The Conservative Papers » Russia

Iran Says Europe Hurting Itself With Sanctions

kalel — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 04:08:32 +0000

Iran continues to claim it is reaping the rewards of European sanctions even amid a deep currency crisis that rocks Tehran.

M Star oil tanker (undated company file photo)

In fact, the oil ministry in Tehran claims the embargo would leave Iran unscathed while inflicting “heavy economic loss” on the “people of Europe, who have been affected by crisis”.

The result would be a “slowdown in global economic growth, particularly in the crisis-hit Western world,” said the statement.

However, the value of the rial, Iran’s national currency, has fallen by around 50 per cent against the dollar in the last month alone as Iran tries to circumvent sanctions by trading in Russian rubles and Chinese yen instead of US dollars and European Euros.

The rial lost 10 per cent of its value in the 24 hours after the European Union’s announcement of oil sanctions.

Heydar Moslehi, the intelligence minister, told Tehran’s official news agency that Iranians would prosper from the sanctions, hailing them as “opportunities” that have “already brought lots of benefits to the country”.

Iranian officials last week had reissued their threat to close the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz, through which much of the world’s oil flows, if the West brought more sanctions to bear against its oil and banking industries. The Bahrain-based US Fifth Fleet has said closing the strait would be “an act of war.”

Britain, America and France responded to Iran’s earlier threats to close the Strait of Hormuz, the vital waterway at the entrance to the Gulf, by sending a joint flotilla of six warships through this channel on Sunday.

Military analysts say that while Iran could briefly close the Strait of Hormuz such a move would likely be a strategic disaster for Tehran, which is asymmetrically outmatched by the US military.

Such a move, they say, could not only lead to an embarrassing and costly US victory over Iran’s naval and air forces, but also trigger a US strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, which are the focus of Western sanctions.

While sanctions are biting deep, critics of Western leaders say they are unlikely to stop Iran’s bid for nuclear weapons as Iran continues to export oil to China, India, Japan, and Russia.

They note that North Korea, an impoverished international pariah languishing under crippling international sanctions, has succeeded in detonating two nuclear devices, to date.

Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)

Source material can be found at this site.

Ambassador McFaul Runs into Putin’s TV Buzz Saw

kalel — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 12:48:34 +0000

Russian state television has launched an all-out assault on the new U.S. Ambassador Michael McFaul—undeservedly so, although not unexpected.

Russia’s Channel One, run by All-Russia State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company (VGTRK), aired a hostile report this week aimed at the ambassador as he begins his tenure in Moscow.

The report attacked McFaul personally and hit the Obama Administration for choosing an ambassador who is not a career diplomat. McFaul is an academic who served as Special Assistant to the President and a Senior Director at the National Security Council.

Channel One won’t have any of that. It vituperated: “This is the second case of the violation of this tradition over the past 30 years. A first exception was [former U.S. envoy to Russia] Bob Strauss, appointed by [former President George H.W.] Bush, which, again, was meant to serve the collapse of the Soviet Union, a characteristic detail.” The venomous attack on Bob Strauss is particularly unfair, as the man spent the rest of his life promoting better U.S.–Russian relations.

McFaul is fluent in Russian, knows the country, and has worked there in the past. In fact, this is the motivation cited for the Kremlin’s temper tantrum. Russian state TV questioned McFaul’s general competence to be an ambassador: “The fact is that McFaul is not an expert on Russia. He is a specialist in a particular pure democracy promotion.” The report accuses him of having an agenda of an “orange revolution” aimed to undermine the Putin regime.

The Kremlin is livid that in his first official function at the Moscow Embassy, he met with human rights activists. McFaul is being denounced publicly for working on behalf of the “so-called democratic movement” in Russia during the early 1990s, when he worked in the country on behalf of the National Democratic Institute, “an organization known for its proximity to the U.S. intelligence services,” the TV announcer said with a straight face.

America-bashing has become a knee-jerk reaction for the Russian leadership. In the Heritage Backgrounder “Russian Anti-Americanism: A Priority Target for U.S. Public Diplomacy,” Ariel Cohen and Helle Dale explain:

Russian anti-Americanism remains an entrenched and politically expedient phenomenon among the country’s governing elites. This may seem puzzling, given the rapprochement between Russia’s political leadership and the Obama Administration. Yet the idea of “resetting” the relationship between the two, as conceived by President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, rests on the profound fallacy that the current Russian leadership and the United States share common values. From the Kremlin’s perspective, anti-Americanism is a strategic tool for pursuing domestic and foreign policy goals. It has remained this way for almost the past 100 years.

Mike McFaul, despite his genuine desire to improve U.S.–Russian relations, ran into the buzz saw of America-bashing, his past activities notwithstanding. He is the chief architect of the Obama Administration’s “Reset” policy with the Kremlin, which aims to strengthen ties between Washington and Moscow. In fact, as we predicted, McFaul’s reset policy, betting on the wrong horse—President Dmitry Medvedev—caused the acerbic reaction by Vladimir Putin. Furthermore, it may endanger his ability to interact with Russia’s presumed next president. Most probably, this personal antipathy is the reason behind the unprecedented attack.

The Obama Administration should denounce this unprovoked attack and make a strong show of support for its ambassador. However, this is not its style. The President would not stand up for his Secretary of State when Putin attacked her and accused her of giving a signal to popular protest in the aftermath of stolen parliamentary elections. Let’s hope that Ambassador McFaul would get more support than the Secretary of State. But don’t hold your breath.

Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)

Source material can be found at this site.

Iran Scoffs at Western Sanctions; Continues With Nuclear Weapons Program

kalel — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 21:23:13 +0000

Iranian Ambassador to South Korea Ahmad Masoumifar on Wednesday said there is a high demand for Iran’s crude oil supplies and Tehran has no problem maintaining exports.

Crude oil tanker

Masoumifar also shrugged off Iran’s shrinking pools of customers, saying “we (Iran) are producing about 80 million barrels [of oil] and there is demand for about 90 million.”

In a Tuesday interview with The Korea Times, he said US sanctions are “a dangerous idea” meant to impose Washington’s domestic law internationally.

Masoumifar’s comments came just one day after British foreign minister William Hague told reporters that he and his EU counterparts were working to hammer out the details of sanctions targeting Iran’s oil industry ahead of a January 23 meeting.

While Iran has been able to shore up lost oil contracts by increasing oil exports to China and Russia, Masoumifar’s claim has been widely panned as Iranian propaganda by analysts who note Iran would not have threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz in the event of further Western sanctions if they were not taking their toll.

The Iranian rial has been struggling as Iran’s Western currency reserves run thin and its export markets narrow. A brief surge in the rial following US sanctions, which have yet to be fully implemented, was killed when President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad refused to raise interest rates.

Market analysts predict EU sanctions would result in a further weakening of the Iranian rial, should they be imposed.

Western experts, however, say that more sanctions are unlikely to deter Iran from its drive to obtain nuclear weapons. On Wednesday, former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton warned that North Korea – languishing in deep poverty under heavy sanctions – managed nonetheless to detonate two nuclear devices.

Iran denies it is seeking nuclear weapons, but the International Atomic Energy Agency has reported Tehran has sought — and continues to seek — nuclear technology with solely military applications.

Israel, the West, and Iran’s Gulf Arab rivals have taken Iran’s refusal to allow IAEA inspectors access to its nuclear facilities under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty –- to which it is a signatory -– as a sign of bad faith.

Nonetheless, more Western sanctions will not hamstring Iran’s oil exports as they do not compel non-Western nations to abide by them. Additionally, Russia has vowed to veto any attempts at universal sanctions on Iran at the United Nations.

Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)

Source material can be found at this site.

The Mortal Threat From Iran; How to Stop Iran and the Possible Ramifications If We Don’t

kalel — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 19:18:01 +0000

To assume that Iran will not close the Strait of Hormuz is to assume that primitive religious fanatics will perform cost-benefit analyses the way they are done at Wharton. They won’t, especially if the oil that is their life’s blood is threatened. If Iran does close the strait, we will fight an air and naval war derivative of and yet peripheral to the Iranian nuclear program, a mortal threat the president of the United States has inadequately addressed.

A mortal threat when Iran is not yet in possession of a nuclear arsenal? Yes, because immediately upon possession all remedies are severely restricted. Without doubt, Iran has long wanted nuclear weapons—to deter American intervention in its and neighboring territories; to threaten Europe and thereby cleave it from American interests in the Middle East; to respond to the former Iraqi nuclear effort; to counter the contiguous nuclear presences in Pakistan, Russia and the U.S. in the Gulf; to neutralize Israel’s nuclear deterrent so as to limit it to the attrition of conventional battle, or to destroy it with one lucky shot; to lead the Islamic world; to correct the security imbalance with Saudi Arabia, which aided by geography and American arms now outclasses it; and to threaten the U.S. directly.

In the absence of measures beyond pinpoint sanctions and unenforceable resolutions, Iran will get nuclear weapons, which in its eyes are an existential necessity. We have long known and done nothing about this, preferring to dance with the absurd Iranian claim that it is seeking electricity. With rampant inflation and unemployment, a housing crisis, and gasoline rationing, why spend $1,000-$2,000 per kilowatt to build nuclear plants instead of $400-$800 for gas, when you possess the second largest gas reserves in the world? In 2005, Iran consumed 3.6 trillion cubic feet of its 974 trillion cubic feet of proven reserves, which are enough to last 270 years. We know that in 2006—generation exceeding consumption by 10%—Iran exported electricity and planned a high-tension line to Russia to export more.

Accommodationists argue that a rational Iran can be contained. Not the Iran with a revered tradition of deception; that during its war with Iraq pushed 100,000 young children to their deaths clearing minefields; that counts 15% of its population as “Volunteer Martyrs”; that chants “Death to America” at each session of parliament; and whose president states that no art “is more beautiful . . . than the art of the martyr’s death.” Not the Iran in thrall to medieval norms and suffering continual tension and crises.

Its conceptions of nuclear strategy are very likely to be looser, and its thresholds lower, than those of Russia and China, which are in turn famously looser and lower than our own. And yet Eisenhower and Churchill weighed a nuclear option in Korea, Kennedy a first strike upon the U.S.S.R., and Westmoreland upon North Vietnam. How then can we be certain that Iran is rational and containable?

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (Associated Press)

Inexpert experts will state that Iran cannot strike with nuclear weapons. But let us count the ways. It has the aerial tankerage to sustain one or two planes that might slip past air defenses between it and Israel, Europe, or the U.S., combining radar signatures with those of cleared commercial flights. As Iran increases its ballistic missile ranges and we strangle our missile defenses, America will face a potential launch from Iranian territory.

Iran can sea-launch from off our coasts. Germany planned this in World War II. Subsequently, the U.S. completed 67 water-supported launches, ending as recently as 1980; the U.S.S.R. had two similar programs; and Iran itself has sea-launched from a barge in the Caspian. And if in 2007, for example, 1,100 metric tons of cocaine were smuggled from South America without interdiction, we cannot dismiss the possibility of Iranian nuclear charges of 500 pounds or less ending up in Manhattan or on Pennsylvania Avenue.

The probabilities of the above are subject to the grave multiplication of nuclear weapons. Of all things in respect to the Iranian nuclear question, this is the most overlooked. A 1-in-20 chance of breaking a leg is substantially different from a 1-in-20 chance of dying, itself different from a 1-in-20 chance of half a million people dying. Cost drastically changes the nature of risk, although we persist in ignoring this. Assuming that we are a people worthy of defending ourselves, what can be done?

Much easier before Iran recently began to burrow into bedrock, it is still possible for the U.S., and even Israel at greater peril, to halt the Iranian nuclear program for years to come. Massive ordnance penetrators; lesser but precision-guided penetrators “drilling” one after another; fuel-air detonations with almost the force of nuclear weapons; high-power microwave attack; the destruction of laboratories, unhardened targets, and the Iranian electrical grid; and other means, can be combined to great effect.

Unlike North Korea, Iran does not yet possess nuclear weapons, does not have the potential of overwhelming an American ally, and is not of sufficient concern to Russia and China, its lukewarm patrons, for them to war on its behalf. It is incapable of withholding its oil without damaging itself irreparably, and even were it to cease production entirely, the Saudis—in whose interest the elimination of Iranian nuclear potential is paramount—could easily make up the shortfall. Though Iran might attack Saudi oil facilities, it could not damage them fatally. The Gulf would be closed until Iranian air, naval, and missile forces there were scrubbed out of existence by the U.S., probably France and Britain, and the Saudis themselves, in a few weeks.

It is true that Iranian proxies would attempt to exact a price in terror world-wide, but this is not new, we would brace for the reprisals, and although they would peak, they would then subside. The cost would be far less than that of permitting the power of nuclear destruction to a vengeful, martyrdom-obsessed state in the midst of a never-subsiding fury against the West.

Any president of the United States fit for the office should someday, soon, say to the American people that in his judgment Iran—because of its longstanding and implacable push for nuclear weapons, its express hostility to the U.S., Israel and the West, and its record of barbarity and terror—must be deprived of the capacity to wound this country and its allies such as they have never been wounded before.

Relying solely upon his oath, holding in abeyance any consideration of politics or transient opinion, and eager to defend his decision in exquisite detail, he should order the armed forces of the United States to attack and destroy the Iranian nuclear weapons complex. When they have complied, and our pilots are in the air on their way home, they will have protected our children in their beds—and our children’s children, many years from now, in theirs. May this country always have clear enough sight and strong enough will to stand for itself in the face of mortal threat, and in time.

Mr. Helprin, a senior fellow at the Claremont Institute, is the author of, among other works, the novels “Winter’s Tale” (Harcourt) and “A Soldier of the Great War” (Harcourt).

From The Wall Street Journal

Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)

Russian Billionaire to Challenge Putin for Presidency

alpineski — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 23:37:45 +0000

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Mikhail Prokhorov, a super-rich tycoon challenging Vladimir Putin for Russia’s presidency in March, said his country faced the danger of violent revolution if it did not break conservative resistance and move quickly to democracy.

Prokhorov, a billionaire bachelor long seen more as playboy than politician, told The Freeland File on reuters.com Russians had shaken off a post-Soviet apathy and were now ‘just crazy about politics’. He denied accusations he was a Kremlin tool, let into the race to split the opposition and lend democratic legitimacy to a vote Putin seems almost certain to win.

Putin is seeking to return to the Kremlin and rule until at least 2018, but protests against alleged fraud in a December 4 parliamentary vote have exposed growing discontent with the system he has dominated for 12 years.

“What worked before does not work now. Look in the streets. People are not happy,” Prokhorov, 46, said in the interview beneath the windowed dome that soars above his spacious office on a central Moscow boulevard close to the Kremlin.

“It is time to change,” said Prokhorov, ranked by Forbes magazine as Russia’s third-richest person, with an $18 billion metals-to-banking empire that includes the New Jersey Nets basketball team in the United States.

“Stability at any price is no longer acceptable for Russians.”

But Prokhorov made clear he considers revolution equally unacceptable for a country with grim memories of a century of hardship, war and upheaval starting with Vladimir Lenin’s 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, instead calling for “very fast evolution”.

“I am against any revolution, because I know the history of Russia. Every time we have revolution, it was a very bloody period,” he said.

The son of a Soviet sports official, Prokhorov has a basketball player’s 204-cm (6-foot-8) frame, a narrow face and a head of short-cut hair graying around the edges. In a dark suit and blue shirt that looked modest for a

Russian tycoon, he sat straight and spoke in English.

Public political consciousness is on the rise after years of apathy. The Soviet mentality is fading as a generation of Russians who “don’t know who Lenin was” grows up, he said. The country was finally ripe for change.

“We now have all the pieces in place to move very fast to being a real democracy,” Prokhorov said.

But he suggested there was a mounting battle in the ruling elite between liberals like himself and conservatives “ready to pay any price” to maintain the status quo. Russia, he said, could face a bloody revolution if opponents of reform prevail.

“If there are no changes in Russia, from day to day this risk will increase,” Prokhorov said. “Because 15, 20 percent of the population, the most active ones living in the big cities, want to live in a democratic country.”

PUTIN’S PUPPET?

Prokhorov cast himself as the candidate for the upwardly mobile Russians who, wearing white ribbons or clutching white carnations in a symbol of protest, turned out in force last month for the biggest opposition rallies of Putin’s rule.

“I think the era of ‘managed democracy’ is over,” Prokhorov said. “I am in the habit of being very active, and I feel that it is time for politics.”

He said that feeling was sweeping Russia, with debate over the future heard “in the kitchens, on the streets, in the elite — everywhere. Now we are just crazy about politics… Just half a year ago, nobody had any interest in it.”

He said he had proved he was his own man in September when he quit after a brief stint leading Right Cause, widely seen as a party controlled by the Kremlin to win liberal support.

Many opposition politicians, however, suspect Putin is using him to shunt middle-class anger into a safe channel in the presidential vote and to blunt opposition in its aftermath.

Russia’s third richest man trod carefully around Putin.

Prokhorov distanced himself from the prime minister by saying they had not met since April and that his “first act” if elected would be to free Khodorkovsky, the jailed former oil tycoon Kremlin critics say was singled out for punishment by Putin during his 2000-2008 presidency.

Prokhorov said he had no evidence that corruption, one of Russia’s biggest problems, reached to the top.

“I am a very practical man, and I like to have evidence.”

He voiced one of the key demands aired at the street protests, calling for a new parliamentary election after reforms to let more parties seek seats in the State Duma, Russia’s lower house, and run in other votes.

If he wins the presidency, he said, he would dissolve the Duma elected December 4 and hold a new vote in December 2012.

Prokhorov’s fun-loving party image took a sour turn in 2007 when French police detained him on suspicion of arranging prostitutes for guests at the Alpine ski resort of Courchevel. He denied any wrongdoing and was later cleared.

His riches and reputation are a hurdle in a country where millions see the ‘oligarchs’ as a criminal class whose wealth comes from corruption and misplaced government largesse.

Prokhorov, who attended the biggest rally in Moscow, on December 24, but did not address the crowd, offered measured praise for some of the street protest leaders.

But he echoed Putin’s assessment that opposition leaders were disorganized, though in nicer terms than those employed by Putin, who likened them to chattering monkeys from Rudyard Kipling’s Jungle Book.

“They know how to bring people out onto the street, but then what? They have no position, no program,” he said. A veteran of boardroom battles and business negotiations, he suggested his own brand of politics is more practical and productive.

Prokhorov made clear he intended to use the campaign to carve out a lasting, leading role in Russian politics as a liberal leader.

“My goal is to win, but I have a long-term strategy and a short-term strategy,” he said.

“For the short-term strategy, I want to address all my ideas to the audience, and I want to receive maximum support from this presidential election. It will be a great platform to make a political party.”

And while he is challenging Putin, he did not rule out becoming Putin’s prime minister — if the 59-year-old leader shifts course and moves close enough to his vision of the future.

“If we have 80 percent or 90 percent the same program or we are on the same page, it’s possible.”

SHIFTING GROUND

Putin and Medvedev have taken steps to appease protesters and blunt public anger triggered by their announcement in September that they would swap jobs in a deal they said predated Medvedev’s ascent to the presidency in 2008.

They have promised to register political parties long barred from ballots and to restore popular elections of regional governors, albeit with candidates ultimately endorsed by the Kremlin. But they have rejected calls for a new parliamentary vote.

Though his popularity may have fallen since the elections, Putin as yet sees no clear rival in the ranks of liberal, communist or nationalist politicians.

Prokhorov said it was unclear whether Putin was capable of defusing growing discontent.

“It depends. He is smart, he is a very good politician, and as far as I know, a politician needs to react to what is going on in the world and what is going on in the country,” he said.

“But he is my opponent for the time being, I have another view about what we need for Russia,” Prokhorov said. “We will see who’s right.”

The very idea of Russia’s third richest man running for president is a sign the ground is shifting beneath Putin’s feet.

Prokhorov and other ‘oligarchs’ who built flashy fortunes on assets snapped up in Russia’s scandal-tainted post-Soviet privatization drive were all but barred from politics as the ex-KGB officer tightened control after becoming president in 2000.

Khodorkovsky, who broke an unwritten compact with the Kremlin by funding opposition parties, was jailed in 2003 and is due to remain behind bars until late 2016, his Yukos oil empire long ago carved up and sold off into state hands.

Prokhorov’s riches are rooted in Norilsk Nickel, a former Soviet slave labor operation and now world’s largest nickel miner, which he and Vladimir Potanin bought at a knock-down price in the 1990s.

Already a billionaire, he sold his stake to Potanin before the 2008 market crash. He kept his hand in an array of investments and was a stranger to politics until his brief stint as Right Cause leader last year.

Prokhorov dismissed the notion that his personal and business history made him vulnerable to control by the Kremlin.

“I have a great biography — it’s very transparent,” said Prokhorov.

“I am a fighter and I am ready to fight, for my ideas and for my country,” he said.

Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)

Russia: Attack on Tehran is Attack on Moscow

alpineski — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 18:58:50 +0000

Russia has given Iran its bear hug and warns Israel and the West that an attack on Tehran would be considered an attack on Moscow. The threat heightens the prospect of World War III in the event of a military strike on Iran.

“Iran is our neighbor,” Russia’s outgoing ambassador to NATO, Dmitry Rogozin, told reporters in Brussels. “And if Iran is involved in any military action, it’s a direct threat to our security.”

Kremlin Security Council head Nikolai Patrushev accused Israel of provoking the United States towards war against Iran, the Russian Interfax news agency reported Friday. “But at the same time, we believe that any country has the right to have what it needs to feel comfortable, including Iran,” he added.

Rogozin warned on Friday that more attacks on Iran could cause “a scorching Arab Summer.”

Russia also has come to the defense of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, warning Western nations not to intervene in Syria with military forces. Russia is a major arms supplier to Syria and has a heavy investment in Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Japan also is drifting towards Iran, backtracking from its promise last week to back American sanctions aimed at persuading Iran to halt its unsupervised nuclear development.

Last week’s assassination of an Iranian nuclear scientist has aroused more “Death to America” and “Death to Israel” protest rallies in Iran, where the scientist was buried on Friday.

Iranian state radio said the 32-year-old scientist was involved with enriched uranium, a key ingredient for a nuclear weapon.

Source: Israel National News

Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)

Putin Dropping In The Polls; Drafts Manifesto Promising Reform

kalel — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 12:52:21 +0000

Just a few weeks ago, Vladimir Putin’s advisers were debating campaign and election strategy. There was no unanimity amongst them.

Putin

Some thought that it would be best for their candidate to win on the first ballot by receiving an absolute majority of votes cast on the first ballot. Others advised holding off to the second ballot to score the victory. The first option had decisiveness to recommend it, while the second strategy, assimilating the lessons of the disputed parliamentary election, sought to parry charges of electoral fraud.

The belief that the elections could be micromanaged found expression in discussions about what was the appropriate victory margin on a region by region basis in Russia.

Putin’s margin could be allowed to be higher in his home town of St. Petersburg than in Moscow, the advisers surmisd. It areas such as Chechnya, where in the parliamentary ballot United Russia scored too striking a success in the parliamentary election, the results had to be toned down to a margin of 65% and not more.

Now with the polls, however unreliable, showing VladimirPutin with 37% of the vote, this debate seems like ancient history. Vladimir Putin may be forced into a runoff and this represents a major comedown for Putin after taking 72% of the vote in 2004.

In light of these developments, Putin seems to have drafted an election platform all on his own. The manifesto was an amalgam of domestic liberalism, economic benefits and foreign policy toughness. Apparently liberalism will be a hot product. Some of the candidates have already promised to released jailed Yukos executive Mikhail Khodorkovsky.

Special courts will be set up to allow citizens to complain against officials. This sounds liberal, but also can be used to purge the bureaucracy of deadwood and opponents.

Putin promised a major drive against corruption that will encompass the most vulnerable areas: state purchases, road construction and law enforcement. The question that arises is, who was in power since 2000 and why hasn’t he produced more tangible results on corruption up to now?

After praising Russia’s economic record while the rest of the world languished in recession, Putin promised to double productivity via economic modernization and investments. This policy would translate into higher wages, pensions and living standards.

Putin promised to reform the military so it could accomplish its objectives, while employing increased firepower and implementing the recent technological breakthroughs.

Liberalization at home does not mean lowering one’s guard abroad, in this platform. The Americans and others could not sign things behind Russia’s back. In an obvious reference to the Americans, Putin warns: “Unilateral steps by our partners that disregard Russia’s opinion and its interests will receive an appropriate assessment and commensurate reaction.”

Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)

Source material can be found at this site.

US Announces Troop Cuts Limiting US To One Theater Of War At A Time; Abandoning Israel

kalel — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 13:42:03 +0000

The new US defense review combines politics, economics and ideology.

Leon Panetta

The decision to make cuts in the US military forces will obviously appeal to President Obama’s base. Obama has announced that the US is ending a decade of war and is effectively going to concentrate on rebuilding the United States domestically.

The administration has renounced an American ability to fight two wars simultaneously as a relic of the Cold War. This means that the US will not be involved in more than one theater at a time simply because experience has already shown that one cannot put a military machine together at the drop of a hat, but that it requires a buildup both militarily and industrially. This somewhat resembles the United States experience when it went from isolationism to war in the 1940s.

Obama and Leon Panetta also paraded Special Forces, drones and other high tech to back the claim that the United States will be getting bigger striking power for its investment while abandoning outmoded military thinking.

Economically, in a period of budgetary retrenchment, the gigantic US military budget is an obvious candidate for cuts. Cutting the Pentagon down to size is always a recurrent theme and there is certain to be a lot of waste. Even Obama’s opponents, for example, Senator John McCain have attacked mismanagement and waste in the Defense Department.

If the United States is going to retain a one-war capability and the Obama administration has signaled that its main preoccupation is in Southeast Asia with China, this means that other areas are going to increasingly have to fend for themselves.

As the military threat from Russia appears to have receded, the administration is looking to its NATO partners to invest more in their own defense. During the Cold War, when Europe was considered the major battleground, the European countries knew that Uncle Sam would grumble but would not be willing to abandon them to a Soviet takeover, given the importance of Western Europe. Now Europe has been downgraded, accompanied by platitudes about its continued importance.

It also means that the United States will be expecting countries in the Middle East to do more, but here the problem is the reverse of Europe. Here the hopes that these countries reach a higher qualitative level in terms of combat strength will be realized, but there is no guarantee that these forces will be employed for the right purposes. When the United States was employing a similar policy during the Eisenhower era, it saw the arms it sent to Iraq and Pakistan, ostensibly to repel a Soviet invasion, used for other purposes. If these countries succumb to instability, the American-supplied arsenal could also fall into irresponsible hands.

Another repercussion of the retrenchment is that the procurement will be a more drawn-out process. Countries such as Israel, who were promised the F-35 fighter to preserve a qualitative edge, are going to be left waiting while watching countries such as Saudi Arabia taking delivery of F-15 planes by the boatload.

A final problem worth mentioning is that the policy here early resembles the Obama green technology solution for what ailed the American economy. The assumption was that only the Americans were smart enough to employ green technology. We now know otherwise. American firms were driven from the market by cheaper Chinese competition.

The opposition is also going to use drones and cyber technology.

America has employed drones in Afghanistan, but it is leaving that country without a clear-cut victory, to say the least.

Rating: 10.0/10 (1 vote cast)

Source material can be found at this site.

Obama to Share U.S. Missile Defense Secrets

alpineski — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 18:30:24 +0000

President Obama signaled Congress this week that he is prepared to share U.S. missile defense secrets with Russia.

In the president’s signing statement issued Saturday in passing into law the fiscal 2012 defense authorization bill, Mr. Obama said restrictions aimed at protecting top-secret technical data on U.S. Standard Missile-3 velocity burnout parameters might impinge on his constitutional foreign policy authority.

As first disclosed in this space several weeks ago, U.S. officials are planning to provide Moscow with the SM-3 data, despite reservations from security officials who say that doing so could compromise the effectiveness of the system by allowing Russian weapons technicians to counter the missile. The weapons are considered some of the most effective high-speed interceptors in the U.S. missile defense arsenal.

There are also concerns that Russia could share the secret data withChina and rogue states such as Iran and North Korea to help their missile programs defeat U.S. missile defenses.

Officials from the State Department and Missile Defense Agency have discussed the idea of providing the SM-3 data to the Russians as part of the so-far fruitless missile-defense talks with Moscow, headed in part of by Undersecretary of State Ellen Tauscher, who defense officials say is a critic of U.S. missile defenses.

Their thinking is that if the Russians know the technical data, it will help allay Moscow’s fears that the planned missile defenses in Europe would be used against Russian ICBMs. Officials said current SM-3s are not fast enough to catch long-range Russian missiles, but a future variant may have some anti-ICBM capabilities.

Ms. Tauscher has repeatedly denied that her talks with the Russians are secret. However, the administration has provided almost no briefings about the talks to Congress, which prompted critics of the talks to include language in the new defense spending law limiting data-sharing.

Section 1227 of the defense law prohibits spending any funds that would be used to give Russian officials access to sensitive missile-defense technology, as part of a cooperation agreement without first sendingCongress a report identifying the specific secrets, how they would be used and steps to protect the data from compromise.

The president also must certify to Congress that Russia will not share the secrets with other states and that it will not help Russia “to develop countermeasures” to U.S. defenses.

The certification also must show whether Russia is providing equal access to its missile defense technologies, which are mainly nuclear-tipped anti-missile interceptors.

Mr. Obama said in the signing statement that he would treat the legal restrictions as “non-binding.”

“While my administration intends to keep the Congress fully informed of the status of U.S. efforts to cooperate with the Russian Federation on ballistic missile defense, my administration will also interpret and implement section 1244 in a manner that does not interfere with the president’s constitutional authority to conduct foreign affairs and avoids the undue disclosure of sensitive diplomatic communications,” Mr. Obama said, incorrectly identifying the section of the law containing the restrictions.

Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)

Quartet Intervention Doomed

kalel — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 23:13:08 +0000

President Shimon Peres says the Quartet’s plan and deadline that expire this month is doomed and that the Palestinian Authority and Israel will return to direct talks.

President Shimon Peres

The Quartet told the PA and Israel three months ago to put forth suggestions for two issues: boundaries for a new Palestinian Authority country and security for Israel, a request that is contrary to the concept of direct talks between the two sides. PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas quickly responded to the Quarter initiative, but the Netanyahu government said its proposals should be presented in direct talks.

With less than a month remaining until the Quartet’s deadline expires, Jordan is scheduled to host Israeli and PA negotiators on Tuesday.

In an interview with the Arabic language daily Asharq Al-Awsat, President Peres suggested that the Quartet initiative scuttled the possibility of the return to direct talks, which he said eventually will happen.

“The International Quartet submitted its new proposals, and Tony Blair and U.S. officials arrived and offered to conduct direct meetings focusing on the issues of borders and security. They asked each party to put forward its proposals within three months…this is what halted our progress” for direct talks, the President said.

He said that all of his contacts with the Palestinian Authority have been conducted with the approval of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. Asked if the “Quartet’s proposal is doomed to failure, and the negotiations will return to their previous track.” President Peres responded, “Yes, this is what I believe.”

He also said that the rapidly changing situation in the Middle East makes it difficult to put forward proposals for Israel’s security. “Since the Americans put forward their initiative regarding the security issue, new developments have occurred in the region,.” he explained. “There is a lack of security in the Egyptian Sinai Peninsula and the Gaza Strip, the situation in Syria and Lebanon is unclear. Even in Egypt, the situation is obscure, but we must not fall victim to despair.

“I believe in direct negotiations. The International Quartet is not an alternative to that. Every party in the International Quartet has its own interests and causes. Take Russia, for example…it is standing with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad who is slaughtering his own people, although the situation in Syria is a source of concern for both Jordan and Lebanon. President al-Assad, who began his political life as an eye-doctor, is now demonstrating that he is a butcher, whilst our Lebanese ‘friend’ Hassan Nasrallah is serving Iran’s interests.”

On other issues, he predicted, “The Muslim Brotherhood’s attempts to hijack the revolution will not succeed” because Egyptians realize that “switching MPs” will not solve Egypt’s problems.

President Peres also revealed that former Palestinian Authority chairman Yasser Arafat once explained that he broke promises to Israel in order to prevent a civil war among Arabs.

“He would go back on things we had agreed on,” said the President. “He believed in the use of violence to exert pressure. He would make promises and then go back on his word. When I asked him about this, he answered that he did not want to cause a Palestinian civil war.”

Rating: 0.0/10 (0 votes cast)

Source material can be found at this site.