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NUCLEAR
Nuclear - Imaging Can Help Heart Diagnosis
U.N. Search Of Distilleries Surprises Iraq
Iraq plant equipment 'missing'
U.N. says visits not part of arms hunt
Annan Calls Iraqi Cooperation'Good'
U.N. Teams Inspect Saddam Palace in Iraq
Putin and Chinese Leader Pledge Friendship
South Korean Candidates Spar Over Nukes
Missile shields urged for airliners
A missile coverup at MIT?
Nevada States Case Against Waste Dump in Mountain
Nevada Tells Court Yucca Mountain is Unsafe
Nev. Outlines Opposition to Waste Site
Leak Prompted Texas Reactor Shutdown
Text: Bush in Lousiana
The Push for War
MILITARY
KABUL Afghans Plan a New Army of 70,000
Prague link to Kenya missiles
Croatia Protects a General Charged With War Crimes
C.I.A. Hunts Iraq Tie to Soviet Smallpox
Business Gets Its Security Connection
Incinerating Chemical Weapons Said Safe
'Zones' suspend Colombian rights
Kurds Keep a Wary Eye on the Iraq Border, Open for Now
Israeli Army chief calls for evacuation of most settlements
Turkey OKs U.S. Use of Country's Bases
Putin Eager to Cooperate With NATO
Pakistan Official to West: Focus Less on Bin Laden
Mossad under fire for disregarding information on Kenya
U.N. Employees Send Israel Protest Petition
Uncle Sam wants your kid
Why the Pentagon will watch where you shop
President Signs Defense Authorization Bill
New Terror Toys
POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS
Guantánamo Prisoners Seek to See Families and Lawyers
Texas Death Row Appeals Lawyers Criticized
Number ties Kenya missile launcher to al-Qaeda
U.S. Says Evidence Links Attack in Kenya With Qaeda Operation
ENERGY AND OTHER
The future is here - Japan launches fuel cell cars
Ex-GM CEO makes "green" auto industry comeback
Cleaner air by increments
U.N. Food Chief Warns of Africa Famine
ACTIVISTS
Peace protests near White House growing
12/10: Protest The War Propagandists
Haitian Leader's Supporters Beat, Chase Protesters
Venezuela Nat'l Guard Disperses Protest
City Council votes for anti-war resolution
Mass protest as new wave of oil hits Spain
Anti-war teach-in squashed
-------- NUCLEAR
-------- health
Nuclear - Imaging Can Help Heart Diagnosis
December 3, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Heart-Test.html
CHICAGO (AP) -- Nuclear-imaging technology already in place at many U.S. hospitals can help emergency room doctors do a better job of ruling out heart attacks in patients with chest pain, a study found.
The study looked at sestamibi imaging, which is normally used in non-emergency settings as part of a stress test. The patient is injected with an isotope that lets doctors monitor the heart's pumping ability and see how much blood is flowing to it.
``We're just taking available technology and using it in a new way,'' said the study's lead author, Dr. James Udelson of Tufts-New England Medical Center in Boston.
More than 6 million people each year go to emergency rooms with chest pain, and many are admitted to the hospital or an observation unit because doctors are unable to rule out a heart attack.
If the patients have abnormal readings on electrocardiograms, doctors can diagnose their heart attacks with certainty and start treatment. Often, however, patients have normal electrocardiograms. These people are frequently admitted for observation.
The research appears in Wednesday' Journal of the American Medical Association.
The study found that 52 percent of patients who were not given the test were admitted with what turned out to be neither a heart attack nor unstable angina, a common precursor to a heart attack. The rate was 42 percent among patients who were given the test.
Dr. Robert Bonow, president of the American Heart Association and chief of cardiology at Northwestern University Medical School, said that number could fall once doctors using the test develop confidence in it.
Bonow said the imaging could save money, because an overnight stay in the hospital would probably be more expensive than the test.
The study looked at 2,475 patients at seven hospitals, ranging from large, academic medical centers to smaller community hospitals. Of the patients, 1,260 were assigned to receive standard care and 1,215 to undergo the imaging.
-------- inspections
U.N. Search Of Distilleries Surprises Iraq
Experts Look for Equipment With Possible Nuclear Uses
By Rajiv Chandrasekaran
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, December 3, 2002; Page A20
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A781-2002Dec2?language=printer
BAGHDAD, Iraq, Dec. 2 -- U.N. weapons experts today conducted their first inspections of Iraqi sites that have not been searched by previous U.N. teams, examining three alcohol distilleries on the outskirts of Baghdad for equipment that could be used in the development of nuclear devices.
Iraqi officials expressed surprise that experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency would choose to visit the Awali, Baraj and Dahab companies, which use the nectar of dates to make a potent and popular gin and an anise-flavored spirit called arak that is sold for 75 cents a bottle. The inspectors visited the plants one after the other, walking through the distillation and bottling facilities, speaking to employees and looking carefully at the machinery, but they did not appear to be carrying any of the radiation monitoring equipment they have taken into other sites.
[Early Tuesday, news services reported that for the first time a team of inspectors entered one of Saddam Hussein's presidential palaces. A convoy of about six U.N. vehicles was allowed inside the complex in the Karkh district in central Baghdad after several minutes of discussion with guards at the gate, the reports said.]
The inspectors did not comment on why they chose to visit the alcohol plants today, or what, if anything, they found inside related to nuclear weapons. An IAEA spokesman issued a brief statement saying "all sites with industrial/technical capability are of interest to us and need to be assessed to determine relevance or not to a nuclear program."
"Any site with industrial/technical capability can be used to conceal illicit activity," the statement said.
U.N. officials suggested, but did not directly confirm, that the inspectors were checking on a tip that nuclear-related equipment was being stored at the beverage plants. They appeared, however, to come up empty.
"We've got to follow up on a lot of leads," one U.N. official said. "Not all of them lead to something productive."
Another group of inspectors, from a special U.N. commission examining biological and chemical weaponry, visited a Baghdad factory that once made guidance and control systems for Scud missiles, which Iraq used extensively during the 1991 Persian Gulf War. During their six-hour search, the inspectors discovered that several monitoring cameras and some of the equipment that had been marked with identification tags by previous inspectors no longer were at the site, now called the Karama Co., a U.N. spokesman here said.
The spokesman, Hiro Ueki, said the inspectors were told by Iraqi officials that some of the equipment had been destroyed when the United States bombed the site in 1998 and other pieces had been moved. A U.N. official said the inspectors would investigate the claims.
"It is something that has to be looked into," the official said. "It's too early to tell how serious this is."
In the 1980s, Iraq modified Soviet-made Scuds to increase their range to 400 miles. Now, Iraq is prohibited from having missiles with a range of more than 93 miles. Although Iraq insists it has no such missiles, the inspectors presumably wanted to ensure that such work had not resumed.
One of the three alcohol plants, the Awali Co., whose name means "the Heights," had been visited by U.N. inspectors in the 1990s, but those inspectors were focused on biological and chemical weapons, not nuclear arms, U.N. officials said. The earlier inspectors had placed small U.N. identification tags on a few large metal fermentation vats, which were visible to journalists who were allowed to tour the plant after the inspectors left.
Part of the reason for the visit may have been to test whether the inspectors would be allowed to scour any site they wanted and to confuse Iraqi officials, who are trying to predict which sites the international experts will choose to search. Under a U.N. Security Council resolution passed unanimously last month, Iraq will face "serious consequences" if it does not allow inspectors access to any person or place in Iraq without having to seek permission or provide advance notice.
"Sometimes we don't know what we're going to find," the U.N. official said. "We've got to be able to surprise them. We wouldn't be very good inspectors if we only visited places that are logical."
But Jamal Ishaa, the manager of the Awali plant, said he could not fathom why nuclear experts were interested in his facility. "We were surprised when they came," he said. "We only produce alcoholic drinks."
Production of alcoholic beverages is legal in Iraq and is a specialty of the country's Christian minority. Consumption is legal in homes but has been banned in public places since the government put increased emphasis on Iraq's Islamic heritage after the 1991 war.
Ishaa said the inspectors looked at the bottling facilities and the fermentation rooms and asked questions of the workers, some of whom were later observed by journalists placing labels on clear glass bottles and heat-sealing metal bottle caps. He said the inspectors did not tell him why they selected his plant.
"I would really like to ask them, 'What does arak and gin have to do with nuclear [technology]?' " he said.
----
Iraq plant equipment 'missing'
Tuesday 3 December 2002
AFP
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/12/03/1038712920450.html
UN arms experts discovered equipment missing during a six-hour inspection of an Iraqi missile plant which had been placed under long-term monitoring by their predecessors, spokesman Hiro Ueki said.
"In 1998, the site contained a number of pieces of equipment tagged by the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) and several monitoring cameras," Ueki said after the inspection of the al-Waziriya facility north of Baghdad.
"None of these was currently present at the facility. It was claimed that some had been destroyed by the bombing of the site, some had been transferred to others sites," he said.
The spokesman said the UN team had nonetheless been "able to carry out the inspection tasks that had been planned" at what was "one of Iraq's principal missile development sites".
Asked by AFP how the inspectors planned to reconcile the discrepancy, he said: "We will check if the equipment has been transferred."
Ueki also confirmed the inspectors had visited a small industrial site north of Baghdad which had never been visited by UNSCOM - the first time they have done so since inspections resumed last Wednesday.
Like two other sites visited nearby, the plant had turned out to be "dedicated to the production of alcohol".
----
U.N. says visits not part of arms hunt
By Betsy Pisik
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
December 3, 2002
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20021203-26296406.htm
NEW YORK - U.N. weapons monitors yesterday scrambled to explain why Iraq had been notified in advance of at least two visits to weapons sites in apparent violation of the surprise inspection regime outlined by the Security Council.
U.N. officials in New York and Baghdad said the forays were not inspections, but technical visits to replace equipment left behind four years ago.
"If you need a 100-foot ladder," said Ewen Buchanan, a spokesman for the United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC), "there's no point in arriving and waiting six hours while they find one."
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher yesterday indicated that Washington found the explanation satisfactory.
"The inspectors have assured us that they are conducting inspections on a no-notice basis," he told reporters. "They weren't conducting inspections. They were picking up equipment."
At one site, inspectors replaced an air-monitoring machine, and at the other site they replaced a video monitor.
In another development yesterday, U.N. inspectors hit their first snag on a visit to a missile-production facility outside Baghdad, where they failed to find several pieces of machinery that had been there four years ago.
They also found that surveillance equipment was not in place.
The compound had produced the long-range al-Hussein missiles that are now forbidden to Iraq and was the site of frequent visits by the former inspection regime.
"In 1998, the site contained a number of pieces of equipment tagged by the United Nations Special Commission and several monitoring cameras," said spokesman Hiro Ueki after the inspection of the al-Karoma facility north of Baghdad.
"None of these was currently present at the facility. It was claimed that some had been destroyed by the bombing of the site, some had been transferred to other sites," Mr. Ueki said.
The United Nations Special Commission was the name used by the previous team of inspectors, who were expelled from the country in December 1998. Days after they left, the al-Karoma facility was targeted by U.S. air strikes.
Mr. Ueki said the Iraqis had told inspectors where to find the missing equipment and that the inspectors would look for it later.
Earlier in the day, Brig. Mohammed Saleh Mohammed, commander of the al-Karoma compound, told reporters that the facility is involved in the design and production of missiles with a range of 90 miles or less - which are permitted by the Security Council.
He said inspections had gone "without a hitch."
The U.N. Security Council imposed sanctions against Iraq after its troops invaded Kuwait, and the economic blockade cannot be lifted until the country is certified as having abandoned all weapons of mass destruction.
A 1996 program to bring humanitarian relief to the Iraqi people allows Baghdad to export oil and buy with the proceeds anything it needs except goods that could be used in the production of chemical, biological or nuclear weapons.
That program was to have been extended last week for another six months, but the Americans have demanded that the list of prohibited items be expanded.
Unable to reach accord with the council's other 14 members, Washington is likely to agree tomorrow to another brief extension, instead of a formal renewal of the program.
----
Annan Calls Iraqi Cooperation'Good'
By DAFNA LINZER
Associated Press Writer
Dec 3, 2002
http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/UN_ANNAN?SITE=DCTMS&SECTION=HOME
Annan says the surprise inspection of a presidential palace suggests Iraq is going along with the expanded authority of the weapons inspectors. (Audio)
UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Tuesday that Iraq's cooperation with weapons inspectors has been good so far, and he praised the inspectors for using their authority to visit presidential palaces.
"There is a good indication that the Iraqis are cooperating, but this is only the beginning," Annan said. "They have to sustain the cooperation and effort ... and we will have to wait for the report of the inspectors." Advertisement
Annan wouldn't comment on remarks from President Bush a day earlier that "the signs are not encouraging" about Saddam Hussein's willingness to disarm.
"The inspectors are not in Iraq to play hide-and-seek with Mr. Saddam Hussein," the president said Monday in his first extensive comment on the U.N. weapons inspections since they got under way last week.
Chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix also said Tuesday that Iraq hasn't obstructed his teams but that Baghdad must provide "good explanations" for moving some equipment.
"I think we have started in the manner we expected and we have not had any impediments in the visits of plants," he told The Associated Press.
"Of course over a period of time, equipment can be moved but there must be some good explanations for it, and I'm sure that our people will inquire why was it moved and where was it moved," Blix said.
"If it were to be moved for some illicit purpose, then of course it would be more serious. But in the first case there was a fermenter which had been moved, and they showed where it was. And in other cases I hope that there are good explanations, but this has to be found out."
Annan wouldn't speculate as to when he expected Iraq to present a declaration of its chemical, biological and nuclear programs. Iraq must provide the declaration to the Security Council and inspectors by Sunday.
"I will wait for the inspectors to analyze it, and then brief the Council on its contents," Annan said.
U.N. weapons inspectors are charged with disarming Iraq's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and long-range missiles to deliver them, During more than seven years of work before leaving in December 1998, inspectors tagged equipment which could have military and civilian use so it could be tracked.
Annan said he had not received a report yet from inspectors on their first week of work. But he was pleased they had gained access to all the sites they've targeted thus far, including a presidential palace which was visited Tuesday. Under the previous inspections regime, advance notice was required before inspectors could visit such sites.
"That is an indication that the inspectors are using their new authority effectively. They have the right to inspect and go anywhere and they have demonstrated that they are determined to use this new authority."
----
U.N. Teams Inspect Saddam Palace in Iraq
By CHARLES J. HANLEY
AP Special Correspondent
Dec 3, 2002 12:50 PM EST
http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/I/IRAQ_WEAPONS_INSPECTORS?SITE=DCTMS&SECTION=HOME
U-N weapons inspectors are flexing their new muscle with their latest visit. (Audio)
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- International inspectors roared up to one of Saddam Hussein's presidential palaces Tuesday and demanded and received quick entry, in an early test of new powers to hunt for weapons of mass destruction anywhere, anytime in Iraq.
A key Iraqi official, meanwhile, said Baghdad will reaffirm its position that it no longer has mass destruction weapons in a long-awaited declaration later this week that is unlikely to satisfy Washington.
In New York, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan described Iraq's cooperation - not only at the palace but in other inspections so far - as good but cautioned "this is only the beginning." Annan's assessment appeared at odds with that of President Bush, who said Monday that early signs from Baghdad "are not encouraging."
And in Vienna, Austria, Melissa Fleming, spokeswoman for the U.N. nuclear control agency, said the Iraqis were expected to submit their report to the U.N. office in Baghdad on Saturday - one day before the deadline mandated by the Security Council.
The U.N. weapons monitors found spectacle and opulence inside the sprawling, riverside Al-Sajoud palace on Tuesday. But there was no word that they found anything else. A day earlier, the United Nations announced inspectors could not find some equipment they were looking for at a missile-related site; it was not the first time in a week of inspections that such a problem arose.
Chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix, speaking to The Associated Press on Tuesday at U.N. headquarters, said Iraq has not obstructed U.N. weapons inspectors during their first week of work but that Baghdad must explain moving some equipment.
Iraqis said Tuesday, as they have on previous days, that they cooperated with the inspectors.
Gen. Hossam Mohammed Amin, the chief Iraqi liaison officer, told journalists after Tuesday's presidential search: "The inspectors were happy."
The U.N. team left the west Baghdad grounds after 1 1/2 hours and had no comment for reporters, as has been their practice. The visit itself carried a message: that this time the inspectors have a free run of Iraq, under a Security Council mandate requiring the Baghdad government to give up any chemical, biological or nuclear weapons.
Once the inspectors left, reporters were briefly allowed inside the palace's spectacular, eight-sided entry hall. Each of the walls was inscribed in huge gold letters with a poem praising Saddam.
In the 1990s, the Iraqis sought to bar U.N. monitors from Saddam's palaces. It took personal negotiations between Saddam and Annan to reach an accommodation: Inspectors could visit with diplomatic escort and notice. Those teams found nothing.
A U.N. resolution adopted last month mandates unrestricted access at all Iraqi sites. The security staff at Al-Sajoud clearly was aware of the new powers, taking just seven minutes of radio consultation before opening the towering, ornate gates Tuesday.
As usual, Saddam's whereabouts were not publicly known. He is known to move about frequently among dozens of presidential palaces across Iraq.
Meanwhile Tuesday, the Kuwaiti Interior Ministry said an Iraqi boat fired on two Kuwaiti coast guard vessels in northern Kuwaiti waters. The Kuwaiti vessels fired back. No injuries in the firing were reported.
Iraq, which did not comment on the firing, and Kuwait have not had relations since the 1991 Gulf War, in which a U.S.-led coalition liberated the oil-rich Kuwait from a seven-month Iraqi occupation. Few clashes along the Kuwaiti-Iraqi land and naval borders have been reported in recent years.
The dramatic, unannounced call on Al-Sajoud came on the sixth day of the inspections, which have been renewed after a four-year break.
The inspectors thus far, in more than a dozen field missions, have reported unimpeded access and Iraqi cooperation.
Speaking to reporters in New York, Annan said he had not received a report yet from inspectors on their first week of work. But he was pleased inspectors had gained access to all sites, including the palace.
"That is an indication that the inspectors are using their new authority effectively," he said. "They have the right to inspect and go anywhere and they have demonstrated that they are determined to use this new authority."
Although Annan said the Iraqis had been cooperative so far, "they have to sustain the cooperation and effort ... and we will have to wait for the report of the inspectors." Annan would not comment on Bush's more pessimistic assessment.
The Bush administration alleges Iraq retains chemical and biological weapons - missed during the 1990s inspections - and has not abandoned its nuclear weapons program.
Bush threatens to wage war on Iraq - with or without U.N. sanction - if it doesn't disarm. Other governments say that only the Security Council can authorize an attack on Iraq in a situation not involving immediate self-defense.
On Tuesday, Gen. Amin told Baghdad reporters that an Iraqi declaration on its weapons required to be given to the United Nations by the end of the week "will include new elements, but those new elements don't mean that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction.
"Iraq is free of weapons of mass destruction."
The inspectors of the 1990s eliminated tons of Iraqi chemical and biological weapons and the equipment to make them, dismantled Iraq's effort to build nuclear bombs, and destroyed scores of longer-range Iraqi missiles. Those inspectors suspect they didn't find all of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. On Monday, among other visits, inspectors searched the Karama missile design plant in Baghdad - a revisit to a site inspected in the 1990s. The inspectors wanted to ensure that this key installation was not involved in producing missiles capable of ranges beyond the 90 miles permitted by U.N. resolutions after Iraq's defeat in the Gulf War.
The U.N. agency reported their inspectors found that equipment which had been tagged by earlier inspectors at Karama was missing. The Iraqis said some of it had been destroyed in U.S. bombing in 1998, when 18 cruise missiles struck the site, and some had been transferred to other locations.
Twice last week at other sites, the inspectors traced other equipment at first thought to be missing to other locations.
"If it were to be moved for some illicit purpose, then of course it would be more serious," Blix, the chief U.N. inspector, said in New York. "But in the first case there was a fermenter which had been moved, and they showed where it was. And in other cases I hope that there are good explanations, but this has to be found out."
In Vienna on Tuesday, a spokesman for the International Atomic Energy Agency said the body would later this month begin analyzing samples gathered by its inspectors in Iraq. The agency, which is overseeing the hunt for Iraqi nuclear weapons, did not expect to present results before Jan. 27 at the earliest.
In a related development, an inspection team official said on condition of anonymity Monday that Iraqi had admitted it had tried, unsuccessfully, to import aluminum tubes that the United States had said might help Iraq build a nuclear bomb. Iraq denies it still has nuclear weapons ambitions.
-------- korea
Putin and Chinese Leader Pledge Friendship and Caution North Korea on Nuclear Arms
December 3, 2002
New York Times
By ERIK ECKHOLM
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/03/international/asia/03CHIN.html
BEIJING, Dec. 2 - China and Russia called on North Korea today to abandon any attempt to acquire nuclear weapons but also called on Washington to honor previous agreements with the North.
The call came during a quick but high-profile visit by President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia that was marked by hearty pledges of mutual friendship and appeals for restraint on Iraq.
In a 13-page declaration that set out no new policies but was notable for its strong emphasis on the unsettled situation on the Korean peninsula, Russia and China said they "consider it important for the destiny of the world and security in Northeast Asia to preserve the nonnuclear status of the Korean peninsula and the regime of nonproliferation of weapons of mass destruction."
"In this context," the statement continued, the two sides "stress the extreme importance of normalizing relations between the United States and the D.P.R.K. on the basis of continued observation of earlier reached agreements, including the framework agreement of 1994." D.P.R.K. are the initials for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
In that agreement, North Korea promised to halt nuclear weapons development in return for energy aid, including construction of nuclear power plants. The agreement is in limbo following North Korean admissions of covert nuclear research.
China is one of North Korea's few allies and does not want to see the country collapse, but its diplomats have also been exasperated by the country's military posturing, which it fears could destabilize the region.
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, which had menaced China, Moscow and Beijing have worked to rebuild friendly ties, in part to counterbalance the global power of the United States. The meeting today seemed intended for each to reassure the other of that commitment, even as both have drawn closer to Washington in the wake of the Sept. 11 terror attacks last year.
President Jiang Zemin, receiving Mr. Putin, said, "China and Russia will be good neighbors, friends and partners forever." Mr. Putin, who arrived this morning at 1:40 and leaves on Tuesday to continue an Asian tour, said he was "fully confident of a bright future for Russia-China relations."
Mr. Putin was the most prominent foreign visitor since the change in Communist Party leadership here last month, and after meeting Mr. Jiang he met with Hu Jintao, the newly selected party chief, and other top leaders.
China and Russia have both joined in President Bush's global crusade against terror and kept quiet as the Americans sent troops to Central Asia. Both also went along, reluctantly, with an aggressive American-sponsored United Nations resolution seeking to disarm Iraq, though they remain nervous about independent American military action.
Today, both sides declared their opposition to "unilateral action" by any country and reiterated their shared faith in the United Nations Security Council, where both have veto power as permanent members. China and Russia also stressed their commitment to a "multipolar" world - code for a world less dominated by the United States.
They called for a peaceful settlement of the Iraqi weapons issue and complained that some governments have a "policy of double standards" on human rights, rejecting "the use of human rights questions as a lever for pressure in international relations."
One new bond the leaders mentioned prominently today was a shared interest in stamping out Islamic separatism. Mr. Jiang praised the Russian leader for his "just antiterrorism actions," including the recent deadly raid on Chechen rebels who held hundreds of hostages in a Moscow theater. Mr. Putin pledged renewed cooperation against Islamic movements in Central Asia and in Xinjiang Province, in China.
--------
South Korean Candidates Spar Over Nukes
December 3, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-SKorea-Election.html
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- The two men most likely to become South Korea's next president sparred Tuesday over how to persuade North Korea to discontinue its nuclear weapons program.
In a televised debate ahead of the Dec. 19 election, Lee Hoi-Chang and Roh Moo-hyun called on the communist North to abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions and agreed the diplomatic crisis should be resolved through dialogue. But they contrasted in their proposed approaches.
Lee, of the conservative opposition Grand National Party, said he favored cutting off economic aid to North Korea if it doesn't end its nuclear weapons program immediately.
``We should make our demand in a forceful manner and should consider economic measures,'' Lee said during the two-hour debate.
Roh, of the pro-government Millennium Democratic Party, warned that increasing pressure on North Korea could be risky.
``When it fails, it can cause terrible consequences,'' he said. ``The carrot and dialogue can cost a lot, but we must be patient, and we will be successful.''
North Korea revealed in October that it had a nuclear weapons program in violation of a 1994 agreement with the United States. The accord called for the country to freeze and eventually dismantle its nuclear weapons program in exchange for international aid to build two power plants.
The United States, with backing from Japan, South Korea and the European Union, decided to punish North Korea by suspending free fuel oil shipments from December.
North Korea responded by declaring the 1994 agreement ``collapsed.''
U.S. officials believe North Korea has produced enough plutonium for at least one, and possibly two, nuclear weapons. North Korea denies it.
Seven candidates are running for president. But only three -- those who won an average of more than 5 percent in public surveys -- were allowed to participate in the debate.
The third candidate was Kwon Young-gil, who heads a minor political party supported by labor unions.
Kwon blamed North Korea for violating the 1994 agreement but also accused the United States of breaking the accord by delaying construction of the promised nuclear power plants.
South Korea's presidential race formally began Nov. 27. Earlier polls suggested Lee, 67, and Roh, 55, were the leading presidential contenders.
President Kim Dae-jung, whose five-year term ends in February, is barred by the constitution from seeking re-election.
-------- missile defense
Missile shields urged for airliners
By Jeffrey Sparshott
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
December 3, 2002
http://www.washtimes.com/business/20021203-83397040.htm
Technology to make airplanes safe from missile attacks is available but unlikely to make its way into passenger craft anytime soon.
"Putting countermeasures onto civilian aircraft is certainly technically feasible but it is not a solution that could occur quickly," said Todd Curtis, founder of the Airsafe Journal, in an article published yesterday.
Senate intelligence committee leaders Sunday called on the newly created Transportation Security Agency to "immediately" respond to the potential for surface-to-air missile attacks against U.S. commercial aircraft.
The remarks followed a failed shoulder-launched missile attack against an Israeli passenger aircraft in Kenya.
Sen. Bob Graham, of Florida, the top Democrat on the intelligence committee, wants the TSA to focus primarily on perimeter security at airports.
"There is a general concern about the working relationship between federal agencies and state and local agencies that manage large facilities, like airports and seaports, and how well they coordinate on providing security across the board," Paul Anderson, Mr. Graham's communications director, said yesterday.
Mr. Curtis and other aviation experts concurred that on-the-ground security could be implemented effectively and quickly, though at some cost.
Mr. Graham was co-sponsor of a port-security bill approved by Congress that mandates coordinated law enforcement at seaports. Mr. Anderson said that the new transportation agency has the legislative authority to act and should take the lead on the matter.
Information and intelligence sharing ought to be a top priority, he said. The TSA did not return phone calls seeking comment.
High-tech solutions also are available. Defense firm BAE Systems, for example, manufactures self-protection systems for military and civil aircraft. The company's systems could be applied to commercial aircraft but that would require government approval, said John Measell, a company spokesman.
"Our systems are primarily for the military. For commercial use, we would need approval of the government," he said.
Design and safety issues also would delay any deployment.
"One of the things we are always trying to do is ensure our design takes into account many different scenarios. But designing any [anti-]missile system in a commercial aircraft would involve significant design work and could raise significant issues in its own right," said a spokesman for airline manufacturer Boeing.
The U.S. commercial fleet includes about 4,900 passenger jets, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.
"It typically takes a year before any major change to the design and operation of commercial aircraft could be certified, tested and installed," Mr. Curtis said.
It is not clear exactly how many missile systems are available around the world or if any are a threat in the United States.
"There are thousands of these surface-to-air missiles around the world," said Sen. Richard C. Shelby, Alabama Republican, who appeared with Mr. Graham on "Fox News Sunday."
"You can buy them and you can transport them. A lot of them are not as accurate as others. But sooner or later that's going to be one of the methods for the terrorists to hit," he said.
Simple law enforcement measures around airports, such as increasing police patrols and restricting some activities would be effective, but that may be an unacceptable burden on communities adjacent to airports, Mr. Curtis said.
"We have to rely on citizens who live near the airports to report anything suspicious," Mr. Curtis said. "Unless we have cooperation from the citizenry, there's no way to put enough eyeballs on everything going on."
--------
A missile coverup at MIT?
By James Carroll,
12/3/2002
Boston Globe
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/337/oped/A_missile_coverup_at_MIT_%2B.shtml
LAST MONTH the Air Force general in charge of developing the missile defense system declared that the elusive technology had finally proven itself. ''We no longer need to experiment, to demonstrate, or prevaricate,'' Lieutenant General Ronald Kadish said. ''We need to get on with this.''
But the record of Pentagon assertions in favor of missile defense has been unreliable, to say the least. A project that is bringing tens of billions of dollars into military-industrial coffers carries an irresistible bias in its own behalf, and history shows that neither the Defense Department nor its contractors are reliable evaluators of the science and technology on which President Bush's vaunted ''shield'' must stand. Leave aside for the moment the disturbing question of whether US initiatives toward missile defense will ignite a mortal new arms race with China and others. The remaining question of feasibility is grave enough. Can the nation afford $100 billion for a system that won't work? Can the government put the lives of citizens at risk behind a shield that will not protect?
Such questions are too important to leave to the obviously biased evaluators of the Pentagon and the defense industry. That is why the scientific claims of the Missile Defense Agency and its contractors must be examined by disinterested experts in the scientific community. On such independence rests the health of the US economy, the safety of the nation, and the integrity of science itself when so much else has been corrupted. These are the stakes of a dispute that has been brewing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for more than a year.
Theodore A. Postol is a professor of science, technology, and national security policy at MIT. He earned a reputation as a debunker of the Patriot missile's Gulf War performance and then as a skeptic of missile defense. He challenged whether the system under design could ever reliably distinguish between incoming warheads and decoys.
At particular issue was a 1997 test conducted and deemed successful by the defense contractor TRW. After that ''success'' was questioned by federal investigators, MIT's Lincoln Laboratory was hired to evaluate it. In 1999 Lincoln Lab affirmed TRW's results. Soon thereafter Postol objected, challenging not only the Pentagon and its contractor - but his own university. The Government Accounting Office investigated and concluded that Postol was right in pointing out flaws in the TRW test, but Postol's charge had gone beyond flaws to fraud. ''Lincoln Lab,'' he said to me over coffee recently, ''covered up a program-stopping flaw in the missile defense system. A great university involved in a coverup?''
In April 2001 Postol went to MIT authorities about the matter, and then early this year he went public, raising the grave question of whether Lincoln Lab colluded in TRW's deception. Postol argued that the ''success'' of the experiment depended on a match between observed phenomena and predicted phenomena. Had TRW fraudulently substituted one for the other? Had Lincoln Lab knowingly covered up that substitution? Had Lincoln Lab misled federal investigators? Had top MIT officials ignored and distorted these charges? Postol demanded an investigation. Last February, MIT launched an in-house inquiry into Postol's charges. (The Boston Globe called for an independent investigation at that time, asking MIT ''to reconsider this self-protecting institutional reflex.'')
The internal MIT inquiry into its own conduct was concluded last month, and it called for the outside investigation Postol had been demanding all along. That recommendation has now gone to MIT's top officials, and what it will lead to remains to be seen.
Postol, for his part, has already reached a conclusion and is hoping for a congressional intervention. In letters he sent in late October to Representative Howard Berman, Democrat of California, and Senator Charles Grassley, Republican of Iowa, cosponsors of the False Claims Act, Postol wrote, ''In effect, Lincoln verified and certified as accurate bookkeeping arithmetic when Lincoln knew that the bookkeeping practices were fraudulent.''
This might sound like a reprise of the Enron scandal when both a company and its watchdog accountants were caught lying - a corruption not only of a basic system but also of the system's oversight mechanism. But Enron, finally, involved only money. The corruption that Postol alleges goes to the quick of scientific integrity, to the dead center of the academy's relationship to government and, even more crucial, to the method by which future US defense strategies will be devised.
The independent investigation demanded by the courageous Postol is long overdue. His demands might seem like disloyalty to a besieged university protective of its reputation. They might seem like mere ''prevarication'' to a Pentagon wanting ''to get on'' with missile defense. But to America there is nothing esoteric about the truth, especially when falsehood, igniting an arms race, can pave the road to war.
James Carroll's column appears regularly in the Globe.
-------- u.s. nuc facilities
-------- nevada
Nevada States Case Against Waste Dump in Mountain
December 3, 2002
New York Times
By MATTHEW L. WALD
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/03/politics/03YUCC.html
WASHINGTON, Dec. 2 - Yucca Mountain cannot be used for disposal of the nation's nuclear waste, the State of Nevada said in a brief filed today, arguing that the site does not meet criteria that require its natural features to contain the material for thousands of years.
The brief, filed in a suit in the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, includes Energy Department estimates that if "engineered barriers" fail, Yucca will leak. According to the department, if the man-made containers do not hold, the radiation dose at the site boundary will be six times higher than the rules allow after 1,000 years; after 3,000 years, the dose will be 67 times higher.
A spokesman for the Energy Department, Joseph H. Davis, said that he could not comment in detail because he had not yet seen the argument. But, he said, "It's certainly not surprising that perhaps some of the same arguments we heard before are being made by the state."
Opponents of the repository have argued before that the Energy Department is trying to make the project acceptable by relying on man-made barriers that cannot reliably be predicted to last for the 10,000 years that the law requires. But the suit includes more details about how the Energy Department has backed away from its initial insistence that the rock alone would contain the wastes.
Since the late 1950's, the United States has been seeking what scientists refer to as a "geologic repository" for the waste, which is mostly from power plants and nuclear weapons production. Nevada's brief quotes a 20-year-old statement by the Energy Department that "the host rock with its properties provides the justification for geologic disposal and is the main element in containing the waste within the repository."
The host rock at Yucca, a ridge in the desert 100 miles from Las Vegas, is formed by volcanic emissions. The main mechanism for waste to escape from the mountain is rainwater seeping down from the summit to the groundwater far below. That water flows steadily across the site's boundaries, where it can feed wells and come to the surface in springs.
Government scientists initially believed that water would take 9,000 to 80,000 years to flow from the repository to the accessible environment. But researchers have discovered fractures in the rock where water flows much faster. In 1997, scientists found traces of chlorine-36, which does not exist in nature, in the five-mile tunnel drilled to explore the mountain's rock. That meant that material produced by nuclear explosions, the first of which was in 1944, had already penetrated through 800 feet of rock. According to the suit, in 1996 the Energy Department said that some water could go from the repository level to the water table, 1,300 feet down, in 50 years, and then flow beyond the site boundaries.
The Energy Department has argued that the storage containers will hold the wastes, and it projects that releases for the first 10,000 years will be very small. But assessing the adequacy of the containers is difficult, the project's critics maintain, because the Energy Department has not made a final design public.
The suit argues that reliance on a system that combines the man-made containers with the natural characteristics is "essentially abandoning" the Nuclear Waste Policy Act's mandate "that the site's geology form the primary isolation barrier."
The suit, brought by the State of Nevada, the City of Las Vegas and Clark County, is the second recent use of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act against the Energy Department. Environmentalists are suing the department over its plan to leave some nuclear waste in steel tanks buried under a few feet of dirt at nuclear weapons plants.
The Energy Department is also under pressure to take the wastes from the operators of civilian power plants. Soon after the waste act was signed in 1982, those operators agreed to pay the government a tenth of a cent per kilowatt-hour produced in exchange for the department taking the wastes beginning in 1998. That date now seems too optimistic by at least a decade, and the courts have ruled that the power companies can seek damages from the department for the extra costs of storing the fuel.
----
Nevada Tells Court Yucca Mountain is Unsafe
December 3, 2002
ENS
http://ens-news.com/ens/dec2002/2002-12-03-09.asp#anchor4
WASHINGTON, DC, In the latest court action challenging the proposed high level nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain, the state of Nevada argued Monday that the site does not meet requirements for containing nuclear waste with its natural features.
In a brief filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit, Nevada's lawyers argued that if casks constructed to hold spent nuclear fuel were to fail, it would increase the radiation released at the proposed repository by as much as six times more than allowed under the federal rules governing the site's licensing.
Yucca Mountain, located about 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is the only site being considered as a permanent repository for thousands of tons of highly radioactive spent nuclear fuel now stored at power reactors across the country.
But the Nevada court papers charge that the Department of Energy (DOE) has known for more than 14 years that the proposed Yucca Mountain site could not contain radioactivity from high level wastes based on geology alone. The DOE endorsed Yucca Mountain two decades ago, stating that "the host rock with its properties provides the justification for geologic disposal and is the main element in containing the waste within the repository."
However, the DOE had later determined "that up to 20 percent of all water moving through the repository would reach the accessible environment in less than 1,000 years," Nevada charges, noting that that water would carry radioactivity to surrounding communities and natural areas.
The brief, which is more than 50 pages long, also argues that the DOE has "failed to address realistic sabotage scenarios involving spent fuel transport and thus vastly understated the risks and consequences of undertaking thousands of such shipments if Yucca proceeds."
Concerns about possible terrorist attacks on the Yucca Mountain site or on cross country shipments of spent fuel and other high level radioactive waste have increased since the attacks of September 11, 2001.
Nevada's court filing charges, for example, that "DOE did not consider the risk that a warhead exploding inside a spent fuel container could cause fissile nuclear material inside to create a nuclear chain reaction, or 'criticality,' whose consequences would catastrophically exceed the postulated consequences of the relatively tame event described" in the agency's final environmental impact statement.
----
Nev. Outlines Opposition to Waste Site
December 3, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Nuclear-Waste.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- A decision to bury thousands of tons of nuclear waste in Nevada should be overturned because the government cannot assure the site's geology will keep radiation from seeping into the environment, the state of Nevada argues in a court filing.
The brief, filed in a suit challenging the decision to entomb the waste at Yucca Mountain, maintains that the Energy Department violated the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act by resorting to ``engineered barriers'' to contain the waste.
In papers filed Monday with the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, the state argues that the Bush administration was ``essentially abandoning'' the 1982 law's ``mandate that the site's geology form the primary isolation barrier'' in selecting the Yucca Mountain site for waste burial.
The mountain is a ridge of volcanic rock and ash about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, adjacent to the Nevada Test Site. Last February, President Bush declared it scientifically suitable and safe as the nation's central repository for 77,000 tons of waste from commercial reactors and the government's nuclear weapons program.
After Nevada challenged the decision, Congress endorsed the president's declaration in July and overturned what could have been a veto of the site by Nevada. The Energy Department is seeking a license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and hopes to open the waste repository by 2010.
But Nevada, joined by the city of Las Vegas and surrounding Clark County, has promised to continue the fight in court and filed a number of lawsuits challenging the project.
In a 100-page filing in support of its lawsuit before the appeals court, Nevada contends that the 1982 law that directed construction of a federal nuclear waste repository specifically required that natural geology at the site ``form the primary barrier keeping waste from people and the environment'' over tens of thousands of years.
The suit also argues that the Energy Department conducted a ``flawed environmental review'' of the Yucca site, disregarded procedures required under the law in determining the site's suitability and failed to assess adequately problems involving the transportation of waste to the site.
Yucca Mountain initially was chosen because Energy Department scientists believed it had the geology required to contain the waste. They later found it did not and adopted a ``total system performance'' approach in violation of the 1982 law, the state argues in its suit.
Now, the suit maintains, the project relies extensively on manmade barriers -- metal alloy waste containers and drip shields, for example -- to keep waste from escaping.
The Energy Department had no immediate response to the Nevada court filing.
Nevada officials have made similar arguments repeatedly in public meetings and in outlining their opposition to the Yucca Mountain project over the years.
Energy Department officials have maintained the site is in full compliance with the 1982 requirements, it relies on geology to contain the waste and the engineered barriers only provide additional protection.
Congress declared in 1987 that Yucca Mountain should be the only site to be considered for nuclear waste disposal. Since then, nearly $7 billion has been spent on studying the area's geology and developing a waste package and design.
On the Net:
Energy Department's Yucca Mountain site: http://www.ymp.gov/
Nevada Yucca Mountain site: http://www.state.nv.us/nucwaste/yucca/state01.htm
-------- texas
Leak Prompted Texas Reactor Shutdown
December 3, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Nuclear-Reactor.html
DALLAS (AP) -- A reactor at a Texas nuclear power plant was shut down after a leak of radioactive water, leading to government scrutiny of the utility's plan for finding such leaks.
Operators shut down the TXU Energy's Comanche Peak twin-reactor plant well before leakage exceeded federal guidelines, TXU spokesman David Beshear said Tuesday. They have since repaired leaking and corroded lines.
``There was never a danger to the safety of the plant, the safety of the employees or the safety of the public,'' he said. Comanche Peak is about 80 miles southwest of Dallas.
A report by Nuclear Regulatory Commission inspectors said radiation monitors inside the plant's Unit 1 sounded alarms after recording high radiation readings on Sept. 26.
Radiation levels peaked six more times before operators shut down the reactor two days later, the inspectors said.
The leak was found in a small tube carrying radioactive water in one of four generators that make steam to turn the reactor's electric turbines.
The utility's own report to the NRC said a subsequent TXU check found corrosion in 667 other tubes in Unit 1, but none was leaking. That number, according to TXU, represented more than 3 percent of the tubes.
NRC spokesman Roger Hannah said an inspection of the plant focused on Comanche Peak's system for finding and responding to leaks.
``What we're interested in is whether they should have picked up on this earlier,'' he said.
The utility said it was the first unplanned shutdown of the plant, which returned to service Nov. 11.
David Lochbaum, a nuclear safety engineer with the Union of Concerned Scientists, said the leak could have quickly developed from debris in the water or over time if corrosion had been overlooked.
``If it was missed and they had the opportunity to prevent this in the past and missed it, that's one thing,'' he said. ``But if it happened randomly, then there was nothing they could do to prevent this.''
Lochbaum said similar leaks have shut down about a dozen plants in the past decade.
The Davis-Besse nuclear power plant near Toledo, Ohio, has been shut down since February because an accumulation of acid nearly ate through a 6-inch-thick steel reactor cap. That leak, discovered in March, was the most extensive corrosion ever found on a U.S. nuclear reactor and led to a nationwide review of 69 similar plants.
On the Net:
Comanche Peak: http://www.txu.com/us/ourbus/elecgen/comanche.asp
NRC: http://www.nrc.gov
-------- us politics
Text: Bush in Lousiana
eMediaMillWorks
Tuesday, December 3, 2002
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A3894-2002Dec3?language=printer
Following is the full text of President Bush's speech in Shreveport, La. Bush touted Suzie Terrell for Senate and talked about Iraq's upcoming deadline.
BUSH: Thank you all very much. I'm glad I came. Thank you all. Please be seated--unless you don't have a chair. It's an honor to be here in Shreveport. I'm so thrilled that you all came out. It's kind of getting close to home, if you know what I mean. I'm proud to be in the great state of Louisiana. Last time I was in Shreveport was on September the 11th, 2001. I went to Barksdale Air Force Base. Since that time, the world has seen the resolve of the United States of America.
I thank the men and women who wore our uniform then at Barksdale, and I know you join me today in thanking them to make sure America is free.
We're grateful for our freedom here in America. We love our freedoms. Nobody is going to take freedom away from this country. But part of living in a free society means we have responsibilities as citizens. We have the obligation as a citizen of America to do our duty. And one of the duties we have is when it comes to election time, one of the duties is to go vote.
So I'm here in the great state of Louisiana urging all the citizens--Republicans and Democrats and folks who care less about political party--to go the polls this Saturday. But I got a suggestion: For the good of Louisiana, for the good of everybody in Louisiana, Suzie Terrell needs to be the next United States senator.
(APPLAUSE)
I'm proud of the race she's running. She talks about what she believes in. She sets the right kind of tone. She's the kind of person with whom I can work to get something done for Louisiana and the people of Louisiana.
No doubt in my mind she's the right choice for everybody who lives in this state. And I want to thank you for coming to show your support for Suzie. I want to thank you for your activity at the grassroots level. You need over the next couple of days to go to your coffee shops, your community centers, and tell the people that you got a good one running for the United States Senate, you got somebody who can do the job for all the people of this state.
She's counting on you, and I'm counting on you to do everything you can to turn out a big a vote and send this good woman to the United States Senate.
And we need to have Lee Fletcher in the House of Representatives, too. I look forward to working with Lee. I look forward to having Lee a part of a fine delegation from the great state of Louisiana. He'll fit in just right with people like Billy Tauzin, who's doing a fabulous job for our country.
Jim McCrery. And David Vitter. All of them fine members of Congress. So when you get in that booth make sure you not only vote for Suzie, but if you live in Lee Fletcher's district, pull the Fletcher lever, too. I appreciate so very much the governor showing up.
Yes, he's a good man. Foster is a good man. He's my kind of guy. He's down to earth. He speaks his mind. But most importantly, he's done in office what he said he would do. He's been a great governor for the people of Louisiana. One of these days, he's going to invite me to come hunting again.
I regret that the first team of our family isn't here today. She's helping decorate the White House. But I'm proud of Laura. She is a fabulous first lady for America. And she sends her best to Suzie and Suzie's family. And like me, she urges you all to get to those polls come Saturday. Show up. Do you duty. Send a good strong message that Louisiana is wise when it comes to electing candidates. It makes sense to have one in one party and a senator in the majority party if you want to get something done. And one thing about Suzie is she's got a good record. She's proven herself to be a competent soul, somebody who can get the job done. You might remember the election commissioner's office. It needed a house cleansing. She cleaned house. There's now integrity in that office. People can be proud of that office thanks to Suzie Haik Terrell. She told the people of Louisiana she would do the job, and she has done that job. She understands who she's accountable to: She's accountable to the people. She understands she works for the people of Louisiana.
She saved $20 million for the taxpayers of Louisiana. She got an awesome responsibility and she saved money. Because she understands what I know: When you're spending the government's money, you don't spend--it's not the government's money you're spending, it's the people's money.
No, she's got a can-do spirit. See, we need people to go to Washington to set aside all the political bickering that tends to dominate the discourse, to get things done on behalf of the American people. That's what we need. We need an attitude of cooperation.
Oh, I expect there to be independent voices in Washington, D.C., and no question about her, she's an independent voice. She kind of tells you what's on her mind. But it's an attitude that's important. We need an attitude in the Senate to bring people together so we can say that we're doing the people's business and we're making a difference in people's lives.
And we're making some progress. I was proud to sign the Department of Homeland Security bill. That made sense. It now means we're going to reorganize our government so we can do our job, and that is to protect the American people from further attack. We want people all focused in the same direction. We want cultures to change if need be to make sure that we can do everything we can to say to the American people, ``We're working overtime to protect you.'' We need to know who's coming into the country, what they're bringing into the country, if they're leaving the country when they're supposed to be leaving the country, so America's protected. And we're making progress about bringing people together to get things done. I'm convinced Suzie's election will continue that progress. I went to the Pentagon yesterday and fulfilled a campaign pledge, signed the most significant increase in the authorization of defense spending since the president--Ronald Reagan was the president.
I was able to sign a piece of legislation will get our hard-hats back to work. I signed a terrorism insurance bill that will enable construction projects that have been on hold to go forward. I'm worried about the fact that some people are looking for work and can't find work in America. I want our hard-hats working. I want our welders welding. I want the construction people back to work. I want to reward the hard-hats, not the trial lawyers of America.
We're making progress up there. Suzie's election will help us make more progress. We got work to do on education. Listen, anytime any child can't read, means we got to stay on education.
I appreciate the governor's hard work, joining and setting high standards. We need somebody in the Senate who will join me in making sure we got local control of our schools in America.
Last year we spent $847 million of federal money on Louisiana schools, and that's good. But now we're starting to ask the question that Mike's been asking, and I know Suzie will ask: Are we getting our money's worth? You got to ask that question if you don't want any child left behind. You know, are the dollars we're spending making a difference in the lives of our children? Can our children read and write and add and subtract? And when we find they can, we'll praise the teachers.
And for those of you who are teachers, thanks for what you do.
But what's important--but what's important is when we find children in schools which won't teach and won't change, that we challenge the status quo. No child should be left behind in America.
And speaking about schools, I want to thank the Byrd High School band and the Parkway (ph) High School band for coming. I'm glad you all came. I'm sorry you had to miss school to come. Just put my name on the excuse slip. And if you're 18, make sure you vote.
No, we got more work to do. We got to make sure this economy continues to grow. I'm for a growth agenda. I want to do things in Washington, D.C., that helps create jobs. The role of government--and Suzie understands this--the role of government is not to create wealth, but an environment in which the small business can grow to be a big business.
In which the entrepreneurial spirit flourishes. And the best way to help people who are looking for work, the best way to stimulate economic vitality is to make the tax cuts we passed permanent. See, when that economy started slowing down I decided to fulfill what I said I was going to do and urge that the government let people keep more of their own money.
See, when you have more of your own money, it means you're likely to demand an additional good or a service. And when you demand an additional good or a service, somebody is likely to produce the good or a service. And when somebody produces the good or a service, it means somebody in Louisiana or Texas or anywhere else is likely to be able to find a job. The tax relief plan came at the right time. And now, in order to make sure our economy is strong and vibrant, we better make sure the tax cuts are permanent. And there's one person in this Senate race who's willing to stand up and say she will join the president in listening to the people and making tax cuts permanent. And that is Suzie Terrell.
No, we got more work to do. We've got more work to do. I need somebody in the Senate with whom I can work and Billy can work to make sure we get us an energy bill. You know, we've got a problem when it comes to energy. We get too much of our energy from countries that may not like us.
That's a problem. We can do a better job of conserving. We can do a better job of promoting technologies that will make us less dependent on foreign sources of crude oil. But we got to do a better job here at home of finding more hydrocarbons in the United States of America. An energy bill...
An energy bill is good for our job base, it's good for economic security and it's good for national security. I want to thank Billy Tauzin for working hard to get an energy bill. That new Senate may make it easier for us to get a bill done on behalf of the American people.
We got more work to do. And I look forwarding to working with Suzie to make sure that we modernize Medicare. See, medicine has changed, and the Medicare system hasn't changed. Medicine is modern, but Medicare's stuck in the past.
For the sake of our seniors, we need to fulfill our national promise and modernize Medicare, which means prescription drugs for our seniors.
I look forward to working with Suzie on behalf of the citizens of Louisiana. I also look forward to working with Suzie to make sure that our judiciary represents the values of Louisiana.
Amazing what an election did. It kind of changed the--changed the attitude in Washington. Up until recently, I couldn't get a lot of my judges through the Senate. They were playing politics with the judges. I had named some very fine people from around the country--good, honest people--and we couldn't get them through because they wanted to play politics.
You need somebody from Louisiana who will join with this president to make sure the judges I name reflect the values of Louisiana.
We don't need any more people legislating. We don't want our judges legislating. We want our judges interpreting the Constitution. Those are the kind of judges I'll name, and I can count on Suzie's vote to make sure they get confirmed. But the biggest job we have for a while is to protect this country. That's the biggest job we got. Our most awesome responsibility is to make this homeland secure. And the best way to do it is to chase the killers down one at a time and bring them to justice.
That's the biggest job facing this administration and the next Congress, and administrations and Congresses to come. This is a long haul to get them.
I guess they didn't realize who they were hitting. Oh, they thought... They probably thought the national religion was materialism and that we were so selfish that we all might file a lawsuit or two. They didn't understand America. They don't understand that when it comes to defending our freedoms, it doesn't matter how long it takes. We will defend freedom no matter what the cost.
And we're making progress. We're making progress. It's a different kind of war. You just got to know it's a different kind of war. In the old days we could destroy tanks and airplanes and ships. And people would say, ``Well, they're making progress.'' It's a different kind of war, because we're fighting people who are--they send youngsters to their suicidal deaths and they try to find a dark cave. They kind of lurch around the dark corners of some cities around the world. They're in over 60 countries.
And slowly, but surely we're dismantling the terrorist network which hates us because of what we love. See, they hate the fact that we love freedom. They can't stand the fact that in this country people can worship the Almighty God any way he or she sees fit.
Thanks to our military--thanks to our fantastic military we won the first battle of the first war of the 21st century. And we won it when we got rid of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.
But in so doing it's important for you to remind your youngsters that this great country never went in to conquer anybody. We went in to liberate.
Thanks to America and our friends, many young girls go to school for the first time in Afghanistan.
Not only did we route the Taliban and many of the killers they harbor, but we freed people to realize their dreams. And we're not leaving. We're going to stay there to make sure this good country is secure, the good country can flourish, and that the hope we want for our own children is the hope that mothers and dads in Afghanistan can realize for their children.
We're making progress on this war against terror. Sometimes you'll see the progress, and sometimes you won't. It's a different kind of war. The other day we hauled a guy in named al-Nashiri. It's not a household name here in America. I can understand why some go blank when they hear his name. But he was the Al Qaida commander in the gulf states. Let me just put it to you this way: He no longer has the capacity to do what he did in the past, which was to mastermind the USS Cole that killed--the plot on the Cole that killed American soldiers. He's out of action for the good of the world.
Sometimes you'll see it and sometimes you won't. But you've got to know that in this war against terror, the doctrine stands that says, ``Either you're with us or you're with the terrorists.''
And a lot of nations have heard that message, and they're with us. We're cutting off their money. We're sharing intelligence. We're hunting down the killers one at a time. It doesn't matter how long it takes, this country will stay the course until Al Qaida is completely demolished.
But September the 11th brought home a new reality, and it's important for all our citizens to understand that reality. See, a lot of us when we were raised never really worried about the homeland. We all believed that two oceans would forever separate us from harm's way and that if there was a threat gathering overseas, we could pick and choose whether or not we wanted to be involved in dealing with that threat. September the 11th delivered a chilling message to our country, and that is oceans no longer protect us. And therefore, it is my obligation to make sure that we address gathering threats overseas before they could do harm to the American people. And that's why I elevated the issue of Iraq. That's why I took our message of peace and freedom to countries around the world. I want them to understand the nature of the man who runs Iraq. It's the nature of a man who doesn't tell the truth. Says he won't have weapons of mass destruction; he's got them.
He's not only got them, he's used them. And he's not only used them in his neighborhood, he's used them on his own people.
That's the nature of the man with whom we deal. For 11 long years he has deceived and denied. So I went to the United Nations. I said, ``When is enough, enough?'' They voted 15 to nothing to say now enough is enough.
The members of the Security Council had a chance and they accepted the challenge to make sure that this United Nations became an effective body when it comes to keeping the peace, not an empty debating society.
Then I went to NATO. Strong allies in NATO. And overwhelmingly the message was, enough is enough. And now there's inspectors inside this country. But I want to tell you, the issue is not the inspectors. The issue is whether or not Mr. Saddam Hussein will disarm like he said he would. We're not interested in hide and seek inside Iraq. The fundamental question is, in the name of peace, in the name of security, not only for America and the American people, in the name of security for our friends in the neighborhood, in the name of freedom, will this man disarm? The choice is his. And if he does not disarm, the United States of America will lead a coalition and disarm him in the name of peace.
We have an obligation to our children and our children's children to do everything we can to make sure the homeland is secure. And we'll meet that obligation. We'll meet that obligation together. You know, the amazing thing about America is that I can predict, boldly predict and certainly predict that out of the evil done to our country will come incredible good. Because of the nature of our country, I can say that.
By being tough and strong and united in the face of danger, we can bring peace to the world. I believe that. I believe that by doing what we need to do to secure the world from terrorist attack, to rid tyrants of weapons of mass destruction, to make sure that somebody like Saddam Hussein doesn't serve as a training base or a provider of weapons of mass destruction to terrorist networks, by doing our job, that the world will be more peaceful, by standing strong for what we believe, by remembering that freedom is not America's gift to the world, but God's gift to each and every human being, that we can achieve peace.
I want you to tell your kids and your grandkids that amidst all the speculation about war and military, that our drive and our vision is for a peaceful world in which everybody can realize their potential and live in peace. And here at home we have a chance to achieve some incredible good out of the evil done to our country. September the 11th shook our soul. I think it has helped awaken a spirit in the country, a spirit that understands that serving something greater than ourself in life is part of the American creed, that the American spirit is bigger than just any selfish ambition. Today, when I landed at the airport, I met Mary Anne Blanchard Selber (ph) and Jane Sares (ph). These ladies have started the Providence House here in Shreveport. This is a home to provide shelter to the homeless. They followed their hearts. The reason I bring up this example is because they represent the true strength of our country. The true strength of our country lay in the hearts and souls of our fellow citizens. You see, out of the evil done to America could come a more compassionate America.
We got to understand that amidst our plenty, there are people who hurt. There's addiction and hopelessness. There are people who wonder whether or not the American dream is meant for them. So long as any of us hurt, we all hurt. Yet, we can solve the problems in our society by loving a neighbor just like we'd like to be loved ourselves. We can solve America's problems by putting our arm around the lonely and the hopeless and say, ``I care for you. I love you.'' American can change one heart, one soul, one conscience at a time.
And the Providence House is one example of what I'm talking about. They represent the true strength of our country. People who love people. People who care for those who hurt. People who understand that government's role is limited. We can hand out money, but we can't put hope in people's hearts or a sense of purpose in people's lives. That's why I'm so strong for the faith-based initiative. I understand the power of faith in the lives of our citizens around this country.
No, if you want to join the war on terror, if you want to show the world the true worth of America, love a neighbor just like you'd like to be loved yourself; see what you can do to help mentor a child; go see a shut-in. It's the small acts of kindness and decency which define the true victory in the war against terror, which will show the world what this country is all about. Perhaps best defined for me and I suspect others as they come up in America of this spirit was defined best on flight 93. Remember that. When people were flying across our country, they thought they were on an average business trip or they thought they might be just taking an average trip to go see a loved one, and they find out the plane they were on was being used as a weapon. And they told their loved ones over the telephone, ``I love you,'' and good-bye. They said a prayer. A guy said, ``Let's roll.'' They took the plane into the ground to serve something greater than themselves.
No, the spirit of America is strong today. I can boldly predict that out of the evil done to America will come great good, because this is the greatest nation, full of the finest people on the face of the Earth.
May God bless you. And may God bless America.
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The Push for War
Anatol Lieven considers what the US Administration hopes to gain
October 3, 2002
London Review of Books
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v24/n19/liev01_.html
The most surprising thing about the Bush Administration's plan to invade Iraq is not that it is destructive of international order; or wicked, when we consider the role the US (and Britain) have played, and continue to play, in the Middle East; or opposed by the great majority of the international community; or seemingly contrary to some of the basic needs of the war against terrorism. It is all of these things, but they are of no great concern to the hardline nationalists in the Administration. This group has suffered at least a temporary check as a result of the British insistence on UN involvement, and Saddam Hussein's agreement to weapons inspections. They are, however, still determined on war - and their power within the Administration and in the US security policy world means that they are very likely to get their way. Even the Washington Post has joined the radical rightist media in supporting war.
The most surprising thing about the push for war is that it is so profoundly reckless. If I had to put money on it, I'd say that the odds on quick success in destroying the Iraqi regime may be as high as 5/1 or more, given US military superiority, the vile nature of Saddam Hussein's rule, the unreliability of Baghdad's missiles, and the deep divisions in the Arab world. But at first sight, the longer-term gains for the US look pretty limited, whereas the consequences of failure would be catastrophic. A general Middle Eastern conflagration and the collapse of more pro-Western Arab states would lose us the war against terrorism, doom untold thousands of Western civilians to death in coming decades, and plunge the world economy into depression.
These risks are not only to American (and British) lives and interests, but to the political future of the Administration. If the war goes badly wrong, it will be more generally excoriated than any within living memory, and its members will be finished politically - finished for good. If no other fear moved these people, you'd have thought this one would.
This war plan is not like the intervention in Vietnam, which at the start was supported by a consensus of both political parties, the Pentagon, the security establishment and the media. It is true that today - for reasons to which I shall return - the Democrats are mostly sitting on the fence; but a large part of the old Republican security establishment has denounced the idea and the Pentagon has made its deep unhappiness very clear.
The Administration has therefore been warned of the dangers. And while a new attack by al-Qaida during the war would help consolidate anti-Muslim American nationalism, the Administration would also be widely accused of having neglected the hunt for the perpetrators of 11 September in order to pursue an irrelevant vendetta. As far as the Israeli lobby is concerned, a disaster in the Middle East might be the one thing that would at last bring a discussion of its calamitous role into the open in the US.
With the exception of Donald Rumsfeld, who conveniently did his military service in the gap between the Korean and Vietnam Wars, neither Bush nor any of the other prime movers of this war served in the military. Of course, General Colin Powell served in Vietnam, but he is well known to be extremely dubious about attacking Iraq. All the others did everything possible to avoid service. If the war goes wrong, the 'chicken hawk' charge will be used against them with devastating political effect.
Vietnam veterans, both Democrat and Republican, have already started to raise this issue, stirred up in part by the insulting language used by Richard Perle and his school about the caution of the professional military. As a recent letter to the Washington Post put it, 'the men described as chicken hawks avoided military service during the Vietnam War while supporting that war politically. They are not accused of lacking experience and judgment compared to military men. They are accused of hypocrisy and cowardice.' Given the political risks of failure - to themselves, above all - why are they doing this? And, more broadly, what has bred this reckless spirit?
To understand the Administration's motivation, it is necessary to appreciate the breathtaking scope of the domestic and global ambitions which the dominant neo-conservative nationalists hope to further by means of war, and which go way beyond their publicly stated goals. There are of course different groups within this camp: some are more favourable to Israel, others less hostile to China; not all would support the most radical aspects of the programme. However, the basic and generally agreed plan is unilateral world domination through absolute military superiority, and this has been consistently advocated and worked on by the group of intellectuals close to Dick Cheney and Richard Perle since the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s.
This basic goal is shared by Colin Powell and the rest of the security establishment. It was, after all, Powell who, as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, declared in 1992 that the US requires sufficient power 'to deter any challenger from ever dreaming of challenging us on the world stage'. However, the idea of pre-emptive defence, now official doctrine, takes this a leap further, much further than Powell would wish to go. In principle, it can be used to justify the destruction of any other state if it even seems that that state might in future be able to challenge the US. When these ideas were first aired by Paul Wolfowitz and others after the end of the Cold War, they met with general criticism, even from conservatives. Today, thanks to the ascendancy of the radical nationalists in the Administration and the effect of the 11 September attacks on the American psyche, they have a major influence on US policy.
To understand the genesis of this extraordinary ambition, it is also necessary to grasp the moral, cultural and intellectual world of American nationalism in which it has taken shape. This nationalism existed long before last September, but it has been inflamed by those attacks and, equally dangerously, it has become even more entwined with the nationalism of the Israeli Right.
To take the geopolitical goals first. As with National Missile Defense, the publicly expressed motive for war with Iraq functions mainly as a tool to gain the necessary public support for an operation the real goals of which are far wider. The indifference of the US public to serious discussion of foreign or security affairs, and the negligence and ideological rigidity of the US media and policy community make searching debate on such issues extremely difficult, and allow such manipulation to succeed.
The immediate goal is indeed to eliminate Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. There is little real fear, however, that Saddam Hussein will give those weapons to terrorists to use against the United States - though a more genuine fear that he might conceivably do so in the case of Israel. Nor is there any serious prospect that he would use them himself in an unprovoked attack on the US or Israel, because immediate annihilation would follow. The banal propaganda portrayal of Saddam as a crazed and suicidal dictator plays well on the American street, but I don't believe that it is a view shared by the Administration. Rather, their intention is partly to retain an absolute certainty of being able to defend the Gulf against an Iraqi attack, but, more important, to retain for the US and Israel a free hand for intervention in the Middle East as a whole.
From the point of view of Israel, the Israeli lobby and their representatives in the Administration, the apparent benefits of such a free hand are clear enough. For the group around Cheney, the single most important consideration is guaranteed and unrestricted access to cheap oil, controlled as far as possible at its source. To destroy and occupy the existing Iraqi state and dominate the region militarily would remove even the present limited threat from Opec, greatly reduce the chance of a new oil shock, and eliminate the need to woo and invest in Russia as an alternative source of energy.
It would also critically undermine the steps already taken towards the development of alternative sources of energy. So far, these have been pitifully few. All the same, 11 September brought new strength to the security arguments for reducing dependence on imported oil, and as alternative technologies develop, they could become a real threat to the oil lobby - which, like the Israeli lobby, is deeply intertwined with the Bush Administration. War with Iraq can therefore be seen as a satisfactory outcome for both lobbies. Much more important for the future of mankind, it is also part of what is in essence a strategy to use American military force to permit the continued offloading onto the rest of the world of the ecological costs of the existing US economy - without the need for any short-term sacrifices on the part of US capitalism, the US political elite or US voters.
The same goes for the war against al-Qaida and its allies: the plan for the destruction of the existing Iraqi regime is related to this struggle, but not as it has been presented publicly. Links between Baghdad and al-Qaida are unproven and inherently improbable: what the Administration hopes is that by crushing another middle-sized state at minimal military cost, all the other states in the Muslim world will be terrified into full co-operation in tracking down and handing over suspected terrorists, and into forsaking the Palestinian cause. Iran for its part can either be frightened into abandoning both its nuclear programme and its support for the Palestinians, or see its nuclear facilities destroyed by bombardment.
The idea, in other words, is to scare these states not only into helping with the hunt for al-Qaida, but into capitulating to the US and, more important, Israeli agendas in the Middle East. This was brought out in the notorious paper on Saudi Arabia presented by Laurent Murawiec of the Rand Corporation to Richard Perle's Defense Policy Board. Murawiec advocated sending the Saudis an ultimatum demanding not only that their police force co-operate fully with US authorities, but also the suppression of public criticism of the US and Israel within Saudi Arabia - something that would be impossible for any Arab state. Despite this, the demand for the suppression of anti-Israeli publications, broadcasts and activities has been widely echoed in the US media.
'The road to Middle East peace lies through Baghdad' is a line that's peddled by the Bush Administration and the Israeli lobby. It is just possible that some members of the Administration really believe that by destroying Israel's most powerful remaining enemy they will gain such credit with Israelis and the Israeli lobby that they will be able to press compromises on Israel.
But this is certainly not what public statements by members of the Administration - let alone those of its Likud allies in Israel - suggest. Rumsfeld recently described the Jewish settlements as legitimate products of Israeli military victory; the Republican Majority Leader in the House, Dick Armey (a sceptic as regards war with Iraq), has advocated the ethnic cleansing ('transfer') of the Palestinians across the Jordan; and in 1996 Richard Perle and Douglas Feith (now a senior official at the Pentagon) advised Binyamin Netanyahu to abandon the Oslo Peace Process and return to military repression of the Palestinians.
It's far more probable, therefore, that most members of the Bush and Sharon Administrations hope that the crushing of Iraq will so demoralise the Palestinians, and so reduce wider Arab support for them, that it will be possible to force them to accept a Bantustan settlement bearing no resemblance to independent statehood and bringing with it no possibility of economic growth and prosperity.
How intelligent men can believe that this will work, given the history of the past fifty years, is astonishing. After all, the Israelis have defeated Arab states five times with no diminution of Palestinian nationalism or Arab sympathy for it. But the dominant groups in the present Administrations in both Washington and Jerusalem are 'realists' to the core, which, as so often, means that they take an extremely unreal view of the rest of the world, and are insensitive to the point of autism when it comes to the character and motivations of others. They are obsessed by power, by the division of the world into friends and enemies (and often, into their own country and the rest of the world) and by the belief that any demonstration of 'weakness' immediately leads to more radical approaches by the 'enemy'.
Sharon and his supporters don't doubt that it was the Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon - rather than the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories - which led to the latest Intifada. The 'offensive realists' in Washington are convinced that it was Reagan's harsh stance and acceleration of the arms race against the Soviet Union which brought about that state's collapse. And both are convinced that the continued existence of Saddam Hussein's regime of itself suggests dangerous US weakness and cowardice, thus emboldening enemies of the US and Israel across the Middle East and beyond.
From the point of view of the Arab-Israeli conflict, war with Iraq also has some of the character of a Flucht nach vorn - an 'escape forwards' - on the part of the US Administration. On the one hand, it has become clear that the conflict is integrally linked to everything else that happens in the Middle East, and therefore cannot simply be ignored, as the Bush Administration tried to do during its first year in office. On the other hand, even those members of the American political elite who have some understanding of the situation and a concern for justice are terrified of confronting Israel and the Israeli lobby in the ways which would be necessary to bring any chance of peace.
When the US demands 'democracy' in the Palestinian territories before it will re-engage in the peace process it is in part, and fairly cynically, trying to get out of this trap. However, when it comes to the new rhetoric of 'democratising' the Arab world as a whole, the agenda is much broader and more worrying; and because the rhetoric is attractive to many liberals we must examine this agenda very carefully.
Belief in the spread of democracy through American power isn't usually consciously insincere. On the contrary, it is inseparable from American national messianism and the wider 'American creed'. However, this same messianism has also proved immensely useful in destroying or crippling rivals of the United States, the Soviet Union being the outstanding example.
The planned war against Iraq is not after all intended only to remove Saddam Hussein, but to destroy the structure of the Sunni-dominated Arab nationalist Iraqi state as it has existed since that country's inception. The 'democracy' which replaces it will presumably resemble that of Afghanistan - a ramshackle coalition of ethnic groups and warlords, utterly dependent on US military power and utterly subservient to US (and Israeli) wishes.
Similarly, if after Saddam's regime is destroyed, Saudi Arabia fails to bow to US wishes and is attacked in its turn, then - to judge by the thoughts circulating in Washington think-tanks - the goal would be not just to remove the Saudi regime and eliminate Wahabism as a state ideology: it would be to destroy and partition the Saudi state. The Gulf oilfields would be put under US military occupation, and the region run by some client emir; Mecca and the Hejaz might well be returned to the Hashemite dynasty of Jordan, its rulers before the conquest by Ibn Saud in 1924; or, to put it differently, the British imperial programme of 1919 would be resurrected (though, if the Hashemites have any sense, they would reject what would without question be a long-term death sentence).
Beyond lies China. When the Bush Administration came to power, its major security focus was not the Middle East. There, its initial policy was benign neglect ('benign' at any rate in the case of Israel). The greatest fears of right-wing nationalist gurus such as Robert Kagan concerned the future emergence of China as a superpower rival - fears lent a certain credibility by China's sheer size and the growth of its economy. As declared in the famous strategy document drawn up by Paul Wolfowitz in the last year of the first Bush Administration - and effectively proclaimed official policy by Bush Jr in his West Point speech in June - the guiding purpose of US strategy after the end of the Cold War should be to prevent the emergence of any 'peer competitor'anywhere in the world.
What radical US nationalists have in mind is either to 'contain' China by overwhelming military force and the creation of a ring of American allies; or, in the case of the real radicals, to destroy the Chinese Communist state as the Soviet Union was destroyed. As with the Soviet Union, this would presumably involve breaking up China by 'liberating' Tibet and other areas, and under the guise of 'democracy', crippling the central Chinese Administration and its capacity to develop either its economy or its Army.
To judge by the right-wing nationalist media in the US, this hostility to China has survived 11 September, although in a mitigated form. If the US can demonstrate overwhelming military superiority in the Middle East, there will certainly be groups in the Republican Party who will be emboldened to push for a much tougher line on China. Above all, of course, they support formal independence for Taiwan.
Another US military victory will certainly help to persuade these groups that for the moment the US has nothing to fear from the Chinese Navy or Air Force, and that in the event of a Taiwanese declaration of independence, the island can be defended with relative impunity. Meanwhile, a drastic humiliation of China over Taiwan might well be seen as a key stepping-stone to the overthrow of Communism and the crippling of the Chinese state system.
At present these are only long-term ambitions - or dreams. They are certainly not shared even by a majority of the Administration, and are unlikely to be implemented in any systematic way. On the other hand, it's worth bearing in mind that the dominant groups in this Administration have now openly abandoned the underlying strategy and philosophy of the Clinton Administration, which was to integrate the other major states of the world in a rule-based liberal capitalist order, thereby reducing the threat of rivalry between them.
This tendency is not dead. In fact, it is strongly represented by Colin Powell, and by lesser figures such as Richard Haass. But their more powerful nationalist rivals are in the meantime publicly committed to preventing by every possible means the emergence of any serious rival or combination of rivals to the US, anywhere in the world, and to opposing not just any rival would-be world hegemon, but even the ability of other states to play the role of great power within their own regions.
Under the guise of National Missile Defense, the Administration - or elements within it - even dreams of extending US military hegemony beyond the bounds of the Earth itself (an ambition clearly indicated in the official paper on Defense Planning Guidance for the 2004-09 Fiscal Years, issued this year by Rumsfeld's office). And while this web of ambition is megalomaniac, it is not simply fantasy. Given America's overwhelming superiority, it might well work for decades until a mixture of terrorism and the unbearable social, political and environmental costs of US economic domination put paid to the present order of the world.
As things stand, the American people would never knowingly support such a programme - nor for that matter would the US military. Even after 11 September, this is not by historical standards a militarist country; and whatever the increasingly open imperialism of the nationalist think-tank class, neither the military nor the mass of the population wishes to see itself as imperialist. The fear of casualties and of long-term overseas military entanglements remains intense. And all opinion polls suggest that the majority of the American public, insofar as it considers these issues at all, is far more interested than this Administration in co-operation with allies.
Besides, if the US economy continues to stagnate or falls sharply, the Republicans will most probably not even be in power after 2004. As more companies collapse, the Administration's links to corrupt business oligarchies will become more and more controversial. Further economic decline combined with bloated military spending would sooner or later bring on the full consequences of the stripping of the public finances caused by this Administration's military spending and its tax cuts for the rich. At that point, the financial basis of Social Security would come into question, and the Republican vote among the 'middle classes' could shatter.
It is only to a minimal degree within the power of any US administration to stimulate economic growth. And even if growth resumes, the transformation of the economy is almost certain to continue. This will mean the incomes of the 'middle classes' (which in American terminology includes the working proletariat) will continue to decline and the gap between them and the plutocracy will continue to increase. High military spending can correct this trend to some extent, but because of the changed nature of weaponry, to a much lesser extent than was the case in the 19th and most of the 20th centuries. All other things being equal, this should result in a considerable shift of the electorate to the left.
But all other things are not equal. Two strategies in particular would give the Republicans the chance not only of winning in 2004, but of repeating Roosevelt's success for the Democrats in the 1930s and becoming the natural party of government for the foreseeable future. The first is the classic modern strategy of an endangered right-wing oligarchy, which is to divert mass discontent into nationalism. The second, which is specifically American, is to take the Jewish vote away from its traditional home in the Democratic Party, by demonstrating categorical Republican commitment not just to Israel's defence but to its regional ambitions.
This is connected both to the rightward shift in Israel, and to the increasingly close links between the Republicans and Likud, through figures like Perle and Feith. It marks a radical change from the old Republican Party of Eisenhower, Nixon and Bush père, which was far more independent of Israel than the Democrats. Of key importance here has been the growing alliance between the Christian Right - closely linked to the old White South - and the Israeli lobby, or at least its hardline Likud elements.
When this alliance began to take shape some years back, it seemed a most improbable combination. After all, the Christian Right and the White South were once havens of anti-semitic conspiracy theories. On the other hand, the Old Testament aspects of fundamentalist Christianity had created certain sympathies for Judaism and Israel from as far back as the US's 17th-century origins.
For Christian fundamentalists today the influence of millenarian thought is equally important in shaping support for Israel: the existence of the Israeli state is seen as a necessary prelude to the arrival of the Antichrist, the Apocalypse and the rule of Christ and His Saints. But above all, perhaps, this coming together of the fundamentalist Right and hardline Zionism is natural, because they share many hatreds. The Christian Right has always hated the United Nations, partly on straight nationalist grounds, but also because of bizarre fears of world government by the Antichrist. They have hated Europeans on religious grounds as decadent atheists, on class grounds as associates of the hated 'East Coast elites', and on nationalist grounds as critics of unconstrained American power. Both sides share an instinctive love of military force. Both see themselves as historical victims. This may seem strange in the case of the American Rightists, but it isn't if one considers both the White South's history of defeat, and the Christian Right's sense since the 1960s of defeat and embattlement by the forces of irreligion and cultural change.
Finally, and most dangerously, both are conditioned to see themselves as defenders of 'civilisation' against 'savages' - a distinction always perceived on the Christian Right as in the main racially defined. It is no longer possible in America to speak openly in these terms of American blacks, Asians and Latinos - but since 11 September at least, it has been entirely possible to do so about Arabs and Muslims.
Even in the 2000 elections, the Republicans were able to take a large part of the white working-class vote away from Gore by appealing to cultural populism - and especially to those opposed to gun control and environmental protection. Despite the real class identity and cultural interests of the Republican elite, they seem able to convince many workers that they are natural allies against the culturally alien and supercilious 'East Coast elites' represented as supporting Gore.
These populist values are closely linked to the traditional values of hardline nationalism. They are what the historian Walter Russell Mead and others have called 'Jacksonian' values, after President Andrew Jackson's populist nationalism of the 1830s. As Mead has indicated, 11 September has immensely increased the value of this line to Republicans.
If on top of this the Republicans can permanently woo the Jewish vote away from the Democrats - a process which purely class interests would suggest and which has been progressing slowly but steadily since Reagan's day - there is a good chance of their crippling the Democrats for a generation or more. Deprived of much of their financial support and their intellectual backbone, the Democrats could be reduced to a coalition of the declining unionised white working class, blacks and Latinos. And not only do these groups on the whole dislike and distrust each other, but the more the Democrats are seen as minority dominated, the more whites will tend to flee to the Republicans.
Already, the anti-semitism of some black leaders in the Democratic Party has contributed to driving many Jews towards the Republicans; and thanks to their allegiance to Israel, the liberal Jewish intelligentsia has moved a long way from their previous internationalism. This shift is highly visible in previously liberal and relatively internationalist journals such as the New Republic and Atlantic Monthly, and maybe even in the New Yorker. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to say that as a result the internationalist position in the Democratic Party and the US as a whole has been eviscerated.
The Democrats are well aware of this threat to their electorate. The Party as a whole has always been strongly committed to Israel. On Iraq and the war against terrorism, its approach seems to be to avoid at all costs seeming 'unpatriotic'. If they can avoid being hammered by the Republicans on the charge of 'weakness' and lack of patriotism, then they can still hope to win the 2004 elections on the basis of economic discontent. The consequence, however, is that the Party has become largely invisible in the debate about Iraq; the Democrats are merely increasing their reputation for passionless feebleness; whereas the Republican nationalists are full of passionate intensity - the passion which in November 2000 helped them pressure the courts over the Florida vote and in effect steal the election.
It is this passion which gives the nationalist Right so much of its strength; and in setting out the hopes and plans of the groupings which dominate the Bush Administration, I don't want to give the impression that everything is simply a matter of conscious and cynical manipulation in their own narrow interests. Schematic approaches of this kind have bedevilled all too much of the reporting of nationalism and national conflict. This is odd and depressing, because in recent decades the historiography of pre-1914 German nationalism - to take only one example - has seen an approach based on ideas of class manipulation give way to an infinitely more subtle analysis which emphasises the role of socio-economic and cultural change, unconscious identifications, and interpenetrating political influences from above and below.
To understand the radical nationalist Right in the US, and the dominant forces in the Bush Administration, it is necessary first of all to understand their absolute and absolutely sincere identification of themselves with the United States, to the point where the presence of any other group in government is seen as a usurpation, as profoundly and inherently illegitimate and 'un-American'. As far as the hardline elements of the US security establishment and military industrial complex are concerned, they are the product of the Cold War, and were shaped by that struggle and the paranoia and fanaticism it bred. In typical fashion for security elites, they also became conditioned over the decades to see themselves not just as tougher, braver, wiser and more knowledgeable than their ignorant, innocent compatriots, but as the only force standing between their country and destruction.
The Cold War led to the creation of governmental, economic and intellectual structures in the US which require for their survival a belief in the existence of powerful national enemies - not just terrorists, but enemy states. As a result, in their analyses and propaganda they instinctively generate the necessary image of an enemy. Once again, however, it would be unwise to see this as a conscious process. For the Cold War also continued, fostered and legitimised a very old discourse of nationalist hatred in the US, ostensibly directed against the Communists and their allies but usually with a very strong colouring of ethnic chauvinism.
On the other hand, the roots of the hysteria of the Right go far beyond nationalism and national security. Their pathological hatred for the Clinton Administration cannot adequately be explained in terms of national security or even in rational political or economic terms, for after a very brief period of semi-radicalism (almost entirely limited to the failed attempt at health reform), Clinton devoted himself in a Blairite way to adopting large parts of the Republican socio-economic agenda. Rather, Clinton, his wife, his personal style, his personal background and some of his closest followers were all seen as culturally and therefore nationally alien, mainly because associated with the counter-culture of the 1960s and 1970s.
The modern incarnation of this spirit can indeed be seen above all as a reaction to the double defeat of the Right in the Vietnam War - a defeat which, they may hope, victory in Iraq and a new wave of conservative nationalism at home could cancel out once and for all. In Vietnam, unprecedented military defeat coincided with the appearance of a modern culture which traditionalist Americans found alien, immoral and hateful beyond description. As was widely remarked at the time of Newt Gingrich's attempted 'Republican Revolution' of the mid-1990s, one way of looking at the hardline Republicans - especially from the Religious Right - is to see them as motivated by a classical nationalist desire for a return to a Golden Age, in their case the pre-Vietnam days of the 1950s.
None of these fantasies is characteristic of the American people as a whole. But the intense solipsism of that people, its general ignorance of the world beyond America's shores, coupled with the effects of 11 September, have left tremendous political spaces in which groups possessed by the fantasies and ambitions sketched out here can seek their objectives. Or to put it another way: the great majority of the American people are not nearly as militarist, imperialist or aggressive as their German equivalents in 1914; but most German people in 1914 would at least have been able to find France on a map.
The younger intelligentsia meanwhile has also been stripped of any real knowledge of the outside world by academic neglect of history and regional studies in favour of disciplines which are often no more than a crass projection of American assumptions and prejudices (Rational Choice Theory is the worst example). This has reduced still further their capacity for serious analysis of their own country and its actions. Together with the defection of its strongest internationalist elements, this leaves the intelligentsia vulnerable to the appeal of nationalist messianism dressed up in the supposedly benevolent clothing of 'democratisation'.
Twice now in the past decade, the overwhelming military and economic dominance of the US has given it the chance to lead the rest of the world by example and consensus. It could have adopted (and to a very limited degree under Clinton did adopt) a strategy in which this dominance would be softened and legitimised by economic and ecological generosity and responsibility, by geopolitical restraint, and by 'a decent respect to the opinion of mankind', as the US Declaration of Independence has it. The first occasion was the collapse of the Soviet superpower enemy and of Communism as an ideology. The second was the threat displayed by al-Qaida. Both chances have been lost - the first in part, the second it seems conclusively. What we see now is the tragedy of a great country, with noble impulses, successful institutions, magnificent historical achievements and immense energies, which has become a menace to itself and to mankind.
Anatol Lieven, a Senior Associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington DC, is the author of Chechnya and Ukraine and Russia: A Fraternal Rivalry.
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KABUL Afghans Plan a New Army of 70,000
December 3, 2002
New York Times
By MARK LANDLER
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/03/international/asia/03AFGH.html
BONN, Dec. 2 - Afghanistan's president, Hamid Karzai, announced here today that his government would establish a streamlined national army of up to 70,000 troops, under civilian control, and conduct a redoubled campaign to disarm the militias that still roam the countryside.
"We have decided to have an army that is small, effective, well paid and in the service of the nation," Mr. Karzai said.
In addition, a senior American official, Zalmay Khalilzad, said the Afghans had scored a major catch in their hunt for prominent members of the toppled Taliban leadership, arresting the son-in-law of its spiritual leader, Mullah Muhammad Omar.
Both Mr. Karzai and Mr. Khalilzad were attending a conference here that marked the first anniversary of an agreement reached here on a framework to move Afghanistan from the Taliban regime to a representative interim government.
Mr. Khalilzad, the Bush administration's special envoy to Afghanistan, told reporters that Mullah Omar's son-in-law had been arrested "a few days ago," though he offered no further details.
He said he believed Mullah Omar and other operatives of the Taliban and Al Qaeda were still at large in the country, but added, "I don't think that Afghanistan is any longer the headquarters of Al Qaeda."
Mr. Khalilzad's attendance at the conference coincided with a White House announcement that he would be ambassador at large for free Iraqis. The White House said he would "serve as a focal point for contacts and coordination among free Iraqis," and "for preparations for a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq."
To conduct those new duties, he is to relinquish his National Security Council role as senior director for Southwest Asian, Near East and North African affairs. He will be replaced by Elliott Abrams, a former State Department official during the Reagan administration. The conference in Bonn, held by the German government, pointed up strides made by the Afghans, as well as their continued vulnerabilities.
Noting that security remains Afghanistan's biggest concern, Mr. Karzai signed a decree creating an Afghan National Army, a volunteer force to be trained, equipped and financed largely by the United States, with help from France and Britain.
The United States has roughly 8,000 troops in Afghanistan, still searching for Qaeda members. But as the trail grows colder, some of those troops are turning their attention to other tasks, like providing security, rebuilding schools and roads, and training soldiers.
The emphasis in the training has been on the basics: marching, tactics and marksmanship. United States officials here estimated that the army would cost $350 million a year to train, equip and operate. It will be several years before the force is fully mobilized.
But even as Mr. Karzai spoke of his pride in Afghanistan's keeping to the timetable delineated in the Bonn agreement, factional fighting erupted in western Afghanistan, near a military base where United States troops are stationed.
Mr. Karzai said the factional militias in his country, which by some estimates have 700,000 members, would be disbanded within a year. Their weapons, including tanks, artillery and rocket launchers, will be collected and turned over to the Defense Ministry.
"There is neither a compromise, nor room, for anyone to say no," he declared.
Some Afghan leaders, including the defense minister, Marshal Muhammad Fahim, had pushed for a much larger force, of 200,000. Marshal Fahim was one of the few Afghan ministers not here today.
Mr. Karzai also announced that Afghanistan's six neighbors - Pakistan, China, Iran, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan - had agreed to convene in Kabul later this month to sign a declaration pledging to respect borders and not to interfere in one another's internal affairs.
"We will take their words as trustworthy and good," said Mr. Karzai, noting that given its history of foreign invasion, Afghanistan needed a well-trained army to protect it.
Among the topics discussed in the corridors at this meeting is a proposal to deploy security forces outside Kabul, the Afghan capital. Britain, Germany and other members of the international security force have refused Afghanistan's requests to expand their operations beyond Kabul.
Under this plan, which is supported by the United States, individual countries would send small detachments of soldiers to outlying cities and the countryside. Germany and the Netherlands are scheduled to take command of the 4,800-member security force in February.
-------- arms sales
Prague link to Kenya missiles
By Inigo Gilmore in Jerusalem
Tuesday 3 December 2002
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002/12/02/wkeny02.xml
The missiles fired at an Israeli airliner in Mombasa last week have been linked to an attempt in Prague last year to bring down an aircraft carrying the then Israeli foreign minister, Shimon Peres, according to an Israeli intelligence official.
The weapon found by Kenyan security forces near the airport - http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/graphics/2002/12/02/wkeny02.jpeg
The discovery is the latest in a series of clues found by Israeli security experts investigating the double attack on Israeli tourists in Kenya and may help identify the perpetrators.
In the attack attributed to al-Qa'eda, suicide bombers rammed a car crammed with explosives into the entrance of the Paradise Mombasa Hotel and blew themselves up, killing three Israeli tourists and 13 Kenyans.
At the same time, a separate squad fired two shoulder-held Strela missiles at an Arkia airliner that was taking off from Mombasa airport. They narrowly missed.
The Israeli investigation, led by the Mossad intelligence agency, has turned up a gas canister used in the bombing as well as witnesses who claim to have seen the bombers.
The discarded missile launchers may yield vital information. Israeli intelligence agents told the Hebrew daily, Yediot Ahronot, that the serial numbers linked them to two similar missile launchers found near a runway at Prague airport in November last year.
Czech officials were convinced the missiles were part of an abortive plot to shoot down an El Al airliner carrying Mr Peres.
According to Yediot Ahronot, the missiles in the two attacks were from the same manufacturing series of missiles manufactured in May 1974 by the Zid factory, just outside Moscow.
Kenyan police said the missile launchers had been painted blue, apparently in an attempt to hide the serial number.
"Cross-referencing this new information with the intelligence services in Europe can give us a clear indication as to the identity of the organisation that committed the terror attack in Mombasa," an intelligence official told the newspaper.
At the time of the abortive plot in Prague, there were suspicions in Israel that the attack had been masterminded by Hizbollah, the pro-Iranian group in Lebanon.
But at yesterday's cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, Shaul Mofaz, the Israeli defence minister, was quoted as telling colleagues: "The suspicion that al-Qa'eda was involved is growing stronger, although there is no concrete evidence."
Investigations appear to show that the missiles fired in Mombasa were in proper working order and that the attack failed only because of the terrorists' lack of expertise.
But several Israeli security experts suggested that the Arkia plane might have been secretly fitted with anti-missile technology, such as flares to foil the heat-seeking missiles.
"I can't guarantee the Arkia plane was equipped with that technology but I don't believe in miracles," said Hirsch Goodman, a researcher at Tel Aviv's Jaffee Centre for Strategic Studies. He said that Israel had for 10 years considered fitting its civilian airliners with such equipment.
-------- balkans
Croatia Protects a General Charged With War Crimes
December 3, 2002
New York Times
By DANIEL SIMPSON
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/03/international/europe/03CROA.html
LICKI CITLUK, Croatia - Nine years after Croatian tanks and artillery chased Djuro Pjevac and his neighbors out of this remote village, it remains a ghost town, reminiscent of countless others across the Balkans.
Mr. Pjevac, a 78-year-old Croatian Serb, has since returned to the rubble of a homestead he spent 50 years building, camping out in a makeshift hut the size of a small automobile.
But the community he used to live in has been wiped out. In September 1993, Croatian forces set fire to every one of Licki Citluk's few dozen houses. Their former occupants, members of a Serb minority that was persecuted during World War II as well in the fighting that tore apart Yugoslavia in the 1990's, have no plans to return.
"Only a nostalgic person would come back," Mr. Pjevac said. "Look at the mess. A lot of people were killed here, some of them in their beds."
After the military action here, United Nations peacekeepers accused the Croatian Army of killing Serbian civilians in cold blood. But almost a decade passed without anyone being held accountable.
The United Nations war crimes tribunal has now charged Croatia's wartime chief of staff, Gen. Janko Bobetko, with crimes against humanity and demanded he be extradited to stand trial in The Hague, where a genocide case against the former Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic is already being heard.
But Croatia is refusing to hand over General Bobetko, setting off a dispute that highlights its problems in coming to terms with acts committed from 1991 to 1995, when it fought for independence against rebel Croatian Serbs backed by Serbia and the Yugoslav Army.
"The Croats thought The Hague was a tribunal for Serbs, and they're shocked to find that's not the case," said Zarko Puhovski, president of a human rights committee. "The right-wing radicals here are sadly right in saying that no general from a winning army has ever been indicted for war crimes."
The country has reappraised the last decade since the death in 1999 of President Franjo Tudjman, the onetime Communist general who secured its independence. Nonetheless, the indictment of General Bobetko, an 83-year-old diabetic with serious heart problems who is said by doctors to be critically ill, has touched a raw nerve.
Despite warnings that Croatia's hopes of eventually joining the European Union will be dashed unless it hands the general over, Prime Minister Ivica Racan has so far refused, fearing a nationalist backlash that could bring down his reformist government.
The diplomatic quarrel has also raised questions about the tribunal's insensitivity to how it is perceived in the Balkans, where its actions stir fierce passions and most people close their ears to evidence against members of their ethnic group.
The wording of the indictment against General Bobetko has angered many Croats, who believe it questions the legitimacy of an operation to stop Serbian artillery in an area known as the Medak Pocket from shelling nearby Croatian towns.
"Janko Bobetko, acting individually and/or in concert with others, planned, instigated, ordered, committed or otherwise aided and abetted in the planning, preparation or execution of persecutions of Serb civilians of the Medak Pocket on racial, political or religious grounds," the indictment says.
Such language, a standard formulation applied to similar cases, troubles Croats. It implies that their leaders actually planned the same sort of "ethnic cleansing" operations that Mr. Milosevic is accused of sanctioning. Although it remains unclear whether this was true in Licki Citluk, there is little doubt that something terrible happened.
"Approximately 164 homes and 148 barns and outbuildings, being a majority of buildings in the villages within the Medak Pocket, were destroyed, mostly by fire and explosives, after the Croatian forces had taken effective control," the indictment adds. "At least 100 Serbs including 29 local Serb civilians were unlawfully killed."
Any indictment would be challenged here, but one that casts doubt on the legitimacy of the Croats' fight against the Serbs, and points the finger at an ailing old man, is particularly inflammatory.
A week after General Bobetko was indicted, he was made an honorary citizen of Gospic, a town known for its strong Croatian nationalism. Gospic was under Serbian artillery fire during the Croatian war, but local Serbs were also killed by Croats.
Such evidence of the general's popularity has worried Mr. Racan, whose government has a narrow majority in Parliament over a resurgent nationalist-led opposition.
Many political experts here worry that the sudden pressure from outside to face up to the past is backfiring.
"The international community needs a normal and stable Croatia," said Slaven Letica, the author of several books on Croatian nationalism. "Indictments such as this, with the terrible public relations from The Hague that accompanies it, just make the Croatian situation worse and the West more unpopular."
That said, diplomats credit The Hague's influence with bringing about two war-crimes trials here. In one, Gen. Mirko Norac is accused of crimes committed in Gospic in 1991. In the other, eight men are accused of atrocities in a military prison in Split in 1992.
Although a majority of Croats surveyed by pollsters acknowledge that some soldiers committed war crimes in the fight for independence, they seem to be struggling to understand the principle of "command responsibility" under which General Bobetko is indicted.
As commander of the armed forces, his failure to prosecute any subordinates who may have committed crimes in the Medak Pocket means he could be found guilty.
Many experts believe that General Bobetko has fallen victim to the need to bring a high-ranking Croat to The Hague after Ante Gotovina, the last general to be indicted, went into hiding.
But such protests do not impress the tribunal, whose chief prosecutor, Carla Del Ponte, says there are no grounds for Mr. Racan to appeal against the indictment. Hoping to stave off international sanctions, Croatia is trying to delay a decision without actually refusing to fulfill its obligation to cooperate.
General Bobetko, who says he would rather die than go to The Hague, may yet be able to use his fading health to avoid a trial. "The government is not stupid; they know they cannot challenge the indictment," said Mr. Letica, the author of books on Croatian nationalism. "Their only hope is to drag this dispute out until Bobetko dies."
As winter approaches in Licki Citluk, Djuro Pjevac is unimpressed. "Someone ordered this," he said, stoking the wood stove that heats his musty one-room shack and doubles as a bread oven. "They should get what they deserve."
-------- biological weapons
GERM WEAPONS
C.I.A. Hunts Iraq Tie to Soviet Smallpox
December 3, 2002
New York Times
By JUDITH MILLER
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/03/international/middleeast/03POX.html
The C.I.A. is investigating an informant's accusation that Iraq obtained a particularly virulent strain of smallpox from a Russian scientist who worked in a smallpox lab in Moscow during Soviet times, senior American officials and foreign scientists say.
The officials said several American scientists were told in August that Iraq might have obtained the mysterious strain from Nelja N. Maltseva, a virologist who worked for more than 30 years at the Research Institute for Viral Preparations in Moscow before her death two years ago.
The information came to the American government from an informant whose identity has not been disclosed. The C.I.A. considered the information reliable enough that President Bush was briefed about its implications. The attempt to verify the information is continuing.
Dr. Maltseva is known to have visited Iraq on several occasions. Intelligence officials are trying to determine whether, as the informant told them, she traveled there as recently as 1990, officials said. The institute where she worked housed what Russia said was its entire national collection of 120 strains of smallpox, and some experts fear that she may have provided the Iraqis with a version that could be resistant to vaccines and could be more easily transmitted as a biological weapon.
The possibility that Iraq possesses this strain is one of several factors that has complicated Mr. Bush's decision, expected this week, about how many Americans should be vaccinated against smallpox, a disease that was officially eradicated in 1980.
The White House is expected to announce that despite the risk of vaccine-induced illness and death, it will authorize vaccinating those most at risk in the event of a smallpox outbreak - 500,000 members of the military who could be assigned to the Middle East for a war with Iraq and 500,000 civilian medical workers.
More broadly, the Russian government's refusal to share smallpox and other lethal germ strains for study by the United States, or to answer questions about the fate of such strains, has reinforced American concerns about whether Russia has abandoned what was once the world's most ambitious covert germ weapons program.
A year ago in Crawford, Tex., Mr. Bush and Russia's president, Vladimir V. Putin, issued a statement vowing to enhance cooperation against biological terrorism. But after an initial round of visits and a flurry of optimism, American officials said Russia had resisted repeated American requests for information about the Russian smallpox strains and help in the investigation into the anthrax attacks in the United States in October 2001.
"There is information we would like the Russians to share as a partner of ours," William Winkenwerder Jr., assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, said in an interview. "Because if there are strains that present a unique problem with respect to vaccines and treatment, it is in the interests of all freedom-loving people to have as much information as possible."
Cooperation on biological terrorism was not discussed at the meeting last week between Mr. Bush and Mr. Putin in St. Petersburg, American officials said, mainly because administration officials are not certain just how willing Mr. Putin is to enhance cooperation in this delicate area. They wonder if he is not doing more because of the military's hostility to sharing the information.
"The record so far suggests he is either unable or unwilling to push the military on this front," an administration official said. "We think it may be a little of both, but we're not really sure at this point or what to do about it."
Administration officials said the C.I.A. was still trying to determine whether Dr. Maltseva traveled to Iraq in 1990, and whether she shared a sample of what might be a particularly virulent smallpox strain with Iraqi scientists.
World Health Organization records in Geneva and interviews with scientists who worked with her confirmed that Dr. Maltseva visited Iraq at least twice, in 1972 and 1973, as part of the global campaign to eradicate smallpox.
Formerly secret Soviet records also show that in 1971, she was part of a covert mission to Aralsk, a port city in what was then the Soviet republic of Kazakhstan, north of the Aral Sea, to help stop an epidemic of smallpox. The Soviet Union did not report that outbreak to world health officials, as required by regulations.
Last June, experts from the Monterey Institute of International Studies, drawing on those Kazakh records and interviews with survivors, published a report saying the epidemic was a result of open-air tests of a particularly virulent smallpox strain on Vozrozhdeniye Island in the Aral Sea.
The island, known as Renaissance Island in English, is between Kazakhstan and another Central Asian country, Uzbekistan. The United States recently spent $6 million to help both countries, which are now independent, to decontaminate anthrax that the Soviet military buried in pits on the island.
Alan P. Zelicoff, co-author of the Monterey report and a scientist at Sandia National Laboratories, said the Aralsk outbreak was a watershed because it demonstrated that the smallpox virus was more easily spread than previously thought and that there may be a vaccine-resistant strain.
The organism can indeed be made to travel long distances, city-size perhaps, and there may be a vaccine-resistant strain or one that is more communicable than garden-variety smallpox, he said in an interview.
The Monterey report led American officials to question whether America's smallpox vaccine would be effective against the Aralsk strain or whether new vaccines or drugs might be needed if the strain was used in an attack. American concern increased in recent months after the White House was told that Dr. Maltseva might have shared the Aralsk strain with Iraqi scientists in 1990, administration officials said.
David Kelly, a former United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq, said there was a "resurgence of interest" in smallpox vaccine in Iraq in 1990, "but we have never known why."
A spokesman for the Russian Research Institute for Viral Preparations declined to comment on Dr. Maltseva or her work. Her daughter, a physician in Moscow, said she had no recollection of her mother's ever going to Iraq.
Svetlana Sergeyevna Marennikova, Dr. Maltseva's deputy in the Moscow laboratory, said in an interview that Dr. Maltseva had never gone to Iraq as far as she knew.
"She worked, and then when she got sick, she took a sick leave when she was no longer able to work," she said. "I don't know about Iraq. I didn't know about a trip there. I don't think she was there. I would know."
Donald A. Henderson, a senior adviser to the Department of Health and Human Services and a leader of the smallpox eradication campaign, described Dr. Maltseva as an "outgoing, hard-working scientist." He said she had traveled widely for the W.H.O in the eradication campaign.
While the organization's records show that she visited Iran, Iraq and Syria, Dr. Henderson recalled that he had also sent her to Pakistan to follow up on an outbreak there. "She clearly enjoyed the international travel circuit," he said.
Scientists and American officials have speculated that Iraq may have tried to buy the Aralsk strain from Dr. Maltseva, whose institute, like so many other scientific labs in Russia, has fallen on hard times since the Soviet Union's collapse.
Dr. Henderson said he was deeply disappointed that Dr. Maltseva and other Russian scientists with whom he had worked closely had helped cover up outbreaks of infectious diseases that should have been reported to the W.H.O.
The Russian government has never publicly acknowledged that Aralsk outbreak or that it tested smallpox in the open air. At a World Health Organization meeting in Lyon, France, last August, officials said, Russian virologists argued privately, in response to the Monterey report and news accounts, that there was no reason to believe that the Aralsk incident was anything other than a natural outbreak and that the strain was not particularly virulent - assertions with which some American experts concur.
American officials familiar with discussions about Aralsk said Russians scientists had confirmed that Dr. Maltseva took tissue samples from Aralsk back to her Moscow lab in 1971. But Russians have insisted that the material was destroyed when Russia quietly moved its smallpox strain collection from the Moscow lab to Vector, where the collection is now stored.
Many American scientists and officials, even those who doubt that the Aralsk strain is unusually potent, are deeply skeptical that the strain was destroyed. Former Soviet germ warfare scientists have privately told American officials that the military took control of these strains when the collection was moved.
American health and defense officials have tried without success to press Russia for help in securing a sample of the strain from the Aralsk smallpox outbreak.
The American officials have also been unable to obtain information that they believe could help federal investigators with their stalled inquiry into the anthrax attacks of October 2001, in which 5 people died and at least 17 were infected.
-------- business
Business Gets Its Security Connection
By Cindy Skrzycki,
Tuesday, December 3, 2002
Washington Post; Page E01
Access is everything in Washington, and during the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, an amalgam of 22 federal agencies and 170,000 employees, business lobbyists worked to ensure they would have a voice on the inside of the mighty fortress.
They wanted someone on speed-dial to listen to their concerns about the cost and economic effect of ramping up the nation's security. And they got their wish: the creation of a special assistant to the secretary, a communicator, coordinator and reconciler who can telegraph to Tom Ridge, the new secretary of the department, what business thinks.
As the legislation puts it, the special assistant will be responsible for "creating and fostering strategic communications with the private sector to enhance the primary mission of the Department to protect the American homeland." The position also will be the nexus between the private sector, research labs, academia and the federal government.
In the days leading up to the passage of the controversial legislation, which President Bush signed into law last week, much attention was paid to smallpox vaccinations, management of the federal workforce and insurance costs. Establishing the special assistant went largely unnoticed, as did several other provisions that business and industry lobbied into the legislation.
The new special assistant is supposed to advise Ridge on how the regulations and policies of the new department affect the private sector. This person also will be in charge of creating and managing any number of "private-sector advisory councils," which would give Ridge the business community's suggestions on security problems. The perch also comes with staff -- another prerequisite of setting up a new power center.
"It's a good government, makes-sense type of amendment. So much of the bill was focused on law and order. We didn't see a person we could go to who would carry these arguments to the secretary," said Randal Johnson, vice president of labor policy for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. "Our primary concern was that in pursuing homeland security . . . legitimate commerce and trade keep moving."
Since most of the nation's infrastructure is owned by the private sector, the Chamber wanted a point person to consider any concerns its members might have about how such issues as backups at the border for inspections, special instructions for nuclear plants, or orders to "harden" bridges to withstand attack would affect commerce. With much of industry depending on just-in-time inventory replenishments, there was concern that policies would be crafted without consultation with business.
Rep. J.C. Watts Jr. (R-Okla.) worked on the issue. Reportedly, business pressed for an undersecretary position, but there was reluctance to create another bureaucracy within the new homeland bureaucracy. In offering the amendment during consideration of the bill by the House Select Committee on Homeland Security in July, Watts said that the private sector had to be involved. "This requires dialogue at the highest levels of this new department to engage companies around the nation with the ability to contribute to homeland security," he said.
On the same day, the Chamber wrote to committee members saying it supported the idea of the department, but "we have also consistently expressed our concern that the legislation does not adequately address the need for the department to include, as part of its basic mission and organizational structure, the protection of our economic security."
The new position takes care of that concern. Now, the focus shifts to finding the right person for the job. "Ideally, it would be someone with a serious security background but skilled at navigating the government bureaucracy while understanding corporate security constraints," said Stephen Jordan, executive director of the Chamber's Center for Corporate Citizenship.
The Senate version of the bill, crafted by Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.), did not create a special assistant, but relied on public-private partnerships to keep business in the loop.
The homeland security legislation also took care of some other issues that business was concerned about: protecting information shared with the government from public disclosure and limiting liability of companies that offer technological solutions to security problems.
The transportation industry, states and local governments got a change in how the Transportation Security Administration issues emergency rulemakings. Although the legislation that set up the TSA created a high-level oversight board to review the rules, it never met to do so. The new law includes a provision that requires the board to act within 90 days after a rule is issued or the rule is suspended until it acts.
"There was the fear that, someday, that power could be used anytime to make rules immediately effective with no oversight whatsoever," said Jim Burnley, a former transportation secretary who represented CNF Inc., a trucking logistics company. "People who are aggrieved can go to this panel and say so."
The liquor industry, led by the Distilled Spirits Council, won on its issue, too. It did not want to see its regulator, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, moved from the Treasury Department to the Justice Department or the Homeland Security Department. Though ATF wanted to stay in one piece, the legislation sent the tobacco and firearms part of the agency to Justice. It kept "alcohol" at Treasury in a new Tax and Trade Bureau, where it will continue to collect some $6.6 billion annually in federal excise taxes on alcohol.
What doesn't change, however, are the jackets agents wear: They will still say ATF, even though there is no "A" left at the agency.
-------- chemical weapons
Incinerating Chemical Weapons Said Safe
December 3, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Chemical-Weapons.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- America's arsenal of chemical weapons can be safely incinerated at a few sites around the country, despite chemical releases and violations at the only two operational incinerators, according to a report Tuesday.
``The risk to the public and to the environment of continued storage overwhelms the potential risk of processing and destruction of stockpiled chemical agent,'' said the report by the National Research Council, a branch of the National Academies of Science. ``The destruction of aging chemical munitions should proceed as quickly as possible.''
The council did not weigh in on whether incineration was preferable to other methods of neutralizing the chemical agents. Critics who favor neutralization said the report ignored important incidents and glossed over the dangers of incineration.
Under an international treaty, the United States agreed to dispose of 31,500 tons of deadly nerve agents and toxic blister agents by 2007, although the Defense Department has said it will likely miss that deadline by two to three years. The project is expected to cost $24 billion. About a quarter of the stockpile has been destroyed at weapons incinerators in Tooele, Utah, and on Johnston Atoll in the Pacific Ocean.
``The technology is capable of doing the job if it's run correctly, and there's no reason it cannot be run correctly if management puts its mind to it and trains its work force properly,'' said Charles Kolb, chairman of the committee.
The council report identified 40 cases where chemical agents leaked into areas where it was not supposed to have been and three where it escaped from an incinerator building. But it said amounts that escaped were too small to threaten the public.
``There will be future `chemical events,' and serious consequences to both plant personnel and surrounding communities cannot be ruled out,'' the report said. It also said, however, ``The major hazard to the surrounding communities arises from potential releases of agent from stockpile storage areas, not the demilitarization facilities.''
Many of the munitions and rockets that hold the chemical agents are aging and leaking, and the report said a deliberate detonation of the stored chemicals could spread a large amount of agent into the atmosphere.
The National Academies of Science is a private, nonprofit entity that provides scientific guidance to the government. The study was financed by the Defense Department and requested by former Rep. Bob Riley, R-Ala., the state's governor-elect.
Craig Williams, director of the Kentucky-based Chemical Weapons Working Group, which favors chemical neutralization to incineration, said the report ignored thousands of pages his group submitted to document incinerator problems and glossed over worries voiced by local officials and complaints by whistle-blowers.
``For anyone to accept this report as either accurate or objective would be a mistake,'' Williams said. ``Unfortunately, it is the citizens living near the incinerators who will bear the consequences of its failures.''
Kolb said the group considered the information submitted by Williams' group, but it was largely repetitive or undocumented hearsay.
The Johnston Atoll incinerator has completed burning the weapons and is being decommissioned. The Tooele incinerator has finished burning its stockpile of the nerve agent sarin and is preparing to burn VX, a more toxic nerve agent.
Incinerators in Anniston, Ala.; Pine Bluff, Ark.; and Umatilla, Ore., are scheduled to begin operations in the coming months. Chemical agents in Newport, Ind.; Aberdeen, Md.; Pueblo, Colo.; and Bluegrass, Ky., are to be neutralized using chemicals.
On the Net:
National Academies: http://www.nationalacademies.org
Chemical Weapons Working Group: http://www.cwwg.org
-------- colombia
'Zones' suspend Colombian rights
By Rachel Van Dongen
SPECIAL TO THE WASHINGTON TIMES
December 3, 2002
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20021203-11559064.htm
SARAVENA, Colombia - Orlando Hernandez said they came for his brother-in-law while he was sleeping in his bed at 7:30 a.m.
Twelve hours later, Mr. Hernandez stood with a crowd of other families outside the military base where their loved ones had been detained amid a military offensive in the department of Arauca, designated in September by President Alvaro Uribe as one of two "Rehabilitation and Consolidation Zones" intended to end the violence that had been plaguing this country for four decades.
In the zones, military commanders were put in charge of all security forces and given authority to conduct searches without court warrants, restrict travel, impose curfews, and question civilian residents and visitors.
But in the first major political defeat for Mr. Uribe since he took office in August, Colombia's Constitutional Court recently ruled many of the methods governing the zones to be unlawful. The president is formulating new rules to govern the zones and has expanded one of them in the provinces of Bolivar-Sucre.
"They haven't let him talk with a lawyer," Mr. Hernandez said, echoing the complaints of other family members who said their mothers, sons and daughters had not been given food or water while in custody. The military denies that food or water is withheld.
"It's necessary to do this, but they're doing it to the wrong people," Mr. Hernandez said.
That morning, the military rounded up about 400 people in the stadium of Saravena to conduct criminal background checks.
Those who didn't have outstanding warrants were freed with stamps on their arms, while 85 were brought to the army base and detained in orange chairs with plastic handcuffs. Forty-two eventually were freed, but the rest were accused of terrorist links and sent to Bogota.
"It's worrisome the way they are going forward like this," said Isnardo Cediel Beltrain, a public defender standing outside the army base. He said the military and police risked abuse of power.
Arrest first and investigate later appeared to be the army's motto on a recent trip to Arauca, which was established under the national emergency decree issued soon after Mr. Uribe took office.
The decree initially was to last 90 days but was prolonged. It may become permanent.
The police and the army were given special judicial powers to arrest suspects or raid homes without court orders in 27 cities in the violence-ridden departments of Arauca, Bolivar and Sucre.
But the Constitutional Court ruled last month that it was illegal for the police and military to arrest suspects, intercept phone calls or raid homes without warrants. The court also said it was unconstitutional to require the press and members of nongovernmental groups to obtain permission from the central government before traveling to any of the designated zones.
Mr. Uribe now either must seek changes to the constitution or propose a new package of reforms for the zones, a key part of his security strategy to defeat the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) and several other outlawed militias.
But Col. Jesus Alberto Ruiz of the army's 8th Brigade in charge of Arauca said he doesn't expect much to change, despite the court's ruling. "I think the situation is not going to be modified much," Col. Ruiz said. "We have the total support of the national government and of security organizations of the state."
Col. Ruiz participated in the military sweep of Saravena at the start of November in which 85 persons, including Mr. Hernandez's brother-in-law, were detained. The government brought in 100 special agents from the Fiscalia, the equivalent of the U.S. Justice Department, to help issue rapid-fire warrants for arrests and home raids.
"We never did anything without the authorization of the Fiscalia," said Col. Ruiz. "For us, [the court´s decision] is not going to change" anything.
But under the court ruling, the army would not have been able to review criminal records in the stadium nor conduct a census of the population and its movements, something Col. Ruiz said had been completed in Arauca. Before the court's decision, police were going door to door to register people, vehicles and cattle, and to take digital photos and fingerprints of residents.
Despite an increased military and police presence in oil-rich Arauca - through which pass 30 miles of the Cano-Limon pipeline that American troops soon will be helping to protect - violence appears to have remained steady and in some cases increased since the zone's creation Sept. 2.
The number of homicides in Arauca reached 291 so far this year and 45 since the zone was implemented. In 2001, 148 homicides were reported in the department and 47 in September and October.
Terrorist incidents are also on the rise this year: seven car bombs, compared with two in 2001, and 65 other bombings, compared with 46 last year.
Since the zone was established, the acting mayor of Saravena was assassinated, as were a city council member, two police officers and 11 civilians. In Arauquita - part of the zone - the entire municipal government, including Mayor Orlando Ardila Torres, resigned in mid-November under pressure from FARC.
Gen. Carlos Lemus, head of the army's 18th Brigade, said the increase in terrorist attacks was a "natural reaction" to the stepped-up military activity.
"We knew that they were going to intensify," Gen. Lemus said. "Our work has multiplied." On Nov. 12, the general spoke in the yard of a home the army had entered in what it called a "voluntary search."
Carmen Aurora Perez seemed unperturbed by the surprise visit of about 40 soldiers.
"I don't have a problem" with the search, Mrs. Perez said, though it was taking place in front of her 4-year-old son, Jaime Leonardo, who clutched a black puppy while soldiers surrounded the house.
The army found a gas cylinder, a popular FARC weapon, in Mrs. Perez's back yard and a changon, a type of gun they said were used by the militias, inside the house.
"The people have responded favorably," Gen. Lemus announced to a bank of television reporters specially flown in from Bogota to witness the Saravena offensive. "The population is very content with these measures."
Outside the army base, the families complained loudly about the treatment of the prisoners and the lack of evidence against them.
"There are many mothers who don't know what their sons are doing," said the mother of Alexander Vargas, who was among the detainees. "I can respond for what my son does."
-------- iraq
OUTSIDE BAGHDAD
Kurds Keep a Wary Eye on the Iraq Border, Open for Now
December 3, 2002
New York Times
By C. J. CHIVERS
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/03/international/middleeast/03IRAQ.html
CHAMCHAMAL, Iraq, Dec. 2 - Najhat Hossein wandered the parched grass, clucking at the sheep and goats he tends and watching Iraqi soldiers nearby. The soldiers sat in trenches. Now and then, a few would stand and silhouette themselves in the midday sun.
The shepherd was careful to keep just beyond Iraqi rifle range. But he hardly worried about being shot. "Usually the soldiers who come down from there are not armed," he said. "Sometimes they ask me for food, a little yogurt or bread."
Mr. Hossein stood squarely in the militarized zone between Iraq proper and the autonomous Kurdish enclave in the nation's northern mountains, which is out of Saddam Hussein's control.
Here, near the busy Kurdish city of Sulaimaniya, a region of broken brown hills is bisected by a four-lane highway that drops to a plateau perhaps a mile wide. On one side of the plateau sits the forward element of the I Corps of the Iraqi Army. On the other are Kurdish border guards and a few bunkers of their own.
In theory, the flatlands are a contested no-man's zone, a front watched over by opposing armies. In practice, the area is guarded as much by intuition as by arms. Chamchamal is well south of the northern no-flight zone maintained by British and American aircraft. Without coordinated air support or modern antitank weapons, both of which the Kurds lack, the 30-minute drive from here to Sulaimaniya is almost indefensible against armored assault. The best the lightly armed Kurdish fighters could hope to achieve in the event of an attack would be a delaying action, which might give civilians time to flee.
But for the moment the Kurds think the possibility of an Iraqi advance is remote. Although Saddam Hussein has attacked them many times in the past, the Kurds say he is now engaged in diplomatic chess, busy with United Nations weapons inspectors, not eager to provoke. He also has little reason to discourage trade and traffic across the front, from which Iraq profits.
Even as Kurds predict that Mr. Hussein will lose this chess game, and face war before next spring, they keep their own lines thinly defended. It is especially true now, in the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, when fasting troops go home at 1 p.m., leaving only shepherds like Mr. Hossein between their homes and the enemy.
"We do sometimes have small skirmishes, but the front is mostly quiet," said Faraidoon Abdulkader, minister of the interior in the Kurdish eastern zone.
What passes for fighting these days between Iraq and its Kurdish opposition is often symbolic. Last week, the Iraqis fired a mortar barrage at another checkpoint after an Iraqi colonel defected to the opposition. The rounds landed harmlessly. To the Kurds, each errant explosion seemed more a message of frustration than a military act.
Kurds say the Iraqis have another reason to keep border tension low. There are six crossing points, through which people from both sides pass for family visits, medical appointments and the like. Each contact provides an opportunity for graft. The Iraqi troops do not want to discourage the flow.
Mr. Hossein, tending sheep directly in front of the Iraqi positions, for example, worried about soldiers acting as rustlers, not riflemen. "Twenty days ago some of them came from trenches and took sheep from my friend by force," he said.
Iraqi troops sometimes demand food, travelers today said, or shake down people seeking to cross. Together, the anecdotes tell of an army suffering from poor discipline and meager supply.
"The guy at the checkpoint asked me to give him a coat," said a man who crosses frequently, and asked that his name not be used because he fears retaliation. "How can I give him a coat? I live in Iraq. I cannot afford a new coat for myself."
Another traveler, whose grinning son reached under his car seat to reveal a hidden case of jelly, said Iraqi soldiers seemed to search his car for things to steal, rather than for weapons or other prohibited equipment. "I am lucky because I am an old man and they did not search me very much," he said.
Inside the Kurdish checkpoint, Sgt. Ibrahim Aziz checked identification cards of people coming from Iraq. One man was going to see his sick brother in Sulaimaniya. He said he had had to pay a bribe of about $10 to cross. Ten dollars is a huge sum in Iraq.
"My brother is ill, and he sent a message for me to visit him," he said. "How can I not?"
Quiet as it may be, Kurdish officials cautioned that the two sides could quickly organize for a fight. Both forces, through long familiarity with the terrain and networks of spies, keep thorough watch over their enemy, and know the whereabouts of each other's bunkers, garrisons and equipment.
Back in his office in Sulaimaniya, Mr. Abdulkader was able to describe new Iraqi fortifications in detail, as well as the movement of missiles into three positions west of Kirkuk, the city where Iraq's I Corps is headquartered. "Our network is wide and it is deep," he said.
The Iraqis demonstrated their own intimacy with the terrain in 1996. In a brief incursion into Sulaimaniya, they captured and executed opposition officials with chilling precision. Accounts from that time describe gunmen who navigated alleys as if they knew exactly where to go.
Signs of such bellicosity remain, apparent in bullet marks in some buildings along the road, and in a shipping container a few hundred yards in front of the last Kurdish checkpoint. It has been thoroughly ventilated by shrapnel. "Our checkpoint used to be there," Sergeant Aziz said. "But they shelled it so many times we had to move back."
-------- israel / palestine
Israeli Army chief calls for evacuation of most settlements
By Ross Dunn,
Herald Correspondent in Jerusalem and agencies,
December 3 2002
Sydney Morning Herald
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/12/02/1038712884339.html
Israel's top military commander has provoked a storm of criticism by proposing that the Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat, be removed and at the same time calling for the evacuation of most Jewish settlements.
The remarks by the chief of staff of the Israeli Defence Forces, General Moshe Ya'alon, were made last week in Washington to a closed-door session of the Institute for Near East Policy and only made public yesterday.
Most of his comments - which were meant to be off-the-record - were aimed at Mr Arafat. General Ya'alon said the only way to improve relations with the Palestinians was for Mr Arafat to be removed from power. It was not clear whether he was advocating that he be sent into exile or simply set aside.
Despite a suicide bombing attack in Jerusalem last month and many more attempts to launch such attacks, General Ya'alon maintains that Israel has already succeeded in the fight against terrorism, as it is now clear to Palestinians that they will be punished for acts of terrorism.
The Israelis realised that in the end most Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip would be evacuated.
"At the end of the day, most of the settlements will be evacuated," General Ya'alon told the Washington forum.
Israeli military officials distanced themselves from the comments on the settlements, some denying that any such comments had been made.
During his appearance in Washington, General Ya'alon also disclosed there had been talks between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority on a ceasefire, but he said Mr Arafat put an end to them to prove that it was impossible to do anything without his approval.
He said secret negotiations had been conducted with Mr Arafat's deputy, Mahmoud Abbas, and a former top security official in the Gaza Strip, Mohammed Dahlan.
Mr Abbas said on a visit to the Gulf state of Qatar that all militant groups, inside and outside the PLO, needed to agree to a "pause" in the more than two-year-old Palestinian intifada to avoid giving Israel a pretext to seize "what remains of our fledgling state".
It was time to "reassess the Palestinian struggle and seize the political rewards of the sacrifices endured by the people" so they did not have to "go on forming an endless column of martyrs, prisoners and invalids", said Mr Abbas, also known as Abu Mazen. "The normal end of any war is through negotiation, which is the means of giving rights to those who made sacrifices."
General Ya'alon said that the secret talks represented what he called a "silent coup" against Mr Arafat, and the aim of the discussions was to establish Mr Abbas as a "powerful prime minister" of the Palestinian Authority.
While no such position yet exists, both Israel and the United Nations are pushing for an alternative leader carrying such a title, to push Mr Arafat aside.
General Ya'alon said removing Mr Arafat had been set back because of US interference.
The US had erred in criticising Israel for laying siege to Mr Arafat's headquarters in Ramallah this year, he said.
Israeli troops imposing a curfew in the West Bank city of Jenin shot dead a Palestinian youth and wounded 16 people in a market yesterday, Palestinian witnesses said.
-------- mideast
Turkey OKs U.S. Use of Country's Bases
December 3, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Turkey-US-Iraq.html
ANKARA, Turkey (AP) -- Turkey's foreign minister said Tuesday that his country would allow the United States to use military bases in the country for a strike against Iraq, but only if the United Nations first approved such military action.
The move boosts pressure on Iraq and comes just before a Sunday deadline for Baghdad to declare all its banned weapons of mass destruction to U.N. weapons inspectors. President Bush has threatened the use of force if Iraq does not disarm.
The announcement by Foreign Minister Yasar Yakis represents a partial victory for the United States in building a coalition against Iraq. It came as U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was in Turkey lobbying for the country's support in an Iraq operation.
Turkish leaders have previously refused to publicly commit as to whether they would allow the United States to use bases in a strike against Iraq, which borders Turkey.
Yakis, however, cast doubt on the possibility of deploying large numbers of U.S. ground troops in Turkey. And the condition of U.N. approval might not be easy for the United States to meet.
Turkey has opposed a war on Iraq, but politicians have always indicated that if a conflict started, the country would have little choice but to back Washington.
``There should not be left any stone unturned before resorting to a military solution,'' Yakis told reporters. ``But if it comes to that, then of course, we will cooperate with the United States because it's a big ally and we have excellent relations with the United States.''
When asked to define cooperation, Yakis said, ``the opening of air space, first of all, and the utilization of facilities in Turkey.''
``The military authorities of the two countries are consulting on the assumption that such a cooperation may be necessary one day,'' Yakis added.
Turkey has repeatedly said any action in Iraq must have U.N. approval.
When asked if the United States would have to seek a new U.N. resolution to use force against Iraq, Yakis said: ``Yes, yes, yes. The Turkish understanding (is) that the present resolution, 1441, does not allow automatic resorting to armed intervention.''
The support of NATO ally Turkey is crucial to any war. Turkey hosts some 50 U.S. aircraft patrolling a no-fly zone over northern Iraq and was a key staging post for U.S. air raids against Iraq during the 1991 Gulf War.
Turkey, however, puts restrictions on aircraft patrolling the no-fly zone.
A Turkish military officer monitors all flights over the no-fly zone from Incirlik air base, sitting next to the U.S. and British officers who command the missions.
The Turkish military must also approve any strike in northern Iraq and must also approve the deployment of allied aircraft to the base and which weapons they use.
Although the United States is looking at the possibility of sending ground troops into northern Iraq, Yakis said Turkey would have trouble supporting a large U.S. military presence.
``It may be difficult to see tens of thousands of American forces being transported through Turkish territory into Iraq or being stationed or deployed somewhere in Turkey and their carrying out strikes inside Iraq,'' he said.
Wolfowitz did not answer directly earlier when asked if the United States had asked for permission to base U.S. troops in Turkey during a war.
``Military and diplomatic planning must proceed because Saddam Hussein must see that we are serious,'' he said.
The Persian Gulf nation of Qatar, to the south of Iraq, has also been touted as a likely staging ground for any military action. Qatar has suggested it would likely accept any U.S. request to use a base there but has not said whether U.N. approval is a condition.
Yakis' statements follow intense lobbying by the United States to win Turkey's support and come just a week before a crucial EU summit in which Turkey is hoping to gain a date for starting EU membership talks. The United States has been pressing European states to agree to that request.
A possible war in Iraq is extremely unpopular in Turkey, NATO's only Muslim member. Many Turks fear that a war will devastate the lucrative tourism industry as Turkey is struggling to recover from its worst recession in decades.
Wolfowitz said that the United States was determined ``to make sure that the Turkish economy continues to recover. If there is a crisis in this region, we know that Turkey is going to be one of the countries most affected and we want to make sure we deal with that.''
The Turkish military, which wields tremendous political power, is fearful that a war might lead to the collapse of the central government in Iraq and lead Kurds living in an autonomous zone in the north to declare independence. That might encourage autonomy-seeking Turkish Kurds, who battled the army for 15 years, a fight that left 37,000 dead.
-------- nato
Putin Eager to Cooperate With NATO
December 3, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-China-Russia.html
BEIJING (AP) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday he is ready to cooperate more with NATO if it focuses on combatting terrorism, but that Russia also is prepared to act alone to defend its interests.
Putin, wrapping up a two-day visit to China, said the NATO alliance created after World War II to counter the Soviet Union could be regarded by Moscow as a key partner if it shifts its emphasis to fighting terrorism and other threats to global security.
``If this transformation really takes place, we may broaden our cooperation with NATO,'' he said, answering a question from the audience after a speech at prestigious Peking University, where he addressed students and Chinese alumni of Russian and Soviet universities.
Putin said China and Russia have a special relationship but that the Kremlin is pursuing friendly ties worldwide.
He said that while the United States is one of Russia's most important partners in trade and the fight against terrorism, ``I must say that our positions on key international questions do not always coincide.
``On those questions, we will defend our interests,'' he said, without giving details.
In a joint declaration they signed Monday, Putin and Chinese President Jiang Zemin called for diplomatic solutions to two issues that Washington says threaten global security -- Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and North Korea's nuclear weapons program.
Putin repeated his government's opposition to the expansion of NATO into the Baltic region. Former Soviet republics Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania were invited last month to become alliance members.
``The mechanical expansion of NATO does not enhance international security,'' the Russian leader said.
Putin left Beijing for India on Tuesday afternoon after a visit to the Great Wall.
Jiang joined Putin at the university, telling the audience that Russia and China are ``good neighbors, good partners and good friends.''
The declaration Monday called for a ``multipolar world'' -- a phrase used by both governments to express dissatisfaction with U.S. global dominance.
Moscow and Beijing have tried to restrain U.S. dominance by insisting the United Nations must have the last word in international affairs.
``In resolving crisis situations, (we must) give priority to political methods within the framework of the U.N. Security Council,'' Putin said Tuesday.
``A scornful attitude to international treaties and agreements is absolutely unacceptable, just as the practice of double standards and attempts at unilateral solutions are unacceptable -- and here our foreign policy approaches and priorities absolutely coincide,'' he said.
In Monday's declaration Putin and Jiang also pledged mutual backing for China's struggle against separatists in its Muslim northwest and Russia's war in Chechnya.
``Today Russia and China have an important common task: the struggle against extremism and separatism. We must prevent regional conflicts and global crimes,'' Putin said in his speech.
Putin, who presented the university with a book in Russian by Jiang about socialism in China, received a warm welcome.
``Putin has a lot of vigor. I really admire him,'' said 18-year-old Zhang Wei. ``He answered the questions very well and seemed knowledgeable.''
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao called Putin's visit a ``crowning success,'' saying that ``new momentum was added to the development of bilateral ties.''
He said the growing ties between Russia and China do not threaten other countries. ``No one should have any fears or anxieties about the development of China-Russia relations,'' Liu said.
-------- pakistan
Pakistan Official to West: Focus Less on Bin Laden
December 3, 2002
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-pakistan-qaeda.html
BERLIN (Reuters) - Pakistan's Foreign Minister said Tuesday that Western powers should fret less about Osama bin Laden and pay more attention to the root causes of militancy such as poverty.
``There is too much focus on the person of Osama,'' Mian Khursheed Mehmood Kasuri told Reuters during a visit to the German capital.
He was referring to the Saudi-born fugitive who heads the al Qaeda network blamed for the September 11 attacks and who has since been the subject of a massive, international manhunt.
``What can help immensely is economic development. Extremism is engendered by poverty. So if the West were to concentrate on economic development in the Third World and in the Muslim world, that would to a very large extent take care of that,'' he said.
``See what happened in Europe after the Second World War: the Marshall Plan. It was able to take care of a large number of countries going the democratic way rather than the other way.''
Under the Plan, Washington poured money into a Europe devastated by World War II to rebuild it and stave off the threat posed by communists supported by the then Soviet Union.
Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has backed the U.S. campaign in Afghanistan and its ``war on terror'' after September 11 last year. Yet he has faced a strong backlash from his people, reflected in growing anti-U.S. sentiment.
Kasuri said bin Laden, believed by Western intelligence to be in the Pakistani-Afghan border region, was unlikely to be hiding in Pakistan, even though a recording of the al Qaeda leader was released there last month.
``It is a pure matter of common sense. If a man wants you to believe he is in Pakistan and the whole world is after him, it's a fair deduction to conclude that he is not in Pakistan,'' Kasuri said. ``It is not easy to hide yourself when there are 70,000 troops looking for you, with the help of American experts.''
``Osama is taller than most Pakistanis. He is six foot four inches. He would stand out.''
He said there are 15 to 20 U.S. experts helping the 70,000 Pakistani soldiers search for al Qaeda members inside Pakistani territory.
A top German intelligence official told a conference last week that bin Laden was likely to be hiding in Pakistan along the Afghan border. The FBI believes that many of its ``Most Wanted Terrorists,'' including bin Laden, are still in or very near Afghanistan, having evaded a massive international manhunt.
Nearly 8,000 U.S. soldiers are among international coalition forces in Afghanistan hunting remnants of the Taliban and the al Qaeda network, Washington's prime suspects in the September 11 attacks.
SOLVE FESTERING CONFLICTS
The Pakistani foreign minister said it was unlikely al Qaeda was responsible for all recent attacks.
``It could be that there is more than one group that is involved,'' Kasuri told Reuters. ``But now it has become very convenient and probably fashionable from their point of view that they are all clubbed together.
``But there are activities taking place in the Philippines, in Palestine, all over. I don't know if al Qaeda is so well organized.''
In addition to addressing poverty, the West should seek to mediate long-festering disputes involving the Palestinians and Kashmiris, the Pakistani official said. Kasuri also called for greater economic cooperation from the United States, Germany and Japan and said Washington should provide greater market access for Pakistani agriculture and textile goods.
-------- spy agencies
Mossad under fire for disregarding information on Kenya
December 4 2002
AFP
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/12/03/1038712939296.html
Israeli intelligence came under fire again today as it emerged that the Mossad knew of terror attacks being planned by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network in the Kenyan city of Mombasa, a few days before Israeli tourists were targeted.
The head of the rival military intelligence services told a parliamentary committee that Mossad had "received advance information on planned al-Qaeda attacks in Africa and notably Mombasa in Kenya."
General Yossi Kuperwasser was answering Labour party secretary general Ofer Pines, who was questioning Mossad's competence for the second time this week, following his condemnation on Sunday of the spy agency's "failure" to warn its citizens of a terrorist threat.
Three Israelis were among the 10 victims of last Thursday's suicide car-bomb attack on a hotel in the Kenyan coastal city of Mombasa.
Minutes later, a tourist-packed Israeli charter flying 261 pasengers back from Mombasa to Tel Aviv was targeted by two missiles which could have caused the deadliest anti-Israeli attack in recent history but missed their target.
Kupperwasser stressed that the information received gave no indication as to when Osama bin Laden's network would strike nor did it specify that Israelis would be targeted, but his remarks were the first admission of shortcomings on the part of the Israeli intelligence services.
The accusations were likely to pile further pressure on Mossad agents currently investigating the twin attacks.
Yesterday Israel questioned Kenya's ability to lead an efficient enquiry.
"We welcome the cooperation of Kenya, which has let us investigate on site, but we believe this country does not have the technological means nor the experts to successfully complete this mission," Sharon spokesman Raanan Gissin told AFP.
Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz also reiterated that the al-Qaeda terror network had made several botched attempts to stage attacks in Israel.
But Sharon also lashed out at Palestinian groups, whom he accused of trying to influence the campaign for the January 28 legislative elections by supporting Amram Mitzna's Labour party.
"Terrorists are playing an important role in the struggle aimed at changing the regime in Israel by supporting other parties which would form a government ready to make crucial concessions which we would never accept," the prime minister told supporters in Tel Aviv Tuesday.
Sharon, who was triumphantly re-elected as the leader of the right-wing Likud party last week, was referring to the congratulations telegram Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak sent to Mitzna when he was elected to lead the Labour party a few days earlier.
-------- un
U.N. Employees Send Israel Protest Petition
December 3, 2002
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-un-israel.html
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - A group of 64 U.N. workers based in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip issued a petition Tuesday calling on Israel to stop what they said has been the harassment, beating and killing of United Nations staff.
``For two years, United Nations staff have been subject to escalating harassment and violence by Israel's military, so that the protection supposed to be afforded by the blue letters of the U.N. is being steadily eroded,'' said the petition, released in Gaza.
Asked about the statement, an Israeli military official said: ``We reject the suggestion Israeli soldiers intentionally try to harass U.N. personnel. We respect the work of the United Nations, and that includes our commitment to their safety.''
The petition was issued two weeks after Israeli soldiers battling Palestinian gunmen in the West Bank refugee camp of Jenin shot dead Iain Hook, a project director for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA).
Israel said the soldiers mistook the Briton for a gunman, and the army opened an investigation. The army said Palestinian gunmen were firing from the UNRWA compound during the battle, an allegation the U.N. agency denied.
Israel released a telephone message an army officer received from Hook 18 minutes before his death in which the UNRWA official said Palestinians were trying to break into the compound. UNRWA said they never succeeded.
In the petition, the signatories slammed what they perceived to be an attempt by Israel to claim the United Nations was somehow culpable for Hook's killing.
``In these tragic circumstances, rather than easily uttered regrets, we expect the Israeli government take the necessary steps to stop the harassment, beating and killing of U.N. staff,'' the petition said.
ROCKY RELATIONS
Relations between Israel and U.N. agencies have been rocky for decades.
In the current Palestinian uprising for statehood, U.N. officials have accused the army of firing on health clinics, schools, ambulances and other installations run by U.N. agencies.
Israel has in turn accused U.N. officials of letting refugee camps run by UNWRA be used as safe havens for militants behind suicide bombings and doing nothing to stop gunmen from firing at Israeli troops from U.N. installations.
The signatories of the petition said they were writing in their personal capacities.
They included citizens of the United States, Britain, Ireland, Germany, France, Australia, the Netherlands, Norway, Austria, Finland, Spain, Jordan, Switzerland, Italy, Canada, Tanzani, Luxembourg and Colombia.
-------- us
Uncle Sam wants your kid
Tuesday, December 3, 2002
AP
http://www.cnn.com/2002/EDUCATION/12/03/recruiting.high.schools.ap/index.html
The new law says that schools must give the military the same access to their campuses that businesses and college recruiters enjoy.
BOSTON, Massachusetts -- A little-noticed provision in a new federal education law is requiring high schools to hand over to military recruiters some key information about its juniors and seniors: name, address and phone number.
The Pentagon says the information will help it recruit young people to defend their country. But the new law disturbs parents and administrators in some liberal communities that aren't exactly gung-ho about the armed forces.
Some say the law violates students' privacy and creates a moral dilemma over the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy on gays.
"I find it appalling that the school is sending out letters to do the job of the military," said Amy Lang, the parent of a student at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, where Coke was once banned in a protest against the soda giant's investments in apartheid South Africa. "It's clearly an invasion of my daughter's privacy."
The No Child Left Behind law, signed last January, pumps billions into education but also gives military recruiters access to the names, addresses and phone numbers of students in 22,000 schools. The law also says that schools must give the military the same access to their campuses that businesses and college recruiters enjoy.
School systems that fail to comply could lose federal money. The measure also applies to private schools receiving federal funding. But Quaker schools and others that have a religious objection to military service can get out of the requirement.
Students and parents who oppose the law can keep their information from being turned over to the military, but they must sign and return an "opt-out" form. Opting out
The Boston school system, which has 7,500 juniors and seniors, included the opt-out notice in a take-home student handbook, but fewer than a dozen parents opted out.
So far, 95 percent of the nation's schools are in compliance, said Pentagon spokeswoman Maj. Sandra Troeber. She would not identify the other schools. But Education Department spokesman Dan Langan said that the current focus is on cooperation and that no schools have been sanctioned.
Federal law already requires men to register with the Selective Service within 30 days of turning 18. The new law, however, enables the Pentagon to reach potential recruits when they are 15 or 16.
In New York City, Daniel Alterman was taken aback when his 15-year-old son, a junior at Stuyvesant High, received a recruitment letter.
"Parents are in the dark," Alterman said. "It freaked me out. I didn't sign up to support the military effort."
Alterman said after he opted out, his son received another letter, this one promoting scholarships. "It was very seductive. They didn't say anything about risk to personal safety," Alterman said.
Among those objecting to the new requirements is the New York City chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. Executive director Donna Lieberman said that the opt-out provision is inadequate and that schools should be doing more to protect students' privacy.
In a letter last month, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Education Secretary Rod Paige reminded high school administrators of their duty, and cited "the excellent educational opportunities the military affords, as well as an environment that encourages the development of strong character and leadership skills." 'We had to comply with the law'
The Pentagon said better access to students could also hold down the rising costs of recruitment. Over the past decade, the cost per recruit has nearly doubled from $6,500 to $11,600.
Before the law, military recruiters could meet with students in Cambridge and Northampton on campus only if the student sought them out, and then only at a meeting attended by a guidance counselor. But Cambridge held a military career fair at the high school a month ago.
"It's a vast departure from the way we've done business," said Donna Harlan, an associate superintendent in the Northampton school system. "We are not in the business of giving lists of names of kids to anybody. That was tough. The issue was if we were to receive federal or state money, we had to comply with the law."
The law also spelled the end of a 6-year ban on military recruiting on campus in Portland, Oregon. After contending that the "don't ask, don't tell" policy discriminates against gays, the school system now gives recruiters a shot at its 16,000 students.
In Massachusetts, Framingham High senior April Middleton decided over lunch recently that maybe the military is in her future after talking with Army National Guard Sgt. Louis Perrin, a recruiter who visited the cafeteria.
Middleton, 18, said she plans to enlist after she graduates, and the prospect of war has not scared her off. "Sometimes you've got to make sacrifices," she said.
Sometimes, however, recruiters battle hostility.
"One teacher said we were trying to brainwash kids. All we were doing was handing out pencils," Perrin said. "We're not trying to invade anybody's privacy. We're just trying to protect their freedoms."
----
Why the Pentagon will watch where you shop
New Total Information Awareness project will sniff company databases for terrorists.
By Faye Bowers and Peter Grier
The Christian Science Monitor
December 03, 2002 edition
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/1203/p01s01-usgn.html
WASHINGTON - Should Uncle Sam know as much about you as MasterCard does?
In essence, that may be the key question posed by the Pentagon's new Total Information Awareness (TIA) project.
This effort - whose Latin motto translates as "knowledge is power" - aims to create huge databases that sift through the purchases, travel, immigration status, income, and other data of hundreds of millions of Americans. Its purpose: to sniff out the terrorists among us.
Credit-card companies already carry out such paper profiling as an antifraud device, say proponents of the new effort. That's why you get a call when you suddenly start spending lots of money far from home, or exceed your daily allotment of transactions. Using such techniques to prevent another Sept. 11 may thus be simply a natural progression in technology.
But the recent theft of thousands of identities from commercial databases points out what can happen when such data falls into the wrong hands, say critics. And the federal government is not American Express. It has far greater power, and citizens thus need to assiduously protect their privacy from its snooping.
"Data files that become available [to the government] are likely to be used beyond their initial purpose, and we need to guard against that somehow," says Robert Pfaltzgraff, professor of international security at Tufts University's Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in Medford, Mass.
A prototype of TIA - funded at $10 million this fiscal year and expected to grow in the next few years - is now being set up, using mostly fabricated information, although some "real" data will be used from public records.
"There are three parts to the TIA project," says Edward Aldridge, undersecretary of Defense for acquisition, technology, and logistics.
The first part of the technology is voice recognition, which would include sifting through electronically recorded transmissions and provide rapid translations of foreign languages.
The second part is to develop a tool that would discover connections between transactions, such as passports, airline tickets, rental cars, gun or chemical purchases, as well as arrests and other suspicious activities.
And the third part is collaborative - a mechanism to allow information- and analysis-sharing among agencies.
"If [the testing] proves useful," Mr. Aldridge says, "TIA will then be turned over to the intelligence, counterintelligence, and law enforcement communities as a tool to help them in their battle against domestic terrorism."
To some, this concept is a no-brainer in light of the 9/11 attacks and subsequent terror activity. "We're talking about data-mining systems that credit-card companies in particular use," says Lee McKnight, a professor of information studies at Syracuse University in New York. "Lots of this they can buy off the shelf."
He cites an example of how the government could have utilized technology used by credit-card companies to alert airport personnel to some of the hijackers boarding planes on Sept. 11.
Dr. McKnight recently tried to purchase a washing machine in upstate New York after moving to the state, and ended up getting a call from his credit card company on the store's phone after it detected that he - a Massachusetts resident - was accruing big charges in upstate New York.
Similarly, shouldn't an alarm bell go off if three known terrorists board planes within minutes of each other, he asks.
The government should be able to have this technology up and running within a year, McKnight says. Some of the more advanced - like voice recognition and face recognition - may take longer.
The key seems to be in information sharing among departments. The CIA, for example, had information linking at least two hijackers to Al Qaeda before Sept. 11, and knew they were in the US. But CIA employees did not get the names into FBI or State Department computer systems. If it had, at least those two may have been prohibited from boarding planes.
Getting government agencies, who have guarded information for their own reasons for decades, to cooperate is one thing. Motivating credit card, telephone, and other private companies to share valuable marketing information, like a customer's personal shopping practices, is another.
"A credit-card company that knows your purchasing patterns can market to you in a way that makes you happier, and makes you a better customer," says Jean Camp, an expert on the interaction of technical design and social systems at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. "It's good for them not to share that information."
(Attention shoppers: think those strategically timed $25-rebates from your favorite clothier.)
Moreover, the technology to mine these data sources is there, but developing systems to "talk" to other systems is much more challenging. Professor Camp says it was pretty easy to develop an online checking account system. But it has been much more difficult to get those programs to talk to banks, all of which have their own coded systems. She says it's the same with most industries - getting those systems to talk are multiyear projects.
Germany is one country that has long experience with this. In the 1970s, its federal police pulled together databases from private and public records. From crosschecking data, they were able to determine where terrorists belonging to the Red Brigades Faction lived, and even the places they frequently visited.
After the group was crushed, Germany's privacy protections were enhanced. But this past fall, Germany attempted to launch the world's largest computer dragnet after it was discovered that the principal 9/11 hijackers had lived in Germany while plotting their attacks.
Some 4,000 German companies were asked by the police to dump their electronic files into the government's database. The plan was to run all these transactions through a computer against a basic profile of hijackers - men 18 to 40 years old from Arab or Muslim countries with technical expertise or training.
Only 212 of the 4,000 companies reportedly complied with the request to give up their records, due to privacy concerns.
It also became evident that German states each had their own systems of coding, as did private companies.
"They haven't got far due to the incompatibility of computers between states and the federal government," a German official says.
The program has now stopped and has been outsourced to a private company to determine how to develop a new computer system, like the one the Pentagon is trying to design.
----
President Signs Defense Authorization Bill
Tuesday, December 03, 2002
Fox News
Wendell Goler
the Associated Press contributed to this report.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,71918,00.html
WASHINGTON - President Bush on Monday signed the Pentagon's biggest budget increase in a generation while warning Iraq not to falter on its obligation to the United Nations to disclose its weapons program.
"Our country has unprecedented challenges and we are facing them with unmatched technology, careful planning and the finest traditions of valor," Bush said at a Pentagon ceremony in which he was flanked by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and several members of Congress.
"The greatest strength of the American military is the cause we all serve. That cause is freedom in a world of peace. ... We will not rest and we will not relent until freedom is secured," he said.
The Defense Authorization Bill is a milestone for the president, who made the size of the defense budget a measure of his commitment to the nation's security.
The $393 billion measure represents a $30 billion increase over current spending. It includes money for a 4.1 percent pay increase for military personnel and better housing, and includes a $10 billion reserve fund to be used in case of future terrorist attacks, which some members of his administration say are inevitable.
The new law also creates an undersecretary for intelligence at the Department of Defense and honors retiring House Armed Services Committee Chairman Rep. Bob Stump, R-Ariz.
Before signing the bill, Bush warned terrorists that the United States would win the first war of the 21st century, one he said that has departed from traditional battles. He said this new war is occurring against the "future face of warfare" - forces that are more agile and lethal and who "prey on failed states."
But he said, they can not win this new fight.
"All of the terrorists can be certain of this: Their hour of justice will come and that hour of justice has already arrived for some field generals," he said, referring to Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, who is credited with masterminding the hit on the USS Cole and the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania.
Bush also issued another warning for Iraqi President Saddam Hussein during the signing ceremony. The president spoke about his continued development of biological and chemical weapons and said the "game is over."
Bush spoke of the importance of Sunday's deadline for Saddam to detail his weapons programs and said that it is not up to inspectors "to play hide and seek with Saddam Hussein" but to verify the evidence.
"It is Saddam Hussein who has the responsibility to provide that evidence, as directed and in full. Any acts of delay, deception or defiance will prove that Saddam Hussein has not adopted the path of compliance and has rejected the path of peace," he said.
So far the signs are not encouraging, Bush added, referring to anti-aircraft weapons fire on Monday aimed at U.S. and British airplanes manning the no-fly zone.
He did not mention the unfolding story in Iraq of weapons inspectors saying that some equipment is missing from one of the inspection sites.
Earlier in the day, White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer said the United States will be looking for a "full and accurate, complete and credible list of Iraq's weapons," and won't buy the argument that he doesn't have any because the United States has intelligence suggesting otherwise.
"The history of people who accept Saddam Hussein at face value and take his word for accurate is one of disappointment because they've been deceived. Saddam Hussein does not exactly have a track record of telling the world the truth. So he, on December 8, has to indicate whether or not he has weapons. Let's see what he says. If he declares he has none, then we'll know that Saddam Hussein is once again misleading the world," he said.
In their first five days on the ground, U.N. weapons inspectors have reported no problems from Iraq, but Fleischer said that it's too soon to make an assessment of how things are going, nor will he confirm reports that the United States is withholding intelligence information about what officials believe to be Iraqi weapons sites, until after Sunday's declaration to try and catch Saddam in a lie.
Fleischer said Bush is not yet making any judgments on whether those inspections will be successful in disarming Saddam peacefully. Should the inspections route fail, Bush has vowed that the United States will lead allies into war to rid Iraq of any weapons of mass destruction.
"The president is skeptical that Saddam Hussein will comply and it's too soon to say. One week is not adequate time,'' Fleischer said.
The president signed the defense bill amid reports that the cost of a war with Iraq could top $200 billion. Despite his insistence that the United States won't have to go it alone - that this country will lead a coalition of the willing - there is likely to be much less financial support from other nations than the United States received in fighting the Persian Gulf War a decade ago.
-------- propaganda wars
New Terror Toys
Is Marketing War to Young Kids Harmful or Beneficial?
By Dan Harris
ABCNEWS.com
Dec. 3, 2002
http://www.abcnews.go.com/sections/wnt/DailyNews/war_toys021203.html
"Army Forward Command Post," a new toy out this holiday season, has been dubbed by one toy expert as "Barbie's Dream House: The Nightmare Version."
It is a bullet-riddled shell of a house, complete with a soldier in military combat gear, weapons, ammunition and even sandbags.
There are two versions of "Forward Command Post": one for children 5 years old and older; the other for children 3 and older.
"I just wouldn't buy it. It's scary," one mother said when ABCNEWS showed the toy to some parents shopping with their children in New York City.
"I mean I know our world has changed, but I hope not that much," said another mother.
The Lion & Lamb Project, a Bethesda, Md.-based group that discourages violent toys and games for kids, put "Forward Command Post" on its annual "Dirty Dozen" list of violent "toys to avoid."
Other war-related toys on the market this holiday include a replica of an actual U.S. Army long-range sniper; a camouflage "Ride-On Tank" complete with flashing lights, machine-gun noises and firing sounds; a "Bazooka and Walkie-Talkie Set," a "Ted from Tora Bora" action figure and a toy head of Osama bin Laden.
"Play is a child's work," said Daphne White, founder and executive director of the Lion & Lamb Project. "Children learn through play ... So actually giving them violent toys predisposes them and ... teaches them that to behave violently is fun and acceptable."
Way to Confront Their Fears?
The maker of Forward Command Post, a company called Ever Sparkle Industrial Toys, says its product is no more violent than the G.I. Joe toys, which have been around for years.
And, in fact, some experts say playing with war-themed toys can be healthy for kids.
Gerard Jones, author of the book Killing Monsters: Why Children Need Fantasy, Super Heroes, and Make-Believe Violence, says such play can be a way for children to confront and conquer their fears.
"What's hard for us, for adults, to understand is that things that things make us nervous, that create some anxiety in us because they remind us of real-world violence, are often the very things that kids need to play through," said Jones.
But even Jones admits that Forward Command Post - described on the J.C. Penney Web site as a "fully outfitted battle zone" - is probably not right for a 5-year-old.
-------- POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS
Guantánamo Prisoners Seek to See Families and Lawyers
By NEIL A. LEWIS
December 3, 2002
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/03/politics/03BASE.html
WASHINGTON, Dec. 2 - Lawyers for 16 men captured in Afghanistan and held at the Guantánamo Naval Base in Cuba asked a federal appeals court today to order the government to allow the detainees to see their families, consult with lawyers and challenge their detentions in court.
Joe Margulies, a Minneapolis lawyer representing four Britons and four Australians in Guantánamo, said he did not dispute that the United States was in a war on terrorism and was entitled to detain prisoners captured in Afghanistan.
"But the question is whether they must detain them consistent with the rule of law," Mr. Margulies told a three-judge panel that is reviewing a lower-court ruling that upheld the government's treatment of the prisoners.
"The government says no court in the world may hear from my clients," Mr. Margulies said. "Guantánamo is unique. It is utterly outside the law."
The Bush administration has maintained that the more than 600 detainees being held at the base have no constitutional rights because Guantánamo is not part of the United States. Moreover, the detainees have been designated as enemy combatants, and a Justice Department lawyer argued to the court today that they needed to be kept in relative isolation because the war was still going on.
Paul D. Clement, the deputy solicitor general who argued for the Justice Department, said the detainees were being held not only to take them off the battlefield but also as a resource of information about Al Qaeda. Mr. Clement said that they were held at Guantánamo "to facilitate intelligence gathering" and that the authorities wanted the detainees available to answer questions that might arise as new information came in. He suggested that the value of such questioning would be limited if the detainees were able to have open communications with family members and lawyers.
"One of the fundamental aspects of holding someone as an enemy combatant is that you can hold them without access to counsel, without access to their family," Mr. Clement said. "The authority to hold them at all is the authority to hold them under those conditions."
The main issue in the case revolves around the unusual legal status of the Guantánamo base. Officials chose the base, in southeast Cuba, because it was isolated from civilians and remote enough to allow the government to control the detainees. The authorities also said they thought the base would be out of reach of American courts.
In July, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly of the Federal District Court for the District of Columbia confirmed that strategy when she ruled that the base was not formally part of the United States and that as a result the detainees did not have constitutional protections. Under well-established principles, even noncitizens have some constitutional protections once they are inside the United States.
Judge Kollar-Kotelly's ruling was a victory for the Bush administration, which has found itself engaged in court tests of many of its policies intended to combat terrorism.
The Britons and Australians had asked the court to issue a writ of habeas corpus, a procedure to challenge someone's detention as illegal or unconstitutional.
Thomas Wilner, a Washington lawyer who is representing the other 12 defendants, Kuwaiti citizens, said that even without habeas corpus the prisoners should have the right to see their families and a lawyer and to challenge their detentions.
But the judges on the panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, A. Raymond Randolph, Stephen Williams and Merrick Garland, by their questions today seemed skeptical of the view that the government was exceeding its authority.
Mr. Clement argued that the detainees' situation was analogous to that of 21 Germans who were captured in China at the end of World War II and held by American authorities in a prison in Germany. The Supreme Court ruled in 1950 that the German prisoners did not have the right to challenge their detention.
But the lawyers for the detainees at Guantánamo said their cases were starkly different because the Germans were tried by a military tribunal, not kept in custody indefinitely without being charged.
-------- death penalty
Texas Death Row Appeals Lawyers Criticized
December 3, 2002
New York Times
By JIM YARDLEY
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/03/national/03DEFE.html
HOUSTON, Dec. 2 - Death row inmates in Texas are often assigned incompetent or unqualified state appellate lawyers who do not raise legitimate constitutional arguments and who fail to unearth facts that could prove the innocence of their clients, according to a new study by an advocacy group for capital defendants.
The group, Texas Defender Service, examined the state habeas appeals of nearly every death row inmate in Texas since 1995 and found that those inmates had a one in three chance of being executed without their cases being adequately investigated or argued by a competent state appeals lawyer. After conviction, a criminal faces a multilayered appeals process. The habeas appeal is intended for inmates to raise questions based on new evidence and not just the trial record. By comparison, the direct appeal is based on the record of the trial.
The study, "Lethal Indifference," cited as an example the case of Leonard Rojas, who is scheduled to be executed on Wednesday night. Mr. Rojas was assigned his state habeas lawyer by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, which by law appoints such lawyers to death row defendants. The man chosen to represent Mr. Rojas had been disciplined three times by the state bar and also given two probated suspensions.
"The overall message of the study is that our post-conviction system is broken in Texas," said Jim Marcus, executive director of Texas Defender Service and an author of the report. "Our system is so unreliable that innocent people or people with serious constitutional questions in their case are going to be executed without any real review."
Texas Defender Service, which often represents death row inmates, has for years been highly critical of the capital punishment system in Texas, which has executed by far the most inmates of any state. In October 2000, the group issued a report that criticized the process by which judges appointed trial lawyers for indigent capital defendants. The following year, the State Legislature passed a law intended to improve trial representation for poor defendants in all criminal cases.
Mr. Marcus said the new report is intended to expand beyond the adequacy of court-appointed trial lawyers and shed light on the problems with the state habeas appellate lawyers appointed by the Court of Criminal Appeals. He said claims made during habeas appeals are often critical in proving innocence or opening new constitutional avenues to overturn a conviction. He added that the state habeas process is also important because such new evidence can rarely be introduced in the federal habeas appellate process.
The study was highly critical of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state's highest criminal court. It accused the court of often appointing unqualified and inexperienced lawyers to handle state habeas appeals, noting that one lawyer still listed by the court as approved is dead. The study also criticized the court as being indifferent when presented with persuasive evidence that an inmate was being poorly represented.
Richard Wetzel, general counsel for the Court of Criminal Appeals, said he had only scanned the study and did not believe it would be appropriate to comment. "We've seen these criticisms before," he added. A spokeswoman for the Texas attorney general said no one in the office had yet read the report.
-------- terrorism
Number ties Kenya missile launcher to al-Qaeda
By David Johnston in Washington
Sydney Morning Herald
12/3/02
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/12/03/1038712939140.html
The Soviet-made missile launcher used in a failed attack on an Israeli passenger plane last week had a serial number close to one on a similar launcher found last year after a failed al-Qaeda attack on an American warplane in Saudi Arabia, United States officials said.
In the attacks last Thursday, three men in Mombasa, Kenya, detonated a car packed with explosives at the Paradise Hotel, killing themselves, 10 Kenyans and three Israelis just minutes after two missiles narrowly missed an Israeli charter plane leaving Mombasa's airport.
Intelligence experts suspected al-Qaeda or allied local groups of responsibility, but American
officials have suggested that an affiliated Islamic network from Somalia, Al Itihaad al Islamiya, was involved.
On Monday the White House spokesman, Ari Fleischer, said there were "suspicions" that al-Qaeda was behind the Kenya attacks. Kenyan officials have arrested more than a dozen people.
Although the launchers came from the same production batch, it was not clear whether the one used in Kenya would have been sold in the same shipment as the one used in Saudi Arabia, or whether the same source bought both weapons, intelligence officials said.
Suspicion of al-Qaeda involvement was strengthened on Monday by a statement on an Islamic website attributed to the group, claiming involvement in both Mombasa incidents.
The statement described them as a Ramadan greeting to the Palestinian people and referred to the 1998 al-Qaeda attacks on American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed 231 people and wounded more than 5000.
US officials said that experts were studying the message and that some regarded it as credible.
The five-page statement was made in the name of "The Political Office of al-Qaeda Jihad Organisation." The statement warned of further attacks but did not indicate how, when or where they might take place.
The officials said al-Qaeda had often used powerful car bombs against undefended targets such as churches or hotels.
In Mombasa, six Pakistani seamen have yet to be interrogated nearly a week after police detained them following the suicide bombing attack on the Israeli-owned resort. The main reason is that investigators have been unable to find a translator, despite a significant number of Pakistanis in Mombasa.
Four Somalis, who were seized with the Pakistanis, have also yet to be questioned, even though Kenyan police have Somali-speaking officers in their ranks. A senior police official assured reporters on Monday that investigators would interrogate the Somalis soon.
But critics say the investigations into the bombing of the resort and the attack on the airliner represent a classic case of how not to proceed.
Kenya was considering an Israeli request to take home and study debris from the attacks as both sides denied any tension between them.
The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, AFP
--------
U.S. Says Evidence Links Attack in Kenya With Qaeda Operation
December 3, 2002
New York Times
By DAVID JOHNSTON
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/03/international/africa/03TERR.html
WASHINGTON, Dec. 2 - The Soviet-made missile launcher used in a failed attack on an Israeli passenger plane on Thursday had a serial number close to one on a launcher of the same type found last year after a failed Qaeda attack on an American warplane in Saudi Arabia, senior government officials said today.
The discovery of the closely sequenced serial numbers could provide the first concrete evidence that the most recent attack was carried out by Al Qaeda, the terror network led by Osama bin Laden.
In the attacks on Thursday, three men in the Kenyan city of Mombasa detonated a car packed with explosives at the Paradise Hotel, killing themselves as well as 10 Kenyans and 3 Israelis. Several minutes earlier, two missiles narrowly missed an Israeli-chartered plane departing from Mombasa's airport.
Intelligence experts have strongly suspected Al Qaeda or closely allied local groups in the attacks, but American and Israeli officials have said they lacked definitive proof.
American officials have suggested that it was possible that another group played a role, citing an affiliated Islamic extremist network from Somalia, Al Itihaad al Islamiya.
Today the White House spokesman, Ari Fleischer, said there were "suspicions" that Al Qaeda was behind the Kenya attacks. Kenyan officials have arrested more than a dozen people in connection with them.
Although the launchers came from the same production batch, it was not clear whether the one used in Kenya would have been sold in the same shipment as the one used in Saudi Arabia, or whether the same source bought both weapons, intelligence officials said. For that reason, they added, intelligence experts were unable to declare with certainty that Al Qaeda was behind them.
Nevertheless, suspicion of Qaeda involvement was further strengthened today by a statement on an Islamic Web site attributed to the group, claiming involvement in both Mombasa incidents.
The statement described them both as a Ramadan greeting to the Palestinian people and referred to the 1998 attacks by Al Qaeda on American Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which killed 231 people and wounded more than 5,000. Twelve of the dead in those attacks were Americans. "At the same place where the `Jewish-Crusader coalition' was hit four years ago," the statement read, "here the fighters came back once again to strike heavily against that evil coalition. But this time, it was against Jews."
Government officials said that experts were studying the message and that some regarded it as credible, although the officials cautioned that Al Qaeda had not usually struck specifically Jewish targets or taken direct responsibility for its terrorist actions.
The five-page statement was made in the name of the Political Office of Al Qaeda Jihad Organization. The statement warned of further attacks but did not indicate how, when or where they might take place.
"We send them a message," the message read, apparently intended for Jews. "Your practices in corrupting earth, occupying sacred places, criminal acts against our families in Palestine, all your practices will not pass peacefully without firing back. Your children for ours, your women for ours, your elders for ours, and we will follow you wherever you are because you made us live in terror and fear."
The officials said those indications were not the only ones that the Kenyan attacks bore the signature of Al Qaeda. It has often used powerful car bombs against undefended targets like churches or hotels, they said. Moreover, Al Qaeda has previously tried coordinated attacks in countries where it has struck before and where Mr. bin Laden's followers are believed to be operating.
The launchers used in Kenya and Saudi Arabia were shoulder-fired weapons manufactured in large quantities by the Soviet Union for use against aerial targets during the cold war era. Thousands of the weapons are still being sold by arms traffickers around the world, the officials said.
American military officials announced in June that a Sudanese man with ties to Al Qaeda, arrested in Sudan, had admitted to launching a Soviet-designed SA-7 shoulder-fired missile at an American warplane in Saudi Arabia late last year.
In Israel, investigators have said the attackers in Kenya apparently used a version of the SA-7, originally designed in the 1970's and later copied for manufacture by China, Yugoslavia, Egypt and Pakistan.
-------- ENERGY AND OTHER
-------- alternative energy
The future is here - Japan launches fuel cell cars
Story by Chang-Ran Kim
REUTERS JAPAN:
December 3, 2002
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/18859/newsDate/3-Dec-2002/story.htm
TOKYO - It sounds too good to be true: a car that runs on an inexhaustible power source and doesn't harm the environment.
But that's exactly what two Japanese automakers put on the road yesterday, with the launch of the world's first fuel cell cars.
Toyota Motor and Honda Motor are leasing a handful of the cars to the Japanese government and several public establishments in the United States in an experimental programme that marks the biggest step yet towards the mass marketing of fuel cell vehicles (FCVs).
The ultimate "green car", FCVs could be part of the solution to smog, global warming and other ecological problems that conventional cars help cause.
The technology, which was first used during the Apollo moon project in the 1960s, mixes hydrogen fuel and oxygen from air using an electrochemical process to produce the electricity that powers the car.
Far from harming the environment, its only by-products are heat and water - water so pure the Apollo astronauts drank it.
Many of the world's biggest carmakers want to make FCVs available to the average consumer. If all goes as planned, FCVs may begin replacing gasoline-powered cars in the next decade.
However, carmakers still haven't figured out how to make FCVs at an affordable price, or how to build enough fuelling stations - and rapidly enough - to make them practical.
The high costs of research would force car firms to charge anything from $1 million to $2 million for every FCV initially.
"There are still many challenges left for full-blown commercialisation," Honda President Hiroyuki Yoshino said at a handover ceremony at the prime minister's office.
Leasing the first FCVs won't be cheap, either.
Three Japanese ministries and the Cabinet Office will fork out a hefty $9,800 a month to rent Toyota's five-seater "FCHV". Honda's four-seater "FCX" will cost $6,500 a month in Japan.
BEST ALTERNATIVE
Still, FCVs are considered the most promising alternative to today's gasoline-fuelled cars.
Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe. Oil supplies, on the other hand, are finite, and global oil production could peak by 2020, according to a U.S. government report.
That means even gasoline-electric hybrid cars, the most fuel-efficient cars around now, will lose their power source one day.
Unlike pure electric cars, FCVs don't need to be recharged. They can run for at least 300 kilometres (186 miles) before refuelling, at a speed of about 150 km an hour (93 mph).
With automotive vehicles believed to be responsible for a third of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, which lead to global warming, governments have recognised the urgent need to encourage cleaner cars.
"When I took office last year, I promised that in three years we would replace all cars used by the government with low-emission vehicles, even if it costs a little more," Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said at the ceremony.
"It's important that we continue to develop green cars."
The United States is doing its part, too.
Although the country pulled out of an international treaty to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, its biggest auto market, California, has been aggressively leading the nation's drive for stricter standards for emissions and fuel efficiency.
California, which has the unique right to set its own emissions regulations, is calling for all cars sold in the state to have near-zero emissions by 2009, which could set a precedent for federal legislation.
The state is leading by example. The FCVs launched today will be leased to two California universities by Toyota and the city of Los Angeles by Honda.
The United States is also keen to reduce its dependence on oil from the Middle East, and fuel cell technology is one answer.
BARRIERS, HAZARDS
In addition to price, the question of refuelling stations could be the biggest barrier to winning a mass market.
Japan, the world's second-largest automobile market, wants to lay the groundwork for full commercialisation by 2005, with the aim of having five million FCVs - or one out of every 14 cars - on the road by 2020, but there are no concrete estimates of how many hydrogen stations would be needed.
"Today, there are about 53,000 petrol stands for the 70 million cars in Japan, so you can do the maths," said Yasuji Hamada, an official at the economy, trade and industry ministry.
Using that ratio, it would take 3,800 hydrogen stations to fuel the five million FCVs that Japan wants on the road by 2020, and they would need to be spread out around the country.
Even before that, Japanese officials will have to revise 26 laws - many of them safety-related - to make it possible for carmakers to mass market FCVs.
Because hydrogen in its natural gaseous state is potentially dangerous to store, Japanese regulations prohibit permanent hydrogen fuelling stations. Only three state-run sites exist, and strictly on an experimental basis.
Industry executives think it's too optimistic to expect FCVs to be a common sight on the roads any time soon.
"But with science, you can never tell. There could be a sudden breakthrough, and who knows, fuel cell vehicles could even overtake hybrid cars in number in the next 10 years," Honda's Yoshino said.
----
Ex-GM CEO makes "green" auto industry comeback
Story by Michael Ellis
REUTERS USA:
December 3, 2002
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/18867/newsDate/3-Dec-2002/story.htm
ROCHESTER HILLS, Mich. - Nearly 10 years to the day after he was pushed out as chief of General Motors Corp. (GM.N), Bob Stempel shoveled a handful of dirt to break ground for a new plant in Ohio that could make him a key player in a more environmentally-friendly automotive industry.
Stempel, 70, could easily have retired to a comfortable life after his tenure as chairman and CEO of GM ended in October 1992 with a boardroom coup. But now as chairman of Energy Conversion Devices Inc. (ENER.O) he works 60 to 70 hours a week, and flies around the world to visit clients as he makes his case for battery-powered vehicles.
Stempel is betting that sales of hybrid cars and trucks, powered by conventional gasoline or diesel engines mated to an electric drive system, will grow in the coming years as companies seek more fuel-efficient vehicles.
In late October, Stempel ceremoniously kicked off construction of a 170,000-square-foot plant in Springboro, Ohio, that will make enough nickel-metal hydride batteries to supply 50,000 to 60,000 vehicles a year.
Production at the plant, a joint venture between Chevron Texaco (CVX.N) and Energy Conversion Devices, is scheduled to start in the third quarter next year.
MOVING OFF THE FENCE
"People have been sort of on the fence about hybrid cars," Stempel told Reuters, his voice booming with excitement. "All of a sudden they are moving off the fence. We know that there's going to be enough solid business out there that we ought to get under way."
Currently there are only three hybrid gas-electric vehicles for sale in the U.S. market, all made by Japanese automakers Toyota Motor Corp. (7203.T) and Honda Motor Co. Ltd. (7267.T) - the Toyota Prius, the Honda Insight and a hybrid-version of the popular Honda Civic small car.
However, Stempel said that U.S. and European automakers are requesting prototypes for some test vehicles from his joint venture company, Texaco Ovonic Battery Systems.
Unlike pure electric vehicles, which take hours to recharge and have limited range, hybrid gas-electric vehicles recharge themselves and can travel as far as conventional cars and trucks.
Some so-called "soft" hybrids expected to be rolled out over the next two years shut the engine down when the vehicle idles or comes to a stop, such as at a traffic light, and quickly restart upon acceleration, also saving gasoline. Some will also have 110-volt outlets that can be used for power tools, which could appeal to construction workers.
Other hybrids, such as the Prius, Insight and Civic hybrid, have electric motors that provide extra power, thus improving fuel economy even more.
Because they use less fuel, hybrids produce less carbon dioxide, which is considered one of the prime greenhouse gases responsible for global warming.
BETTER MILEAGE, LOWER EMISSIONS
Stempel, an engineer by trade, was part of a team at GM that created the catalytic converter to clean vehicle emissions. He laughs now when recalling how he and his colleagues thought they had perfected the converter so it produced only "harmless" carbon dioxide.
"If we don't really control the emissions from personal transportation, the way the regulators are going to control it is to put limits on driving. Look what happened to Mexico City. There are days in Mexico City when you can't see," he said.
"I think once the public really gets used to (hybrids) there won't be any question that they're going to be pretty well accepted," Stempel said. By 2007, "we may be approaching 500,000 a year from all manufacturers here in North America."
Stempel said that automakers are moving ahead with plans that include his batteries, though he declined to give details, citing confidentiality agreements. The company is also testing some Toyota vehicles with its batteries to try to win business from Matsushita Battery, a unit of Japan's Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd. (6752.T).
Matsushita and Stempel's company have been embroiled in a patent dispute. ECD has alleged that Matsushita, which supplies the batteries through a joint venture with Panasonic Electronics for the Toyota Prius, wrongfully obtained patents held by ECD. Matsushita has denied the charges.
Toyota intends to sell 300,000 hybrid vehicles a year by 2005, with most of the sales in North America. One of its next hybrid models will be a version of the Lexus RX 330, the upcoming replacement of the popular RX 300 SUV.
Perhaps not surprisingly, the U.S. automakers who are trailing the Japanese in the race for hybrid vehicles have played down their importance. John Smith, GM's vice president of field sales, service and parts, said that the ultimate goal for GM is for cars and trucks that run on fuel cells.
"Hybrids can never be an endgame because they have packaged in one vehicle two modes of power sources," Smith said. "There's a redundant system on board and by definition it's not the efficient engineering solution."
But Stempel's former company is also proceeding with plans for more hybrid vehicles. GM will launch hybrid full-size pickup trucks in 2004 that use lead acid batteries, and is considering a hybrid sedan or sport utility vehicle in a few years that could use nickel metal hydride batteries, a spokesman said.
-------- environment
Cleaner air by increments
EDITORIAL
December 3, 2002
http://www.washtimes.com/op-ed/20021203-56022475.htm
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently announced a few new air pollution rules under its New Source Review (NSR) program. While the announcement set off a firestorm of criticism, concerned parties would be wise to take a deep breath, since those changes are more likely to result in air that becomes cleaner by increments than in anyone's lungs being filled with anything particularly sulfurous or particulate-laden anytime soon.
Actually, the just-enacted rules have been in the public eye for nearly a decade. The process of writing them began in 1992, when EPA administrators attempted to determine how the NSR could be improved. Several proposals were published in the Federal Register in 1996 and 1998, after which the EPA solicited and received an enormous amount of public comment on them. When the Bush administration requested another review, EPA representatives held even more meetings and received more than 130,000 written comments on the measures.
That extensive vetting process produced the just-issued rules. One rule clarifies the baseline that polluters use to calculate their emissions of pollutants, thus giving them a better yardstick with which to determine if specific changes will trigger NSR requirements for adding extensive pollution-control equipment, while holding them to the strict emissions limits already codified. The other three rules are designed to yield incremental improvements in air quality by giving polluters greater flexibility in controlling actual pollutants. One rule permits plants to take measures that result in incremental increases in the emissions of some pollutants, so long as the overall effect is friendly to the environment - i.e., results in overall reductions of the plant's emissions. Another rule allows "Clean Unit" facilities that have undergone a major NSR review in the last decade to install additional equipment without undergoing an additional NSR, if the plant's emissions stay within prescribed limits. The last major rule change puts pollutant caps on plants as a whole, rather than on specific pieces of equipment therein, thus (it is hoped) giving them flexibility to reduce pollution incrementallt without triggering a plant-wide NSR, which would be more expensive and time consuming.
The EPA's just-proposed rule attempts to delineate exactly what constitutes "routine maintenance" at power plants. It's a critical question, since routine maintenance is excluded from NSR review. It's also a highly complex question, one that has never been adequately clarified. In fact, according to EPA spokesman Joe Martyak, this is the first time that the agency has taken formal comments on the matter - given that it will be subjected to the same sort of vetting process as the just-issued rules, it may be some time before the rule is codified, if ever.
While neither the proposed nor the formalized rules are perfect - in fact, they contain significant loopholes, some of which could be closed by Congress acting on President Bush's Clear Skies Initiative - they are far more likely to result in incremental improvements to air quality than smoggy skies. Instead of posturing, environmental groups and potential presidential contenders such as Sens. John Kerry and Joseph Lieberman should pause for a careful look at the rules.
-------- health
U.N. Food Chief Warns of Africa Famine
December 3, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-UN-Africa-Hunger.html
UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- Africa faces an unprecedented hunger crisis with 38 million people threatened by starvation, the head of the U.N.'s food relief agency warned the Security Council on Tuesday.
James T. Morris, executive director of the World Food Program, said the only obstacle to ending hunger tomorrow is ``lack of political will.''
But instead of making the political decisions and earmarking the money to eliminate hunger, ``U.N. member states have unwittingly adopted policies that make the idea of ending hunger little more than fantasy.''
``There is not enough money to feed those starving today, and trade and economic policies -- national and international -- make it unlikely all will be fed in the future,'' he said.
Morris said the United Nations is currently ``struggling to feed 38 million new victims of food crises'' in Africa.
``We are now confronted with the possibility of mass starvation in several regions in Africa -- in a half dozen countries in the south, in the Horn of Africa and in parts of the Sahel,'' he said.
In southern Africa, where over 14 million people in Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, Lesotho, Swaziland and Mozambique, need food, donors have pledged only 56 percent of the $511 million needed, he said.
In the Horn of Africa, 6 million Ethiopians and more than 2 million Eritreans need food due to drought, the legacy of political disputes and violence, Morris said. Violence and hunger also ``go hand in hand now in West Africa,'' especially Liberia and Ivory Coast.
Earlier Tuesday, 15 American humanitarian groups met Morris in Baltimore to urge governments, citizens' groups and private citizens to help Africans plagued by famine and AIDS. The relief groups, which include the American Red Cross, Save the Children and Catholic Relief Services, say more than 34 million people in sub-Saharan Africa face death by starvation in the next six to eight months.
Morris told an open Security Council meeting late Tuesday that Africa faces a drought far more widespread than every before, at a time of ``massive demands for food aid elsewhere'' in Afghanistan, North Korea and parts of Central America.
Last year, the World Food Program fed 77 million people in 82 countries at a cost of $1.74 billion. But Morris said it has had to cut off rations because of a lack of money.
``For the short-term, we will need a major infusion of funds for humanitarian relief and stronger and better cooperation from recipient governments; for the long-term we will need reforms in governance and economic policy in Africa.''
``People are hungry because their governments have made the wrong political decisions. In the end hunger is a political creation and we must use political means to end it,'' he said.
-------- ACTIVISTS
Peace protests near White House growing
By Stefany Moore
UPI
From the Washington Politics & Policy Desk
12/3/2002
http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20021202-043034-9002r
WASHINGTON, Dec. 2 -- Finding vacant space in the grassy area across from the White House is proving to be no easy task these days, as more and more activist groups are setting up camp to protest a potential war with Iraq. But Conchita Picciotto, who has called Lafayette Park her home for the past 21 years, welcomes the company.
"It's nice to have more people around," she says.
The Pennsylvania Avenue park has long been a home to activists, some of them permanent residents, most of them temporary visitors. But as talk of war with Iraq becomes louder, the number and variety of activist groups in Lafayette Park continues to grow.
The scene near the White House is only a small part of a growing peace movement that is showing its face in a very visible, sometimes very loud way, across the nation.
As tourists make their rounds for photos at the gates of the White House, across the street protesters can be heard chanting, Buddhist monks can be seen praying and colorful signs of protest litter the sidewalk.
In the middle of the park, a women's group has staked their claim on a portion of the land. They are staging a 4-month-long vigil in opposition to war. They call themselves Code Pink, "A pre-emptive strike for peace." Many of them are members of women's groups such as National Organization for Women; others are parents and concerned citizens.
The organization maintains that the Bush administration is "squandering" money that could be used for public health or education to attack a nation that poses no immediate threat.
One of their signs reads, "Bush says Code Red; we say Code Pink." They wear buttons on their pink jackets saying, "Women For Peace."
Jodie Evans, one of the organizers, says she is worried her 18- and 21-year-old boys back home in Venice, Calif., might have to go to Iraq if there is a war.
"I'm worried about more than my children," she adds. "I'm worried about my country and about my world."
A few feet away, a group of Buddhists from Massachusetts have secured their space. Flanked by large posters with graphic photographs of Iraqi children injured in the Persian Gulf War, half a dozen men and women sit on a large blanket, quietly beating drums with sticks and praying.
Clare Carter, a Buddhist nun who wears a yellow robe over her winter clothes, says the world should be concerned about the Iraqi people, most specifically, the children. Her organization is holding a week-long vigil and fast.
"It's a humble effort," Carter says, "But it's from the heart."
By far, the most permanent fixture in Lafayette Park is Picciotto. A U.S. citizen of Spanish descent, she has spent the past 21 years of her life living there as part of a 24-hour anti-nuclear peace vigil.
Through the cold, the rain and the snow, Picciotto mans her post. Directly in front of George W. Bush's home, she remains on the sidewalk all day and all night. She keeps a plastic tarp for when it pours. Standing at barely 4 feet 10 inches tall, she resides between two large signs with pictures of nuclear explosions in Hiroshima and Nagasaki above photos of mangled bodies. The large, black text reads, "Stay the course and this will happen to you."
Picciotto opposes the use of nuclear weapons, war with Iraq, and is a supporter of the Palestinian cause.
Despite the seemingly grueling lifestyle, she seems to remain jovial. She jokes with tourists as they pass by, and her face is almost always smiling beneath a scarf that covers her head.
She does acknowledge, however, that her life is, well, "difficult," she says. For example, she has to sleep sitting up because it is against U.S. Park Police regulations to lie down.
"I don't even remember what a bed feels like," she says.
Though one would assume her to be in a constant state of boredom, Picciotto always looks busy. She is sweeping the sidewalk of leaves, speaking with passersby, or feeding the hordes of pigeons that seem to follow her every move.
When she sees a stark white pigeon scurry up to her feet, she interrupts conversation to pour a handful of peanuts into a dish.
"His name is Havel," she says. "He is my pet."
Picciotto stands guard as the bird digs in, making sure to protect him from other pigeons that want a bite.
"Get away!" she shouts to the invaders.
"Everybody wants peanuts," she says with a laugh. "But I cannot give peanuts to everybody."
A nearby shelter brings Picciotto bread every couple days, and she keeps two large Gatorade bottles of water among her things. Friends and supporters come by often to bring her food or the daily newspaper.
William Sylvester, a machinist from New Mexico on vacation in Washington, stops by to chat with Picciotto about the war in Iraq and brings her a pastry with some orange juice. He says he heard about Picciotto's vigil a few years back and was looking forward to "breaking bread" with her.
"I feel compelled to at least bring some juice," Sylvester says. "I sure don't have that kind of dedication."
----
12/10: Protest The War Propagandists
From: Bette Hoover <BHoover@afsc.org>
Date: Tue, 3 Dec 2002
NO TO WAR: YES TO HUMAN RIGHTS
Protest the Committee for the "Liberation" of Iraq
Tuesday, December 10th
918 Pennsylvania Ave, SE
4:30-7:00 pm
The "Committee for the Liberation of Iraq" is a private propaganda office set up in conjunction with the Bush Administration to help beat the drums for war against Iraq. Newt Gingrich, former CIA director James Woolsey, and alleged Vietnam war criminal Bob Kerrey are only three members of the rogue's gallery of right-wingers and war profiteers that make up this organization. No one on the committee has shown a regard for anyone's liberation - in fact, they have supported violent U.S. puppet regimes from the Philippines to El Salvador. Come celebrate International Human Rights Day by welcoming these Propaganda Ministers to the neighborhood with a healthy lesson in what liberation really is -- the right of people in the U.S., Iraq, and everywhere to live in a world where human lives are more important than oil profits.
Sponsored by the Washington DC Ad Hoc Committee Against the War
For more information contact Trent: 202-299-1050, tmoyer@hampshire.edu.
--------
Haitian Leader's Supporters Beat, Chase Protesters
December 3, 2002
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-haiti-unrest.html
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (Reuters) - Several thousand supporters of Haiti's President Jean-Bertrand Aristide hit anti-Aristide demonstrators with metal bars and chased them away with stones and bottles in Port-au-Prince on Tuesday.
In the southwestern city of Petit Goave, an anti-Aristide protester was shot and wounded during a demonstration there, private Radio Metropole reported, but did not give details.
The unrest, the latest in a series of demonstrations and counter-protests to hit the impoverished Caribbean nation, took place on the anniversary of the murder of a Haitian journalist whose death -- allegedly at the hands of Aristide supporters -- was one of the sparks for growing opposition to the president.
Hundreds of anti-Aristide marchers near the United States embassy in downtown Port-au-Prince were stopped by a much larger crowd of young Aristide supporters.
``Now is not the time to be afraid, now is the time to be brave,'' said one woman in the anti-Aristide crowd, as bottles shattered at her feet and rocks were pelted at cars.
``Aristide or death!'' shouted one young man carrying a poster of the president.
Police did not intervene and no serious injuries were reported.
``This is democracy: People, including government supporters, may take part in any march they want to,'' Secretary of State for Communications Mario Dupuy told reporters.
An anti-government march in the northern city of Cap Haitien was also broken up, Radio Metropole reported.
Members of the political opposition said they planned a general strike on Wednesday in their efforts to oust Aristide, who has said he has no plans to step down.
A tide of protests has hit Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas, recently as opposition and student groups decry a deteriorating economy and what they charge is government corruption and Aristide's increasingly authoritarian rule.
Aristide, a former Catholic priest, rallied Haiti's poor in the mid-1980s at the end a 30-year dictatorship and was elected president in 1990 only to be ousted in a coup months later.
U.S. troops helped restore him to power in 1994 and he won a second term in Nov. 2000, but since then he has been mired in a dispute over May 2000 legislative elections, which has stalled foreign aid for his 8 million people as prices soar and the value of the country's currency, the gourde, slumps.
--------
Venezuela Nat'l Guard Disperses Protest
December 3, 2002
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Venezuela-Strike.html
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) -- The national guard broke up an opposition protest with tear gas and rubber bullets and chased away dissident Venezuelan generals Tuesday during an escalating strike to oust President Hugo Chavez.
In his first public comment since the strike began Monday, Chavez called the action ``a desperate effort'' to oust him by an opposition bent on ``destabilization and violence.''
``This strike, like all the others, has a hidden agenda: another coup attempt,'' Chavez told reporters. He vowed that ``they won't achieve their sinister goals of destabilizing the country.''
Chavez accused opposition thugs of harassing storekeepers to close their shops and provoking clashes with security forces. He vowed that the strike won't ``paralyze'' Venezuela's key oil industry, and he said he wasn't considering calling a state of emergency, as strikers claim.
Venezuela's energy ministry said late Tuesday that all oil refineries were producing at 100 percent capacity and that shipments were normal. Venezuela is the world's fifth-largest oil producer and a top U.S. supplier.
Chavez urged strike leaders to return to negotiations on elections, mediated by the Organization of American States.
But strike leaders extended their action indefinitely and called more street protests for Wednesday after the National Guard chased away protesters and roughed up several journalists.
Dozens of oil executives and their supporters, angered by the armed robbery of a top manager early Tuesday, called a rally at the headquarters of Venezuela's state-owned oil monopoly Petroleos de Venezuela S.A.
Soldiers swiftly cleared the protest from the area, which had been decreed an off-limits ``security zone'' by Chavez. They also chased away dissident generals who tried to convince them to let the protest proceed.
Hours later, troops withdrew to a nearby air force base. Thousands of protesters celebrated at PDVSA headquarters, banging pots and pans and blowing whistles. Others protested outside the air base but were chased away by tear gas.
Rafael Vargas, a top Chavez aide, said the government will not hesitate to crack down on protests.
``PDVSA is a strategic business. It's the heart of Venezuela. What happens to PDVSA happens to Venezuela,'' Vargas said.
Oil accounts for half of government income and a third of gross domestic product. The oil company managers are trying to halt oil operations and provide a critical boost to the general strike.
Elsewhere, police scuffled with strikers in western Venezuela, a base for the nation's oil industry. The navy chased away strikers in small boats trying to block a navigation canal in Lake Maracaibo used by tankers exporting 1 million barrels of crude each day.
Many oil managers were participating in the strike, but production at rigs and refineries appeared normal. Workers who had trouble getting to oil rigs because of boaters' strikes on Monday worked normally Tuesday.
Strike leaders said 75 percent of oil workers stayed home Tuesday. Labor Minister Maria Cristina Iglesias insisted only 18 percent stayed home. There was no way to reconcile the figures.
Venezuelans also kept a close watch on the military, which this fall has seen more than 100 officers rebel against Chavez. None of them command troops, and many were stripped of authority after Chavez was deposed for two days in an April coup.
An oil industry shutdown, a general strike and the killings of 19 people in an April 11 opposition march provoked Chavez's ouster on April 12 by dissident officers. Thousands of civilians rebelled when an interim government abolished the constitution, and Chavez was restored to power.
The United States appealed to the government and the opposition to return to peace talks led by OAS Secretary General Cesar Gaviria. Gaviria met with Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel on Tuesday and urged both sides to refrain from violence.
``I'm very worried, of course, and hope this is solved soon,'' U.S. Ambassador Charles Shapiro said after meeting with Gaviria. Shapiro also visited the presidential palace on Tuesday.
The government said talks could resume when the strike ended. The opposition said the strike will end when the government resumes talks.
In Caracas, hundreds more stores, banks, food shops and cafes opened for business on Tuesday, and downtown's traffic jams resumed. But many events -- including Venezuela's treasured winter league baseball All-Star Game -- were postponed.
The strike began after the Supreme Court voided a Feb. 2 nonbinding referendum on Chavez's rule, saying the five-member national elections council needed at least four votes for approval. The council said Tuesday it had voted 4-1 to prepare the referendum. Chavez insists the constitution allows only a binding vote halfway into his presidency, in August 2003.
----
City Council votes for anti-war resolution
By Christopher Johnson,
Michigan Daily Staff Reporter
December 03, 2002
http://www.michigandaily.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2002/12/03/3dec4b98bfdfc?in_archive=1
Voices arguing against the nation's movement toward war found a sympathetic audience at the Ann Arbor City Council meeting last night. Joining 21 other cities, including Washington and Detroit, the council voted 7-1 in favor of a resolution against war with Iraq.
Councilwoman Heidi Cowing Herrell (D-3rd Ward) pitched the proposed resolution as a means to support local representatives in higher government who oppose the war.
"This is a question that concerns the whole nation," she said. "If we go to war there will be economic impacts on our community. There will be members of our community who will serve in the armed forces."
The City Council received a large audience - a couple hundred community members - for the vote. Attendees filled every spot on the benches, parading signs of protest against the progression toward war. Several participants presented arguments decrying the possibility of war, urging the council to take action.
Stephen Boyce, an Ann Arbor resident who said he participated in the Vietnam War, the Persian Gulf War and the war on drugs, described the senselessness of initiating a conflict with Iraq. "I've come to the humble conclusion that the whole foul lump is not worth the life of a single American citizen," he said. "There is nothing in this war that will help our people. There is nothing in this war that will expand our democracy."
The new resolution presents several reasons for averting war, such as the loss of life on both sides of the conflict, the diversion of local tax money outside the community, the potential change in national policy toward preemptive strikes in other cases and the opposition presented by Ann Arbor's elected officials in Congress.
"It is the people who are not in agreement at this time that we are trying to convince and the majority of (those who serve in) Congress that did not oppose unilateral action," Herrell said.
Most council members, including Margie Teall (D-4th Ward), expressed an emphatic approval of the resolution.
"These are voices that need to be heard, and if we can be that avenue, I encourage it and support it," she said.
Joan Lowenstein (D-2nd Ward) supported the proposal, but cautioned against continued resolutions regarding national policy. "I think the City Council can provide moral support in resolution," she said. "But our power to use resolution should be used sparingly."
Mike Reid (R-2nd Ward), who cast the lone dissenting vote opposing the resolution, said Iraq presents too significant a problem for the federal government to leave unchecked.
"We would be remiss if we expect actions in Iraq and the export of terrorism has not affected our day-to-day lives," he said. "If we yield to the temptation of picking out one issue here, we will fall into the problem of addressing all of them."
----
Mass protest as new wave of oil hits Spain
Story by Emma Ross-Thomas,
REUTERS SPAIN:
December 3, 2002
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/18858/newsDate/3-Dec-2002/story.htm
SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA, Spain - Tens of thousands of angry demonstrators packed Galicia's capital on the weekend to protest at the government's handling of a tanker disaster as a new wave of fuel oil hit Spanish beaches.
The streets of Santiago, the ancient pilgrimage centre in northwestern Spain, were thronged with marchers upset by the destruction wrought on the region's environment and fisheries by a huge oil spill from the sunken tanker Prestige.
Organisers of the march, held under the slogan "Never Again", estimated that up to 200,000 people marched through driving rain under a sea of umbrellas. There was no official estimate but one local police officer agreed with that figure.
Marcher Juan Raimundez, his clothes smeared with oil from the cleanup, accused authorities of playing down the disaster. "You can't lie and take the situation so lightly... Those of us who've been to clean up have no doubt it's a catastrophe."
Demonstrators, criticising the authorities' response to the spill as slow and inadequate, called for the Spanish and Galician regional governments to resign.
Seventy miles (110 km) away on Galicia's storm-driven "Coast of Death", small patches of a huge oil slick released when the 26-year-old Prestige broke up and sank 12 days ago in deep Atlantic waters began washing up on beaches.
The fishing village of Muxia on Spain's northwestern corner, repeatedly cleaned only to be soaked again with thick, foul-smelling fuel oil, was hit again.
For the first time, oil washed up on about 10 beaches near Valdovino, 40 kms northeast of La Coruna in northern Galicia, officials said.
The spread of the slick led Galician officials to extend a ban on gathering shellfish - which already covered 400 kms of coast - to the bays of Ferrol and Cedeira in northern Galicia.
A larger slick containing most of the estimated 11,000 tonnes of fuel oil spilled when the Prestige sank was now about 19 miles (35 km) off the Spanish coast, slightly further away than on Saturday, Environment Minister Jaume Matas said.
PREPARED FOR THE WORST
But stormy weather, with driving rain and shifting winds and currents, made it difficult to predict where the slick would end up. "You have to be prepared for the worst," Matas said.
Ominously, Monday's weather forecast predicted waves of up to five metres and strong winds from the northwest, which could push the main oil slick towards the rich Rias Baixas shellfish grounds in southern Galicia, so far spared the onslaught.
Residents of that area were gloomy. Manuel Iglesias, a fisherman in the village of O Grove, said inflatable barriers intended to keep out the slick had broken and he urged the government to supply stronger barriers. "People are desperate. There's nothing you can do," he said.
Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar announced the Navy had expelled a single-hulled Maltese oil tanker from Spanish waters on Saturday - the first time it has put into effect a new get-tough policy that Spain and France agreed on last week.
The French mini-submarine Nautile, which will be sent on a deep-sea mission to check if the Prestige's tanks are still leaking, arrived in the Galician port of Vigo on the weekend.
Bad weather hampered the work of eight cleanup ships, from around Europe, which have so far scooped up 5,500 tonnes of fuel oil from the sea.
The slick close to Spain's shores was bigger than the 5,000 tonnes of fuel oil spilled when the Prestige, carrying 77,000 tonnes of oil, was holed off the Galician coast on November 13. It was towed out to sea for nearly a week before sinking.
The original spill caused untold damage to Galicia's renowned fisheries, shellfish and barnacles, a culinary delicacy. Thousands of fishermen have been thrown out of work.
Some 1,400 white-suited workers, wearing face masks to avoid inhaling fumes, scraped up oil from scores of beaches on the weekend.
Wildlife group SEO/BirdLife estimated that up to 15,000 birds may have been killed or severely affected by the slick.
It said the disaster may mean the extinction of Spain colonies of the protected guillemot. Eighteen of the birds have been found dead and the Spanish population of the birds is estimated at only 11 pairs, it said. (Additional reporting by Adrian Croft, Marta Calleja in Madrid, Tomasz Janowski and George Georgiopoulos in Corfu).
----
Anti-war teach-in squashed
Radio rips it, school halts it
By Lee Sensenbrenner
December 3, 2002
Madison.com (Wisconsin)
12/03/02
The Madison Metropolitan School District is restricting students from addressing controversial topics unless their forums include equal time for contrasting views.
The administration staked out its position Monday afternoon when a last-bell announcement at Madison Memorial High School told students that an optional assembly today, which would have hosted three speakers opposed to war with Iraq, was postponed.
Until some hawks could be found to balance the discussion, the administration felt that it violated a line of policy that says: "The study of and the teaching of controversial issues shall be in an academic atmosphere as free as possible from bias and prejudice."
That decision, which was reached and ordered by Superintendent Art Rainwater, came after a morning of talk radio that again skewered the district as subversive and anti-American.
For nearly a month, a group of 20 students had worked to organize the anti-war teach-in. They enlisted the help of social studies teacher Pat Calchina and had clustered posters advertising the event around the school.
The speakers were to include Vietnam veteran Will William, peace activist Rae Vogeler and Progressive magazine Editor Matthew Rothschild. It was to have been open to anyone during seventh and eighth hours, followed by an after-school reception for refreshments and more discussion.
"Organizing it was really a powerful experience," said Memorial sophomore Rachael Blumenfeld. "It made me feel like I was a big part of something."
"We all have our opinions, but getting a chance to really express them and share our view - and really touch other people - was a great experience. We worked really hard on it," Blumenfeld said.
Blumenfeld said her detractors, who made "derogatory remarks" and tore down posters, were not meant to be excluded from discussing Iraq.
"They're more than welcome to organize a teach-in from their point of view - in fact, we encouraged them to. But they just didn't get it together," she said.
After the posters went up on the walls, and some were torn down to skid around the floors, a group of students involved in the Young Republicans organization began complaining that the school was going to sanction a message biased against their views. They said they weren't being included.
Principal Pam Nash, as well as the students who organized the teach-in, invited the students to organize their own assembly, a teacher at the school said, or find their own pro-war speakers to participate.
Neither offer was taken, and Monday morning the perception among the conservative students that they had been slighted turned more bitter - and it was being broadcast on AM talk radio.
Memorial High School student Andrew Schneider was on air with WTDY/AM 1670 host Chris Krok - who had drummed up anti-School Board sentiment last year when the board resisted mandated daily classroom recitations of the Pledge of Allegiance.
Those who spoke on the radio show gave slightly different variations on the theme that the school was engaged in some sort of thought control, and it was stifling voices from outside the left.
Some of the talk, too, was critical of Calchina, the teacher who was helping the students organize the assembly.
Calchina, who teaches women's history and other classes in the social studies department, had faced controversy last spring when she helped a group of girls build an American flag made of bras to celebrate women's history month. The project, after some hand-wringing by district administrators, won the adulation of local politicians and a call from Oprah Winfrey's cable TV network.
Calchina said she's concerned about the position the district took Monday, and is bewildered by the line of policy used to justify it.
"Where does it end?" she said.
To illustrate her frustration, she gave an example of how Ron Greer, a conservative, anti-gay former candidate for Congress, visited the school during the week before the November election.
She said she attended his talk, which was before classes started but during the paid school day.
"There was no opposing viewpoint," Calchina said. "I went, and so did students, and we politely asked questions."
"But in no way did we go on talk radio," she said.
Calchina said she was upset by reports that she had been heavily criticized on the air. Despite being told not to talk to the media, she said she had to respond to what she called "outright lies in an incredibly hateful manner."
"I didn't want to step on any toes, but I also felt like - my God, I'm the one being put out there as a demagogic teacher brainwashing my students, so I needed to speak. I needed to speak."
"I defended the right to dissent in a democracy and said that this is all part of the educational process."
Blumenfeld said she and her fellow students did not intend their teach-in to be politically balanced - rather, it was meant to be rather one-sided to counteract what they see as a national bias toward war.
"We're just trying to present a pro-peace side," she said.
For that, Blumenfeld said that "our posters were ripped down by teachers and students."
"It was just incredible, the amount of anger people had just for having a teach-in.
"People see it as anti-American. I think when we're doing something that's against our president's policy, people see us as attacking the American government.
"I think what America truly is, is discussion. I think what a real patriot is, is someone who says what they believe in, even if it's not the most popular thing - someone who just strives to make America better. Not necessarily by agreeing with power, but by demanding a better government and just demanding that their voice be heard.
"I think that's what makes our country so great, or what should make it so great," Blumenfeld said.
Calchina said she and her students have tentatively rescheduled the teach-in for Dec. 13, provided opposition speakers can be arranged.
"If they are not able to dig anyone up, I will," she said, "because these kids are so disappointed."
"We were so excited about this beautiful event that we were going to put on," Calchina said. "But I do believe that this is a very teachable moment. If they can just hold on, on Dec. 13 we can have an even better event. We really can. I have no qualms about the opposition being there."
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