C E B O . org

Posted 9:02 PM by The Moderator

BBC NEWS
"Wars 'useful', says US army chief

[Someone should send this psychopath the UN charter - Mary]

Schoomaker wants to free up more troops for combat
The head of the United States army has said that the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan have provided a 'tremendous focus' for the military.
General Peter Schoomaker said in an interview with AP news agency that the wars had allowed the army to instil its soldiers with a 'warrior ethos'. "
{He also said what was the use of training if you never got to fight .. }

Posted 10:04 PM by The Moderator

Afghans Say U.S. Air Raid Killed 11 Civilians, Including Children: "Afghans Say U.S. Air Raid Killed 11 Civilians, Including Children. Tuesday, January 20, 2004

A U.S. air raid in southern Afghanistan on Sunday night killed 11 villagers, among them four children, Afghan officials said yesterday. The U.S. military said it killed five militants in the weekend raid, but did not mention civilian casualties.
Abdul Rahman, chief of Char Chino district in Uruzgan, said the attack occurred in the village of Saghatho, where he said U.S. forces hunting for insurgents had conducted searches and made several arrests.

He said the victims were outside a house and a helicopter was hovering nearby when 'a big plane came and dropped bombs.'

'They were simple villagers, they were not Taliban. I don't know why the U.S. bombed this home,' he said, according to Associated Press."

Posted 9:51 AM by The Moderator

Responsibility to Protect
Preventing Conflicts, Protecting Civilians Project - R2P:
"Humanitarian intervention has been controversial both when it happens, and when it has failed to happen. Rwanda in 1994 laid bare the full horror of inaction. The UN Secretariat and some permanent members of the Security Council knew that officials were planning genocide; UN forces were present and credible strategies were available to prevent, or at least greatly mitigate, the slaughter which followed. But the Security Council refused to take the necessary action…Kosovo, where intervention did take place in 1999, raised major questions about the legitimacy of military intervention in a sovereign state.'
Excerpt from “The Responsibility to Protect” report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, December 2001
The United Nations and individual governments have a responsibility to protect the world’s citizens from the threat of large scale loss of life. We cannot permit another crisis like Rwanda, Kosovo, Cambodia, Uganda, and untold others to develop. At the same time, we cannot continue to allow military action to be presented as the only viable response.
WFM’s Preventing Conflicts, Protecting Civilians project aims to deepen the debate about these issues, and to help ensure that the United Nations and individual governments respond earlier and more effectively to emerging crises. "

Posted 9:57 AM by The Moderator

http://www.ceip.org/
WMD IN IRAQ: Evidence and Implications

Summary of New Carnegie Report on WMD in IRAQ

WMD in IRAQ: Evidence and Implications, a new study from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, details what the U.S. and international intelligence communities understood about Iraq's weapons programs before the war and outlines policy reforms to improve threat assessments, deter transfer of WMD to terrorists, strengthen the UN weapons inspection process, and avoid politicization of the intelligence process.

The report distills a massive amount of data into side-by-side comparisons of pre-war intelligence, the official presentation of that intelligence, and what is now known about Iraq's programs.

The authors of the report are: Jessica T. Mathews, president; George Perkovich, vice president for studies, and Joseph Cirincione, senior associate and non-proliferation project director of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

SUMMARY OF RECOMMENDATIONS
Changes to U.S. Policy
· Revise the National Security Strategy to eliminate a U.S. policy of unilateral preventive war, i.e., preemptive war in absence of imminent threat.
· Create a nonpartisan, independent commission to establish a clearer picture of what the intelligence community knew and believed it knew about Iraq's weapons program.
· Consider changing the post of Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) from a political appointment to a career appointment, based on the outcomes of the independent commission.
· Make the security of poorly protected nuclear weapons and stockpiles of plutonium and highly enriched uranium a much higher priority for national security policy.

International Action
· The United States and United Nations should together produce a complete history and inventory of Iraq's WMD and missile programs.
· The UN Secretary General should commission a high-level analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of the WMD inspection processes in Iraq, and how inspections could be strengthened in the future.
· The UN Security Council should consider creating a permanent, international, nonproliferation inspection capability.
. Make the transfer of WMD a violation of international law.

Changes to Threat Assessments
· Recognize distinctions in the degree of threat posed by the different forms of "weapons of mass destruction" - chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons pose vastly different risks and cost-benefit calculations of actions to combat them.
· Recognize red flags indicating that sound intelligence practices are not being followed.
· Examine and debate the assertion that the combined threat of evil states and terrorism calls for acting on the basis of worst-case reasoning.
· Examine assumption that states will likely transfer WMD to terrorists.

SUMMARY OF KEY FINDINGS
:
Iraq WMD Was Not An Immediate Threat
· Iraq's nuclear program had been suspended for many years; Iraq focused on
preserving a latent, dual-use chemical and probably biological weapons capability, not weapons production.
· Iraqi nerve agents had lost most of their lethality as early as 1991.
· Operations Desert Storm and Desert Fox, and UN inspections and sanctions
effectively destroyed Iraq's large-scale chemical weapon production capabilities.

Inspections Were Working
· Post-war searches suggest the UN inspections were on track to find what was there.
· International constraints, sanctions, procurement, investigations, and the export / import control mechanism appear to have been considerably more
effective than was thought.

Intelligence Failed and Was Misrepresented
· Intelligence community overestimated the chemical and biological weapons in Iraq.
· Intelligence community appears to have been unduly influenced by policymakers' views.
: · Officials misrepresented threat from Iraq's WMD and ballistic missiles programs over and above intelligence findings.

Terrorist Connection Missing
· No solid evidence of cooperative relationship between Saddam's government
and Al Qaeda.
· No evidence that Iraq would have transferred WMD to terrorists - and much
evidence to counter it.
· No evidence to suggest that deterrence was no longer operable.

Post-War WMD Search Ignored Key Resources
· Past relationships with Iraqi scientists and officials, and credibility of UNMOVIC experts represent a vital resource that has been ignored when it should be being fully exploited.
· Data from the seven years of UNSCOM/IAEA inspections are absolutely essential. Direct involvement of those who compiled the more-than-30-million- page record is needed.

War Was Not the Best-Or Only-Option
· There were at least two options preferable to a war undertaken without
international support: allowing the UNMOVIC/IAEA inspections to continue until obstructed or completed, or imposing a tougher program of "coercive inspections."

Download the report at http://www.ceip.org/WMD or contact Maura Keaney at
202-939-2372 or mkeaney@ceip.org.

Posted 8:55 AM by The Moderator

Haaretz Article: "IDF offers foreign armies: pay per training

By Amos Harel
The IDF is offering foreign armed forces training sessions in the training center for field units in the Ze'elim base. The move is intended to improve the relations with friendly states' armies as well as bring income into the IDF's empty coffers. "