Breaking News and Commentary from Citizens For Legitimate Government29 May 2009All links are here:Special 'How Many Wars Can the US Fight (or Foment) At Once?' Edition: Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, the AfPak al-Qaeda border combo, North Korea, and last but not a snowball's chance in hell least: cyberspace. --LRP
Pentagon Plans New Arm to Wage Cyberspace Wars --Obama expected to sign classified order in coming weeks that will create the military cybercommand 29 May 2009 The Pentagon plans to create a new military command for cyberspace, administration officials said Thursday, stepping up preparations by the armed forces to conduct both offensive and defensive computer warfare. The military command would complement a civilian effort to be announced by President Obama on Friday that would overhaul the way the United States safeguards its computer networks. The main dispute has been over whether the Pentagon or the National Security Agency should take the lead in preparing for and fighting cyberbattles. Under one proposal still being debated, parts of the N.S.A. would be integrated into the military command so they could operate jointly.
Homeland Security taps sci-fi writers 29 May 2009 The line between what's real and what's not is thin and shifting, and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security has decided to explore both sides. Boldly going where few government bureaucracies have gone before, the agency is enlisting the expertise of science fiction writers. Recently the 2009 Homeland Security Science & Technology Stakeholders Conference, with contractors hustling business around every corner, felt at times more like a convention of futuristic yarn-spinners. The master of ceremonies for the week was Greg Bear, the sci-fi novelist whose book "Quantico" featured FBI agents battling a designer plague targeting specific ethnic groups. [I think the science fiction writers are tapping Homeland Security for their ideas.]
FBI planning a bigger role in terrorism fight 28 May 2009 The FBI and Justice Department plan to significantly expand their role in global counter-terrorism operations, part of a U.S. policy shift that will replace a CIA-dominated system of clandestine detentions and interrogations with one built around transparent investigations and prosecutions. Under the "global justice" initiative, which has been in the works for several months, FBI agents will have a central role in overseas counter-terrorism cases.
'Without a doubt, it was a scheme to drive a wedge between the Shia population and the Sunni minority in Iran.' Iran mosque blast bears 'US, Israel thumbprints' 29 May 2009 A senior Iranian official says Israel and the US have had a hand in the mosque bombing that shook the southeastern city of Zahedan to its core. "The bomb tragedy that occurred yesterday in the city of Zahedan is awash with Israeli and US fingerprints," said Tehran's Interim Friday Prayers Leader, Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami. "Without a doubt, it was a scheme to drive a wedge between the Shia population and the Sunni minority in Iran," he added. Ayatollah Khatami said that the perpetrators of the bomb attack have been identified and will be brought to justice.
Iran official blames U.S. in deadly mosque bombing 29 May 2009 An Iranian official accused the United States on Friday of involvement in a mosque bombing that killed more than 20 people in southeastern Iran, two weeks before a presidential election. Washington denied the allegation. Jalal Sayyah, of the governor's office in Sistan-Baluchestan province, said three people had been arrested in connection with the blast on Thursday in a crowded Shi'ite mosque in the city of Zahedan. "The terrorists, who were equipped by America in one of our neighboring countries, carried out this criminal act in their efforts to create religious conflict and fear and to influence the presidential election," Sayyah told state radio.
Diplomat says Iran no threat to US 29 May 2009 A senior Russian diplomat says the US is using Iran as a pretext to establish a military foothold in east and central Europe. Alexander Sternik, a senior diplomat at Russia's embassy in London, said that the US is grossly exaggerating the missile threat posed by hostile powers such as Iran, predicting there would be no tangible threat from the Middle East "for at least a decade to come," the Guardian reported.
Israel rebuffs U.S. call for total settlement freeze 28 May 2009 Israel will press ahead with housing construction in its West Bank settlements despite a surprisingly blunt demand from U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton that all such building stop, an Israeli official said Thursday. The Israeli position could set the stage for a showdown with the U.S. on the day President Barack Obama meets his Palestinian counterpart, Mahmoud Abbas, at the White House.
Israel 'repeatedly breached' laws of war in Gaza: Report 28 May 2009 Amnesty International has accused Israel of repeatedly violating the rules of armed conflict during its recent offensive against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. "Israeli forces repeatedly breached the laws of war, including by carrying out direct attacks on civilians and civilian buildings and attacks targeting Palestinian militants that caused a disproportionate toll among civilians," the human rights watchdog said in its annual report.
U.S. man who gave secrets to Israel spared jail 29 May 2009 An 85-year-old former civilian employee of the U.S. Army was fined but given no prison time on Friday after earlier pleading guilty to giving classified documents to Israel in the 1980s in a case the sentencing judge said was "shrouded in mystery." U.S. District Judge William Pauley fined Ben-Ami Kadish $50,000, but Kadish received no prison time at his sentencing hearing. He pleaded guilty in December to acting as an unregistered agent of Israel.
Iraq minibus bombing kills six - police 29 May 2009 A bomb attached to a minibus killed six people in Iraq's restive Diyala province on Friday, police said. It was unclear who was targeted in the attack in the town of Khalis, some 80 km (50 miles) north of Baghdad. Separately, another bomb attached to parked car in Khalis killed one person.
North Korea Test-Fires Short-Range Missile 29 May 2009 North Korea rattled its neighbors again Friday when it fired a short-range missile off its east coast, the sixth such firing since the secretive country announced a "successful" underground nuclear test on Monday, and a large number of Chinese fishing boats left the disputed water off the western coast of the Korean Peninsula in the past several days, according to reports from South Korea.
US Army moves to DEFCON 2 28 May 2009 Sources close to MiNa claim the US Army has moved their alert level to Defcon 2. This was initiated by the alarming situation in North Korea. The US Army has over 35,000 troops stationed in South Korea, well within reach of North Korean conventional weapons. North Korea has the largest artillery force in the world, which adds more to the already tense situation. Earlier today, N. Korea's leader Kim Jong Il issued threats to the South Korean and US Navy ships for coming too close to North Korea's territorial waters.
South Korea and U.S. Raise Alert Level 29 May 2009 One day after North Korea warned of a possible attack against the South, the United States and South Korea ordered their forces here to their highest alert for three years, increasing surveillance flights and satellite reconnaissance to counter what officials termed a "grave threat." The South Korean Defense Ministry said allied troops, including, 28,000 U.S. soldiers based in South Korea, raised their Watch Condition, or Watchcon, to the second-highest level from Watchcon 3 to Watchcon 2.
Casey: Army would have to 'shift gears' for N. Korea battle 30 May 2009 It would take the Army time to "shift gears" if it needed to fight against North Korea, Army Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey said Thursday. Right now, the Army is focused on the counterinsurgency efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, but North Korea's recent [and perpetual US] saber rattling has raised the prospect that the Army might be called upon to fight a conventional war. "I have said publicly for some time that if we had to shift gears, it would probably take us about 90 days or so to shift our gears and to train the folks up that were preparing to go to Iraq and Afghanistan to go someplace else," Casey said after a speech at a Washington think tank. [How many wars -- on how many fronts -- would the US then be fighting?]
Pakistan on 'Red Alert' amid wave of bombings 29 May 2009 Pakistan declares 'Red Alert' in the wake of a fresh round of bomb attacks by pro-Taliban forces as the reward offers for Swat valley militant chief hikes. "The security has been put on high alert after secret agencies received information that a number of suicide bombers are trying to target key installations at all major cities of the country, including the capital Islamabad," a senior Interior Ministry official told Press TV on condition of anonymity.
Pakistan issues dead or alive Taliban list --Swat uprising rebel has 5 million rupees on his head 28 May 2009 Pakistan issued a dead or alive "rogues list" Thursday, putting prices on the heads of 21 top Taliban operating in the Swat Valley. The most-wanted chart, complete with mug shots, went to newspapers across the country with radical cleric Maulana Fazlullah, the architect of the uprising in Swat, heading the list with a reward of 5 million rupees ($62,320), PTI reported.
Afghan was taken to Guantanamo aged 12: rights group 27 May 2009 An Afghan who has spent over six years at the U.S. military's Guantanamo Bay prison was only around 12 years old when he was detained, not 16 or 17 as his official record says, an Afghan rights group said on Tuesday. Interviews with the family of Mohammed Jawad... showed he was probably not even a teenager when he was arrested in 2002, the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission said.
Abu Ghraib rape pictures known in 2004 29 May 2009 United States military officials knew of torture pictures taken in Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison as early as May 2004, says RNW reporter Hans-Jaap Melissen. In his Baghdad blog he writes that he witnessed US officials in the Iraqi capital discussing pictures that showed US soldiers raping Iraqi prisoners.
Abu Ghraib abuse photos 'show rape' --Photographs of alleged prisoner abuse which Barack Obama is attempting to censor include images of apparent rape and sexual abuse, it has emerged. 28 May 2009 At least one picture shows an American soldier apparently raping a female prisoner while another is said to show a male translator raping a male detainee. Further photographs are said to depict sexual assaults on prisoners with objects including a truncheon, wire and a phosphorescent tube... Detail of the content emerged from Major General Antonio Taguba, the former army officer who conducted an inquiry into the Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq. Allegations of rape and abuse were included in his 2004 report but the fact there were photographs was never revealed. He has now confirmed their existence in an interview with the Daily Telegraph. [See: 'I saw ___ fucking a kid...' Source: The "Taguba Report" On Treatment Of Abu Ghraib Prisoners In Iraq, statement by Kasim Mehaddi Hilas, Detainee #151108, 1300/18 Jan 2004.]
General Accuses White House of War Crimes 18 Jun 2008 The two-star general who led an Army investigation into the horrific detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib has accused the Bush administration of war crimes and is calling for accountability. In his 2004 report on Abu Ghraib, then-Major General Anthony Taguba concluded that "numerous incidents of sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses were inflicted on several detainees." He called the abuse "systemic and illegal." Now, in a preface to a Physicians for Human Rights report based on medical examinations of former detainees, Taguba adds an epilogue to his own investigation.... "After years of disclosures by government investigations, media accounts, and reports from human rights organizations, there is no longer any doubt as to whether the current administration has committed war crimes. The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account."
The Bogus Torture Coverup By Scott Horton The Pentagon is denying the facts: Photographs of Abu Ghraib torture are even more sexually explicit than first reported, including rape and sodomy, writes Scott Horton, who has obtained specific and detailed corroboration of the photos. 29 May 2009 The Daily Beast has confirmed that the photographs of abuses at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison, which President Obama, in a reversal, decided not to release, depict sexually explicit acts, including a uniformed soldier receiving oral sex from a female prisoner, a government contractor engaged in an act of sodomy with a male prisoner and scenes of forced masturbation, forced exhibition, and penetration involving phosphorous sticks and brooms.
The Pentagon's Secret Stash --Why we'll never see the second round of Abu Ghraib photos By Matt Welch April 2005 The images, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told Congress, depict "acts that can only be described as blatantly sadistic, cruel, and inhuman." After Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) viewed some of them in a classified briefing, he testified that his "stomach gave out." NBC News reported that they show "American soldiers beating one prisoner almost to death, apparently raping a female prisoner, acting inappropriately with a dead body, and taping Iraqi guards raping young boys." Everyone who saw the photographs and videos seemed to shudder openly when contemplating what the reaction would be when they eventually were made public. But they never were.
Did Erich "Mancow" Muller Fake His Waterboarding for Publicity? By The Cajun Boy 28 May 2009 Yesterday we showed you video of Erich "Mancow" Muller, a Chicago-based right-wing shockjock, appearing as a guest on Keith Olbermann's show to discuss his being waterboarded. He claimed it led to an ideological conversion! But now a tipster has provided information that suggests the whole thing may be a hoax.
Media groups seek access to terrorism evidence 28 May 2009 News organizations asked a federal judge on Thursday to grant the media access to copies of audio and video court records key to the upcoming trial against a terrorism suspect. The motion seeks access to about 12 hours of an audiotaped FBI interview with Syed Haris Ahmed, who is set to go on trial Monday on charges that he aided a terrorist group. It also seeks videos that prosecutors say he and another suspect filmed of potential terrorist targets in Washington.
US security offices told to share 28 May 2009 Obama administration officials have been instructed to review the many US national security agencies with a view to bringing them closer together. Government officials will determine how there can be better sharing of classified information between the agencies.
Official preparing Obama's France trip hit by H1N1 29 May 2009 A U.S. official in France preparing President Barack Obama's visit next week has been admitted to hospital with H1N1 flu in the Norman city of Caen, French officials said on Friday. "A U.S. citizen, who is in France as part of an official delegation preparing the D-Day ceremonies, has tested positive for H1N1 flu and has been hospitalized in Caen," said a spokeswoman for France's health authority.
Cruise travellers to be kept away from public 30 May 2009 Passengers leaving the P&O ship Pacific Dawn, which docks in Brisbane this morning, will be kept away from the public amid concerns swine flu may have spread on the ship. Extensive health precautions are being taken on the luxury cruise liner after three crew members tested positive to the H1N1 strain of the flu virus.
Swine flu cases pass 15,000 mark 29 May 2009 Figures announced by the World Health Organisation show that swine flu has infected more than 15,000 people in 53 countries since it was first detected in Mexico in April. The latest countries to report cases of the H1N1 virus include Cyprus, Estonia, Hungary and Slovakia in Europe, and Venezuela and Paraguay in South America.
Three more heads roll over expenses scandal 29 May 2009 Three MPs announced their intention to quit at the next election yesterday after intense criticism of their parliamentary expenses. Conservative back-bencher Julie Kirkbride followed her husband, Andrew MacKay, in announcing her departure from parliament. The former Labour whip Margaret Moran, who represents Luton South, has also announced that she will be standing down.
'There is some risk we will run out of storage space in the next four to six weeks.' Oil Is Plentiful, Demand Weak. Why Are Gas Prices Going Up? --Over the past two months, investors have plowed billions of dollars into oil futures. 29 May 2009 Storage tankers across the globe may be brimming with oil that no one is buying because of the global economic downturn, but the traditional laws of supply and demand don't always apply to oil prices. Drivers have faced rising prices at the gas pump in recent months, as investors and oil-producing countries hoard supplies in anticipation of a global economic recovery later this year. Investors and oil producers are betting that global demand will roar back.
Schwarzenegger plan would close 220 Calif. parks 29 May 2009 Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's budget cuts could mean the closing of up to 220 state parks, among them the home of the world's tallest tree and other attractions that draw millions of visitors. Schwarzenegger (R) this week recommended eliminating $70 million in parks spending through June 30, 2010.
Report: Climate change crisis 'catastrophic' 29 May 2009 The first comprehensive report into the human cost of climate change warns the world is in the throes of a "silent crisis" that is killing 300,000 people each year. More than 300 million people are already seriously affected by the gradual warming of the earth and that number is set to double by 2030, the report from the Global Humanitarian Forum warns.
Bird uses body as dam to stop drainpipe soaking chicks 28 May 2009 A bird used her body as a dam to stop overflowing drainpipe water from soaking her chicks. The Mistle Thrush had built her nest on top of a downpipe, blocking the water's passage and causing the gutter to flood. But desperate to protect her young, she puffed herself up to twice her size and sat in the drainpipe to stop the tide of rain water swamping the nest. She was so occupied with her task that her mate was left to feed her and their young.
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Contributions to CLG are not tax deductiblePrevious lead stories: Iraq redux? Obama seeks funds for Pakistan super-embassy 27 May 2009 The U.S. is embarking on a $1 billion crash program to expand its diplomatic presence in Pakistan and neighboring Afghanistan, another sign that the Obama administration is making a costly, long-term commitment to war-torn South Asia, U.S. officials said Wednesday. The White House has asked Congress for -- and seems likely to receive -- $736 million to build a new U.S. embassy in Islamabad, along with permanent housing for U.S. government civilians and new office space in the Pakistani capital. The scale of the projects rivals the giant U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, which was completed last year after construction delays at a cost of $740 million.
US Army prepared to stay in Iraq for a decade 27 May 2009 The Pentagon is prepared to remain in Iraq for as long as a decade despite an agreement between Washington and Baghdad that would bring all American troops home by 2012, according to the US army chief of staff. Gen George Casey said the world remained "dangerous and unpredictable", and the Pentagon must plan for extended US combat and stability operations in both Iraq and Afghanistan that could deploy 50,000 US military personnel for a decade.
Israel threatening Iran with 'nukes' 27 May 2009 As Israel remains adamant on blemishing the prospects of Iran-US dialogue and coaxing the White House into a war, Israel's military Chief of Staff says the regime is ready to use all options against Iran. Israel, the possessor of the sole nuclear arsenal in the Middle East, has long strived to portray Iran as a regime hell-bent on starting a nuclear war through the pursuit of its nuclear program.
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