What ever Happened to “a New Way Forward”?!

Has anyone else been wondering what happened to Bush’s campaign to start a “new way forward in Iraq”? When this “plan” came out, it was all we heard every single leader saying. The study group on Iraq was supposed to be the best (newest) plan that we could possibly put into action…so why don’t we hear about it anymore?

U.S. Official: There will be an Attack on Iran

Reports that the Bush Administration will put Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on the terrorism list can be read in one of two ways: it’s either more bluster or, ominously, a wind-up for a strike on Iran. Officials I talk to in Washington vote for a hit on the IRGC, maybe within the next six months. And they think that as long as we have bombers and missiles in the air, we will hit Iran’s nuclear facilities. An awe and shock campaign, lite, if you will. But frankly they’re guessing; after Iraq the White House trusts no one, especially the bureaucracy.

As with Saddam and his imagined WMD, the Administration’s case against the IRGC is circumstantial. The U.S. military suspects but cannot prove that the IRGC is the main supplier of sophisticated improvised explosive devices to insurgents killing our forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. The most sophisticated version, explosive formed projectiles or shape charges, are capable of penetrating the armor of an Abrams tank, disabling the tank and killing the crew.

War with Iran Coming?

MANAMA (Reuters) – A U.S. aircraft carrier is heading to the U.S. Navy’s Fifth Fleet area of operations, which includes the Gulf, but the Pentagon said on Tuesday there had been no decision to increase naval power in the region.

U.S. defence officials said the deployment of the USS Enterprise was a routine measure to replace one of two U.S. Navy carriers now in the Fifth Fleet area.

Bahrain-based Fifth Fleet said the Enterprise was expected to arrive within weeks in its area of operations, where the U.S. has been flexing its muscles in a standoff with Iran over Tehran’s nuclear programme that has stoked regional tensions.

“There is a scheduled swap of carriers that is part of the routine deployment of the Enterprise,” Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told reporters in Washington.

“Has the department made a decision for three carriers in the Gulf? No,” he added.

The U.S. Navy declined to comment on the future movements of the USS Stennis and the USS Nimitz, the two carriers currently deployed in the Fifth Fleet area.

The area includes the Gulf, the Arabian Sea, the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden, Gulf of Oman and parts of the Indian Ocean.

A Pentagon official said there was a possibility the Navy could go down to one carrier in the region.

The United States sent a second carrier to the Gulf at the start of this year. U.S. officials said that move was designed to reassure U.S. allies concerned about Iran’s increasing influence in the region.

In May, a flotilla of U.S. warships sailed through the Gulf to hold exercises off Iran’s coast in a major show of force that unnerved oil markets.

The U.S. Navy said in a statement that the Enterprise would provide “navy power to counter the assertive, disruptive and coercive behaviour of some countries,” and take part in anti-submarine, anti-surface, anti-mine, air and missile defence and air strike operations.

“These operations are not specifically aimed at Iran… We consider this time unprecedented in terms of the amount of insecurity and instability in the region,” Navy spokeswoman Denise Garcia said, citing tensions in Somalia, Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan.

The West suspects Iran of secretly seeking to build a nuclear bomb and wants Tehran to suspend uranium enrichment activities. Tehran insists its atomic ambitions are peaceful.

Earlier this month, commercial satellite imagery showed Iran was building a tunnel facility inside a mountain near a key nuclear complex — a move nuclear analysts said could be an attempt to protect nuclear activity from aerial attack.

Tension over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions has raised regional fears of a military confrontation. Iran has dismissed previous U.S. drills off its coast as morale-boosting exercises, and has said it had missiles that could sink big war ships in the Gulf.

(Additional reporting by Andrew Gray in Washington)

6-year Old Boy: “Taliban recruited Me to Bomb U.S. Troops”

FORWARD OPERATING BASE THUNDER, Afghanistan The story of a 6-year-old Afghan boy who says he thwarted an effort by Taliban militants to trick him into being a suicide bomber provoked tears and anger at a meeting of tribal leaders. The account from Juma Gul, a dirt-caked child who collects scrap metal for money, left American soldiers dumbfounded that a youngster could be sent on such a mission. Afghan troops crowded around the boy to call him a hero.

Though the Taliban dismissed the story as propaganda, at a time when U.S. and NATO forces are under increasing criticism over civilian casualties, both Afghan tribal elders and U.S. military officers said they were convinced by his dramatic account.

Juma said that sometime last month Taliban fighters forced him to wear a vest they said would spray out flowers when he touched a button. He said they told him that when he saw American soldiers, “throw your body at them.”

The militants cornered Juma in a Taliban-controlled district in southern Afghanistan’s Ghazni province. Their target was an impoverished youngster being raised by an older sister—but also one who proved too street-smart for their plan.

“When they first put the vest on my body I didn’t know what to think, but then I felt the bomb,” Juma told The Associated Press as he ate lamb and rice after being introduced to the elders at this joint U.S.- Afghan base in Ghazni. “After I figured out it was a bomb, I went to the Afghan soldiers for help.”

While Juma’s story could not be independently verified, local government leaders backed his account and the U.S. and NATO military missions said they believed his story. Abdul Rahim Deciwal, the chief administrator for Juma’s village of Athul, brought the boy and an older brother, Dad Gul, to a weekend meeting between Afghan elders and U.S. Army Col. Martin P. Schweitzer. Schweitzer called the Taliban’s attempt “a cowardly act.”

As Deciwal told Juma’s story, 20 Afghan elders repeatedly clicked their tongues in sadness and disapproval. When the boy and his brother were brought in, several of the turban-wearing men welled up, wiping their eyes with handkerchiefs.

“If anybody has a heart, then how can you control yourself (before) these kids?” Deciwal said in broken English.

Wallets quickly opened, and the boys were handed $60 in American and Afghan currency—a good chunk of money in a country where teachers and police earn $70 a month. Afghan officials described the boys as extremely poor, and Juma said he is being raised by his sister because his father works in a bakery in Pakistan and his mother lives and does domestic work in another village.

“I think the boy is intelligent,” Deciwal said. “When he comes from the enemy he found a checkpoint of the ANA (Afghan National Army), and he asked the ANA: ‘Hey, can you help me? Somebody gave me this jacket and I don’t know what’s inside but maybe something bad.’”

Lt. Col. George Graff, a father of five who attended the meeting, also teared up.

“Relating to them as a father and trying to fathom somebody using one of my children for that kind of a purpose, jeez, it just tore me up,” said Graff, a National Guard soldier from St. George, Utah. “The depths that these people will go to get what they want, which is power for themselves—it’s just disgusting.”

A Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, denied the militant group uses child fighters, saying it has hundreds of adults ready for suicide missions. “We don’t need to use a child,” Ahmadi told the AP by satellite phone. “It’s against Islamic law, it’s against humanitarian law. This is just propaganda against the Taliban.”

However, a gory Taliban video that surfaced in April showed militants instructing a boy of about 12 as he beheaded an alleged traitor with a large knife. U.N. officials condemned the act as a war crime. Fidgety but smiling during all the attention, Juma told the AP that he had been scared when he was surrounded by Taliban fighters. He cupped his hands together to show the size of the bomb, then ran his hands along his waist to show where it was on his body.

A fan of soccer, Juma said his favorite subject in school is Pashto, his native language, but he also showed off a little English, shyly counting “1, 2, 3″ before breaking out in an oversize smile.

Raised in a country where birthdays are not always carefully tracked, Juma said he is 4. But he looks older and Afghan officials said he is about 6. His brother appears to be a year or so older.

Their village lies in Ghazni province’s Andar district, a Taliban stronghold targeted this month in a joint Afghan-U.S. operation. The region remains dangerous and Afghan elders worry for Juma’s safety. Maj. John Thomas, a spokesman for NATO’s International Security Assistance Force, said he was “a bit skeptical” about Juma’s story at first, “but everything I’ve heard makes me more and more comfortable.”

Thomas said the case would force soldiers to think twice before assuming children are safe.

“This is one incident. We hope it doesn’t repeat itself. But it gives us reason to pause, to be extra careful,” he said. “We want to publicize this as much as we can to the Afghan people so that they can protect their children from these killers.”

Col. Sayed Waqef Shah, a religious and cultural affairs officer for the Afghan army, wiped away tears after seeing Juma. “Whenever I see this kind of action from the Taliban, if I am able to arrest them, I’ll kill them on the spot,” he said.

Haji Niaz Mohammad, one of the elders at the gathering, said he hoped “God makes the Afghan government strong” so it can defeat the Taliban.

“They are the enemy of Muslims and the enemy of the children,” he said, shaking his fists in anger.

 (Story and picture from breitbart.com)

Let Muslims Rule – Or Else!

As we have seen for a while now, it appears that the best way to get someone to understand and adopt your religion in the middle east is to just kill them.

According to Islamic militant Abu Dujana, strategies such as the ever so popular car bomb will be used against Westerners in Indonesia.  In fact, “all Westerners are legitimate targets”, says Dujana.

I am still trying to wrap my head around the logical (or illogical) thought process that leads one to believe that the best way to ‘honor’ religion is by killing someone just because of geological location and societal ideals – very shallow thinking indeed. However, despite his twisted thinking, Dujana did say something that is very true.  In an interview with CNN, he told the reporter: “If they [Bush and Blair] refuse to let Muslims rule, we’ll continue doing what we are doing”.

This statement is absolutely, 100% true.  Essentially, if we keep trying to set up a Western government in that part of the world, there will always be vicious attacks with complete disregard to life and humanity.  In other words, there must be an alternative to the government we are attempting to set up in that region.  Our attempts now are like trying to push a square block through a circular hole – it just won’t work. If they keep doing what they are doing, then we (the U.S.) will have to keep doing what we are doing…fighting in Iraq.

But what does Dujana mean by letting “the Muslims rule”?  It’s not like we are putting government officials that are only Christian or Jewish power.  Well, although there are Muslims in power, Dujana is referring to secularization (the separation of state and religion).  The Qur’an was written for a governmental purpose as much as a religious one (see the free report on the side-bar for an explanation of this).

It is satisfying that we have caught Dujana (who faces the death sentence if convicted of his crimes against humanity), but I wonder if we have learned to block out what these people are saying.  Let’s try to understand where the hate and violence is stemming from instead of putting up our blinders and naively going about our usual routine.

(picture from cnn.com)

BUSH: “All options are on the table with Iran”

This is the crap that scares me. If the Bush administration is thinking that military action is reasonable in Iran, they are seriously mistaken. Let’s focus on solving the Iraq problem first. Perhaps you disagree. If so, please post your thoughts on why we should go to war (attack) Iran…seeing how this option is “on the table”.
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President George W. Bush reiterated on Tuesday that all options were on the table in dealing with Iran’s nuclear challenge.

At the start of a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Bush was asked if military action remained an option for dealing with Iran.

“My position has not changed. All options are on the table. I would hope that we could solve this diplomatically,” he replied.

Bush said it was important that Iran faced “consequences” such as sanctions and other economic measures for defying the international community over its nuclear program. “There’s a price to be paid,” Bush said.

The United States accuses Iran of seeking to build atomic bombs, a charge Tehran denies.

read more

Military strike on Iran? Uh-Oh…

I really hope that there are elected officials with a more rational approach to dealing with the world community than this!
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Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT) on CBS’s Face the Nation, laid out a case for the US taking military action against Iran.

“Iraq is now the main front in the long war we are fighting against the Islamist terrorists who attacked us on 9/11. In fact 90% of the suicide bombers in Iraq today killing Iraqis and American soldiers are foreign Al Qaeda fighters. Iran is training and equipping soldiers, Iraqis, to come in and kill American soldiers and Iraqis,” said Lieberman.

Host Bob Schieffer then asked Lieberman what the United States should do about Iran.

Lieberman said that Iran is at war with the US and “the moderates” and that while he supports sitting down and talking with the Iranian government, that might not be enough.

“If we’re going to sit and talk with the Iranians, tell them what we want them to do, which is to stop doing that because it’s killing Americans, we can’t leave it at that. I think we have to be prepared to take aggressive military action against the Iranians to stop them from killing Americans in Iraq,” he said. “To me that would include a strike into, over the border into Iran where we have good evidence that they have a base at which they are training these people coming back into Iraq to kill our soldiers.”

“Let’s just stop right there,” said Schieffer. “You’re saying that if the Iranians don’t let up that the United States should take military action.”

“I am,” replied Lieberman. “If they don’t play by the rules we’ve got to use our force and to me that would include taking military action to stop them from doing what they’re doing.”

(story by David Edwards and Josh Catone) – Click below for the video

Video |

Russia to aim missiles at Europe

Russian President Vladimir Putin is threatening to point missiles at Europe if the United States implements strategic intercepting missiles in the Czech Republic and Poland. According to Washington, the preventative missiles are designed to protect Europe from an Iranian attack. Iran is laughing at the charge, claiming their weaponry cannot reach Europe (but certainly can reach Israel). So the question that must be asked: why in the world does the United States feel the need to play bodyguard for Europe?

This type of global politics is very irritating. It is clearly apparent that there is an alternative agenda. Given our current policy as of late, there seems to be no reason why we would be doing this (unnecessary?) favor for a body of countries who we have ignored, stepped on, and plainly rejected over the past six to eight years. It doesn’t make sense.

And then there is Russia. Are they honestly still worried about the United States attacking them? Putin is very upset about this situation, and was reported saying:

“If a part of the strategic nuclear potential of the United States appears in Europe and, in the opinion of our military specialists, will threaten us, then we will have to take appropriate steps in response. What kind of steps? We will have to have new targets in Europe. These targets could be targeted with ballistic or cruise missiles or maybe a completely new system” (taken from CNN.com)

This raises some red flags. Is Russia really concerned about their safety from their former Cold War foe? Or, is Russia trying to protect Iran? Putin has claimed that he does not want a new “arms race” in Europe (which apparently seems to be on its way), so perhaps that is his motive.

In the end, it appears that the smartest, most logical decision at this point is to let Europe protect Europe. It makes more sense economically and practically to focus our interests on our current hazardous situations than to create new ones.

Inside the mind of a Suicide Bomber

 

It’s hard to think of anything more stupid than jumping in front of traffic on a busy highway – oh wait, I forgot about suicide bombers. It is no secret that the suicide bomber is the Middle East’s favorite “weapon” against American Troops. But, the reasoning for the suicide bomber is completely perverted. The suicide bomber issues an attack out of hate and revenge with no intent for diplomacy (obviously).

As I mentioned in a previous post, the political process in the Middle East is violence first, diplomacy second (or possibly third, after some more violence). Religious tolerance and respect are foreign ideas to the suicide bomber. He (or she, but for simplicity’s sake we’ll say “he”) is bent on extreme religious convictions that promise him awards for murder. Most people don’t understand how anyone could do such a thing, so I am going to go ahead and guide you through the thought process of a suicide bomber – we’ll call him Mr. Z.

1. Mr. Z watches television and sees the opposite Islamic sect is about to celebrate one of their holidays – this makes him extremely angery. “They are being led astray and disgracing Islam” he says to himself.

2. While walking to the store, Mr. Z sees American soldiers huddled behind a wall discussing something. He immediately feels tremendous anger towards all Americans, young and old, because they are (a) not Muslim, and (b) they are still in his country. Mr. Z walks onward to the store, deciding that he needs to do something about all the “treachery” that is going on around him.

3. Mr. Z settles down to read the Qur’an after a short dinner, he thumbs through the familiar text to some of his favorite passages about the infidels. Mr. Z becomes enamoured with the idea of a paradise which appeases physical pleasures (i.e. abundance of virgins and endless amounts of water) – he can’t wait for this paradise, so he decides that night to be a “holy warrior”.

4. After a month of saving, Mr. Z has saved enough money to obtain explosives. His extreme hate for “the enemy” makes him giddy with excitement. He brags to his friends that he will kill more of the enemy than any other suicide bomber has thus far.

5. Mr. Z wakes up with vigor and enthusiasm, he straps on his bombs, says a prayer, and walks off to a marketplace that is full of his enemy. With his last breath, Mr Z detonates his explosives.

6. The evening news covers the story, Mr. Z’s corrupt thinking managed to kill three people and injure nine. Mr. Z is gone from the world, and most likely not in a paradise that endorses physical (earthly) pleasures.

In the end, we see that Mr. Z’s thought process was so bent on anger and hatred, it doesn’t seem plausible that it come from an all loving God, but rather, the motives of men. The thing is, if suicide bombers were really as affective as religious extremists believe, then the leaders themselves would be jumping at the opportunity to strap explosives to their chests – but no, we don’t see that. What we see are the lower status people who are tired of the oppression, and who are fueled by hate, killing themselves and others in the belief that they will finally be eradicated from their current situation (preached to them by the wealthy war-lords who are too coward to do it themselves). However, I am hesitant to blame these suicide bombers entirely. They have grown up in a part of the world where such actions are actually endorsed. For whatever reason, They let religious propaganda permeate their mind, probably due to constant exposure.

Friends, if we are to understand our situation in the Middle East, we need to understand the thinking, something we havn’t done very well lately.

(picture from themuslimwoman.org)

The Middle East: No Respect for Humanity

 

It is truly another world in the Middle East. The political precedent in that area is violence first, then diplomacy (if it can even be called such a thing). Just recently the Hamas-Fatah cease fire fell through. First, true cease-fires do not exist in that part of the world unless you happen to have a powerful and influential friend, like Israel does with the United States. In fact, I would argue that if it weren’t for the United States relation with Israel, they would already be “wiped off the map” (thank you to President Ahmadinejad for those eloquent words).

The news outlets are overwhelmed with violence from that part of the world, I often find myself releasing an exhausted breath of air, thinking “what else is knew”, and then moving on to the sports. Violence in that area does not affect me; I would be more interested in a peace story that comes out of that region. The violence in that region has been so bad for so long, it is an expectation and a profiling mechanism that the rest of the world has developed. Worse yet, the people from this region have accepted the war, violence, and inhumanity to the point where it is just a part of their lives – they embrace it as part of their identity and life’s purpose.

Do people from the Middle East even know what they are shooting each other over anymore? I sure don’t. I do know that many of it comes from the divisions within Islam, the “peaceful” religion that for some reason (according to some interpretations) endorses violence. I would venture as far to say that the God of Islam and the God of Christianity are not the same – sorry to burst anyones bubble on this matter. I will write another post about this subject in upcoming days. But for now, I let us return to the subject at hand.

Do you think the violence in this part of the world will ever stop? Can a civilized culture every exist in an area where gross religious convictions pervert logical thought process? Judging by the track records, my answer is no, never, not in million years. Knowing this, can a war “on terror” (can you have a war on an adjective?) every really be won in an area of the world where violence is ingrained in the culture?

Granted some of these questions are rhetorical, but they are vital questions that you need to consider for yourself – ignoring reality does not eliminate it. (picture from infopalestina.com)