End of Issue #17 |

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Editorial and Rants
July 18, 2005 - From: http://www.praguemonitor.com
Klaus Says Multiculturalism, Immigration Cause Terrorism
(PDM staff with CTK) 18 July - The excessive openness of the West to immigrants from other cultural environments facilitates attacks by radical Islamists in western countries, President Vaclav Klaus said in an interview printed Saturday in the daily Mlada fronta Dnes (MfD).
"This [openness] is in any case a suitable soil for these things [attacks] to happen," Klaus said.
He said that multiculturalism is a tragic mistake of western civilisation for which all will pay dearly. Such openness is not the direct cause of terror, but it is terrorism's fundamental cause, Klaus said. He compared multiculturalism to the role Marx's teaching played in the crimes of communism.
He said at the same time that multiculturalism is not an explanation for the recent attacks in London. "Multiculturalism is an ideology that says that you should emigrate and to make claim to your civilisation, your group and ethnic interests" in the new countries, Klaus said.
"Mass emigration has emerged as a false ideology according to which there exists a kind of claim, a general human right to wander anywhere around the world," Klaus said.
He added that this suppresses the civil rights of the original inhabitants.
If people leave for a place, they should fully accept the place, Klaus said. He said there is a hope for remedy in that this demand is shared by more and more countries, and that the naive ideas from about 30 years ago no longer apply.
CTK news edited by the staff of the Prague Daily Monitor, a Monitor CE service.
Apr 24, 2003 - From http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/ED24Ak05.html
The Mukhabarat's Shopping List
By Pepe Escobar
BAGHDAD - While the buildup to the war on Iraq was convulsing world capitals, world opinion and the United Nations, the Mukhabarat - the feared Saddam Hussein secret service machine - was still living in its own Thousand and One Nights bubble.
This is what is revealed by a document found by Asia Times Online, among other files, in a nondescript, abandoned Mukhabarat safe house in the Qadissiya district of the capital. Iraqis who read it and translated it had no reason to doubt its authenticity. The handwritten document details a series of meetings between June 2002 and March 2003 (even when war was already raging in Iraq), probably in the same safehouse, involving Mukhabarat agents and representatives of firms from many Arab countries but also from France, Russia and the Netherlands. The document should constitute additional proof that the secret services indeed operated as a parallel state in Iraq - way beyond the reach of United Nations sanctions and trade embargo. All negotiations were secret. And everything was paid in US dollars, cash.
All manner of other secrets and not-such-secrets are to be found in what remains of Baghdad. Detailed personal files by Internal Security in Mukhabarat abandoned safe houses in Karada. Compromising files at the torched and looted Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Secret graves in the al-Qarah cemetery of nearly 1,000 political prisoners tortured and mostly hanged at Abu Ghraib prison. And in the basement of another Mukhabarat safe house in Wahda, after a poor torch job, an astonishing room brimming with the latest high-tech surveillance equipment is still practically intact. Possibly much of the equipment was purchased following the meetings detailed at the document found in Qadissiya.
From the Alwaeth firm in Syria, the Mukhabarat negotiated to buy machines to conceal fax numbers. They could be delivered in three days. From an unnamed Egyptian firm, it wanted wireless communication systems for buildings, at US$55,000, and a more sophisticated system for $100,000. It also wanted wireless systems from the Iraqi firm, al-Azhal. From an unnamed corporation in Abu Dhabi, the Mukhabarat wanted an array of goods: wireless systems; wireless pinhole cameras with a maximum range of 100 meters (delivery in one month); four-channel AV receivers; pen cameras with a maximum range of 100 meters, connected to video, recording audio and operating on 12V batteries; cameras with a range of 1 kilometers, and upgraded with an outer antenna for 3 kilometers; and night vision goggles with a 1 kilometer range. The goggles could be the most explosive item in the shopping list as Washington had all but accused Syria of selling them to Iraq. According to the document, the negotiations were actually conducted with this unnamed Abu Dhabi corporation.
From the Dutch firm Haiman, and also from an unnamed Lebanese firm, the Mukhabarat wanted spray to detect fingerprints on paper and wood, and to detect separate fingerprints from different people. Mukhabarat agents questioned Haiman for any new technology and also wanted to know the prices for card-operated security systems.
From the French firm APX, the Mukhabarat wanted to buy listening devices, portable satellites and private security systems. The document states that the Mukhabarat had "direct contacts with a minister in France" who could help the negotiations. The document also states the Mukhabarat desire of trying to improve the security systems of Iraqi embassies around the world. Thus the quest for sophisticated listening devices; small microphones; telephone bugs; transmitter pens; laser systems to check camera performance; listening devices to monitor what happens inside a building from the outside; hidden espionage cameras; night cameras to identify people from a distance of 150 meters; and the smallest color cameras available on the market. From the Alsalam company - country of origin non-identified - the Mukhabarat was trying to buy video cameras inside pens and made-in-Russia long-distance cameras, with a range of 2 to 3 kilometers.
In another meeting with an unidentified French firm, the Mukhabarat wanted to purchase equipment to recognize fingertips on glass and wood; machine guns disguised as suitcases; and voice identifying systems that can be matched with databases. It also wanted a spray to identify fingerprints; laser tools to identify fingerprints; a system to identify food poisoning (a key Saddam Hussein obsession); tools to identify explosive materials and give the exact distance between the target and the explosives; and a robot to remove explosives.
From the al-Asriya firm - not identified as Iraqi or foreign - the Mukhabarat wanted to buy three different computer systems for $199,000 each (with a discount, it could come to $130,000 each). The systems are called Spread Spectrum (operating between 1,5 and 5 gigahertz). There was an explicit condition for the purchase: the manager of the firm had to send Mukhabarat agents for training out of Iraq - with specialists from Lebanon. And all spare parts should be free. On this particular negotiation, the Mukhabarat was dealing with Muhamad Halewi, a doctor and manager of the Fica firm in Baghdad. And it was also comparing prices with the Abu Dhabi office of a firm called Teltec. The Mukhabarat complains that the prices quoted by the Reeger company - country of origin non-specified - are very high. The document states that if they buy anything from Reeger, training will have to be conducted in Malaysia.
The Mukhabarat was actively comparing prices between Iraqi and Syrian firms. It was negotiating to buy Toyota Camrys at $20,500 apiece and Mercedes sedans for $55,000 apiece from the Aldahi dealership in Baghdad, imported from a firm in the United Arab Emirates. From the al-Azar firm, also in Baghdad, it wanted Mercedes vans. From the Jawrah and Hensi corporation in Syria, it received an assurance that the cars could be delivered in two months. And it could also buy on request air-conditioners, Hyundai elevators, copy machines, Panasonic videos and TVs and paper shredders.
One thing is certain: not all Mukhabarat papers were shredded as the Americans arrived at the gates of Baghdad.
(2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved.
Aug 14, 2005 - From http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/08/14/wiran14.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/08/14/ixnewstop.html
Iran 'Kept EU Talking' While it Finished Nuclear Plant
By Colin Freeman
An Iranian foreign policy official has boasted that the regime bought extra time over its stalled negotiations with Europe to complete a uranium conversion plant.
In comments that will infuriate EU diplomats, Hosein Musavian said that Teheran took advantage of the nine months of talks, which collapsed last week, to finish work at its Isfahan enrichment facility.
"Thanks to the negotiations with Europe we gained another year in which we completed the [project] in Isfahan," he told an Iranian television interviewer.
Mr Musavian also claimed that work on nuclear centrifuges at a plant at Natanz, which was kept secret until Iran's exiled opposition revealed its existence in 2002, progressed during the negotiations.
"We needed six to 12 months to complete the work on the centrifuges," said Mr Musavian, chairman of the Iranian Supreme National Security Council's foreign policy committee. He made his remarks on August 4 - two days before Iran's foreign ministry rejected the European Union offer of incentives to abandon its uranium enrichment programme.
Critics of the regime will see his comments as confirmation that Iran never contemplated giving up its programme, despite top-level diplomacy involving Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, and his French and German counterparts.
The US was always pessimistic about the talks' chance of success. Yesterday President George W Bush refused to rule out using military force to press Iran into giving up its nuclear programme, which Washington suspects is a front for weapons-making. "All options are on the table," Mr Bush told Israeli television.
Mr Musavian, whose remarks were translated by the Middle East Research Institute based in Washington, was responding to criticism from Iranian hardliners that Teheran should never have entered into the EU negotiations.
He said that until then, Iran had dealt solely with the UN-backed International Atomic Energy Authority, which had given it a 50-day deadline to suspend uranium enrichment on pain of referral to the UN Security Council.
"The IAEA give us a 50-day extension to suspend the enrichment and all related activities," he said. "But thanks to the negotiations with Europe we gained another year, in which we completed the [project] in Isfahan."
The plant, about 250 miles south of Teheran, carries out an early stage of the cycle for developing nuclear fuel, turning yellowcake into UF4 and then into UF6, a gas essential to enrichment.
"Today, we are in a position of power," Mr Musavian said. "Isfahan is complete and has a stockpile of products." Mr Musavian also said that Iran had further benefited from sweeteners offered by the EU, including the invitation to enter talks on Iran joining the World Trade Organisation.
Iran is facing possible referral to the Security Council after scientists began breaking seals at the Isfahan plant, a precursor to resuming the research it agreed to suspend during the EU talks.
The Foreign Office declined to comment on Mr Musavian's remarks. Last week it said Iran made a "serious mistake" by opting to resume uranium conversion.
Mohamed ElBaradei, the head of the IAEA, is due to report on Iran's renewed nuclear activities on September 3, which could trigger a Security Council referral.
VJ Day Remembered
By William F. Sauerwein
August 15th marks the 60th anniversary of the World War II victory over Japan (V-J Day). On this day six decades ago the guns finally fell silent around the world. For a brief period it seemed peace would finally reign. It didn't happen of course but for a few memorable moments boundless joy was the spirit of the day.
While the May 8th victory in Europe (V-E Day) is widely memorialized, V-J Day is sometimes overlooked. Perhaps too many historians focus on the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki instead of on the sacrifices of millions of men and women from around the world who faced naked Japanese aggression and defeated it at huge cost in lives and treasure. V-J Day is about the human spirit and the will to win.
While most people are at least familiar with the Nazi and their countless atrocities against the peoples of Europe, far fewer are familiar with widespread Japanese atrocities in China, the Philippines, and throughout Southeast Asia. Japan, like all nations afflicted by the scourges of war has a right to mourn its dead; it also has a responsibility to acknowledge its aggression, an issue it is slowly coming to grips with.
Japanese aggression that culminated in World War II started with a staged bombing of a Japanese-owned railway in Mukden, Manchuria on September 18, 1931 which ultimately led to the creation of the puppet state of Manchukuo. The West protested vigorously yet did nothing else, relying instead on fruitless diplomacy through the virtually powerless League of Nations. Proclaiming themselves the "victims" of Western persecution, Japan left the League in 1934 and abrogated the Washington Naval Limitation Treaty of 1922 that was intended to limit the size of the Japanese Navy. Their departure from the treaties opened the door to subsequent war in Asia.
Japanese ultranationalist groups, like the Black Dragon Society, gained popularity during this time. The right-wing Japanese nationalists viewed themselves as the superior Asian race that descended directly from a sun goddess. They believed it was their duty to free the "inferior Orientals" from the Western Powers.
Ultimately, for a variety of economic and political reasons Japan invaded China in 1937 using advanced weaponry and technology against an inferior Chinese Army that divided it energies between fighting the emerging Communists and the warlords that abounded throughout China. Again the West protested through the offices of the League of Nations, which only encouraged the Japan's aggressive generals and admirals to renew their efforts to subdue the Chinese.
In The Rape of Nanking, author Iris Chang graphically describes the most villainous Japanese atrocity. Nanking (now Nanjing, China). When the city was captured in December, 1937 Japanese troops began a deliberate campaign of genocide in which an estimated 260,000 Chinese men, women and children were murdered, including 80,000 Chinese women raped, and mutilated before dying. Chinese POW's were used for bayonet practice and decapitation contests, all of which is documented in Japanese media.
This treatment from the Japanese conquerors became common for POW's and civilian populations alike. They practiced torture, starvation, murder, slave labor and forced women into prostitution for Japanese soldiers. Lesser known are the gruesome human medical "experiments," and their nuclear, biological and chemical (NBC) warfare programs the Japanese perpetrated later in the war. The Japanese were viewed by many as the most hated race in Asia; a hatred that still burns in some quarters today.
With France's defeat in 1940 at the beginning of World War II in Europe, Japan joined the Axis Powers along with Germany, Italy and a handful of lesser states and demanded concessions in French Indochina from the prostrate Vichy French government. The militarily weak United States was ostensibly the only power capable of halting Japan's ambitions. When Japan refused to end its aggression, the United States enacted an oil embargo that the Japanese viewed as the trip wire for war in Asia and the Pacific Rim.
When Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 Japan's more enlightened leaders understood they could not defeat the Americans in a long war. Many Japanese leaders, particularly Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, had been in the United Sates and knew America's industrial potential. As a result they developed a strategy hamstring us in the Pacific while Japan seized as much territory as possible in the misplaced belief America was a weak democracy and would sue for peace.
Two years later Japan was on the defensive as American forces slugged their way across the Pacific, Japanese resistance intensified in hopes of forcing a negotiated peace. Japanese leaders thought they understood the American public's influence over the government and hoped our high casualties would cause Americans to lose faith and seek a negotiated peace. In many respects Japan's intransigent strategy of attrition created an environment even more brutal than the genocidal atmosphere in Europe. Adding to the tragedy was Japanese soldiers' penchant for fighting to the death rather than surrendering. In the end most Japanese defenders were exterminated.
When the U.S. Navy decisively defeated the Japanese Navy in Leyte Gulf in October, 1944 it set the stage for Japan's ultimate defeat. More than 260,000 Japanese ground forces stationed in the Philippines were irretrievably cut off from outside support. Despite their predicament they fought on, buying time for home island defense preparations. The battles in the Philippine archipelago the also marked the first time Japan used kamikaze attacks against American ships.
My father served in the Philippines with the 1st Cavalry Division and described the tenacity of Japanese resistance his division encountered there. He fought through the bloody urban combat in Manila, which lasted over a month. It began after Gen. Tomoyuki Yamashita ordered his troops into the hills and rogue Japanese naval elements stayed behind in Manila and slaughtered more than 100,000 Filipinos in an orgy of death before Manila was freed.
Meanwhile American naval forces, U.S. Marines and some Army troops invaded pre-war Japanese territory with the invasions of Iwo Jima and Okinawa. Iwo Jima became the bloodiest battle in Marine Corps history, losing about one-third of their strength to casualties. The American forces on Okinawa suffered 30 % casualties, including 34 ships sunk, 368 damaged and 763 aircraft lost.
Intelligence intercepts revealed that Japan would continue the fight, and propaganda called for every man, woman and child to kill Americans. The U.S. government saw no alternative to a direct invasion of Japan, codenamed Operation Downfall and described in Code-Name Downfall by Thomas Allen and Norman Polmar.
This invasion would be the largest amphibious operation in history: including 20 aircraft carriers, 36 escort carriers and 20 battleships. Projected ground forces exceeded 800,000, including 14 divisions and related support personnel. Based on previous casualty figures, it was also expected be the largest bloodbath in American history.
The first phase, Operation Olympic, called for invading the southern island of Kyushu as a base for future operations. It would be strictly an American operation because British Commonwealth forces were occupied in bitter fighting in Southeast Asia and China was still struggling to regain its vast territory occupied by Japanese forces. At the time the Soviet Union was still doing a balancing act and had refused to enter the war in Asia, even refusing American bombers access to Siberian bases to protect its neutrality.
After four years of war the United States faced a manpower shortage as we struggled to replace combat losses. My mother, then in high school, remembered that the only men remaining in our county were too young, too old, or otherwise unfit for military service. She spoke of rumors about lowering the draft age to seventeen and drafting women for stateside duties. History records they were both options considered and ultimately rejected by Washington planners.
When the war ended in Europe in May 1945 the troops who had won the peace were scheduled for redeployed to the Pacific, creating morale problems among these soldiers. Reports circulated among both the public and the military that some soldiers reported that while transiting through the United States they would go AWOL. Many desperately homesick soldiers complained bitterly about the cumbersome "point system" based on length of service, awards, and combat campaigns that determined who would redeploy. Those with sufficient "points," many experienced non-commissioned officers, were replaced by recruits, further hindering combat readiness.
To defend against the anticipated American invasion of the home islands the Japanese devised Operation Ketsu-Go (Decisive), the Japanese defense plan. Japanese intelligence correctly anticipated the American landing beaches on Kyushu and the time frame. American intelligence, relying on communication intercepts and aerial photography was blind to Japan's machinations.
Japan carefully conserved its remaining military power for stopping the American invasion. Kyushu hosted 15 Japanese divisions, 7 independent brigades, 3 tank brigades and a population of 2,400,000. Furthermore, the Japanese possessed 10,000 planes, piloted rockets, manned suicide torpedoes and special suicide frogmen for striking our fleet.
The Japanese high command still believed that if American forces suffered enough damage that U.S. public opinion would demand peace. Japan still occupied large segments of China, Korea, Manchuria and much of Southeast Asia with about four million troops.President Harry Truman, attending the Potsdam Conference in Germany, who had only learned of America's closely held atomic secrets when President Franklin D. Roosevelt died and he succeeded him to the Presidency, was told of the successful atomic bomb testing on July, 16, 1945 in New Mexico. At the time little was known of the effects of radiation, or even if the bomb would work. It was seen as another weapon that would reduce American casualties and hasten Japan's desire for peace.
Truman knew the casualty figures from Iwo Jima and Okinawa, and the anticipated 250,000 to 500,000 casualties just during Operation Olympic, the occupation of Kyushu. He further understood the American public's desire for ending the war, and then predicted to last until November, 1946. Peace feelers through Switzerland and the Soviet Union proved either noncommittal, or defiant, framed in the "decisive battle" rhetoric Japan's bombastic generals and admirals preferred.
The first bomb destroyed Hiroshima on August 6th, and killed and estimated 140,000 people in the fireball that consumed the city. The Japanese refused to surrender. Two days later the Soviet Union declared war on Japan and it now faced a two-front war. The second atomic bomb destroyed Nagasaki August 9th and killed an additional 70,000 people.
Still the Japanese did not surrender and conventional bombing missions resumed, while the U.S. prepared another atomic bomb for Japan. Faced with inevitable defeat and probable annihilation Emperor Hirohito accepted American surrender terms on August 15th and for the first time addressed the Japanese people of the radio. Mutinous troops took over the designated radio station and battled loyal troops for several hours before the Emperor's message was transmitted. Many high-ranking officers chose suicide over surrender when Hirohito finally spoke.
Americans rejoiced when they learned of the surrender. My father, destined for Operation Olympic, stated that the troops wildly celebrated their good fortune. When his unit entered Japan they discovered warehouses full of military equipment reserved for the anticipated invasion.
Today, Japanese students do not always learn of their country's aggression during World War II and American students are sometimes exposed to versions of military history that unfairly shade the reasons why America was first to use atomic bombs. Revisionist historians argue that using nuclear weapons was unnecessary because Japan was already defeated. These critics make their arguments from the safety of classrooms and lecture halls. They faced no personal danger and bear no consequences for their actions.
A Pacific Theater veteran who knows better said, "If there had been no Pearl Harbor, there would not have been a Hiroshima. America did not start the war, nor was it the aggressor, yet when attacked we responded. The atomic bomb broke the emperor's will to fight, therefore Japan's will, and ended a bloody war."
William F. Sauerwein is a Contributing Editor of DefenseWatch. He can be reached at mono@gtec.com. Please send Feedback responses to dwfeedback@yahoo.com.