NucNews - July 19, 2005 -------- NUCLEAR Nuclear weapons ruin the art of warfare. Date published: 7/19/2005 Fredericksburg.com http://www.fredericksburg.com/News/FLS/2005/072005/07192005/115698 What happened to the good old days of warfare? Soldiers fighting hand to hand, canons recoiling and running over people, knights in shining armor battling other knights in shining armor, choreographed advances and other such things marking a great battle. But now we have nuclear weaponry. And as a good friend of mine once said, it's like cheating in a video game. Nuclear weaponry has never really gotten us anywhere. It's completely unfair to anyone we use it against. Instead of just losing an arm or a leg, they get cancer, or some horrible genetic mutation that leaves them in a lifetime of pain. Personally I'd rather lose the leg to shrapnel or gangrene. Not to mention, as it's pretty commonly known, during the Cold War we created a mass amount of nuclear weapons, along with the U.S.S.R., in an attempt to be the bigger, stronger superpower. So, now the U.S. and Russia have tons of nuclear weapons and other countries are trying to build them. This is a recipe for disaster all because Einstein got the bright idea to further our species. So what do we do? I suggest we go back to the old days. The old days where if a man offended you or your father, you asked him to a duel, not a war. Where a fight was carefully choreographed, where one fires after the other. And where the idea of a bomb was as foreign as the idea of women's liberation. Of course, this might not work. In fact I'm rather sure it wouldn't. Too many casualties to contend with, and I don't think soldiers would be too interested in learning how to dance as a part of their training. But regardless, the problem of nuclear weaponry goes beyond what I have discussed, to the problems of nuclear waste, cancer, mutations, genocide in the name of war, and the ultimate problem: If we use another nuclear bomb, will that trigger enough bombs to end the world? Is that a risk we're willing to take? I'd like to think not. I'd like to think that we're better than that, and I hope that our country never decides to take that risk again. Plus, who wants to deal with nuclear radiation when you can't even get nifty world powers out of it? -------- accidents and safety With New Data, a Debate on Low-Level Radiation By MATTHEW L. WALD July 19, 2005 NY TIMES http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/19/science/19radi.html?pagewanted=print WASHINGTON, July 18 - A report on the health effects of small doses of radiation has renewed a debate on the way exposure is regulated and how the public should regard such doses. The report, issued by the National Academy of Sciences, incorporates nearly 15 years of new data on atomic bomb survivors in Japan. It makes only small changes in estimates of the number of fatal cancers that can be expected from a given radiation dose, but it reinforces the idea, opposed by some experts, that even tiny doses may add slightly to risk. The report also gives more detail on cancer cases, concluding that women are more likely than men to contract the disease, given equal doses. The study estimates that if 100,000 people are exposed to a given dose, it will create 410 fatal cases of solid cancers in men and 610 in women. While the report does not discuss explicitly why women seem to be more vulnerable, the data tables show a high incidence of cancer in female organs and in the breast. That finding raises the question of whether radiation protection regulations should be rewritten with women in mind, said Arjun Makhijani, a nuclear physicist who runs a foundation that is highly critical of some government nuclear programs. For example, he said, nuclear power plant workers are limited to a dose of 5 rems per year, a measurement that counts the amount of radiation energy absorbed by flesh, adjusted for different types of radiation. Perhaps, Dr. Makhijani suggested, it should be 3.5, to reflect the idea that women are one-third more sensitive. But most power plant workers absorb far less than that amount, experts say. At the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Donald A. Cool, a senior adviser to the commission on radiation safety, said that the committee's new report would be considered, along with others that are being prepared, but that the exposure standards were already "prudent." He noted that those standards were stated two ways, with absolute numbers and with a separate requirement that exposures be "as low as reasonably achievable." Even though radiation has been intensively studied since the atomic bombings in Japan 60 years ago next month, the effects of low doses are still much in dispute. The study chairman, Dr. Richard R. Monson of the Harvard School of Public Health, said that while this study varied slightly from the last one, in 1990, the actual rates could be two or three times as high or half as great as the values given, so they were essentially equal. A medical radiation expert not involved in the study, Robert J. Barish of New York, said the problem was that the association between radiation and cancer was "very weak" at low doses. "You're measuring a small effect and that could be confounded by all kinds of things," he said. The report, issued late last month, makes clear that the main sources of radiation exposure are natural, not manufactured; for example, it points out that average annual radiation dose in the United States is about three millisieverts, units used for measuring biological damage. But there is wide variation. People living at sea level, for example, are better shielded from cosmic rays. Some people absorb doses from naturally occurring radiation in rocks and minerals. As a result Florida residents may receive about 2 millisieverts a year, and people in northeastern Washington State, 17 millisieverts. About 82 percent of radiation exposure is from natural sources, and of the human-generated part, 58 percent comes from medical X-rays and another 21 percent is therapeutic exposures, the report points out. Consumer products account for 16 percent; occupational exposure and fallout are 2 percent each, and aspects of the nuclear fuel cycle are 1 percent. The report recommends, among other steps, following the health of people given whole-body scans, which give off doses of radiation much larger than X-rays, to learn about the effects of small doses. But opponents of nuclear power seized on the decision of the report's authors to continue to support the idea that no dose is without risk. The report said that its observations were consistent with an explanation of the relationship of dose to cancer called "linear no-threshold." In that model, used to explain the effect of doses that are too small to cause immediate sickness, each time the dose is cut in half, the cancer risk is cut in half, with no lower limit. This is in contrast to other hazards, like some chemicals, in which small exposures appear to have no effect but larger ones can be fatal. The report was a disappointment for some in the nuclear industry who have argued that no excess deaths are observed for small doses. "It just didn't look at reams and reams and reams of the most relevant data," said Theodore Rockwell, a veteran of the World War II project to build the first nuclear bombs and later the first nuclear submarines. He pointed out that the French counterpart of the National Academy of Sciences recently backed away from the idea that small doses were meaningful, concluding instead that radiation damage occurs when the doses become large enough to overwhelm the body's defenses. Other nuclear professionals took some comfort in some of the findings, though. Peter F. Caracappa, who is the radiation safety officer at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, said the report "makes very clear that the risks from low doses are very small." "I'd say vanishingly small, for the kinds of doses that are typically incurred from operating nuclear power plants," he said. Dr. Makhijani, though, said the report showed that human-generated doses were very important, even if they were far smaller than the natural ones, simply because they were imposed involuntarily. "From your neighbor, you're not willing to be punched in the nose," he said, drawing a parallel to industrial activities that cause radiation exposure, "even though God may do very much worse to you." -------- australia Bush welcomes Howard for talks on security, China WASHINGTON (AFP) Jul 19, 2005 http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050719152929.orv9qg3h.html Australian Prime Minister John Howard met with US President George W. Bush at the White House Tuesday for talks on terrorism, freer trade, the North Korean nuclear issue and relations with China. The full plate reflects the extent of US-Australian cooperation on important international issues including Iraq and Afghanistan, where "Australia has been a stalwart partner," according to a senior US official who requested anonymity. The two leaders were also to discuss the fate of Australian "Taliban" David Hicks, who was captured in 2001 in Afghanistan and faces an imminent military trial, the official told AFP. Bush and Howard, who met in the Oval Office ahead of a joint press conference scheduled for 11:50 am (1550 GMT), were to expected to focus on relations with Beijing and the role China plays in the region. "They will discuss China, Australian relations with China, US relations with China, and how we all relate to one another" on trade and security issues such as efforts to end North Korea's nuclear weapons programs, the official said. Australia is not a party to the six-country talks on Pyongyang's atomic ambitions but "has been supportive of" the US-led proliferation security initiative that aims to choke off illicit technology transfers, the official said. Bush and Howard's discussion of ties with China came amid renewed tensions over Beijing's threats to use military force against Taiwan if it believes the island is moving toward declaring its independence. At the Pentagon on Monday, Howard joined US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld in condemning remarks by a top Chinese general who warned that China would use nuclear weapons if the US military intervened in Taiwan. Howard told reporters that the remarks were "irresponsible and I couldn't believe that they represent the views of the government." Howard said that while China's military and economic might is growing, he believed Beijing understood that "military conflict of any kind is not conducive to their leading longer term goals." Under the ANZUS (Australia-New Zealand-United States) treaty, each country is obliged to support the other in the event of an attack, and Australia could be expected to back the United States if China resorted to force over Taiwan. But Howard has said Australia's close ties with China and the United States placed it in a position to lobby both sides for peace. "We see ourselves as having a role in continually identifying, and advocating to each, the shared strategic interests these great powers have in regional peace and prosperity," he said when tensions over Taiwan rose earlier this year. China is one of Australia's most important trading partners, and the two countries are currently discussing a free trade agreement. As a leading light in the "Cairns group" of agricultural exporters, Australia has been in the vanguard of calls for trade liberalization, especially in farming produce. That has contrasted with the apparent reluctance of the United States and the European Union to go dramatically further in scrapping their own generous subsidies to their farmers. Howard left for the United States on Friday with a pledge to send 150 elite troops to Afghanistan ahead of September elections there. Howard, who also has some 900 soldiers in Iraq, has dismissed suggestions in the wake of the July 7 London bombings that the new deployment announced Wednesday could put Australia at greater risk of a terror attack. "If you imagine you can buy immunity from fanatics by curling yourself in a ball and apologising to the world for who you are; not only is that morally bankrupt, it's also ineffective," he said. ---- Territorians urged not to panic over radioactive waste dump Tuesday, 19/07/2005 Australian Broadcasting http://www.abc.net.au/rural/content/2005/s1417595.htm One of Australia's leading nuclear experts is urging Northern Territorians not to panic over a Federal Government plan to build a radioactive waste dump in the Territory. Three suggested sites for a low level dump are to be assessed for their hydrology, geology, Aboriginal heritage and closeness to communities. Dr Ron Cameron, from the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, says while international recommendations suggest it is safer to keep radioactive waste underground, it can be stored in other ways. "I think it's important to remember this is solid material, this is compacted very densely or in concrete," he said. "It's not liquid, so it doesn't flow anywhere even if the drums were to have any problems with them. "And if it's above ground and a drum does deteriorate you can always just repack it. "And water tables is one of the key issues you look at and generally sites with water tables close or nearby wouldn't be suitable for putting it below ground. So clearly those that would be more suitable would be those with deep water tables." ---- CLP refuses to pressure Senators over nuclear dump vote Tuesday, July 19, 2005. 11:02am (AEST) http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200507/s1417384.htm The Country Liberal Party leader Jodeen Carney has rejected suggestions that she can and should pressure her federal colleagues into voting against a Commonwealth nuclear waste dump in the Northern Territory. When the announcement about the proposed sites was made last week, the Opposition Leader said the CLP would work with the Labor Government to fight the Federal Government's decision. The Territory Government argues Ms Carney should instruct the CLP's Senator Nigel Scullion and the Member for Solomon, Dave Tollner, to vote against any legislation allowing the dump. While Ms Carney has not been contactable, a statement from her office says in the case of Senator Scullion it would be contempt of the Senate if the CLP instructed him on how to vote. Senator Scullion and Mr Tollner have not be contactable for a statement on the voting issue. -------- britain Trident to get £1bn boost - Reid The issue of Trident was controversial from the outset Tuesday, 19 July, 2005 (BBC) http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4697605.stm The UK's Trident nuclear arsenal is to get a £1bn boost over three years to ensure it is "reliable and safe" for its remaining two decades of service. Defence Secretary John Reid said cash would go to updating the Atomic Weapons Establishment at Aldermaston, Berks. The investment will ensure the UK can "maintain the existing Trident warhead stockpile" Dr Reid told MPs. Tony Blair has said Britain wants to retain its independent nuclear deterrent after Trident. But the prime minister has also stressed no decision has been taken about how to replace the current system. Outdated? In a Commons written answer, Dr Reid said: "In the absence of the ability to undertake live nuclear testing - given that the UK has signed and ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty - it is necessary to invest in the facilities at AWE [Aldermaston] which will provide assurance that the existing Trident warhead stockpile is reliable and safe." Critics say Trident is outdated, designed to deal with the threat posed by the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and should now be stood down. Last month Mr Blair told Labour MP and ex-minister Chris Mullin it was too early to rule in or rule out any particular option about what to do in terms of replacing Trident. "As we set out in our manifesto, we're committed to retaining the UK's independent nuclear deterrent but I'm sure there will be plenty of opportunities to discuss this before the final decision is taken." -------- business Uranium Price Triples to Record Peak, Seen Higher Story by Nick Trevethan REUTERS UK: July 19, 2005 http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/31708/story.htm LONDON - Prices of uranium, the fuel used in most of the world's nuclear power plants, have tripled in the last five years to record levels due to years of under-investment in the supply chain, traders and analysts said. Soaring oil prices and international attempts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions have thrown the spotlight back onto nuclear energy after many years of disfavour. European manufacturers are looking at nuclear energy to secure long-term power prices, with Alcan considering building a plant to feed its aluminium smelting capacity in France and construction of a reactor in Finland is already under way to supply the paper and pulp industry. China plans to build 30 new reactors by 2020 and the United States, Britain, South Korea, Russia, Ukraine, India and Chile also looking at reactor programs. Spot uranium is trading at $29.50/lb according to the Ux Consulting (UxC) website, a leading publisher of uranium prices and price forecasts, against $8-10/lb three or four years ago. Industry watchers said prices could rise to $50 or even $100/lb as years of low prices and under-investment in mining capacity result in significant shortfalls of material. "I think $100 is unlikely. But $50 is certainly not out of the question and the market is definitely not capped at $30," Jeff Combs, president of UxC, said. In addition to strong fundamentals, speculative interest could also push uranium prices higher. [nL18268489] DEMAND RISING "At the moment the world requirement (for uranium) is about 65,000 tonnes per year, but that is rising by 1,000-2,000 tonnes per year, so it will get above 100,000 tonnes in the early 2020s," Steve Kidd, director of strategy and research at the World Nuclear Association, said. "Production is only 40,000 tonnes, with the other 25,000 tonnes coming from ex-weapons material and inventories that have been built up in the past." He said a typical reactor consumes about 200 tonnes of uranium per year, but required an initial charge or 'first core' of around 600 tonnes. "Uranium stocks have fallen because of production shortfalls in recent years and due to the environmental and permitting processes it will take several years for new mines to come into production," Standard Bank London analyst Robin Bhar said. Kidd said he did not expect primary output to rise much above 45,000 tonnes in the next two or three years. Canada produces 11,000-12,000 tonnes of primary uranium a year, followed by Australia with about 9,000 tonnes and Russia, Kazakhstan, Niger and Namibia which each produce about 3,000 tonnes per year. "Primary production is almost at capacity. There is not that much coming on for a few years. The big one will be Olympic Dam in Australia," Kidd said. "That could increase from 4,000 tonnes to 12,000-13,000 tonnes, but it will take until 2010 or 2011." BHP Billiton acquired Olympic Dam, the world's largest uranium deposit, when it bought WMC Resources earlier this year. "While a full feasibility study is yet to be conducted...we believe that there is a high probability of being able to proceed with an open pit expansion," BHP Billiton said. Other miners were also bullish. "The fact that there has been a prolonged period of limited exploration and investment suggests that there will be a significant lead-time before new projects will satisfy demand," a Rio Tinto spokeswoman told Reuters. "The near-to-medium term outlook for prices is therefore positive." -------- canada Public favours refurbishment of Point Lepreau plant Kevin Bissett Canadian Press Tuesday, July 19, 2005 http://www.canada.com/fortstjohn/story.html?id=48b3a2a1-950a-4bc9-a39e-50f38f5f4013 SAINT JOHN, N.B. - In a meeting that was more about optics than energy, more than 150 people gathered Monday to tell Premier Bernard Lord what to do with New Brunswick's aging nuclear power plant. The meeting was called after the federal government announced last week that it won't help the province pay for the proposed $1.4-billion refurbishment of the aging Point Lepreau generating station near Saint John. Ottawa said it couldn't fund the project without setting an expensive precedent that would cause other provinces to seek a similar deal. Lord reacted angrily to the decision last week, saying the province had been misled and betrayed by Ottawa into believing a deal was coming. While the province hasn't made its final decision on what to do with Lepreau, the premier has said all along that he prefers refurbishment over construction of a new coal-fired power plant. Most of the business and labour leaders entering Monday's closed-door meeting were in support of the project, and didn't expect to hear anything new. Darryl Goyetche, president of the Saint John Board of Trade, said he expects the provincial government to proceed with the project. "Even without the participation of the federal government, we believe the business case for refurbishment from an environmental perspective, financially, and diversity of supply, is too strong," he said. "Refurbishment must proceed." Ross Galbraith of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers said the province must keep Lepreau running to protect the many direct and indirect jobs that rely on it. "We can ensure that this project gets done on time and on budget, and that's how we can do our part, and we've got the right people to do that," said Galbraith. The union represents 640 of the 700 employees at Point Lepreau. But not everyone in the meeting was supportive of refurbishment. Environmentalist David Thompson of the New Brunswick Conservation Council said the province should use the opportunity now to get rid of obsolete technology. "If Lepreau goes ahead, it's just going to suck up all the available capital, and we may only see a few token windmills around, and the odd renewable energy project," he said. Despite his government's decision on funding, Saint John Liberal MP Paul Zed remains a supporter of refurbishment, and attended the meeting. "I feel that Mr. Zed was hung out to dry by his own government," said Lord. "He made statements in the past knowing his government was supportive, and in the end they changed their mind, and that's very difficult for him as an MP." Zed is to meet Wednesday with officials of Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. to discuss the future of Lepreau. "I'm very hopeful there are other trees to shake within the federal government and that perhaps through AECL or the government of Canada, working together with the premier, I want to be part of developing another solution that results in refurbishment of Lepreau," said Zed. Lord said if Zed can find any help, it will have to be soon. He said the provincial cabinet will make its decision when it meets on Thursday of next week, and will announce the decision the next day. Point Lepreau generates one third of the province's electricity. It came on line in 1983 and faces the end of its life in 2008 unless it is refurbished. -------- depleted uranium Depleted Uranium: States Take Action to Protect Their Soldiers and Veterans Tue, 19 Jul 2005 06:17:50 -0700 By Kevin Zeese, GNN http://www.gnn.tv/articles/1541/Depleted_Uranium_States_Take_Action_to_Protect_Their_Soldiers_and_Veterans Louisiana passes law giving returning veterans the right to get tested Louisiana recently passed legislation giving all returning veterans the right to get a best practices health screening test for exposure to depleted uranium. Interviewed here is Bob Smith, one of the activists that helped make this bill possible. He is with the Louisiana Activist Network. He is also I am a member of Veterans for Peace and the Viet Nam Veterans Against the War. Born a Texan and raised in a Navy family with three siblings, moved to Louisiana in 1977 a few years after returning from Viet Nam. He worked with adolescents in a psychiatric hospital where he met his wife, a co-worker, returning to the military and retired eight years ago as a Command Sergeant Major. He became actively involved the day Congress gave the President unconstitutional, power to make war on Iraq and has been active ever since in the peace movement and with the Presbyterian Church. Zeese: What made you pursue legislation regarding depleted uranium in Louisiana? Smith: As a twenty year veteran I have been concerned about veterans health since I returned from Viet Nam. From first hand experience I knew the treatment of veterans by our country was highly inadequate after their service. Each year after Gulf War I, more and more veterans were being diagnosed with a mysterious illness, Gulf War Syndrome (GWS) without significant research for cause and effect much like what happened with Agent Orange contamination. I learned about how the government dealt with Agent Orange contamination during the eighties as an outreach counselor at the VA’s Viet Nam Veterans Outreach Center or Vet Center here in New Orleans. We were actively involved in trying to alert the VA to the effects of Agent Orange contamination. For twenty five years a government study done by the Rand Corporation denied any cause and effect between Agent Orange and health problems experienced by veterans and their offspring. Just this week the VA has finally recognized the connection between Agent Orange and diabetes. Remember the last troops returned from Viet Nam over thirty years ago. Worth mentioning is that the same Rand Corporation now denies any cause and effect between depleted uranium contamination and health. Late last year after a lot of reading I found out about depleted uranium. In January at the Jazz Funeral for Democracy, a peace march in New Orleans organized by the Louisiana Activist Network, I met a young Gulf War I veteran, Dennis Kyne. He talked with me about what he knew first hand as a combat medic about illnesses of our veterans even before they returned home and what he has found out about DU since returning home. I then did more research and studying. In March I met Leuren Moret, a geoscientist, who reaffirmed everything that Dennis Kyne had told me and reaffirmed what I had been reading. I then did more research and studying including conversation with Doug Rokke. Doug was the overall supervisor in charge of the clean-up after Gulf War I and is an expert in depleted uranium. Thirty to forty percent of his team are now dead. I then became concerned about what could be done to bring this issue out into the public conversation. Leuren told me about a young lady in Connecticut, Melissa Sterry, who was doing something about it. Working with Rep Patricia Dillon of Connecticut they were introducing a bill to have all of their state’s veterans tested. The always unselfish Melissa willingly shared a copy of the Connecticut bill with me. Melissa had been a member of a depleted uranium clean-up team after Gulf War I. She herself was very sick and had six of her eight team members die since returning home. All six were less than thirty-five years old. Taking the Connecticut bill, changing the name to a Louisiana bill, and making a few minor amendments preceded a call to my Louisiana congressperson, Rep. Jalila Jefferson-Bullock. The submission deadline was less than twenty-four hours after our meeting. Rep. Juan LaFonta sponsored and Rep. Jefferson-Bullock co-sponsored the bill. The deadline was made. Zeese: What does the legislation accomplish? Smith: The legislation will allow all returning veterans to have the right to get a best practices health screening test for exposure to depleted uranium. The test will use a bioassay procedure involving sensitive methods capable of detecting depleted uranium at low levels and the use of equipment with the capacity to discriminate between different radioisotopes in naturally occurring levels of uranium and the characteristic ratio and marker for depleted uranium. This test will determine if a soldier has been contaminated. It will prevent mis-diagnosis so soldiers are not given the wrong medications that usually make them sicker. It will allow the contaminated soldier to decide about parenting further offspring who have an increased chance of serious birth illnesses or defects. The bill also prescribes a reporting mechanism from the Louisiana’s Attorney General to the legislature that requires that awareness sessions and training have been done as required by Army regulations. Zeese: What tips do you have for activists in other states interested in pursuing this in their state? Smith: Stay focused. Depleted uranium testing is for discovery of contamination of a very hazardous material made from radioactive nuclear waste. This is something that truly supports the troops. Remind your elected representatives of that often. Read, study, and discuss with the experts and others experienced in this type of legislation. Other advocates should remember that the weapons manufacturers do not want this in the public. They make a lot of money off this death bringing material. Likewise the military does not want to give up these very effective offensive weapons regardless of how it effects our soldiers or civilians, enemy soldiers, or the environment. Although we did not encounter resistance from those two potential adversaries, weapons manufacturers or the military, others might and they should be prepared to bring in experts. Having veterans testify helps. Another veteran, Ward Reilly, from Baton Rouge was instrumental in helping get the bill through committee. Zeese: What were some of the challenges you faced with this legislation and how did you overcome them? Smith: The only real obstacle we encountered was educating our representative. We knew we would have to educate her and do it quickly but fortunately she agreed to a minimum one-hour meeting. We were lucky as both representatives cared deeply about our troops and taking care of them after they come home. There were no other obstacles. Zeese: What are your next steps? Smith: We have been having awareness sessions at coffeehouses and public events to educate the public, either by passing out literature, making educational speeches, posting literature on the internet, or showing documentaries. We are also communicating with advocates in other states by sharing information, resources, networking, and offering tips to help. And if that doesn’t work I may just stand on top of the roof and scream out the truth. Note: I retired after 20 years in the Army and National Guard as a Command Sergeant Major, serving three tours in Viet Nam as a Special Forces Green Beret and was mobilized for Desert Storm. Education includes a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology and a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering. Currently employed as an engineer living in New Orleans with Julie my wife and life partner for over twenty-six years and our dog, Maggie. Member of Veterans for Peace, Viet Nam Veterans Against the War, and the Louisiana Activist Network. Kevin Zeese is a director of Democracy Rising. You can comment on this column on his blog spot at DemocracyRising.US. For more on DU, see GNN’s book True Lies. Authors Lappé and Marshall travel to Iraq to conduct their own radiation tests. Anthony Lappé is GNN's Executive Editor. He's written for The New York Times, Details, New York, Paper, The Fader and Vice, among many others. He has worked as a producer for MTV, Fuse and WTN. He is the co-author of GNN's True Lies and the producer of their Iraq doc,... ---- Disappointed with Democrats July 19, 2005 Tuesday Rutland, VT Herald http://www.rutlandherald.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050719/NEWS/507190305/1037 Thank you for the excellent coverage your paper had of the Democratic Party committee meeting in Brattleboro last week. Ir there had been more time and I had been able to think more clearly, I would have added a suggestion that ought to have followed Peter Alexander's question, "What are you going to do to get us out of this mess now?" I would have asked them to inform those in the Legislature who don't understand the deadly nature of either an "uprate" or an extension of Entergy VermontYankee, (the fallout from which, if there is an accident or a meltdown will not stop in Dummerston or Wilmington or Guilford or the Connecticut River, but will kill, albeit sometimes more slowly, their children along with the rest of New England's children, too), and then to push the governor, with all their collective might, for a true independent safety assessment of the plant. Maine's governor at the time insisted on this, and Maine Yankee, a plant as old as ours and one, I believe, that was not threatening to produce more power, was shut down. This second thing I forgot to bring up, that would have added to the list of issues that led us to feel abandoned and neglected by a mostly Democratic Legislature, was the fact that our depleted uranium resolution, (Don Gray's and Gary Cheney's) never got out of the Veterans Affair's Committee onto the floor at all. Instead other states, like Connecticut and Louisiana, have mandated that all soldiers returning from war be tested for depleted uranium, thus beginning to destroy the myth of some mysterious Gulf War syndrome, and if not giving people a chance to avoid diseases like leukemia, allowing them to keep from having babies with terrible genetic defects. JANE NEWTON South Londonderry -------- india Concerns voiced over U.S.-India nuclear agreement By Carol Giacomo, Diplomatic Correspondent Tue Jul 19, 2005 3:03 PM ET (Reuters) http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050719/ts_nm/india_usa_nuclear_dc_3 WASHINGTON - President Bush, aiming to boost India as a counterbalance against China's rise, has moved closer to accepting the world's largest democracy as a nuclear weapons state and fueled fears he is weakening decades-old prohibitions against atomic arms. Bush accelerated the U.S. embrace of India, after years of estrangement, during his first term. Monday's decision to permit expansive civilian nuclear cooperation is a further dramatic development. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns called the agreement "the high-water mark of U.S.-India relations since 1947." The approach was developed by former U.S. ambassador to India Robert Blackwill and a close ally, Ashley Tellis, a South Asia specialist at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. It could, however, provoke a fight with the U.S. Congress, which must amend U.S. laws, and with America's other nuclear partners, who must tailor international policies to accommodate Bush's initiative. But Bush's Republican Party controls Congress and U.S. concerns over China's growing military and economic might could make support for India irresistible. The agreement goes farther than many expected. It would remove a ban on civilian nuclear technology sales, allowing India to obtain nuclear fuel and advanced reactors from U.S. and other suppliers. In return, New Delhi would allow international inspections and safeguards on its civilian nuclear program and refrain from further weapons testing and transferring arms technology to other countries. Experts agree these are important advances. Still, "selling nuclear materials to India is a dangerous proposition and bad nonproliferation policy," said Democratic Rep. Edward Markey (news, bio, voting record) of Massachusetts, an arms control advocate. Some experts said the deal sends the wrong signal to Russia and China, major arms merchants whom Washington has urged not to sell to India, Iran and other countries, and may prompt other states who surrendered their nuclear ambitions under the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, or NPT, to reconsider. NUCLEAR AMBITIONS It could also complicate efforts to pressure Iran and North Korea into forsaking their nuclear arms ambitions. While improved relations with India are desirable, "it's unfortunate they picked the nuclear area and the missile/space areas in which to do this because it really erodes certain fundamental principles," said Leonard Spector of the Monterey Institute's Center for Nonproliferation Studies. The belief that the spread of nuclear weapons must be curbed "is being trumped by a view that there are worthy holders of nuclear weapons and unworthy holders and that universal rules are going to be modified in a way that favors those countries considered more worthy," added Spector, a former Clinton administration official. U.S. officials dismissed comparisons with Iran, saying Tehran had long cheated on its nuclear weapons activities, while India had been open and convinced Washington it wanted to curb proliferation. George Perkovich, another South Asia expert with Carnegie, said Bush's initiative could be complicated to implement. "India has been a responsible steward of nuclear technology ..." so if key states in the existing nonproliferation system agree to adapt the rules as Bush recommends, "this should be acceptable," he told Reuters. "The problem is, if the United States ... races ahead without obtaining the consent of other key states, then the risk is that the system of nonproliferation rules can begin to collapse," Perkovich said. Under the 1970 NPT, only the United States, Britain, France, China and Russia may have nuclear weapons. Some 182 other signatories gave them up in return for access to peaceful nuclear energy. India and Pakistan never signed the treaty. While ties with Pakistan have also vastly improved since Sept. 11, 2001, Washington is much more wary of Islambad's nuclear activities especially after a former government official, Abdul Qadeer Khan, was discovered running a nuclear black market that sold to Iran, Libya and North Korea. Tellis said the administration realized that India, a democracy offering America a lucrative market, posed no threat but would never give up nuclear arms if China and Pakistan retained them. ---- Bush seeks full civil nuclear cooperation with India WASHINGTON (AFP) Jul 19, 2005 http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050719000133.houbvioh.html US President George W. Bush said Monday he would work for "full" civil nuclear cooperation with India and ask Congress to lift sanctions preventing Indian access to American nuclear technology. Bush said in a joint statement with visiting Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh after talks here that he would "work to achieve full civil nuclear energy cooperation with India as it realizes its goals of promoting nuclear power and achieving energy security." The United States had placed sanctions on India after its second round of nuclear tests in May 1998, but agreed after the September 11, 2001 attacks to waive those and other sanctions in return for support in the war on terrorism. India is not a party to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. US law bars export of technology that could aid a nuclear program to any country that has not signed the treaty. Bush said he would seek agreement from Congress to adjust US laws and policies and work with other countries "to adjust international regimes to enable full civil nuclear energy cooperation and trade with India." This included "expeditious consideration of fuel supplies" to the US-built Tarapur nuclear power plant near Mumbai. "In the meantime, the United States will encourage its partners to also consider this request expeditiously," the statement said. The Tarapur reactor was constructed and remained operational under safeguards. Bush, according to the statement, "conveyed his appreciation" to Singh over Indias strong commitment to preventing proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and said that "as a responsible state with advanced nuclear technology, India should acquire the same benefits and advantages as other such states." Singh arrived in Washington Sunday on a four-day trip with all of the trappings of a state visit. ---- Bush gives India a 'Yes' on nuclear technology, 'No' on U.N. By Ashish Kumar Sen The Washington Times Published July 19, 2005 http://www.wpherald.com/storyview.php?StoryID=20050719-091853-8809r WASHINGTON -- President Bush yesterday acknowledged India as a responsible state with advanced nuclear technology but declined to endorse its bid for a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council. After a meeting with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at the White House, Mr. Bush said he supports civil nuclear energy cooperation with India as it realizes its goals of promoting nuclear power and achieving energy security. The White House also said it would seek to adjust U.S. laws and policies, as well as international regimes, to enable civil nuclear cooperation and trade with India. Mr. Singh, who is on a three-day official visit to Washington, pledged that India would be ready to assume the same responsibilities and practices, and acquire the same benefits and advantages, as other leading countries with advanced nuclear technology. These responsibilities include identifying and separating civilian and military nuclear facilities and programs and filing a declaration regarding its civilian facilities with the International Atomic Energy Agency. Ashley J. Tellis, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said it will become "increasingly obvious over time that the Bush administration will have diminishing incentives to accept these burdens if India is unable to demonstrate a new willingness to ally itself with American purposes." In a report, Mr. Tellis said that unless Indian security managers make conscious efforts to shape their national policies to promote at least tacit coordination with, if not extensive support for, U.S. goals, the strategic partnership that both sides seek will remain elusive. Despite Western pressure, India has resisted joining the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty or any of the multilateral export-control arrangements. Both leaders yesterday reiterated their commitment to playing a leading role in international efforts to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear, chemical, biological and radiological weapons. Mr. Singh praised Mr. Bush's "steadfast determination and leadership" in the war on international terrorism. This, he said, "is widely appreciated by us, in particular, but all the world, all civilized men and women all over the world." Addressing a joint press conference at the White House with Mr. Bush, Mr. Singh said India has a "compelling case" for a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council, but Mr. Bush refused to back New Delhi's bid. Washington has endorsed only Japan's candidacy and has called for more time to examine various options for reforming the council and the entire United Nations. At a briefing later in the day, R. Nicholas Burns, undersecretary of state for political affairs, said Mr. Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told the Indians that the United States was opposed to a vote to enlarge the 15-member council. ---- Indian leader addresses Congress Praises newfound cooperation Tuesday, July 19, 2005; Posted: 10:56 a.m. EDT (14:56 GMT) http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/07/19/us.india.ap/index.html?section=cnn_allpolitics WASHINGTON (AP) -- Prime Minister Manmohan Singh proclaimed India "a responsible nuclear power" Tuesday, going before Congress to hail newfound cooperation with the United States on that sensitive issue and an array of tough problems including terrorism and AIDS. Basking in the glory of the reversal of a long-standing U.S. policy against helping other nations develop nuclear programs, Singh assured members of the House and Senate that his country has "never been, and never will be a source of proliferation of sensitive technologies." He told a joint meeting of Congress that India "is fully conscious of the immense responsibilities that come with the possession of advanced technologies, both civilian and strategic" and said his country is "a responsible nuclear power." In only the eighth such appearance by a foreign visitor in the House chamber in the last five years, Singh told lawmakers that the objective of his trip here was "to lay the basis for transformed ties between our two great countries." Relations between the world's oldest and largest democracies have often been shadowed by suspicion, but have improved markedly in recent years. Singh, standing before Vice President Dick Cheney and House Speaker Dennis Hastert, said the two countries have common interests in such areas as the fight against terrorism, joint work to combat AIDS and dual efforts to promote democracy -- as well as cooperation in developing new energy resources, including nuclear power. "The field of civil nuclear energy is a vital area for cooperation between our two countries," Singh said. He noted one area where the two countries do not agree: U.S. resistance to India gaining a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council. "The voice of the world's largest democracy surely cannot be left unheard on the Security Council when the United Nations is being restructured," he said. Singh's speech was the first by an Indian leader since former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2000. Such occasions are typically reserved for the United States' closest allies. "The relationship between our two nations has never been stronger," Bush told Singh on Monday during an elaborate White House welcome, complete with a fife-and-drum corps in full Revolutionary-era regalia. During an Oval Office meeting, the two leaders broke new ground on nuclear power, with Bush offering U.S. help in India's civilian nuclear program despite its military nuclear capabilities and its refusal to sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. India remains one of only four states that have not signed the treaty. According to a joint statement issued after their meeting, Bush "stated that as a responsible state with advanced nuclear technology, India should acquire the same benefits and advantages as other such states." India exploded its first nuclear device in 1974. Three more blasts in 1998 led to sanctions by the United States, Japan and Germany. Monday's joint statement committed Bush to work on getting Congress to approve changes in U.S. law that would allow the United States to help with India's civilian power program, including the possibility of supplying fuel for India's nuclear reactors at Tarapur near Bombay. "Cleaner energy resources, including nuclear power, are vital for the future of both our economies," Bush said. Later, during a luncheon for Singh and his wife, Gursharan Kaur, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said, "We welcome India as a global partner, and we look forward to the continued strengthening of democratic institutions, values and peace because this partnership will prosper and move forward." Singh was honored Monday night with a grand White House dinner -- only the fifth of Bush's presidency and the first since his re-election. Already, Singh's responses to the Bush administration glad-handing suggest that the feeling is mutual. "Ladies and gentlemen, the refashioning of this bilateral relationship is not merely a matter of diplomatic process," he said at Rice's luncheon. "What we have embarked upon is, therefore, not just for tomorrow, but I sincerely hope and believe that it is for generations to come." Still, the U.S.-India friendship clearly has its limits: As expected, Singh failed to win Bush's support for India's bid for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. ---- George W. Strangelove and the Triumph of Nuclear Faith Published on Tuesday, July 19, 2005 by CommonDreams.org by Norman Solomon http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0719-24.htm The silver-spooned cowboy in the Oval Office just presented a fine new saddle to the nuclear horseman of the apocalypse. It was a gift worthy of hell. "President Bush agreed yesterday to share civilian nuclear technology with India, reversing decades of U.S. policies designed to discourage countries from developing nuclear weapons," the Washington Post reported Tuesday. The lead was more understated in the New York Times: "President Bush, bringing India a step closer to acceptance in the club of nuclear-weapons states, reached an agreement on Monday with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to let India secure international help for its civilian nuclear reactors while retaining its nuclear arms." No matter how the story was spun, it could only be read in the world's capitals as further proof that U.S. nuclear policies are grimly laughable -- thanks to policymakers in Washington who simultaneously decry and promote nuclear proliferation. And nowhere will the hypocrisy-laced ironies be more appreciated than in Tehran. More than 50 years after the U.S. government launched its "atoms for peace" program, faith in the peaceful atom is alive and well -- in Iran. While a large proportion of the American public distrusts nuclear power, Iranians routinely echo the positive themes that the industry and its supporters have labored to promote ever since President Dwight Eisenhower pledged "to help solve the fearful atomic dilemma" by showing that "the miraculous inventiveness of man shall not be dedicated to his death, but consecrated to his life." Touting the use of nuclear fission to generate electricity, American presidents have strived to make sharp rhetorical distinctions between atomic power and nuclear weapons technologies, despite their extensive overlap. Such reassuring distinctions now have wide credibility in Iran, as I found last month during conversations with Iranian political campaigners, clerics, bazaar merchants, shoppers, teachers and students. Almost all gave notably similar responses when asked whether their country should acquire nuclear energy. The replies -- often tinged with indignation that the atomic prerogative would even be questioned -- reflected why nuclear development was a non-issue in Iran's latest presidential campaign. The Iranian public appears to believe what nuclear-power boosters loudly proclaimed to the world for several decades -- that nuclear energy can be safe and distinct from the capacity to build nuclear weapons. If nuclear power plants are good enough for the United States, the prevailing logic goes, then Iran is certainly good enough for nuclear power plants. Present-day Iran, with its eagerness to use nuclear reactors to generate electricity, is a success story for generations of pro-nuclear politicians in Washington. A civil atomic pact, signed in 1957, initiated nuclear assistance from the United States to Iran. In 1972, President Richard Nixon urged the Shah to build nuclear power plants. The Shah fell in 1979, but after many delays the Islamic Republic resumed work on the nuclear plant near Bushehr, a project that is currently being denounced in Washington. In Tehran, no one I talked with seemed to have any doubt that such projects should continue. At the city's bazaar -- where I could not find any expression of support for Iran to acquire nuclear weapons -- there appeared to be something close to a consensus for building nuclear power plants. "It should be done," said a 26-year-old owner of a carpet shop who gave his name as Nahdi. "If it's going to be dangerous, it's dangerous for everyone in the world, not just for the Iranian people. How come they all have access to that kind of energy and just talking about Iran and Iranians?" In a baby supply shop, the man behind the counter said: "It is Iran's right, like other countries." Cleric Hassan Khomeini -- the most prominent grandson of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, founding leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran -- responded to my question in much the same way. He pointed back at the country now pointing the finger at Iran: "The same thing happened in the United States. You've got access to lots of oil and gas resources, and what happened? The United States is producing nuclear energy." In a mid-June interview, shortly before the first round of the presidential elections, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani told me that nuclear weapons are antithetical to Islamic law and that Iran should never try to acquire any. Yet, like every one of his opponents, Rafsanjani (then seen as the frontrunner) expressed strong support for nuclear power in Iran. Given its vast untapped reserves of oil and natural gas, Iran's claim of needing nuclear-generated electricity might seem farfetched. But arguments about whether Iran really "needs" nuclear power may be beside the point. For the Iranian government, the issue is a matter of national sovereignty and basic prerogatives. In a region where Israel, Pakistan, and India have atomic bombs (made possible by nuclear technology exported from the West), Iran appears to want to keep its nuclear options open. Unwilling to forsake the myth of the peaceful atom, the United States continues to proselytize for nuclear power while practicing what it preaches. As long as that continues, Washington is in no position to convincingly question the merits of nuclear fundamentalism in Iran or anywhere else. Norman Solomon is the author of the new book "War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death." For information, go to: www.WarMadeEasy.com ---- Bush Opens Door to Nuclear Help for India Story by Paul Eckert, Asia Correspondent REUTERS USA: July 19, 2005 http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/31707/story.htm WASHINGTON - President George W. Bush, in a dramatic policy shift, promised India full cooperation on Monday in developing its civilian nuclear power program in return for New Delhi's commitment to adhere to international regimes aimed at curbing arms proliferation. A statement released after talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh that underscored Washington's recognition of India as a rising power said Bush would ask Congress to change US law and work with allies to adjust international rules to allow nuclear trade with India. Washington had barred providing atomic technology to India because of New Delhi's status as a nuclear power that has refused to sign the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, which was designed to halt the spread of nuclear weapons. But the joint statement, obtained by Reuters, said: "As a responsible state with advanced nuclear technology, India should acquire the same benefits and advantages as other states." Bush would "seek agreement from Congress to adjust US laws and policies, and the United States will work with friends and allies to adjust international regimes to enable full civil nuclear energy cooperation and trade with India," it said. India, which tested a nuclear weapon in 1998, agreed to identify and separate its civilian and military nuclear programs, continue a moratorium on nuclear testing and place civilian nuclear facilities under the UN nuclear watchdog. But these are all voluntary, not legal, commitments, and India continues to remain outside the Nuclear Nonproliferation treaty, the bedrock of international arms control. 'EVERYTHING IT WANTED' "The president just gave India everything it wanted. He's rewarding India despite that country's remaining outside the global NPT regime," said Joseph Cirincione of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "This is the triumph of great power politics over nonproliferation policy. I don't know how the president is going to square this circle when he says nonproliferation is his highest priority and still does this," he added. The United States is eager to improve ties with the world's largest democracy, attracted by India's booming technology expertise, growing commercial market and strategic importance as a counterweight to China both militarily and economically. Singh told reporters that India had an "ambitious and attainable national road map" in civilian nuclear power, aimed at fueling economic growth for its billion people. He touted recent economic growth of 7 percent a year. Opponents of the change say setting aside the rules for India would make it harder for the United States to stop Russian or Chinese transfers to states of concern. "The potential benefits of nuclear power for India's energy sector are much more elusive and distant than any of the proponents think," said Henry Sokolski, head of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center in Washington. "But what is immediate and dramatic is how this decision is going to undermine the good behavior of countries including Russia and France, who have adhered to very tough nuclear supplier guidelines," he said. Bush's push to help India increase its coal and nuclear power generating capacity is being driven at least partly to give New Delhi an alternative to a proposed $4 billion gas pipeline deal with Tehran, which Washington accuses of trying to secretly develop nuclear weapons. Indian media had described the nuclear issue as a "touchstone" for US willingness to work with India and accept its growing role on the international stage. Singh, who said India had a "compelling case" for a permanent seat on an expanded UN Security Council, did not get everything on his Washington wishlist. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said Bush told Singh the Washington wanted fundamental UN reforms before any expansion of the council and hoped there would be no vote on council enlargement in coming weeks. (Additional reporting by Carol Giacomo, Adam Entous and Patricia Wilson) -------- iran Iran will not bargain on nuclear enrichment: Khatami Tue Jul 19, 2005 11:32 AM ET (AFP) http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20050719/wl_mideast_afp/iraneunuclear_050719153257 TEHRAN - Iran's outgoing President Mohammad Khatami said that Tehran would not bargain on its right to enrich uranium during talks with Europe on its nuclear activities. "Iran's admission to the World Trade Organisation and the mastering of the fuel cycle are the rights of the Iranian people... and are not negotiable," Khatami was quoted as saying Tuesday by state television. Khatami's reference to the WTO stemmed from the fact that the Europeans succeeded in convincing the United States to lift its long-standing objections to Iran beginning negotiations to join the organisation. He reiterated Iran's insistence on the peaceful nature of its nuclear programme, and the government's stance that its freeze on enrichment -- a key part of the fuel cycle -- "will not become permanent." Iran agreed in November to suspend enrichment activities during negotiations with Britain, France and Germany, representing the European Union. The EU-3 have promised to come up with a proposal by the end of this month that could make or break a lengthy diplomatic process aimed at easing fears in the West that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons technology. "We are waiting for the Europeans, to show in their proposals the same good will they did three or so months ago so that, with their cooperation, we might master peaceful nuclear technology," Khatami said. In contrast to the United States, which suspects Tehran of wanting to build nuclear bombs, the EU-3 is seeking to engage the Islamic state, offering trade and other benefits to persuade it to curb its nuclear plans. Washington accuses Tehran of using a civilian atomic energy programme as a cover for weapons development and seeks a permanent halt to uranium enrichment and plutonium reprocessing activities that could be used to build arms. Iran denies the charge and says it has the right under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to the peaceful use of nuclear technology, including making atomic fuel. -------- japan Ford mulled pulling nukes from ships to shield Japan from 'transit' fallout The Japan Times: July 19, 2005 http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/makeprfy.pl5?nn20050719a2.htm WASHINGTON (Kyodo) U.S. President Gerald Ford mulled the removal of all nuclear weapons from the U.S. Navy's Seventh Fleet in 1976 out of concern there could have been a major backlash in Japan, according to U.S. documents and senior administration officials at the time. There was even fear the Japanese government could collapse should a then secret bilateral pact that allowed nuclear-equipped U.S. military vessels to stop in or pass near Japan be discovered, the documents show. The Seventh Fleet operates in the Far East. Although the Ford administration did review policies regarding the transport of nuclear weapons into Japanese ports, in the end it decided to continue allowing warships with such arms to enter Japanese waters. Nevertheless, observers said the mere fact that removal of the weapons was considered indicated the U.S. administration at the time took the political risk of nukes in Japan seriously. According to a State Department document found at the U.S. National Archives dated Jan. 16, 1976, and marked secret, the passage of the fleet's nuclear vessels through Japan was potentially the biggest danger to the bilateral relationship. In documents exchanged by the two governments on implementation of Article 6 of the 1960 bilateral security treaty -- which grants U.S. forces permission to use facilities and areas in Japan -- the U.S. was to hold "prior consultations" with Tokyo whenever the military wanted to bring nuclear weapons to Japan. To date, no such consultations have ever taken place, and the Japanese government's position is that, because there were never any prior consultations, no nuclear arms have ever entered Japanese territory. But other documents, including U.S. government documents, have shown that another secret pact was made when the security treaty was revised in 1960 that exempted the passage of nuclear-armed ships through Japanese waters or ports of call from prior consultation. The U.S. side termed this action "transit," and distinguished it from storage and deployment, which was described by the phrase "introduction." In 1974, retired Rear Adm. Gene La Rocque told Congress that all vessels capable of carrying nuclear weapons did so, creating an uproar in Japan. The 1976 State Department document said that if the existence of the secret agreement was discovered, it could lead to such events as the collapse of the Liberal Democratic Party's power, an increase in the influence of opposition parties hostile to Japanese-U.S. defense cooperation and a loss of trust in bureaucrats. In addition to such political risks, the then head of the U.S. Pacific Command questioned the military value of such arms and proposed the option of removing nuclear weapons from Seventh Fleet ships, according to the document. ---- Japan to seek ban on all nuclear use in NKorea, even for power: media TOKYO (AFP) Jul 19, 2005 http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050719000111.c55aezri.html Japan has decided to urge the United States, China, Russia and South Korea to adopt a policy to ban the use of any nuclear technology in North Korea, even for peaceful purposes, a newspaper reported Tuesday. Japan hopes to present the policy at six-nation talks due this month on disarming North Korea, and make it a condition for the North to receive energy assistance, the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper said, citing government sources. The Japanese government has determined it would be dangerous to leave open the possibility of Pyongyang turning peaceful nuclear development to military purposes in the future, the newspaper said. Japan will demand that Pyongyang disclose all details of its nuclear program and ask the Stalinist regime to scrap all nuclear development, including for peaceful purposes, the newspaper said. Japan will also ask Pyongyang to allow the other countries to confirm in a verifiable manner that it has frozen its nuclear development program, the Yomiuri said. -------- korea Finally, Washington Is Ready to Play Ball But will North Korea now agree on a price to eliminate its nuclear arsenal? Jonathan D. Pollack YaleGlobal, 19 July 2005 http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/display.article?id=6028 NEWPORT, Rhode Island: For the first time since the unraveling of the Agreed Framework accords in late 2002, there is guarded optimism about progress on the North Korean nuclear issue. On July 9, following a 13-month hiatus, North Korea announced its return to the six-party discussions. In word if not yet in deed, both Washington and Pyongyang have signaled an interest in negotiation – distinct from the ritualized posturing in previous talks. However, unless there is willingness to modify the profoundly divergent interests and expectations separating both countries, an actual diplomatic breakthrough could prove illusory. During President Bush's first term, senior US policy makers repeatedly called for a "diplomatic solution" to the nuclear impasse. But they expected a solution to somehow materialize without negotiations. The US wanted North Korea to commit unequivocally and comprehensively to dismantle its entire nuclear infrastructure. Washington adamantly opposed any outcome that might enable the North to reconstitute its weapons program. The administration's stance was born out of its profound antipathies toward Pyongyang and an aversion to the step-by-step approach to conciliation pursued by President Clinton – an aversion demonstrated in official avoidance of the word "negotiations" to describe the Korean denuclearization process. Responding in kind to Washington's unequivocal stance, the North claimed in February 2005 to possess an unspecified number of finished weapons and pledged to expand its inventory. Despite the presumed danger of nuclear weapons proliferation, American policy has demonstrated a seeming lack of urgency during this protracted nuclear standoff. Some US officials believed there were no possible circumstances under which North Korea would forego its emergent capabilities. Senior officials also contended that China and South Korea could bring far greater pressure to bear on the DPRK, but neither state seemed inclined to move toward more coercive options. Both Washington and Pyongyang seemed prepared to play for time in this oddest and most slow moving of crises. However, unwilling to offer inducements to the North, lacking even remotely feasible military options to eliminate its nuclear weapons potential, and absent any signs that the DPRK was on the verge of collapse, the Bush administration seemed increasingly bereft of policy options. Indications in the late spring of North Korean preparations for a nuclear detonation only made matters worse. Although the North ultimately refrained from a test, it had demonstrated testing capability. These and related developments, such as the resumption of large reactor construction, seem to have convinced administration officials to reexamine the assumptions underlying US policy. Meanwhile, during almost three years of acute tension and international pressure, Pyongyang has demonstrated grim persistence in its nuclear weapons objectives, undeterred by warnings from its adversaries and unmoved by demands from its principal benefactors. North Korea has become the first state to withdraw from the Nonproliferation Treaty. Analysts believe it may possess up to eight weapons. Further, it has removed from its nuclear reactor additional spent fuel, some or all of which has almost certainly been reprocessed into plutonium. The completion of the two larger reactors would make the potential risks of marketing nuclear material incalculably larger. The United States contends that the North continues work on a uranium enrichment facility, though knows neither its location nor its status. Pyongyang has also demonstrated a capability to prepare a nuclear weapons test site. It has managed to avoid isolation in the context of the six-party process, with a notional anti-nuclear coalition never coalescing in common cause. Finally, it has survived as a state. These circumstances are not a ringing affirmation of the Bush administration's first-term strategy. Some within the administration seem quietly sobered both by North Korea's willful defiance and by the longer-term outlook in Northeast Asia should Pyongyang persist on its current path. This has led the administration to refrain from characterizing North Korea as one of world's "outposts of tyranny," and to acknowledge the North as a sovereign state. Also, senior US officials, including Secretary of State Rice, now explicitly refer to "negotiations" with Pyongyang. Washington seems to bear a heightened awareness that another round of talks necessitates more than simply meeting, but also taking substantive steps towards agreement. These actions and sentiments reflect the administration's tacit acknowledgment that its efforts have not yielded any of the desired results, and have strained US relations with Seoul. Officials are therefore broaching whether there might be an alternative path to constrain and ultimately to eliminate North Korea's actual capabilities and longer-term weapons potential. What happens next? Pyongyang will likely pursue two overarching goals at next week's talks. First, it will commit to denuclearization as an ultimate goal, thereby attempting to demonstrate a "strategic decision," as demanded by Washington, to yield its nuclear capabilities. Reference to Kim Il-sung's supposed "dying wish" for a nuclear-free peninsula might be part of this commitment. This promise could also encompass a pledge to freeze specific ongoing activities, such as additional reprocessing and construction work at the reactivated reactor sites, both of which could be readily verifiable. Second, Pyongyang will again propose a phased disarmament process, whereby sequential, mutually reinforcing actions will place the North on a path to ultimate dismantlement of its weapons programs. The implicit premise in Pyongyang's message: The sooner its identified needs are met, the sooner it will disclose information and yield capabilities that Washington deems essential to realizing true denuclearization. Three expectations dominate Pyongyang's calculations in reentering the six-party talks: validation, assurance, and compensation. For Kim Jong-il, these goals are interrelated and mutually reinforcing. The Bush administration has long balked at meeting Pyongyang's expressed needs, let alone responding to its terms of reference. However, Washington likely found no practicable alternative for testing North Korea's intentions and for achieving a lasting negotiated outcome. Though the administration deems Pyongyang's third expectation especially objectionable, South Korea's recent proposal to provide the North with massive amounts of surplus power and related technical assistance obviates the need for the United States to incur major financial obligations. It also very appropriately places South Korea in an essential leadership role in the denuclearization process. Is a negotiated outcome still imaginable? Washington refuses to characterize next week's talks in bilateral terms, but the other parties in Beijing intuitively understand that the US-North Korea relationship constitutes the essence of the matter. Is Pyongyang prepared to definitively forego strategic capabilities it deems integral to its identity and autonomy in a hostile world, in a manner acceptable to the United States? Is the United States prepared, for the sake of larger strategic gains, to make binding commitments to a hugely repressive regime and America's longest-running adversary – even though it neither trusts this regime nor wants to keep it in power? The Beijing meeting therefore affords the last, best opportunity for Kim and Bush to tell each other and the world their respective answers. All other issues to be addressed at next week's talks pale by comparison. If either country answers "no" to the above questions, then all six parties will be on a path to a very different and far less congenial strategic future. Affirmative answers by both would only begin a highly protracted process with ample risks and transaction costs, but the ultimate results could transform Northeast Asia as a whole. To govern is to choose, and the stakes next week in Beijing could hardly be higher. Jonathan D. Pollack is Professor of Asian and Pacific Studies at the Naval War College. The opinions expressed in this article are his own, and should not be attributed to the Naval War College, the Department of Defense, or the US Government. ---- Bush wants talks to bring "common sense" to North Korea's Kim WASHINGTON (AFP) Jul 19, 2005 http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050719165740.3ter7zrm.html President George W. Bush on Tuesday said he hoped a new round of six-party nuclear crisis talks this month would help North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il see "common sense." Bush said he discussed the showdown on the Korean peninsula in talks with visiting Australian Prime Minister John Howard at the White House. "I told him that we're committed to solving the North Korean nuclear issue in a diplomatic way and that we're pleased that the six-party talks have become renewed," Bush told reporters. "We're sincere about working with China and South Korea and Japan and Russia to bring some common sense to the leader of North Korea," said Bush. The fourth round of so-far inconclusive talks on North Korea's nuclear ambitions will take place in Beijing on July 26, China said Tuesday. Pyongyang broke off the discussions in June 2004, rejecting a US offer then on the table which required an up-front pledge to dismantle all nuclear programs before getting energy and other assistance. Bush also said he believed that Australia, a key Asian regional power and US ally, could help influence China to convince Kim to stand down his nuclear program. "I know that Australia can lend a wise message to the Chinese about the need for China to take an active role in the neighborhood to prevent, for example, Kim Jong-Il from developing a nuclear weapon," Bush said at a joint White House press appearance with Howard. North Korea made a surprise announcement earlier this month that it would return to the table for the talks, days before South Korea offered to build new power lines across the border and provide electricity to the North. South Korea also pledged 500,000 tonnes of rice to the starving and isolated nation. Last month, Washington said it was donating 50,000 tonnes of food aid to North Korea, but denied it was bait to lure Kim's regime back to the talks. The six-party talks began in August 2003, nearly a year after Pyongyang allegedly told US officials it was running a uranium enrichment program. It has since claimed it has nuclear bombs. The United States has made clear it wants to see concrete action next week, with a senior administration official saying it was no longer time to "talk for talk's sake." However, the official stopped short of saying the upcoming round would be the last attempt before Washington seeks United Nations sanctions against the Stalinist regime, a move opposed by China and South Korea. Kim told Chinese presidential envoy Tang Jiaxuan last week he was looking forward to "positive progress." The United States has refused to hold direct one-on-one talks with Pyongyang, arguing it will not reward North Korea for breaking a 1994 anti-nuclear pact. ---- Japan to seek ban on all nuclear use in NKorea, even for power: media TOKYO (AFP) Jul 19, 2005 http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050719000111.c55aezri.html Japan has decided to urge the United States, China, Russia and South Korea to adopt a policy to ban the use of any nuclear technology in North Korea, even for peaceful purposes, a newspaper reported Tuesday. Japan hopes to present the policy at six-nation talks due this month on disarming North Korea, and make it a condition for the North to receive energy assistance, the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper said, citing government sources. The Japanese government has determined it would be dangerous to leave open the possibility of Pyongyang turning peaceful nuclear development to military purposes in the future, the newspaper said. Japan will demand that Pyongyang disclose all details of its nuclear program and ask the Stalinist regime to scrap all nuclear development, including for peaceful purposes, the newspaper said. Japan will also ask Pyongyang to allow the other countries to confirm in a verifiable manner that it has frozen its nuclear development program, the Yomiuri said. -------- russia Russia Signs WMD Disposal Agreement with Canada GSN Tuesday, July 19, 2005 http://www.nti.org/d_newswire/issues/2005_7_19.html#018D5227 Russian President Vladimir Putin has given final approval to an agreement under which Canada will provide technical and financial support for Russia’s efforts to eliminate its chemical weapons and decommissioned submarines and to protect nuclear materials, Interfax reported yesterday (see GSN, July 6). The Russian Duma approved the legislation on July 1, followed by the Federation Council on July 6 (Interfax/BBC Worldwide Monitoring, July 18). ---- Swiss court finds Adamov's arrest legitimate July 19, 2005 (RIA Novosti, Yekaterina Andrianova) http://en.rian.ru/society/20050719/40932679.html GENEVA - The Swiss federal court has found the arrest of Russia's former Nuclear Energy Minister Yevgeny Adamov legitimate, a spokeswoman for the Swiss federal justice department said Tuesday. The federal court in Lausanne, a higher court, upheld the appeal by the federal justice department, which had sanctioned the ex-minister's arrest on May 2 in Bern at the request of the U.S. Justice Department. Igor Petrov, press-attache of the Russian embassy in Bern, confirmed that Russian diplomats had received a resolution from the federal court. In early June, the Swiss federal criminal court in Bellinzona found the ex-minister's arrest at the United States' request illegal and ordered his release. But the Federal Justice Department filed an appeal to the federal court in Lausanne to overrule the decision. The federal court's decision is final and is not subject to appeal. This means that Adamov will stay in a Swiss prison until the Federal Justice Department decides on his extradition. The judges will have to decide whether Adamov will be extradited to the United States or Russia. The U.S. sent a formal request for Adamov's extradition on June 24. U.S. authorities are accusing Adamov and his business partner, U.S. citizen Mark Kaushansky, of embezzling $9 million allotted by Washington for security at Russia's nuclear facilities. Russia sent an extradition request on May 17 after the Moscow Basmanny Court issued a warrant for his arrest. The Russian General Prosecutor's Office has charged Adamov with fraud and office abuse. Adamov, who was Russia's atomic energy minister from 1998-2001, rejected a simplified extradition to the United States and Russia. He is denying any wrongdoing and intends to return to Russia as a free man. -------- security NRC wants emergency preparedness program info from nuclear reactor operators Tuesday, July 19, 2005 Mid Hudson News http://www.midhudsonnews.com/News/nuke_emer_prep-19Jul05.htm The Nuclear Regulatory Commission wants licensed operators of commercial nuclear reactors in the county to provide it with information on several components of their emergency preparedness programs. The NRC said studies show the existing emergency planning basis can successfully deal with events, including security, at nuclear power plants. The agency recognizes that security-based incidents present issues, such as the need to relay information and protect plant personnel, where enhancements to emergency planning could be made, an NRC announcement said yesterday. Exactly what the NRC wants will be studied, said James Steets, Entergy’s spokesman at the Indian Point nuclear power plants. “This bulletin includes things that the NRC would like us to do and we would like to do them, of course,” he said. “Before we make any commitments, we want to make sure what it is they want us to do and whether there are commitments that ought to be made that we actually can make.” The NRC wants the licensees to provide a written response by August 17 on issues including a summary discussion of any planned changes to emergency classification levels, as well as a schedule for implementing the changes,’ and summary discussions of programs and any changes for NRC notification, onsite protection actions, onsite response organization augmentation and drills and exercises. ---- Nuclear Reactor Operators - Emergency Preparedness Emergency Preparedness and Response Actions for Security-Based Events Source: U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) Tuesday, July 19, 2005 http://www.docuticker.com/2005/07/emergency-preparedness-and-response.html Emergency Preparedness and Response Actions for Security-Based Events (PDF; 645 KB) From press release: "The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has issued a Bulletin to companies licensed to operate commercial nuclear reactors in the United States requesting information on several components of their emergency preparedness programs. Several NRC studies show the existing emergency planning basis can successfully deal with events, including those dealing with security, at nuclear power plants. The agency recognizes, however, that security-based incidents present issues, such as the need to relay information and protect plant personnel, where enhancements to emergency planning could be made. The Bulletin asks reactor operators for information on their emergency preparedness planning, procedures and training to be cognizant of what enhancements are planned or have been made." -------- treaties Signatories of UN additional nuclear weapons safeguard now number 100 UN Wire 19 July 2005 http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=15078&Cr=&Cr1= One hundred countries have now signed an additional protocol in connection with to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), granting United Nations inspectors greater access to ensure that nuclear materials are not being diverted to weapons production, the UN atomic watchdog agency announced today. The century mark was reached earlier this month when Honduras signed what is officially known as an Additional Protocol to a Safeguards agreement with the UN International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), affording agency inspectors greater rights of access to information about a country’s nuclear programme and to its nuclear sites. IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei referred to additional protocols as absolutely essential for effective verification and invited all States to conclude them. Additional Protocols grant the IAEA complementary inspection authority to that provided in underlying safeguards agreements, typically concluded pursuant to provisions of the NPT, thus facilitating its task to verify that all nuclear material has been declared to the Agency and is for peaceful nuclear activities. As well as affording greater rights of access, they grant inspectors added authority to use advanced technologies to track that nuclear materials are not being diverted, and that there are no clandestine, proscribed nuclear activities in a state. -------- u.s. nuc facilities -------- nevada Agency plans special trains for waste site Department decides Yucca Mountain should use dedicated rail service By STEVE TETREAULT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU Tuesday, July 19, 2005 Las Vegas Review-Journal http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2005/Jul-19-Tue-2005/news/26905011.html WASHINGTON -- The Energy Department said Monday it plans to ship nuclear waste to Nevada using dedicated railroad service rather than on trains that would carry other cargo too. The department, announcing part of its Yucca Mountain transportation policy, cited safety, security and cost benefits to using trains devoted solely to radioactive spent fuel in its shipping program for the proposed repository. A two-page policy statement indicated mixed-cargo trains might be used in some instances, but the agency plans to use dedicated rail "for its usual transport" of nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Several other issues remain outstanding, such as the Energy Department's plans to transport nuclear waste within Nevada and what type of protective casks will encase the radioactive materials during transport. An environmental impact study of a 318-mile railroad corridor from Caliente to the repository site in Nye County was expected in the spring but will be delayed until next year while government officials seek to address concerns of ranchers along the corridor, Energy Department spokesman Allen Benson said. The Association of American Railroads had urged the agency to ship nuclear waste on dedicated trains, which it said offered advantages such as not needing to be switched often at rail yards and being able to use advances in safety technology. The decision to use dedicated trains "was inevitable given national security and logistical considerations," said David Blee, executive director of the U.S. Transport Council, a nuclear waste shipping coalition. The agency said dedicated trains could travel faster to Nevada and enable the project to operate with fewer rail cars and fewer casks because equipment would not sit idle at rail yards. "Analyses indicated the primary benefit is the significant cost savings over the lifetime of the Yucca Mountain Project," the agency said. No figures were given. The agency's estimate is 3,500 rail shipments of radioactive spent fuel from commercial power plants and nuclear waste from government weapons plants. Robert Halstead, a transportation expert working for Nevada, said the the policy falls short of the "total commitment" to dedicated rail that had been urged by the state and the rail industry. Halstead said the numbers of shipments could be larger depending on the configuration of the dedicated trains. He challenged one of the department's safety arguments and said dedicated trains would not cut significantly into "dwell time" during which radioactive waste would sit at rail yards in Chicago; Memphis or Nashville, Tenn.; or Texas awaiting other nuclear cargo to fill out a trainload for the journey west. Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., contended use of dedicated trains will make them bigger targets for attack. "The recent attacks in London and last year's train bombings in Madrid should be a stark reminder of the vulnerability of America's rail system," Berkley said. "Unfortunately, the Bush administration appears perfectly content to move forward on a plan that will paint a giant bull's eye on shipments of nuclear waste and on the communities through which they will pass." Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said the Energy Department was putting the cart before the horse. "What the Department of Energy seems to be missing is that they have nowhere to ship the waste," Reid said in a statement. "Yucca Mountain is never going to open." ---- Subpoena on the way for DOE, Porter says By STEVE TETREAULT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU Tuesday, July 19, 2005 Las Vegas Review-Journal http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2005/Jul-19-Tue-2005/news/26905493.html WASHINGTON -- A House committee chairman was readying a subpoena as the Department of Energy missed a deadline Monday for supplying Congress with documents for a Yucca Mountain investigation. Rep. Jon Porter, R-Nev., said the chairman of the House Government Reform Committee will issue a subpoena today to break a stalemate in an investigation of worker e-mail messages. The e-mails suggested quality assurance documents might have been falsified on the nuclear waste repository project. "The Department of Energy has continued to be uncooperative," Porter said after meeting with the chairman, Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va. Porter leads the subcommittee conducting the inquiry. Energy Department officials had offered to allow Porter and his investigators to review documents at agency headquarters. They have expressed concern that the Nevada lawmaker would make sensitive documents public, which they said could complicate the department's efforts to seek a repository license. "We have made these documents available over the past three weeks, also offering to make weekend arrangements or evening arrangements for them to see whatever documents they want to see," agency spokesman Craig Stevens said. "They have yet to reach out." Porter rejected the offer and called it an "insult to Congress." The seeds of the dispute were planted early in April. Energy Department officials were said to be angered when, over their objections, Porter released documents given to his federal work force and agency organization subcommittee several weeks after Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman revealed the e-mails. Since then, an Energy Department investigation has tentatively concluded the allegations in the e-mails did not compromise Yucca Mountain science or decisions by President Bush to designate the Nevada site for nuclear waste burial. Joseph Hevesi, a hydrologist who wrote many of the e-mails, testified before Congress last month that he did not falsify documents. He said he had a reputation of being "flippant in my e-mail." Porter, like most elected Nevada leaders, is a Yucca Mountain opponent and has expressed skepticism of DOE's pronouncement the program has a clean bill of health. Other state officials have expressed hope that the subcommittee's inquiry would uncover science or management flaws that could be brought up during licensing. Stevens did not say Monday how department would respond to a subpoena. Porter said the subpoena would demand documents he had requested to see in April, including personnel records of the three scientists who have been identified as primary e-mail authors and the research to which they contributed. Porter had asked for a copy of a 5,800-page draft license application the DOE had been preparing for the repository. Attorneys for the Energy Department and Nevada are in a legal dispute before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission over access to the same document. On Monday, DOE acting general counsel Eric Fygi questioned why Porter's subcommittee needed to see the draft license paperwork. "This sort of draft document is quite unrelated to those that chronicle activities of federal employees," Fygi said in a letter sent to the subcommittee. Fygi said he feared the panel's document requests "could metastasize without discrete bounds" to encompass other Yucca licensing material. The agency "has attempted to balance the concerns of the department with the needs of the committee," Stevens said. "We want to make sure we follow the letter of the law to make sure we are following the proper steps of the licensing process." -------- new jersey Reactor might have to retool BY NICHOLAS CLUNN AND TODD BATES STAFF WRITERS, Asbury Park Press 07/19/05 http://www.app.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050719/NEWS/507190312 Although Oyster Creek nuclear power plant officials likely will spend the next two years convincing federal regulators to keep the Lacey reactor open past 2009, they also may have to consider spending hundreds of millions of dollars on a cooling tower. The state Department of Environmental Protection has yet to renew a permit needed by the plant to use water from the south branch of the Forked River to cool the 650-megawatt reactor, raising the prospect that it could require the cooling tower instead. Such towers have been hailed by environmentalists as more "eco-friendly" and are in use elsewhere. State environmental officials in New York have proposed that two cooling towers be built at the Indian Point nuclear power plant, located about 25 miles north of Manhattan, if federal regulators renew the operating licenses of the two reactors there. Furthermore, 44 of the nation's 103 commercial reactors use cooling towers, although the hyperbolic structures were installed during the original construction at each plant, according to the Nuclear Energy Institute, an advocate for the industry. At issue is how Oyster Creek, the nation's longest-running reactor, cools itself. Since the plant opened in 1969, it has used an open-loop system. Under this design, river water is pumped into the plant and then discharged — now slightly warmer than when it came in — into a body of water. Cooling towers are used in what is called a closed-loop system. This means that discharged water is piped to the top of a cooling tower and then sprayed. At this point, the water either evaporates or falls to the tower's base for reuse in the plant. In either case, the water is needed to cool steam used in the reaction process. Reactors create steam, which spins a turbine, which turns a generator, which then creates electricity. The possibility of the DEP requiring a closed-loop system comes as plant owner AmerGen prepares to apply to the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a 20-year renewal of the Oyster Creek operating license. Without a renewal, the plant likely would close in 2009. Concern for fish At a news conference last year, six environmental groups and several fishermen called on state environmental officials to require a closed system for Oyster Creek. They cited an accident in 2002 in which 5,800 fish died after water leaving the plant exceeded 100 degrees. "When they talk about 5,000 fish, they killed more fish than an angler could kill in a lifetime," said Thomas P. Fote, legislative chairman of the Jersey Coast Anglers Association, one of the groups that have called for the closed system. The force of water being pumped into the plant also can kill aquatic life by either pinning animals against intake grates or sucking them into the system. Following the news conference, DEP Commissioner Bradley M. Campbell said his department would consider requiring a closed-loop system in light of the fish kill. On Monday, DEP spokesman Fred Mumford wouldn't say if a decision has been reached. An amendment to the federal Clean Water Act calling for a drastic reduction in the number of organisms killed by intake systems, such as the one at Oyster Creek, could bolster a case for a closed system there. Power plants, however, could comply with the new rule without building cooling towers, said Mary T. Smith, director of the Engineering and Analysis Division in the Office of Water at the federal Environmental Protection Agency. Alternatives include installing screens and other equipment to protect fish. Plants also could satisfy the conditions of the act through wildlife restoration, she said. At Oyster Creek, plant workers watch for turtles that may get pinned against grates blocking the tubes that suck water into the plant, said Gina Scala, plant spokeswoman. If they find one, the plant can call marine mammal experts, who will rush to the plant. "They'll do a whole evaluation of them if they are injured," she said. "They also do rehabilitation." Scala said closed cooling systems also can harm aquatic life. The mortality rate for organisms that travel through them is 100 percent, she said. Cites 1989 report In rebutting the need for a closed system at Oyster Creek, Scala also pointed to a 1989 report concluding that effects of discharges in the existing system were small and had "no adverse consequences" to Barnegat Bay. The report, completed by Maryland-based consultants Versar Inc., was commissioned by the DEP, known then as the Department of Environmental Protection and Energy, to evaluate studies done by Oyster Creek's operator, which was then run by GPU Nuclear Corp. Officials at Entergy, which owns the Indian Point reactors, also are opposed to the idea of building a closed system. A draft permit issued by the New York state Department of Environmental Conservation in 2003 calls for two cooling towers, one for each reactor. According to department figures, the cost of the building the towers is likely to cost about $740 million, not including $145 million in operation and maintenance costs. Entergy's perspective is that Indian Point has $100 million in technology already in place to help save fish and aquatic invertebrates, said Elise N. Zoli, a partner in the Goodwin Procter law firm in Boston and a lawyer for Entergy Nuclear Northeast. "The vast majority of creatures survive and survive well in going through the plant," she said. Nicholas Clunn: (609) 978-4597 or nclunn@app.com -------- new mexico Museum replaces atomic bomb replica for security reasons Katie Allison Granju , Online Producer Last updated: 7/19/2005 5:29:22 PM AP http://www.wbir.com/news/news.aspx?storyid=27357 A museum in New Mexico has replaced a replica of the atomic bomb for security reasons. The model of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima had been on display at the museum in Los Alamos, New Mexico, for more than a decade. The Y-12 nuclear weapons plant in Oak Ridge produced about 50 kilograms of highly enriched uranium for the so-called "Little Boy" bomb. A limited public tour of those still-guarded facilities was staged recently as part of an annual Secret City Festival. The new model is more historically accurate and also satisfies security concerns. -------- new york Agreement reached on backup power for Indian Point sirens Tuesday, July 19, 2005 Mid-Hudson News Network http://www.midhudsonnews.com/News/IP_siren-backup-19Jul05.htm Senator Hillary Clinton today announced that she has reached an agreement with Senate Environment and Public Works Chairman Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma on legislation to require backup power for Indian Point's emergency sirens. The legislation will be included in a nuclear plan security bill that Inhofe plans to move through the Senate in the coming weeks. "It's just common sense that the emergency sirens ought to work in the event of a blackout," said Clinton. The legislation would direct the National Regulatory Commission to require backup power for the Indian Point sirens within 18 months. Clinton said she would hope that Entergy "will not wait for the legislation, but will instead begin to install backup power as soon as possible." Back in May, the NRC rejected a citizen petition to require backup power at Indian Point sirens. -------- washington Deadline set for outlining halt at Hanford plant The Associated Press July 19, 2005 http://www.registerguard.com/news/2005/07/19/d2.wa.hanford.0719.html RICHLAND, Wash. - Officials with the U.S. Department of Energy at south-central Washington's Hanford nuclear reservation must submit an outline by Sept. 2 for halting work on the massive waste treatment plant at the site, according to a memo by agency officials in Washington, D.C. The plant is the federal government's largest construction project, but skyrocketing costs forced the department to announce plans to halt some construction late last month. The move came as a congressional subcommittee requested an investigation into the rising costs of the plant, which is being built to treat millions of gallons of radioactive waste left from Cold War era nuclear weapons production. The Energy Department's Office of River Protection must submit a comprehensive plan to agency headquarters outlining an orderly halt to construction on the plant. The plan is due Sept. 2, said Charles Anderson, principal deputy assistant secretary for environmental management, in a memo to Roy Schepens, manager of the Office of River Protection. The memo also makes clear that any future decisions about key facilities for the plant will be handled in Washington, D.C.. In addition, all work authorizations and technical directions related to facilities that will handle highly radioactive waste will require Anderson's written approval, the memo said. Earlier this year, the Energy Department began to study the plant's design and cost estimate after a scientific review found that the force of the ground movements at the plant site during a severe earthquake would be 38 percent greater than previously estimated. Agency officials have said they are still working on new construction costs in light of those problems. The plant's cost was estimated at $4.35 billion before the contract was awarded in 2000. Already, the cost has grown more than 30 percent - to $5.8 billion. Congressional leaders have said the new problems could push the estimated cost closer to $10 billion and delay its start by four years. Under the Tri-Party Agreement, a cleanup pact signed by the Energy Department, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Washington state, the vitrification plant must be built by 2009 and fully operating by 2011 after two years of testing. ``The Waste Treatment Plant is central to fulfilling our obligations under the Tri-Party Agreement and a key part of our overall cleanup strategy at Hanford,'' Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said Friday. ``We are committed to its completion.'' -------- MILITARY -------- arms Greece to purchase 30 American F-16 aircraft for about 1.1 billion euros ATHENS (AFP) Jul 19, 2005 http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050719135306.ksb01k38.html Greece will purchase 30 F-16/Block 52 fighter aircraft in a direct deal with the United States government for about 1.1 billion euros (1.32 billion dollars), Greek Defence Minister Spilios Spiliotopoulos said on Tuesday. Athens will also sign an option to obtain 10 more aircraft of the same type for operational needs as part of a four-year arms programme extending to 2010, the minister said following a meeting of the Greek state council of foreign affairs and defence (KYSEA). The final cost of the contract will depend on the offer tendered by the US government, Spiliotopoulos said. The Greek defence ministry will request the provision of maintenance support for the F-16 planes as part of the offset deal, he added. In April, the government said it would reexamine a deal sealed by its socialist predecessors for the purchase of 60 Eurofighter aircraft from European consortium EADS at an estimated cost of 1.7 billion euros. The state council will decide at a later meeting whether to buy a further 30 fighter planes, with an option for another 10, the minister said. The F-16/Block 52 is the latest generation of the popular fighter, which first appeared in the 1980's. Spiliotopoulos and Greek Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis both visited the United States earlier this year, respectively in April and May. At the time, the Greek press had reported that the government was examining proposals for F-16 planes. The minister also announced on Tuesday the approval of a contract with the German government for 333 Leopard tanks. Originally scheduled to order 170 Leopard 2A5-class tanks from Germany's Krauss-Maffei Wegmann (KMW), the Greek government modified the deal to include 183 Leopard 2A4's and 150 Leopard 1A5's for an additional 325 million euros (392 million dollars). The renegotiated deal is to be signed soon, a defence ministry source told ---- WW-II artillery shell found in Moscow nuclear research institute MOSCOW (AFP) Jul 19, 2005 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/world/issues/tsunami/?g=1 A World War II-era artillery shell was dug up and safely defused Tuesday on the premises of a nuclear research institute in western Moscow, ITAR-TASS news agency said. No evacuation of the Kurchatov Institute's personnel was necessary while sappers defused the shell, then removed it for safe destruction, the emergency situations ministry said. In June another three artillery shells dating from the war were discovered at the institute, which was established in 1943 in an area then outside Moscow, but now well inside the capital. The Kurchatov Institute played a key role in the development of the first Soviet nuclear weapons and remains a leading research facility, with equipment including a mini nuclear reactor. ---- China military report shows importance of arms sales embargo: Rumsfeld WASHINGTON (AFP) Jul 19, 2005 http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050719180919.291ev9hj.html A Chinese military buildup detailed in a new US report shows why the United States wants the European Union to maintain its embargo on arms sales to Beijing, US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Tuesday. The long-awaited report on Chinese military power was to be presented to the US Congress on Tuesday, casting a spotlight on an issue that has been a source of growing US concern as well as tension with Beijing. Its release comes only days after a Chinese general warned that Beijing would retaliate with nuclear weapons if the US military intervened in a military conflict over Taiwan. Rumsfeld described the report as a "factual presentation" of China's growing military budget and its acquisition of substantial quantities of modern weapons from countries like Russia. He said the report reflected the thinking of the Defense Department, State Department and the National Security Council. "It clearly points up the reason the president and the United States government has been urging the EU to not lift the arms embargo on the Peoples Republic of China," Rumsfeld told a press conference with visiting Polish Defense Minister Jerzy Szmajdzinski. Under US pressure, the European Union has put off a decision on whether to end an embargo on sales of advanced weapons to China that was imposed after the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre of pro-democracy protesters. Rumsfeld said the report describes China's efforts to make the Peoples Liberation Army smaller, more mobile and more capable of projecting force than the gargantuan force that unleashed human wave assaults on US forces in Korea more than half a century ago. The defense secretary declined comment on US concerns about the buildup or say what it is doing in response. The report, he said, "reflects the behavior in the collective decisions that are being made in that country with respect to military investments and acquisitions." However, he predicted that China will be confronted with a dilemma in the years ahead between a political system that is not free and the need for openness to compete successfully in the world economy. "And that suggests to me as we go through the coming years there will be a tension between the two, and something will give," he said. "To the extent the vertical system does not give it will inhibit the growth of their economy, and the ultimately the growth of their military capabilities," he said. "To the extent the political system gives and they take a path that increasingly reflects the reality that a country that fully participates in the world is going to be most successful if they have a relatively free political and a reflatively free economic system, then that would be a good thing for the world," he said. -------- china China's military build-up is tipping balance against Taiwan: Pentagon Tue Jul 19, 5:45 PM ET (AFP) http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20050719/wl_asia_afp/uschinamilitary WASHINGTON - China is building up its military at a pace and scope that is tipping the military balance against Taiwan and could pose a credible threat to modern militaries operating in the region, a Pentagon report on Chinese military power said. The annual report to Congress said China's actual defense spending is estimated to be two to three times more than acknowledged by Beijing, or up to 90 billion dollars this year, the largest in Asia and the third largest in the world after the United States and Russia. The report detailed China's efforts to improve and add to its ballistic missile forces and modernize its conventional forces with acquisitions of advanced fighter aircraft, surface warships, submarines, precision weapons and computerized information systems. "China does not now face a direct threat from another nation," the report said. "Yet, it continues to invest heavily in its military, particularly in programs designed to improve power projection." "The pace and scope of China's military build-up are, already, such as to put regional military balances at risk," said the 45-page report, entitled "The Military Power of the People's Republic of China." It said China has deployed 650 to 730 mobile short range ballistic missiles in garrisons opposite Taiwan, and is adding to them at a rate of about 100 missiles a year, it said. Newer versions of the missiles have improved range and accuracy. "The cross-Strait military balance appears to be shifting toward Beijing as a result of China's sustained economic growth, growing diplomatic leverage, and improvements in the PLA's military capabilities," the report said. -------- europe Two Bidders Enter 2nd Stage of Belene Nuke Tender Business: 19 July 2005, Tuesday Sofia News Agency http://www.novinite.com/view_news.php?id=50193 Two companies - a Czech and a Russian consortiums - have successfully passed the first stage of the tender for the construction of the Belene nuclear power plant. The two consortiums - one led by the Czech Skoda and another by Russia's Atomstroyexport - have met the demands of the first stage and will be invited to join the second one, the National Electric Company (NEC) announced. The bidding prerequisites for the construction of Bulgaria's second nuclear plant include an annual turnover of at least USD 5 B and previous experience in the construction and commissioning of water-pressurized nuclear units. Skoda formed a consortium with two banks and Atomexportstroy - with the French Framatome and German Siemens. The chief contractor for the construction of Bulgaria's second nuclear power plant should be selected by January 2006. -------- india India to assess Kashmir troop reduction after summer 2006: army chief NEW DELHI (AFP) Jul 19, 2005 http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050719151713.0g6a8qkv.html The Indian army Tuesday said it would assess the level of separatist violence in disputed Kashmir until summer next year before deciding whether to reduce the number of troops deployed in the Himalayan region. General J.J. Singh, head of India's 1.32-million-strong army, also alleged that militant training camps were still operating on Pakistani soil despite an ongoing peace process between the two South Asian neighbours. "The level of violence has gone down by 30 percent in Kashmir, but there is no guarantee that this may not again increase. "So we will watch until next summer and after that come to a conclusion whether we reduce our force levels (from Kashmir)," Singh said. "But as of now, we have no such plans," he told reporters in New Delhi. Singh also said there were some 2,000 to 2,500 militants enrolled in 53 training camps in Pakistan as well as the Pakistani-administered zone of divided Kashmir. "Their numbers fluctuate as some come to India and get killed and their place is taken by fresh recruits," he said India does not reveal the number of military personnel deployed in Kashmir but commanders say an entire division of 60,000 combat troops is at the borders, where a ceasefire is holding since it was enforced by the two countries in 2003. In addition, thousands of paramilitary troops, state policemen and other armed agencies are deployed, especially in the Muslim-majority Kashmir Valley. General Singh asserted that Islamic militants were on the run in Indian Kashmir because of stepped-up military operations. "Previously, there were 2,000 militants in Kashmir. The number has fallen to 1,600 because in January, we eliminated 400 terrorists," Singh said, while accusing Pakistan of backing the militants spearheading the anti-Indian rebellion in Kashmir since 1989. "Despite the assurances, we have not been able to see a peaceful resolution yet," Singh said, referring to Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf's pledge earlier this year that Islamabad would not permit Pakistani soil to be used for cross-border attacks. "We are likely to face the situation for some time because terrorism infrastructure is yet to be dismantled across the borders. "In light of the situation, we have to continue efforts at achieving our objectives in Kashmir, which is to 'bring down the level of violence to such a degree that the other organs of the state and central governments can deliver on governance'," he said. More than 44,000 people have died in disputed Kashmir during the insurgency, according to official figures. India and Pakistan both claim the disputed territory which is divided between them. Singh's chief commander in Kashmir, meanwhile said militants were crossing the ceasefire line with the knowledge of the Pakistani army. "I am quite certain that they (Pakistani troops) are not unaware of this infiltration. But what active support they are giving to the infiltration, it is difficult for me to tell you," Lieutenant General S.S. Dhillon said in Kashmir's summer capital of Srinagar. -------- iraq Seymour Hersh: Bush Authorized Covert Plan to Manipulate Iraqi Elections Tuesday, July 19th, 2005 Democracy Now! http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/07/19/1353243 Pulitzer prize-winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh reports that President Bush authorized covert plans last year to support the election campaigns of Iraqi candidates and political parties with close ties to the White House. Hersh cites unidentified former military and intelligence officials who said the administration went ahead with the plan over congressional opposition. [includes rush transcript] In Iraq, the bloodshed under the US occupation continues on a daily basis. Gunmen killed at least 24 police, soldiers and government workers on Monday in assorted attacks across the country. The killings come after one of the bloodiest weekends in Iraq since the March 2003 U.S. invasion. In three days of suicide attacks, more than 150 people were killed and nearly 300 wounded. Meanwhile, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard Myers, said on a visit to Berlin that the recent violence wouldn't derail the drafting of a constitution or what he said was progress toward democracy. Myers said, "We should see a draft constitution by the end of this month. A constitutional referendum is planned for the middle of October and then (national) elections in December." The formation of a new permanent government in Iraq began with the highly-lauded January 30 elections that formed the country's national assembly. In his 2005 State of the Union address a few days later, President Bush celebrated the Iraqi elections as free and fair and a step towards democracy. But did Washington manipulate the Iraq vote? Investigative journalist Seymour Hersh reports in this week's issue of The New Yorker that President Bush authorized covert plans last year to support the election campaigns of Iraqi candidates and political parties with close ties to the White House. Hersh's article cites unidentified former military and intelligence officials who said the administration had gone ahead with covert election activities in Iraq that "were conducted by retired CIA officers and other nongovernment personnel, and used funds that were not necessarily appropriated by Congress." In response to the article, a spokesperson from the National Security Council denied that, saying the administration rescinded the proposal because of congressional opposition. * Seymour Hersh, Pulitzer prize-winning investigative reporter for The New Yorker. - Read Hersh's article: Get Out the Vote RUSH TRANSCRIPT AMY GOODMAN: We're joined on the line now by Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, Seymour Hersh, author of the piece. Welcome to Democracy Now! SEYMOUR HERSH: Hi. AMY GOODMAN: It’s great to have you with us. Well, can you explain exactly what you found? SEYMOUR HERSH: Yeah. What I found was about a year's worth -- the election took place as you know this January. It was scheduled initially to take place in December, and from my -- I would say from February of last year, 2004, on until the election, we're talking eleven-and-a-half months or so, there was an enormous concern inside the White House and the Pentagon among the [inaudible] the neoconservatives in the Pentagon about what's going to happen, because in February of 2004, we agreed -- the Bush administration agreed with Ayatollah Sistani, the leader of the -- the religious leader of the Shiites, many Shiite factions, in one man, one vote. And once that decision was made and once -- we needed Sistani's authority, approval, to delay the vote. At that point, we were going to have some sort of a caucus selection process or election process, and the security was so bad it simply couldn't be done. And the thought was if we could delay until January, we could do something about it -- January of this year. In any case, it was from the very moment the deal was made, there was a lot of concern, frankly, because a lot of the many people in Washington are convinced that the Iranians – that the Iraqis right now, the Shiite Iraqis, many of them, are in league with Iran, as you know, one of the original members of Bush's famous axis of evil. And so there was a concern that by making -- acceding to Sistani's request for one man, one vote, a nation-wide election with the Shiites so much in the predominance just in terms of popularity, population 60%, we were going to give over much of certainly southern Iraq to a Shiite government closely allied with Iran. And that was the issue. So, they decided -- there was a lot of back and forth about it. There was -- I write about all the attempts made through various election groups, etc., monitoring groups that try and smuggle money into the non-Iranian election groups, election parties, which would, of course, be Iyad Allawi, essentially, who is our sort of strong man, Potemkin village guy, the man that was made, created as the, I guess, as the interim prime minister by us, and Allawi was our guy. And there was a tremendous effort all along to try and do what they can do increase his vote and increase his standing inside Iran -- Iraq, rather. AMY GOODMAN: So, how exactly did it happen? SEYMOUR HERSH: Well, I don't know how it happened. What I know is that after they tried to convince the various election groups, the NGOs, the American NGOs, sort of like the N.D.I., National Democratic Institute and others that were training poll watchers and others all throughout 2004, last year, before the election, there was an effort made to get those groups to funnel $40 million or $50 million into Allawi, and they refused. The President eventually put out a finding, a highly classified finding -- covert finding that under the law, since the 1970s, any time the C.I.A. is authorized to do covert action, clandestine action, the Congress has to be notified, and that finding, by the way, is very broad. It not only referred to Iraq, it referred to sponsoring democracy anywhere in the -- you know, anywhere -- anywhere we thought it was important to do so. And some people in Congress, particularly I write about Nancy Pelosi from California, the House Democratic leader, she grew up in Baltimore, it turns out. Her father was a -- for 12 years, he was mayor of Baltimore, D’Alexandro. Her brother was mayor later. She grew up in a very, very political family. And she just balked. She said, ‘I'm not going to go along with a presidential finding that authorizes covert action to tilt the election. We -- you know, we didn't have all of these boys die so we can fix an election.’ And Bush backed off at that point, rescinded -- so the White House says -- they rescinded that finding. What I write is, ‘Are you kidding?’ What I write is that they simply went off the record, off the books on it. In other words, rather than deal with the C.I.A. and money that was appropriated by Congress, they took money -- I can’t -- I don't know from where, one guess would be Iraqi oil money, which we had control of. They took money that had not been appropriated by Congress and put it to work using retired intelligence people and other probably retired military people and others to help generate votes for Allawi. Allawi was running at, oh, 3% or even lower in other polls. 3% during the year. And he improved at the end, because, among other things, the Saudis and the Brits were doing an awful lot right before the election to support him, but nonetheless, in the election, he got 14% or 15%, which was much more than anybody expected. How did he do it? Well, three or four or five different ways. There was some direct intimidation by Iraqi police of people at the polls telling them how to vote. There was money. There were intelligence, former C.I.A. people who bragged after the election of stuffing ballots. There was also a lot of reports that -- as most people in the audience don't know, the way the election was set up, the Iraqi election, by us, there were 30,000 polling places around the country and only, at the most, 6,000 or 8,000 poll watchers. So there were a lot of places where there was nobody to monitor. And more importantly, really, there was no ability for the American or international press to go throughout the country. The security wasn't good enough, so you have thousands of polling places to which there were only government people and military people around. Anything could happen. And what I was told is that the end -- the way it was set up, the poll results in each precinct were to be reported directly to a central headquarters. And after the election polls, you know, the doors closed, you would count the votes and report them. How easy would it be to take ten votes for Allawi and make it 100? This is also something that happened. So through a combination of means, so I was told, Allawi got more votes than he would have gotten normally. AMY GOODMAN: You talk about how several weeks before the election Margaret McDonagh, a political operative close to Tony Blair showed up at the side of Iyad Allawi in campaigning. With money? SEYMOUR HERSH: Oh, I'm sure. Certainly with a lot of advice. There was a huge amount of money from the -- Allawi was also seen by the Sunni world, that is, particularly the Saudis, who are Sunnis, and the Jordanians and the Egyptians, as a savior, even though he's a secular Shiite. He was obviously somebody who would carry on the traditions of the predominantly dominant Sunni majority in the Ba'athist Party. I mean, there's a tremendous irony here. The way we saw it, the United States saw it, is Allawi would never get enough votes to win, but you have a large Kurdish vote, a very much larger Shia vote, and if Allawi could get enough votes, he could be the middle man, he could play the power broker, and the United States could keep him in as prime minister. And if you remember, the election results were delayed, and we had Rumsfeld coming into Iraq twice and Condoleezza once, all arguing for a man that represented Allawi, as Allawi did, the worst elements of Saddam, Saddam-lite: brutality, murder. Close -- he was one of the closest advisers of Saddam throughout Saddam's rise in the Ba'ath Party, his murderous rise. He also has his own -- what we have done is from the very beginning, when we -- the war went in March or April when we seemingly won the war early on in 2003, we were capturing former Makhabarat, members of Saddam's military security units, and retraining them into a secret force that Allawi controlled. So we were basically -- in their visits, Rumsfeld and Rice were, with the most ironies of ironies, were advocating for the continued power and political position of a man who represented the worst of Saddam and also had his own sort of military militia like everybody else did that was composed of Saddam's worst. I mean, talk about hysteria. So what happened with the Brits is in the end, when there was a lot of concern about Allawi's standing, McDonagh, with a man named Mendelsohn, was sort of the – they were the geniuses of the Labour Party. They were the people who moved the Labour Party to the center and helped Blair get elected and re-elected. Very close to Blair. Blair, as you know, was a more -- moved in from the old traditional Labour Party closer to the middle, which is one factor in his success, sort of like Clinton did, moving more towards the middle as a Democrat. And also, it's my understanding that McDonagh and others were, when Blair first began as the buildup to the Iraqi war began, they were involved in doing some of the early white papers inside the British government, making the case for Saddam having WMD. Later that activity was taken over by 10 Downing Street, the professionals, but she and others on the outside were doing early drafts of that stuff, very close to Blair. And she was just there at his side in his office, seen by people in his office, not publicly known, but there's no question that she was playing a major role as a political adviser to Allawi in the end. AMY GOODMAN: We're talking to Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, Seymour Hersh. We have to break for 60 seconds, but then when we come back, I want to ask you about the U.S. saying in response to your article, Washington Post today, that President Bush scrapped the plan before the January vote. That's their response to your piece in The New Yorker magazine. We'll be back with Seymour Hersh in a minute. [break] AMY GOODMAN: We are talking to Seymour Hersh, Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, his latest piece in The New Yorker magazine is called, "Get Out the Vote: Did Washington Try to Manipulate Iraq's Election, Pour Money Into the Campaign of the Iraqi Prime Minister, Iyad Allawi?" The response of the U.S. government, Sy, in yesterday's Washington Post says, “President Bush authorized covert plans last year to support the election campaigns of Iraqis with close ties to the White House, but government and intelligence officials have said the plan was scrapped before the January vote. Some officials with knowledge of the original proposal said the Bush administration backed down after Congressional objections, but others cited concerns within the intelligence community that the effort was likely to backfire.” Your response? SEYMOUR HERSH: Well, look, I think just the fact that they made that much of an acknowledgement is pretty amazing because, as you said, this is a president who was publicly saying how fair and open, and the whole issue of whether or not, you know, what we're doing and what the motives are, and this idea that we want to instill democracy, and as I said, the finding was not just limited to Iraq, we're talking about the former Soviet Union, etc. We're doing a lot of talking about restoring democracy. Even the fact they thought about it so long, I think, was a significant acknowledgement. But look, this is a government that, as I have written about before, has gone off the books. It's gone off the books in the global war on terrorism. By that I mean, we're using -- we're outsourcing operations. The President has decided that he doesn't have to go to Congress for certain kind of operations against would-be terrorists, the renditions and other stuff. We're a operating right now in Africa and East Asia with military units that are doing the work that normally would be done -- snatching people, etc. -- by the C.I.A. under a finding. So, already they have made significant changes in how they operate. This President has decided that any action that is involved with the war does not have to go to Congress because he is Commander in Chief. This is a legal determination they have made, has the right as Commander in Chief, as I said, to authorize anything in -- any operation that supports the war. They call it actually a -- preparations of the battlefield. That's been expanded right now, as I understand it, from inside. They determined that any even informational preparation of the battlefield, whatever loose term that is, is something that the President can authorize without going to Congress. So, if they make a determination that there's a national security reason for something to take place, and this is a determination they make by themselves in the White House and in the Pentagon, they don't have to go to Congress for justification or anything. This is going on now. And it's been once I wrote that story, I think January, February in The New Yorker; other newspapers subsequently wrote that indeed it is going on. What's happened here is that because of heat from Congress, surprising heat, because as you know, most of the time, you know, my big issue with the Congress is I can't decide in any given day whether they are prone or supine. But in this case, Congress stood up and they said, no, we will not let you intervene in the democratic -- that we have gone to war and we're killing American boys and, God knows, killing how many Iraqis for democracy. We are not going to tilt the playing field. Instead of taking that answer, they went off the books. This is what I'm writing about. This is the core. And, of course, I can’t name the sources. And, of course, the White House is going to say they did not. That doesn't mean I'm right because they denied it. I wouldn't say that. I would just say, let's just wait and see, because as with other stuff I have written, sometimes it takes weeks and months, but in this case, the important distinction right now, the question that should be asked right now, is was that finding limited to Iraq? And the answer is no. Then if you really want to get into the next level, you say, well, what does this mean about what we're doing elsewhere? What else are we doing around the country? Around the world, rather, in terms of supporting democracy? And then you begin to get a lot of very uncomfortable questions, I think, for this White House, for which there won't be immediate answers. I don't mean to alarm everybody. But, you know, we're on a slippery slope here. AMY GOODMAN: And the role of the International Republican Institute, the National Democratic Institute, the National Endowment for Democracy in this? SEYMOUR HERSH: Actually, these guys were totally stand-up. That's one reason I could do this story. Because for once, I shouldn't say for once, they very clearly all along, particularly in the National Democratic Institute, which is the most -- it's the largest and the most influential of those NGOs who do election stuff around the world. And there have been questions raised about whether they're too close to the administration in Haiti and other places. In this case, all I can tell you is -- particularly the N.D.I., they were admirable. They refused to get into the game of taking the money that they had been allotted by Congress for the election, and beginning to spread, you know, buy printing presses and cars and other materials for certain parties and not all of them. They all along -- this debate began last spring and lasted until August or September of last year, they all along said we'd love to help out the non-Iranian supported teams if we can only do – you know, political units -- we can only do so if we offer money to everybody. So that was really very interesting to me. And that's frankly how this story sort of emerged. I initially learned about that issue. And from there, I learned that, of course, it had not been stopped. This is something -- the concern. You have to understand one of the key sort of hawks said to me, you know, ‘The real story that you should be looking at is how could a bunch of guys delude themselves last year after they made the agreement with Ayatollah Sistani into thinking that we could have a one-man, one vote election and the country won't turn over to the Iranians.’ Now, whether or not this is true, whether or not the Iraqis, the Shiite Iraqis or certain elements are that close to Iran is -- that's a whole another issue. And it could be everybody is wrong. But it is true that Iran is -- my own instinct is that Iran would -- if we would talk to Iran in the long run, it's in Iran's very much in their long range interests to have a stable, independent Shiite country that doesn't go religious and doesn't exclude the others. That would be -- that would show the world, particularly the Sunni world, which is very, very worried about what's going on in Shiite Iraq, and you know, the idea of Shiite Iran expanding its influence into Shiite Iraq immediately raises questions about whether the Shiites in the eastern province of Saudi Arabia, where the most of the oil is, would start agitating. So you can see, this whole action that we have taken in Iraq has caused enormous concern among the Sunnis that run most of the countries in the Middle East. And it's -- the distress and chaos that we are causing is much more than what you see. God knows, just from your report today of the kind of continued violence, there's an enormous amount, but there's also a very deep misgiving inside the Arab world about what's happening. The Arab world has been turned on its head in a profound way, in ways that nobody can quite understand, and the tensions in the Sunni world about the Shiites and particularly the Shiites expanding into Iraq is just horrific. AMY GOODMAN: Seymour Hersh, there was a report in the Financial Times right before the election in Iraq -- it was around January 10 -- that said the electoral group headed by Iyad Allawi, the interim Iraqi Prime Minister, handed out cash to journalists to insure coverage of the press conferences. Your response to that? SEYMOUR HERSH: I just don't know that but, you know, when you talk about cash in Iraq, you don't just talk about cash. You talk about pallet loads of cash. There's an awful lot of money. If anybody wanted -- the London Review of Books recently did an amazing -- they took the six last State Department and U.N. reports on the missing cash in Iraq. Twenty billion dollars, much of it Iraqi oil money, has just disappeared, and there's no accounting for it. I shouldn't say all of it has disappeared, but the accounting is very lax. The corruption of Iraq and the corruption of our military by the dollars around, the invidious and systematic corruption of our military is just beyond belief. And we will pay a price for that in the end, too. You just cannot have that much money around. There were all kinds of colonels -- look, and it just doesn't matter. I'm getting ahead of myself, because I -- I don't want too talk about things I can’t prove, but I can tell you in the London Review of Books in the last issue, the most recent issue, was a very, very serious essay about the extent of financial corruption and how much money simply disappeared from view, and we're not talking about hundreds of millions, we're talking about billions. AMY GOODMAN: Seymour Hersh, very quickly your response to Rumsfeld announcing the Pentagon intends to move ahead quickly with the military tribunals of two prisoners at Guantanamo? SEYMOUR HERSH: Well, you know -- you know, I just don't know enough about it. I haven't read his response. I'm not in the country right now, so I just don't know about it. I don't want to talk about -- you know, I just don't know. AMY GOODMAN: Finally, Westmoreland, one of the main U.S. military leaders during the Vietnam War, retired General William Westmoreland has died at the age of 91. You won your Pulitzer Prize covering Vietnam, exposing a massacre, the My Lai massacre. Your response? SEYMOUR HERSH: Well, Peter Davis, the filmmaker, did a marvelous documentary called Hearts and Minds, in which Westmoreland is filmed saying, ‘Well, the Vietnamese’ he said, ‘are not like Americans and us in the West. They don't feel losses. They don't feel. They don’t have the same kind of family feelings we do. Death to them is not like death to us.’ And that's what he said on camera. I'm paraphrasing because it's a 30-year-old memory. The movie, the documentary, was done in the 1970s, but his suggestion was somehow they're less human than we are. And that kind of institutional racism, which may have something to do with our, you know, the casualness with which we look at the daily atrocities in Iraq. You know, this is a stigma for all of us. And unfortunately, those who say that this is not like Iraq, should just start listening to the way the military in the last six months have begun talking about insurgents killed, 100 insurgents killed here, 80 insurgents killed there. It's all that talk and the same language we had and the body counts back in Vietnam. You know, they are less than real. AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you very much for being with us, Seymour Hersh, Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter. And thank your family for giving us this time on your vacation. SEYMOUR HERSH: Amy, for you, anything. Bye. AMY GOODMAN: Seymour Hersh, thanks very much. -------- prisoners of war Rumsfeld Announces Military Trials Will Proceed at Gitmo Tuesday, July 19th, 2005 Democracy Now! http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/07/19/1353235 Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld announced yesterday that the Pentagon intends to move ahead quickly with the military trials of two prisoners at the Guantanamo prison camp and file charges against eight others. This comes after a ruling Friday by a three-judge federal appeals court panel. Rumsfeld said the ruling was a vindication of the Bush administration's policy on prosecuting detainees. But lawyers for at least one of the prisoners said they will appeal the ruling, saying Bush violated the separation of powers in the Constitution when he established military commissions. -------- space BMD Focus: DOD space buys leak billions By Martin Sieff UPI Senior News Analyst Published July 19, 2005 http://www.wpherald.com/storyview.php?StoryID=20050719-042857-1423r WASHINGTON -- To the American public, U.S. aerospace remains a miracle-working wonder of the world, with bold high tech visionaries at the Pentagon inspiring it to develop ever more fabulous weapons and defenses to keep the United States safe and decades ahead of the rest of the world. But according to a scathing new report, the Pentagon's space acquisitions policy is a costly and disastrous shambles, routinely incurring 100 percent, and in at least one case even a nearly 300 percent, cost over-runs and failure to deliver the goods. And this criticism came, not from Democrats or anti-nuclear activists whom space power visionaries routinely shrug off. It came from the Bush administration's own Government Accountability Office. In testimony before the Strategic Forces Subcommittee of the House Committee on Armed Services delivered last week, Robert E. Levin, director of Acquisitions and Sourcing Management at the GAO, delivered a devastating critique of the Bush administration and the Pentagon's space acquisitions' record. "The results are discouraging," he said. "Systems cost more and take much longer to acquire than promised when initially approved. "Overall, we have found that DOD (the Department of Defense) has been unable to match resources (technology, time, money) to requirements before beginning individual programs, setting the stage for technical and other problems, which lead to cost and schedule increases," Levin said. Many of the problems, Levin said, came from sloppiness on the part of DOD leaders or senior officials in defining what they specifically wanted their new space-based high-tech systems to do, or in being too visionary -- approving programs when the technology did not yet exist, or had not yet been developed sufficiently to assure the necessary reliable performance. "Technologies are not mature enough (in some cases) to be included in product development," Levin said. "Cost estimates are unreliable -- largely because requirements have not been fully defined and because programs start with many unknowns about technologies." Levin painted a picture of thousands of hardworking and dedicated individuals stymied by the complexities and cross-purposes of the bureaucratic structures in which they had to function. "Factors that make it more difficult for DOD to achieve a match between resources and requirements for space acquisitions," he said "... include: a diverse array of organizations with competing interests; a desire to satisfy all requirements in a single step, regardless of the design or technology challenge; and a tendency for acquisition programs to take on technology development that should occur within the S & T (science and technology) environment." Also, he said, "DOD starts more programs than it can afford in the long run, forcing programs to underestimate costs and over promise capability." "As a result," he said, "there is pressure to suppress bad news about programs, which could endanger funding and support, as well as to skip testing because of its high cost." Levin acknowledged that the Department of Defense "has recently revised its space acquisition policy, in part to attain more knowledge about technologies before beginning an acquisition program." "However," he continued, "we remain concerned that this policy still allows programs to begin before demonstrating technologies in an operational or simulated environment." The results of these shortcomings have cost billions of dollars and seriously reduced the space capabilities that the Department of Defense has been able to deliver, Levin said. "For decades, space acquisition programs have been encountering large cost and increases and schedule delays," he said," As a result, DOD has been unable to deliver capabilities as promised. "This year alone," Levin said, "... costs have continued to climb on the Space-Based Infrared System High (SBIRS-High) program ... pushing DOD's investment in this critical missile warning system to over $9.9 billion from the initial $3.9 billion made nine years ago." Also, he said, "the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System has been restructured and is facing cost increases and schedule delays." Even the simplest and most straightforward part of the military space program -- launching satellites into space on reliable, cost-effective rockets -- is becoming more difficult and vastly more expensive, Levin warned. "Unit cost increases for launch vehicles have now increased by 81 percent since 2002 due to erroneous assumptions about the commercial launch market upon which the program's business case was based," he said. In the case of many programs, Levin said, there would be no improvement in sight and cost over-runs would continue for many years. "DOD originally planned to complete expenditures for SBIRS-High in fiscal year 2005, for example, but currently plans to spend about $3.4 billion in fiscal years 2007 through 2013," he said. Levin and his GAO analysts were not alone in their indictment. Pedro "Pete" Rustan, director of Advanced Systems and Technology at the National Reconnaissance Office, told a congressional subcommittee, "I think space acquisitions procedures are the biggest challenge facing our space systems today. "We must do things differently." "Unless decisive actions are taken," Rustan said, "I think we will continue to spend large amounts of money without returning a commensurate capability to our stakeholders." Rep. Terry Everett, R-Ala, the subcommittee chairman who called the hearing, made clear he took the criticisms seriously. "Acquisition and management practices, as well as industry standards and quality control must be vastly improved," he said in his opening statement. -------- spies The NOC Program: A Look at Valerie Plame's "Nonofficial Cover" as a CIA Operative Tuesday, July 19th, 2005 http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/07/19/1353253 As pressure mounts for President Bush to fire senior adviser Karl Rove for his role in the outing of undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame, we take a look at her reported work as a "NOC" - "nonofficial cover". We speak with investigative journalist Bob Dreyfuss, the first American reporter to cover the CIA's Non-Official Cover program. [includes rush transcript] We now to turn to the CIA leak case that has recently been dominating the headlines. In the latest news, President Bush is appearing to backtrack on his pledge to fire anyone involved in the outing of undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame. Bush said on Monday he will fire anyone who "committed a crime" in the leak. On June 10, 2004, Bush was asked whether he stood by an earlier White House pledge to fire anyone found to have leaked the officer's name, Bush replied: "Yes." On Monday, he added the qualifier that it would have to be demonstrated that a crime was committed. While it is clear that chief presidential advisor Karl Rove played a role in the outing of Plame as a CIA operative, whether he broke the law or not is still a matter of debate Under the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, prosecutors would have to prove that Rove knew Plame was operating undercover. During the 1990's, Plame posed as a private energy consultant while actually working for a CIA department tracking weapons proliferation. The Los Angeles Times reported this weekend, that Plame worked under what is known as "nonofficial cover" or NOC. * Robert Dreyfuss, investigative reporter and contributing editor at Mother Jones, the Nation and American Prospect. He was the first American reporter to cover the CIA's Non-Official Cover program, or NOC. His new book is "Devil's Game: How the United States Helped Unleash Fundamentalist Islam." It is coming out in October from Henry Holt as part of the American Empire Project. Read Dreyfuss' two-part series on an exit strategy from Iraq: - The Vietnam Solution http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20050628/the_vietnam_solution.php - An Iraqi Peace Process http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20050629/an_iraqi_peace_process.php RUSH TRANSCRIPT AMY GOODMAN: Bob Dreyfuss is with us. He's the first U.S. reporter to cover the C.I.A.'s N.O.C. program. He is an investigative reporter, contributing editor at Mother Jones magazine, The Nation, and The American Prospect. He covered Non-Official Cover in a piece he did some ten years ago. His forthcoming book is called Devil's Game: How the United States Helped Unleash Fundamentalist Islam. Welcome to Democracy Now! ROBERT DREYFUSS: Thanks, Amy. Glad to be here. AMY GOODMAN: It’s good to have you with us. Talk about what N.O.C. is and what you exposed more than ten years ago. ROBERT DREYFUSS: Well, N.O.C. stands for Non-Official Cover. At the time that I wrote my piece in Mother Jones magazine, I believe there was something like 100 or 120 N.O.C. officers serving for the C.I.A. overseas. I don't know what the current number would be, but there have been calls for years now to significantly, in fact, hugely increase that number, especially after 9/11. What these N.O.C. officers are, at the time that I wrote, were very often people who worked for major American corporations, banks, oil companies, perhaps arms companies, even, you know, consumer companies. What would happen is the C.I.A. would go to a major company to its C.E.O. and say, ‘We'd like you to provide cover for one of our folks to serve overseas.’ And they would create a fictitious job, again in a major company, in Fortune 500 companies. They would create a fictitious job for somebody, let's say at a bank in Kuwait, and then that person would, in fact, be a full-time, not an employee of that company, but a full-time C.I.A. officer conducting espionage. This is a program that goes back many, many years. It's been riddled with corruption. It's been -- it's been often put on the backburner at the C.I.A. because it's very expensive to create these kinds of fictitious jobs. And there are many, many concerns with a program like this. First of all, these people overseas don't have diplomatic protection, so if they're caught they can be arrested and sentenced to, you know, life in prison or executed, for one thing. By working for private companies they can put the entire company's reputation and all of its employees at risk. In other words, if somebody says, ‘Oh, this guy who works for Citibank in Indonesia is actually a C.I.A. officer,’ well, all of that bank's employees could be then in turn accused of being C.I.A. people and, in fact, it could -- it puts suspicion of being a C.I.A. person on anybody who works for the United States overseas, because if the C.I.A. is known, as they do, to put these people in those kind of jobs, then any American who works for any company is liable to be accused of being a C.I.A. officer. That happened to journalists. It's one of the reasons why the C.I.A. has an administrative provision not to use journalist cover overseas. As well, I think they decided not to use religious cover and a couple of others. But, business cover is something that's now come to prominence. And I think it's something to be concerned about, not to cheerlead. But for the last ten years, starting with Newt Gingrich when he was Speaker, and now all this talk about increasing humint, or human intelligence, that means getting more spies overseas supposedly to be part of a war on terrorism but, in fact, to do what the C.I.A. has always done, which is to covertly advance American interests abroad. AMY GOODMAN: You wrote in your original piece about the companies that use N.O.C., that used -- have sponsored Non-Official Cover overseas, N.O.C.s, as they're called, people who are undercover using these companies as a cover for them. And you say there are RJR Nabisco, Prentice-Hall, Ford Motor Company, Procter & Gamble, General Electric, IBM, Bank of America, Chase Manhattan Bank, Pan-Am, Rockwell, Campbell Soup and Sears Roebuck. Why would a corporation do this? ROBERT DREYFUSS: Well, you know, I asked a lot of these companies when I was doing that story, and nobody would talk about it. Now, in the company, by the way, nobody knows about this, except for probably the C.E.O., the general counsel, that is the chief lawyer, and the immediate supervisor of the person overseas who is doing this work. Obviously, the employees of Campbell Soup or RJR don't know that there are C.I.A. people in their midst. The reason they do it? Patriotism, maybe they get information. You know, there's all kinds of potential for corruption involved. At the time that I was writing about this, the issue came up because of economic espionage. The Cold War had ended. The C.I.A. was turning its attention then, and still is, to spying on economic issues. You know, people don't realize, but the C.I.A. provides information not just to the Pentagon, but to the Federal Reserve. If the chairman -- if Alan Greenspan wants to know if the Germans are going to increase interest rates next month, he can use the C.I.A. to spy on the Bundesbank in Germany. That's routine. That happens every day. Same thing with major aerospace and, you know, Boeing contracts and fights with Airbus, banking deals. I mean, all kinds of things the United States can find out economic information abroad and use it for competitive purposes. So, a lot of these N.O.C.s are put into business jobs, not to meet terrorists, obviously, but to hobnob with bankers, high-tech executives, you know, other people who might have information about economic issues that would relate to the oil market or countless other things where the United States has a “national interest,” quote/unquote. AMY GOODMAN: Bechtel also, add to that list. Some of these companies, certainly, you know, active today in Iraq. Do you know what N.O.C. is today? ROBERT DREYFUSS: I haven't researched this topic lately. I would assume from what I have read, and talking to some people, that there's been a significant expansion of the N.O.C. program. In Congress, it has sort of come out of the closet, and members of Congress who ten years ago didn't know what N.O.C. stood for now throw this around. You know, ‘We’ve got to have more N.O.C.s.’ You know, and I guess the theory is if we're fighting terrorism, we can’t have people in business suits in our embassies meeting with, you know, skullduggery-minded terrorists. So we need to send people oversees who can infiltrate terrorist groups. Well, we're not using these corporation executives, either, to do that, nor are we using people like Valerie Plame to do that. I mean, she clearly was not just by her appearance someone who could go around hobnobbing with Islamic fundamentalist murderers. So, the idea that somehow by increasing our use of N.O.C.s overseas, we're going to be able to fight terrorism, I think is ludicrous. What it does do, however, is give us one more additional covert operations arm by which the United States can increase its influence overseas in the great struggle for hegemony that's underway. AMY GOODMAN: Bob Dreyfuss, a reporter who reported extensively more than ten years ago about the N.O.C. program, Non-Official Cover program of the C.I.A. We're going to come back to him after break and also ask about the two-part series he has done on a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq. [break] AMY GOODMAN: We're talking to investigative reporter, Robert Dreyfuss, both about Non-Official Cover, which is now coming back into the news, Valerie Plame being a N.O.C., Non-Official Cover, undercover in the Central Intelligence Agency beginning in the 1990s. Looking at the piece in the Los Angeles Times this weekend, saying, “Plame worked under official cover early in her career, but moved to non-official commercial cover during the nineties, maintaining that status even after she returned from overseas work to work at the C.I.A. headquarters. Federal election records show in ‘99 she listed as her employer a Boston firm named Brewster Jennings & Associates, which former agency officials acknowledge was a front company.” But I wanted to move on now to a piece -- two pieces that you have written on the Iraqi peace process and what you believe needs to be happening now, Robert Dreyfuss. ROBERT DREYFUSS: Yeah. I started thinking about Vietnam, and it occurred to me, and obviously several other people, too, and this is starting to become, I think, hopefully a movement here in Washington and around the country to develop a concrete exit strategy for Iraq. In Vietnam, we realized that the war was lost at a certain point, at a high level in the government. And we decided to open talks with the North Vietnamese and the Vietcong in Paris in 1972, and that, of course, led to our withdrawal from Vietnam. I think it's clear from what I know about Iraq -- and I’ve done a lot of reporting about this over the last several years -- that it's way past time to start opening up a negotiation with the resistance, with the insurgency in Iraq. That's a difficult thing to do, because if they became public at this point, we’d bomb them or kill them. So we need to create space for the political opposition in Iraq -- mostly Sunnis, but extending into other parts of the country, as well -- to come forward and sit down with us in a negotiation fashion; and I proposed in my pieces going to probably Amman, Jordan, where there's a precedent for, you know, these kinds of discussions and where apparently some of the Sunni opposition leaders still live, the Sunni Iraqi opposition. Anyway, and in getting some kind of talks going that would supersede this government that we’ve created and put in place. It is, by the way, still an interim government. This is not the real government of Iraq, this -- under Prime Minister Jaafari, who’s probably an Iranian agent. This government in Iraq is something that we created out of our own bungling; and now I think it's time to abandon them and move to the next phase of our presence in Iraq, which is a rapid withdrawal, but based on a discussion and negotiations with the opposition groups there. AMY GOODMAN: And what is your understanding of where the administration is on this? I mean, we know they're opposed on the outside, but what's going on behind the scenes? ROBERT DREYFUSS: Well, after I wrote my pieces I heard from some, you know, people who wrote to me, State Department types and others, saying, there's a lot of concern about this and people are looking for options, looking for ways out. I don't know that the White House is thinking along those lines. I think quite the opposite. The President is notoriously stubborn, and I’m sure would resist this to the bitter, bitter end. On the other hand, I think that this -- from the far left to the fairly moderate conservative parts of the spectrum, you’ve got more and more people thinking about exit strategies; so I think as long as all of those different kinds of discussions get underway in a sort of a combined and uneven fashion, eventually it will create enough political pressure on the administration to start taking it seriously. Ultimately, the White House has to give a green light for this. We can’t get out of Iraq just because a lot of people want to get out. The President has to decide to go ahead with that. So, what I'm trying to do is get a discussion going about sort of what I call the “Vietnam solution” of how we can start thinking about an exit strategy that isn't as simple as just setting a date and pulling out. I mean, I’d love to do that, but it's not going to fly, and it might even leave worse chaos in its wake. So, a responsible way out is to start thinking about a roundtable negotiations process; and I think there's a lot of potential for that, even among the Shiites. Most Iraqi Shiites are not supporters of these extreme right-wing Islamists and Ayatollah Sistani and these people. Iraqi Shiites, many of them are secular; and they have now found that this Shiite theocracy is being imposed on them. The reports out of Basra are just chilling that these Shiite paramilitary groups and gangs are imposing a real hell on that city, which was once a secular and prosperous one—bombing liquor stores, and closing movie theaters, and forcing women to cover up, and assassinating secular leaders and intellectuals. I mean, what's happening in Basra is a huge scandal and, of course, in the United States, people say, ‘Oh, well, there's no insurgency there.’ That's because the guys we're supporting in Basra are these crazy Shiite fundamentalists; and it seems peaceful to us because they're not attacking us. What they're doing is attacking the secular opposition. AMY GOODMAN: We're going to have to leave it there. ROBERT DREYFUSS: So those are the people we need to negotiate with. Yeah. Yeah. AMY GOODMAN: Bob Dreyfuss, I want to thank you for being with us, an investigative reporter and contributing editor at Mother Jones magazine, The Nation and the American Prospect. Thank you. His forthcoming book is called, Devil's Game: How the U.S. Helped Unleash Fundamentalist Islam. ---- President will fire anyone who committed crime in CIA leak 7/19/2005 12:46 PM By Richard Benedetto and Mark Memmott, USA TODAY http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-07-18-bush-rove_x.htm WASHINGTON — President Bush said Monday that he would fire anyone in his administration who had leaked the identity of a CIA officer — if the leak broke the law. "If someone committed a crime," Bush said speaking to reporters after a meeting with visiting Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, "they will no longer work in my administration." Time reporter Matthew Cooper has said Karl Rove, Bush's deputy chief of staff and closest political adviser, was the first person to disclose to him that an administration critic's wife worked for the CIA. She was subsequently identified as Valerie Plame. (Related video: White House comments on leak) Several Democrats, including Sens. John Kerry of Massachusettts and Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, have called for Rove's firing. Some Democrats charged that Bush had shifted his position. They said Bush had promised to fire anyone involved in the leaking of Plame's name in 2003, regardless of whether a law had been broken. "President Bush backed away from his initial pledge and lowered the ethics bar," Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean said. Dean and other Democrats said Bush had promised during a news conference in June 2004 to fire any aide involved in the leak. Asked by a reporter whether he would "fire anyone" involved in leaking Plame's name, Bush replied, "Yes." Bush went on to add a caveat, however: "And that's up to the U.S. attorney to find the facts." That was a reference to special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation into who leaked Plame's name and whether that was a crime. It can be a violation of federal law to knowingly disclose the name of a covert CIA agent, but the law is written narrowly and is hard to break. In his own words: Bush on leak Some of President Bush's comments on what he would do if any aide were involved in leaking the identity of a CIA officer: Sept. 30, 2003: 'If there is a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is. And if the person has violated (the) law, the person will be taken care of ... If somebody did leak classified information ... we'll take the appropriate action.' June 10, 2004: (Even though he had made no such vow, Bush was asked at a news conference if he stood by his 'pledge' to 'fire anyone' involved). 'Yes. And that's up to the U.S. attorney to find the facts.' Monday: 'If someone committed a crime they will no longer work in my administration.' White House spokesman Scott McClellan cautioned reporters Monday not to "read anything into" the president's latest comment. "I think you should look back at what the president said" in the past, McClellan said. In September 2003, Bush said that he wanted to know the identity of any leaker, and that "if the person has violated (the) law, the person will be taken care of." Rove, who McClellan had previously said was not involved in Plame's unmasking, was identified this week by Cooper as one of his sources for a story on the Time Web site in July 2003. The story revealed Plame's connection to the CIA. Cooper says he learned of Plame's job at the CIA from Rove and confirmed the information later with Lewis Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff. Neither identified her by name, Cooper said, but rather as former diplomat Joseph Wilson's wife. On Monday, Bush also commented on his effort to fill the seat of retiring Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. Asked about reports that he is "close to a nomination," Bush replied, "Really?" He said, "I'm going to take my time, and I will be thorough and deliberate." He said he will meet face-to-face with some potential nominees. With Singh standing at his side, Bush said the United States-India relationship "has never been stronger," as a result of improved economic ties, a common commitment to democracy and an alliance in the war on terrorism. Singh failed to get Bush to support India's quest for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. Bush also was cool to his efforts to acquire U.S. nuclear energy technology to help fuel India's rapidly growing economy. -------- war crimes Three British soldiers charged with Iraq war crimes By Peter Griffiths Tue Jul 19, 6:35 PM ET (Reuters) http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050719/ts_nm/iraq_britain_dc LONDON - Three British soldiers have been charged with war crimes for the alleged abuse of Iraqi detainees in the first case of its kind in Britain, the government said on Tuesday. A spokeswoman for Attorney General Lord Goldsmith said the men were the first British soldiers to be charged under the International Criminal Court Act 2001. Britain, Washington's key ally in Iraq, has investigated scores of deaths and injuries of Iraqis since joining the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. Britain's army chief apologized to the Iraqi people in February after three British soldiers were jailed for abusing Iraqi detainees in a case which drew comparisons with the mistreatment of Iraqis by U.S. troops at the Abu Ghraib prison. In the latest case of alleged abuse, one of the soldiers, Corporal Donald Payne, 34, was charged with the war crime of the inhumane treatment of Iraqi detainee Baha Musa, who died in custody in the southern city of Basra in September 2003. Payne, of the Queen's Lancashire Regiment, was also charged with Musa's unlawful killing and perverting the course of justice. Two others -- Lance Corporal Wayne Crowcroft, 21, and Private Darren Fallon, 22, both of the 1st Battalion The Queen's Lancashire Regiment -- were jointly charged with the war crime of abusing Iraqi civilians. A spokeswoman for the attorney general said the three soldiers charged with war crimes would be tried in Britain, not before the International Criminal Court in The Hague. "The International Criminal Court only kicks in ... when a state is either unwilling or unable to investigate," she said. The attorney general said in a statement eight other British soldiers, including a former colonel, would face military tribunals in connection with the alleged abuse of Iraqi detainees. They were charged under British law. Four of them were charged with the manslaughter of Ahmed Kareem, an Iraqi who drowned in a canal in Basra in May 2003 after being detained by British soldiers. No date had been set for any of the military tribunals. British Defense Secretary John Reid said it was proper that allegations of abuse should be investigated. "It is vital now that justice is allowed to take its course, so you will understand that I cannot comment further," he said. -------- POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE -------- prisons / prisoners Lawyers for 'dirty bomb' suspect prepare case 7/19/2005 4:27 PM (AP) http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-07-19-dirtybomb-case_x.htm RICHMOND, Va. — Lawyers for the government and those for an American citizen accused of being an al-Qaeda operative readied their arguments about whether he can be indefinitely held without criminal charges. The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals scheduled arguments Tuesday in the case of "dirty bomb" suspect Jose Padilla, a former Chicago gang member and Muslim convert arrested at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport in May 2002 and designated an "enemy combatant" by President Bush a month later. The Justice Department alleges that Padilla, now in a military prison in Charleston, S.C., flew from Pakistan to the U.S. on a scouting mission to detonate a conventional bomb laced with radioactive material within the United States. The department also alleges that Padilla planned to blow up apartment buildings by filling them with natural gas. The government contends that the Bush administration not only has the authority to order detention of "enemy combatants" but it is vital to the fight against terrorism. But lawyers for Padilla question whether his indefinite detention is a violation of U.S. civil liberties. In December 2003, the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York ruled that the Bush administration lacked the authority to designate Padilla an "enemy combatant." The ruling was thrown out in June 2004 when the U.S. Supreme Court declared that the case should have been filed in South Carolina rather than New York. Attorneys for Padilla filed the appeal in Spartanburg, S.C., where a U.S. District Court judge ordered the government to either charge Padilla or release him. Padilla is one of two U.S. citizens held as enemy combatants since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Yaser Esam Hamdi, captured on a battlefield in Afghanistan, was released and flown to Saudi Arabia last year after the Supreme Court rejected the government's attempts to detain Hamdi indefinitely without trial. -------- ENERGY -------- alternative energy Zimbabwe Says to Reopen Ethanol Fuel Plant - Paper REUTERS ZIMBABWE: July 19, 2005 http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/31704/story.htm HARARE - Zimbabwe is to recommission an ethanol plant and resume research into the use of vegetable oils to boost its transport fuel supplies, the official Herald newspaper said on Monday. Zimbabwe is experiencing its worst fuel crisis in years with gasoline filling stations remaining dry for weeks, forcing many urban commuters to walk to and from work. The fuel crisis has also affected the manufacturing sector and annual tobacco sales. "The ministry is aiming at producing fossil fuel substitutes from ethanol blending, castor and soya beans, livestock feeds ... rape and sunflower seeds," the state-owned Herald quoted Energy and Power Development Minister Mike Nyambuya as saying. Zimbabwe abandoned the production of ethanol in 1992 following a severe drought. Ethanol, which can be produced through fermentation from various agricultural crops including sugar cane, was used to blend gasoline from the late 1970s when the then white-minority government had difficulties in obtaining fossil fuel because of economic sanctions. Zimbabwe has vast sugarcane fields in the southern part of the country owned by Anglo American Corp and Tongaat-Hullet. It is not clear whether the government would proceed with the recommissioning project on its own or in partnership with Anglo American, which owned the ethanol plant in Zimbabwe's southern area of Triangle. Anglo American has had parts of its sugar estates confiscated by the government under its controversial land reform programme. The Herald said the government would also resume research into bio-diesel, but gave no time frame. The use of vegetable oils as a diesel substitute was researched in the 1970s and 1980s, but abandoned after it was discovered that the country could export vegetable oil seed and use the proceeds to import diesel. Zimbabwe requires 2.5 million litres of diesel and 2 million litres of fuel every day, but imports have been erratic since 1999 amid foreign currency shortages due to poor exports. The fuel crunch has hit key annual tobacco sales, which traditionally account for a third of Zimbabwe's export earnings, while farmers are struggling to deliver their crop to auctions. The fuel woes have exacerbated the economic crisis gripping the southern African state, shown in food shortages, record unemployment and one of the highest rates of inflation in the world. President Robert Mugabe, 81, and and in power since independence from Britain in 1980, denies he has mismanaged the economy. He instead charges it has been sabotaged by local and international opponents over his government's seizure of white-owned farms for redistribution to landless blacks. -------- OTHER -------- environment Higher Cancer Rate Found at Omaha Lead Refinery Site ATLANTA, Georgia, July 19, 2005 (ENS) http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/jul2005/2005-07-19-09.asp#anchor2 The federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) has found that the rates of new cancer cases in the Omaha Lead Site are slightly higher than new cancer rates in Douglas County and Nebraska for stomach, lung and kidney cancer. The Omaha Lead site in the city of Omaha, Douglas County, Nebraska has been contaminated with lead from air emissions from lead refining operations and other sources. The site covers about 8,840 acres and includes residential properties, childcare facilities, and schools. The Omaha Lead site was added to the Superfund List on April 30, 2003. The review sought to determine if the rates of new cancer cases in the Omaha Lead Site, or East Omaha, were higher or lower than the rates in Douglas County as well as the state. Using information provided by the Nebraska Cancer Registry (1990-2001), ATSDR compared the cancers that may be associated with lead exposure - bladder, brain, kidney, lung and stomach. The agency found that cancer rates within the site, Douglas County and Nebraska are similar for bladder and brain. "The findings from this analysis are insufficient to conclude that lead is the cause for cancer in residents of East Omaha," the agency found, while at the same time noting higher cancer rates for stomach, lung and kidney cancers. Other factors, including smoking, occupation, diet, length of residency and industrial exposure in Omaha Lead Site residents, could not be controlled or accounted for the agency said. The Cancer Data Review is an addendum to the public health assessment released this May, which found that ongoing exposure to lead in children six years of age and younger living in or near the Omaha Lead site is a public health hazard. The report is available online at: www.atsdr.cdc.gov/sites/omahalead -------- ACTIVISTS 10,000 protest Army exercises at Camp Hansen, Okinawa Kyodo / Associated Press July 19, 2005 http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-983236.php NAHA, Japan — Some 10,000 people staged a protest Tuesday against U.S. Army exercises using live ammunition in the town of Kin, Okinawa Prefecture. The protesters, including Okinawa Gov. Keiichi Inamine, highlighted the danger posed by the exercises at a new combat facility at the Marine Corps’ Camp Hansen, which is only 300 meters away from residential areas. Marching up to the front gate of Camp Hansen, the demonstrators called on the U.S. Army to stop the exercises and remove the facility, claiming that people living in the vicinity risk the danger of being hit by stray bullets. ”I will do my utmost to have the facility shut down so that residents can enjoy their peace and quiet,” Inamine told the participants. The U.S. Army started the exercises July 12 amid protests by the local residents.