PNAC Rebuilding America's Senses

[blackcat]

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8545414779301935419

This is an interesting lecture which just about covers everything which has caused the present state of affairs in the USA. Like Alex Jones without the histrionics.

[kbo234]

Absolutely brilliant lecture. Lots of detail here that was new to me. Sensible advice re actions and types of approach we should take.

[Reflecter]

I just discovered this last night after popping back to DL's 'Roy Shivers' myspace site. An amazing lecture that condenses everything so well.

Question is, does anyone know if this is obtainable in hard copy DVD form as the google version appears immune to download tools? This needs to get spread around.

Im also interested in the OKC research of another speaker.

I gather a recent hit piece film utilised this conferences footage, to argue points over but as far as I am concerned, D. L. Abrahamson is a spokesmen for the campaign bar none.

[frenchconnection]

Project for A New American Century, page 51

"Further, the process of transformation,
even if it brings revolutionary change, is
likely to be a long one, absent some
catastrophic and catalyzing event – like a
new Pearl Harbor. Domestic politics and
industrial policy will shape the pace and
content of transformation as much as the
requirements of current missions."

9 11 was an inside job, and it must be classified as a
"new Pearl Harbor" for our purpose to analyse what is behind the PNAC text in the optic to analyse their aims : control Space and cyberspace.

I will developp the first one : Space.

[frenchconnection]

1. History concerning Space Control.

"Various technical, economic and political problems led to the ABM treaty of 1972, which restricted the deployment of strategic (not tactical) anti-ballistic missiles.

Under the ABM treaty and a 1974 revision, each country was allowed to deploy a single ABM system with only 100 interceptors to protect a single target. The Soviets deployed a system named A-35 (using Galosh interceptors), designed to protect Moscow. The U.S. deployed Safeguard (using Spartan/Sprint interceptors) to defend ballistic missile sites at Grand Forks Air Force Base, North Dakota, in 1975. The U.S. Safeguard system was only briefly operational. The Russian system (now called A-135) has been improved and is still active around Moscow.

On June 13, 2002, the United States withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and subsequently recommenced developing missile defense systems that would have formerly been prohibited by the bilateral treaty. This action was taken under the auspices of needing to defend against the possibility of a missile attack conducted by a rogue state."
<wikipedia>

Reason for the United Statesian to withdraw from the ABM treaty, they are saying : "defend against the possibility of a missile attack conducted by a rogue state".
Yes it is right Irak at this time is a very dangerous enemy which has got many chemical bombs, even nuclear bombs (WMD), and a lot of oil by the way.

From this date, United Statesian have got the "international law" right to developp futher military projects such as the old Reagan "Stars Wars" project.

[scubadiver]

Video not available

[alfsevic]

If this is the lecture from D. L. Abrahamson "Rebuilding America's Senses" I downloaded it last year, and noticed it was removed shortly afterwards. I expect he came to close for comfort. If anyone can advise where I could upload, it should be no problem.

[frenchconnection]

2. Vreeland case

Very controversial topic, because very important to understand that 1. Vreeland and others knew 911 before the date, 2. America wants to control Space (PNAC- REBUILDING AMERICA’S DEFENSES Strategy, Forces and Resources) For a New Century

[frenchconnection]

Interview difficult to download from internet, because Very important doc in order to tie it with Rebuilding America defenses.

FTW interview: Delmart "Mike"
Vreeland
What the CIA doesn't want you to know
By Michael C. Ruppert
[Ed. Note: Just prior to the publication of this article the FTW
(From the Wilderness) web site was hacked for the second
time in a month. This hacking—accomplished via
sophisticated methods—has been apparently intended to
prevent us from publishing the following interview. As a
temporary emergency measure ONLY please direct
emergency e-mail correspondence to
mikeruppert@earthlink.net. FTW will be back up and running
in an even more secure manner in the near future.— MCR]

LET US SEE THE QUESTIONS, especially n#3 :

[frenchconnection]

I have asked him 35 questions, and now you can read
Mike Vreeland's answers as he speaks for himself. The
first 32 questions were jointly submitted to both
Vreeland and his attorney, Paul Slansky, for review.
The remaining three questions were asked after the most
recent hacking of FTW's website, which we believe
was perpetrated by the CIA. This made the publication
of this story an emergency and also made a statement
about the survival of a free press in America:

1. What part of the U.S. government did you work for?
Was it the CIA?
I worked for U.S. Naval intelligence. What the CIA
directs us to do is their business, so we have no way of
knowing whether we're working for them or not.

2. Was your assignment primarily connected to
terrorism/oil?
Yes, on both issues, in part.

3. Why were you in Moscow and Russia in the latter
part of 2000?
I was sent there by the U.S. government and the ONI
[Office of Naval Intelligence]. I got my orders between
Sept. 4 and Sept. 7, 2000.
Marc Bastien departed for Russia on Sept. 7, 2000. I
had orders to meet him. Bastien was going to work at
the Canadian embassy regarding diagrams and
blueprints of a weapons defense system. The U.S.
government had a direct influence on his mission. The
name of the defense system is SSST [Stealth Satellite
System Terminator]. There are five different individual
and unique defensive and strike capabilities of the
system. The only portion that I have publicly spoken on
is one frame regarding actual current orbiting satellites,
which are not at this time owned by the US government.
On advice of counsel I cannot discuss the other
components.This one component is a satellite system. Within the
confines of the system there are multiple, deployable
space/orbital EMP [Electromagnetic Pulse] missiles
that are not aimed at the ground. They are targeted at
everyone else's satellites. These would kill worldwide
communications. The satellites of some countries that
are shielded with titanium are protected from these
weapons. The protected countries are Russia and
China, but U.S. satellites are vulnerable and Putin has
told Bush that the U.S. missile defense system doesn't
work, and that Bush knows it.
The reason why I went to Russia was because I needed
to meet with Bastien and another individual from the
Russian Ministry of Defense named Oleg. The purpose
was to get the Canadian diplomat who had made contact
with Oleg to get the book of designs out of the ministry's
R&D. That was done. We copied the entire book. Then
we took certain documents, and we changed serious
portions of the defense design so the program wouldn't
work. They know this now.
Additionally I was to pick up docs from other agents
and bring them back.

[Jayhawk]

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6546428322176715714

[frenchconnection]

Vreeland is not a technician, he is giving a description of the america ABM system and most of all he is specifying that the satellites used are civil-type.
His statements are coming exactly together with our technical analysis of this system.
Indeed if there are civil type satellites, then the used technologies used are really lower power, there is other choice, and we are thionine that America army is really using lower power devices for the detection.

This is making credible for us the overall statements from Vreeland.
He couldn4t make up a technical point that much accurate, and moreover which is at the widespread opposite opinion of the spatial analysts.
Hence Vreeland is well saying the truth too, when he is saying things about internal CIA informations about 11 Sept bombings planning.

During his captivity, Vreeland wanted to pass a message outside : he had got no reasons to speak about the american spatial system, he spoke about ABM america system, only to give eighties and crédibilité about his staements concerning 11 Sept.
What he wanted to say is : « check if what i am saying about ABM is right and that no body said anything about it before me, you will see that I have said only the truth, like I ve said the truth on 11 Sept business.

Saying that the satellites are not the american government property, Vreeland put us without any doubts on WorldSpace track. He is adding besides an essential point : the satellites are Stealth type.
How can we explain the stealth of a civil satellite, for which the fréquence plans are inévitable publics ?

The only possibilité to garentee a stealth radar signal is exactely to use a technology called Spread Spectrum Multiple Access- SSMA is used commonly for localisation by the GPS. This technology is too, radar liaison balance speaking, the only way to compensate for the lower power and the distance between civils géostationnaire satellites such as Worldspace. Stealth is coming from the fact that radar signal is hiden by a numeric radio signal.
All that, Vreeland who is not technician, couldn’t make it up.
Placing us Worldspace track, Vreeland know that he is putting us on Mahfouz track.

[frenchconnection]

WorldSpace uses its two satellites, AfriStar™ and AsiaStar™, to broadcast digital-quality audio channels to people around the world who want world-class programming that is not available or rarely found on local regional or national terrestrial radio. Each satellite has three beams and each beam is able to send up to 80 channels directly to portable satellite radios. Inside each WorldSpace digital satellite radio is a proprietary chipset designed to lock onto the WorldSpace satellite signal in your region of the world.

No other option provides the variety of programming that WorldSpace offers. Also, each WorldSpace satellite radio is equipped with a data port that transforms it into a wireless modem able to download data to personal computers at rates of up to 128kbps. Thus, the WorldSpace satellite radio can also broadcast multimedia content.

The WorldSpace digital satellite signal means no fading, noise or interference. The system delivers high quality digital sound in a coverage area of 14 million square kilometers. As long as you're in line of sight with the satellite, you'll never lose the WorldSpace signal.

Source www.WorldSpace.com website

[frenchconnection]

WorldSpace Seeks to Become 'Voice From Home'
Few people are watching XM Satellite Radio and Sirius as closely as Noah A. Samara.
"We literally founded this industry," the chairman and CEO of WorldSpace said during a recent visit I made to the company's headquarters on N Street in northwest Washington.
Right now, virtually all U.S. media stories about satellite radio focus on XM and Sirius. But WorldSpace, which the Ethiopian-born Samara founded in 1990 at age 34 and which began satellite audio services in 1999, seems to be at a critical point in its own growth.
Samara is majority owner of WorldSpace, which is backed by private venture capital. His initial money came from Saudi investors.

Forbes reported in 2002 that those backers had grown restless, with one trying oust Samara; instead, it stated, he wound up taking over most of the company and continued to seek the path to profitability. Those efforts apparently continue.
The company has approximately 300 employees, 80 or so in Washington. It broadcasts an MP3-encoded signal on the L Band in approximately 100 dialects and languages via its AfriStar and AsiaStar satellites.

Source : http://www.rwonline.com/reference-room/special-report/04_rw_page_4_feb _1.shtml

[frenchconnection]

WorldSpace gets another $40M cash infusion
Wednesday, January 2, 2008 at 2:52 PM

This cash infusion will help in WorldSpace's preparations for the launch of its European mobile service in the Italian market and business development activities in selected markets. Meanwhile WorldSpace is continuing to look for additional financing from a variety of sources, including existing and new investors.
WorldSpace also announced it had secured a waiver of certain pre-payment obligations owed to the holders of its existing debt.
Now here's where it gets interesting:
Yenura is a "special purpose entity" established by both WorldSpace CEO Noah Samara and an initial investor in WorldSpace, Salah Idris. That "special purpose" is to invest in WorldSpace, the company reported. Samara holds all of the voting shares in Yenura. But Idris, through his ownership of non-voting shares, holds the major economic interest in Yenura.

[frenchconnection]

Previous text Source : http://www.orbitcast.com/archives/worldspace-gets-a-40m-cash-infusion. html

"The largest factor in our ability to raise money in the late '90s and in the early years of this decade was the size of our debt. We were carrying around $1.5 billion," Frickel said. WorldSpace also faced questions about three of its backers. Saudi investors Mohammed H. Al Amoudi, one of the world's richest men, and Khalid Bin Mahfouz, a former chief operating officer of the Bank of Credit and Commerce International, had provided about $1 billion to WorldSpace. Both men have been named as defendants in lawsuits filed by relatives of victims of the Sept. 11 attacks. The suits accused them of financially supporting the al Qaeda terrorist network -- a charge both men have denied.

As a result of the debt restructuring, Al Amoudi, the Bin Mahfouz family and Idris no longer hold any direct debt or equity interest in WorldSpace or have any voting control. However, in the event that WorldSpace makes a profit between now and 2015, the company has to pay a royalty to Stonehouse Capital Ltd., a company controlled by two sons of Bin Mahfouz, according to the company's SEC filing. Under a recent agreement, Idris holds only non-voting shares in Yenura, a company that owns shares in WorldSpace. Yenura is controlled by WorldSpace founder and chief executive Noah Samara, who is the company's major shareholder.

Source : http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/04/18/AR2005 041801894.html

[frenchconnection]

A, B, C Only developped briefly in this topic in order to limit range of legs and keep the main track.

A) Salah Idris // "Our forces ... attacked a factory in Sudan associated with the bin Laden network," President Clinton told the world on August 20, 1998. "The factory was involved in the production of materials for chemical weapons."
Wrong on both counts, says the plant's owner Salah Idris , and he's setting out to prove it. The president was referring to a cruise missile strike, which, together with another on Afghanistan, he ordered in retaliation for the bombing of two U.S. embassies in East Africa, bombings that were allegedly authored by reputed super-terrorist Osama bin Laden.
Source http://edition.cnn.com/2000/WORLD/africa/07/28/factory7_28.a.tm/

B) Khalid Bin Mahfouz // In US Senate testimony in 1998, CIA Director James Woolsey stated that bin Mahfouz's sister is a wife of Osama bin Laden, making the two brothers-in-law.
Bin Mahfouz was a non-executive director of Bank of Credit and Commerce International, a financial conglomerate later convicted of money laundering, bribery, support of terrorism, arms trafficking, and many other crimes.[

Source wikipedia

C) Mohammed H. Al-Amoudi
He is a Saudi Arabian /Ethiopian business magnate who lives in Ethiopia and Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. In 2008, Forbes magazine ranks Mohammed Al Amoudi as the 77th richest person in the world[3] with a net worth of $9 billion.

Source wikipedia

[frenchconnection]

Looking at the accountability of WorldSpace, it is a project which is spending tremendous money without earning subsequent revenues.
On top of this point the personalities involved in this company supposed to deliver radio to the World are linked to Oil or US governement interests.

--> This is one example of a Black Project

"In the United States a black project is a classified military/defense project, unacknowledged by the government, military personnel, and defense contractors. Familiar examples of U.S. military aircraft developed as black projects are the F-117 stealth fighter and B-2 stealth bomber, which were highly classified and denied to exist until ready to be announced to the public."

Source definition : Wikipedia

[frenchconnection]

William Schneider Jr

1. Director at
WorldSpace, Incorporated
n/a, Maryland
SERVICES / BROADCASTING - RADIO
Director since January 2005
William Schneider, Jr. has been a director of WorldSpace since January 2005. He is a Washington, D.C. based economist and defense analyst, is President of International Planning Services, Inc., an international trade and finance advisory firm, and an Adjunct Fellow of the Hudson Institute. From 1981 to 1982, he served as the Associate Director for National Security and International Affairs at the Office of Management and Budget and from 1982 to 1986, as Under Secretary of State for Security Assistance, Science and Technology. Subsequent to his government service, Dr. Schneider served, from 1987 to 1993, as an advisor to the U.S. government in several capacities, including Chairman of the President"s General Advisory Committee on Arms Control and Disarmament, and is currently Chairman of the Defense Science Board of the Department of Defense as well as a member of the Defense Trade Advisory Group of the Department of State. He is the author of several works on defense policy, including Why IBM? Policy Issues in the Missile Defense Controversy (1969), and Arms, Men, and Military Budgets, an annual review of defense budget issues, and has also published numerous articles and monographs.

Source : http://www.forbes.com/finance/mktguideapps/personinfo/FromPersonIdPers onTearsheet.jhtml?passedPersonId=865607

2. William Schneider, Jr. is an American politician who currently chairs the Defense Science Board.

Schneider served as Under-Secretary of State in the Reagan administration, and later became a member of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC). He was one of the signers of the January 26, 1998, PNAC Letter sent to President Bill Clinton that encouraged an attack against Iraq. In that same year he served on the Commission to Assess the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States, which came to the conclusion that Iraq could develop a ballistic missile capable of striking the US in ten years.

In January of 2001, as George W. Bush prepared to take office, Schneider served on a panel for nuclear weapons issues sponsored by the National Institute for Public Policy, a conservative think tank. Other members of the panel included Stephen Hadley, Stephen Cambone, and Robert Joseph, who later were appointed to senior positions in the Bush Administration. This panel advocated using tactical nuclear weapons as a standard part of the United States defense arsenal.

In 2001 he was appointed by the senate to the Commission on the Future of the United States Aerospace Industry.

Schneider was selected by Donald Rumsfeld to chair the Defense Science Board. In this position, Schneider continues to advocate using nuclear weapons in certain limited first-strike situations.

Source : wikipedia

[Mark Gobell]

[Ragondin]

The attack towers of the World Trade Center and Pentagon on September 11, 2001, justified the release of USA from the ABM Treaty of 1972.

The announcement of the withdrawal was made public on December 13, 2001, following the terrible attacks of September 11. Indeed, a clause in the ABM treaty provided for its denunciation as a result of "extraordinary events". Coming to suffer a terrorist attack as it had never existed such so far, considering themselves at war and wanting to protect themselves, the USA then demanded a freedom of action that the ABM treaty can not qu'entraver. Tuesday, June 12, 2002 in Madrid, President George W. Bush asserts that the Treaty of 1972 is now "a relic of the past." The next day the USA are officially and fully emerged from the ABM treaty in the context of the new war against international terrorism. This unilateral withdrawal removed the lock that prevented any revival of anti-missile shield. Not only the latter found an event, but now it is the U.S. Navy who is in a central position in what has now succeeded the IDS program: the National Missile Defense implementation by the Missile Defense Agency (MDA).

[Ragondin]

Remarks by the President to Students and Faculty at National Defense University
www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/05/20010501-10.html
Fort Lesley J. Mcnair
Washington, D.C.

2:40 P.M. EDT

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much, Mr. Secretary. I appreciate you being here. I also want to thank Secretary Powell for being here as well. My National Security Advisor, Condi Rice is here, as well as the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Myers. I appreciate Admiral Clark and General Ryan here, for being here as well. But most of all, I want to thank you, Admiral Gaffney, and the students for NDU for having me here today.


For almost 100 years, this campus has served as one of our country's premier centers for learning and thinking about America's national security. Some of America's finest soldiers have studied here: Dwight Eisenhower and Colin Powell. Some of America's finest statesmen have taught here; George Kennan. Today, you're carrying on this proud tradition forward, continuing to train tomorrow's generals, admirals and other national security thinkers, and continuing to provide the intellectual capital for our nation's strategic vision.

This afternoon, I want us to thank back some 30 years to a far different time in a far different world. The United States and the Soviet Union were locked in a hostile rivalry. The Soviet Union was our unquestioned enemy; a highly-armed threat to freedom and democracy. Far more than that wall in Berlin divided us.

Our highest ideal was -- and remains -- individual liberty. Theirs was the construction of a vast communist empire. Their totalitarian regime held much of Europe captive behind an iron curtain.

We didn't trust them, and for good reason. Our deep differences were expressed in a dangerous military confrontation that resulted in thousands of nuclear weapons pointed at each other on hair-trigger alert. Security of both the United States and the Soviet Union was based on a grim premise: that neither side would fire nuclear weapons at each other, because doing so would mean the end of both nations.

We even went so far as to codify this relationship in a 1972 ABM Treaty, based on the doctrine that our very survival would best be insured by leaving both sides completely open and vulnerable to nuclear attack. The threat was real and vivid. The Strategic Air Command had an airborne command post called the Looking Glass, aloft 24 hours a day, ready in case the President ordered our strategic forces to move toward their targets and release their nuclear ordnance.

The Soviet Union had almost 1.5 million troops deep in the heart of Europe, in Poland and Czechoslovakia, Hungary and East Germany. We used our nuclear weapons not just to prevent the Soviet Union from using their nuclear weapons, but also to contain their conventional military forces, to prevent them from extending the Iron Curtain into parts of Europe and Asia that were still free.

In that world, few other nations had nuclear weapons and most of those who did were responsible allies, such as Britain and France. We worried about the proliferation of nuclear weapons to other countries, but it was mostly a distant threat, not yet a reality.

Today, the sun comes up on a vastly different world. The Wall is gone, and so is the Soviet Union. Today's Russia is not yesterday's Soviet Union. Its government is no longer Communist. Its president is elected. Today's Russia is not our enemy, but a country in transition with an opportunity to emerge as a great nation, democratic, at peace with itself and its neighbors. The Iron Curtain no longer exists. Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic are free nations, and they are now our allies in NATO, together with a reunited Germany.

Yet, this is still a dangerous world, a less certain, a less predictable one. More nations have nuclear weapons and still more have nuclear aspirations. Many have chemical and biological weapons. Some already have developed the ballistic missile technology that would allow them to deliver weapons of mass destruction at long distances and at incredible speeds. And a number of these countries are spreading these technologies around the world.

Most troubling of all, the list of these countries includes some of the world's least-responsible states. Unlike the Cold War, today's most urgent threat stems not from thousands of ballistic missiles in the Soviet hands, but from a small number of missiles in the hands of these states, states for whom terror and blackmail are a way of life. They seek weapons of mass destruction to intimidate their neighbors, and to keep the United States and other responsible nations from helping allies and friends in strategic parts of the world.

When Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990, the world joined forces to turn him back. But the international community would have faced a very different situation had Hussein been able to blackmail with nuclear weapons. Like Saddam Hussein, some of today's tyrants are gripped by an implacable hatred of the United States of America. They hate our friends, they hate our values, they hate democracy and freedom and individual liberty. Many care little for the lives of their own people. In such a world, Cold War deterrence is no longer enough.

To maintain peace, to protect our own citizens and our own allies and friends, we must seek security based on more than the grim premise that we can destroy those who seek to destroy us. This is an important opportunity for the world to re-think the unthinkable, and to find new ways to keep the peace.

Today's world requires a new policy, a broad strategy of active nonproliferation, counterproliferation and defenses. We must work together with other like-minded nations to deny weapons of terror from those seeking to acquire them. We must work with allies and friends who wish to join with us to defend against the harm they can inflict. And together we must deter anyone who would contemplate their use.

We need new concepts of deterrence that rely on both offensive and defensive forces. Deterrence can no longer be based solely on the threat of nuclear retaliation. Defenses can strengthen deterrence by reducing the incentive for proliferation.

We need a new framework that allows us to build missile defenses to counter the different threats of today's world. To do so, we must move beyond the constraints of the 30 year old ABM Treaty. This treaty does not recognize the present, or point us to the future. It enshrines the past. No treaty that prevents us from addressing today's threats, that prohibits us from pursuing promising technology to defend ourselves, our friends and our allies is in our interests or in the interests of world peace.

This new framework must encourage still further cuts in nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons still have a vital role to play in our security and that of our allies. We can, and will, change the size, the composition, the character of our nuclear forces in a way that reflects the reality that the Cold War is over.

I am committed to achieving a credible deterrent with the lowest-possible number of nuclear weapons consistent with our national security needs, including our obligations to our allies. My goal is to move quickly to reduce nuclear forces. The United States will lead by example to achieve our interests and the interests for peace in the world.

Several months ago, I asked Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld to examine all available technologies and basing modes for effective missile defenses that could protect the United States, our deployed forces, our friends and our allies. The Secretary has explored a number of complementary and innovative approaches.

The Secretary has identified near-term options that could allow us to deploy an initial capability against limited threats. In some cases, we can draw on already established technologies that might involve land-based and sea-based capabilities to intercept missiles in mid-course or after they re-enter the atmosphere. We also recognize the substantial advantages of intercepting missiles early in their flight, especially in the boost phase.

The preliminary work has produced some promising options for advanced sensors and interceptors that may provide this capability. If based at sea or on aircraft, such approaches could provide limited, but effective, defenses.

We have more work to do to determine the final form the defenses might take. We will explore all these options further. We recognize the technological difficulties we face and we look forward to the challenge. Our nation will assign the best people to this critical task.

We will evaluate what works and what does not. We know that some approaches will not work. We also know that we will be able to build on our successes. When ready, and working with Congress, we will deploy missile defenses to strengthen global security and stability.

I've made it clear from the very beginning that I would consult closely on the important subject with our friends and allies who are also threatened by missiles and weapons of mass destruction.

Today, I'm announcing the dispatch of high-level representatives to Allied capitals in Europe, Asia, Australia and Canada to discuss our common responsibility to create a new framework for security and stability that reflects the world of today. They will begin leaving next week.

The delegations will be headed by three men on this stage: Rich Armitage, Paul Wolfowitz, and Steve Hadley; Deputies of the State Department, the Defense Department and the National Security staff. Their trips will be part of an ongoing process of consultation, involving many people and many levels of government, including my Cabinet Secretaries.

These will be real consultations. We are not presenting our friends and allies with unilateral decisions already made. We look forward to hearing their views, the views of our friends, and to take them into account.

We will seek their input on all the issues surrounding the new strategic environment. We'll also need to reach out to other interested states, including China and Russia. Russia and the United States should work together to develop a new foundation for world peace and security in the 21st century. We should leave behind the constraints of an ABM Treaty that perpetuates a relationship based on distrust and mutual vulnerability. This Treaty ignores the fundamental breakthroughs in technology during the last 30 years. It prohibits us from exploring all options for defending against the threats that face us, our allies and other countries.

That's why we should work together to replace this Treaty with a new framework that reflects a clear and clean break from the past, and especially from the adversarial legacy of the Cold War. This new cooperative relationship should look to the future, not to the past. It should be reassuring, rather than threatening. It should be premised on openness, mutual confidence and real opportunities for cooperation, including the area of missile defense. It should allow us to share information so that each nation can improve its early warning capability, and its capability to defend its people and territory. And perhaps one day, we can even cooperate in a joint defense.

I want to complete the work of changing our relationship from one based on a nuclear balance of terror, to one based on common responsibilities and common interests. We may have areas of difference with Russia, but we are not and must not be strategic adversaries. Russia and America both face new threats to security. Together, we can address today's threats and pursue today's opportunities. We can explore technologies that have the potential to make us all safer.

This is a time for vision; a time for a new way of thinking; a time for bold leadership. The Looking Glass no longer stands its 24-hour-day vigil. We must all look at the world in a new, realistic way, to preserve peace for generations to come.

[Ragondin]

For Donald Rumsfeld, the events of September 11 constituted a "divine surprise", according to the expression used by the fascists french defeat when their permit to overthrow "the Gueuse" and confer full powers to Philippe Pétain.

On 11 September, 18 h 42, Donald Rumsfeld gave a press conference at the Pentagon [2]. To demonstrate the unity of America in these difficult times, leading Democrats and Republicans on the Senate Committee on Defence had joined him. There was no news of President Bush and the world looked with concern the U.S. response. But in the middle of the conference, in front of the cameras of the international press, Donald Rumsfeld took part in Senator Carl Levin (D-Michigan): "You, as well as other representatives Democrats in Congress have expressed concern not have the means to finance the significant increase in defence budgets requested by the Pentagon, including anti-missile defence. You are afraid of having to dip into the funds of Social Security to fund this effort. Does that the type of events that has happened is enough to convince you that it is urgent for the country to increase spending on its defence and, if necessary, it will draw on funds of Homeland Security Social pay for military spending - increased military spending? "

Faced with an opponent-which was not then formally identified-such a display of dissension, represents a major fault for a political leader. Also Senator Lévin he answered briefly recalling that the Commission on Defence was unanimous on many issues including the conscience of budgetary needs.

[Ragondin]

Pnac and ABM

But since a system installed in space was a violation
the ABM treaty, the administration has put an end to
program "Brilliant Pebbles", choosing the
place to continue with a radar intercept
ground-based system that will not be expensive
particularly effective.

The system
Theatre de la Marine is based on the system
Aegis radar with an improved version and a more
Quick missile normal, although voluntarily
slow to respond to the concern of policy
material breach of the ABM Treaty

Compliance by the Clinton administration from the ABM Treaty (Anti-Ballistic Missile) of 1972 has prevented
development of ballistic missile defences that would have been very useful

In fact, the distinction made by the Clinton administration
between the defence theatre and the national territory
is still a legacy of the ABM treaty that does
not meet the current strategic situation.
Moreover, by establishing the distinction between defending
national territory and the defence of theatre,
current projects are creating a gap between the USA
and their allies, which may cause a "decoupling
". Conversely, the interests of USA
will differ from those of our allies if the defences
theatre are able to protect our allies
and deployed forces overseas, then they
leave unprotected the American people on his
own soil

[Ragondin]

The 911 story
http://rightweb.irc-online.org/profile/1535.html
The Project for the New American Century (PNAC) was established in 1997 by a number of leading neoconservative writers and pundits to advocate aggressive U.S. foreign policies and “rally support for American global leadership.”
One of the group’s founding documents claimed, “a Reaganite policy of military strength and moral clarity may not be fashionable today. But it is necessary if the United States is to build on the successes of this past century and to ensure our security and our greatness in the next.”1

PNAC, which phased out most operations by 2006 and let its website expire (possibly temporarily) in May 2008,2 was perhaps best known for its ability to attract divergent political factions behind its foreign policy agenda, which the group repeatedly demonstrated with its numerous sign-on letters and public statements. PNAC forged an influential coalition of rightist political actors in support of its calls for an aggressive “war on terror” aimed largely at the Middle East, including the invasion of Iraq. Although some observers have exaggerated its impact—two scholars, for instance, argued in the Sociological Quarterly that PNAC almost single-handedly “developed, sold, enacted, and justified a war with Iraq” 3 —the group was arguably the most effective proponent of neoconservative ideas during the period between the beginning of President Bill Clinton's second term and President George W. Bush’s 2003 decision to invade Iraq.4

PNAC's 1997 "Statement of Principles" set forth an ambitious agenda for foreign and military policy that William Kristol and Robert Kagan, PNAC’s founders, described as "neo-Reaganite."5 Signatories of this charter document included many leading figures from the Christian Right and other conservative political factions. The statement argued, "We seem to have forgotten the essential elements of the Reagan administration's success: a military that is strong and ready to meet both present and future challenges; a foreign policy that boldly and purposefully promotes American principles abroad; and national leadership that accepts the U.S. global responsibilities."6

Among PNAC's staff and directors were Kristol (chairman), Kagan, Bruce Jackson, Mark Gerson, Randy Scheunemann, Ellen Bork (deputy director), Gary Schmitt (senior fellow), Thomas Donnelly (senior fellow), Reuel Gerecht (director of the Middle East Initiative), Timothy Lehmann, (assistant director), and Michael Goldfarb (research associate).7 In addition, a host of mainly conservative figures supported PNAC’s various sign-on letters and policy statements. (See "A Complete List of PNAC Signatories and Contributing Writers," Right Web.)

Origins and Agenda
Before establishing PNAC, neoconservatives and their allies among hardline nationalists, including Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney, began aggressively promoting ideas meant to replace the militant anticommunism that dominated U.S. policy during much of the Cold War. A key step in this process was the 1995 establishment of the Weekly Standard by two scions of the neoconservative movement—William Kristol (son of Irving) and John Podhoretz (son of Norman). Together with Fred Barnes, a former correspondent for The New Republic, they secured funding from media mogul Rupert Murdoch to support the magazine, which quickly replaced Commentary as the high-profile outlet of neoconservative ideas.

In 1996, Kristol and Kagan wrote an article for Foreign Affairs that become a sort of founding statement for the new neoconservative agenda. Entitled "Toward a Neo-Reaganite Foreign Policy," the article established several pillars of a post-Cold War foreign policy agenda, including maintaining a benevolent hegemony based in part on a willingness to use force unilaterally and preemptively. Kristol and Kagan asked rhetorically: “What should the U.S. role be? Benevolent global hegemony. Having defeated the 'evil empire,' the United States enjoys strategic and ideological predominance. The first objective of U.S. foreign policy should be to preserve and enhance that predominance by strengthening America's security, supporting its friends, advancing its interests, and standing up for its principles around the world."8

The main enemy was internal; in Kagan and Kristol’s opinion, it was “time once again to challenge an indifferent America and a confused American conservatism." They added: "In a world in which peace and American security depend on American power and the will to use it, the main threat the United States faces now and in the future is its own weakness. American hegemony is the only reliable defense against a breakdown of peace and international order. The appropriate goal of American foreign policy, therefore, is to preserve that hegemony as far into the future as possible. To achieve this goal, the United States needs a neo-Reaganite foreign policy of military supremacy and moral confidence."9

PNAC served as an institutional vehicle for advocating the ideas laid out in this article. Housed in the same Washington, D.C. office building as the American Enterprise Institute, PNAC was staffed by a number of emerging neoconservatives who generated statements and open letters on various themes and marshaled the gathering of signatures of elite political actors. The founding of PNAC marked a "complete generational transition" in neoconservatism that occurred somewhere "between the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Bosnian war," write conservative scholars Stefan Halper and Jonathan Clarke in their 2004 book America Alone. "By the later half of the 1990s, Kagan, William Kristol, [Joshua] Muravchik, [Richard] Perle, [and Paul] Wolfowitz ... had assumed the leadership roles that had long been held by Nathan Glazer, Irving Kristol, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, and Norman Podhoretz. The younger neoconservatives had filled a space left by the increasing inability of older neoconservative views to provide a sufficient interpretative framework for the changing realities of international events in the 1990s."10

PNAC's June 1997 statement of principles repeated many of the same goals laid out in Kristol and Kagan’s Foreign Affairs article, including the use of preemptive force. The statement argued that "the history of the 20th century should have taught us that it is important to shape circumstances before crises emerge, and to meet threats before they become dire." Responding to what they saw as the confusion of the Clinton administration, the statement called for a "Reaganite policy of military strength and moral clarity" that would be based on several key pillars. "We need to increase defense spending significantly if we are to carry out our global responsibilities today and modernize our armed forces for the future; we need to strengthen our ties to democratic allies and to challenge regimes hostile to our interests and values; we need to promote the cause of political and economic freedom abroad; we need to accept responsibility for America's unique role in preserving and extending an international order friendly to our security, our prosperity, and our principles."11

Establishing the format that would be used in later PNAC publications, the statement of principles was published letter-style and signed by an impressive list of supporters. Although many of the signatories to the statement of principles (and other PNAC documents) were neoconservatives, young and old—such as Elliott Abrams, Norman Podhoretz, George Wiegel, Midge Decter, Frank Gaffney, and I. Lewis Libby—there were also representatives from other political and social sectors, including Religious Right leaders like Gary Bauer; mainstream Republicans like Steve Forbes, social conservatives like William Bennett; hawkish nationalists like Peter Rodman, Rumsfeld, and Cheney; and prominent academic proponents of some neoconservative ideas like Francis Fukuyama and Eliot Cohen. This range of support demonstrated PNAC’s success as an instrument for building a broader coalition of influential militarists around the neoconservative ideas and objectives of its founders. Nearly a dozen of the original signatories would, some four years later, obtain posts in the George W. Bush administration, including Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Cheney, Paula Dobriansky, Zalmay Khalilzad, Abrams, and Libby.12

In the wake of 9/11, the agenda items outlined in PNAC’s founding statement reemerged in the form of Bush's 2002 National Security Strategy, the definitive statement of the so-called Bush Doctrine.13 As described by leading international relations scholar Robert Jervis, the Bush Doctrine is composed of "a strong belief in the importance of a state's domestic regime in determining its foreign policy and the related judgment that this is an opportune time to transform international politics; the perception of great threats that can be defeated only by new and vigorous policies, most notably preventive war; a willingness to act unilaterally when necessary; and, as both a cause and a summary of these beliefs, an overriding sense that peace and stability require the United States to assert its primacy in world politics."14

Open Letters and Other Publications
PNAC published more than a dozen open letters—usually sent to the president or other public officials—on issues ranging from the defense of Taiwan to the need to overthrow Slobodan Milosevic. Demonstrating PNAC's ability to pull together different elements of the political landscape, some letters were supported by traditionally liberal groups and individuals like the International Crisis Group, Morton Abramowitz, and Morton Halperin, as well as by evangelical Christians, social conservatives, liberal hawks in the Democratic Party, and elite proponents of “realism.”

Among its various concerns PNAC’s first order of business was Iraq, which as George Packer wrote in his 2005 book The Assassins' Gate, would serve "as the test case for [neoconservative] ideas about American power and world leadership."15 Upset over the failure of the first President Bush to oust Saddam Hussein, neoconservatives had long been agitating for more aggressive U.S. action, penning numerous articles on the subject, creating pressure groups like the revived Committee for Peace and Security in the Gulf (whose members included Abrams, Khalilzad, Perle, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, John Bolton, and David Wurmser), and attracting other factions of the Republican establishment to the cause.16 In Iraq, PNAC and its allies apparently saw an opportunity to accomplish two separate but related goals: to show the world that the United States was the dominant global power by undertaking, in the words of Charles Krauthammer, “unapologetic demonstrations of will”17 ; and to begin a dramatic restructuring of the Middle East political landscape along lines consistent with the neoconservatives’ vision for Israeli security, which they had outlined in numerous documents since the mid-1990s.18

In January 1998, PNAC published an open letter to President Bill Clinton arguing that "containment" of Iraq "has been steadily eroding," jeopardizing the region and, potentially, beyond. "Given the magnitude of the threat, the current policy, which depends for its success upon the steadfastness of our coalition partners and upon the cooperation of Saddam Hussein, is dangerously inadequate."19 PNAC followed up a few months later with an open letter to Senate leader Trent Lott (R-MS) and Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (R-GA), arguing that the "only way to protect the United States and its allies from the threat of weapons of mass destruction [is] to put in place policies that would lead to the removal of Saddam and his regime from power."20

Those who signed these letters included many signatories to PNAC’s statement of principles, as well as future realist-inclined Bush administration officials Richard Armitage and Robert Zoellick. PNAC set up a meeting in 1998 between Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, Perle, and Sandy Berger, Clinton's national security advisor, to argue the case for intervention.21 In February 1998, Wolfowitz had testified before the House International Relations Committee that regime change in Iraq was the "only way to rescue the region and the world from the threat" posed by Hussein. Revealing another aspect of neoconservative alliance-building in the years leading up to George W. Bush’s presidency, Wolfowitz added that the United States should recognize "a provisional government of free Iraq," and that the best place to look for such a government was "with the current organization and principles of the Iraqi National Congress."22 Thus, write Halper and Clarke, "in only a few years since the Soviet collapse, neoconservatism had refocused itself as an interventionist lobby intent above all else on waging a second Gulf war.”23

During Clinton's second term, PNAC organized two open letters to the president (the first on Iraq; the second on Milosevic); one letter to congressional leaders (on Iraq); and one general statement (on the "Defense of Taiwan"). (See "A Complete List of PNAC Signatories and Contributing Writers," Right Web.) In 2000, PNAC published a book and a report, both of which were designed as blueprints for a new U.S. foreign and military policy. The book, Present Dangers, included work from many PNAC associates and other neoconservatives; the report, "Rebuilding America's Defenses," written largely by PNAC's Donnelly, offered an agenda for military transformation that echoed many ideas that first gained prominence in the 1992 Draft Defense Policy Guidance.24

In 2001, several individuals associated with PNAC letter-writing campaigns entered the administration of George W. Bush (in particular in the Pentagon and the Office of the Vice President). (See “PNAC Contributors and Signatories from the George W. Bush Administration,” Right Web.) It was not, however, until after 9/11 that the PNAC agenda began to take hold.25

Shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, on September 20, 2001, PNAC issued an open letter to Bush that commended his newly declared “war on terrorism” and urged him not only to target Osama bin Laden but also other supposed "perpetrators," including Saddam Hussein and Hezbollah. The most notorious of PNAC’s many publications, this letter made one of the first arguments for regime change in Iraq as part of the war on terror, arguing that this was necessary even if the Hussein regime was unconnected to the attacks. "It may be that the Iraqi government provided assistance in some form to the recent attack on the United States. But even if evidence does not link Iraq directly to the attack, any strategy aiming at the eradication of terrorism and its sponsors must include a determined effort to remove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq. Failure to undertake such an effort will constitute an early and perhaps decisive surrender in the war on international terrorism."26

The letter also pointed out that to undertake this new war, it would be necessary to inject more money into the U.S. defense budget: "A serious and victorious war on terrorism will require a large increase in defense spending. Fighting this war may well require the United States to engage a well-armed foe, and will also require that we remain capable of defending our interests elsewhere in the world. We urge that there be no hesitation in requesting whatever funds for defense are needed to allow us to win this war." 27

In April 2002, PNAC followed up its push toward war with a letter to Bush on "Israel, Arafat, and the War on Terrorism.” Calling for more assertive action in helping Israel fight terrorism, the letter stated, “Israel’s fight against terrorism is our fight.… For reasons both moral and strategic, we need to stand with Israel in its fight against terrorism.” It argued that “one spoke of the terrorist network consists of Yasser Arafat and the leadership of the Palestinian Authority.… Mr. Arafat has demonstrated time and again that he cannot be part of the peaceful solution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.” The letter also reiterated the call for removing Saddam Hussein from power: “If we do not move against Saddam Hussein and his regime, the damage our Israeli friends and we have suffered until now may someday appear but a prelude to much greater horrors. Moreover, we believe that the surest path to peace in the Middle East lies not through appeasement of Saddam and other local tyrants, but through a renewed commitment on our part, as you suggested in your State of the Union address, to the birth of freedom and democratic government in the Islamic world.”28

Those who signed this letter included social conservatives and Religious Right figures like Gary Bauer as well as liberal hawks like Marshall Wittmann. Richard Perle, Jim Woolsey, Ken Adelman, and Eliot Cohen—neoconservative members of the Defense Policy Board—signed on, as did others from the neoconservative network including Robert and Donald Kagan, Daniel Pipes, Norman Podhoretz, Gary Schmitt, Joshua Muravchik, Reuel Marc Gerecht, Bruce Jackson, William Kristol, Frank Gaffney, and several others.

Two months later, Bush made a dramatic about-face in U.S. policy on Israel and Palestine. After months of tit-for-tat violence between the Israelis and Palestinian militants, which included several large-scale suicide bombings and the decision by the government of Arial Sharon to place Arafat’s headquarters in Ramallah under siege, Bush announced at a Rose Garden press conference on June 24, 2003, that he would no longer negotiate with Arafat and urged Palestinians to elect new leaders who were “not compromised by terror.” Once a democratically elected government was in place, Bush said, the United States would support the creation of a Palestinian state.29 The announcement, which directly contradicted a proposal by Colin Powell to set up an international conference as part of an effort to revive negotiations toward Palestinian-Israeli peace, was “a milestone,” as writer James Mann put it. “For the first time the United States had explicitly abandoned Arafat, declaring that America would support a Palestinian state only if it was not under his leadership.”30

In March 2003, on the first day of the U.S. invasion of Iraq and again nine days later, PNAC issued statements on “post-war Iraq.”31 Notably, these statements included many liberal hawks as signatories and, in the second statement, the grudging acceptance that the United States must look to the international community for help with reconstruction and pacifying the country. One concern of the neoconservatives at the time was the mounting calls for an early exit from Iraq. Said the first statement, “Everyone—those who have joined the coalition, those who have stood aside, those who opposed military action, and, most of all, the Iraqi people and their neighbors—must understand that we are committed to the rebuilding of Iraq and will provide the necessary resources and will remain for as long as it takes.”32

Tom Barry of the International Relations Center wrote that, “Two PNAC letters in March 2003 played to those Democrats who believed that the invasion was justified at least as much by humanitarian concerns as it was by the purported presence of weapons of mass destruction.”33 Signatories to the statements included several Democrats.

On January 28, 2005, PNAC issued its final open letter. Addressed to congressional leaders, it requested that they "take the steps necessary to increase substantially the size of the active duty Army and Marine Corps." At least 25,000 troops a year would be needed to meet what Condoleezza Rice called the country's "generational commitment" to fighting terrorism in the greater Middle East. Turning on some of its erstwhile allies in the Bush administration, like Rumsfeld, the letter stated: "The administration has been reluctant to adapt to this new reality.… We understand the dangers of continued federal deficits and the fiscal difficulty of increasing the number of troops. But the defense of the United States is the first priority of the government."34 This letter was notable for the many liberal hawks and liberal internationalists—Peter Beinart, Paul Kennedy, Will Marshall, Michael O'Hanlon, and James Steinberg—who joined the neoconservatives in signing.

The most recent PNAC report, "Iraq: Setting the Record Straight," published in April 2005, is an apologia for the invasion and war. It concludes that Bush's decision to act "derived from a perception of Saddam's intentions and capabilities, both existing and potential, and was grounded in the reality of Saddam's prior behavior." The authors blame the reporting of the UN inspection teams and U.S. government statements, which they say "left wide gaps in the public understanding of what the president faced on March 18, 2003, and what we have learned since." The report also charged that administration critics "selectively used material in the historical record to reinforce their case against the president's policy."35

PNAC's activities dwindled after 2005, with its activity limited to publishing a few articles by staffers Ellen Bork and Gary Schmitt in the Weekly Standard. In May 2008, news that PNAC’s website closed down spread quickly in the blogosphere. Commenting on the group’s apparent final demise, Jim Lobe of the Inter Press Service wrote, “Visitors to the former web site are diverted to another one that says, ‘This Account Has Been Suspended. Please contact the billing/support department as soon as possible.’ A metaphor, perhaps, for the bankruptcy of the ideas that inspired the project and the strategic disaster that they produced for U.S. interests in Iraq, the greater Middle East, and the wider world?”36

PNAC’s Legacy
Several organizations and advocacy groups that shared PNAC's views about U.S. global dominance—and also had overlapping memberships—emerged in response to the Bush administration’s war on terror. Many of these entities—such as the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, the U.S. Committee on NATO, the Committee on the Present Danger, and the Coalition for Democracy in Iran—were formed as ad hoc pressure groups that were closely associated with PNAC and have now folded or become dormant. Other groups, notably Clifford May’s Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), have evolved as major institutions with large budgets and staffs.

Despite PNAC's efforts to forge a consensus around neoconservative ideas, many differences surfaced among the circle of hawks and social conservatives that PNAC brought together in 1997. Some, like Francis Fukuyama, have backed away from the imperialism of PNAC and the neoconservative camp. While generally supportive of the Bush administration's stance on the war on terror, many rightists became critical of the neoconservatives’ foreign, military, and domestic policies, creating divisions between PNAC associates in and outside government.37

In a widely noted January 2004 National Interest article titled “The Neoconservative Moment,” Fukuyama argued that the neoconservatives had failed to acknowledge “new facts” about the situation in Iraq and elsewhere. These new facts, he said, included "the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the virulent and steadily mounting anti-Americanism throughout the Middle East, the growing insurgency in Iraq, the fact that no strong democratic leadership had emerged there, the enormous financial and growing human cost of the war, the failure to leverage the war to make progress on the Israeli-Palestinian front, and the fact that America's fellow democratic allies had by and large failed to fall in line and legitimate American actions ex post.”38

Although the neoconservative camp and its allies, including Cheney's foreign policy team, continued to push for military action against Iran during Bush’s last year in office, public differences began to emerge over issues such as which groups should receive U.S. assistance, whether there are non-violent means to effect change in Iran, and whether Tehran poses as grave a threat as once thought.39

Ultimately, however, as a mechanism through which the neoconservatives built a cohesive—if often turbulent—coalition of political elites in support of their agenda, PNAC demonstrated that through a propitious combination of astute political organizing and dramatic outside events (e.g., 9/11), even a small group of ideologues like the neoconservatives can help shape the preferences of key sectors of the political landscape. Repeating a pattern established by similar letterhead groups from the past, most notably the various incarnations of the Committee on the Present Danger in the 1950s and 1970s, PNAC demonstrated the vulnerability of national security to campaigns that use fear of impending doom at the hands of a mortal enemy to mobilize public and elite action.40

PNAC successfully harnessed another tactic used by it predecessors: the evocation of deeply engrained ideas in the United States about the country’s exceptionalism, moral superiority, and national greatness. An earlier example of this came soon after World War II, when George Kennan’s 1947 article, “The Sources of Soviet Conduct,” outlined what would become U.S. deterrence policy. In an observation about the ability of Kennan’s formulation to win adherents, scholar Bruce Kuklick wrote: “It brought together strands of thought floating around Washington, blending a no-nonsense program for political action with moralistic denunciation of a dangerous but beatable enemy. Kennan took his place in a long tradition of American calls to arms, from John Winthrop to Manifest Destiny.”41 To that “long tradition” one might also add PNAC—with the caveat that while Kennan’s deterrence theory served as the dominant paradigm of U.S. foreign policy for more than four decades, PNAC’s call for a post-Cold War recipe of aggressive interventionism and unilateralism appeared to fall out of favor within the span of a single presidency.

Foundation Support
From 2000 to 2005, PNAC received $241,735 in grants from several conservative foundations, including the Earhart, Olin, and William H. Donner foundations.42 From 1994 to 2005, the New Citizenship Project, which sponsored PNAC and whose chairman was Kristol, received $3.5 million in grants, mostly from the largest right-wing foundations: Bradley, Olin, and Scaife. The Bradley Foundation was PNAC's largest source of foundation support, granting PNAC $800,000 from 1997 to 2005. In its first year of operations, PNAC received grants from Bradley, Sarah Scaife, and Olin foundations.43

[Ragondin]

`P2OG' allows Pentagon to fight dirty
by David Isenberg
5 November 2002
Asia Times www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/P2OG.html

"Run away from the light": Such might be the motto of a new, covert policy that the Bush administration is considering implementing. According to recent news reports, it would be the largest expansion into the world of black ops and covert action since the end of the Vietnam War in the 1970s.

And that's saying quite a lot, considering that since Vietnam the Pentagon has not exactly been dormant in this area.

As well-known military analyst William Arkin pointed out in an October 27 column in the Los Angeles Times, the development of the Pentagon's covert counter-terror capability has its roots in the 1979 Iran hostage crisis. The army created a highly compartmentalized organization that could collect clandestine intelligence independent of the rest of the US intelligence community, and follow through with covert military action. Today, it operates under the code name Grey Fox. In Afghanistan it operated alongside the Central Intelligence Agency's (CIA) paramilitary Special Activities Division and the Pentagon's Joint Special Operations Command.

Then there are numerous recent initiatives, such as net assessment capabilities at combatant commands, a new campaign support group at Fort Bragg, a counter-terrorism Technology Support Office, to name just a few.

Yet the Pentagon wants more. Its Defense Science Board (DSB) conducted a 2002 "Summer Study on Special Operations and Joint Forces in Support of Countering Terrorism". Excerpts from that study, dated August 16, were leaked and obtained by the Federation of American Scientists, which posted them on their website. The report was produced by a 10-member panel of military experts that included Vice Admiral William O Studeman, former director of the National Security Agency.

According to the leak, the United States is engaged in a global war on terrorism that is "a real war" in case anyone doubts it. This means, among other things, a "committed, resourceful and globally dispersed adversary with strategic reach" against whom the US will wage "a long, at times violent, and borderless war" which "requires new strategies, postures and organization".

That explains why the United States has, so to speak, decided to fight fire with fire. Although the study is filled with lots of the usual buzzwords and phrases that Pentagon planners love, such as "robust connectivity, agile ground forces, adaptive joint command and control and discriminant use of force", one thing that does stand out is its call for "preemption/proaction/interdiction/disruption/quick-response capabilities".

This is consistent with the administration's new National Security Strategy, which called for preemption; indeed, since the DSB study preceded the release of the strategy, it is possible that the strategy was written to incorporate some of its aspects.

The study urges the Pentagon to "take the terrorist threat as seriously as it takes the likelihood and consequences of major theater war", urging officials to launch secret missions and intelligence operations to penetrate and disrupt terrorist cells abroad. Some of those operations should be aimed at signaling to countries that harbor terrorists that "their sovereignty will be at risk".

If adopted, some of the proposals appear to push the military into territory that traditionally has been the domain of the CIA, raising questions about whether such missions would be subject to the same legal restraints imposed on CIA activities.

But William Schneider Jr, chairman of the DSB, rejected such concerns, saying that the panel set out to identify ways that special operations units could do more to assist the war on terrorism, not encroach on other agencies' authority.

"The CIA executes the plans but they use Department of Defense assets," Schneider said. He emphasized that the board was not recommending any changes to long-standing US policies banning assassinations, or requiring presidents to approve in advance US covert operations. Nor, he said, was the panel advocating changes that would erode congressional oversight.

Yet lawmakers have expressed concern with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's push to expand the Pentagon's covert capabilities, mainly because the Pentagon is not subject to rules that require the CIA to report its covert activities to Congress.

The DSB summary document suggests that many changes are already under way. It cites the expansion of existing intelligence analysis centers and the creation of new management teams to direct covert operations at such installations as Fort Bragg, where US special forces such as Delta Force are based.

It recommends the creation of a super-Intelligence Support Activity, an organization it dubs the Proactive, Preemptive Operations Group (P2OG), to bring together CIA and military covert action, information warfare, intelligence and cover and deception. For example, the Pentagon and CIA would work together to increase human intelligence (HUMINT) forward/operational presence and to deploy new clandestine technical capabilities.

To bolster government HUMINT capabilities, the task force advances the idea of an intelligence "surge/unsurge" capability -- a "robust, global cadre of retirees, reservists and others who are trained and qualified to serve on short notice, including expatriates". This group could be pressed into service during times of crisis.

P2OG would launch secret operations aimed at "stimulating reactions" among terrorists and states possessing weapons of mass destruction, meaning it would prod terrorist cells into action, thus exposing them to "quick-response" attacks by US forces. The means by which it would do this is the far greater use of special operations forces.

Responsibility and accountability for the P2OG would be vested in a "Special Operations Executive" in the National Security Council (NSC). The NSC would plan operations but not oversee their execution in order to avoid comparisons to past abuses, such as the Iran-Contra operations run out of the NSC by Oliver North during the Reagan administration. Under the board's proposal, NSC plans would be executed by the Pentagon or the CIA.

Costs would include developing new means to enable "deep penetration of adversaries" ($1.7 billion annually); exercises and gaming ($100 million annually); development of technical capabilities and the hiring of 500 new staff ($800 million annually); establishment of centers of excellence to handle increased workload ($500 million annually); and expansion of the Joint Forces net assessment activity ($100 million annually). The total cost is envisaged as $3.3 billion.

The DSB study also provides tantalizing glimpses of new capabilities already in the works, referring to new high-tech sensors in development that would enable the United States more closely to track the movements of vehicles or even individuals by satellite. Some of these capabilities are already advanced, such as high-altitude airships, thermobaric weapons and improved urban assault capabilities. Other new projects are being executed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

If the DSB proposal is adopted, it would only reinforce recent Pentagon activity. The Washington Post reported last month that the Pentagon was preparing to consolidate control of most of the global war on terrorism under the US Special Operations Command, signaling an intensified but more covert approach to the next phase in the battle against al-Qaeda and other international terrorist groups.

Special Operations units have been active in Pakistan for months and are training military forces in Yemen and Georgia. These missions could provide a cover for conducting any covert raids and other actions against suspected al-Qaeda members in the two countries.

The United States has also placed more than 500 Special Operations troops in the African nation of Djibouti, where they are near potential hot spots such as Yemen and Somalia. The USS Belleau Wood, an amphibious assault ship that carries attack helicopters and a handful of Harrier jump jets, has been stationed off the Horn of Africa for about six weeks, ready to carry those troops and some specialized helicopters.

And, in early October, the Washington Times reported that US commandos hunting Taliban and al-Qaeda guerrillas in Afghanistan gained permission to employ "source operations" -- clandestine tactics typically confined to the CIA.

"Source operations" generally refers to recruiting and maintaining spies within the enemy's camp. In Afghanistan, it means finding Afghans and Arabs, possibly within the Taliban and al-Qaeda network, who would supply intelligence to US special-operations forces.

[Ragondin]

As the outpouring of international sympathy that followed 9/11 continued to justify and fuel the drive for American hegemony, the Nuclear Posture Review was leaked to the Los Angeles Times in February 2002. [31] It revealed that the Pentagon had begun developing contingency plans for using nuclear weapons, not as retaliation but as a first strike, against seven mainly, though not all, non-nuclear countries including Iraq and North Korea. In June 2002 in a speech at the West Point military academy, the President announced that the US would strike at its enemies "before they emerge." [32] This was followed by last September's National Security Strategy which echoed both the DPG and the PNAC report of 2000 in asserting that the US would "dissuade potential adversaries from... surpassing, or equalling, the power of the United States" and that "we will not hesitate to act alone, if necessary, to exercise our right of self-defence by acting pre-emptively." [33] The strategy was complete with the disturbing revelation that Donald Rumsfeld has proposed the establishment of a covert Proactive Pre-emptive Operations Group (P2OG) to provoke terrorist attacks where it deems necessary to which the US can then deliver an 'appropriate' response. [34]
http://216.239.59.104/search?q=cache:lpsbLkqDaw4J:www.nthposition.com/ theprojectforthenew.php+pnac+abm+p2og&hl=fr&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=fr