sandbox."
"We've seen time and again the State Department asking for things and not being listened to," said Crocker, an analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
As early as August, Bremer raised the detention issue with superiors in Washington. Aides said he and Powell began pushing for a stronger Pentagon effort in meetings with Bush's senior foreign policy team, including Rumsfeld, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and Vice President Cheney.
Detention emerged more prominently in October and November as the insurgency in the Sunni Triangle intensified, said one U.S. official briefed on top-level meetings. Improving detention policy was one element of the emerging strategy urged by the State Department to calm tensions.
At the same time, U.S. military and civilian intelligence agencies concluded that they needed to squeeze more information from Iraqis at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere if they hoped to quell rising violence.
Red Cross monitors, meanwhile, had been visiting Iraqis in 14 U.S. and British detention centers. In mid-October, during a trip to the vast Abu Ghraib compound, they discovered the abuse by the 372nd Military Police Company.
Shocked, they interrupted their interviews to tell the jail's commander.
In early November, the Red Cross delivered a report on Abu Ghraib to the U.S. military in Iraq -- yet the report did not reach the officer responsible for running the prison and other U.S. detention facilities, Brig. Gen. Janis L. Karpinski. She said she was startled to be told of the findings for the first time at the end of November.
It was also odd, Karpinski said in an interview, that it was military intelligence officers who presented the report to her. Earlier Red Cross reports about Abu Ghraib had reached her desk and she had responded, she said. This time, she was told of the report by Col. Thomas M. Pappas, the senior military intelligence officer at Abu Ghraib, and Col. Marc Warren, a lawyer advising Sanchez.
Karpinski said she made a remark about the Red Cross assertion that Iraqi prisoners had been forced to wear women's underwear on their heads. She said one of half a dozen officers replied, "I told the commander to stop giving them Victoria's Secret catalogues."
Military intelligence officers made clear that they wanted to establish rules limiting Red Cross access to sensitive parts of the prison and to prisoners undergoing interrogation, Karpinski said. They argued that Red Cross interviews could "disrupt" the questioning process just as prisoners may have been about to talk.
Sanchez testified yesterday that he did not get word of the Abu Ghraib abuses until Jan. 13, when Darby tipped off military investigators. Sanchez opened an investigation within hours and soon ordered that all Red Cross documents be addressed to him.
The Red Cross delivered a blistering final study of Iraq detention policy to Bremer and Sanchez in February 2004.
In its first sentence, the Red Cross report alleged "serious violations of international humanitarian law." The document, which criticized harsh and allegedly indiscriminate arrests, brutal incarceration and the use of live ammunition to quell prison unrest, pointed to problems that went beyond a handful of soldiers.
There was a "broader pattern and a system, as opposed to individual acts," the report said.
Although the Red Cross completed much of the investigation for its report by the end of October, the organization did not distribute its findings beyond Iraq. This was in keeping with its standard protocol, which calls for working with locally based officials well positioned to correct problems. That practice, some U.S. officials contend, contributed to the slow pace of the administration's response.
When Jakob Kellenberger, the organization's president, visited Powell in mid-January, he focused on problems in U.S. detention centers in Afghanistan and at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He referred to Iraq only in general terms and did not mention Iraq when he met with Rice, aides have said.
The Geneva-based organization observes strict rules designed to maintain neutrality, credibility and access. Red Cross officials told U.S. authorities at the Pentagon and elsewhere that they believed relationships with U.S. military and civilian authorities in Iraq were bearing fruit. They did not want to jeopardize their prospects by seeming to go over their heads.
Worried that the Iraq problems were not receiving sufficient attention, U.S. diplomats persuaded the Red Cross to give a copy of its findings quietly to the American mission in Geneva in early March. The details were more damning than anyone had imagined.
State Department deputy spokesman J. Adam Ereli said the department's legal counsel, William Howard Taft IV, and Assistant Secretary of State Gene Dewey read the report and briefed Powell.
More than two months later, influential Defense Department officials startled Republicans and Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee by conceding that they had not read the report.
"Something does not connect there," Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said.
Staff writers Rajiv Chandrasekaran in Baghdad and Mike Allen and R. Jeffrey Smith in Washington contributed to this report.
-------- propaganda wars
Bush Invokes 'War on Terror' in Energy Debate
Story by Caren Bohan
REUTERS USA:
May 20, 2004
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/25186/story.htm
WASHINGTON - President Bush said yesterday he would not release strategic oil stocks to curb record gasoline prices while he was waging war on terror and accused Democrats of playing politics on energy.
Bush rejected any solution to the rapid rise in gasoline prices that would use the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, a national emergency stockpile, to give motorists relief at the pump.
Ideas such as halting shipments to the reserve or releasing some of its supplies would leave America vulnerable in the event of a terrorist attack, Bush said.
"The idea of emptying the Strategic Petroleum Reserve ... would put America in a dangerous position in the war on terror," Bush told reporters after a Cabinet meeting.
"We must not put ourselves in a worse position in this war. And playing politics with the Strategic Petroleum Reserve would do just that." But the campaign for Bush's rival, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, accused Bush of avoiding the problem by trying to fault others.
"Once again, the president is making excuses instead of coming up with a plan to deal with gasoline price rises that are roiling the economy," said Kerry spokesman Phil Singer.
U.S. retail gasoline prices have topped $2 per gallon. Yesterday, gasoline futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange traded as high as $1.45 a gallon - a new record - amid supply fears ahead of the U.S. summer driving season.
When asked what short-term measures he would use to rein in the prices, Bush did not list any new initiatives but lambasted Democrats for blocking his sweeping energy bill.
BUSH WARNING
While Bush warned of the danger of emptying the reserve - which is stored in salt caverns at four underground sites in Texas and Louisiana - Democratic proposals range from a temporary halt in shipments to it to releasing a portion of the crude it holds.
The stockpile now contains 660 million barrels and the Bush administration wants to accumulate 700 million barrels by next year. Former President Bill Clinton released 30 million barrels of oil from the reserve when gasoline prices soared in the summer and fall of 2000.
Kerry, Bush's likely challenger at the November election, has said that he would not tap the reserve now. But he said continuing to fill the stockpile is helping to push up prices.
Going a step further, some Democratic lawmakers want the Bush administration to release up to 60 million barrels of crude.
Bush blames Senate Democrats for blocking a broad energy bill that he says could have secured more supplies.
The legislation is controversial and some Democrats view it as a giveaway to energy companies and also dislike aspects of it that would open some protected lands for drilling.
Bush cited one such provision yesterday, saying that if his plan to allow drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge had passed, it would be having a "positive impact" for U.S. consumers.
Oil industry executives have said that even if ANWR was opened to drilling, it would be about 10 years before a significant amount of oil would get to the market.
Sen. Byron Dorgan, a Democrat from North Dakota, noted that several Republicans played a role in the demise of Bush's energy bill last year. Bush's Republican party has a majority in both the Senate and the House of Representatives.
Dorgan said Bush needs to hold to his campaign promise to put pressure on OPEC cartel members. "I don't hear any jawboning going on. The president is largely silent at a time when the OPEC countries have announced they want to cut supply," he said.
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The Religious Warrior of Abu Ghraib
An evangelical US general played a pivotal role in Iraqi prison reform.
The Guardian U.K.
By Sidney Blumenthal
Thursday 20 May 2004
http://truthout.org/docs_04/052104F.shtml
Saving General Boykin seemed like a strange sideshow last October. After it was revealed that the deputy undersecretary of defence for intelligence had been regularly appearing at evangelical revivals preaching that the US was in a holy war as a "Christian nation" battling "Satan", the furore was quickly calmed.
Donald Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, explained that Boykin was exercising his rights as a citizen: "We're a free people." President Bush declared that Boykin "doesn't reflect my point of view or the point of view of this administration". Bush's commission on public diplomacy had reported that in nine Muslim countries, just 12% believed that "Americans respect Arab/Islamic values". The Pentagon announced that its inspector general would investigate Boykin, though he has yet to report.
Boykin was not removed or transferred. At that moment, he was at the heart of a secret operation to "Gitmoize" (Guant?mo is known in the US as Gitmo) the Abu Ghraib prison. He had flown to Guant?mo, where he met Major General Geoffrey Miller, in charge of Camp X-Ray. Boykin ordered Miller to fly to Iraq and extend X-Ray methods to the prison system there, on Rumsfeld's orders.
Boykin was recommended to his position by his record in the elite Delta forces: he was a commander in the failed effort to rescue US hostages in Iran, had tracked drug lord Pablo Escobar in Colombia, had advised the gas attack on barricaded cultists at Waco, Texas, and had lost 18 men in Somalia trying to capture a warlord in the notorious Black Hawk Down fiasco of 1993.
Boykin told an evangelical gathering last year how this fostered his spiritual crisis. "There is no God," he said. "If there was a God, he would have been here to protect my soldiers." But he was thunderstruck by the insight that his battle with the warlord was between good and evil, between the true God and the false one. "I knew that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God and his was an idol."
Boykin was the action hero side of his boss, Stephen Cambone, a conservative defence intellectual appointed to the new post of undersecretary of intelligence. Cambone is universally despised by the officer corps for his arrogant, abrasive and dictatorial style and regarded as the personal symbol of Rumsfeldism. A former senior Pentagon official told me of a conversation with a three-star general, who remarked: "If we were being overrun by the enemy and I had only one bullet left, I'd use it on Cambone."
Cambone set about cutting the CIA and the state department out of the war on terror, but he had no knowledge of special ops. For this the rarefied civilian relied on the gruff soldier - a melding of "ignorance and recklessness", as a military intelligence source told me.
Just before Boykin was put in charge of the hunt for Osama bin Laden and then inserted into Iraqi prison reform, he was a circuit rider for the religious right. He allied himself with a small group called the Faith Force Multiplier that advocates applying military principles to evangelism. Its manifesto - Warrior Message - summons "warriors in this spiritual war for souls of this nation and the world ... "
Boykin staged a travelling slide show around the country where he displayed pictures of Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. "Satan wants to destroy this nation, he wants to destroy us as a nation, and he wants to destroy us as a Christian army," he preached. They "will only be defeated if we come against them in the name of Jesus". It was the reporting of his remarks at a revival meeting in Oregon that made them a subject of brief controversy.
There can be little doubt that he envisages the global war on terror as a crusade. With the Geneva conventions apparently suspended, international law is supplanted by biblical law. Boykin is in God's chain of command. President Bush, he told an Oregon congregation last June, is "a man who prays in the Oval Office". And the president, too, is on a divine mission. "George Bush was not elected by a majority of the voters in the US. He was appointed by God."
Boykin is not unique in his belief that Bush is God's anointed against evildoers. Before his 2000 campaign, Bush confided to a leader of the religious right: "I feel like God wants me to run for president ... I sense my country is going to need me. Something is going to happen."
Michael Gerson, Bush's chief speechwriter, tells colleagues that on September 20 2001, after Bush delivered his speech to the Congress declaring a war on terror, he called Gerson to thank him for writing it. "God wants you here," Gerson says he told the president. And he says that Bush replied: "God wants us here."
But it's Bush who wants Rumsfeld, Cambone and Boykin here.
-------- us politics
White House's Medicare Videos Are Ruled Illegal
May 20, 2004
By ROBERT PEAR
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/20/politics/20medicare.html
WASHINGTON, May 19 - The General Accounting Office, an investigative arm of Congress, said on Wednesday that the Bush administration had violated federal law by producing and disseminating television news segments that portray the new Medicare law as a boon to the elderly.
The agency said the videos were a form of "covert propaganda" because the government was not identified as the source of the materials, broadcast by at least 40 television stations in 33 markets. The agency also expressed some concern about the content of the videos, but based its ruling on the lack of disclosure.
The consequences of the ruling were not immediately clear. The accounting office does not have law enforcement powers, but its decisions on federal spending are usually considered authoritative and are taken seriously by officials in the executive branch of the government.
The decision fuels a raging political debate over the new Medicare law. President Bush and many Republicans in Congress say the law will provide immense assistance to millions of elderly and disabled people. But Democrats say the law will do little for the elderly and is so seriously flawed that the government had to resort to an illegal public relations campaign to sell it to voters.
The General Accounting Office said that a specific part of the videos, a made-for-television "story package," violated the prohibition on using taxpayer money for propaganda.
People seeing the videos in a newscast would "believe that the information came from a nongovernment source or neutral party," it said.
William A. Pierce, a spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services, who helped develop the videos, said: "We disagree. It's not covert. TV stations knew the videos came from us and could have identified the government as the source if they had wanted to."
The accounting office dismissed that argument. The intended audience, it said, was not news directors, but viewers, and "the video news releases did not alert viewers that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services was the source."
Moreover, it said, "some news organizations indicated that they misread the label or they mistook the story package as an independent journalist news story."
Two videos end with the voice of a woman who says, "In Washington, I'm Karen Ryan reporting." A third video is narrated, in Spanish, by a man who identifies himself as "Alberto Garcia reporting." The scripts were prepared by the Bush administration at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, a unit of the Department of Health and Human Services.
The accounting office said the videos were "not strictly factual news stories" and were flawed by "notable omissions and weaknesses" in their explanation of the Medicare law. But the main problem, it said, is that they were "misleading as to source."
The government, it said, served up a "purported news story" using "alleged reporters" to read scripts prepared by the government, but "nothing in the story packages permits the viewer to know that Karen Ryan and Alberto Garcia were paid with federal funds."
Federal law prohibits the use of federal money for "publicity or propaganda purposes" not authorized by Congress. The accounting office has found that federal agencies violated this restriction when they disseminated editorials and newspaper articles written by the government without identifying the source.
The accounting office said the administration's misuse of federal money "also constitutes a violation of the Antideficiency Act," which prohibits spending in excess of appropriations. Under the law, the secretary of health and human services, Tommy G. Thompson, must report the violation to Congress and the president, with "a statement of actions taken" to prevent a recurrence.
The Antideficiency Act, derived from a law passed in 1870, is one of the major statutes by which Congress exercises its constitutional control of the purse.
Medicare officials are unlikely to face any penalties. David M. Walker, the comptroller general of the United States, who is head of the General Accounting Office, said, "We do not have reason to believe that this violation was knowing and willful, and we are not in the enforcement business."
Senator Frank R. Lautenberg, Democrat of New Jersey, said he was drafting legislation that would require the Bush campaign to reimburse the Medicare trust fund for the cost of the videos. The administration put the cost at $42,750, but refused to provide any documentation.
Senator John Kerry, the likely Democratic presidential nominee, said it confirmed his view that the administration had improperly tapped the Medicare trust fund to pay for political advertisements.
Under the Medicare law, the government is encouraging the use of drug discount cards for the next 18 months. In 2006, Medicare will provide insurance coverage for certain outpatient drug costs.
The Bush administration hired Ketchum Inc. to disseminate information about the Medicare law, and Ketchum hired another company, Home Front Communications, to create the videos. The materials were distributed to television stations by satellite, mail and a syndicated news service, CNN Newsource, the ruling said.
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Dogged Reporter's Impact, From My Lai to Abu Ghraib
May 20, 2004
By DAVID CARR
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/20/books/20HERS.html?pagewanted=all&position=
With his reports in 1969 of a massacre by young American soldiers at My Lai, Seymour M. Hersh began his run as one of journalism's best-known investigative reporters. But in spite of his longevity, none of his subsequent reportorial efforts has had the impact of his first. Until now.
In less than a month, Mr. Hersh, 67, has written three articles in The New Yorker that have helped set the political agenda by reporting that once again American soldiers in the midst of a war where the enemy is elusive and the cause is complicated had committed atrocious acts.
The two sets of articles, on My Lai and on the mistreatment of Iraqis at the Abu Ghraib prison, serve as bookends on a career built on dogged pursuit. And longtime associates of Mr. Hersh say it is no coincidence that the news development that has brought him back to the center of American journalism is one in which right and wrong are separated by bright, clear lines.
Throughout his career Mr. Hersh has served as a sort of a global cop reporter, working disaffected bureaucrats, intelligence operatives and soldiers to uncover intelligence pratfalls, foreign intrigues and administration wrongdoing.
"There is a sense of outrage at this story for him," said Tom Goldstein, a professor of business and journalism at Arizona State University who was a colleague of Mr. Hersh at The New York Times (and his tenant) in the 1970's. "He has a sense of outrage unlike anyone I have ever known, and it remains undiminished over a career."
The subjects of his reporting often find themselves outraged as well. On Monday the Defense Department accused him of writing a "hysterical piece of journalistic malpractice" for this week's article in The New Yorker reporting that Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld approved the use of a clandestine unit to find terrorists within the walls of Abu Ghraib prison. In Bob Woodward's "Bush at War," the president called Mr. Hersh a liar.
And Gen. Barry McCaffrey, who was accused by Mr. Hersh in a lengthy New Yorker article in 2000 of authorizing the massacre of fleeing Iraqi troops at the end of the first Gulf War, said the charges were outrageous. "The guy just fundamentally lacks integrity," he said in an interview.
Mr. Hersh and the editor at The New Yorker, David Remnick, stand by his reporting, and many former colleagues and press critics praise Mr. Hersh's career-long body of work.
Unlike his colleagues at newspapers or on television, Mr. Hersh can be quite subjective in his judgments; anyone who is reading his current magazine articles is well aware he is against the war. To Mr. Hersh, what took place at Abu Ghraib - and the responsibility that higher-ups bear for the abuses - represent a grievous perversion of the American mission.
"My Lai and Vietnam was a technical problem," he said. "America was not jeopardized. This story represents a very important strategic loss, not something that can be fixed by setting up an embassy and giving people some breaks on trade."
Because Mr. Hersh mines intelligence channels, his articles often depend on anonymous sourcing. The lack of names, which Mr. Hersh has said is born of necessity, leaves him open to attack. (Mr. Remnick said he knew the identities and agendas of the anonymous sources.)
This week's claim that Mr. Rumsfeld himself ordered more aggressive treatment of prisoners has yet to be duplicated.
"All of the dots aren't connected yet," said Jeff Leen, assistant managing editor for investigations at The Washington Post. But he is not one to bet against Mr. Hersh. "He is a legend and deservedly so."
Jack Shafer, press critic for Slate, an online magazine, said: "He has gotten lots of stuff wrong or only half right. He predicted that C.I.A. director George Tenet was done, that special ops and air power could not defeat the Taliban, he said that the war in Iraq had faltered and we were in danger of stalemate. Ten days later, Baghdad fell. But after having a bad early war, he has been on a blistering run."
Mr. Hersh won a National Magazine Award last month for his articles last year about corruption within the Saudi royal family and stumbles in the war on terror by the United States military and intelligence.
"He is the consummate muckracker," Mr. Shafer said. "It's just important to catalog his hits and misses."
Mr. Hersh got his start in journalism during the 1960's at the City News Bureau in Chicago, where he wrote numerous articles about crime. After stints at United Press International and The Associated Press, he made a brief detour as a press secretary to the presidential candidate Eugene McCarthy. He soon returned to reporting, and came across the events at My Lai.
He received the Pulitzer Prize in 1970 and was eventually hired by The Times to help the newspaper catch up with The Post on the Watergate scandal. He published a number of influential articles at the paper, including breaking the news of broad-based domestic spying by the C.I.A., but it was a fitful collaboration.
He went on to write a number of books, including a damning portrait of Henry A. Kissinger, "The Price of Power," published in 1983. He returned to The Times for several special projects, but eventually landed at The New Yorker. Mr. Hersh's journalistic crusades have received mixed reviews over the years. For example, his assertion in his book "The Samson Option," about the Israeli effort to build a nuclear bomb, that there was a political conspiracy in the United States to delay the release of the American hostages in Iran and prevent President Jimmy Carter's re-election caused an uproar and suggestions that he had overreached.
Mr. Hersh is often compared to Mr. Woodward, an occasional antagonist with whom he competed on Watergate. Mr. Woodward, an assistant managing editor for The Post, has also driven the news agenda recently, with his latest book, "Plan of Attack" (Simon & Schuster). "They are like Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb," said Mr. Leen of The Post. But while Mr. Woodward is on a first-name basis with many of the administration's highest ranking officials, Mr. Hersh sticks to the back channels for articles that often countervail the official wisdom.
Mr. Hersh is a noir version of Mr. Woodward, darker and brusquer. Robert Baer, a former C.I.A. officer and a friend and source of Mr. Hersh, can recall being dragged out of bed on a Sunday morning at 7 a.m. to go to breakfast.
"He calls me and 10 other military and intelligence guys by 8 in the morning every day," said Mr. Baer, who has a Labrador that he has affectionately named Hersh who is fond of digging through trash.
That intensity is on display in his working relationship with Mr. Remnick at The New Yorker. "Has there been any screaming and yelling along the way? Sure," Mr. Remnick said. "Like any good marriage we have had our moments."
Last week Mr. Hersh called Mr. Remnick at a hotel in California at 4 in the morning. "There was no `Hello,' no `How are you?' " Mr. Remnick said. "Just the news that he had nailed down a source, and then he was gone."
-------- ENERGY
-------- alternative energy
California Senate OKs New Home Solar Power Bill
May 20, 2004
SACRAMENTO, California, (ENS)
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/may2004/2004-05-20-096.asp
The California State Senate passed a bill Wednesday that will require builders of new housing developments to install solar photovoltaic (PV) energy systems on a percentage of new homes beginning in 2006. Such a requirement is intended to help make the solar energy systems cost effective and help address anticipated energy shortages while preventing air pollution.
"Solar power is much more cost effective when included in the construction of new homes," said Senator Kevin Murray, a Democrat and author of the bill. "This bill simply requires that builders phase in solar systems during construction, reducing energy costs and air pollution at the same time."
Solar power works best on summer afternoons when the power grid is under great stress from demand by air conditioning units. Murray says if the bill becomes law the installed solar systems would offset thousands of pounds of pollution during the smoggiest months of the year and prevent the need to build new natural gas power plants.
"Several large scale housing developments have already begun offering new solar homes," said Bernadette Del Chiaro, energy advocate for Environment California, sponsor of the bill. "By creating a larger market, this bill will help drive down the cost of PV making it available to the mainstream homebuyer."
California remains dependent on non-renewable energy resources such as fossil fuel and nuclear power plants for 90 percent of its electricity.
While the state has recently required utility companies to double renewable energy purchases by 2017, less than one percent of the state's electricity will come from solar power in the coming years.
"Our over-reliance on polluting power plants is what got us into an energy crisis in the first place," said Del Chiaro. "Solar homes not only save money and protect our health, they can also help stabilize California's electric grid."
-------- ACTIVISTS
Award is first formal thanks to man who may have saved the world
IN 1983, SOVIET COLONEL REFUSED TO PUSH THE NUCLEAR BUTTON
By Chuck Carroll,
San JoseMercury News
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/8714683.htm?ERIGHTS=-1346156422608920405mercurynews
More than 20 years after he may have saved the world from nuclear obliteration, a San Francisco-based peace organization is honoring a little-known retired Soviet colonel who has been living out his meager retirement outside Moscow.
Friday, in Moscow, the Association of World Citizens, a United Nations-recognized non-governmental organization, will hand its World Citizen Award to the impoverished pensioner for his troubles.
On Sept. 26, 1983, Col. Stanislav Petrov, in charge of 200 men, was the duty officer at Serpukhov-15, the then-Soviet Union's main nuclear command and control center, when the country's satellite-based early-detection system began warning of the launch of five U.S. intercontinental ballistic missiles.
A large red button flashing ``START'' in Russian, along with flashing lights and a loud Klaxon, was telling him to push the button that would begin a sequence that would have led to the launch of a massive nuclear counterattack.
The pressure on him was enormous, and seared him for the rest of his life. But Petrov finally decided it was a false alarm. Tensions with the United States were high, but he figured a nuclear war would certainly -- well, almost certainly -- begin with an all-out attack, not five missiles. He decided not to alert his superiors, as protocol demanded, because they might order him to push the button and set off a nuclear holocaust.
As it turned out, the Soviets' satellites had mistaken a cloud for a missile launch out of North Dakota.
At first, Petrov was praised for his calm judgment, but later he came under intense scrutiny. In the end, he was neither punished nor rewarded.
In the ensuing years, major news organizations have interviewed the old colonel, who recalls drinking a half-bottle of vodka ``like it was one glass'' after the harrowing incident, which left him bitter.
But until now, he has not received a single formal recognition for possibly saving civilization. Friday afternoon, in the editorial offices of the liberal Russian-English newspaper Moscow News (Moskovskije Novosti), he will accept not only the World Citizen Award, but a financial gift from grateful people around the globe.
Although the incident remains a state secret in Russia, U.S. officials have reportedly concluded that Petrov's story is highly credible. The Soviet and Russian governments have never challenged it.
Previous recipients of the award include the Rev. Jesse Jackson and Robert Muller, former U.N. Assistant-Secretary-General and founder of the University for Peace.
Contact Chuck Carroll at ccarroll@mercurynews.com or (408) 920-5206.
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Accused U.S. Army Deserter Says Iraqi Prisoner Mistreatment Affected Decision
Florida National Guard Staff Sergeant Camilo Mejia, accused of deserting his unit in Iraq, says he witnessed prisoner abuse, which partly influenced his decision to not return.
Thursday, May 20, 2004
(MASNET & News Agencies)
http://www.masnet.org/news.asp?id=1227
WASHINGTON, May 20 - A U.S. Army soldier being tried on charges of deserting his unit in Iraq, has claimed he saw civilians die and Iraqi prisoners mistreated as early as May 2003.
Lawyers for Florida National Guard Staff Sergeant Camilo Mejia last year argued that he walked away partly to avoid orders to abuse Iraqi prisoners, reports the Associated Press (AP).
"It wasn't what I had imagined as a soldier, that we were going to attack a defined enemy and that soldiers were going to be killed by enemies," said Mejia, whose court-martial begins Thursday at Fort Stewart, Georgia, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).
"I saw rather that a lot of innocent people died, a lot of civilians."
His attorneys spent Wednesday, the first day of Mejia's court-martial, asking a military judge to allow testimony from witnesses who could support Mejia's claim that his unit was ordered to abuse detainees, reports the AP.
But the judge ruled that only Mejia himself could raise the abuse issue before a military jury of officers and enlisted men that will begin hearing the case Thursday, the news agency reports.
Mejia, 28, claimed he saw as early as May 2003 prisoners being mistreated, an issue that has rocked the U.S. military since recent revelations of abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad.
Ramsey Clark, a former U.S. attorney general and one of Mejia's lawyers, said Mejia's unit was ordered to use sleep-deprivation tactics with blindfolded Iraqi detainees, in at least one instance by cocking a pistol next to their heads, reports the AP.
"In early May we went to a prisoner detention camp" in Al Assad, he said. Al Assad is an Iraqi air base occupied by U.S. forces.
"We began to see that prisoners were not allowed to sleep for several hours. Plus, there was psychological mistreatment. They were threatened with death, they screamed at them and they insulted them," Mejia said. "It was something that did not appear right."
Ordered to keep prisoners awake for up to 48 hours, soldiers would sometimes bang on walls with a sledgehammer, Mejia wrote, or would "load a 9 mm pistol next to their ear."
Clark, attorney general under President Lyndon B. Johnson, said Mejia was protected by international law to avoid duties that would have constituted war crimes. He compared Mejia's claims of prisoner mistreatment to the abuse scandal at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, reports the AP.
"The United States is seeking to court-martial soldiers in [Iraq] for outrageous abuses at the same time it prosecutes a soldier halfway around the world because he did what he had a duty to do under international law," Clark said.
Capt. A.J. Balbo, the lead prosecutor, argued that even if Mejia saw prisoners abused in Iraq that would not justify fleeing the Army for five months, the news agency reports.
"This is about a soldier who deserted, who ran away," Balbo said. "While he went into hiding, he never raised these issues. Instead, he buried them in his conscientious objector packet."
Mejia filed for conscientious objector status with the Pentagon, his civilian lawyer, Louis Font of Brookline, Massachusetts, said in March.
He is seeking an honorable discharge and dismissal of all charges against him.
The International Committee of the Red Cross has reported what it called systematic abuse of Iraqi prisoners that amounted to torture, saying it first raised concerns with the United States more than a year ago.
Although graphic photos of the abuses only became public last month, sparking a scandal that continues to rock Washington, the Red Cross report was submitted in February and based on visits to Iraqi prisons between March 31, 2003, and October 24.
A Red Cross report specifically on abuses it witnessed at Abu Ghraib prison was delivered to U.S. military commanders in Iraq in November, but it was not taken seriously, and the allegations it made were not investigated until two months later, the Wall Street Journal said Wednesday quoting a senior U.S. Army official.
The Red Cross report stated there were attempts by the U.S. military to curtail the international group's unannounced visits to sensitive cellblocks at Abu Ghraib where interrogations were taking place, the daily said.
Three of seven U.S. soldiers accused of prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib were to appear before courts martial in Iraq on Wednesday.
Mejia, who has dual Nicaraguan and Costa Rican nationality, said he was in Iraq from April to October 2003, when he obtained permission to return to the United States for two weeks.
He is charged with desertion after failing to return to his unit in Iraq after the two-week furlough in October, reports the AP.
Military law defines desertion as leaving the military with no intention to return or to "avoid hazardous duty or to shirk important service."
Mejia, born in Nicaragua and raised in Miami, is not a U.S. citizen but has permanent resident status.
In March, military officials said he would face a special court-martial, sparing him the risk of facing a death sentence, the harshest possible penalty for desertion.
A special court-martial means Mejia could receive no more than one year in a military prison and a bad conduct discharge if convicted, a military spokesman said.
He has been in the Florida National Guard for almost six years and served in the Army for three years before that.
"I can only say, whatever I did, I did because I felt like I had an obligation - moral and in some cases legal," Mejia told reporters outside the courtroom.
"I came back and I decided not to return [to Iraq] because I doubted the constitutional and international legality of the war, and because I was morally opposed to the things that I had seen over there as a soldier," he had said earlier.
"I'm at peace with my decision. I would have liked to have done something more, but at least I know that what I did was right."
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Bush Administration Case Against Greenpeace Dismissed
May 20, 2004
MIAMI, Florida, (ENS)
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/may2004/2004-05-20-01.asp
A federal judge Wednesday dismissed charges brought by the U.S. Justice Department against Greenpeace USA for violating an obscure 1872 maritime law prohibiting "sailormongering."
Judge Adalberto Jordan of the U.S. District Court in Miami ruled there was not enough evidence to try the case. He accepted Greenpeace's claim that the U.S. government provided insufficient evidence for the case to be presented to a jury.
Granting a jury trial in the case last month, Judge Jordan expressed doubts about the Justice Department's ability to prevail against Greenpeace's claim that the criminal statute involved is unfairly vague. "It is not a good sign," he wrote, "when the government resorts to defining a phrase by repeating the phrase itself."
Speaking from the Miami Federal Courthouse, Greenpeace USA Executive Director John Passacantando said, "America's tradition of free speech won a victory today, but our liberties are still not safe. The Bush administration and its allies seem bent on stifling our tradition of civil protest, a tradition that has made our country stronger throughout our history."
On April 12, 2002, two Greenpeace volunteers carried out a peaceful protest against a cargo ship, the APL Jade, which was transporting illegal mahogany from the Brazilian Amazon. The protest was part of Greenpeace's ongoing campaign to save the world's forests from destructive logging.
Scott Anderson, a third and fourth grade school teacher from Utah, testified that he had boarded the APL Jade. He explained that he asked ship's crew for permission to board and was greeted warmly and helped aboard. He and Hillary Hosta came aboard using the same ladder that the pilot had.
After boarding the ship, they said they explained to the crew why they were there and what they intended to do, which was to hang a banner. The banner read, "President Bush, Stop Illegal Logging."
In its allegations of conspiracy against them, the Justice Department said that after reaching the APL-JADE's pilot house, Hosta and Anderson attempted to evade the ship's crew but were apprehended and detained until the ship moored and law enforcement arrived.
The two protesters who boarded the ship and four others who maneuvered in the area flying Greenpeace flags, all expected to be arrested and charged as part of the demonstration. They were charged with illegally boarding a vessel before its arrival in port and conspiracy to do so and have settled the charges against them.
The case before Judge Jordan was brought by the U.S. Justice Department against Greenpeace USA as an organization, the first case of its kind.
In granting a jury trial, Judge Jordan agreed with Greenpeace's assertion that the case was essentially a free speech case. The judge ruled that "the indictment is a rare - and maybe unprecedented - prosecution of an advocacy group" for conduct related to free speech.
Passacantando said, "The unprecedented nature of this prosecution has the potential to transform an important aspect of our nation's legal and political life, significantly affecting our tradition of civil protest."
"The conduct for which the Ashcroft Justice Department seeks to prosecute Greenpeace was, essentially, whistle-blowing - publicly exposing and preventing violations of U.S. law prohibiting the importation of illegally harvested mahogany wood."
The 1872 law under which Greenpeace was prosecuted was originally designed to discourage owners of inns and brothels from boarding ships, as they are about to enter port, in order to lure the sailors into their establishments. It has only been used twice in its history, most recently in 1890.
Former Vice President Al Gore called the case "highly disturbing" and Senator Patrick Leahy warned that a successful prosecution would "have a chilling effect on free speech and activism of all kinds."
In another high profile demonstration of support for Greenpeace, more than 1,200 people gathered on Miami's South Beach January 17 to create a massive human art image by arranging their bodies to form a replica of a 1959 Picasso work of art showing a prisoner and words "Endangered Freedoms." It was photographed from a helicopter above Miami Beach.
"Greenpeace is grateful to everyone who stood with us, from Al Gore and Julian Bond to the citizens of Miami and people around the world. We will never give up the struggle to protect our forests, our air and oceans, and to build a green and peaceful future," said Passacantando.
A record number of more than 100,000 people from around the world sent protest messages to President George W. Bush and U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft demanding that the case be dropped.
"Nothing better illustrates the frivolous nature of this prosecution than the fact the judge threw the case out without even needing to hear from the defense," said David Bookbinder, Sierra Club's Washington Legal Director. "We wish that the Bush administration would have devoted the time and money spent on this case to instead focusing more on the central issue -- stopping the import of illegally harvested timber."
----
Greenpeace cleared in U.S. ship-boarding case
Thursday, May 20, 2004
By Jim Loney,
Reuters
http://www.enn.com/news/2004-05-20/s_24063.asp
MIAMI - A U.S. judge acquitted environmental protection group Greenpeace Wednesday on charges it conspired to break the law by sending activists aboard a freighter carrying illegally felled mahogany two years ago.
The politically charged case dusted off a law not used since 1890 to bring the first criminal prosecution by U.S. authorities of an advocacy group for civil disobedience.
U.S. District Judge Adalberto Jordan granted a Greenpeace motion to dismiss the charges after the prosecution rested on the third day of trial, ruling that federal prosecutors had failed to prove their case, a Greenpeace lawyer said.
"We're elated. This is a real victory for America's tradition of free speech," said John Passacantando, the executive director of Greenpeace U.S. "But our liberties are still in jeopardy, of course. The Bush administration is intent on stifling free speech."
The case stemmed from a day in April 2002 when two Greenpeace activists climbed onto the APL Jade freighter just off Miami to hang a sign reading: "President Bush: Stop Illegal Logging."
Two Greenpeace members were charged and pleaded guilty after the incident. Fifteen months later, prosecutors targeted the entire organization with a grand jury indictment. Civil rights advocates said the obscurity of the law used to take Greenpeace to court suggested the case was revenge for Greenpeace's criticism of President Bush's environmental policies.
Passed in 1872 to prevent "sailor mongering," the law has been gathering dust since it was last prosecuted in 1890. Sailor mongering was common in the 19th century, when brothels sent whores onto ships before they had reached harbor to lure sailors ashore with booze and promises of warm beds.
Greenpeace was accused of illegally boarding the APL Jade, as the 964-foot vessel "was about to arrive at the place of her destination." It also faces a charge of conspiring to commit that crime.
U.S. prosecutors argued Greenpeace conspired to break the law by recruiting "climbers" for the seaborne protest and by using a Greenpeace corporate credit card to rent a boat.
Greenpeace challenged the prosecution on the wording of the law, saying the ship was too far offshore when it was boarded to be considered "about to arrive" at its destination.
Greenpeace general counsel Tom Wetterer said the statute failed to define what "about to arrive" meant, and the judge agreed it was too vague.
The boarding of the APL Jade was part of a global campaign to stop the illegal logging of mahogany in Brazil's Amazon, a lucrative trade blamed for the destruction of vast swathes of rain forest.
Advocacy groups had said a conviction would be a blow to Brazilian efforts to win more backing for its fight against the illegal mahogany trade from the United States, the biggest market for a wood so valuable it boasts fatter profit margins than cocaine.
----
Judge Dismisses Greenpeace Charges
By Manuel Roig-Franzia
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 20, 2004; Page A14
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A40993-2004May19.html
MIAMI, May 19 -- A federal judge dismissed criminal charges Wednesday against the environmental group Greenpeace, ending an unusual case that drew the ire of free-speech advocates and critics of the Bush administration.
The activist group, known for its high-profile demonstrations, was criminally charged after two members were caught in April 2002 boarding a ship off Miami Beach that they believed was carrying 70 tons of illegally imported Brazilian mahogany.
The activists spent a weekend in jail. But the case became a national cause celebre when the U.S. attorney's office here took the unprecedented step of seeking a criminal indictment of the organization itself, using an obscure 1872 law intended to dissuade brothel owners from boarding ships to lure sailors with prostitutes and liquor. The law had not been used in 113 years.
Greenpeace's attorneys did not have to offer up evidence to counter the charges on Wednesday because U.S. District Judge Adalberto Jordan in Miami dismissed the case shortly after the prosecution presented its last witness following 1 1/2 days of testimony.
"The Bush administration and its allies are bent on chilling dissent," said John Passacantando, Greenpeace's executive director. "This is clearly a big victory for America's tradition of free speech."
Scott Anderson, a third-grade teacher from Moab, Utah, who was one of the two activists arrested in connection with boarding the cargo ship in 2002, said, "The checks and balances system worked. The message is: You cannot pick on advocacy groups."
Carlos B. Castillo, a spokesman for U.S. Attorney Marcos Daniel Jimenez, said the verdict would not alter the office's approach to handling protest cases.
"The U.S. attorney's office remains undeterred in prosecuting those persons who illegally attempt to board ships at the Port of Miami or otherwise threaten port security," he said.
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Protesters Hit Blair With Flour in Parliament
May 20, 2004
By LIZETTE ALVAREZ
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/20/international/europe/20blai.html
LONDON, May 19 - Prime Minister Tony Blair was pelted on the back by a ball of purple flour on Wednesday in the House of Commons, an episode that raised serious questions about security in Westminster.
The attack led to a 70-minute evacuation of Parliament. The flour, which was stuffed inside two condoms, was found to be harmless.
Two men, Ron Davis and Guy Harrison, who are members of Fathers 4 Justice, a group known for using publicity stunts to push for the rights of divorced fathers, were arrested.
The two men had been sitting in a special guest area of the House of Commons gallery, when Mr. Davis rushed to the railing and lobbed the flour-filled condoms, which sent plumes of purple powder into the air. Mr. Harrison, standing next to him, held up a poster.
The men had spent a total of £700, or about $1,237, to buy tickets for the guest area at a charity auction about two months ago, said Graham Manson, a spokesman for the group. The men had been vouched for by Lady Golding, who later apologized.
The special guest area is not secured by the temporary plexiglass barrier that was recently erected around the public gallery to protect members of Parliament from just such an attack.
Mr. Blair, who was in the middle of a raucous exchange during the weekly prime minister's questions session, initially appeared oblivious to the flour bomb. As the purple powder floated in the air and the two men in the gallery began to shout, a few House members sprang to their feet and gazed up with startled looks. At that point, Mr. Blair noticed the commotion and was quickly ushered out of the room. A circle of purple powder was visible on his back.
A spokeswoman for the prime minister's office said Mr. Blair was unfazed and had asked to return to the question and answer session, but it had already been suspended.
Scotland Yard's antiterrorist branch has been asked to investigate.
Calling the incident serious, the leader of the House of Commons, Peter Hain, said he asked for an immediate report on the attack and any security lapses. Mr. Hain had recommended the installation of the screen, warning at the time that someone could easily release deadly agents into the chamber.
For now, the privilege of allowing lawmakers to invite special guests who sit in a separate, unrestricted area has been suspended.
While no one was hurt in the incident, members of Parliament and other politicians said it revealed distressing failures of both security and procedures for handling an attack.
It was also just one of several security breaches in the past year. Last year, a Daily Mirror reporter wrangled a job as a footman at Buckingham Palace during President Bush's state visit. He later wrote about his time in the palace.
Earlier this week, a man posing as a police officer penetrated several layers of security and got inside Windsor Castle.
Responding to Wednesday's incident, Home Secretary David Blunkett ordered that a security review, which was already under way, be speeded up, and he said that one outcome of Wednesday's incident would be less public access to the House of Commons.
Iain Duncan Smith, the former Tory leader, said he was appalled at how the incident was handled, adding that had it been a chemical or biological agent, it would have been spread all over London as lawmakers evacuated the site.
"What we did today was categorically the opposite of what should have happened," he said. "With a threat like this, you should seal the doors completely."
But Mr. Blunkett, speaking to BBC's Radio 4, said it was clear that the substance was not hazardous at the time the decision was made to clear the House of Commons.
In a statement, Fathers 4 Justice said the powder attack was "the first in a series of planned protests" before its main Father's Day demonstration on June 18.
"Fathers 4 Justice say that M.P.'s are fully aware that every day 100 children lose contact with their fathers in the family courts and that Parliament has failed children, failed fathers and failed families," the statement said.
---------
Ashcroft Loses Controversial Prosecution Against NGO
antiwar.com
by Jim Lobe
May 20, 2004
http://www.antiwar.com/lobe/?articleid=2617
In a rebuke to the U.S. Justice Department, a federal judge in Miami has thrown out a criminal case against environmental group Greenpeace, a prosecution that was watched closely by other progressive organizations that say they are under threat from the Bush administration.
U.S. District Judge Adalberto Jordan acquitted the group at the end of the prosecution's case Wednesday, the third day of the jury trial, for protesting against a ship that carried 70 tons of illegally cut mahogany. He said the prosecution, which based the action on an obscure 1872 law, had failed to provide enough evidence for the case to go to the jury.
"America's tradition of free speech won a victory today," said John Passacantando, Greenpeace executive director, "but our liberties are still not safe. The Bush administration and its allies seem bent on stifling our tradition of civil protest, a tradition that has made our country stronger throughout our history."
The case, which marked the first time a non-governmental organization (NGO) had been indicted by the federal government for the protest activities of its members, drew considerable national and even international attention. Former Vice President Al Gore and Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy were among a number of prominent individuals and groups that protested the prosecution.
It was triggered by an April 2002 protest in which two volunteers from a Greenpeace vessel boarded the APL Jade cargo ship, which was carrying the mahogany from Brazil toward the Port of Miami.
Just a few months before, President George W Bush himself publicly committed Washington to help developing countries prevent illegal logging of mahogany, and the two activists who boarded the ship unfurled a banner that read, "President Bush, Stop Illegal Logging."
The two activists, as well as the four others in the Greenpeace boat, were arrested when they came into port, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor, and spent a weekend in jail.
But fifteen months later, the Justice Department filed an indictment in Miami against Greenpeace itself under the 1872 law, which had last been used in 1890.
The statute was originally intended to keep houses of prostitution and rum shops from luring sailors on incoming ships to shore with promises of women and grog, and the judge decided the case on a technicality.
As the boarding took place about six miles from port, according to Jordan, it did not meet the statutory requirement that it was "about to arrive," suggesting that he might have ruled differently on the motion to dismiss had the boat been much closer when the protest occurred. "Caveat emptor," he warned the defendant in reference to future protests.
But Passacantando and other activists were unrepentant. "Greenpeace will never let up in its defense of our planet," he said, while Greenpeace's general counsel, Tom Wetterer, said the ruling was "a message that the government can't just throw any charge at an organization to silence (it)."
According to Howard Simon, director of the Florida branch of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) "the fact (that the prosecutors) get bounced out of court within two and a half days, does that indicate at all that the case was ill-conceived from the start?"
Still, the case has been taken very seriously among progressive NGOs that have been increasingly under attack by both the administration and various groups closely allied with it.
For example, the neo-conservative American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies launched a new website last June to monitor the activities and internal structure of more than 100 international NGOs, including Greenpeace, that they accuse of pursuing a "globalist agenda" at the expense of U.S. sovereignty or national interest.
"There is this falsehood that (these NGOs) are somehow from the grassroots," said Danielle Pletka, an AEI vice president, at a Federalist Society meeting last November. "That is an untruth."
Labor Secretary Elaine Chao and other administration officials, particularly former Federalist Society members around Attorney General John Ashcroft, have also spoken out strongly against certain NGOs that they consider to be working against the administration's policies.
The Justice Department had insisted the Greenpeace prosecution was not politically motivated but was undertaken only to prevent people from illegally attempting to board ships near the Port of Miami or threaten port security. The port denied berthing space for Greenpeace boats after the indictment was filed.
But NGO supporters of Greenpeace doubted that explanation.
"I'm not naïve enough to think the government will cease its efforts to suppress dissent," said the ACLU's Simon, while Mitch Bernard, litigation director of the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, "The government is full of cards it can play if it wants to continue to stifle dissent."
"Unfortunately, I don't see any reason for believing this is the end. Non-profit groups and advocates need to be on their guard for this sort of thing."
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Activists and MPs renew call for British hunt ban
By Reuters
Thursday, May 20, 2004
http://www.enn.com/news/2004-05-20/s_24066.asp
LONDON - Animal welfare activists and backbench members of parliament called on Britain's government Wednesday to reopen the long-running debate on banning hunting with dogs.
Opponents of blood sports have tried for more than a half-century to put an end to fox-hunting, but red-jacketed horsemen and their hounds still thunder across the countryside in pursuit of their prey.
The issue has become one of the most divisive in the country. More than 400,000 hunt supporters marched through London in 2002 - among the biggest protests in recent times - while hunts are often sabotaged by undercover activists.
"I am continually amazed that in today's modern and so-called civilized society people still congregate in parts of England and Wales to chase an animal to exhaustion before killing it with dogs," former minister Tony Banks said at the campaign launch. "Furthermore they do so in the name of sport and in the knowledge that it is perfectly legal."
Supporters of hunting - including heir to the throne Prince Charles - say it is a service to farmers who regard foxes as vermin and that it maintains thousands of rural jobs.
Britain's upper chamber, the unelected House of Lords, voted against a ban last October, going against the wishes of elected members of parliament who voted overwhelmingly in favor.
And despite promising to scrap the centuries-old activity more than four years ago, there was no mention of a ban when the government set out its agenda last November. However, Prime Minister Tony Blair has promised he would resolve the saga during this parliament. Now the lawmakers are calling once more for him to push through a ban.
Some 253 members of parliament signed an motion presented Wednesday saying the House of Commons "looks forward to the early re-introduction of the government's Hunting Bill" and "recalls its own votes to ban the cruel sport of hunting with dogs on at least nine occasions since 1995."
The motion, like a petition in parliament, does not force the government to act but is a barometer of sentiment.
Launching its report, "Time to Deliver the Ban," the protest group Campaigning to Protect Hunted Animals (CPHA) said a ban was an issue of trust for the government.
"Parliamentary expectation of a ban is higher than ever, reflecting the fact that 76 percent of the British public think that hunting with dogs should not be legal," said group spokeswoman Phyllis Campbell-McRae.
Britain's Department for the Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs said the commitment to resolve the issue during this parliament would be met.
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Two Charged in Flour Attack on Tony Blair
(AP) London
May 20, 2004
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/B/BRITAIN_COMMONS_DISRUPTION?SITE=DCTMS&SECTION=HOME
LONDON (AP) -- Two men who hurled purple flour at Prime Minister Tony Blair in Parliament were charged Thursday with causing a security scare.
Blair was not hurt in the Wednesday incident, and the powder was only cornstarch. But fearing a terrorist attack, the House of Commons speaker ordered the chamber evacuated.
The two protesters, 48 and 36, were charged with violating public order.
Both were released on bail pending and ordered to appear Wednesday. The amount of bail was not disclosed.
It was a major security breach in the House of Commons, which recently put up a bulletproof screen to protect legislators from possible attacks from the public gallery.
The two protesters were from a group campaigning on child custody issues.
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