US Military Operating Under Secret Orders

Well the news itself is no surprise, but what the fact that the mass media is reporting it is. As usual, journalistic ethics are out the door. The media loves to report anything classified, top secret etc… As long as they can get it out to the people who should know… Bullshit.

Operations are on going, as in the recent Syrian raid, which is mentioned in the article, and the publication of news like this only puts our troops in danger. It also escalates tensions between countries because now things are public knowledge, instead of being handled by the respective powers and counter parts in the countries involved.

I guess that is why the UK is looking to censor media outlets from reporting on items that compromise national security. Maybe we should consider doing the same thing, and make it a criminal act… And when items involve national security and put soldiers lives in danger, I think the anonymous sources excuse used by the media must be abolished. If there is no national security issue or potential to put soldiers lives in danger, then fine, let them use all the anonymous sources they want.

The United States military since 2004 has used broad, secret authority to carry out nearly a dozen previously undisclosed attacks against Al Qaeda and other militants in Syria, Pakistan and elsewhere, according to senior American officials.

These military raids, typically carried out by Special Operations forces, were authorized by a classified order that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld signed in the spring of 2004 with the approval of President George W. Bush, the officials said. The secret order gave the military new authority to attack the Qaeda terrorist network anywhere in the world, and a more sweeping mandate to conduct operations in countries not at war with the United States.

In 2006, for example, a Navy Seal team raided a suspected militants’ compound in the Bajaur region of Pakistan, according to a former top official of the Central Intelligence Agency. Officials watched the entire mission — captured by the video camera of a remotely piloted Predator aircraft — in real time in the CIA’s Counterterrorist Center at the agency’s headquarters in Virginia 7,000 miles away.

Some of the military missions have been conducted in close coordination with the CIA, according to senior American officials, who said that in others, like the Special Operations raid in Syria on Oct. 26 of this year, the military commandos acted in support of CIA-directed operations.

But as many as a dozen additional operations have been canceled in the past four years, often to the dismay of military commanders, senior military officials said. They said senior administration officials had decided in these cases that the missions were too risky, were too diplomatically explosive or relied on insufficient evidence.

More than a half-dozen officials, including current and former military and intelligence officials as well as senior Bush administration policy makers, described details of the 2004 military order on the condition of anonymity because of its politically delicate nature. Spokesmen for the White House, the Defense Department and the military declined to comment.

Apart from the 2006 raid into Pakistan, the American officials refused to describe in detail what they said had been nearly a dozen previously undisclosed attacks, except to say they had been carried out in Syria, Pakistan and other countries. They made clear that there had been no raids into Iran using that authority, but they suggested that American forces had carried out reconnaissance missions in Iran using other classified directives.

According to a senior administration official, the new authority was spelled out in a classified document called “Al Qaeda Network Exord,” or execute order, that streamlined the approval process for the military to act outside officially declared war zones. Where in the past the Pentagon needed to get approval for missions on a case-by-case basis, which could take days when there were only hours to act, the new order specified a way for Pentagon planners to get the green light for a mission far more quickly, the official said.

It also allowed senior officials to think through how the United States would respond if a mission went badly. “If that helicopter goes down in Syria en route to a target,” the official said, “the American response would not have to be worked out on the fly.”

The 2004 order was a step marking the evolution of how the American government sought to kill or capture Qaeda terrorists around the world. It was issued after the Bush administration had already granted America’s intelligence agencies sweeping power to secretly detain and interrogate terrorism suspects in overseas prisons and to conduct warrantless eavesdropping on telephone and electronic communications.

Shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks, Bush issued a classified order authorizing the CIA to kill or capture Qaeda militants around the globe. By 2003, American intelligence agencies and the military had developed a much deeper understanding of Al Qaeda’s extensive global network, and Rumsfeld pressed hard to unleash the military’s vast firepower against militants outside the combat zones of Iraq and Afghanistan.

The 2004 order identifies 15 to 20 countries, including Syria, Pakistan, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and several other Gulf states, where Qaeda militants were believed to be operating or to have sought sanctuary, a senior administration official said.

Even with the order, each specific mission requires high-level government approval. Targets in Somalia, for instance, need at least the approval of the defense secretary, the administration official said, while targets in a handful of countries, including Pakistan and Syria, require presidential approval.

The Pentagon has exercised its authority frequently, dispatching commandos to countries including Pakistan and Somalia. Details of a few of these strikes have previously been reported.

For example, shortly after Ethiopian troops crossed into Somalia in late 2006 to dislodge an Islamist regime in Mogadishu, the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations Command quietly sent operatives and AC-130 gunships to an airstrip near the Ethiopian town of Dire Dawa. From there, members of a classified unit called Task Force 88 crossed repeatedly into Somalia to hunt senior members of a Qaeda cell believed to be responsible for the 1998 American Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania.

At the time, American officials said Special Operations troops were operating under a classified directive authorizing the military to kill or capture Qaeda operatives if failure to act quickly would mean the United States had lost a “fleeting opportunity” to neutralize the enemy.

Occasionally, the officials said, Special Operations troops would land in Somalia to assess the strikes’ results. On Jan. 7, 2007, an AC-130 struck an isolated fishing village near the Kenyan border, and within hours, American commandos and Ethiopian troops were examining the rubble to determine whether any Qaeda operatives had been killed.

But even with the new authority, proposed Pentagon missions were sometimes scrubbed because of bad intelligence or bureaucratic entanglements, senior administration officials said.

The details of one of those aborted operations, in early 2005, were reported by The New York Times last June. In that case, an operation to send a team of Navy Seals and Army Rangers into Pakistan to capture Ayman al-Zawahri, Osama bin Laden’s top deputy, was aborted at the last minute.

Zawahri was believed by intelligence officials to be attending a meeting in Bajaur, in Pakistan’s tribal areas, and the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations Command hastily put together a plan to capture him. There were strong disagreements inside the Pentagon and the CIA about the quality of the intelligence, however, and some in the military expressed concern that the mission was unnecessarily risky.

Porter Goss, the CIA director at the time, urged the military to carry out the mission, and some in the CIA even wanted to execute it without informing Ryan Crocker, then the American ambassador to Pakistan. Rumsfeld ultimately refused to authorize the mission.

Former military and intelligence officials said that Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal, who recently completed his tour as head of the Joint Special Operations Command, had pressed for years to win approval for commando missions into Pakistan. But the missions were frequently rejected because officials in Washington determined that the risks to American troops and the alliance with Pakistan were too great.

Captain John Kirby, a spokesman for General McChrystal, who is now director of the military’s Joint Staff, declined to comment.

The recent raid into Syria was not the first time that Special Operations forces had operated in that country, according to a senior military official and an outside adviser to the Pentagon.

Since the Iraq war began, the official and the outside adviser said, Special Operations forces have several times made cross-border raids aimed at militants and infrastructure aiding the flow of foreign fighters into Iraq.

The raid in late October, however, was much more noticeable than the previous raids, military officials said, which helps explain why it drew a sharp protest from the Syrian government.

Negotiations to hammer out the 2004 order took place over nearly a year and involved wrangling between the Pentagon and the CIA and the State Department about the military’s proper role around the world, several administration officials said.

American officials said there had been debate over whether to include Iran in the 2004 order, but ultimately Iran was set aside, possibly to be dealt with under a separate authorization.

Senior officials of the State Department and the CIA voiced fears that military commandos would encroach on their turf, conducting operations that historically the CIA had carried out, and running missions without an ambassador’s knowledge or approval.

Rumsfeld had pushed in the years after the Sept. 11 attacks to expand the mission of Special Operations troops to include intelligence gathering and counterterrorism operations in countries where American commandos had not operated before.

Bush administration officials have shown a determination to operate under an expansive definition of self-defense that provided a legal rationale for strikes on militant targets in sovereign nations without those countries’ consent.

Several officials said the negotiations over the 2004 order resulted in closer coordination among the Pentagon, the State Department and the CIA, and set a very high standard for the quality of intelligence necessary to gain approval for an attack.

The 2004 order also provided a foundation for the orders that Bush approved in July allowing the military to conduct raids into the Pakistani tribal areas, including the Sept. 3 operation by Special Operations forces that killed about 20 militants, American officials said.

Administration officials said that Bush’s approval had paved the way for Defense Secretary Robert Gates to sign an order — separate from the 2004 order — that specifically directed the military to plan a series of operations, in cooperation with the CIA, on the Qaeda network and other militant groups linked to it in Pakistan.

Unlike the 2004 order, in which Special Operations commanders nominated targets for approval by senior government officials, the order in July was more of a top-down approach, directing the military to work with the CIA to find targets in the tribal areas, administration officials said. They said each target still needed to be approved by the group of Bush’s top national security and foreign policy advisers, called the Principals Committee.

Code Pink’s Jodie Evans Donates to Terrorists And Barack Obama

One of the founding members of Barack Obama’s finance campaign team has ties to terrorists. Jodie Evans, co-founder of Code Pink, has personally donated $40,000 to Barack’s campaign and raised between $50,000-$100,000 in donations. Evans has a long history of ties to foreign terrorist organizations and state sponsors, including the “Iraqi Resistance” which is responsible for killing thousands of US Soldiers.

This woman undermines our military, undermines our country and puts American lives in danger.

This is another “Association” that is troublesome. Barack Obama’s relationships, allies and partners, with extremist elements is just beginning to be uncovered, unfortunately the fourth estate will not do their job and dig into his past. They will go to the mattresses to discover what Joe the Plumber is hidding though…

More Change You Can Believe In!

Please read the whole article and educate yourself

Author’s note: It is commonly known that political visitors to totalitarian nations are only let in those nations if the visit serves the purposes of that government, the visitors are accompanied by minders and are monitored at all times and that the government facilitates propaganda events during the visits.

The following article is heavily documented with supporting links. The story it tells is very troubling for our nation. It is a story our news media refuses to investigate and report. Please forward this article widely.

A founding member of the campaign finance team of Democratic presidential nominee Illinois Sen. Barack Obama has been working with state sponsors of terrorism to undermine the United States in the global war on terror since at least February, 2003.

Jodie Evans, co-founder of the leftist anti-American group Code Pink, has documented ties to governments on the State Department’s list of current and former state sponsors of terrorism including Iran, Cuba, Syria and the former Iraqi government under Saddam Hussein. She also has endorsed and worked with the so-called Iraqi resistance that has killed over three thousand American soldiers and thousands of free Iraqis.

Evans is listed on the official Obama website as a bundler of between $50,000 and $100,000 in contributions. According to FEC reports, the official Obama website and news accounts, Evans has personally contributed over $40,000 to the Obama campaign—$4600 to Obama for America and around $36,000 to the Obama Victory Fund.

Evans served as a co-host for Obama’s first Hollywood fundraiser right after he announced his long-shot bid for the presidency in February 2007, just weeks after she returned from Cuba where she and Code Pink worked with the Castro government to protest the terrorist detention center in Guantanamo. Evans and Code Pink, who market themselves as feminists and human rights activists, blew off the Ladies in White, a Cuban human rights group that asked the delegation Evans led to inspect Cuban prisons where democracy advocates were being held by the Castro government.

The propaganda effort against the terrorist detention center at Guantanamo garnered worldwide sympathetic media coverage that undermined America’s efforts in the war on terror.

Evans and Code Pink’s trip to Cuba in January 2007 made up for their aborted effort to visit the communist nation the year before to celebrate the anniversary of Fidel Castro’s violent revolution.

In February, 2003, Evans traveled with Code Pink to Baghdad as a guest of Saddam Hussein’s government to lobby the world to keep him in power. Saddam’s government made a lasting impression on Evans. As late as summer 2008 she was still wishing that the genocidal, mass murdering tyrant was still in power in Iraq. She made a similar statement in 2006 pining for the ‘good old days’ under Saddam:

Let’s go back to the Iraq before we invaded, there was a good education and health care system, food for everyone. That system didn’t belong to Saddam it belonged to the Iraqi, it belonged to years of creating what a civilization needed. If your parents didn’t send you to school they could be put in jail.

Evans made several trips to Iraq in 2003 after the liberation. She worked with anti-liberation Iraqis to set up Occupation Watch in Baghdad. The purpose was to propagandize alleged war crimes by American soldiers and to recruit American soldiers into quitting the war by becoming conscientious objectors.

Evans did a propaganda interview with a communist newspaper in August, 2003, accusing G.I.s of wantonly slaughtering Iraqi women and children.

In December 2004, as the Marines were clearing out Fallujah from al Qaeda and Iraqi Sunni terrorists, Evans and Code Pink delivered over $600,000 in cash and humanitarian aid for what Code Pink called “the other side” in Fallujah.

(Giving cash and “humanitarian aid” to the anti-American or anti-freedom side in a conflict is an age old tactic of Western leftists as a way of bolstering their allies and prolonging the conflict without being accused of directly arming the enemy.)

In January, 2006, Evans traveled to Venezuela with Code Pink where she met with Hugo Chavez and protested against President Bush.

In April, 2006, Evans led a delegation to Iran. Blog entries by her and her fellow travelers are filled with propaganda designed to undermine U.S. policy againt the state sponsor of terrorism.

In June, 2006, Evans represented Code Pink at the World Tribunal on Iraq, a leftist-jihadist show trial held in Istanbul, Turkey, that proclaimed the ‘right’ of the terrorists in Iraq to kill Americans and free Iraqis:

There is widespread opposition to the occupation. Political, social, and civil resistance through peaceful means is subjected to repression by the occupying forces. It is the occupation and its brutality that has provoked a strong armed resistance and certain acts of desperation. By the principles embodied in the UN Charter and in international law, the popular national resistance to the occupation is legitimate and justified. It deserves the support of people everywhere who care for justice and freedom.

Evans herself gushed about her support for the so-called Iraqi resistance in an essay written in Istanbul:

“We must begin by really standing with the Iraqi people and defending their right to resist. I can remain myself against all forms of violence, and yet I cannot judge what someone has to do when pushed to the wall to protect all they love. The Iraqi people are fighting for their country, to protect their families and to preserve all they love. They are fighting for their lives, and we are fighting for lies.” (AlterNet, June 26, 2005)

In the summer of 2006, Evans and Code Pink traveled to Jordan and Syria. She and Code Pink wrote extensively about the Jordan visit, where they met with pro-terrorist Iraqi parliamentarians who urged them to seek recognition of the so-called Iraqi resistance.

The stop in Syria is clouded in mystery as none of the Code Pink members have written about what they did and who they met in Syria, except here:

From Damascus to Beirut: Arriving, Safely

By Medea Benjamin

Four of us—Gael Murphy, Judith LeBlanc, Diane Wilson and myself—split off from the rest of the group in Syria to make our way to Lebanon.

As noted at the beginning of this article, Evans traveled to Cuba in January 2007 to undermine America, then just weeks later she co-hosted Barack Obama’s first big Hollywood fundraiser.

In November, 2007, when Obama announced his campaign bundlers, Evans was on the list, as well as her husband Max Palevsky.

Evans got more involved in supporting Obama’s candidacy in 2008. In February she hosted a support Obama event and published an endorsement of Obama co-signed by several New York feminists.

On June 4, 2008, Evans was interviewed by radio talk show host Paul A. Ibbeston (Part One on YouTube and Part Two on YouTube.)

In the interview, Evans expressed her sympathy for the Sept. 11 terror attacks by al Qaeda that led to the murder of 3000 innocents, mostly her fellow Americans:

Jodie Evans:…”We were attacked because we were in Saudi Arabia, that was the message of Osama, was that because we had our bases in the Middle East, he attacked the United States.”

Paul A. Ibbetson: “Do you think that’s a valid argument?”

Evans: “Sure. Why do we have bases in the Middle East? We totally violated the rights of that country. Why do we get to have bases in the Middle East?”

Evans also expressed her “love” for the anti-American leader of Venezuala, Hugo Chavez, calling him a “sweetheart”, and admitted that Code Pink is trying to “undermine the war effort” of the United States in the war on terror.

Several weeks after that interview, Obama received Evans at a high-dollar fundraiser. Evans is listed by the FEC has having made a $7250 contribution to the Obama Victory Fund, a joint fundraising vehicle of Obama’s presidential committee, Obama for America, and the Democratic National Committee. The legal limit, $2300 of Evans’ contribution, was given to Obama’s general election coffers as she had already given the maximum allowed by law to his primary campaign, also $2300, at the Hollywood fundraiser she co-hosted in February, 2007. The balance of the $7250 went to the DNC.

Days after the event, a video was published featuring Code Pink’s Medea Benjamin bragging about Evans’ meeting with Obama.

In July, 2008, Evans joined other leftists in signing a letter urging Obama to keep left in his campaign that was published by The Nation.

The next month, Evans’ success at infiltrating the Democratic party was recognized with her being given the “Inside the Party” award by the Progressive Democrats of America, a group founded in 2004 at the Boston Democratic national convention to pull the party further to the left. Evans is known by her fellow leftists as a master of the ‘inside-outside game’.

Later that month, Evans attended the Democrats’ national convention in Denver. While Code Pink did their usual street theater outside the convention, they did not disrupt the convention inside. That is most likely because as a bundler for Obama, Evans was invited to private meetings with Obama and his vice presidential nominee Delaware Sen. Joe Biden after their respective acceptance speeches. From the National Journal:

After Biden’s speech on Wednesday night, bundlers are invited to an hour-long reception with the vice presidential candidate in a private room in the Pepsi Center, and then on Thursday morning, Barack and Michelle Obama are hosting a breakfast at the Hyatt Regency. After Obama’s acceptance speech, he is scheduled to mingle with bundlers at a private lounge inside Invesco Field.

The next week, at the Republicans’ national convention in St. Paul, Evans made headlines by trying to storm the stage during the acceptance speech by Republican vice presidential nominee Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

Evans spent her time in St. Paul committing identity theft to gain access to the convention and related events.

Less than two weeks later, Evans was again received by Obama, this time at an intimate $28,500 per person fundraiser in Hollywood and again later that evening at a $2500 per person fundraiser that featured a performance by Barbra Streisand.

Evans capped off her month by meeting with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in New York City. Ahmadinejad’s government has been funding, training and equipping terrorists in Iraq who have killed American soldiers and free Iraqis, as well as Hezbollah in its war against Israel, among many other activities that threaten the free world including seeking nuclear weapons.

Evans, who is no fool but is a propagandist, told Fox News after meeting Ahmadinejad that he is “really about peace and human rights and respecting justice.”

Ahmadinejad is also no fool. He would know that Jodie Evans, who visited his country in 2005, is in tight with the Democratic party’s presidential nominee and that Obama has stated his willingness to meet with Ahmadinejad and has downplayed the danger of Iran to the free world.

This raises the question of whether Evans was acting as an intermediary between Obama’s campaign and Ahmadinejad.

The American news media has utterly failed the nation by its willful failure to investigate and report the alliance between Barack Obama and the terrorist supporter Jodie Evans.

Evans has brushed off the few queries about this by saying her husband, Max Palevsky, is an old friend of Obama’s from Chicago and she’s just along for the ride. The evidence belies that story. Evans is a player in her own right.

In addition to working with state sponsors of terrorism, Evans works with pro-terrorist communist groups in the U.S. Those groups include The World Can’t Wait, ANSWER, Troops Out Now and United for Peace and Justice. Evans is the tip of spear of the pro-terrorist left into the heart of mainstream American politics.

There have been several calls from troop support groups for Obama to renounce Evans. He has ignored them and instead has drawn closer politically to Evans as the election draws near.

Obama said this summer he knows he needs to earn the trust to be commander-in-chief. He has failed to earn that trust, completely, by allying with Jodie Evans.

Jodie Evans and Barack Obama, photo by Code Pink

Jodie Evans and Code Pink lead protest against Marine Corps, Berkeley, CA. Feb. 12, 2008.

Jodie Evans being interviewed about anti-Marines protest, Berkeley, CA. Feb. 12, 2008. Photos by ZombieTime.com
More photos and story from that protest by Zombie Time here.

Cindy Sheehan, Jodie Evans, Hugo Chavez, Medea Benjamin in Venezuela. Photo by Code Pink. Jan. 28, 2006.

Jodie Evans in at Chavez speech, Caracas, Venezuela. Jan. 27, 2006. Photo by Code Pink. (Sign translation by Code Pink: Women Say Bush Must Go)

Jodie Evans and Jane Fonda.

Carter Has Ended The Palestinian/Israeli Conflict

No not really, but anyone that read the headline and believed, please contact me, I have a bridge for sale…

Carter claims Hamas ready for peace with Israel… Yeah right… This vile ex-President, who has meet on many occassions with a Terrorist Organization, claiming you have to talk with the enemy to make peace with them, disgraced the soldiers that died in Beirut at the hands of Hezbollah by meeting in Syria with Hamas on the 25th anniversary of the barracks bombing, is blowing smoke up the public’s ass, and has accomplished nothing.

Until Hamas stops its terror campaign, there cannot be any chance of peace.

Sami Abu Zuhri, a Hamas spokesman, later said Carter’s comments “do not mean that Hamas is going to accept the result of the referendum.”

Here is the key, no matter what peace agreement is reached, until Israel is no longer, Hamas will not stop.

 JERUSALEM —  Former President Jimmy Carter said Monday that Hamas is prepared to accept the right of Israel to “live as a neighbor next door in peace.”

Carter said the group promised it wouldn’t undermine Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ efforts to reach a peace deal with Israel, as long as the Palestinian people approved it in a referendum. In such a scenario, he said Hamas would not oppose a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza.

Hamas, a militant Islamic group that both the U.S. and Israel consider a terrorist organization, calls in its charter for Israel’s destruction. It has also traditionally opposed peace negotiations with the Jewish state.

Sami Abu Zuhri, a Hamas spokesman, later said Carter’s comments “do not mean that Hamas is going to accept the result of the referendum.”

Carter’s comments came after his much criticized meetings with the top Hamas leaders in Syria in last week.

The Nobel laureate also urged Israel to engage in direct negotiations with the Islamic militant group, saying it was a “problem” that Israel and the U.S. refuse to meet with Hamas. Both governments consider it a terrorist organization.

“The problem is not that I met with Hamas in Syria,” he said. “The problem is that Israel and the United States refuse to meet with someone who must be involved.”

“There’s no doubt that both the Arab world and Hamas will accept Israel’s right to exist in peace within 1967 borders,” he said, referring to Israel’s frontiers before it captured large swaths of Arab lands in the 1967 Mideast war.

Over the weekend, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said he decided not to meet with Carter in Israel because he does not wish to be seen as participating in any negotiations with Hamas.

In his comments Monday, Carter said Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking has “regressed” since a U.S.-hosted Mideast conference in Annapolis, Md., in November.

Israel has been negotiating directly with Abbas, who heads a moderate government based in the West Bank. Abbas lost control of the Gaza Strip last June, when Hamas violently seized control of that territory.

Carter said Hamas has promised to let a captured Israeli soldier send a letter to his parents, and said the militants “made clear to us that they would accept an interim cease-fire in the Gaza Strip.”

However, Carter said Hamas rejected his specific proposal for a monthlong unilateral cease-fire.

 

I also find Carter’s timing a bit curious… He chose to meet with Hamas just before the start of Passover and again after Passover started… Hmmm… I guess maybe there was extra plague the bible left out, terrorists…

Now Hamas’ real answer to Carter’s peace making trip, a step up of attacks from Gaza. These attacks were authorized if not ordered during the talks with Carter.

As for Hamas, our intelligence sources report that Saturday, April 19, after the Gazan leaders Mahmoud a-Zahar and Siad Siyam, fresh from their Cairo stalemate, met former US president Jimmy Carter in Damascus – and heard his suggestion of a one- or two-week halt in rocket fire as a gesture of good will – they went straight into a conference with their masters.

Khaled Meshaal and Mussa Abu Marzuk were there as well as Iranian intelligence officers based permanently in Syria and Syrian intelligence officers who maintain liaison with Hamas. It was agreed that Hamas would not only continue to batter the Gaza-Israel border as in the last ten days, but intensify its assaults against a broader range of targets.

Sunday night, Hamas fired 8 Qassam missiles and half a dozen mortar rounds against Israel civilian locations, their first nocturnal attack of this kind.

Shortly before midnight, they directed fire at Israeli farmers who were harvesting the Kibbutz Nir Oz potato crop in bullet-proof vests by night to escape sniper fire from Gaza. Israeli air force strikes followed, hitting armed Palestinian bands. At least 8 gunmen were killed over the week end.

DEBKAfile’s military sources stress that these Israeli attacks and the deaths of its operatives offer Hamas neither disincentive nor impediment for its war preparations

Carter’s Planned Syria Romp With Hamas’ Khaled Meshal

Failed negotiations with Iranian Terrorists was the first thing that came to mind when I read this article. I love how Carter thinks he is still relevant in todays politics and acts as if he actually accompished something useful during his Presidency. Carter failed miserably when Iran’s now president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad  took hostages in Iran and held them for over a year.

Does anyone remember the gas crisis from the late 70’s. That was Jimmy Carter’s successful diplomacy in action as well when it came to the Middle East…

Now after years of Anti-Israeli rhetoric, this chump is going to meet with the exiled Hamas leader Khaled Meshal. That sounds an awful lot like negotiating with terrorists to me.

I do have to say my favorite part of the article is:

“Obviously President Carter has a great amount of credibility in the region because of his past efforts seeking peace internationally,”

Yes Carter’s credibility in the region is great, not because he actually accomplished anything there, but because of Iran and his on going terrorist sympathizer status. He is probably an idol to them and he is definitely a pawn to the leadership of terror organizations.

Jimmy should have gone back to peanut picking. This is a classic example of a President with lack of experience… (Hint Hint – Obama and Clinton, although if memory serves me correct he was at least governor for a few years, more than Obama and Clinton have under their belt…)

NEW YORK CITY —  Former President Jimmy Carter is reportedly preparing an unprecedented meeting with the leader of Hamas, an organization that the U.S. government considers one of the leading terrorist threats in the world.

The Arabic-language newspaper Al-Hayat reported Tuesday that Carter was planning a trip to Syria for mid-April, during which he would meet with Khaled Meshal, the exiled head of the Palestinian terror group Hamas, on April 18.

Deanna Congileo, Carter’s press secretary, confirmed in an e-mail to FOXNews.com that Carter will be in the Mideast in April. Pressed for comment, Congileo did not deny that the former president is considering visiting Meshal.

“President Carter is planning a trip to the Mideast next week; however, we are still confirming details of the trip and will issue a press release by the end of this week,” wrote Congileo. “I cannot confirm any specific meetings at this point in time.”

Meshal, who lives in Syria to avoid being arrested by the Israeli government, leads Hamas from his seat in Damascus, where he is a guest of Bashar al-Assad’s regime.

The State Department has designated Hamas a “foreign terrorist organization,” and some groups hold Meshal personally responsible for ordering the kidnapping of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack once said of the prospect of meeting with Meshal, “That’s not something that we could possibly conceive of.”

Some Carter critics called the latest reports typical of the ex-president.

“It’s about par for the course from President Carter, demonstrating a lack of judgment typical of what he does,” said John Bolton, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. “To go to Syria to visit Hamas at this point is just an ill-timed, ill-advised decision on his part.”

“I’m not surprised that Carter would do this, as he has been supporting Palestinian extremism for many years,” said Steve Emerson, director of the Investigative Project on Terrorism, a watchdog group.

Carter would be the first Western leader of his stature to meet with the Hamas chief. Though Meshal met with Clinton officials in the 1990s, the Bush administration has sought to isolate Hamas, enforcing rigid sanctions on its government in Gaza and refusing to meet with its leaders unless it recognizes Israel and abandons terror.

“I think this [visit] undermines the U.S. policy of isolating Hamas,” said Emerson. “I think this encourages Europeans to further dilute their sanctions against the Hamas government.”

“When you put the prestige of a former president of the United States in a meeting with one of its terrorist leaders, you’re giving it a legitimacy and currency it never had,” said Bolton.

But Ibrahim Hooper, communications director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a non-profit advocacy group, said Carter’s efforts demonstrate he’s a true partner in peace.

“I think if true, this report would indicate that President Carter is willing to travel any road in search of peace,” he said. “I think President Carter would only undertake such a mission if he believed that something could be achieved in terms of peace and reconciliation in the region.”

Hooper added that because of Carter’s reputation among Palestinians he might be able to bring some pressure to bear.

“Obviously President Carter has a great amount of credibility in the region because of his past efforts seeking peace internationally,” Hooper said.

The Al-Hayat report stated that Carter would be traveling in his capacity as head of the Carter Center, and not in his capacity as a former president.

“That’s a distinction that’s absurd,” said Emerson.

“Maybe he’ll give up his pension, but he’s always a former president,” said Bolton.

Egyptian Ambulances Smuggle Terrorists Into Gaza

This is the reason Israel closes the borders and restricts aid going into Gaza… But as usual the liberal media will spin this into Israel is the cause of the problem…

Note that these terrorists were being trained in Syria and Iran, not that it is a surprise, however it is important to note the real source of terrorism.

Sunday, March 2, Egypt re-opened Gaza’s Rafah crossing for the first time since Hamas blew up the border wall on Jan. 23 for ambulances to collect some 150 wounded Palestinians.

DEBKAfile’s military sources disclose that 27 ambulances also brought in 15-20 Hamas commando fighters, part of the of the 120-strong group rounded up in Sinai and detained on their return from advanced courses in Iran and Syria. They were permitted to cross back into Gaza with a quantity of weapons and ammunition.

Israel military sources are watching to see if the incoming ambulances are also carrying shoulder-borne anti-air missiles for shooting down Israeli helicopters and drones, which Hamas has been pressing Egypt to allow them to bring in. So far Cairo has resisted this demand but may have now relented. These sources describe the returning Hamas fighters as highly trained for guerilla warfare against conventional armies and therefore a valuable increment for Hamas’ war against Israel.

Our sources also confirm that the incoming group of trained fighters is not the first Cairo waved through the Rafah terminal. Last week, as fighting flared between Israel and Hamas, 17 were admitted to reinforce embattled Hamas. Israel officials imposed a blackout on this incident, reluctant to show the public the two-faced nature of Cairo’s policy of lenience for Hamas behind the mask of cooperation with Israel’s war on terror. The Olmert government also feared the exposure of the real state of affairs on the Gaza-Egyptian frontier notwithstanding its under-the-counter tacit acceptance of the buildup of Egyptian frontier troops to 1,500 in breach of the 1982 peace treaty.

Prime minister Olmert prefers to avoid any disclosures that might embarrass Cairo ahead of Condoleezza Rice’s visits to Israel, Ramallah and Egypt, starting Tuesday, March 4. According to our Washington sources, she will rap Palestinian knuckles for Hamas’ missile blitz, but at the same time tighten the screw on Israel to lift its siege of Gaza and reopen the border crossings. (Food and other convoys have never really stopped crossing into Gaza even under fire.)

The Mubarak government therefore is not afraid to reopen the supposedly closed Rafah terminal from time to time whenever Hamas demands essential items to fuel its ongoing war on Israel.

Russia To Defend Terrorist Nations Using Nukes

I wonder where the liberal media is with this one, had the US been the one to say the nuclear option is not off the table, then the media would be lambasting Bush for threatening nuclear war with Russia…. but since it is Russia threatening to use nukes if their allies, Iran, Syria, North Korea, are attacked, then it is ok…

Not that this is a new policy, the timing of their restatement of their policy is interesting, it would appear they are more worried about strikes against Iran….

Russia’s military chief of staff said Saturday that Moscow could use nuclear weapons in preventive strikes to protect itself and its allies, the latest aggressive remarks from increasingly assertive Russian authorities.

Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky’s comment did not mark a policy shift, military analysts said. Amid disputes with the West over security issues, it may have been meant as a warning that Russia is prepared to use its nuclear might.

“We do not intend to attack anyone, but we consider it necessary for all our partners in the world community to clearly understand … that to defend the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Russia and its allies, military forces will be used, including preventively, including with the use of nuclear weapons,” Baluyevsky said at a military conference in a remark broadcast on state-run cable channel Vesti-24.

According to the state-run news agency RIA-Novosti, Baluyevsky added that Russia would use nuclear weapons and carry out preventive strikes only in accordance with Russia’s military doctrine.

The military doctrine adopted in 2000 says Russia may use nuclear weapons to counter a nuclear attack on Russia or an ally, or a large-scale conventional attack that poses a critical risk to Russia’s security.

Retired Gen. Vladimir Dvorkin, formerly a top arms control expert with the Russian Defense Ministry, said he saw “nothing new” in Baluyevsky’s statement. “He was restating the doctrine in his own words,” Dvorkin said.

Moscow-based military analyst Alexander Golts said that when Russia broke with stated Soviet-era policy in the 2000 doctrine and declared it could use nuclear weapons first against an aggressor, it reflected the decline of Russia’s conventional forces in the decade following the 1991 Soviet collapse.

“Baluyevsky’s statement means that, as before, we cannot count on our conventional forces to counter aggression,” Golts told Ekho Moskvy radio. “It means that as before, the main factor in containing aggression against Russia is nuclear weapons.”

Putin and other Russian officials have stressed the need to maintain a powerful nuclear deterrent and reserved the right to carry out preventive strikes. But in most of their public remarks on preventive strikes, Russian officials have not specifically mentioned nuclear weapons.

Baluyevsky spoke amid persistent disputes between Moscow and the West over issues including U.S. plans for missile defense facilities in former Soviet satellites, NATO members’ refusal to ratify an updated European conventional arms treaty, and Kosovo’s bid for independence from Serbia.

Like Golts, Moscow-based military analyst Pavel Felgenhauer said Russia plays up its nuclear deterrent because of its weakness in terms of conventional arms. “We threaten the West that in any kind of serious conflict, we’ll go nuclear almost immediately,” he said.

But in the absence of a real threat from the West, he said, “It’s just talk.”

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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Canada’s Foreign Minister Apologizes For Including The US & Israel On Torture List

In a reversal of a non-official list of countries considered to be countries that use Torture, Canada’s Foreign Minister Bernier has apologized and ordered a re-evaluation and re-issue of the list to remove the US and Israel.

Well I am suprised by this turn of events, considering the obvious distaste for America expressed by the typical Canadian politicians… I do welcome the fact they they realized they made a mistake and acknowledge that “forced nudity, isolation, sleep deprivation and the blindfolding of prisoners ” are not actual forms of torture…

I wonder when the rest of the mainstream liberal media will put this on the front page like they did when the US and Israel were included…

The Canadian foreign minister has apologised for including the US and Israel on a list of states where prisoners are at risk of torture.

Maxime Bernier said the list, which formed part of a manual on torture awareness given to diplomats, “wrongly includes some of our closest allies”.

Mr Bernier insisted the manual was not a policy document and did not convey the official views of his government.

The listing was criticised by the US and Israel, who demanded it be changed.

“We find it to be offensive for us to be on the same list with countries like Iran and China. Quite frankly it’s absurd,” said the US ambassador to Canada, David Wilkins.

A spokesman for the Israeli embassy in Ottawa, Michael Mendel, said the Israeli Supreme Court was “on record as expressly prohibiting any type of torture”.

“If Israel is included in the list in question, the ambassador of Israel would expect its removal,” he added.

‘Reviewed and rewritten’

In a statement on Saturday, Mr Bernier said he regretted the embarrassment caused by the public disclosure of the list and promised it would be changed to reflect the Canadian government’s official position.

“It contains a list that wrongly includes some of our closest allies. I have directed that the manual be reviewed and rewritten,” he said.

“The manual is neither a policy document nor a statement of policy. As such, it does not convey the government’s views or positions.”

The manual lists US interrogation techniques such as forced nudity, isolation, sleep deprivation and the blindfolding of prisoners under its “definition of torture”.

It also refers to the US detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, where a Canadian man, Omar Khadr, is being held. Critics say it ridicules Ottawa’s claims that he is not being mistreated.

The manual refers to Guantanamo Bay where a Canadian is being held

Other countries on the watch list include Afghanistan, China, Iran, Israel, Mexico, Saudi Arabia and Syria.

The document was mistakenly provided to the human rights group, Amnesty International, as part of a court case it is bringing against the Canadian government over the treatment of detainees in Afghanistan.

The torture awareness course was introduced after Ottawa was strongly criticised for its handling of the case of a Canadian who was deported from the US to Syria in 2002.

Syrian-born Maher Arar, who was accused of being an al-Qaeda member, has said he was tortured during the 10 months he was detained in a prison in Damascus. An inquiry exonerated him of any links to terrorist groups in 2006.

Syria’s Biological Clock Ticking Away

This article is a must read for anyone who takes our nations security, as well as the security of the world, seriously… Syria and N. Korea are one of the worlds biggest problems… Now the only think that needs to be clarified is Iran’s heavy involvement in all this, between their work with the North Koreans and their recent “accident” that explosed their involvement in Syria’s chemical warefare program, the are just as involved as N. Korea.

Also do not forget that intel showed much of Iraq’s NBC programs going into Syria before the invasion..

When news leaked out of the September 6^th Israeli Air Force and commando raid on a Syrian Nuclear facility followed by revelations about the deaths of dozens of Iranians and Syrians in a Chemical warfare missile accident in July the world was jarred. Recently, it was revealed that the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) had aided Syria in its chemical warfare programs. I noted in a recent interview with former US UN Ambassador John Bolton his early concerns about the Syrian Bio Warfare threat. Questions arose, specifically about the size, nature and danger of the Syrian bio-warfare military programs. For answers and professional views on how extensive the Syrian bio-warfare threat is, we turned to Dr. Jill Dekker, a consultant to the NATO Defense Establishment in bio-warfare and counter terrorism. Dr. Dekker is also a member of the board of advisors of the Intelligence Summit.

Dr. Dekker’s answers give a foreboding picture of how large and refined the Syrian bio-warfare programs are and how little Western Intelligence knows about how the programs were developed. The potential exists for a significant WMD threat in the Middle East and the West, especially, against America. Syria is a proxy ally of Iran, North Korea (DPRK) and terror groups such as Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and Hamas. Thus, the supply of bio-weapons and delivery platforms that could results in mass casualties makes it a real and present danger.

We were pleased that Dr. Dekker took time out from her professional work to answer questions about the Syrian bio-warfare establishment and WMD threat.

Jerry Gordon: Tell us briefly about your professional background and research background in Bio-warfare.

Jill Dekker: Well, I started working on bio-safety several years ago under the guidance of a colleague at the World Health Organization in Geneva and the concern then was Laboratory Acquired Diseases (LAD’s) and how best to protect workers and the environment from accidental exposure to dangerous pathogens. There were few national requirements to report sharps and sticks accidents as well as other accidents. If you recall Vector in Novosibirsk Russia had an accident with a senior scientist who subsequently contracted Ebola-Vector failed to report the incident until 12 day had passed and by then it was too late for the US team en route to save her life. I also worked on notification for zoonotic diseases (transmissible from animal to human) to public health authorities. Back then in the EU emergency animal disease outbreaks, even with public health consequences, were only notified to the OIE, which is the World Organization for Animal Health. There was little regulation on the reporting of public health cases of Campylobactor, Listeriosis, E-coli 0157 and or strains of Salmonella. Keeping in mind here that with the exception of variola (smallpox) nearly all Category A biological warfare pathogens are zoonotic. I then worked with several organizations involved with the UN Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BTWC) in Geneva. It was during this work in 2000 that I really came to understand the threat state biological weapons programs posed.

In 2001, when the US suffered its anthrax attacks, everything changed. We went from looking at bio-safety as an aspect of protecting workers and the environment, to bio-security and trying to safe-guard High Consequence Pathogens mainly in P3 and P4 facilities from terrorists. The P4 or Biological Safety Level 4 (BSL4) before 2000 were usually associated with national defense programs. A P4 laboratory or is the highest level of laboratory containment for handling mainly warfare agents or what might be considered battle strains. We went from bio-safety to developing various interventions to prevent the theft, diversion and sale of High Consequence Pathogens by terrorists from laboratories. After the US postal attacks, institutions such as Sandia, the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta and the World Health Organization in Genève were instrumental in developing this concept of “bio-security” or protective measures for laboratories. Bio-security has remained a focus in the United States and Europe. Events over the last three or four years have shifted the perception of bio-security significantly. While bio-security is certainly still on the agenda, the relationship of states and terrorists has changed. I now focus on state supported bio-terrorism whereby pathogens don’t need to be stolen or diverted. A state warfare lab, such as exists in Iran and Syria today, could easily provide their terrorist surrogates with the most advanced biological agents for covert operations. This is far more likely and would be far more devastating in terms of kill ratios than some lone terrorist group trying to weaponize pathogens without state support or a warfare laboratory.

Gordon: You are currently a consultant with the NATO Defense Establishment, what are your principle duties?

Dekker: For the past few years, I’ve developed a number of programs which NATO supports and in which NATO is a full participant. Additionally, I represent both governmental and defense industry clients who are interested in collaboration with supranational military structures such as NATO, US Dept. of Defense or Ministries of Defense on this side of the Atlantic. I’ve also worked on national assessments of Mid-East bio-warfare programs and as a strategic advisor for McKenna, Long and Aldridge, LLP in Washington D.C. on their Bio-Defense practice. I have consulted with the Public Health Preparedness program for the European Homeland Security Association under the French High Committee for Civil Defense. I developed and ran war games for this program.

Gordon: You have written and presented extensively to international groups in the US, EU and Middle East on Syrian Bio-warfare. How did you get interested in the subject?

Dekker: Initially, I became interested in looking at bio-safety standards mainly of East European laboratories and the types of pathogens which were being transported pretty much without regulation to other nations in Africa and the Mid-East. The World Health Organization, which I consulted with, was interested in these areas as well. Some laboratories in Africa and the Mid-East tend to have a lower level of bio-safety containment. A P4 is extremely expensive to build and maintain so nations with fewer resources tend to work on their bio-warfare programs in labs which may not be suitable. In the course of this two things happened; I was looking at issues related to the Soviet programs, what pathogens they may have provided to Iraq, Syria, Iran and the DPRK, specifically I was looking at their smallpox and botulinium programs. Then in Afghanistan, you may recall, the US recovered documents which Al Qaeda had on their bio-programs. I moved from an interest in bio-safety and bio-security to looking at the threat state biological warfare labs pose and the types of criteria we need to assess them. Most biological weapons research is dual use. It is quite difficult to determine if it falls within the BTWC, which allows defensive research, or if it is “offensive” which is prohibited. These programs are usually a nation’s most sensitive weapons sections. Thus, it can be very difficult, but not impossible, to estimate how advanced they are.

Gordon: What have your investigations revealed about the level of commitment and investment in Bio-warfare programs by the Syrian military establishment?

Dekker: Contrary to how the US State Department and other agencies tend to downplay the sophistication of the Syrian biological and nuclear programs, they are very advanced. Syria has always had the most advanced chemical weapons program in the Middle East. The US and other western agencies have in a sense been distracted by this, but their biological programs and the “concept of use” are robust. Syria’s biological weapons capability today is closely tied to the former and current Soviet and Russian programs respectively, the DPRK, Iran and the former Iraq regime. A major concern is their strategic concept of use – which has gone from one of ‘special weapons’ to incorporation into their ‘conventional arsenal.’ That is a significant shift and one that seems to have eluded the US. The Syrians run their biological programs out of the Syrian Scientific Research Council (SSRC) in Damascus. They have separate wings for separate pathogens. They also have a number of programs running in Aleppo. The Syrians are 100% committed to deniable operations as their modus operandi. Biological weapons, particularly those which might occur naturally, are the ultimate in deniability, for example, their cryptosporidium program for force reduction. The Wednesday Report noted a few years ago that in terms of the Syrian anthrax program, Syria has extensive expertise in the industrial cultivation of germs and viruses for the civilian production of anthrax (and smallpox) vaccines. It also noted that Russian experts, contracted by Syria, are apparently helping them to cultivate a highly virulent anthrax germ for installation in missile warheads. Their pharmaceutical infrastructure is fully integrated with their defense structure. Syrians cannot reach parity with US and Israeli conventional weapons. However, they view their bio-chemical arsenal as part of a normal weapons program. This is a huge shift in thinking by the Syrian military. It means they condone the use of biological pathogens as ‘offensive’ weapons. NATO and the United States should be very concerned about that re-designation.

Gordon: What external resources did the Syrian military establishment draw upon to develop its Bio-warfare capabilities?

Dekker: The Syrians work on most Category A pathogens: anthrax, plague, tularemia, botulinium, smallpox, aflotoxin, cholera, ricin, camelpox. Some of these they acquired during natural outbreaks, others they acquired from the Soviets, Russians, DPRK, Iran and Iraq. Some of these pathogens such as their botulinium program have their own facilities and sections within chemical weapons institutes and defense labs; others are in veterinary vaccine research facilities and have a ‘latent’ component. Keep in mind ‘defensive’ biological research is completely legal and prior to the 1980’s it was normal to trade in pathogens, even dangerous ones. Although the US gave up its bio-warfare program in the 1960’s, the BTWC of 1972, ratified in 1976, had no verification mechanism. Offensive programs were not that uncommon. The Soviets hid theirs (Biopreparat) and it was massive. US intelligence agencies denied the Soviets could possibly have such a massive program – even after the defection of high level scientists- such Vladimir Pasechnik. You have to wonder at what point they are going to sharpen up and see that nations like Syria also have a robust advanced biological weapons program. Things have changed with genetic modification and other technologies which make the need to ‘stockpile’ biological weapons obsolete. The Syrians are intent on having a very agile program; additionally they work on a number of crash programs. Thus, we see a progression from the old Soviet days of bio-weapon development to a far more contemporary way in which the Syrians have made tremendous gains from the Soviets and more recently the Russians and the DPRK. The Syrians also acquired some of their dual-use technologies completely legally when companies such as Baxter and other bio-pharma concerns were developing factories in Damascus. The majority of their bio-programs stocks have come from Russia, Iran and the DPRK.

Gordon: We heard that some of the late Saddam Hussein’s Bio-warfare research and pathogens may have been transferred to Syria during Operation Enduring Freedom. Is that accurate to your knowledge, and who facilitated the transfer? What types of bio-warfare agents and materials might have been transferred?

Dekker: Yes. It is important to remember that the Iraqi programs were far more advanced at the time than what the Syrians had, and were developing. The delivery of certain pathogens in a ‘weaponized’ form taught the Syrians new techniques they previously had not mastered. This is very problematic. I am less concerned about the types of pathogens or specific pathogens as these were available to Syria from other sources. What Hussein’s transfer taught the Syrians was more sophisticated ways of weaponization and dispersal. I believe Russian special ops- their Spetsnaz teams – transported sections of the programs. Remember these are not MIRVed ICBM’s we are talking about – you don’t need to stockpile biological weapons. It is the quality of the pathogen and ‘weaponization’ or aerosolization, milling processes that count, not the quantity. I don’t believe they moved some biological arsenals into the Baqaa Valley in Lebanon, perhaps sections of their chemical and nuclear weapons, but not the biological programs. Those are much too sensitive to dump in the desert. They must be carefully maintained in a defense laboratory. If you take something like Bot – I gram of crystalline Botulinium is estimated to kill about a million people if it were evenly dispersed – you don’t want to bury it out in the desert.

Gordon: To your knowledge what pathogens and toxins are the Syrian bio-warfare establishment developing and what is their propensity to produce mass casualties?

Dekker: Syria posesses Category A, B, and C pathogens and toxins. To my knowledge the most problematic program, I believe was transferred, was the Iraqi camelpox program – the fact that Iraq had this program in the first place is a problem. That it was one of their major programs, which UNMOVIC had detailed the first time around, is a big problem. It’s a problem because camelpox research and other types of orthopox research can and have been used as a safe substitute for conducting smallpox research. A particular issue I have with smallpox research conducted in rogue states is that these programs most likely are not based on vaccine preventable strains. So the US national strategic stockpile of smallpox vaccine, which has cost the US tax payers billions of dollars to stockpile, may be totally non-efficacious against a battle strain developed in Syria, Iran or the DPRK. There were reports a few years back, that something like the India 1 strain, which is considered exceptionally virulent, can be prevented with modern attenuated vaccine. However, this is first of all not an absolute and secondly India 1 which is associated with the 1971 Smallpox outbreak in Aralsk, Kazahkstan which came from Vozrozhdenie Island may not resemble genetically modified strains. It creates a false sense of security to think that out of 128 strains, only four (the most prevalent previously naturally occurring strains) are the ones rogue states would choose to reintroduce smallpox. It is naive to think that states developing weapons of mass destruction are going to select a strain we can prevent. The Soviets ramped up their work on smallpox once they knew the WHO had declared it eradicated and that the United States had ceased vaccination against it. The US national stockpile is based primarily on the Ankara strain (Modified Vaccinia Ankara). Syria also has high capacity samplers now that are exceptionally useful in field testing biological weapons, again, another possible acquisition from Iraq. They have recently mastered different types of dispersal methods which may have come from the Iraqi programs. As I previously mentioned, Syria works ‘offensively’ on most Category A bio-warfare pathogens as do a number of other states.

Gordon: To your knowledge have Syrian Bio-warfare programs been supplied by Russian, West German and even American research and technical processing entities?

Dekker: Yes, several West European nations (Germany, the UK, Holland, France), the US and Russia were trading partners of Syria and supplied technologies which could and were used for offensive programs. At that time it was not illegal – the only firm I know specifically which seems to have caught the attention of the US Dept. of Justice was Baxter Pharmaceutical. At the moment the main bio-pharma trading partners are the DPRK and Russia. The Iranians have supplied scientific teams which will advance their weapons knowledge. The Syrians have also been somewhat successful at third party bidding through countries in Africa.

Gordon: How extensive has the Syrian Bio-warfare program become and who in their military and defense establishment is directing and controlling its development?

Dekker: The Syrian biological warfare programs are administratively run under the SSRC in Damascus. They have one of the most highly developed pharmaceutical industries in the Mid East. It is overseen by the Ministry of Defense under General Talas and their intelligence services. This is rather unusual as most western pharmaceutical firms are overseen by a Ministry of Public Health. There is also Saydalaya which is their foreign procurement board for all chemical and biological imports. I would say the Syrian bio-pharma sector is highly interfaced with the defense establishment. They also have a number of veterinary institutes – again oversight is from the Ministry of Defense.

Gordon: What means of delivery does Syria have available for its bio weapons?

Dekker: Well they’ve mastered micro-encapsulation which is necessary for aerosol dispersal. They have experimented with parachute dispersal techniques for orthopox based on Soviet methods. They are also developing micro aerosol dispersal technologies which have no military application. This is probably the most alarming as it is designed for terrorist use. They are also looking at amplifying virulence. Syria wants to develop a very high quality arsenal and a very agile one, hence their crash programs. They do of course have a sophisticated chemical weapons program for which missile delivery is far more complementary. Remember, if you are preparing to do a covert release of a biological agent you don’t necessarily want to use something as traceable as a crop sprayer. The Syrians are perfecting advanced dispersal technologies that will be for use against civilians but far more sophisticated than the use of a crop duster.

Gordon: How much of a threat is the Syrian Bio-warfare capability to Israel and US forces in the Middle East, e.g. Iraq?

Dekker: Syria poses an immediate and imminent threat to the United States and Israel. The most likely use of their biological weapons arsenal against Israel would be to reduce IDF fighting forces prior to an attack on the Golan. It’s conceivable they could incapacitate the IDF for a few days even with a non-lethal pathogen or repetitively weaken civilians in Lebanon, where the water supplies are unprotected. This could be an optimum use of their bio-arsenal. That might not be as catastrophic as some fear, but it would be very effective. Obviously, there are more serious scenarios one can imagine in terms of deniability, if they have produced vaccines to protect their military and maybe their civilians against more lethal strains of virus such as smallpox. The immediate threat is their ability to reduce fighting forces. They have a strain of pneumonia that is probably very effective and they had a crash program on cryptosporidium prior to last year’s war in Lebanon. If you look at regions in Lebanon with known concentrations of anti-Syrian civilians, it may be possible for Syria to contaminate water distribution systems with a pathogen like Crypto which is impervious to chlorine and will pass through most filtration systems. Such a contamination could infect significant sections of a population. Even in the United States, there have been natural outbreaks. There is no treatment available, so it could have quite an impact. There are other concerns such as the use of pre-deployed biological agents in the event that Iran is attacked by the United States. Again, here we should pay close attention to how the Soviets planned for Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD). They planned their smallpox program specifically in the event of MAD so that smallpox would wipe out whoever was left. It’s not beyond reason to consider that the Syrians and Iranians have engaged in such contingency planning

Gordon: Does the Syrian Bio-warfare establishment have co-operative weaponization programs on-going with Iran, Sudan and other terrorist sponsoring states?

Dekker: Similar to Iran’s collaboration on their nuclear testing with the DPRK, Syria has joint efforts for field testing their biological agents. It appears they have done some field testing with the cooperation of Khartoum. There is also evidence to suggest they have conducted tests on sections of their prison populations. Iranian scientific teams are known to work within the SSRC system on bio-warfare programs and certainly they have high level exchanges on their chemical and nuclear programs. Russia has sent scientists recently to work within their bio-chem programs.

Gordon: We noted Israeli and some mainstream media reports about an alleged chemical warfare accident in July 2007 that took place in Syria and killed ‘dozens of Iranian and Syrians technicians and officials.’ Are you able to confirm that through your sources? Have there been equivalent technical accidents in the Syrian Bio-warfare programs?

Dekker: There have been a number of accidents with their biological weapons programs that have killed civilians in the past in cities like Homs and Aleppo. The July 2007 accident was a far more serious and immediate one. As is the case with chemical munitions, the types of previous accidents took time to develop and tended to produce chronic symptoms. Some of those programs were ended and it appears that casualties from former bio-programs were related to ventilation problems. This latest accident appears to have occurred while they were mounting a warhead. Syria is known to have a stockpile of chemical weapons and accidents happen. It is interesting to note that Iranian scientists were involved in that activity.

Gordon: How much does the US Bio-warfare establishment and intelligence community know about the Syrian Bio-warfare threat?

Dekker: It is similar to the US negligent underestimation and denial that the Soviets had a massive biological weapons program. The US Intelligence Community negligently underestimates and denies the sophistication of the Syrian biological weapons programs which is very unfortunate. I think it has been very difficult for the US Intelligence Community to procure knowledgeable sources due to internal institutional problems. Former US Ambassador to the UN, John Bolton has tried since 2001 to warn the US about the threat the Syrian biological weapons programs poses. His warnings have fallen on deaf ears. I hope Israel is helping the United States because it would appear the US is really not up to this challenge. The US public should demand that our military is first and foremost protected. Every soldier should carry Factor Seven and should be vaccinated against smallpox, have botulinium anti-toxin available and anthrax vaccine. This should be standard protection for our military personnel operating in the Middle East. Obviously in other areas we need counter medical measures to prevent VHF’s (Viral Hemorrhagic Fevers). The US public needs to be informed that the intelligence community is falling far short here in protecting them. Other US allies are not, they are up to speed. Again as an American citizen it is unbelievable to see such negligence in the US intelligence community. Having lived in Europe for 20 years and working as a defense consultant on Category A warfare agents, this is not the standard approach of other NATO nations. There is something deeply disturbing with the US approach. Time will tell as unfortunately it did with 9/11.

Gordon: In your opinion, what has prevented the US from recognizing the significance of the Syrian bio-warfare threat and developing effective counter measures?

Dekker: I believe there is a specific mind-set within the US intelligence community which makes it difficult for them to procure sources in the Middle East and of course the lack of language ability is a problem for them as well. I’ve lived outside the US for nearly 20 years now and what I’ve seen in their approach is not reassuring. Most of their experienced officers are gone. The US State Dept. moves their staff about every three years which is not compatible with building long-term relationships. They appear not to have the Human Intelligence (HUMINT) resources required for long term assessment of WMD programs. Because they have not taken appropriate defensive measures in view of the potential consequences of a WMD attack, they have left the US exposed. It’s also problematic that the US relies heavily on technology and has done so for a number of years. Biological weapons cannot be assessed by satellites anymore. Perhaps during the old Soviet era but now science has moved beyond this. I believe the US incompetence in this field and its arrogance could eventually lead to a successful strike on the US by a rogue nation-possibly in the very near future.

Another problem for the United States as a result of their inability to assess Syrian programs accurately is their failure to inform the US public on the real threat they face. The smallpox program is a case in point. The US may not be able to protect its citizens with its ‘treasured’ national strategic stockpile of smallpox vaccine. Who wants to be the one to come out and announce that to the US public? Who wants to say they have no idea how advanced the Syrian Botulinium or Plague programs are because they don’t have any access? It would be very unpopular if the US public knew they were potentially defenseless and that the people charged with protecting them had dropped the ball again. What is disconcerting is they don’t seem to be able to recognize, acknowledge and correct their prior mistakes, such as the denial of the Soviet Biopreparat programs. If they don’t start taking Mid-East biological weapons programs more seriously the U.S. is likely to suffer far worse attacks than 9/11. The US intelligence community is inadequately equipped to deal with this threat.

Gordon: Could Bio-weapons developed by the Syrian military establishment be used as WMD producing significant mass casualties in Israel, the EU and here in America?

Dekker: Yes, Syria is very good at conducting covert operations. They have a number of technologies available which they could provide to either Special Forces or terrorists who could release them in airports, other transportation hubs, airplane ventilation systems and that would cause mass casualties. I certainly believe they have very advanced biological weapons capabilities and we are at a point where there really aren’t any technological obstacles for them to overcome in dispersal or deployment. This is why intelligence is so vital in this area. It is probably the last line of defense, so to neglect it, or deny that one should allocate resources for prevention, is odd. Some biological weapons use pathogens which don’t need to be ‘weaponized’. This requires specialized intelligence techniques not used for tracking chemical or nuclear weapons. Of all the countries Israel is by far the most prepared to handle the release of biological weapons. The nations of Western Europe are unevenly prepared and the United States is probably not prepared. In such an attack, the country would probably suffer major mass casualties. I think the Syrians are much more sophisticated than the US intelligence community realizes. This puts American lives at immediate risk. The American public should demand that the US intelligence community close the gap in their intelligence on the Syrian biological weapons programs. Additionally, they have underestimated the Syrian nuclear programs for several years as well.

Gordon: In your opinion what should America, Israel and NATO do to combat the Syrian Bio-warfare threat and its proliferation to terrorist groups?

Dekker: The US intelligence community could start by acknowledging that Syria has an advanced, well developed program and take things a bit more seriously. It would be helpful if they stopped tasking resources to intimidate US scientists abroad who are informed on Syrian biological weapons. The US Intelligence Community seems particularly risk averse. It’s almost as if Syria couldn’t possibly have such a program because their scientific community isn’t advanced enough. Syria’s scientific community is exceptionally advanced and sophisticated. They work closely with Iran, Russia and the DPRK. They have vast expertise to draw upon. Their conventional weapons programs may fall far behind Israel and the US but they have leveled the playing field considerably with their unconventional weapons arsenal. It has been their goal to do so. If you deny something exists and seek to intimidate those who say it does, then any preventive measures to protect your citizens are lacking. Other NATO nations are preparing for deliberate disease outbreaks and acknowledge that Syrian biological weapons programs are a threat. These efforts may now be accelerated given concerns over Syria’s nuclear program that caught many off guard.

Israel on the other hand is well prepared. Its citizens have experience with Scud attacks and Israel is poised to interdict WMD attacks because their intelligence services are so competent.

Biological weapons and terrorist use of them require excellence in intelligence not incompetence and denial.

Gordon: Thank you Dr. Dekker for this most informative and I’m sorry to say, frightening discussion of the Syrian bio-warfare threat and why America has not done enough to recognize and combat it.

Dr. Dekker suggests that for more information you consult “Biological Terrorism: The Threat of the 21st Century” by Marie Sultan for the types of technological advancements which might be a concern.

Saudi Arabia & Libya Largest Source of Iraqi Terrorist Last Year

Saudi Arabia and Libya source of 60% of foreign fighters that entered Iraq over the past year…A raid in the town of Sinjar near the Syrian border this past September yielded documents that revealed the names and countries of origin of 700 terrorists in Iraq who came to join their Jihad brothers in arms. Of the terrorist immigrants, a little over 300 came from Saudia Arabia while almost another 150 or so came from Libya, through Syria, either via normal air transport or sneaking across the border into Iraq.

In the months since, it appears that Syria and Saudia Arabia have cracked down on terrorists movements to Iraq and are better scrutinizing people with suspicious activity patterns.

As the liberal media coverage of the good things that have been happened is overlooked, this is another one they don’t want you to know…

WASHINGTON (CNN) — As many as 60 percent of the foreign fighters who entered Iraq in the past year have come from Saudi Arabia and Libya, according to documents discovered in a raid in September near the Syrian border, a senior U.S. military official in Baghdad confirmed to CNN Thursday.

A Syrian soldier stands guard at a border post with Iraq. The majority of foreign fighters coming into Iraq have entered via Syria.

The documents confiscated in that raid listed the identities of more than 700 foreign fighters in Iraq, whom the United States believes entered that country since August 2006. The official describes the documents as “an al Qaeda rolodex.”

Scrutinized along with other intelligence in the hands of the U.S. military, the documents show that 60 percent of the foreign fighters who entered Iraq during that time frame came either from Saudi Arabia or Libya, the official said.

The United States believes 305 foreign fighters came from Saudi Arabia, and 137 came from Libya.

The raid took place in Sinjar, close to the Syrian border. That raid has been discussed in the past by the U.S. military, but this is the first time the intelligence findings have been discussed in such detail. The New York Times first reported the new information on Thursday.

The official said the number of foreign fighters has dropped off since the Sinjar raid. The U.S. military believes both Syria and Saudi Arabia in recent months have taken a number of actions to reduce the flow of foreign fighters.

“We continue to work with the countries in the region to stem the flow of foreign fighters into Iraq and appreciate the efforts they’ve made,” said White House spokeswoman Nikki McArthur from Washington.

“These statistics remind us that extremists continue to go to Iraq because they do not want the United States nor the Iraqis to succeed in establishing a democracy there that is an ally in the war on terror,” she added.

The official said in particular both countries are more closely watching military-age males who buy on- way airline tickets. The majority of foreign fighters have entered Iraq either by coming across the Syrian border, or flying into Iraq from Syria.

The official said intelligence had shown that the majority of suicide bombers in Iraq in recent months had come into Iraq via airports in Syria after arriving there from their home countries.

Syria’s Nuke Facility So Secret Army Didn’t Know It Existed

Syria’s government apparrently kept information on the nuclear facility that Israel destroyed, such a secret that it’s own military did not know it existed. Plausible deniability and prevent of leaks about it’s existance seem the most likely reason for such a covert operation. Fortunately this left the facility unprotected and thus the Israel commandos were able to paint targets for the F-16s to strike with ease.

Report: Syria gov’t kept nuke facility secret from army to avoid leaks

By Haaretz Service

tags: Syria, Israel

Syria’s said nuclear facility allegedly bombed by Israel two months ago was kept so secret that the government in Damascus did not inform its own army of its existence, Aviation Week magazine on Saturday quoted Israeli officials as saying. Because the Syrian army was kept out of the loop, anti-aircraft batteries were not positioned around the facility rendering it vulnerable to attack by air, the unnamed source said. The U.S. publication said Israel used an array of sophisticated technological tools ranging from satellites to anti-electronic warfare to plan and carry out the alleged bombing of the complex in northern Syria, said to be built with the aid of North Korea. A previous report by ABC claimed Israel had obtained detailed pictures of the Syrian complex from an apparent mole. ABC, citing a senior U.S. official, said the person had provided several pictures of the complex from the ground, and Israel showed the images to the CIA. The U.S. spy agency helped pinpoint “drop points” to assist in potential targeting, ABC said. Israel urged the United States to destroy the complex, but Washington hesitated because no fissionable material was found that would prove the site was nuclear, ABC said