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Paul Merrell

Defending Dissent » New Docs Show Army Coordinated Spy Ring - 1 views

www.defendingdissent.org/...army-spy-ring

surveillance state Army fusion-centers litigation

shared by Paul Merrell on 30 May 14 - No Cached
  • Army illegally supplied  intelligence on nonviolent antiwar protesters to FBI and police in multiple states Tacoma, WA – Recently obtained public records confirm an Army-led, multi-agency spy network that targeted “leftists/anarchists” as domestic terrorists. The Army used illegal infiltration to gather information on nonviolent antiwar protesters, disseminate it to the FBI and police departments in multiple states, and in some cases used it to disrupt planned protests by preemptively and falsely arresting activists. Public records obtained last month by Olympia activist Paul French reveal new evidence in the widely-watched Army spying case Panagacos v. Towery. An email from November 2007, in particular, shows that intelligence analyst John J. Towery was paid by the Army to infiltrate political groups and share unlawfully obtained intelligence with a growing network of law enforcement agencies, including the FBI, and police departments in Los Angeles, Portland, Eugene, Everett, and Spokane. The Towery email not only represents a broader spying program than previously thought, it also confirms the program was led by the Army, a fact contradicted by Towery’s 2009 sworn statements.
  • “The latest revelations show how the Army not only engaged in illegal spying on political dissidents, it led the charge and tried to expand the counterintelligence network targeting leftists and anarchists,” said Larry Hildes, a National Lawyers Guild attorney who filed the Panagacos lawsuit in 2010. “By targeting activists without probable cause, based on their ideology and the perceived political threat they represent, the Army clearly broke the law and must be held accountable.” Previously obtained public records indicate that absent such accountability, the Army will continue to spy on and target protesters, which it did until at least 2010, long after Towery’s identity was exposed. Public records previously obtained in 2009 already established that over a two-year period beginning in 2006, Towery (under the alias “John Jacob”) spied on the Olympia antiwar group Port Militarization Resistance (PMR) as well as several other organizations, including Students for a Democratic Society, the Industrial Workers of the World, and Iraq Veterans Against the War. It has also already been established that Towery’s intelligence was passed on to the Washington State Fusion Center, a communications hub of  local, state and federal law enforcement, and then used by local police to target activists for repeated harassment, preemptive and false arrest, excessive use of force, and malicious prosecution
  • The recently disclosed Towery email was a follow-up to a 2007 Domestic Terrorism Conference he attended in Spokane, during which “domestic terrorist” dossiers on some of the Panagacos plaintiffs were distributed. The Towery email shows the development of a multi-agency spying apparatus in intimate detail. “I thought it would be a good idea to develop a leftist/anarchist mini-group for intel sharing and distro,” wrote the Army analyst to several law enforcement officials. Towery references books, “zines and pamphlets,” and a “comprehensive web list” as source material, but cautions the officials on file sharing “because it might tip off groups that we are studying their techniques, tactics and procedures.” Towery, who worked at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, not only coordinated his actions with local, state and federal law enforcement agencies, many of whom are named defendants in the Panagacos case, he also admitted to eavesdropping on a confidential, privileged attorney-client email listserv of criminal defendants and their legal counsel. Such conduct is considered a constitutional violation, but Towery also took sensitive information from the listserv vital to a pending criminal trial in 2007 and passed it on to fusion center officials who then transmitted it to prosecutors, forcing a mistrial in a case the defense was winning handily. The case was later dismissed for prosecutorial misconduct.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • The public records disclosure comes as government spying and criticism of the National Security Agency’s surveillance program has reached a fever pitch. However, a little-known and rarely, if ever, enforced law from 1878 distinguishes the spying under Panagacos from that of the NSA. The Posse Comitatus Act prohibits the military from enforcing domestic laws on U.S. soil by making such actions a Gross Misdemeanor, yet to-date no official has been prosecuted under the Act. Instead of conceding to the violations, the Army is currently using the Panagacos case to try to seal nearly 10,000 pages of documents, many of which are incriminating and embarrassing to the government. The legal effort to unseal those documents will play out over the next few weeks. The Obama Administration tried to dismiss the Panagacos lawsuit, but in a Ninth Circuit decision from December 2012 the court rejected the government’s arguments, ruling that allegations of First and Fourth Amendment violations were “plausible,” and ordered the case to proceed to trial. The lawsuit was filed on behalf of seven PMR members who sought to oppose the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan through nonviolent civil disobedience and is being heard by U.S. District Court Judge Ronald B. Leighton. In addition to Towery, named defendants in Panagacos include Thomas Rudd, one of Towery’s superiors at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, the U.S. Army, Navy, and Coast Guard, as well as certain officials within its ranks, the City of Olympia and its police department, the City of Tacoma and its police department, Pierce County, and various personnel from those jurisdictions.
  • Panagacos v. Towery is currently in the discovery stage and is scheduled to go to trial in June 2014. Further information: Recently disclosed Towery email Panagacos lawsuit complaint Domestic terrorism dossiers on plaintiffs
  • Paul Merrell on 30 May 14
     
    One I had missed from February, 2014. I believe I had bookmarked something about this before the lawsuit was filed. Now not only has the case been filed but the alleged grounds for the lawsuit have been greenlighted by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. If you click through the link to the court's opinion, you'll find one of the Ninth Circuit's shorter opinions, less than five pages, which does not even mention that the defendants were employed by the U.S. Army or any branch of government, while still rejecting their claim of government officials' qualified immunity from suit for the alleged First and Fourth Amendment violations. The third amended complaint sufficiently alleged facts to support claims that had been clearly established as violative of the First and Fourth Amendments.   It's clear that the plaintiffs have smoking gun evidence and that the National Lawyers' Guild is all over this one. Trial is scheduled next month, according to the article. It's just under 300 miles from here to Seattle, but I just might make the trip to watch a few days of this trial. Strong First Amendment cases for damages that survive appellate review of the qualified immunity nearly always settle before trial. But this one smells like it is going to trial for publicity purposes even if not for the vindication of rights, considering the nature of the organizations involved both as targets of the surveillance and their lawyers. It's great entertainment watching government guys and gals squirm on the witness stand when they've been caught violating civil rights. In criminal cases, invoking the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination cannot be taken as evidence of guilt. But in a federal civil rights case, that entitles the plaintiffs to have the jury instructed that it can infer liability from the resort to the Fifth Amendment to refuse answering questions.  Better back in the day when I was the lawyer asking the questions. But it's still great fun just to watch
Paul Merrell

​Russia may join forces with China to compete with US, European satnavs - RT News - 0 views

rt.com/...92-russia-china-gps-competitor

global-realignment Russia China BRICS technology-agreements

shared by Paul Merrell on 07 Jun 14 - No Cached
  • Russia and China are eyeing a number of joint high-tech projects, ranging from creation of a new long-range passenger plane to joining forces on a satellite navigation system to compete with American GPS and European Galileo. The range of prospects was outlined on Friday by Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who met Chinese Vice-Premier Wang Yang in Siberian Novosibirsk. Rogozin said Russia would develop cooperation with BRICS members in defiance of any possible Western sanctions. “Our technological partnership should be directed at the countries that are close to us in mentality and which in general constitute an emerging geopolitical force that we could rely on in opposing the monopolar world. Those are BRICS countries first and foremost,” he said.
  • Rogozin set examples of several joint projects Russia has or may have with China. The most concrete is the project for a new long-range wide-hull airliner with an estimated development cost of $7-8 billion. Russia and China have already signed a memorandum on it in May. Another aviation project the countries may pursuit is the modernization of Mil Mi-26 heavy transport helicopter. The aircraft design would be altered for smaller weight, but without compromising its capacity too much. The new helicopter would be able to carry up to 15 tons of cargo as opposed to 20 tons of the original.
  • If both pilot projects do well, Russia and China may form a permanent cooperation consortium similar to Europe’s Airbus, Rogozin said. China and Russia may also find synergy in space by making their respective satellite navigation systems, Glonass and Beidou, more compatible, the Russian official said. “We see good prospect in cooperation between the Russian Glonass system and the Chinese navigation system,” he said. “Our system is more suitable for northern, polar latitudes. The Chinese system is more southern. Their complementariness would result in a biggest and most powerful competitor to any navigation system." Rogozin’s shot was aimed at both American GPS, which was the focus of a recent fallout between Russia and the US, and the European Galileo. He also commented on Russia’s downgrade of the work of ground stations of the Differential GPS network based in the Russian territory. This week’s move was Moscow’s response to Washington’s failure to allow deployment of similar Glonass stations in America.
  • Paul Merrell on 07 Jun 14
     
    So Russia and China aim to take down Boeing and Airbus. And it seems as though the BRICS nations may get their own global positioning system by integrating Russian and Chinese satnavs. While Russia and China progress rapidly for earned economic leadership of the world, the U.S. sinks billions intoa new super-aircraft carrier and lets its civilian infrastructure -- vital to economic recovery if were was any serious plan to recover -- disintegrate into obsolete rust. But Obama tells us that the U.S. economy is not in decline.That's why China becomes the world's largest economy this year, no doubt. 
Paul Merrell

One Click Politics - 0 views

oneclickpolitics.com/...movetoamend

shared by Paul Merrell on 03 Jun 14 - No Cached
  • Senate Joint Resolution 19 is a proposed Constitutional Amendment to overturn Citizens United, but it doesn’t address corporate constitutional rights at all. Please send a message to the authors of SJR19 -- let them know that Corporate Personhood MUST be included in the language of the amendment... What You Can Do: Help movetoamend accomplish these goals by contributing your power of voice. Take action now by sending a message to Congress telling them why these issues are important to you.
  • Formed in September 2009, Move to Amend is a coalition of hundreds of organizations and hundreds of thousands of individuals committed to social and economic justice, ending corporate rule, and building a vibrant democracy that is genuinely accountable to the people, not corporate interests.
  • Senate Joint Resolution 19 is a proposed Constitutional Amendment to overturn Citizens United, but it doesn’t address corporate constitutional rights at all. Please send a message to the authors of SJR19 -- let them know that Corporate Personhood MUST be included in the language of the amendment... What You Can Do: Help movetoamend accomplish these goals by contributing your power of voice. Take action now by sending a message to Congress telling them why these issues are important to you.
  • Paul Merrell on 03 Jun 14
     
    I have never forwarded action alerts to others by email. The typical action alert winds up sharing your email address with at least one other organization. The next thing you know you're getting donor solicitations from both the Republican and Democratic party central national coordinating committees. It's not just that I'm a political independent; it's an ongoing task to unsubscribe from unwanted mailing lists. Today I got an action alert from Move to Amend, only the second I have received from the organization. This group does not share your email address with anyone. If you choose to participate in this action alert, which is nearing 1 million messages sent, there is a send button near the bottom of the page to participate. That takes you to a page where you can read the message that will be sent. Move to Amend is a non-partisan organization that has been working toward a constitutional amendment for around 4 years that would clear the way for Congress to regulate campaign contributions, in light of Supreme Court decisions declaring that corporations have a First Amendment right to make campaign contributions in any amount they desire. But their amendment would also abolish constitutional rights for all fictional legal "persons" other than human beings and government at the local, state, and national levels. Move to Amend has been going about the process the right way and to date has scored supporting resolutions in 16 state legislatures and hundreds of community governments. That's enough to get oligarchs worried. So there's a bill gathering steam in the U.S. Senate, SJR 19, that's a watered-down version. It grants Congress and the states power to regulate campaign contributions, but it does not speak to the problem of granting human constitutional rights to entities that have existence only in the eyes of the law. The Senate bill is here: http://goo.gl/Nkvfkg Our nation's Founders unmistakably did not contemplate that corporations would have constitution
Paul Merrell

Secret Docs Reveal Dubious Details of Targeted Killings in Afghanistan - SPIEGEL ONLINE - 0 views

www.spiegel.de/...-in-afghanistan-a-1010358.html

war & peace drone attacks Afghanistan Pakistan leaked-docs

shared by Paul Merrell on 29 Dec 14 - No Cached
  • Combat operations in Afghanistan may be coming to an end, but a look at secret NATO documents reveals that the US and the UK were far less scrupulous in choosing targets for killing than previously believed. Drug dealers were also on the lists.
  • The child and his father are two of the many victims of the dirty secret operations that NATO conducted for years in Afghanistan. Their fate is described in secret documents to which SPIEGEL was given access. Some of the documents concerning the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and the NSA and GCHQ intelligence services are from the archive of whistleblower Edward Snowden. Included is the first known complete list of the Western alliance's "targeted killings" in Afghanistan. The documents show that the deadly missions were not just viewed as a last resort to prevent attacks, but were in fact part of everyday life in the guerilla war in Afghanistan. The list, which included up to 750 people at times, proves for the first time that NATO didn't just target the Taliban leadership, but also eliminated mid- and lower-level members of the group on a large scale. Some Afghans were only on the list because, as drug dealers, they were allegedly supporting the insurgents.
  • Different rules apply in war than in fighting crime in times of peace. But for years the West tied its campaign in Afghanistan to the promise that it was fighting for different values there. A democracy that kills its enemies on the basis of nothing but suspicion squanders its claim to moral superiority, making itself complicit instead. This lesson from Afghanistan also applies to the conflicts in Syria, Iraq, Pakistan and Yemen. The material SPIEGEL was able to review is from 2009 to 2011, and falls within the term of US President Barack Obama, who was inaugurated in January 2009. For Obama, Afghanistan was the "good" war and therefore legitimate -- in contrast to the Iraq war. The president wanted to end the engagement in Iraq as quickly as possible, but in Afghanistan his aim was to win.
  • ...9 more annotations...
  • After Obama assumed office, the US government opted for a new strategy. In June 2009, then Defense Secretary Robert Gates installed Stanley McChrystal, a four-star general who had served in Iraq, as commander of US forces in Afghanistan. McChrystal promoted the aggressive pursuit of the Taliban. Obama sent 33,000 additional troops to Afghanistan, but their deployment was tied to a demand that military officials provide a binding date for the withdrawal of US forces. At the same time, the president distanced himself from the grand objectives the West had proclaimed when it first marched into Kabul. The United States would not try to make Afghanistan "a perfect place," said Obama. Its new main objective was to fight the insurgency.
  • This marked the beginning of one of the bloodiest phases of the war. Some 2,412 civilians died in Afghanistan in 2009. Two-thirds of them were killed by insurgents and 25 percent by NATO troops and Afghan security forces. The number of operations against the Taliban rose sharply, to between 10 and 15 a night. The operations were based on the lists maintained by the CIA and NATO -- Obama's lists. The White House dubbed the strategy "escalate and exit." McChrystal's successor, General David Petraeus, documented the strategy in "Field Manual 3-24" on fighting insurgencies, which remains a standard work today. Petraeus outlined three stages in fighting guerilla organizations like the Taliban. The first was a cleansing phase, in which the enemy leadership is weakened. After that, local forces were to regain control of the captured areas. The third phase was focused on reconstruction. Behind closed doors, Petraeus and his staff explained exactly what was meant by "cleansing." German politicians recall something that Michael T. Flynn, the head of ISAF intelligence in Afghanistan, once said during a briefing: "The only good Talib is a dead Talib."
  • Under Petraeus, a merciless campaign began to hunt down the so-called shadow governors and local supporters aligned with the Islamists. For the Americans, the fact that the operations often ended in killings was seen as a success. In August 2010, Petraeus proudly told diplomats in Kabul that he had noticed a shifting trend. The figures he presented as evidence made some of the ambassadors feel uneasy. At least 365 insurgent commanders, Petraeus explained, had been neutralized in the last three months, for an average of about four killings a day. The existence of documents relating to the so-called Joint Prioritized Effects List (JPEL) has only been described in vague terms until now. The missions by US special units are mentioned but not discussed in detail in the US Army Afghanistan war logs published by WikiLeaks in 2010, together with the New York Times, the Guardian and SPIEGEL. The documents that have now become accessible provide, for the first time, a systematic view of the targeted killings. They outline the criteria used to determine who was placed on the list and why.
  • According to the NSA document, in October 2008 the NATO defense ministers made the momentous decision that drug networks would now be "legitimate targets" for ISAF troops. "Narcotics traffickers were added to the Joint Prioritized Effects List (JPEL) list for the first time," the report reads. In the opinion of American commanders like Bantz John Craddock, there was no need to prove that drug money was being funneled to the Taliban to declare farmers, couriers and dealers as legitimate targets of NATO strikes.
  • The document also reveals how vague the basis for deadly operations apparently was. In the voice recognition procedure, it was sufficient if a suspect identified himself by name once during the monitored conversation. Within the next 24 hours, this voice recognition was treated as "positive target identification" and, therefore, as legitimate grounds for an airstrike. This greatly increased the risk of civilian casualties. Probably one of the most controversial decisions by NATO in Afghanistan is the expansion of these operations to include drug dealers. According to an NSA document, the United Nations estimated that the Taliban was earning $300 million a year through the drug trade. The insurgents, the document continues, "could not be defeated without disrupting the drug trade."
  • When an operation could potentially result in civilian casualties, ISAF headquarters in Kabul had to be involved. "The rule of thumb was that when there was estimated collateral damage of up to 10 civilians, the ISAF commander in Kabul was to decide whether the risk was justifiable," says an ISAF officer who worked with the lists for years. If more potential civilian casualties were anticipated, the decision was left up to the relevant NATO headquarters office. Bodyguards, drivers and male attendants were viewed as enemy combatants, whether or not they actually were. Only women, children and the elderly were treated as civilians. Even officers who were involved in the program admit that these guidelines were cynical. If a Taliban fighter was repeatedly involved in deadly attacks, a "weighing of interests" was performed. The military officials would then calculate how many human lives could be saved by the "kill," and how many civilians would potentially be killed in an airstrike.
  • In early 2009, Craddock, NATO's Supreme Allied Commander for Europe at the time, issued an order to expand the targeted killings of Taliban officials to drug producers. This led to heated discussions within NATO. German NATO General Egon Ramms declared the order "illegal" and a violation of international law. The power struggle within NATO finally led to a modification of Craddock's directive: Targets related to the drug production at least had to be investigated as individual cases. The top-secret dossier could be highly damaging to the German government. For years, German authorities have turned over the mobile phone numbers of German extremists in Afghanistan to the United States. At the same time, the German officials claimed that homing in on mobile phone signals was far too imprecise for targeted killings. This is apparently an untenable argument. According to the 2010 document, both Eurofighters and drones had "the ability to geolocate a known GSM handset." In other words, active mobile phones could serve as tracking devices for the special units.
  • The classified documents could now have legal repercussions. The human rights organization Reprieve is weighing legal action against the British government. Reprieve believes it is especially relevant that the lists include Pakistanis who were located in Pakistan. "The British government has repeatedly stated that it is not pursuing targets in Pakistan and not doing air strikes on Pakistani territory," says Reprieve attorney Jennifer Gibson. The documents, she notes, also show that the "war on terror" was virtually conflated with the "war on drugs." "This is both new and extremely legally troubling," says Gibson.
  • A 2009 CIA study that addresses targeted killings of senior enemy officials worldwide reaches a bitter conclusion. Because of the Taliban's centralized but flexible leadership, as well as its egalitarian tribal structures, the targeted killings were only moderately successful in Afghanistan. "Morover, the Taliban has a high overall ability to replace lost leaders," the study finds.
Paul Merrell

Florida Event Spotlights Signs of Foreign Support of 9/11 Plot | 28Pages.org - 0 views

28pages.org/...of-foreign-support-of-911-plot

9-11 28-pages declassification-review Graham video

shared by Paul Merrell on 21 Dec 14 - No Cached
  • Last month, 9/11 parents Loreen and Matt Sellitto hosted an informative event focused on one of the most important yet least-understood aspects of September 11: the extent to which the terrorists received support from foreign governments—and the extent of the government’s knowledge of that support, both before and after the attacks.
  • Held in Naples, Florida, the November 11 event was called “The Untold Story of 9/11: A Conversation with Bob Graham.” Following opening remarks from host Loreen Sellitto and from Terry Strada of 9/11 Families United for Justice Against Terrorism, the event featured three speakers: Former Senator Bob Graham, the most prominent voice outside government fighting for declassification of the 28 pages. Broward Bulldog editor Dan Christensen, who broke the story of the FBI’s discovery of a 9/11 cell in Sarasota, and who continues working to bring FBI investigation documents into the daylight. Attorney Tom Julin, who is helping the Broward Bulldog in its effort to overcome the government’s stonewalling. Here, we cover many of the highlights; a full video of the event can be found at the bottom of the page.
  • Broward Bulldog Battles Feds Over Sarasota Investigation Christensen’s quest for answers about foreign sources of support of the 9/11 hijackers began in 2011 with a tip passed to him by Anthony Summers, who, with his wife Robbyn Swan, had just completed their book, “The Eleventh Day.” Summers and Swan had learned about an FBI investigation of a Saudi family with close ties to the Saudi government that suddenly abandoned its upscale home just outside Sarasota about two weeks before 9/11. Pursuing the lead, Christensen contacted Senator Graham for his insights into the Sarasota cell. Braced for the possibility that Graham would decline comment because of classification restraints, Christensen was stunned to learn that Graham—who had been chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee and co-chaired the joint Congressional inquiry into 9/11—was unable to comment for an altogether different reason: Graham said the FBI had never told him about its Sarasota investigation.
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  • Christensen then inquired with the FBI, which confirmed there had been an investigation, but said it found no connection to 9/11. Next, seeking to learn how they reached that conclusion, he requested the FBI’s investigation documents using the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), but the FBI said there were no documents matching the request. Finding that completely implausible, in September 2012, Christensen and the Broward Bulldog filed a FOIA lawsuit. About six months later, the FBI sent Christensen 35 partially redacted pages that contained a bombshell conclusion directly contradicting the government’s earlier denials: The investigation had in fact “revealed many connections” between the Saudi family that fled their home and “individuals associated with the terrorist attacks on 9/11/2001.” (Indeed, investigations showed the home had been called and even visited by future 9/11 hijackers.)
  • In April 2014, as the Bulldog’s lawsuit progressed, Fort Lauderdale U.S. District Judge William Zloch ordered the FBI to conduct a more thorough search of its files, chiding the government for advancing “nonsensical” legal arguments in its effort to maintain secrecy. Later, he ordered the FBI to turn over more than 80,000 pages from its Tampa office so he could personally review them and reach his own conclusions about the need for secrecy. The judge’s review of that enormous cache is still underway.
  • Julin, in addition to providing an interesting elaboration on the legal battle to liberate the FBI’s Sarasota files, explained the Broward Bulldog’s attempts to secure the release of the 28-page finding on foreign government support of the 9/11 hijackers found in the 2002 report of the joint Congressional inquiry. Julin is helping Christensen, Summers and Swan push for the declassification of the 28 pages through a little-known process called Mandatory Declassification Review. Under that process, an agency’s refusal to declassify material can ultimately be appealed to a multi-agency panel that reviews the material and presents a recommendation to the president. The panel is now reviewing the 28 pages. While there’s no deadline, Julin has been told to expect the panel’s recommendation to President Obama sometime this winter.
  • Graham also explored the questions of: Why would the Saudis support Islamic terrorists operating in the United States? Why did the Bush administration shield Saudi Arabia by preventing the release of damning material? Why would the Obama administration continue the Bush administration’s “soft treatment” of Saudi Arabia? In the course of his remarks, Graham briefly discussed two of his books. The first, “Intelligence Matters: The CIA, the FBI, Saudi Arabia and the Failure of America’s War on Terror,” is a non-fiction work, which required advance clearance from the federal government that resulted in many passages being censored. That disappointing experience prompted Graham to do an end-run around government censors by publishing “Keys to the Kingdom,” a work labelled as fiction but which Graham used to write on the topic with greater freedom.
Paul Merrell

ANKARA, Turkey: U.S., Turkey agree to Syrian rebel training, but not whom they'll fight | World | The Bellingham Herald - 0 views

www.bellinghamherald.com/...key-agree-to-syrian-rebel.html

war & peace Syria Turkey U.S.-foreign-policy opposition-training

shared by Paul Merrell on 08 Jan 15 - No Cached
  • The United States and Turkey have agreed tentatively to start joint training of Syrian rebel fighters in March but have put off the question of defining the enemy – the government of President Bashar Assad or Islamist extremists – the Turkish Foreign Ministry said Monday.Under a memorandum of understanding, the U.S. will send about 100 military trainers to the Kirsehir-Hirfanli base in central Anatolia to train and equip up to 2,000 rebels this year, a senior official told reporters.Altogether, Turkey, Jordan and Saudi Arabia are to host training for 5,000 rebels this year and a total of 15,000 over three years, said the official, who declined to be named because this was not an official announcement.Turkey expects to conclude the deal by late January, but major questions remain open – not only about naming the ultimate foe but also how to choose the rebels and where to base them.Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan appears to have backed down from his demand that the U.S. support a no-fly zone over northern Syria, something the Obama administration adamantly opposed.
  • Other differences appeared to have been papered over. Turkey has been adamant that any force deployed in Syria must have as a goal defeating the Assad government, but the Obama administration has insisted it is interested only in battling the Islamic State. There is no need to define the ultimate target now, the Turkish official said, because rebel forces already are fighting a two-front war, against both the Syrian government and the Islamic State. Turkey had sought to select rebels from the anti-regime Free Syrian Army umbrella group who have been fighting inside Syria, but the Obama administration would not agree, the official said. Instead, the two sides agreed to select rebels through a joint commission.Also left up in the air is how the new force will be integrated with forces already fighting in Syria. Rebel officials estimate there are at least 30,000 fighters in southern Syria and 10,000 in the north, and of the total, at least 1,000 already have been trained in Qatar through a covert CIA-directed program.Top Pentagon aides favor recruiting unit-level commanders for the training and providing them weapons to defend Syrian civilians against the regime’s use of barrel bombs and other unguided munitions, but they have yet to win White House backing, according to an informed Capitol Hill official who spoke under the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic.
  • Paul Merrell on 08 Jan 15
     
    The part, "Turkey has been adamant that any force deployed in Syria must have as a goal defeating the Assad government ...." may be outdated. Turkey recently indicated that it was open to ending its hostilities with the Assad government.
Paul Merrell

washingtonpost.com - 0 views

www.washingtonpost.com/...bushaddress_092001.html

war & peace Bush2 why-do-they-hate-us

shared by Paul Merrell on 10 Jan 15 - Cached
  • Americans are asking ``Why do they hate us?'' They hate what they see right here in this chamber: a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms: our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other. They want to overthrow existing governments in many Muslim countries such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. They want to drive Israel out of the Middle East. They want to drive Christians and Jews out of vast regions of Asia and Africa. These terrorists kill not merely to end lives, but to disrupt and end a way of life. With every atrocity, they hope that America grows fearful, retreating from the world and forsaking our friends. They stand against us because we stand in their way. We're not deceived by their pretenses to piety. We have seen their kind before. They're the heirs of all the murderous ideologies of the 20th century. By sacrificing human life to serve their radical visions, by abandoning every value except the will to power, they follow in the path of fascism, Nazism and totalitarianism. And they will follow that path all the way to where it ends in history's unmarked grave of discarded lies.
  • Paul Merrell on 10 Jan 15
     
    George W. Bush's infamous answer to the question "Why do they hate us?" From an address to Congress and the nation on 20 September 2001.  His answer, of course, doesn't even satisfy the standard *qui bono* test. A more satisfying answer might have been along the lines of "they're upset because we've been victimizing Arabs for so long and helping the Israeli government brutalize the Palestinian people, in violation of international human rights law." But even answer assumes that it was in fact angry Arabs who committed the 9/11 attacks, when the strongest evidence is that it was a joint operation of the Israseli Mossad and neocons that Bush had appointed to high office, a false flag psychological operations attack to manufacture citizen support for U.S. war against Arab nations.   
Paul Merrell

John McCain, Conductor of the "Arab Spring" and the Caliph , by Thierry Meyssan - 0 views

www.voltairenet.org/article185085.html

war & peace Iraq Syria U.S.-foreign-policy ISIL McCain NED Benghazi Arab Spring

shared by Paul Merrell on 27 Aug 14 - No Cached
  • Everyone has noticed the contradiction of those who recently characterized the Islamic Emirate as "freedom fighters" in Syria and who are indignant today faced with its abuses in Iraq. But if that speech is incoherent in itself, it makes perfect sense in the strategic plan: the same individuals were to be presented as allies yesterday and must be as enemies today, even if they are still on orders from Washington. Thierry Meyssan reveals below US policy through the particular case of Senator John McCain, conductor of the "Arab Spring" and longtime partner of Caliph Ibrahim.
  • ohn McCain is known as the leader of the Republicans and unhappy 2008 US presidential candidate. This is, we will see, only the real part of his biography, which serves as a cover to conduct covert actions on behalf of his government. When I was in Libya during the "Western"attack, I was able to view a report of the foreign intelligence services. It stated that, on February 4, 2011 in Cairo, NATO organized a meeting to launch the "Arab Spring" in Libya and Syria. According to this document, the meeting was chaired by John McCain. The report detailed the list of Libyan participants, whose delegation was led by the No. 2 man of the government of the day, Mahmoud Jibril, who abruptly switched sides at the entrance of the meeting to become the opposition leader in exile. I remember that, among the French delegates present, the report quoted Bernard-Henry Lévy, although officially he had never exercised functions within the French government. Many other personalities attended the symposium, including a large delegation of Syrians living abroad.
  • Emerging from the meeting, the mysterious Syrian Revolution 2011 Facebook account called for demonstrations outside the People’s Council (National Assembly) in Damascus on February 11. Although this Facebook account at the time claimed to have more than 40,000 followers, only a dozen people responded to its call before the flashes of photographers and hundreds of police. The demonstration dispersed peacefully and clashes only began more than a month later in Deraa. [1] On February 16, 2011, a demonstration underway in Benghazi, in memory of members of the Islamic Fighting Group in Libya [2] massacred in 1996 in the Abu Selim prison, degenerated into shooting. The next day, a second event, this time in memory of those who died by attacking the Danish consulate during the Muhammad cartoons affair, also degenerated into shooting. At the same time, members of the Islamic Fighting Group in Libya ,coming from Egypt and coordinated by unidentified, hooded individuals, simultaneously attacked four military bases in four different cities. After three days of fighting and atrocities, the rebels launched the uprising of Cyrenaica against Tripolitania [3]; a terrorist attack that the western press falsely presented as a "democratic revolution" against "the regime" of Muammar el-Qaddafi.
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  • On February 22nd, John McCain was in Lebanon. He met members of the Future Movement (the party of Saad Hariri) whom he charged to oversee the transfer of arms to Syria around the MP Okab Sakr [4]. Then, leaving Beirut, he inspected the Syrian border and the selected villages including Ersal, which were used as a basis to back mercenaries in the war to come. The meetings chaired by John McCain were clearly the trigger point for a long-prepared Washington plan; the plan that would have the UK and France attack Libya and Syria simultaneously, following the doctrine of "leadership from behind" and the annex of the Treaty of Lancaster House of November 2010. [5]
  • In May 2013, Senator John McCain made his way illegally to near Idleb in Syria via Turkey to meet with leaders of the "armed opposition". His trip was not made public until his return to Washington. [6] This movement was organized by the Syrian Emergency Task Force, which, contrary to its title, is a Zionist Organization led by a Palestinian employee of AIPAC [7]
  • John McCain in Syria. In the foreground at right is the director of the Syrian Emergency Task Force. In the doorway, center, Mohammad Nour.
  • In photographs released at that time, one noticed the presence of Mohammad Nour, a spokesman for the Northern Storm Brigade (of the Al-Nosra Front, that is to say, al-Qaeda in Syria), who kidnapped and held 11 Lebanese Shiite pilgrims in Azaz. [8] Asked about his proximity to al-Qaeda kidnappers, the Senator claimed not to know Mohammad Nour who would have invited himself into this photo. The affair made a great noise and the families of the abducted pilgrims lodged a complaint before the Lebanese judiciary against Senator McCain for complicity in kidnapping. Ultimately, an agreement was reached and the pilgrims were released. Let’s suppose that Senator McCain had told the truth and that he was abused by Mohammad Nour. The object of his illegal trip to Syria was to meet the chiefs of staff of the Free Syrian Army. According to him, the organization was composed "exclusively of Syrians" fighting for "their freedom" against the "Alouite dictatorship” (sic). The tour organizers published this photograph to attest to the meeting.
  • John McCain and the heads of the Free Syrian Army. In the left foreground, Ibrahim al-Badri, with which the Senator is talking. Next, Brigadier General Salim Idris (with glasses).
  • If we can see Brigadier General Idriss Salem, head of the Free Syrian Army, one can also see Ibrahim al-Badri (foreground on the left) with whom the senator is talking. Back from the surprise trip, John McCain claimed that all those responsible for the Free Syrian Army were "moderates who can be trusted" (sic).
  • However, since October 4, 2011, Ibrahim al-Badri (also known as Abu Du’a) was on the list of the five terrorists most wanted by the United States (Rewards for Justice). A premium of up to $ 10 million was offered to anyone who would assist in his capture. [9] The next day, October 5, 2011, Ibrahim al-Badri was included in the list of the Sanctions Committee of the UN as a member of Al Qaeda. [10] In addition, a month before receiving Senator McCain, Ibrahim al-Badri, known under his nom de guerre as Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, created the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ÉIIL) – all the while still belonging to the staff of the very "moderate" Free Syrian Army. He claimed as his own the attack on the Taj and Abu Ghraib prisons in Iraq, from which he helped between 500 and 1,000 jihadists escape who then joined his organization. This attack was coordinated with other almost simultaneous operations in eight other countries. Each time, the escapees joined the jihadist organizations fighting in Syria. This case is so strange that Interpol issued a note and requested the assistance of the 190 member countries. [11]
  • For my part, I have always said that there was no difference on the ground between the Free Syrian Army, Al-Nosra Front, the Islamic Emirate etc ... All these organizations are composed of the same individuals who continuously change flag. When they pose as the Free Syrian Army, they fly the flag of French colonization and speak only of overthrowing the "dog Bashar." When they say they belong to Al-Nosra Front, they carry the flag of al Qaeda and declare their intention to spread Islam in the world. Finally when they say they are the Islamic Emirate, they brandish the flag of the Caliphate and announce that they will clean the area of all infidels. But whatever the label, they proceed to the same abuses: rape, torture, beheadings, crucifixions. Yet neither Senator McCain nor his companions of the Syrian Emergency Task Force provided the information in their possession on Ibrahim al-Badri to the State Department, nor have they asked for the reward. Nor have they informed the anti-terrorism Committee of the UN.
  • But John McCain is not just the leader of the political opposition to President Obama, he is also one of his senior officials! He is in fact President of the International Republican Institute (IRI), the republican branch of NED / CIA [12], since January 1993. This so-called "NGO" was officially established by President Ronald Reagan to extend certain activities of the CIA, in connection with the British, Canadian and Australian secret services. Contrary to its claims, it is indeed an inter-governmental agency. Its budget is approved by Congress in a budget line dependent of the Secretary of State. It is also because it is a joint agency of the Anglo-Saxon secret services that several states in the world prohibit it from any activity on their territory.
  • he list of interventions by John McCain on behalf of the State Department is impressive. He participated in all the color revolutions of the last twenty years.
  • And an agent that has the best coverage imaginable: he is the official opponent of Barack Obama. As such, he can travel anywhere in the world (he is the most traveled US senator) and meet whoever he wants without fear. If his interlocutors approve Washington policy, he promised them to continue it, if they fight it, he hands over the responsibility to President Obama.
  • In 2003, France’s opposition was not enough to offset the influence of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq. The United States attacked the country again and this time overthrew President Hussein. Of course, John McCain was a major contributor to the Committee. After handing to a private company the care of plundering the country for a year [17], they tried to partition Iraq into three separate states, but had to give it up due to the resistance of the population. They tried again in 2007, around the Biden-Brownback resolution, but again failed. [18] Hence the current strategy that attempts to achieve this by means of a non-state actor: the Islamic Emirate.
  • The operation was planned well in advance, even before the meeting between John McCain and Ibrahim al-Badri. For example, internal correspondence from the Qatari Ministry of Foreign Affairs, published by my friends James and Joanne Moriarty [19], shows that 5,000 jihadis were trained at the expense of Qatar in NATO’s Libya in 2012, and 2,5 million dollars was paid at the same time to the future Caliph. In January of 2014, the Congress of the United States held a secret meeting at which it voted, in violation of international law, to approve funding for the Al-Nosra Front (Al-Qaeda) and the Islamic emirate in Iraq and the Levant until September 2014. [20] Although it is unclear precisely what was really agreed to during this meeting revealed by the British Reuters news agency [21], and no media US media dared bypass censorship, it is highly probable that the law includes a section on arming and training jihadists.
  • Proud of this US funding, Saudi Arabia has claimed on its public television channel, Al-Arabiya, that the Islamic Emirate was headed by Prince Abdul Rahman al-Faisal, brother of Prince Saud al Faisal (Foreign Minister) and Prince Turki al-Faisal (Saudi ambassador to the United States and the United Kingdom) [22]. The Islamic Emirate represents a new step in the world of mercenaries. Unlike jihadi groups who fought in Afghanistan, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Chechnya around Osama bin Laden, it does not constitute a residual force but actually an army in itself. Unlike previous groups in Iraq, Libya and Syria, around Prince Bandar bin Sultan, they have sophisticated communication services at their disposal for recruitment and civilian officials trained in large western schools capable of instantly taking over the administration of a territory.
  • Brand new Ukrainian weapons were purchased by Saudi Arabia and conveyed by the Turkish secret services who gave them to the Islamic Emirate. Final details were coordinated with the Barzani family at a meeting of jihadist groups in Amman on 1 June 2014. [23] The joint attack on Iraq by the Islamic Emirate and the Kurdistan Regional Government began four days later. The Islamic Emirate seized the Sunni part of the country, while the Kurdistan Regional Government increased its territory by over 40%. Fleeing the atrocities of jihadists, religious minorities left the Sunni area, paving the way for the three-way partition of the country. Violating the Iraqi-US Defense agreement, the Pentagon did not intervene and allowed the Islamic Emirate to continue its conquest and massacres. A month later, while the Kurdish Peshmerga Regional Government had retreated without a fight, and when the emotions of world public opinion became too strong, President Obama gave the order to bomb some positions of the Islamic Emirate. However, according to General William Mayville, director of operations at the headquarters, "These bombings are unlikely to affect the overall capacity of the Islamic Emirate and its activities in other areas of Iraq or Syria ". [24] Obviously, they are not meant to destroy the jihadist army, but only to ensure that each player does not overlap the territory that has been assigned. Moreover, for the moment, they are symbolic and have destroyed only a handful of vehicles. It was ultimately the intervention of the Kurds of the Turkish and Syrian Kurdish PKK which halted the progress of the Islamic Emirate and opened a corridor to allow civilians to escape the massacre.
  • In the latest issue of its magazine, the Islamic Emirate devoted two pages to denounce Senator John McCain as "the enemy" and "double-crosser", recalling his support for the US invasion of Iraq. Lest this accusation remain unknown in the United States, Senator immediately issued a statement calling the Emirate the "most dangerous Islamist terrorist group in the world" [26]. This controversy is there only to distract the gallery. One would like to believe it ... if it were’t for this photograph from May 2013.
  • Paul Merrell on 27 Aug 14
     
    Thierry Meysann makes the case that Sen. John McCain, working with  was the guiding force behind the Arab Spring, the overthrow of Qadaffi in Libya, and the invasion of Syria by mercenary Islamists, working with a Zionist but deliberately misnomered front group. Thierry goes on to show that McCain played a key role in the creation and deployment of ISIL.  
Paul Merrell

Hillary Clinton's Real Scandal Is Honduras, Not Benghazi - 0 views

www.informationclearinghouse.info/article39225.htm

Auction 2016 Hillary Honduras

shared by Paul Merrell on 28 Jul 14 - No Cached
  • What beats me is why more Democrats aren’t deeply troubled by the legacy of Clinton’s foreign policy blunder in Honduras. Maybe you’ve forgotten what happened in that small country in the first year of the Obama administration — more on that in a moment. But surely you’ve noticed the ugly wave of xenophobia greeting a growing number of Central American child refugees arriving on our southern border. Some of President Barack Obama’s supporters are trying to blame this immigration crisis on the Bush administration because of an anti-trafficking law George W. signed in 2008 specifically written to protect Central American children that preceded an uptick in their arrivals. But which country is the top source of kids crossing the border? Honduras, home to the world’s highest murder rate, Latin America’s worst economic inequality, and a repressive U.S.-backed government. When Honduran military forces allied with rightist lawmakers ousted democratically elected President Manuel Zelaya in 2009, then-Secretary of State Clinton sided with the armed forces and fought global pressure to reinstate him.
  • Washington wields great influence over Honduras, thanks to the numerous military bases built with U.S. funds where training and joint military and anti-drug operations take place. Since the coup, nearly $350 million in U.S. assistance, including more than $50 million in military aid has poured into the country. That’s a lot of investment in a nation where the police, the military, and private security forces are killing people with alarming frequency and impunity, according to Human Rights Watch. In short, desperate Honduran children are seeking refuge from a human rights nightmare that would cast a dark cloud over Clinton’s presidential bid right now if the media were paying any attention. That wouldn’t give Republicans a big advantage, of course. Until they stop alienating a majority of female voters and communities of color, I find it hard to see the party of Mitt Romney and John McCain winning the White House.
  • Given the Democratic Party’s demographic edge, progressives have nothing to lose by seizing on the GOP field’s weakness and pressing for a viable alternative to another Clinton administration. Senator Elizabeth Warren could prove a contender. Unfortunately, the consumer-rights firebrand and Massachusetts Democrat lacks any foreign policy experience. And foreign policy is no afterthought these days. Israel — the recipient of $3.1 billion a year in U.S. military aid — is waging a ground war in Gaza, and the stakes in the Russia-Ukraine conflict just grew following the downing of that Malaysia Airlines jet. Plus, Iraq is growing more violent and unstable once more. On all these issues, Clinton is more hawkish than most of the Democratic base. But other Democrats with a wide range of liberal credentials and foreign policy expertise are signaling some interest in running, especially if Clinton ultimately sits out the race. Even if Clinton does win in 2016, a serious progressive primary challenge could help shape her presidency. As more and more Honduran kids cross our border in search of a safe haven, voters should take a good look at her track record at the State Department and reconsider the inevitability of another Clinton administration.
Paul Merrell

Boehner Bringing Bibi to Washington « LobeLog - 0 views

www.lobelog.com/er-bringing-bibi-to-washington

war & peace Boehner Netanyahu Obama Iranian-nukes-myth Iran-sanctions must-read

shared by Paul Merrell on 21 Jan 15 - No Cached
  • In his State of the Union address Tuesday night, U.S. President Barack Obama stated once again, and quite firmly, that he would veto any new sanctions bill against Iran. Apparently, Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner was not going to take that lying down. Less than twelve hours after Obama finished his speech, Boehner announced that he has invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress on February 11. White House Spokesman Josh Earnest expressed President Obama’s displeasure at the invitation, of which the White House was not informed until Boehner’s announcement. Earnest called it a “departure from protocol” whereby the two leaders normally coordinate such visits. The soft words are thin cover for what is surely white-hot anger in the White House.
  • Paul Merrell on 21 Jan 15
     
    This is a must-read. The War Party is going full-tilt boogie to blow the Iran negotiations out of the water, with the full backing of Bibi Netanyahu.  
Paul Merrell

Obama will not meet US-bound Netanyahu - Yahoo News - 0 views

news.yahoo.com/rip-white-house-174947742.html

war & peace Iranian-nukes-myth Netanyahu Congress

shared by Paul Merrell on 23 Jan 15 - No Cached
  • US President Barack Obama has refused to meet Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu, who will make a controversial visit to the United States in early March as he fights for re-election.
  • It is a "matter of long-standing practice and principle" that the president does not meet foreign leaders engaged in an electoral campaign, a White House spokeswoman, Bernadette Meehan, said Thursday.Netanyahu will address a joint session of Congress in early March -- just a few weeks before Israelis go to the polls on March 17.But the focus of Netanyahu's address -- Iran -- as much as his timing is giving the White House heartburn.Obama's allies fear the trip could be used by Israel and by the US Republicans, who control Congress and issued the invitation, to undercut nuclear talks with Tehran just as they appear poised to bear fruit.
  • The White House initially gave an icy response to news of Netanyahu's trip, saying it had not been informed -- a break with protocol.Twenty-four hours later, the Obama administration announced that neither the president nor his Secretary of State John Kerry would meet Netanyahu.- Battle over new Iran sanctions -The Israeli prime minister -- and his Republican Congressional hosts -- have expressed deep skepticism about a brokered deal, believing Iran cannot be trusted to keep its side of the bargain. US lawmakers have even sketched plans to impose fresh sanctions on Iran, legislation Obama has said would wreck talks and which he has pledged to veto."The president has been clear about his opposition to Congress passing new legislation on Iran that could undermine our negotiations and divide the international community," said Meehan.
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  • Four European foreign policy chiefs issued a joint call in support of Obama's position Thursday."Introducing new hurdles at this critical stage of the negotiations," they wrote in the Washington Post, "would jeopardize our efforts at a critical juncture." Negotiators hope to have a framework deal in place by March 31, leaving the last technical details to be worked out by June 30.
  • Paul Merrell on 23 Jan 15
     
    I was hoping for something a bit stronger from the Obama administration. So the tail continues to wag the dog. Such is the relation of the American  and Israeli governments. 
Paul Merrell

United States v. Curtiss-Wright Export Corp., 299 US 304 - Supreme Court 1936 - Google Scholar - 0 views

scholar.google.com/scholar_case

shared by Paul Merrell on 05 Feb 15 - No Cached
  • Not only, as we have shown, is the federal power over external affairs in origin and essential character different from that over internal affairs, but participation in the exercise of the power is significantly limited. In this vast external realm, with its important, complicated, delicate and manifold problems, the President alone has the power to speak or listen as a representative of the nation. He makes treaties with the advice and consent of the Senate; but he alone negotiates. Into the field of negotiation the Senate cannot intrude; and Congress itself is powerless to invade it. As Marshall said in his great argument of March 7, 1800, in the House of Representatives, "The President is the sole organ of the nation in its external relations, and its sole representative with foreign nations." Annals, 6th Cong., col. 613. The Senate Committee on Foreign Relations at a very early day in our history (February 15, 1816), reported to the Senate, among other things, as follows: "The President is the constitutional representative of the United States with regard to foreign nations. He manages our concerns with foreign nations and must necessarily be most competent to determine when, how, and upon what subjects negotiation may be urged with the greatest prospect of success. For his conduct he is responsible to the Constitution. The committee consider this responsibility the surest pledge for the faithful discharge of his duty. They think the interference of the Senate in the direction of foreign negotiations calculated to diminish that responsibility and thereby to impair the best security for the national safety. The nature of transactions with foreign nations, moreover, requires caution and unity of design, and their success frequently depends on secrecy and dispatch." U.S. Senate, Reports, Committee on Foreign Relations, vol. 8, p. 24.
  • It is important to bear in mind that we are here dealing not alone with an authority vested in the President by an 320*320 exertion of legislative power, but with such an authority plus the very delicate, plenary and exclusive power of the President as the sole organ of the federal government in the field of international relations — a power which does not require as a basis for its exercise an act of Congress, but which, of course, like every other governmental power, must be exercised in subordination to the applicable provisions of the Constitution. It is quite apparent that if, in the maintenance of our international relations, embarrassment — perhaps serious embarrassment — is to be avoided and success for our aims achieved, congressional legislation which is to be made effective through negotiation and inquiry within the international field must often accord to the President a degree of discretion and freedom from statutory restriction which would not be admissible were domestic affairs alone involved.
  • Paul Merrell on 05 Feb 15
     
    It turns out there are legal problems with Speaker Boehner's invitation for Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress in order to undermine the Administration's negotiations with Iran over its nuclear energy development. In addition to the quoted Supreme Court decision see 18 U.S. Code § 953,  http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/953 "Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both." "This section shall not abridge the right of a citizen to apply, himself or his agent, to any foreign government or the agents thereof for redress of any injury which he may have sustained from such government or any of its agents or subjects."
Paul Merrell

European Lawmakers Demand Answers on Phone Key Theft - The Intercept - 0 views

firstlook.org/...gemalto-heist-shocks-europe

surveillance state Gemalto SIM-card-keys

shared by Paul Merrell on 24 Feb 15 - No Cached
  • European officials are demanding answers and investigations into a joint U.S. and U.K. hack of the world’s largest manufacturer of mobile SIM cards, following a report published by The Intercept Thursday. The report, based on leaked documents provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, revealed the U.S. spy agency and its British counterpart Government Communications Headquarters, GCHQ, hacked the Franco-Dutch digital security giant Gemalto in a sophisticated heist of encrypted cell-phone keys. The European Parliament’s chief negotiator on the European Union’s data protection law, Jan Philipp Albrecht, said the hack was “obviously based on some illegal activities.” “Member states like the U.K. are frankly not respecting the [law of the] Netherlands and partner states,” Albrecht told the Wall Street Journal. Sophie in ’t Veld, an EU parliamentarian with D66, the Netherlands’ largest opposition party, added, “Year after year we have heard about cowboy practices of secret services, but governments did nothing and kept quiet […] In fact, those very same governments push for ever-more surveillance capabilities, while it remains unclear how effective these practices are.”
  • “If the average IT whizzkid breaks into a company system, he’ll end up behind bars,” In ’t Veld added in a tweet Friday. The EU itself is barred from undertaking such investigations, leaving individual countries responsible for looking into cases that impact their national security matters. “We even get letters from the U.K. government saying we shouldn’t deal with these issues because it’s their own issue of national security,” Albrecht said. Still, lawmakers in the Netherlands are seeking investigations. Gerard Schouw, a Dutch member of parliament, also with the D66 party, has called on Ronald Plasterk, the Dutch minister of the interior, to answer questions before parliament. On Tuesday, the Dutch parliament will debate Schouw’s request. Additionally, European legal experts tell The Intercept, public prosecutors in EU member states that are both party to the Cybercrime Convention, which prohibits computer hacking, and home to Gemalto subsidiaries could pursue investigations into the breach of the company’s systems.
  • According to secret documents from 2010 and 2011, a joint NSA-GCHQ unit penetrated Gemalto’s internal networks and infiltrated the private communications of its employees in order to steal encryption keys, embedded on tiny SIM cards, which are used to protect the privacy of cellphone communications across the world. Gemalto produces some 2 billion SIM cards a year. The company’s clients include AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, Sprint and some 450 wireless network providers. “[We] believe we have their entire network,” GCHQ boasted in a leaked slide, referring to the Gemalto heist.
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  • While Gemalto was indeed another casualty in Western governments’ sweeping effort to gather as much global intelligence advantage as possible, the leaked documents make clear that the company was specifically targeted. According to the materials published Thursday, GCHQ used a specific codename — DAPINO GAMMA — to refer to the operations against Gemalto. The spies also actively penetrated the email and social media accounts of Gemalto employees across the world in an effort to steal the company’s encryption keys. Evidence of the Gemalto breach rattled the digital security community. “Almost everyone in the world carries cell phones and this is an unprecedented mass attack on the privacy of citizens worldwide,” said Greg Nojeim, senior counsel at the Center for Democracy & Technology, a non-profit that advocates for digital privacy and free online expression. “While there is certainly value in targeted surveillance of cell phone communications, this coordinated subversion of the trusted technical security infrastructure of cell phones means the US and British governments now have easy access to our mobile communications.”
  • For Gemalto, evidence that their vaunted security systems and the privacy of customers had been compromised by the world’s top spy agencies made an immediate financial impact. The company’s shares took a dive on the Paris bourse Friday, falling $500 million. In the U.S., Gemalto’s shares fell as much 10 percent Friday morning. They had recovered somewhat — down 4 percent — by the close of trading on the Euronext stock exchange. Analysts at Dutch financial services company Rabobank speculated in a research note that Gemalto could be forced to recall “a large number” of SIM cards. The French daily L’Express noted today that Gemalto board member Alex Mandl was a founding trustee of the CIA-funded venture capital firm In-Q-Tel. Mandl resigned from In-Q-Tel’s board in 2002, when he was appointed CEO of Gemplus, which later merged with another company to become Gemalto. But the CIA connection still dogged Mandl, with the French press regularly insinuating that American spies could infiltrate the company. In 2003, a group of French lawmakers tried unsuccessfully to create a commission to investigate Gemplus’s ties to the CIA and its implications for the security of SIM cards. Mandl, an Austrian-American businessman who was once a top executive at AT&T, has denied that he had any relationship with the CIA beyond In-Q-Tel. In 2002, he said he did not even have a security clearance.
  • AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon could not be reached for comment Friday. Sprint declined to comment. Vodafone, the world’s second largest telecom provider by subscribers and a customer of Gemalto, said in a statement, “[W]e have no further details of these allegations which are industrywide in nature and are not focused on any one mobile operator. We will support industry bodies and Gemalto in their investigations.” Deutsche Telekom AG, a German company, said it has changed encryption algorithms in its Gemalto SIM cards. “We currently have no knowledge that this additional protection mechanism has been compromised,” the company said in a statement. “However, we cannot rule out this completely.”
  • Update: Asked about the SIM card heist, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said he did not expect the news would hurt relations with the tech industry: “It’s hard for me to imagine that there are a lot of technology executives that are out there that are in a position of saying that they hope that people who wish harm to this country will be able to use their technology to do so. So, I do think in fact that there are opportunities for the private sector and the federal government to coordinate and to cooperate on these efforts, both to keep the country safe, but also to protect our civil liberties.”
  • Paul Merrell on 24 Feb 15
     
    Watch for massive class action product defect litigation to be filed against the phone companies.and mobile device manufacturers.  In most U.S. jurisdictions, proof that the vendors/manufacturers  knew of the product defect is not required, only proof of the defect. Also, this is a golden opportunity for anyone who wants to get out of a pricey cellphone contract, since providing a compromised cellphone is a material breach of warranty, whether explicit or implied..   
Paul Merrell

President Obama threatened to shoot down Israeli jets | Daily Mail Online - 0 views

www.dailymail.co.uk/...lities-year-claim-sources.html

war & peace Iranian-nukes-myth Israel Obama air-strikes Netanyahu-speech propaganda

shared by Paul Merrell on 03 Mar 15 - No Cached
  • President Obama is alleged to have stopped an Israeli military attack against Iran's nuclear facilities in 2014 by threatening to shoot down Israeli jets before they could reach their targets, according to reports to emerge from the Middle East at the weekendThe threat from the U.S. forced Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to abort a planned attack on Iraq, reported Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Jarida.
  • According to the report, 'Netanyahu and his commanders agreed after four nights of deliberations to task the Israeli army's chief of staff, Benny Gantz, to prepare a qualitative operation against Iran's nuclear program. 
  • Paul Merrell on 03 Mar 15
     
    The report is dubious. Although the article states that the source is the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Jarida, "The report" is linked to an article in Arutz Sheva, the voice of religious Zionist Israeli colonizers in Palestine. That article too states that the source is Al-Jarida. But a site search of Al-Jarida produces no such article. Coming the day before Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu addresses a joint sesion of Congress in an attempt to scuttle the negotiations with Iran over the Iranian Nukes Myth, the article seems designed to provoke anti-Obama and anti-Iran fervor in Congress and among Israel-Firsters in the U.S. It will be interesting to see how this meme plays out.   
Paul Merrell

The Aviationist » U.S. aircraft carrier and part of its escort "sunk" by French submarine during drills off Florida - 0 views

theaviationist.com/...-aircraft-carrier-sunk-by-subs

war & peace U.S.-Navy aircraft-carrier-defense France submarine

shared by Paul Merrell on 11 Mar 15 - No Cached
  • If you thought aircraft carriers were invincible you were wrong.On Mar. 4, the French Ministry of Defense released some interesting details, about the activity conducted by one of its nuclear-powered attack submarine (SNA) in the waters of the North Atlantic Ocean.According to French MoD website (that is no longer online, even if you can still find a cached version of the article titled “Le SNA Saphir en entraînement avec l’US Navy au large de la Floride”), the Saphir submarine has recently taken part in a major exercise with the U.S. Navy off Florida.The aim of the exercise was joint training with U.S. Carrier Strike Group 12 made by the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt, several Ticonderoga cruisers or Arleigh Burke-class destroyers and a Los Angeles-class submarine, ahead of their operational deployment.The scenario of the drills saw some imaginary states assaulting American economic and territorial interests; threats faced by a naval force led by USS Theodore Roosevelt.During the first phase of the exercise, the Saphir was integrated into the friendly force to support anti-submarine warfare (ASW) by cooperating with U.S. P-3C Orion P-8A Poseidon MPA (Maritime Patrol Aircraft): its role was to share all the underwater contacts with the other ASW assets.In the second phase of the exercise, the Saphir was integrated with the enemy forces and its mission was to locate the aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt and its accompanying warships and prepare to attack the strike group.
  • While the fictious political situation deteriorated, the Saphir quietly slipped in the heart of the multi-billion-dollar aircraft carrier’s defensive screen, while avoiding detection by ASW assets.On the morning of the last day, the order to attack was finally given, allowing the Saphir to pretend-sinking the USS Theodore Roosevelt and most of its escort.Although we don’t really know many more details about the attack and its outcome, the scripted exercise its RoE (Rules of Engagement), the simulated sinking of a U.S. supercarrier proves the flattop’s underwater defenses are not impenetrable.This is the reason why modern subs often train with aircraft carriers: they pose a significant threat to powerful Carrier Strike Groups.Obviously, this was not the first time a submarine scored a simulated carrier kill with torpedo attacks.For instance, in 2007 HMCS Corner Brook, a Canadian diesel-electric submarine “sunk” UK’s Illustrious during an exercise in the Atlantic.
  • Paul Merrell on 11 Mar 15
     
    Thus proving that we need many more aircraft carrier groups, I guess.
Paul Merrell

Making NATO Defunct: EU Military Force intended to Reduce US Influence in Europe? | Global Research - 0 views

www.globalresearch.ca/...5436940

empire NATO-breakup EC EU-military U.S.-foreign-policy Ukraine Germany

shared by Paul Merrell on 19 Mar 15 - No Cached
  • An EU military force is being justified as protection from Russia, but it may also be a way of reducing US influence as the EU and Germany come to loggerheads with the US and NATO over Ukraine. While speaking to the German newspaper Welt am Sonntag, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker announced the time has come for the creation of a unified EU military force. Juncker used rhetoric about “defending the values of the European Union” and nuanced anti-Russian polemics to promote the creation of a European army, which would convey a message to Moscow. The polemics and arguments for an EU army may be based around Russia, but the idea is really directed against the US. The underlying story here is the tensions that are developing between the US, on one side, and the EU and Germany, on the other side. This is why Germany reacted enthusiastically to the proposal, putting its support behind a joint EU armed force.
  • Previously, the EU military force was seriously mulled over during the buildup to the illegal Anglo-American invasion of Iraq in 2003 when Germany, France, Belgium, and Luxembourg met to discuss it as an alternative to a US-dominated NATO. The idea has been resurrected again under similar circumstances. In 2003, the friction was over the US-led invasion of Iraq. In 2015, it is because of the mounting friction between Germany and the US over the crisis in Ukraine.
  • To understand the latest buildup behind the call for a common EU military, we have to look at the events stretching from November 2014 until March 2015. They started when Germany and France began showing signs that they were having second thoughts about the warpath that the US and NATO were taking them down in Ukraine and Eastern Europe. Franco-German differences with the US began to emerge after Tony Blinken, US President Barack Obama’s former Deputy National Security Advisor and current Deputy Secretary of State and the number two diplomat at the US Department of State, announced that the Pentagon was going to send arms into Ukraine at a hearing of the US Congress about his nomination, that was held on November 19, 2014. As the Fiscal Times put it, “Washington treated Russia and the Europeans to a one-two punch when it revealed its thinking about arming Ukraine.” The Russian Foreign Ministry responded to Blinken by announcing that if the Pentagon poured weapons into Ukraine, Washington would not only seriously escalate the conflict, but it would be a serious signal from the US that will change the dynamics of the conflict inside Ukraine. Realizing that things could escalate out of control, the French and German response was to initiate a peace offence through diplomatic talks that would eventually lead to a new ceasefire agreement in Minsk, Belarus under the “Normandy Format” consisting of the representatives of France, Germany, Russia, and Ukraine.
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  • Germany’s public position at the Munich Security Conference flew in the face of US demands to get its European allies to militarize the conflict in Ukraine. While US Secretary of State John Kerry went out of his way at the gathering to reassure the media and the public that there was no rift between Washington and the Franco-German side, it was widely reported that the warmonger Senator John McCain lost his cool while he was in Bavaria. Reportedly, he called the Franco-German peace initiative “Moscow bullshit.” He would then criticize Angela Merkel in an interview with the German channel Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen (ZDF), which would prompt calls by German MP Peter Tauber, the secretary-general of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), for an apology from Senator McCain.
  • After the Munich Security Conference it was actually revealed that clandestine arms shipments were already being made to Kiev. Russian President Vladimir Putin would let this be publicly known at a joint press conference with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban in Budapest when he said that weapons were already secretly being sent to the Kiev authorities. In the same month a report, named Preserving Ukraine’s Independence, Resisting Russian Aggression: What the United States and NATO Must Do, was released arguing for the need to send arms to Ukraine — ranging from spare parts and missiles to heavy personnel — as a means of ultimately fighting Russia. This report was authored by a triumvirate of leading US think-tanks, the Brookings Institute, the Atlantic Council, and the Chicago Council on Global Affairs — the two former being from the detached ivory tower “think-tankistan” that is the Washington Beltway. This is the same clique that has advocated for the invasions of Iraq, Libya, Syria, and Iran.
  • Watch out NATO! United EU military in the horizon? It is in the context of divisions between the EU and Washington that the calls for an EU military force are being made by both the European Commission and Germany.
  • The EU and Germans realize there is not much they can do to hamper Washington as long as it has a say in EU and European security. Both Berlin and a cross-section of the EU have been resentful of how Washington is using NATO to advance its interests and to influence the events inside Europe. If not a form of pressure in behind the door negotiations with Washington, the calls for an EU military are designed to reduce Washington’s influence in Europe and possibly make NATO defunct. An EU army that would cancel out NATO would have a heavy strategic cost for the US. In this context, Washington would lose its western perch in Eurasia. It “would automatically spell the end of America’s participation in the game on the Eurasian chessboard,” in the words of former US national security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski.
  • The intelligentsias in the US are already alarmed at the risks that an EU military would pose to American influence. The American Jewish Committee’s influential Commentary Magazine, which is affiliated to the neo-cons in the Washington Beltway, has asked, as the title of the article by Seth Mandel illustrates, “Why Is Germany Undermining NATO?” This is while the Washington Examiner has asked, as the title of the article by Hoskingson says, “Whatever happened to US influence?” This is why Washington’s vassals in the EU — specifically Britain, Poland, and the three Baltic states — have all been very vocal in their opposition to the idea of a common EU military force. While Paris has been reluctant to join the calls for an EU army, French opposition politician Marine Le Pen has announced that the time has come for France to come out of the shadow of the United States.
  • here are some very important questions here. Are the calls for an EU military, meant to pressure the US or is there a real attempt to curb Washington’s influence inside Europe? And are moves being made by Berlin and its partners to evict Washington from Europe by deactivating NATO through a common EU military?
Paul Merrell

UN officials accused of bowing to Israeli pressure over children's rights list | World news | The Guardian - 0 views

www.theguardian.com/...pressure-childrens-rights-list

war & peace U.N. Israel IDF child-rights

shared by Paul Merrell on 20 Mar 15 - No Cached
  • Senior UN officials in Jerusalem have been accused of caving in to Israeli pressure to abandon moves to include the state’s armed forces on a UN list of serious violators of children’s rights. UN officials backed away from recommending that the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) be included on the list following telephone calls from senior Israeli officials. The Israelis allegedly warned of serious consequences if a meeting of UN agencies and NGOs based in Jerusalem to ratify the recommendation went ahead. Within hours, the meeting was cancelled. “Top officials have buckled under political pressure,” said a UN source. “As a result, a clear message has been given that Israel will not be listed.”
  • Organisations pressing for the IDF’s inclusion on the list since the war in Gaza last summer – which left more than 500 children dead and more than 3,300 injured – include Save the Children and War Child as well as at least a dozen Palestinian human rights organisations, the Israeli rights organisation B’Tselem and UN bodies such as the children’s agency Unicef. “These organisations are in uproar over what has happened,” said the UN source
  • The IDF’s inclusion on the UN’s list of grave violators of children’s rights would place it alongside non-state armed forces such as Islamic State, Boko Haram and the Taliban. There are no other state armies on the list. It would propel Israel further towards pariah status within international bodies and could lead to UN sanctions.
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  • Although Jerusalem-based officials cancelled the meeting – and subsequently decided not to recommend the IDF’s inclusion on the list – the UN complained to Israel over the intimidation of its staff. Susana Malcorra – a high-ranking official in the New York office of the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon – raised the issue in a private letter to Israel’s ambassador to the UN, Ron Prosor. The UN in New York said it could not comment on leaked documents. The telephone calls were made to June Kunugi, Unicef’s special representative to Palestine and Israel, on 12 February, the night before a meeting to decide whether to recommend the IDF’s inclusion on the list. One call was from a senior figure in Cogat, the Israeli government body that coordinates between the IDF, the Palestinian Authority and the international community; the other was made by an official in Israel’s foreign ministry.
  • ccording to UN and NGO sources, Kunugi was advised to cancel the meeting or face serious consequences. However, Israeli sources described the telephone conversations as friendly and courteous attempts to persuade Kunugi to delay the working group’s decision on its recommendation regarding the IDF until Israel had been allowed to present its case on the issue. At 8.54am the next morning, an email was sent on behalf of James Rawley, a senior official with UNSCO (the office of the UN special coordinator for the Middle East peace process) who had called the meeting, to participants. It said: “Please be informed that today’s meeting scheduled at 13:00hrs has been postponed. Sincere apologies for the inconvenience this may have caused.” A joint statement to the Guardian from Kunugi and Rawley said the “strictly confidential process” of determining inclusion on the list was still ongoing and was the “prerogative of the UN secretary general, and it rests with him alone”. The UN in Jerusalem was unable to comment on the process, it added, but the submission from Jerusalem to New York was “based on verified facts, not influenced by any member state or other entity”.
  • Unicef has called a fresh meeting to update UN and NGO officials in Jerusalem on Thursday. The decision on which state and non-state armed forces are to be included on the list will be taken by UN chiefs in New York next month. However, according to the UN source, “a political decision has already been taken not to include Israel”.
  • A separate source told the Guardian: “The UN caved to Israel’s political pressure and took a highly contentious step to shelter Israel from accountability.” The list of violators of children’s rights is contained in the annex of the annual report of the secretary general on children and armed conflict. A “monitoring and reporting mechanism”, established by a UN security council resolution, supplies information on grave violations of children’s rights, such as killing and maiming, recruitment of minors into armed forces, attacks on schools, rape, abduction, and denial of humanitarian access to children. The secretary general is required to list armed forces or armed groups responsible for such actions. Following last summer’s seven-week war in Gaza, a number of UN agencies and NGOs met to consider whether to recommend the IDF’s inclusion on the list. According to insiders, participants “agreed there is a strong and credible case to recommend listing”.
  • A 13-page internal Unicef paper seen by the Guardian examined the case for the IDF to be listed on the basis of its actions in last summer’s war in Gaza, including the killing and injuring of children, and “targeted and indiscriminate” attacks on schools and hospitals. Several of the working group’s participants wrote to the UN secretary general to urge the inclusion of the IDF on the list. A letter sent in December by Defence for Children International (Palestine) said: “There is ample evidence to demonstrate that Israel’s armed forces have committed acts that amount to the grave violations against children during armed conflict, as defined by UN security council resolutions, including killing or maiming children and attacks against schools and hospitals.” The Israeli ministry of foreign affairs and Cogat declined to answer specific questions about the phone calls to Kunugi, but said in a joint statement: “Israel has a good working relationship with Unicef and the United Nations in general. Israel has no desire to get into a slanging match with anti-Israel elements nor to submit to their intimidations.”
  • Paul Merrell on 20 Mar 15
     
    More information, including that Palestine Civil Society has requested that U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon to discharge two U.N. officials involved becuase of this issue and because of signifificant delays that work to Israel's advantage in reconstruction of Gaza following Israel's assault last summer. http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/un-providing-israel-cover-killing-gazas-children
Paul Merrell

US Sends Green Berets to Northern Iraq | Military.com - 0 views

www.military.com/...n-berets-to-northern-iraq.html

war & peace U.S.-foreign-policy Iraq troop-levels air-strikes

shared by Paul Merrell on 06 Jul 14 - No Cached
  • Special Forces advisors have set up an operations center in northern Iraq as part of the expanding U.S. political and military effort to keep Iraq from splintering against attacks by Islamic extremists, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Thursday. In recent days, a small team of advisors opened up a Joint Operations Center (JOC) in Irbil, capital of the semi-autonomous Kurdish Regional Government, Hagel said at a Pentagon briefing with Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The Irbil mission will complement the JOC already in operation in Baghdad in assessing the capability and will of the Iraqi national security forces to combat militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant who have swept across large swaths of western and northern Iraq against little opposition. President Obama has authorized 300 troops for the advisory mission and about 200 are now on the ground, Hagel said. "None will perform combat missions," he said.
  • About 550 additional troops have the separate mission of protecting the U.S. Embassy and U.S. facilities at the Baghdad airport with the goal of "providing our diplomats time and space" to press for the formation of a unity government in Iraq, Hagel said. The troops at the airport arrived earlier this week with Apache attack helicopters and small surveillance drones to protect U.S. facilities at the airport should an evacuation be ordered.
  • The U.S. has moved the aircraft carrier George H.W. Bush into the Persian Gulf, and has numerous other air assets in the region, but Dempsey stressed that there had been no decisions as yet on the feasibility of airstrikes against ISIL. "We may get to that point," Dempsey said of airstrikes. "I'm suggesting to you that we're not there yet." If airstrikes were ordered, "that's going to be a tough challenge" because of the intermingling of ISIL fighters with Sunni tribes that have supported them, Dempsey said. U.S. pilots probably would attempt not to hit the tribal fighters to send the message that a unified Iraq was in their best interests, Dempsey said. "It matters for the future of Iraq," he said.
Paul Merrell

U.S. expands secret facility in Iraq - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - 0 views

www.post-gazette.com/...201407120083

war & peace Iraq Kurds CIA

shared by Paul Merrell on 13 Jul 14 - No Cached
  • IRBIL, Iraq — A supposedly secret but locally well-known CIA station on the outskirts of Irbil’s airport is undergoing rapid expansion as the United States considers whether to engage in a war against Islamist militants who have seized control of half of Iraq in the past month. Western contractors hired to expand the facility and a local intelligence official confirmed the construction project, which is visible from the main highway linking Irbil to Mosul, the city whose fall June 9 triggered the Islamic State’s sweep through northern and central Iraq. Residents around the airport say they can hear daily what they suspect are U.S. drones taking off and landing at the facility. Expansion of the facility comes as it seems all but certain that the autonomous Kurdish regional government and the central government in Baghdad, never easy partners, are headed for an irrevocable split — complicating any U.S. military hopes of coordinating the two entities’ efforts against the Islamic State.
  • Overnight, Kurdish troops seized oil fields operated by Iraq’s Northern Oil Co., whose exports had been controlled by the central government, “These two are among the main wells producing oil in Iraq,” said Assam Jihad, the Oil Ministry spokesman. “They are the spine of Iraq’s oil wealth and produce 400,000 barrels a day.” Oil industry publications said they had produced a little less than half that in recent months, but nonetheless represent a significant share of Iraq’s oil production. In 2012, Iraq produced on average of 3 million barrels of oil per day, according to the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. “Half of this production goes to the local market, and the other half goes for export,” said Mr. Jihad, criticizing the Kurds’ seizure of the field as a “constitutional breach” and “violation of Iraq’s sovereignty.”
  • The developments all come as the United States, which has said it won’t come to Iraq’s assistance unless Mr. Maliki takes steps to make his government more inclusive, is expected to announce early next week its assessment of the military situation in the country. Pentagon officials said the assessment might be made public as soon as Monday. But U.S. officials have known for some time that it was likely that they would need to coordinate any steps taken in Baghdad and in Irbil, where the peshmerga has worked closely over the years with the CIA, U.S. special forces and the Joint Special Operations Command, the military’s most secretive task force, which has become a bulwark of counterterrorism operations. Peshmerga forces already are manning checkpoints and bunkers to protect the facility, which sits just a few hundred yards from the highway.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • Other contractors who deal extensively with moving heavy equipment through Irbil’s airport, which has supported a rapidly expanding oil and gas drilling industry, said they were aware of the expansion. One British oil executive said he’d detected a “low-key but steady stream of men, equipment and supplies for an obvious expansion of the facility.” The local Kurdish intelligence official described what was taking place as a “long-term relationship with the Americans.” In a statement July 3, U.S. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel announced that Irbil would host such a center, in addition to one being set up in Baghdad, and suggested that it had already begun operating. “We have personnel on the ground in Irbil, where our second joint operations center has achieved initial operating capability,” he said then.
  • “It’s no secret that the American special forces and CIA have a close relationship with the peshmerga,” said the Kurdish official, who spoke only on condition of anonymity because he was discussing covert military operations. He added that the facility had operated even “after the Americans were forced out of Iraq by Maliki,” a reference to the 2011 U.S. troop withdrawal after the Obama administration and the Iraqi government couldn’t agree on a framework for U.S. forces remaining in the country. The official refused to directly identify the location of the facility but when he was shown the blurred-out location on an online satellite-mapping service he joked, “The peshmerga do not have the influence to make Google blur an area on these maps. I will leave the rest to your conclusions.”
  • Paul Merrell on 13 Jul 14
     
    Two CIA drone bases in Iraq; what could be wrong with that? Remember that CIA staff and contractors, being civilians, aren't included in the head count of American boots on the ground. And the CIA is rather notorious these days for operating drones that kill, not the observation drones that the Pentagon said it would be flying over Iraq.  Smells like Obama has decided to run a hot war in Iraq, at least of the covert variety. 
Paul Merrell

IRBIL, Iraq: Expansion of 'secret' facility in Iraq suggests closer U.S.-Kurd ties | Iraq | McClatchy DC - 0 views

www.mcclatchydc.com/...ion-of-secret-facility-in.html

war & peace Iraq Kurdistan Irbil JSOC CIA green-berets

shared by Paul Merrell on 13 Aug 14 - No Cached
  • IRBIL, Iraq — A supposedly secret but locally well-known CIA station on the outskirts of Irbil’s airport is undergoing rapid expansion as the United States considers whether to engage in a war against Islamist militants who’ve seized control of half of Iraq in the past month.Western contractors hired to expand the facility and a local intelligence official confirmed the construction project, which is visible from the main highway linking Irbil to Mosul, the city whose fall June 9 triggered the Islamic State’s sweep through northern and central Iraq. Residents around the airport say they can hear daily what they suspect are American drones taking off and landing at the facility.Expansion of the facility comes as it seems all but certain that the autonomous Kurdish regional government and the central government in Baghdad, never easy partners, are headed for an irrevocable split _ complicating any U.S. military hopes of coordinating the two entities’ efforts against the Islamic State.
  • U.S. officials have known for some time that it was likely that they’d need to coordinate any steps it takes both in Baghdad and in Irbil, where the peshmerga has worked closely over the years with the CIA, U.S. special forces and the Joint Special Operations Command, the military’s most secretive task force, which has become a bulwark of counterterrorism operations. Peshmerga forces already are manning checkpoints and bunkers to protect the facility, which sits just a few hundred yards from the highway.“Within a week of the fall of Mosul we were being told to double or even triple our capacities,” said one Western logistics contractor who spoke only on the condition of anonymity because he’d signed nondisclosure agreements with the U.S. government on the matter. “They needed everything from warehouse space to refrigeration capacity, because they operate under a different logistics command than the normal military or embassy structures,” the contractor said. “The expansion was aggressive and immediate.”
  • In a statement July 3, U.S. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel announced that Irbil would host such a center, in addition to one being set up in Baghdad, and suggested that it had already begun operating.“We have personnel on the ground in Irbil, where our second joint operations center has achieved initial operating capability,” he said then.“It’s no secret that the American special forces and CIA have a close relationship with the peshmerga,” said the Kurdish official, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity because he was discussing covert military operations. He added that the facility had operated even “after the Americans were forced out of Iraq by Maliki,” a reference to the 2011 U.S. troop withdrawal after the Obama administration and the Iraqi government couldn’t agree on a framework for U.S. forces remaining in the country.
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