Friday, March 16, 2012
N. Korea Plans to Launch Long-Range Rocket
North Korea announced that it intends to launch a rocket into space carrying a satellite between April 12 and April 16. The announcement comes just weeks after the North agreed to suspend long-range missile tests. Click here for the story.Thursday, March 15, 2012
Report Ties Israel to New Iran Sanctions
Afghanistan Looking Like Iraq at its Worst
Egyptian Parliament Turns Viciously Anti-Israel
Overlooked (deliberately?) by the so-called liberal media: Egypt's post-Mubarak parliament demands the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador. More about this over here.Santorum Sparks Furor in Puerto Rico
'Time to End Jackson-Vanik'
French Spies Plan Work Stoppage
Swedish Defense Ministry Official Used Personal Hotmail Account to Send Secret Information About Controversial Saudi Arms Deal
Iran Behind Gaza-Based Rocket Attacks
Friday, 16 March 2012
Even if it is for peaceful/prestige purposes, which is most unlikely, the launch will be closely observed and has most likely been paid for in whole or in part by North Korea's partner in proliferation, Iran. On March 5, Foreign Confidential™ noted:
The period from April 15, when North Korea will mark the centennial birthday of the country's founder and "Eternal President," Kim Il Sung, to July 27, the day the Korean War armistice was signed in 1953--called a "Commemorative Day of War Victory" in the North--is particularly dangerous in light of a possible U.S. or Israeli conflict with Iran this spring.
Weather permitting, Pyongyang will make every effort possible to fire the missile on April 15.
Click here to read more about North Korea's nuclear and missile tests and Iran.
The United States and Europe may have imposed new sanctions on Iran, and China may have reduced oil imports from the nuclear-arming nation, in response to Israeli pressure, as reported here.
Assuming that's true, a key question is this: at some point in the sanctions/strangling process, will Iran make good on its threats to attack first--i.e. to strike the U.S. and Israel preemptively? Most important, is Iran really capable of "burning Tel Aviv" and attacking "U.S. interests" globally--including the U.S. homeland itself?
A never-ending nightmare--read about it here--the war that should have been won in a matter of days or weeks after the mega-terrorist attacks of 9/11. For reasons still not explained and still not understood, Bush blew it. Instead of destroying the Taliban and Al Qaeda, he dislodged them, allowed their most senior leaders and top henchmen to escape into Pakistan.
Ten-and-a-half years later, the United States finds itself in a miserable mess that recalls the Iraq and Vietnam quagmires, trapped, or so it seems, into supporting a corrupt, cowardly regime, desperately seeking so-called victory with honor.
Egypt is a disaster bordering on catastrophe. The Obama administration-assisted overthrow of the pro-Western government of Hosni Mubarak echoes the Carter administration-aided ouster of Iran's modernizing monarch, Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. In the name of democracy promotion, the United States has stupidly and cynically helped antidemocratic, anti-American, anti-Western elements to take power in important countries. Incredible.
There he goes again….
Republican Presidential hopeful Rick Santorum is defending his offensive demand that Puerto Rico adopt English as an official language as a condition of statehood--a statement at odds with the U.S. Constitution. Click here for the news.
Santorum, who has referred to himself as a "Jesus candidate," recently revealed a deeply disturbing misunderstanding of theFirst Amendment to the Constitution. Read about that over here.
This reporter reveres the memory of Henry M. ("Scoop") Jackson as an estimable--possibly, even, a saintly--defender of democracy and the U.S. national interest. But the time to do away with the law that bears the late Senator's name is long overdue, as a column by Forbes contributor Mark Adomanis makes clear. He writes:
In what is surely a sign that the apocalypse is nigh I find myself fully in agreement with the Obama Administration’s man in Moscow, Michael McFaul about the need to immediately repeal the Jackon-Vanik amendment without preconditions or the passage of additional “human rights” legislation. Although I’ve had many agreements with McFaul over the years, and still undoubtedly have basic differences over the United States’ role in promoting democracy, it’s extremely discouraging to see him criticized and attacked for promoting an eminently reasonable and rational policy.
Another excerpt:
Jackson-Vanik is a self evidently absurd law: if we’re going to keep it on the books we might as well have sanctions against Italy for its cruel occupation of Abyssinia or Japan for its misbehavior in Manchukuo. It is worth re-emphasizing, again, that Jackson-Vanick is designed to remedy a malady that no longer exists. The Soviet Union’s strict control over emigration is on history’s ash heap and Russian citizens are today perfectly free to emigrate if they so desire.
Click here to read the entire essay. Adomanis is an exceptionally interesting and entertaining columnist. His pieces are informative and thought-provoking--essential, enjoyable reading from Forbes.
Click here to read more about the Jackson-Vanik issue. That it should even be an issue--more than 20 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War--speaks volumes.
Spies on strike--what's next?
The main union representing French domestic intelligence officers has called on its members to stage a protest. Click here for the story.
A high-ranking official at Sweden's defence ministry used her Hotmail account to report on highly confidential negotiations with Saudi Arabia concerning a controversial arms deal, according to a report in the daily Dagens Nyheter (DN).
The four-page long email, which details a secret conversation with a Saudi general, was sent in 2008 from assistant under-secretary Cecilia Looström at the Ministry of Defence, according to the paper. The subject: Sweden's involvement in building a secret Saudi arms factory.
The email recipients reportedly were a Swedish defense ministry colleague; a high ranking official at Sweden's foreign ministry; the director general of the Swedish Agency for Non-proliferation and Export Controls; and a senior official at the Swedish Defence Research Agency.
Looström used her personal email address, which, despite having a Swedish top-level Internet domain, ends up in a Microsoft email server in the United States, DN reported.
The Swedish Defense Research Agency is a member of Sweden's intelligence community. It is unclear if the Agency official who received the email took any action regarding what should have been an obvious security breach, or if the recipient noticed the use of a private account.
The email should also have come to the attention of the Swedish National Defense Radio Establishment, which provides IT security support services to the Swedish Security Serviceand other government agencies.
Iranian proxies in Gaza are attacking Israel with rockets in order to divert attention from Iran's menacing nuclear program, raise oil prices--and challenge Hamas, which has more or less outlived its usefulness to Iran, according to one expert. Click here to read his analysis; and here, to read how Iran is arming rebels in Yemen and fighting a "shadow war" in Syria to keep its ally, President Bashar al-Assad, in power.
Syria is arguably a power preserving operation on Iran's part; but proxy attacks on Israel and arms smuggling into Yemen belie attempts to increase Iranian power across the Middle East and should be seen in the context of repeated threats to eradicate Israel and drive the United States from the region. In other words, Iran's foreign policy is imperialist--it seeks to overthrow the status quo, to dominate and destroy. Iran cannot be appeased, and probably can no longer be contained. Once it acquires atomic arms, containment will surely be impossible--President Obama is right about that. (The Soviet Union was hard enough to contain.)
An imperialist, nuclear-armed theocracy? The mere thought of that is terrifying.
Copyright © 2012 Foreign Confidential™
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