Maher muses . . .

READER SUPPORTED NEWS has a fine post by Bill Maher, “The US: World's Policeman or Schoolyard Bully?”. Check it out.

New rule: 12 years after 9/11, and amidst yet another debate on whether to bomb yet another Muslim country, America must stop asking the question, "Why do they hate us?" Forget the debate on Syria, we need a debate on why we're always debating whether to bomb someone. Because we're starting to look not so much like the world's policeman, but more like George Zimmerman: itching to use force and then pretending it's because we had no choice.

• • •

And look, like I said, I'm no fan of Assad. And I say that openly: I don't care if it costs me jobs in Hollywood. I think he's the worst kind of sociopath - the kind who commits unspeakable acts, but who looks like a menswear salesman.

I'm just pointing out that in recent years, our foreign policy debates look like the Facebook page of a loner who shot up a McDonald's. We're the only country in the world that muses out loud about who we might bomb next.

Down the drain . . .

BAATHISM HAS BEEN a driving political force in the Middle East for decades, but according to an article on The New Republic, by Paul Berman, "Baathism: An Obituary", it seems that the movement is about to be nailed to its perch, so to speak, with the imminent collapse of its last adherents in Syria.

Baathism is one of the last of the grandiose revolutionary ideologies of the mid-twentieth century—an ideology like communism and fascism in Europe (both of which exercised a large influence on Baathist thinking), except in an Arab version suitable for the age of decolonization. Its champions came to power not only in Syria but in Iraq, in both cases in the 1960s; and the consequences were not of the sort that leave people unchanged.

Now, while Bashar seems to be a rather unpleasant fellow, the collapse of the Baathist movement and its discreditation in the Middle East may have not-good consequences:

The political and cultural landscape of the Middle East, post-Baath, will be pockmarked by blighted zones that might otherwise have been a prosperous Iraq and Syria, if only the Baathist doctrine had not destroyed those countries. A cloud of intellectual bafflement and paranoia will hover overhead, consisting of the confused thoughts of everyone across the region who, in the past, talked themselves into supposing that Baathism was a good idea. And more than visible will be the triumphant zeal of Baathism’s principal rivals in the matter of grandiose revolutionary ideology—the champions of the single Middle Eastern millenarian doctrine still standing, once the Assad regime has finally gone. These will be the Islamists.

Yep, the Islamic Brotherhood and the Wahabbists may wind up being the real winners, in the near-term, the next 5 to 10 years. But as the 21st century passes and things like satellite dishes and the web have their influence, there will be changes — and surprises.

Bashar's beastliness . . .

A NASTY SUMBITCH INDEED, who seems to have Vladimir Putin's enthusiastic support. Last week, Bashar managed to kill Marie Colvin, an intrepid journalist with a fearless drive for the truth. And as we know, journalism in places where bullets fly can be dangerous.

BUT FOREIGN POLICY seems to think this was not accidental, 'collateral damage', according to Robert Pelton's post, "Kill the Messenger, What Russia taught Syria: When you destroy a city, make sure no one -- not even the story -- gets out alive".

It seems that Marie Colvin was targeted intentionally. According to the FP article, the Russians started this technique in their gentle intrusion into Chechnya. Check out the whole sorry tale.

It was December 1999, and the Russian assault on Grozny was unfolding in all its gruesome detail. After the dissolution of so much of the former Soviet empire, Chechnya was one country that the newly minted prime minister, Vladimir Putin, refused to let go of. His boss, Boris Yeltsin, and the Russian army had been defeated and then humiliated in the media by Chechen forces in the first war. Five years later, Russia was back. And Putin's new strategy was unbending: silence, encircle, pulverize, and "cleanse." It was a combination of brutal tactics -- a Stalinist purge of fighting-age males plus Orwellian propaganda that fed Russians a narrative wherein Chechen freedom fighters were transformed into Islamist mercenaries and terrorists. More than 200,000 civilians were to die in this war, the echoes of which continue to this day.

This time, journalists were specifically targeted to prevent sympathetic or embarrassing reports from escaping the killing zone. As such, you can't find a lot of stories about the second Chechen war. One of the few and best accounts was written by Marie Colvin, who described her terrifying escape from Grozny for the Sunday Times. Last month, Colvin thought she could roll the dice and enter the besieged Syrian city of Homs to defy yet another brutal war of oppression. This time she lost.

It's impossible to know whether Syrian President Bashar al-Assad -- a longtime ally of Russia -- studied the success of the last Chechen war before launching his own assault on the restive city of Homs. However, his Russian military advisors surely know the tactics well. The crackdown in Homs carries a grim echo of Grozny, both in its use of signals intelligence to track down and silence the regime's enemies and in its bloody determination to obliterate any opposition, including Western journalists.

The silence is deafening . . .

WHAT ABOUT SYRIA? Bashar and his psychopathic Baathists are chewing up a lot of their citizens, and all you hear from the left or the right in this country is . . . silence. WAKE UP! Right now, we have a reprise of the 1953 East German Workers' Revolt — on steroids.

Once upon a time, abuses like this created things like the Mackenzie–Papineau Battalion. Now, it's a different era and Mac-Pap Redux is not doable, but could somebody please ask Stevie to see about getting those F-18's some Syrian sorties?

Syria becomes serious . . .

OL' BASHAR'S BASHING his citizens, who are fed up with some 40 years of single-party (the Ba'ath party) corruption and police state. According to The Guardian's Katherine Marsh, in Damascus, they're killing people. That's Bashar, below. He's used to causing pain.

Last night there were reports that at least 23 people had been killed, some of them in Damascus, hitherto unaffected; the reports could not be independently verified. Amnesty International put the death toll around Deraa in the past week at 55 at least.

This may not cool down. There's an interesting Syrian site, ALL4SYRIA. Whoever runs it has a number of articles worthy of your attention. One, "Syria’s coming revolution?" makes the observation that

By taking to the streets, even in fairly small numbers, Syrians have crossed a ‘red line’ with their regime.

The revolution that was sparked in Tunisia has given birth to a new pan Arab-movement, a “neo-Arabism”, which privileges freedom and democratic participation of the people over ideology, sectarianism and the interest of dictators.

As we witness a rebirth of a revolutionary neo-Arabism that has infected millions from Morocco to Bahrain, we cannot ignore the birth-place of the original pan Arab movement of the past century – Syria.

• • •

A forty year old red line has been crossed and there is no turning back.

Torturing our intelligence

Reading the media hullabaloo about Made in Canada torture - Tuesday's big exposé followed by Thursday's big retraction - I have to wonder if they watched the same proceedings I did.

Appearing before the public safety committee on Tuesday, CSIS lawyer Geoffrey O'Brian testified that Canadian intelligence agencies would make use of information obtained by torture from foreign agencies in the "one-in-a-million" eventuality that "lives were at stake".
In fact, said O'Brian, who has been with CSIS since its inception in 1984, "we would be bound to do so."

Under further questioning from aghast committee members, he admitted that agencies often "have no idea under what conditions info received from foreign agencies is obtained" and "just because a country has a questionable or even abysmal human rights record does not mean info received from them is necessarily extracted by torture".

That would be the old don't ask, don't tell Syria defence. CSIS Director Jim Judd gave that very same defence about intelligence from Syria on Arar back in November 2006.
So are we still trading info with Syria and Egypt? Yes we are, but now "with caveats".

The committee members pressed on : "What Canadians want to hear is that we do not condone the use of information derived from torture."

O'Brian :

"I would love to give you a simple answer. The simple answer is that we will never use info from torture. I cannot say that because recipients of info do not know how that info was obtained. I can say we do not knowingly" - and he stressed this again -"knowingly use info extracted by torture."

Huge resulting stink in the Star, G&M, and CBC.

Then yesterday CSIS Director Jim Judd and Public Safety Minister Peter Van Loan went before the same public safety committee to spin this sucker clarify. Judd :

"I think it's unfortunate that Mr. O'Brian may have been confused in his testimony. He will clarifying that via a letter to this committee. I know of no instance where such information has been made use of by our service."

and

"He [O'Brian] ventured into the hypothetical. In the past we used information received obtained by torture. Such information is not to be relied upon. We've changed our policies. Our policy now is under no circumstances do we condone the use of torture for any reason."

Judd went on to explain that the intelligence agencies are directed in this policy by the federal government.
Ok, that seems pretty straight forward, right?

Next up - Public Safety Minister Peter Van Loan responding to Bloc MP Mourani - italics mine :

"We do not condone the use of torture in intelligence gathering and our clear directive to our law enforcement agencies and intelligence services is that they are not to condone the use of torture, practice torture, or knowingly use any information obtained by torture."

Uh oh.
And here's the relevant quote from O'Brian's "clarification" letter - again, italics mine :

"I wish to clarify for the committee that CSIS certainly does not condone torture and that it is the policy of CSIS to not knowingly rely upon information that may have been obtained through torture."

Uh oh. Anybody see any difference between Tuesday's "confusion" and Thursday's clarification"? Because I don't.
As O'Brian points out, if we have no clue how the info we get is obtained, we're free to go ahead and use it. And this would presumably be just as true on Thursdays as it is on Tuesdays.

I'd also like to point out that the RCMP got a completely free ride here in the media coverage.
In his opening statement to the commitee on Tuesday, RCMP spokesman Gilles Michaud rejected the use of torture as repugnant and the information obtained thereby as unreliable, but explained the RCMP position on the use of intelligence obtained from foreign agencies :

"I want to be clear here - there is no absolute ban on the use of any information by the RCMP."

Uh huh.
O'Brian lost control of the spin there for a moment here - and that's all that happened.

Cross-posted at Creekside

Syria to let in U.N. nuclear investigators

Reuters : "The U.N. atomic watchdog chief said on Monday Syria would let in top inspectors to examine allegations of a secret nuclear reactor."

... which seems somewhat rash on Syria's part.
Isn't this usually followed up by being invaded by the U.S.?

Just in case the world wasn't complicated enough...

Let's start the Cold War with Russia all over again.

Via Cernig this report on the prospect of the Russian navy re-establishing a permanent presence in the Mediterranean.

"The Mediterranean Sea is very important strategically for the Black Sea fleet," head of the navy Admiral Vladimir Masorin said yesterday.

"I propose that, with the involvement of the Northern and Baltic fleets, the Russian Navy should restore its permanent presence there."

Buoyed by huge oil revenues and with President Putin showing increasing assertiveness, Russia has been boosting military spending.

At the same time, it has been using diplomacy to broaden Moscow's sphere of influence, especially in the Middle East, and a Russian force would further this cause.

However, it would mean sharing Mediterranean waters with the US Sixth Fleet - whose home base is in Italy - and this could further exacerbate recent tensions between the two.

Well, that's just deja vu all over again. The raison d'etre of NATO is starting to rise on its hind legs.

"It has been the dream of our admirals for a long time to restore our naval greatness and keep the task force we had under the Soviet Union," said military expert Pavel Felgenhauer.

Old habits die hard.

It has not been revealed where the fleet would be based, but the most likely option would be reviving the Tartus base.

"We still maintain a naval station in Syria but that has been mostly standing empty because, after the break-up of the Soviet Union, the naval task force was withdrawn," said Mr Felgenhauer.

Actually, the Russians have been accused of rebuilding their old Soviet-era port facilities in Tartus. Last year Moscow vehemently denied that accusation.

But they have also been busy building facilities at Latakia, Syria, according to the late Russian reporter Ivan Safronov. Late? Oh yeah. He "fell" from a fifth floor window of his apartment building in March after exposing a litany of serious problems within the Russian military and security service. The Kremlin didn't really like him all that much.

A part of the motivation to develop bases in the Mediterranean is the fact that the base they lease from the Ukraine, in Sevastapol, has a limited life-span. The Ukraine has insisted that Russia abide by the bilateral agreement which would see the Russian navy evicted in 2017.

Now, before you jam that paper bag over your mouth, keep in mind the Russian fleet isn't really very big - at the moment. When the Soviet Union collapsed, so too did the Soviet navy. In terms of surface ships, the Russian navy has fewer major surface combatants than the British. But that's changing.

Russia, as its wealth from oil production increases, has expanded its defence spending and has embarked on new ship-building programs. It has also started to refit and re-commission ships which have been laid-up.

Being positioned in the Mediterranean will, no matter what anyone in the Pentagon says, upset the balance of power in the region. The renewed chuminess with Syria will undoubtedly cause the Israelis to go into short fits. Further, based on Russian domestic requirements, being permanently in the Med makes little or no sense unless Putin has a desire to revive Russian influence in the Middle East.

Putin may feel his hand is being forced on this one. His admirals have long been advising that George W. Bush's imperial adventure in Iraq and his sabre-rattling over Iran are cause for concern. The US has embarked on a course of military conquest and the Russian admirals have been pressing to at least meet the US 6th Fleet (Mediterranean) head on.

Is George W. Bush concerned? That's doubtful. He'll be out of office before he's able to figure out what's going on. It will be up to the next president to revive this little document.

Urban Legends, Modern Folklore, or just another Snow job?

The White House press briefing by Tony Snow contained this little remark yesterday: (Emphasis mine)

Also, I want to address kind of a rumor, an urban legend that's going around -- and it comes from language in the President's Wednesday night address to the nation, that in talking about Iran and Syria, that he was trying to prepare the way for war with either country and that there are war preparations underway: There are not. What the President was talking about is defending American forces within Iraq and also doing what we can to disrupt networks that might be trying to convey weapons or fighters into battle theaters within Iraq to kill Americans and Iraqis.

Then there was this:

Q: Everyone from the President on down has said that this depends on the cooperation of the Iraqis. And yet, to date, nothing has been heard from al Maliki, as far as I know. He's declined to endorse this, though invited to do so. There's no expression of enthusiasm over there.

MR. SNOW: Well, no, that's not true. As matter of fact, the Prime Minister, as I pointed out, on Wednesday he talked in a very forward-leaning direction about going after militias, and he mentioned the Sadrists by name. On Thursday he mentioned Muqtada al Sadr. I'm sorry, that -- yes, Wednesday and Thursday. Then yesterday, his press spokesman, in the weekly briefing, talked about the fact that they have been working with the Americans and that as the plan moves forward it is in concert with the Iraqi government. But there's also another --

Q But he's declined to speak about it.

MR. SNOW: No, and I'm glad you raise that, because that's urban legend number two of the day. And I think some news organizations that have reported this are prepared now to issue corrections.

He did not decline. He was never scheduled to make comments about it yesterday. It was his spokesman's normal weekly briefing. And somehow that has been reported or misreported as the Prime Minister not showing up for a briefing.

Ah yes. When a major shift in military disposition in one's own country by an occupying force is announced, one does not make a speech unless it was already on the calendar. To do otherwise is the stuff of modern folklore. Then:

Q Sure, but wouldn't you think that under the circumstances, with all of the rollout that's gone on here, that you would want the principal ally to endorse this in the most public and positive way?

MR. SNOW: You know, you've got an interesting political dynamics. You can turn it around and say the Iraqis have made clear their support.

By not coming out with a two sentence line endorsing Bush's ridiculous plan, that is viewed as support.

OK, all you penis enhanced warbloggers out there. Here's one for you. Your subjugated spousal unit goes to the hair dresser. She returns and asks, "How do you like my new hair style?" You say nothing. Tell me how that works for you.

Digby takes on Urban Legend number one. Go read.