The top commander of U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan says that 2009 will be a "tough fight" in Afghanistan, and the United States will need nearly twice as many troops for up to four years to stabilize the country.
Gen. David McKiernan told USA Today on Sunday that increasing U.S. troop levels from about 32,000 to 55,000 or 60,000 is "needed until we get to this tipping point where the Afghan army and the Afghan police have both the capacity and capability to provide security for their people. That is at least three or four more years away."
A report issued Monday by a Europe-based think tank said that the Taliban have expanded their presence in Afghanistan to cover more than 70 percent of the country.
The report, issued by the International Council on Security and Development, said that the Taliban presence this year was up from 54 percent of the country last year.
"While the international community’s prospects in Afghanistan have never been bleaker, the Taliban has been experiencing a renaissance that has gained momentum since 2005. The West is in genuine danger of losing Afghanistan," its authors wrote.
Jesse Trentadue discusses the the events surrounding the 1995 murder of his brother while in federal custody in Oklahoma City and the connection to the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, the Elohim City paramilitary camp sting operation run by the FBI and Southern Poverty Law Center, foreknowledge of FBI agents and complicity of FBI informants in the bombing, the ongoing court battles with the U.S. government over FOIA requests and civil lawsuits and the involvement of Obama’s appointed attorney general Eric Holder in the coverup of Kenny’s murder.
HOAX PHONE CALL ALMOST TRIGGERED INDIA- PAKISTAN WAR, MORE INFO ON MASSACRED SOUTH KOREANS EMERGES, ALL ROADS LEAD TO PAKISTANI INTEL, RICE SAYS RUMSFELD NOT TO BLAME FOR IRAQ, CHAVEZ TRANSFORMS MILITARY
A hoax telephone call almost sparked another war between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan at the height of last month's terror attacks on Mumbai, officials and Western diplomats on both sides of the border said on Sunday.
Asif Ali Zardari, the Pakistani President, took a telephone call from a man pretending to be Pranab Mukherjee, India's Foreign Minister, on Friday, November 28, apparently without following the usual verification procedures, they said.
The hoax caller threatened to take military action against Pakistan in response to the then ongoing Mumbai attacks, which India has since blamed on the Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), they said.
Mr Zardari responded by placing Pakistan's air force on high alert and telephoning Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State, to ask her to intervene.
An official but secret United States government document, marked as releasable to the government in Islamabad, has linked Pakistan’s former top spymaster, Inter-Services Intelligence Director General Lt Gen (retd) Hamid Gul, to the Taliban and Al Qaeda networks.
The two-page unsigned document has already been provided to the government, and published in the Pakistani media yesterday.
Official sources say that Gul has been charged in the paper with providing financial assistance to Kabul-based criminal groups and involvement in spotting, assessing, recruiting and training young men from seminaries.
Condoleezza Rice is taking responsibility for the troubled U.S. occupation in Iraq right after Saddam Hussein was overthrown.
Rice was President George W. Bush's national security adviser when the war began in 2003. She says it wasn't former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's fault that things went badly when the U.S. began to occupy Iraq after driving out Saddam.
Government investigators digging into the grim hidden history of mass political executions in South Korea have confirmed that dozens of children were among many thousands shot by their own government early in the Korean War.
The investigative Truth and Reconciliation Commission has thus far verified more than two dozen mass killings of leftists and supposed sympathizers, among at least 100,000 people estimated to have been hastily shot and dumped into makeshift trenches, abandoned mines or the sea after communist North Korea invaded the south in June 1950.
The killings, details of which were buried in classified U.S. files for a half-century, were intended to keep southern leftists from aiding the invaders at a time when the rightist, U.S.-allied government was in danger of being overrun by communist forces.
Congo's government has invited about 20 armed groups to participate in talks with Tutsi rebels to end fighting in war-ravaged North Kivu province, the information minister said Sunday.
Tutsi insurgent leader General Laurent Nkunda demanded direct negotiations with President Joseph Kabila's government after launching a renewed offensive in late August that forced a quarter of a million people to flee violence in the east of Democratic Republic of Congo.
Repeatedly routed by Nkunda's battle-hardened fighters, the government appeared to agree to that demand Friday, announcing it would send a delegation to Kenya to meet with the rebels on December 8. http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081207/wl_nm/us_congo_democratic
As President Hugo Chavez launches another campaign to abolish term limits and rule Venezuela until at least 2019, he counts on a loyal and powerful partner: the armed forces.
His military made headlines this month conducting a three-day exercise with Russian warships in the Caribbean Sea. But on the mainland, a more lasting transformation is under way: Chavez is converting the armed forces into a revolutionary corps at the service of the president. http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/world/6150191.html
It has remained one of World War II's most enduring mysteries, one that resonated decades later after Sept. 11: Who in Washington knew what and when before the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941?
Specifically, who heard or saw a transcript of a Tokyo shortwave radio news broadcast that was interrupted by a prearranged coded weather report? The weather bulletin signaled Japanese diplomats around the world to destroy confidential documents and codes because war with the United States, the Soviet Union or Britain was beginning.
PAKISTAN - U.S. RELATIONS NEAR SHAMBLES, IRAN FIRST OBAMA TEST, GOP ROUTES DEMOCRATS IN GEORGIA, EMPIRE STATE BUILDING STOLEN!, THAILAND GOVERNMENT ORDERED TO STEP DOWN BUT..., FAILED FINANCERS TAKE OVER OBAMA GOVERNMENT!
A plan by Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) that had been in the pipelines for several months - even though official policy was to ditch it - saw what was to be a low-profile attack in Kashmir turn into the massive attacks on Mumbai last week.
The original plan was highjacked by the Laskar-e-Taiba (LET), a Pakistani militant group that generally focussed on the Kashmir struggle, and al-Qaeda, resulting in the deaths of nearly 200 people in Mumbai as groups of militants sprayed bullets and hand grenades at hotels, restaurants and train stations, as well as a Jewish community center.
The attack has sent shock waves across India and threatens to revive the intense periods of hostility the two countries have endured since their independence from British India in 1947.
There is now the possibility that Pakistan will undergo another about-turn and rethink its support of the "war in terror"; until the end of 2001, it supported the Taliban administration in Afghanistan. It could now back off from its restive tribal areas, leaving the Taliban a free hand to consolidate their Afghan insurgency.
A US State Department official categorically mentioned that Pakistan's "smoking gun" could turn the US's relations with Pakistan sour. The one militant captured - several were killed - is reported to have been a Pakistani trained by the LET. http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/JL02Df05.html
Iran poses the greatest foreign policy challenge to Barack Obama, the President-elect, with Tehran on course to produce a nuclear bomb in the first year of an Obama administration, a coalition of top think-tanks gave warning yesterday.
Mr Obama must keep his promises of direct talks with Tehran and engage the Middle East region as a whole if he is to halt a looming crisis that could be revisited on the US, the experts said.
“Diplomacy is not guaranteed to work,” Richard Hass, one of the authors said. “But the other options – military action or living with an Iranian weapon are sufficiently unattractive for it to warrant serious commitment.”
The warnings came in a report entitled Restoring the Balance. The Middle East strategy for the President-elect was drafted by the Council for Foreign Relations and the Brookings Institution.
In one of the biggest heists in American history, the Daily News "stole" the $2 billion Empire State Building.
And it wasn't that hard.
The News swiped the 102-story Art Deco skyscraper by drawing up a batch of bogus documents, making a fake notary stamp and filing paperwork with the city to transfer the deed to the property.
Some of the information was laughable: Original "King Kong" star Fay Wray is listed as a witness and the notary shared a name with bank robber Willie Sutton.
Federal prosecutors in Seattle on Wednesday will ask a judge to more than double the 22-year sentence he gave to an al-Qaida-trained terrorist convicted of plotting to bomb Los Angeles International Airport at the turn of the millennium. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008461263_webressam02m.html
Thailand's courts did on Tuesday what anti-government protesters have been trying to do for months - bring down the government. The Constitution Court ordered that the ruling party and two of its allies be disbanded over electoral fraud, and that numerous politicians, including the premier, be banned from politics. The anti-government groups responded by saying they will unblock the international airport and others they have forced to close. But the political crisis is far from over. http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/JL03Ae03.html
One wants to ask the Wall Street wizards who comprise the talent pool for the incoming administration, "If you so smart, how come you ain't rich no more?"
Manhattan's toniest private schools, harder to get into than Harvard, quietly are looking for full-tuition pupils now that the children of sacked Wall Street bankers are departing for public schools in cheaper suburbs. Harvard University president Drew Faust has warned of budget cuts to come due to "unprecedented losses" to its US$39 billion endowment.
Shares of Citibank, the current firm of Bill Clinton's treasury secretary Robert Rubin, last week traded at less than a tenth of their year-earlier market price and may require yet another federal bailout. [Citigroup will have more than $300 billion of troubled mortgages and other assets guaranteed by the US government under a federal plan to stabilize the lender after its stock fell 60% last week, Bloomberg reported today, November 24. Citigroup also will get a $20 billion cash infusion from the Treasury Department, adding to the $25 billion the bank received last month under the Troubled Asset Relief Program. In return for the cash and guarantees, the government will get $27 billion of preferred shares paying an 8% dividend.]
Rubin, a transition advisor to president-elect Barack Obama, was mentor to Treasury secretary designate Timothy Geithner. Even Goldman Sachs, the thoroughbred trading machine that gave us Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson as well as Rubin, is trading at a fifth of its peak value.
These facts came to mind while reading David Brooks' November 21 New York Times panegyric to Obama's prospective cabinet, which gushes, "Its members are twice as smart as the poor reporters who have to cover them, three times if you include the columnists." Brooks added, "... as much as I want to resent these overeducated Achievatrons ... I find myself tremendously impressed by the Obama transition."
Has Brooks checked the markets? The cleverest people in the United States, the Ivy-pedigreed investment bankers, have fouled their own nests as well as their own net worth, and persuaded the taxpayers to bail them out. If these are the best and the brightest of 2008, America is in very deep trouble.
The one-trick wizards of Wall Street had one idea, which was to ride the trend and pile on as much leverage as credulous investors and crony regulators would allow. It has gone pear-shaped, and those who didn't cash out early along with the cynics are poor. Fortunately for them, Obama will let them play with the budget of the US federal government for the next four years.
Failed financiers run the Obama transition team. It used to be that the heads of great industrial companies got the top Cabinet posts. Now it is the one-trick wizards. After George W Bush fired former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, who had run Alcoa, the last survivor of the species was Vice President Dick Cheney, the former CEO of Halliburton. Obama's bevy of talent comes from finance. American industrialists have become figures of ridicule, like the pathetic chief executive of General Motors, Rick Wagoner, begging for a government loan. http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/JK25Dj06.html
Terror does leave a calling card. As the enormity of the attack on Mumbai sank in, it seemed like the arrival of al-Qaida in India, a version of 9/11 designed to attract a global audience given the scale of violence and the planned targeting of westerners.
With the capture of a terrorist, the actual authors were revealed. It wasn't the al-Qaida. But the jihadi credentials were not much less impressive with Lashkar-e-Taiba named as the suspect. Given the operation's obvious planning, few doubted it was the deadly firm of LeT-ISI in action yet again.
Yet the difference between LeT and al-Qaida is not so significant as might have once been the case. In recent years, Lashkar has emerged as not only the single largest pan-Indian terror threat, but also a partner with al-Qaida in jihadi battlegrounds like Iraq, Chechnya and Afghanistan. It has shared training camps and cadre and used al-Qaida-Taliban facilities for a "jihad" against India.
It has been proscribed by US and UK who have recognised LeT to be a global terrorist organisation. In UK, it has been allied to the Kashmiri underground, for long recognised as one of the easiest way to get into the jihadi circuit which leads to Pakistan. It poses as a charity and openly seeks donations in Pakistani cities for the "Kashmir cause" and its leader, Prof Hafiz Saeed, is allowed free movement apart from occasional cosmetic spells of house arrest.
Before the Markaz-da'wa wal-irshad, the Lashkar's religio-political wing, was banned, its website regularly carried the view of its founder. Saeed's view of LeT's mission was quite unambiguous. He argued that Kashmir was the "gateway" to India, much of which comprised "lost Muslim lands". He saw jihad in Kashmir as a religious duty and fully identified himself with the 9/11 mayhem that Osama bin Laden wreaked.
Aligned with the Ahl-e-Hadees sect, Lashkar was founded in 1987 by Saeed, who incidentally was also trained as an engineer like Osama and many other prominent jihadis, and who drew his inspiration from the Egypt-based Muslim Brotherhood — an organisation that saw Palestine as an Islamic cause way back in the 1930's. In collaboration with ISI, Lashkar built up an impressive Kashmir portfolio with recruits chiefly drawn from Pakistani Punjabis, Pashtoons, Bangladeshis, Arabs and south-east Asians.
Description: A black AK-47 rifle, placed against a yellow sun in the center, protrudes vertically from an open, green Koran. Above the rifle, in black, is a semi-circular Koranic phrase which translates: "And fight them on until there is no more tumult or oppression, and there prevail justice and faith in Allah." These images are set against a light blue background. Below the Koran is white lettering against a red background; it bears the group's original name: Markaz al-Dawa wa al-Irshad (the Center for Preaching and Guidance).
Explanation: The Koran signifies the centrality of Islam to Lashkar-e-Taiba's ideology; green is also Islam's traditional color. The blue background represents Allah's mercy and the sun symbolizes wisdom and virtue. The rifle's placement above the Koran, and the inscription above, denote the organization's belief that violent jihad will establish a society based on Islamic precepts. The red on the bottom is a symbol of strength and violence.
Overview Lashkar-e-Taiba (LET), a Pakistani-based Islamic terrorist organization, seeks to drive out Indian security forces from the disputed Jammu and Kashmir regions of South Asia and establish an Islamic caliphate. Various intelligence services consider LET to be one of the most dangerous Islamic militant groups operating in Kashmir. Known for its expertise in suicide bombing and conventional assault tactics, LET has carried out many deadly attacks, including a raid on the Indian Parliament in 2002, which killed 14. Although the organization stopped claiming responsibility for attacks after it was ostensibly banned by Pakistan in 2002, Indian authorities have arrested many LET operatives in connection with attacks in the region.
The group was founded in the late 1980’s with the help of the Pakistani government (which also opposes the Indian presence in Kashmir) as the armed wing of the Markaz al-Dawa wa al-Irshad, an Islamic social welfare group. LET, which was also inspired by Osama bin Laden, continues to maintain close ties with Al Qaeda. Intelligence services have discovered that, before its camps were destroyed by the United States in 2001, Al Qaeda frequently hosted and trained LET operatives. Conversely, since the destruction of those camps, LET has hosted Al Qaeda trainees and other Islamic militants, including Shahzad Tanweer, one of the suicide bombers in the July 7, 2005 London Underground attack, according to British authorities. Additionally, senior Al Qaeda leaders, such as Abu Zubeida have been arrested at LET compounds.
Focus of Operations Pakistan, India, Jammu and Kashmir
Major Attacks
October 29, 2005: Three coordinated suicide bombs in New Delhi during Hindu festival of Diwali killed at least 63 and wounded over 200.
August 25, 2003: Double bombing in Bombay (Mumbai) killed 52 and wounded 175.
September 24, 2002: Raid on Akshardam Temple in Gujarat killed 28 Hindu worshippers.
December 13, 2001: Raid on Indian Parliament killed at least 14.
Leaders
Leader: Hafiz Muhammad Saeed
Leader: Maulana Abdul Wahid Kashmiri
Co-Founder: Zaki ur Rehman Lakhwi a.k.a. Abdullah Azam
Ideology Militant Islamic Fundamentalism
Goals Establishment of Islamic rule over Jammu, Kashmir and eventually India
Methods Suicide bombings, paramilitary operations against civilian and military targets, mass-executions.
Sponsors Formerly Pakistan
U.S.-Related Activities
Designated by the U.S. as a Foreign Terrorist Organization.
Several American citizens, including members of the so-called “Virginia Jihad Network,” were convicted of training at LET camps in Kashmir and Pakistan, as well as other related terrorism charges.
LET operatives have reportedly been recruited for planned Al Qaeda attacks on American interests and the organization is believed to have operatives already in the U.S.
Indian and American intelligence sources tell ABS-CBN that there is increasing evidence that the attacks in Mumbai were carried out by a Pakistani militant group linked to Al-Qaeda. The primary suspects, they say, are Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed. Lashkar-e-Toiba has denied it’s behind the attacks.
Indian intelligence sources say that one of the gunmen now in custody told Indian authorities that he – along with seven others – pretended to be students, rented an apartment in Mumbai and meticulously staked out the targets. Allegedly, they carried Malaysian identity cards. A Pakistani national, he told authorities he was trained by Lashkar-e-Toiba – taught to hijack a sea vessel and carry out urban warfare. These are tactics used by Al-Qaeda in past terror attacks, honed and passed along in its training camps; Lashkar-e-Toiba has long been linked to Al-Qaeda.
The ties are clear if we take the facts in Mumbai and compare them with the history of Al-Qaeda and its affiliate groups. WHICH YOU CAN DO WITH THE FULL STORY HERE:
As many as seven of the terrorists may have British connections and some could be from Leeds and Bradford where London's July 7 bombers lived, one source said.
Two Britons were among eight gunmen being held, according to Mumbai's chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh. At least nine others are reportedly dead.
The eight arrested were captured by commandos after they stormed two hotels and a Jewish centre to free hostages today. Despite the Indian authorities' assurances that the situation was under control, the siege continued at the Taj Mahal hotel and explosions could still be heard in central Mumbai.
The militants, who entered into Mumbai by boats to carry out probably the worst terror attack on India, began their killing spree in the high seas where they killed five fishermen who're "missing" since last week.
The militants killed and thrown off-board four members of Indian fishing trawler 'Kuber' soon after they had hijacked it, while the fifth person, identified as Balwant Tandel, was beheaded as the vessel neared the Mumbai shores, sources said.
In fact, the investigators are now corroborating the information they gathered with that of the version of the arrested Lashker-e-Taiba militant Ajmal Amin Kamal.
The terror attacks in Mumbai, India, are a reminder that intelligence agencies needs to "be on guard", South African President Kgalema Motlanthe said on Friday.
In a speech at a closed awards ceremony at the National Intelligence Agency, Motlanthe said the world was shocked by media reports and images of terrorism in Mumbai.
"These and other events remind us that terrorism is real and that our intelligence agencies need to be on their guard if we are to rid ourselves of this scourge."
He said on behalf of all South Africans he had sent heartfelt condolences to the people and government of India and those affected by the terrible events.
According to top intelligence sources, at least six terror modules comprising nearly 20 youths aged between 25-30 years are believed to be the executors of Wednesday's attack in Mumbai.
"The attack is unprecedented, its scale beyond anticipation, and very clearly directed at the international audience. Star hotels were hit with the intent of taking foreign tourists hostage,'' a senior official told MiD DAY.
A meeting chaired by union home minister Shivraj Patil with top cops from the NSG, state police and home department officials yesterday morning, concluded that the attack was conceived and executed by Pakistan-trained terrorists.
"Preliminary intelligence inputs suggest they arrived in two speed boats one anchored near Sassoon Customs Docks off Colaba coast, and another near Fishermen's Colony at Cuffe Parade. They spread out into small modules to execute the highly sophisticated terror operation," said a senior official.
"One module was armed with hand grenades, Kalashnikov assault rifles and automatic pistols. The second went on planting bombs and lobbed grenades as they drove along,'' he added.
Federal authorities are warning law enforcement personnel of a possible terror plot against the New York City subway system during the holiday season.
An internal memo obtained by The Associated Press says the FBI has received a "plausible but unsubstantiated" report that al-Qaida terrorists in late September may have discussed attacking the subway system.
Department of Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said the warning was issued as a routine matter, but added that there may be an increased police presence in New York and other large metropolitan areas.
The report indicates that al-Qaida terrorists "in late September may have discussed targeting transit systems in and around New York City. These discussions reportedly involved the use of suicide bombers or explosives placed on subway/passenger rail systems," according to the document. http://wcbstv.com/breakingnewsalerts/subway.terror.plot.2.874410.html
I would urge you to carry bottled water, a flashlight and a towel/ t-shirt, etc - if you are stuck in the train tunnels you will need these to get out. Water the shirt to protect from dust and smoke. You can get a flashlight and extra batteries at any dollar store. This is not the time to be plugged into your iPod.
OBAMA'S FREE MARKET TEAM EMERGES, THE FIRST FBI ANTHRAX CASE MISSTEPS REVEALED, TAMIL TIGERS SURROUNDED BY TROOPS, THAILAND MOVEMENT IN COLLAPSE, DID CAPITALISM KILL THE BANKS?
President-elect Barack Obama is assembling a deeply experienced team of top economic advisers whose key members firmly believe limited government spending combined with free markets can create lasting prosperity.
But those advisers will take over at a moment Obama says requires just the opposite: New financial regulations and generally unthinkable levels of deficit spending are in the offing as the new administration prepares to battle the most severe economic downturn since the Great Depression.
"Right now, our economy is trapped in a vicious cycle. The turmoil on Wall Street means a new round of belt-tightening for families and businesses on Main Street, and as folks produce less and consume less, that just deepens the problems in our financial markets," Obama said in introducing his economic team at a news conference Monday. "These extraordinary stresses on our financial system require extraordinary policy responses."
To fashion government's response, Obama has turned to people who have been associated with more market-oriented approaches. Timothy F. Geithner, 47, Obama's choice for Treasury secretary, is president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and has been a key player in negotiations aimed at saving some of the nations' largest financial institutions.
Lawrence H. Summers, whom Obama tapped to direct his National Economic Council, served eight years in the Clinton administration, including a year and a half as Treasury secretary. http://www.montereyherald.com/ci_11069215?source=rss
Reporting from Islamabad, Pakistan — Pakistan's powerful spy agency, the Directorate of Inter-Services Intelligence, has quietly shut down a unit that for decades spied on domestic politicians and exerted shadowy influence in affairs of state.
Analysts described the decision to deactivate the ISI's "political wing" as the latest in a series of steps meant to separate the army and the security apparatus from domestic politics -- and also to rehabilitate the spy agency's battered public image. http://fairuse.100webcustomers.com/itsonlyfair/latimes0557.html
Amid driving monsoon rain, a bitter and bloody battle is being fought for one of the Tamil Tigers' last strongholds – a battle that could mark a decisive turning point in Sri Lanka's 25-year-old civil war. Government troops, buoyed by their recent capture of the entire western coast of the island, have been pressing to take control of the northern town of Kilinochchi. The town has been the Tigers' de facto headquarters and they are fighting desperately to hold on to it. In recent days, scores of troops on both sides have reportedly been killed.
Sri Lanka's President, Mahinda Rajapaksa, elected three years ago, has been adamant in his determination to destroy the Tigers.
Despite the increasingly violent "final showdowns" that Thailand's antigovernment protesters have carried out this week, the months-old movement appears to be losing steam.
On Tuesday, members of the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) clashed with government supporters and continued besieging Don Muang airport, where government officials had set up a temporary office. They also swarmed Thailand's main international airport and blocked the road to it in anticipation of Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat's return Wednesday, forcing all departing flights to be suspended.
But the PAD's self-declared "last war" – which follows months of disruptive protests – failed to achieve its goals of compelling the government to step down or of triggering a military coup. Meanwhile, the PAD's ranks are thinning as followers weary of the prolonged turmoil. http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/1126/p04s01-woap.html
