Vote Brian Haw.
Seriously. Imagine the message that'd send to the politicians in their cosy Westminster bubble.
It'll only take half a minute to vote. Why not encourage other like minded people to do the same? Go on. I'll owe you one.
Those not familiar with Brian should start here.
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Tim has a post up about Guido Fawkes (aka Paul Staines). Interesting.
Can't help but notice that Guido has comment moderation on again. If that was simply about deleting "boring" posts, why go to the bother of having to personally approve every single one of the numerous comments his site receives? (It wouldn't be too much trouble for the comments he submits himself, of course.) And pretty much real time too if my not at all scientific checks in the early hours of this morning and then just now are any indication. Surely an occasional scan through to delete these "boring" posts would be all that's required. Unless Guido has some sort of overwhelming phobia about "boring" posts, he's behaving rather strangely. It's almost as if he's got something to hide.
And as Tim points out today, Guido's response is far from open. Did he answer any of the points Tim raised or did he indulge in the sort of smearing which is so popular among the politicians he claims to despise? He didn't even link to Tim's post to make one of his "witty" remarks about it. Clearly Guido Fawkes (aka Paul Staines) really doesn't want you to read the post.
Guido can do what he likes of course but his responses to Tim's post have been informative in their own way.
Can't help but notice that Guido has comment moderation on again. If that was simply about deleting "boring" posts, why go to the bother of having to personally approve every single one of the numerous comments his site receives? (It wouldn't be too much trouble for the comments he submits himself, of course.) And pretty much real time too if my not at all scientific checks in the early hours of this morning and then just now are any indication. Surely an occasional scan through to delete these "boring" posts would be all that's required. Unless Guido has some sort of overwhelming phobia about "boring" posts, he's behaving rather strangely. It's almost as if he's got something to hide.
And as Tim points out today, Guido's response is far from open. Did he answer any of the points Tim raised or did he indulge in the sort of smearing which is so popular among the politicians he claims to despise? He didn't even link to Tim's post to make one of his "witty" remarks about it. Clearly Guido Fawkes (aka Paul Staines) really doesn't want you to read the post.
Guido can do what he likes of course but his responses to Tim's post have been informative in their own way.
Monday, January 15, 2007
Remember when Blair approved the sale of a hugely expensive BAE Systems military air traffic control system to Tanzania despite the fact that Tanzania had almost no military aircraft? The SFO has discovered that BAE paid a middleman a $12 million "commission" to grease the wheels of that transaction. I wonder how Lord Falconer will quash that investigation?
And what's this? Remember Lakshmi Mittal, the steel magnate Blair helped out with various deals after he donated £125,000 to the Labour Party? You know, the man Blair claimed he helped because he was the owner of a British company despite the fact that the company in question was actually registered in the Dutch Antilles? Well, he now intends to donate £2 million to the Labour Party. Well I never.
Do you think Polly still as a few of her nosepegs handy? The stench is getting to be almost unbearable.
And what's this? Remember Lakshmi Mittal, the steel magnate Blair helped out with various deals after he donated £125,000 to the Labour Party? You know, the man Blair claimed he helped because he was the owner of a British company despite the fact that the company in question was actually registered in the Dutch Antilles? Well, he now intends to donate £2 million to the Labour Party. Well I never.
Do you think Polly still as a few of her nosepegs handy? The stench is getting to be almost unbearable.
Sunday, January 14, 2007
Nicole Belle at Crooks and Liars points out that even some Republican have openly expressed concern that Bush may be planning to create a Gulf of Tonkin type incident in order to justify military action against Iran.
So it's not just us leftie moonbats who're worried.
The linked article on Bush's proposed replacement for John Negroponte as Director of National Intelligence is also worth reading.
So it's not just us leftie moonbats who're worried.
The linked article on Bush's proposed replacement for John Negroponte as Director of National Intelligence is also worth reading.
Repeat until Believable
Edward Pearce on Blair:
In his "warfighter" speech, he argued that this country must continue to be willing to participate in the illegitimate use of violence as a means to combat the illegitimate use of violence of others. He didn't phrase it that way of course but that's essentially what he said. He also blamed the media, the public and the military for that fact that the policy wasn't working.
He said:
If you are a dedicated sophist, you could just about argue that there's a tiny sliver of truth in that but sophistry and the power of Blair's delusions and pronouncements have no impact on the real world. Blair's refusal to accept that may be one of his most alarming traits.
The reality is that the vast majority of Iraqis voted along sectarian lines. Even Khalilzad, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, could not avoid concluding that "it looks as if people have preferred to vote for their ethnic or sectarian identities". It's not in any way controversial.
And yet Blair continues to make these absurd claims, lies in fact, and the majority of MPs and activists in the Labour Party continue to let him. And the Tories, the party who did/didn't support the war (delete as appropriate), are not exactly doing a sterling job of holding him to account either. When our PM can repeatedly lie about the situation in Iraq without facing any consequence whatsoever, is it any wonder confidence in politicians is at an all time low?
Still, I suppose that's all our fault too. If only we were the credulous, unquestioning fools Blair would like us to be, our democracy would be in the best of health.
"The point about Blair is that he combines maximum assurance with maximum delusion." The comment, made privately by the leader of a Labour council, is the exact and perfect judgment. No other analyst need apply.Indeed but here's a little bit more analysis anyway. This particular topic has been covered here before but if the PM is going to continue to say it, it seems only fair to continue to point out that he's talking utter garbage.
In his "warfighter" speech, he argued that this country must continue to be willing to participate in the illegitimate use of violence as a means to combat the illegitimate use of violence of others. He didn't phrase it that way of course but that's essentially what he said. He also blamed the media, the public and the military for that fact that the policy wasn't working.
He said:
They now know that if a suicide bomber kills 100 completely innocent people in Baghdad, in defiance of the wishes of the majority of Iraqis who voted for a non-sectarian government, then the image presented to a Western public is as likely to be, more likely to be, one of a failed Western policy, not another outrage against democracy.The majority of Iraqis voted for a non-sectarian government?
If you are a dedicated sophist, you could just about argue that there's a tiny sliver of truth in that but sophistry and the power of Blair's delusions and pronouncements have no impact on the real world. Blair's refusal to accept that may be one of his most alarming traits.
The reality is that the vast majority of Iraqis voted along sectarian lines. Even Khalilzad, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, could not avoid concluding that "it looks as if people have preferred to vote for their ethnic or sectarian identities". It's not in any way controversial.
And yet Blair continues to make these absurd claims, lies in fact, and the majority of MPs and activists in the Labour Party continue to let him. And the Tories, the party who did/didn't support the war (delete as appropriate), are not exactly doing a sterling job of holding him to account either. When our PM can repeatedly lie about the situation in Iraq without facing any consequence whatsoever, is it any wonder confidence in politicians is at an all time low?
Still, I suppose that's all our fault too. If only we were the credulous, unquestioning fools Blair would like us to be, our democracy would be in the best of health.
Saturday, January 13, 2007
They Hate Our Freedoms
Clive Stafford Smith on a new approach to the U.S. government's defence of Guantánamo Bay internment camp.
(I've changed the link to the interview to a more useful one that that used in the original article. The link I used is from this page on Federal Radio News)
The ink was barely dry on all the criticisms issued on the five-year anniversary of Guantánamo Bay before the US department of defence began its desperate riposte. On the day of the anniversary, January 11 2007, Cully Stimson, a "deputy assistant secretary of defence for detainee affairs" went on Federal News Radio to launch an assault on the law firms who represent the prisoners. (You can listen to his interview here.)Read more. If anything, it gets worse.
The deputy secretary, a lawyer with the department of defence (DoD), knows "the news story that you're really going to start seeing in the next couple of weeks" about Guantánamo Bay. A freedom of information request has, he says, elicited the names of the lawyers representing the prisoners.
"And you know what?" he asks rhetorically. "It's shocking." He goes on to list a Who's Who of the American legal profession, which he obviously had prepared to read out on the radio programme. I could name many others.
He suggests that this information should be passed along to the CEOs of American businesses who currently employ these firms, because the lawyers "are representing the very terrorists who hit their bottom line back in 2001." He thinks that those CEOs should "make those law firms choose between representing terrorists or representing reputable firms." This scandalous story, he says, "is going to have major play" in the media.
(I've changed the link to the interview to a more useful one that that used in the original article. The link I used is from this page on Federal Radio News)
Friday, January 12, 2007
An Army of Frothers
Right, I will change the record shortly but one more post on Iran for now.
Via a comment by redpesto, my attention is drawn to one Andrew McCarthy writing for the National Review's The Corner. From what I've read elsewhere, the Iranian government building raided in Irbil may not have been an officially designated consulate but the Iranians presence was certainly fully authorised by the Kurdish authorities. McCarthy, however, accepts that it was a consulate.
He writes:
To fully understand where McCarthy is coming from, I'll first go back to quoting something I wrote before Bush made his speech. It concerns the anonymously leaked claims that the Iranians are aiding both sides of the sectarian conflict in Iraq in order to provoke instability.
But what did McCarthy make of Bush's speech? He was underwhelmed. While welcoming Bush's words, he did not think Bush went far enough.
If I could be bothered to wade through all the bile, I'm quite sure I could find many more examples of this sort of war drumming in other neo-con publications today. It's not that McCarthy is involved in some deep dark conspiracy (at least, I very much doubt he is), just that his own prejudices make it easy for the Bush administration to manipulate him.
Sometimes, for all that I try, it is simply impossible to avoid saying I told you so. But it's not that difficult to predict this sort of thing when exactly the same tactic was used before the invasion of Iraq.
Via a comment by redpesto, my attention is drawn to one Andrew McCarthy writing for the National Review's The Corner. From what I've read elsewhere, the Iranian government building raided in Irbil may not have been an officially designated consulate but the Iranians presence was certainly fully authorised by the Kurdish authorities. McCarthy, however, accepts that it was a consulate.
He writes:
[T]he raid on the Iranian consulate in Iraq's Kurdish region has to be welcome news. We would certainly regard that as an act of war if the tables were turned.Hurray for acts of war!
To fully understand where McCarthy is coming from, I'll first go back to quoting something I wrote before Bush made his speech. It concerns the anonymously leaked claims that the Iranians are aiding both sides of the sectarian conflict in Iraq in order to provoke instability.
If he [Bush] goes on record with these claims, I'll be extremely surprised and I'd still want the captured documents made available to independent experts for translation and corroboration before giving any weight to them. It is, however, far more likely that he will insinuate that the claims are true without actually saying so directly. Frothing warmongers will then complain that he didn't go far enough, that he should have made the case explicit, that he should have published the captured intelligence, without considering possibility that he didn't do any of these things for the very good reasons that the intelligence doesn't actually exist.Hopefully, we're now all up to the speed with the fact that Bush made no explicit reference to these claims and have understood the implications of that omission.
But what did McCarthy make of Bush's speech? He was underwhelmed. While welcoming Bush's words, he did not think Bush went far enough.
Under the Bush Doctrine as articulated in September 2001, it [material support for America's enemies] is supposed to be met with a vigorous American response because we deem rogue regimes to be just like the terrorists they abet. Patently, in the case of Iran and Syria, we have not done that. In turning away from the Bush Doctrine in this most essential of its potential applications, we have turned away from the blueprint for winning the war — not the Battle of Baghdad but the War on Terror.Froth, froth, bomb, bomb, kill kill.
In the raging sectarian warfare, Iran promotes jihadists of both Sunni and Shiite stripe. Plainly, it sees its interest in a destabilized Iraq.
Actions, the old saw tells us, speak louder than words. Given our actions, and what they imply about our sentiments, it’s going to take a lot more than last night’s rhetoric to make an impression on Iran and Syria.
If I could be bothered to wade through all the bile, I'm quite sure I could find many more examples of this sort of war drumming in other neo-con publications today. It's not that McCarthy is involved in some deep dark conspiracy (at least, I very much doubt he is), just that his own prejudices make it easy for the Bush administration to manipulate him.
Sometimes, for all that I try, it is simply impossible to avoid saying I told you so. But it's not that difficult to predict this sort of thing when exactly the same tactic was used before the invasion of Iraq.
Cowboy Diplomacy Rides Again
As far as I can tell, the British media doesn't really seem to have grasped the importance of the Iranian angle to Bush's escalation speech. I've been banging on about it here but it doesn't seem to have been given the coverage it deserves in the British media.
It's almost enough to make a person wonder whether he's barking up the wrong tree.
But then again.
And there's more (via a comment by rick). And more. And more. And a bit more. I could go on but you probably get the picture.
And there are some British voices who have noticed too. Our old friend Con Coughlin is all for this escalation against Iran. Well, who would have thought it?
In a previous post, I suggested that Blair might understand that British involvement in attacks on Iran would be a step too far for him. I may have been over-optimistic. Perhaps it's just a coincidence that Blair is today making a speech on the need for continued support for American policy and stressing the need for British armed forces to "be war fighters" and for us to "pay the cost of that fight, whatever it may be".
Or perhaps it isn't.
By the way, Olbermann, for all that he's often bang on the money on Bush's many failings, made a rather grotesque claim in his special comment. A vista of 3,008 dead and 22,834 wounded in Iraq? I think you'll find the vista is far more littered with corpses than that, Keith. Or do only Americans count?
It's almost enough to make a person wonder whether he's barking up the wrong tree.
But then again.
Only this president, only in this time, only with this dangerous, even messianic certitude, could answer a country demanding an exit strategy from Iraq, by offering an entrance strategy for Iran.Full transript here (via).
Only this president could look out over a vista of 3,008 dead and 22,834 wounded in Iraq, and finally say, “Where mistakes have been made, the responsibility rests with me” — only to follow that by proposing to repeat the identical mistake ... in Iran.
Only this president could extol the “thoughtful recommendations of the Iraq Study Group,” and then take its most far-sighted recommendation — “engage Syria and Iran” — and transform it into “threaten Syria and Iran” — when al-Qaida would like nothing better than for us to threaten Syria, and when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would like nothing better than to be threatened by us.
This is diplomacy by skimming; it is internationalism by drawing pictures of Superman in the margins of the text books; it is a presidency of Cliff Notes. And to Iran and Syria — and, yes, also to the insurgents in Iraq — we must look like a country run by the equivalent of the drunken pest who gets battered to the floor of the saloon by one punch, then staggers to his feet, and shouts at the other guy’s friends, “Ok, which one of you is next?”
And there's more (via a comment by rick). And more. And more. And a bit more. I could go on but you probably get the picture.
And there are some British voices who have noticed too. Our old friend Con Coughlin is all for this escalation against Iran. Well, who would have thought it?
In a previous post, I suggested that Blair might understand that British involvement in attacks on Iran would be a step too far for him. I may have been over-optimistic. Perhaps it's just a coincidence that Blair is today making a speech on the need for continued support for American policy and stressing the need for British armed forces to "be war fighters" and for us to "pay the cost of that fight, whatever it may be".
Or perhaps it isn't.
By the way, Olbermann, for all that he's often bang on the money on Bush's many failings, made a rather grotesque claim in his special comment. A vista of 3,008 dead and 22,834 wounded in Iraq? I think you'll find the vista is far more littered with corpses than that, Keith. Or do only Americans count?
At this point, it's worth repeating something retired U.S. Colonel Sam Gardiner said last year (via the now sadly defunct Whiskey Bar).
When I discuss the possibility of an American military strike on Iran with my European friends, they invariably point out that an armed confrontation does not make sense -- that it would be unlikely to yield any of the results that American policymakers do want, and that it would be highly likely to yield results that they do not. I tell them they cannot understand U.S. policy if they insist on passing options through that filter. The "making sense" filter was not applied over the past four years for Iraq, and it is unlikely to be applied in evaluating whether to attack Iran.
- The End of the "Summer of Diplomacy" (pdf)
Thursday, January 11, 2007
Nudge Nudge
Tim is back. Yay!
As the Iraqi end of Bush's speech is well covered there, I'll continue to concentrate on the Iranian angle. Let's look at the references to Iran in yesterday's speech. I'll ruin the tension straight away and tell you that he didn't explicitly reference the "captured intelligence" reported by the New York Sun.
Right, here's the first mention of Iran.
I've run out of time. More on this in an update to this post this evening.
Update
We interrupt the analysis of Bush's speech to point out that U.S. escalation against the Iranians is ongoing.
For some reason, I'm reminded of the way Bush wanted to provoke Saddam into retaliatory action by painting U2 spy planes in UN colours and then flying them over Iraq. The thinking was that if Saddam did react, this could then be used as a justification for the military action Bush had already decided to take. That plan was never actually carried out, of course.
More later.
Update 2
Right, here are the rest of Bush's references to Iran in yesterday's speech.
In fact, of course, victory in Iraq, the stabilisation of the Shiite dominated government, would be a victory for the Iranians. Failure of the sort Bush imagines, a Sunni extremist, al Qaeda style group taking control of Iraq, would be very bad news for the Iranians too.
Last section now and this is the really troubling one.
As far the claim that Iran and Syria are "allowing terrorists and insurgents to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq" goes, this is pure misdirection. The U.S. are on the other side of those borders. If it was so easy to stop insurgents moving across them, why don't they do it? It's because it would be enormously difficult. Iraq's borders with these countries are long and extremely difficult to police. You could probably stop a conventional military force from crossing because a conventional military force is large and pretty obvious. Terrorists and insurgents, on the other hand, are not easily spotted. That's sort of the point.. You might as well claim that the U.S. government allowed the 9/11 terrorists to move into their territory before the attacks. It's quite true but it says nothing about whether they supported the terrorists activities. (Note to conspiracy theorists: not interested, take it elsewhere.)
It may be true that the Iranians are providing "material support for attacks on Americans troops". Juan Cole offers a considerably more plausible explanation.
That's a far cry from an Iranian strategy of deliberately targeting U.S. troops or indeed fuelling the sectarian violence by supporting each side against the other (the second of which, as I said, Bush did not in any way claim). It is certainly true that Iran is actively involved in Iraq but all the evidence suggests that Iranian involvement is at the active request of Shiite and Kurdish members of Iraq's "unified and democratic" government.
If they are provoking instability, it is only to the extent that they are aiding the Shiites, and to a lesser extent the Kurds, in their efforts to defeat Sunni insurgents. This is exactly what the U.S. government says it has been doing in Iraq these last three years. I wonder if that counts as fuelling instability and sectarian violence too?
For those who think the difference is that the Iranians are funding Shiite death squads, think again. Check the date of that article. How does that correspond with the rise of Shiite death squads in Iraq?
Just to re-emphasise one more time, at no point did Bush claim that the Iranians were playing Sunni against Shiite in Iraq. But he did make some pretty serious threats.
It is possible that all of this is just sabre rattling designed to pressure the Iranians into halting its nuclear enrichment programme but Bush is not known for making empty threats. He is, rather, known for his propensity to favour violence as a means to achieve his stated goals. If that's what he intends to do, I doubt the Democrats or anyone else will be able to stop him.
If he does escalate the conflict and start attacking Iranian facilities in any significant way, it'll make what's happened so far look like that elusive "cakewalk" we were promised. Because if the Iranians really start to cause trouble for U.S. forces in the region, it'll be a whole lot worse than anything that has gone before.
As the Iraqi end of Bush's speech is well covered there, I'll continue to concentrate on the Iranian angle. Let's look at the references to Iran in yesterday's speech. I'll ruin the tension straight away and tell you that he didn't explicitly reference the "captured intelligence" reported by the New York Sun.
Right, here's the first mention of Iran.
Al Qaeda terrorists and Sunni insurgents recognized the mortal danger that Iraq's elections posed for their cause, and they responded with outrageous acts of murder aimed at innocent Iraqis. They blew up one of the holiest shrines in Shia Islam -- the Golden Mosque of Samarra -- in a calculated effort to provoke Iraq's Shia population to retaliate. Their strategy worked. Radical Shia elements, some supported by Iran, formed death squads. And the result was a vicious cycle of sectarian violence that continues today.It is undisputed that the Iranians support the SCIRI and therefore the Badr Organisation so the explicit, but actually very limited claim made here is probably true. No reference here to Iranian support for Sunni extremists though or of an Iranian policy of intentionally fuelling sectarian conflict. Instead, Iran is mentioned in the context of the attack on the Golden Mosque and a strategy of provoking sectarian violence. Note that the NYS article suggests that the Iranians are "clandestinely cooperating, with Sunni Jihadists who attacked the Golden Mosque". Bush didn't explicitly make the same suggestion. Nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more.
I've run out of time. More on this in an update to this post this evening.
Update
We interrupt the analysis of Bush's speech to point out that U.S. escalation against the Iranians is ongoing.
For some reason, I'm reminded of the way Bush wanted to provoke Saddam into retaliatory action by painting U2 spy planes in UN colours and then flying them over Iraq. The thinking was that if Saddam did react, this could then be used as a justification for the military action Bush had already decided to take. That plan was never actually carried out, of course.
More later.
Update 2
Right, here are the rest of Bush's references to Iran in yesterday's speech.
The consequences of failure are clear: Radical Islamic extremists would grow in strength and gain new recruits. They would be in a better position to topple moderate governments, create chaos in the region, and use oil revenues to fund their ambitions. Iran would be emboldened in its pursuit of nuclear weapons. Our enemies would have a safe haven from which to plan and launch attacks on the American people. On September the 11th, 2001, we saw what a refuge for extremists on the other side of the world could bring to the streets of our own cities. For the safety of our people, America must succeed in Iraq.This time, mention of Iran is embedded in a series of key words and phrases. Radical Islamic extremism, chaos, Iran, nuclear weapons, our enemies, safe haven, attacks on the American people. The ultimate key phrase, "September the 11th, 2001", is also there. No explicit link is made (apart from the nuclear one) but the implication that Iran is somehow connected to all of these phrases is obviously intentional.
In fact, of course, victory in Iraq, the stabilisation of the Shiite dominated government, would be a victory for the Iranians. Failure of the sort Bush imagines, a Sunni extremist, al Qaeda style group taking control of Iraq, would be very bad news for the Iranians too.
Last section now and this is the really troubling one.
Succeeding in Iraq also requires defending its territorial integrity and stabilizing the region in the face of extremist challenges. This begins with addressing Iran and Syria. These two regimes are allowing terrorists and insurgents to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq. Iran is providing material support for attacks on American troops. We will disrupt the attacks on our forces. We'll interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria. And we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq.This is the escalation as it relates to Iran. Rather than talking to the Iranians as recommended by the Iraq Study Group, Bush goes all out and claims that the Iranians are providing "material support for attacks on American troops". Instead of dialogue, there will be increased military pressure on the Iranians.
We're also taking other steps to bolster the security of Iraq and protect American interests in the Middle East. I recently ordered the deployment of an additional carrier strike group to the region. We will expand intelligence-sharing and deploy Patriot air defense systems to reassure our friends and allies. We will work with the governments of Turkey and Iraq to help them resolve problems along their border. And we will work with others to prevent Iran from gaining nuclear weapons and dominating the region.
As far the claim that Iran and Syria are "allowing terrorists and insurgents to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq" goes, this is pure misdirection. The U.S. are on the other side of those borders. If it was so easy to stop insurgents moving across them, why don't they do it? It's because it would be enormously difficult. Iraq's borders with these countries are long and extremely difficult to police. You could probably stop a conventional military force from crossing because a conventional military force is large and pretty obvious. Terrorists and insurgents, on the other hand, are not easily spotted. That's sort of the point.. You might as well claim that the U.S. government allowed the 9/11 terrorists to move into their territory before the attacks. It's quite true but it says nothing about whether they supported the terrorists activities. (Note to conspiracy theorists: not interested, take it elsewhere.)
It may be true that the Iranians are providing "material support for attacks on Americans troops". Juan Cole offers a considerably more plausible explanation.
Although Bush keeps implying that Iran is supplying weapons and aid to US enemies in Iraq, the circumstantial evidence is that it was helping the two main US allies in Iraq with their paramilitary capabilities-- Kurdistan and SCIRI. But it is likely that the money and weapons do bleed over into insurgent groups and have a destabilizing effect.It certainly wouldn't surprise me if they are supplying material aid to Shiite and Kurdish groups in order to bolster their ability to fight Sunni insurgents, particularly the Baathists (all three groups hated Saddam's regime with a vengeance). And, as the Professor says, in the chaotic world of today's Iraq it is highly likely that some of this material aid could be diverted from its intended purpose. Material aid delivered by the British and Americans has certainly found its way into the wrong hands.
That's a far cry from an Iranian strategy of deliberately targeting U.S. troops or indeed fuelling the sectarian violence by supporting each side against the other (the second of which, as I said, Bush did not in any way claim). It is certainly true that Iran is actively involved in Iraq but all the evidence suggests that Iranian involvement is at the active request of Shiite and Kurdish members of Iraq's "unified and democratic" government.
If they are provoking instability, it is only to the extent that they are aiding the Shiites, and to a lesser extent the Kurds, in their efforts to defeat Sunni insurgents. This is exactly what the U.S. government says it has been doing in Iraq these last three years. I wonder if that counts as fuelling instability and sectarian violence too?
For those who think the difference is that the Iranians are funding Shiite death squads, think again. Check the date of that article. How does that correspond with the rise of Shiite death squads in Iraq?
Just to re-emphasise one more time, at no point did Bush claim that the Iranians were playing Sunni against Shiite in Iraq. But he did make some pretty serious threats.
We'll interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria. And we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq... I recently ordered the deployment of an additional carrier strike group to the region. We will... deploy Patriot air defense systems to reassure our friends and allies.. And we will work with others to prevent Iran from gaining nuclear weapons and dominating the region.These are not small measures. One U.S. carrier group is an extremely powerful force; having two in the region is significant. As a means to combat Iraq's sectarian strife, two U.S. carriers groups would be overkill in all senses of the word. And what are the Patriot air defence systems for? You certainly don't fight terrorists or insurgents with an air defence system designed to shoot down ballistic missiles. These are systems designed to be used against a conventional military force. What did Bush say they are being sent for? "To reassure our friends and allies". To reassure them against what exactly?
It is possible that all of this is just sabre rattling designed to pressure the Iranians into halting its nuclear enrichment programme but Bush is not known for making empty threats. He is, rather, known for his propensity to favour violence as a means to achieve his stated goals. If that's what he intends to do, I doubt the Democrats or anyone else will be able to stop him.
If he does escalate the conflict and start attacking Iranian facilities in any significant way, it'll make what's happened so far look like that elusive "cakewalk" we were promised. Because if the Iranians really start to cause trouble for U.S. forces in the region, it'll be a whole lot worse than anything that has gone before.
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
As regular readers may know, the idea that John Reid could be the next PM scares me silly. The ex-communist bully boy he has a reputation for competence which seems to be based solely on the fact that he can string sentences together in a semi-coherent fashion. This, admittedly, is something that not all members of the government are capable of but it's hardly a good indicator of wider competence in running a government deperatment, never mind the whole country.
So it is fortunate, in a way, that the Doctor's efforts at the Home Office are revealing the depths of his "competence" for all of us to see.
And here's a wee reminder of Reid's not so distant past.
So it is fortunate, in a way, that the Doctor's efforts at the Home Office are revealing the depths of his "competence" for all of us to see.
And here's a wee reminder of Reid's not so distant past.
Reid is not without serious blemish. A few months before his Ulster posting [2000/01], he was the first senior cabinet member ever to be severely censured by the parliamentary commissioner for standards, Elizabeth Filkin. It was a tangled affair, but in essence he was accused of using parliamentary allowances, taxpayer's cash, to pay the salaries of staff, again including his son, in his constituency office, knowing that they were really working for Labour's electoral campaign. In the course of the inquiry, it emerged that Reid had held "discussions" with other witnesses, which in plain unparliamentary language sounded a lot like threats. Conveniently for Reid, Filkin's censure was overturned by a Labour-dominated House of Commons committee. It was a political fix that undermined her office, and diminished the notion of independent parliamentary scrutiny of MPs' conduct.Reid is the personification of everything that is wrong with New Labour.
Use of Weapons
So President Bush is to announce his long awaited new strategy for Iraq today (actually 2am, Thursday morning in British money).
If you aren't intending to stay up to watch his speech, here's an exclusive BSSC preview.
Bush's trusted cabal of foreign policy advisers are ideologically committed to the use of violence as the main means to achieve their objectives. They believe that the U.S. government's current difficulties are due to the fact that they have not used enough violence, that their problems would be solved if they could really take the gloves off and let rip. That's one of the reasons why they are so hostile to the "liberal" media; TV pictures of the actual consequences of the U.S. use of violence in far away places, beamed into the living rooms of the American public, act as a restraint on their ability to pursue their agenda.
The conviction that violence is the primary solution is held with religious fervour and no amount of real world evidence or rational argument will shake their faith in the power of violence. This week's attacks on "suspected terrorists" in Somalia are an expression of that belief.
Bush is essentially going to announce more of the same as the solution to Iraq's problems.
These same advisers, this same mindset, will also be the main influence on President Bush's decisions on policy towards Iran. In an earlier post, I highlighted this report from the NYS which claimed that the U.S. government had captured intelligence which showed that Iran has been playing Sunni against Shiite in Iraq in order to provoke civil war. The claims made in that article have spread like a rash.
Mel Phillips, unsurprisingly, has swallowed them whole, even going so far as to say that it is "blindingly obvious " that Iran is "the principle instigator" of the current war. As Mel doesn't allow comments on her own site, I decided to ask one of her supporters on the CiF thread (someone called Sluijser) why it was that this apparently hugely significant find had been announced by anonymous officials to the NYS. Why, I asked, had Bush himself not made any reference to these claims. No answer was forthcoming but this oddity did nothing to dent Sluijser's confidence in the essential truth of the claims made in the article.
There is one possibility (other than the obvious one that the claims are entirely spurious). It has been exactly one week since the NYS claimed that the U.S. government has this damning intelligence. I can't find the link now but I read one anonymous official tell the Washington Post (I think) that President Bush's comments on Iran in today's speech would be "informed by" the claims made in the NYS article. Is Bush saving this bombshell for today's speech?
If he goes on record with these claims, I'll be extremely surprised and I'd still want the captured documents made available to independent experts for translation and corroboration before giving any weight to them. It is, however, far more likely that he will insinuate that the claims are true without actually saying so directly. Frothing warmongers will then complain that he didn't go far enough, that he should have made the case explicit, that he should have published the captured intelligence, without considering possibility that he didn't do any of these things for the very good reasons that the intelligence doesn't actually exist.
In the campaign to build popular support for the invasion of Iraq, this method, using anonymous briefings and playing to the prejudices of friendly journalists and warbloggers, was how the direct link between Saddam and the September 11th attacks was created in the minds of the American people (some of them at least). When Bush says he never claimed that there was such a link - "This administration never said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and al Qaeda" - he's not lying. All he ever did was imply one; his army of useful idiots did the rest.
Unless I'm very much mistaken, it's all just a little bit of history repeating.
If you aren't intending to stay up to watch his speech, here's an exclusive BSSC preview.
Bush's trusted cabal of foreign policy advisers are ideologically committed to the use of violence as the main means to achieve their objectives. They believe that the U.S. government's current difficulties are due to the fact that they have not used enough violence, that their problems would be solved if they could really take the gloves off and let rip. That's one of the reasons why they are so hostile to the "liberal" media; TV pictures of the actual consequences of the U.S. use of violence in far away places, beamed into the living rooms of the American public, act as a restraint on their ability to pursue their agenda.
The conviction that violence is the primary solution is held with religious fervour and no amount of real world evidence or rational argument will shake their faith in the power of violence. This week's attacks on "suspected terrorists" in Somalia are an expression of that belief.
Bush is essentially going to announce more of the same as the solution to Iraq's problems.
These same advisers, this same mindset, will also be the main influence on President Bush's decisions on policy towards Iran. In an earlier post, I highlighted this report from the NYS which claimed that the U.S. government had captured intelligence which showed that Iran has been playing Sunni against Shiite in Iraq in order to provoke civil war. The claims made in that article have spread like a rash.
Mel Phillips, unsurprisingly, has swallowed them whole, even going so far as to say that it is "blindingly obvious " that Iran is "the principle instigator" of the current war. As Mel doesn't allow comments on her own site, I decided to ask one of her supporters on the CiF thread (someone called Sluijser) why it was that this apparently hugely significant find had been announced by anonymous officials to the NYS. Why, I asked, had Bush himself not made any reference to these claims. No answer was forthcoming but this oddity did nothing to dent Sluijser's confidence in the essential truth of the claims made in the article.
There is one possibility (other than the obvious one that the claims are entirely spurious). It has been exactly one week since the NYS claimed that the U.S. government has this damning intelligence. I can't find the link now but I read one anonymous official tell the Washington Post (I think) that President Bush's comments on Iran in today's speech would be "informed by" the claims made in the NYS article. Is Bush saving this bombshell for today's speech?
If he goes on record with these claims, I'll be extremely surprised and I'd still want the captured documents made available to independent experts for translation and corroboration before giving any weight to them. It is, however, far more likely that he will insinuate that the claims are true without actually saying so directly. Frothing warmongers will then complain that he didn't go far enough, that he should have made the case explicit, that he should have published the captured intelligence, without considering possibility that he didn't do any of these things for the very good reasons that the intelligence doesn't actually exist.
In the campaign to build popular support for the invasion of Iraq, this method, using anonymous briefings and playing to the prejudices of friendly journalists and warbloggers, was how the direct link between Saddam and the September 11th attacks was created in the minds of the American people (some of them at least). When Bush says he never claimed that there was such a link - "This administration never said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and al Qaeda" - he's not lying. All he ever did was imply one; his army of useful idiots did the rest.
Unless I'm very much mistaken, it's all just a little bit of history repeating.
Monday, January 08, 2007
Spooks in your Inbox
From tomorrow (Tuesday), MI5 is offering a new service.
It's a wonder MI5 didn't know that. I might email them. They'll already have spent the money now and have gone to all that effort at what must be a very busy time but at least they'll know for the next time.
MI5 is to send emails alerting the public to the prospect of an imminent terror attack. From tomorrow, the security service's website will provide a free registration service for those wanting the latest information about the threat level. Subscribers entering their email address will receive a message with the words ''MI5 news update'' whenever there is a change on the website.I hate to be a party pooper but I already have a service in place which alerts me to any changes in the terror threat level. I call it "the news". And the great thing is, anyone with an internet connection, a TV or a radio can already access this extraordinarily useful service.
It's a wonder MI5 didn't know that. I might email them. They'll already have spent the money now and have gone to all that effort at what must be a very busy time but at least they'll know for the next time.
Dear Spooks,Perhaps I'm being unkind. Maybe this is actually part of a new cunning but secret plan to win the war on terror with a deluge of unfiltered spam.
I am writing to direct your attention to a service you may not have heard of. It's called the BBC News website. This publicly available service is specifically designed to disseminate newsworthy materials and I'm reliably informed that it reaches a rather large number of people. While you appear to be unaware of it, the BBC and other media organisations (companies who specialise in providing factual information to the public) have an impeccable track record when it comes to this sort of thing. A simple phone call to a person called a "journalist" would be a simple and cost-effective way to advise the public of any changes to the terrorist threat level.
Sorry for taking up so much of your time with this email but I thought that knowledge of these "news services" might be of some help to you in your tireless efforts to defeat the terrorist menace.
Yours humbly,
C.H.
Smoking Guns and Propaganda
This year, everyone will be talking about Iran. Whatever the intentions of the Iranian government, Iran's leaders are now in a position where they will find it impossible to halt their uranium enrichment programme in the face of American demands. Unless the U.S. government is prepared to offer concessions of a size that'd make Iran the unambiguous winner of this confrontation, and the Bush administration certainly wont do that, the Iranians will not back down.
Regarding the intentions of the Iranian government, it should be remembered that while certainly possible, there is no conclusive evidence to support the view that they have a nuclear weapons programme. It is also worth noting that Iran's stated reason for developing nuclear power is to reduce their dependence on their finite oil resources in order to make more oil available for export and for processing into petrochemicals.
This rationale has been slated as ridiculous by many but it was considered perfectly credible when then the U.S. government was offering assistance to the Shah in the 1970's. A strategy paper signed by President Ford stated that the "introduction of nuclear power will both provide for the growing needs of Iran's economy and free remaining oil reserves for export or conversion to petrochemicals." Iran obviously has less oil now than then so it's slightly strange that so many people now consider this possibility so utterly implausible.
There are, nevertheless, still questions as to whether the Iranians are being entirely honest. The IAEA have said that "Iran possesses a document related to [the] casting and machining of enriched, natural and depleted uranium metal into hemispherical forms". There is, as far as I'm aware, only one use for these hemispherical uranium forms. and it isn't as the latest design of Nike football.
But then again, despite fatuous reports that Iran's spiritual leaders had issued a fatwa allowing the use of nuclear weapons (the reported "fatwa" actually came from a minor figure, a student called Mohsen Gharavian who immediately complained that he had been misquoted), Iran's Supreme leader has actually issued a fatwa expressly stating that "the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons are forbidden under Islam and that Iran shall never acquire these weapons".
It is hard to know what the real intentions of the Iranians are. President Bush, however, has no such difficulties. Never one to question the validity of his own judgements, he's already decided that he does know exactly what's going on and he has been clear as to the approach he intends to take. Several times, he has stated that a nuclear armed Iran is "unacceptable".
The noise in the media concerning military action against Iranian nuclear facilities has been steadily increasing in recent months. 2007 may well be the year in which the U.S. and/or Israel takes military action against Iranian nuclear facilities. It is hard to avoid concluding that a campaign is under way to prepare the public.
Here's an example of this in action. The small silver lining to the cloud is that this does suggest that the U.K. government may not be so keen this time round.
According to Newsnight's sources, the "meddling" Iranian's captured by the U.S. military in Iraq, the one's in Iraq at the express invitation of the Iraqi government, were there to meet with various Shiite factions.
On the other side of the pond, however, a notoriously right-wing newspaper is telling a different story. Here what the the New York Sun had to say on the matter (via).
What's going on there then? I'm going to have to speculate to an extent but I suspect Con Coughlin would probably understand it.
It's safe to assume that if British intelligence services genuinely had access to this sort of smoking gun, the British government would be very keen to make sure that we all heard about it. The Blair government are desperate to divert blame for the failure of their Iraq misadventure onto anyone but themselves. If they'd had access to captured intelligence which showed that the Iranians genuinely were fuelling Iraq's instability by playing one side off against the other, they'd tell everyone who'd listen. The fact that they haven't can surely only mean that they don't have access to this sort of intelligence.
Given what American intelligence officials have told the New York Sun, that leaves two realistic possibilities. The first is that the U.S. government has this information but has decided not to pass it on to the British but this would make no sense at all. The Bush administration wants the British to help them pressure the Iranians and are trying to turn worldwide public opinion against Iran's government. In such a circumstance, why would they withhold such information? Even taking into account the famously secretive nature of the secret services, it just doesn't add up. Why tell the NYS but not your main ally?
The second possibility is that this intelligence is a fiction, one that even the British government is not prepared to propagate. That seems to me to be the most likely explanation. It is explicitly illegal in the U.S. for the government to conduct disinformation campaigns against its own citizens. This is almost certainly the reason why the "information" has been released to a friendly newspaper by anonymous intelligence officials. Anyone heard any member of the U.S. government go on record with these allegations? No? Perhaps that's because it is illegal for a U.S. government official to tell the U.S. public something they know to be false.
But they don't need to make an official statement. Despite the absence of any on the record expression of these allegations, the echo chamber of the interwebs (along with more traditional forms of communication) will spread this sort of disinformation and add to its apparent authenticity without any further manipulation from the government. Here's an example from the Christian Broadcasting Network (via). One of the bizarre ironies of the interwebs is that those who uncritically disseminates propaganda like this are also highly likely to be entirely too fond of calling people with alternate views "useful idiots".
In any event, to seems safe to conclude that the intended effect of this propaganda is to provide a boost in U.S. public support for military action against Iran. It appears to be a strong indication that the U.S. government is preparing for another use of force.
As noted earlier, the fact that Blair has apparently refused allow similar leaks from British intelligence may be a sign that he knows that significant U.K. involvement in this is simply not an option. It is highly unlikely that he does not want to participate, more that he feels it'd be politically unacceptable. For all that the Labour Party has been unforgivably compliant with regard to Blair over Iraq, there are signs that they're near to breaking point. It should be remembered that Blair's stance during the crisis in Lebanon caused considerable instability within the party. Active British involvement in military action against Iran would probably be the final straw.
Blair has, however, been happy to pump out as much anti-Iranian rhetoric as he can. It looks like he's trying to get into the position of being able to offer at least diplomatic support for the U.S./Israeli military effort.
But if Blair did decide not to involve British forces in military action against Iran, that wouldn't be the end of the matter. There's every chance that British troops in Iraq could get caught up in Iranian retaliation against U.S. forces thus drawing the U.K. into the new conflict.
There's an idea going around that there could be a relatively cost free limited air campaign against Iranian nuclear facilities. To see how dangerous this is, consider Blair's recent claim that the reason Iraq has been difficult is because he didn't realise that when you use force to achieve an objective, other people will tend to use force to try to stop you. He really isn't as bright as is sometimes claimed. The idea that the Iranians will not have a major say in the scale of any military confrontation initiated by the U.S. seems to be based on the same wilful naivety. Whether the plan is for a limited military action or not, the U.S. is highly likely to become sucked further into an ever more treacherous quagmire if it attacks Iran militarily. It's hard to see how U.K. forces could avoid becoming involved too.
All the signs are that this could be a very difficult year.
Regarding the intentions of the Iranian government, it should be remembered that while certainly possible, there is no conclusive evidence to support the view that they have a nuclear weapons programme. It is also worth noting that Iran's stated reason for developing nuclear power is to reduce their dependence on their finite oil resources in order to make more oil available for export and for processing into petrochemicals.
This rationale has been slated as ridiculous by many but it was considered perfectly credible when then the U.S. government was offering assistance to the Shah in the 1970's. A strategy paper signed by President Ford stated that the "introduction of nuclear power will both provide for the growing needs of Iran's economy and free remaining oil reserves for export or conversion to petrochemicals." Iran obviously has less oil now than then so it's slightly strange that so many people now consider this possibility so utterly implausible.
There are, nevertheless, still questions as to whether the Iranians are being entirely honest. The IAEA have said that "Iran possesses a document related to [the] casting and machining of enriched, natural and depleted uranium metal into hemispherical forms". There is, as far as I'm aware, only one use for these hemispherical uranium forms. and it isn't as the latest design of Nike football.
But then again, despite fatuous reports that Iran's spiritual leaders had issued a fatwa allowing the use of nuclear weapons (the reported "fatwa" actually came from a minor figure, a student called Mohsen Gharavian who immediately complained that he had been misquoted), Iran's Supreme leader has actually issued a fatwa expressly stating that "the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons are forbidden under Islam and that Iran shall never acquire these weapons".
It is hard to know what the real intentions of the Iranians are. President Bush, however, has no such difficulties. Never one to question the validity of his own judgements, he's already decided that he does know exactly what's going on and he has been clear as to the approach he intends to take. Several times, he has stated that a nuclear armed Iran is "unacceptable".
The noise in the media concerning military action against Iranian nuclear facilities has been steadily increasing in recent months. 2007 may well be the year in which the U.S. and/or Israel takes military action against Iranian nuclear facilities. It is hard to avoid concluding that a campaign is under way to prepare the public.
Here's an example of this in action. The small silver lining to the cloud is that this does suggest that the U.K. government may not be so keen this time round.
According to Newsnight's sources, the "meddling" Iranian's captured by the U.S. military in Iraq, the one's in Iraq at the express invitation of the Iraqi government, were there to meet with various Shiite factions.
Officials told Newsnight the arrests produced highly important intelligence, but no "smoking gun" about weapons supplies or attacks on coalition forces.This makes perfect sense. While giving the general impression that the Iranians are "up to no good", the extent of the anti-Iranian message is limited.
They said that the arrested men were in Iraq to hold high-level meeting with representatives of several Iraqi Shia factions.
On the other side of the pond, however, a notoriously right-wing newspaper is telling a different story. Here what the the New York Sun had to say on the matter (via).
Iran is supporting both Sunni and Shiite terrorists in the Iraqi civil war, according to secret Iranian documents captured by Americans in Iraq.Just to reiterate, both of these reports concern the same captured Iranians. Clearly, these two reports of the captured intelligence cannot both be accurate.
The news that American forces had captured Iranians in Iraq was widely reported last month, but less well known is that the Iranians were carrying documents that offered Americans insight into Iranian activities in Iraq.
An American intelligence official said the new material, which has been authenticated within the intelligence community, confirms "that Iran is working closely with both the Shiite militias and Sunni Jihadist groups."
[...]
Another American official who has seen the summaries of the reporting affiliated with the arrests said it comprised a "smoking gun." "We found plans for attacks, phone numbers affiliated with Sunni bad guys, a lot of things that filled in the blanks on what these guys are up to," the official said.
What's going on there then? I'm going to have to speculate to an extent but I suspect Con Coughlin would probably understand it.
It's safe to assume that if British intelligence services genuinely had access to this sort of smoking gun, the British government would be very keen to make sure that we all heard about it. The Blair government are desperate to divert blame for the failure of their Iraq misadventure onto anyone but themselves. If they'd had access to captured intelligence which showed that the Iranians genuinely were fuelling Iraq's instability by playing one side off against the other, they'd tell everyone who'd listen. The fact that they haven't can surely only mean that they don't have access to this sort of intelligence.
Given what American intelligence officials have told the New York Sun, that leaves two realistic possibilities. The first is that the U.S. government has this information but has decided not to pass it on to the British but this would make no sense at all. The Bush administration wants the British to help them pressure the Iranians and are trying to turn worldwide public opinion against Iran's government. In such a circumstance, why would they withhold such information? Even taking into account the famously secretive nature of the secret services, it just doesn't add up. Why tell the NYS but not your main ally?
The second possibility is that this intelligence is a fiction, one that even the British government is not prepared to propagate. That seems to me to be the most likely explanation. It is explicitly illegal in the U.S. for the government to conduct disinformation campaigns against its own citizens. This is almost certainly the reason why the "information" has been released to a friendly newspaper by anonymous intelligence officials. Anyone heard any member of the U.S. government go on record with these allegations? No? Perhaps that's because it is illegal for a U.S. government official to tell the U.S. public something they know to be false.
But they don't need to make an official statement. Despite the absence of any on the record expression of these allegations, the echo chamber of the interwebs (along with more traditional forms of communication) will spread this sort of disinformation and add to its apparent authenticity without any further manipulation from the government. Here's an example from the Christian Broadcasting Network (via). One of the bizarre ironies of the interwebs is that those who uncritically disseminates propaganda like this are also highly likely to be entirely too fond of calling people with alternate views "useful idiots".
In any event, to seems safe to conclude that the intended effect of this propaganda is to provide a boost in U.S. public support for military action against Iran. It appears to be a strong indication that the U.S. government is preparing for another use of force.
As noted earlier, the fact that Blair has apparently refused allow similar leaks from British intelligence may be a sign that he knows that significant U.K. involvement in this is simply not an option. It is highly unlikely that he does not want to participate, more that he feels it'd be politically unacceptable. For all that the Labour Party has been unforgivably compliant with regard to Blair over Iraq, there are signs that they're near to breaking point. It should be remembered that Blair's stance during the crisis in Lebanon caused considerable instability within the party. Active British involvement in military action against Iran would probably be the final straw.
Blair has, however, been happy to pump out as much anti-Iranian rhetoric as he can. It looks like he's trying to get into the position of being able to offer at least diplomatic support for the U.S./Israeli military effort.
But if Blair did decide not to involve British forces in military action against Iran, that wouldn't be the end of the matter. There's every chance that British troops in Iraq could get caught up in Iranian retaliation against U.S. forces thus drawing the U.K. into the new conflict.
There's an idea going around that there could be a relatively cost free limited air campaign against Iranian nuclear facilities. To see how dangerous this is, consider Blair's recent claim that the reason Iraq has been difficult is because he didn't realise that when you use force to achieve an objective, other people will tend to use force to try to stop you. He really isn't as bright as is sometimes claimed. The idea that the Iranians will not have a major say in the scale of any military confrontation initiated by the U.S. seems to be based on the same wilful naivety. Whether the plan is for a limited military action or not, the U.S. is highly likely to become sucked further into an ever more treacherous quagmire if it attacks Iran militarily. It's hard to see how U.K. forces could avoid becoming involved too.
All the signs are that this could be a very difficult year.
Sunday, January 07, 2007
This week's Scottish Blog Roundup is out now. Lot's of bloggy goodness as usual.
On an only very slightly related subject, I still haven't finalised the new layout here yet. I'm in something of a quandary with regard to my blogroll and that's the reason why it hasn't reappeared in the new template yet.
The social aspect of it has always appealed (although I've always been very bad at maintaining the thing and there are any number of bloggers who I meant to add but never got round to).
But I don't really want the clutter of listing so many links, especially now that I've only got one sidebar. Also, there are disadvantages to listing an enormous number of links on your front page when it comes to google rankings and that sort of thing. For those reasons, I'd sort of like to trim it down. But that'd mean removing some from the list and even if I didn't want to add more, that'd be very difficult indeed. The problem is that there are just too many good bloggers and not enough space.
I'm wondering whether I might do something similar to Nosemonkey and list them on separate pages with a link from the main page. Anyone got any thoughts on the matter?
On an only very slightly related subject, I still haven't finalised the new layout here yet. I'm in something of a quandary with regard to my blogroll and that's the reason why it hasn't reappeared in the new template yet.
The social aspect of it has always appealed (although I've always been very bad at maintaining the thing and there are any number of bloggers who I meant to add but never got round to).
But I don't really want the clutter of listing so many links, especially now that I've only got one sidebar. Also, there are disadvantages to listing an enormous number of links on your front page when it comes to google rankings and that sort of thing. For those reasons, I'd sort of like to trim it down. But that'd mean removing some from the list and even if I didn't want to add more, that'd be very difficult indeed. The problem is that there are just too many good bloggers and not enough space.
I'm wondering whether I might do something similar to Nosemonkey and list them on separate pages with a link from the main page. Anyone got any thoughts on the matter?
Friday, January 05, 2007
In Search of the Strings
This is quick follow up to the previous post. It concerns Bush's intention to crush the al-Sadr's Mahdi Army and is speculative, perhaps even bordering on conspiraloonacy.
The U.S. administration has had a problem with al-Sadr ever since the Mahdi Army's 2004 uprisings but the current obsession with him is a relatively new phenomenon. It is perfectly possible to understand this as an expression of the bizarre machinations a desperate U.S. administration but it is also possible that other actors have fuelled this new desire to disband his militia.
And the question then is, who gains? Al-Sadr has shown himself willing to co-operate with the Iranian government but contrary to some reports, and unlike members of the SCIRI, he is not particularly keen on the idea of the Iranian government acquiring too much influence in Iraq. In fact, he and his homegrown Iraqi militia present a barrier to the extension of Iranian influence.
And he is in direct competition with the SCIRI and their Badr Organisation for the loyalty of Iraq's Shiites. It is already clear that al-Hakim is trying to manipulate the U.S. into destroying all Sunni resistance and therefore removing one barrier to SCIRI/Iranian power in Iraq. Is it such a stretch to imagine that members of the SCIRI might also be attempting to manipulate the U.S. military into crushing their main Shiite rival too? I'm not sure it is. Without the Mahdi Army in Iraq, the SCIRI would be in an even stronger position and that would suit them and their Iranian supporters nicely.
(Note - I've used "SCIRI/Iranian power" as a sort of shorthand. They have a very close relationship but shouldn't be thought of as one unified block.)
It is not a given that the U.S. military will succeed in disbanding the Mahdi Army, far from it in fact. Disbanding a militia which has popular support is hugely difficult and, as I've said many times, the U.S. military is particularly unsuited to this sort of operation. But, whether as unwitting puppets or not, the U.S. is about to begin a campaign which, in the unlikely event that it succeeds, will only advance Iranian interests in Iraq yet further.
Every time you think there might be some possibility that these idiots have finally realised the size of the hole they've got themselves into, it turns out that they were actually only pausing for long enough to find themselves an even bigger spade.
The U.S. administration has had a problem with al-Sadr ever since the Mahdi Army's 2004 uprisings but the current obsession with him is a relatively new phenomenon. It is perfectly possible to understand this as an expression of the bizarre machinations a desperate U.S. administration but it is also possible that other actors have fuelled this new desire to disband his militia.
And the question then is, who gains? Al-Sadr has shown himself willing to co-operate with the Iranian government but contrary to some reports, and unlike members of the SCIRI, he is not particularly keen on the idea of the Iranian government acquiring too much influence in Iraq. In fact, he and his homegrown Iraqi militia present a barrier to the extension of Iranian influence.
And he is in direct competition with the SCIRI and their Badr Organisation for the loyalty of Iraq's Shiites. It is already clear that al-Hakim is trying to manipulate the U.S. into destroying all Sunni resistance and therefore removing one barrier to SCIRI/Iranian power in Iraq. Is it such a stretch to imagine that members of the SCIRI might also be attempting to manipulate the U.S. military into crushing their main Shiite rival too? I'm not sure it is. Without the Mahdi Army in Iraq, the SCIRI would be in an even stronger position and that would suit them and their Iranian supporters nicely.
(Note - I've used "SCIRI/Iranian power" as a sort of shorthand. They have a very close relationship but shouldn't be thought of as one unified block.)
It is not a given that the U.S. military will succeed in disbanding the Mahdi Army, far from it in fact. Disbanding a militia which has popular support is hugely difficult and, as I've said many times, the U.S. military is particularly unsuited to this sort of operation. But, whether as unwitting puppets or not, the U.S. is about to begin a campaign which, in the unlikely event that it succeeds, will only advance Iranian interests in Iraq yet further.
Every time you think there might be some possibility that these idiots have finally realised the size of the hole they've got themselves into, it turns out that they were actually only pausing for long enough to find themselves an even bigger spade.
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