On Dec. 17, two days after the U.S. military cased its colors and formally ended its mission in Iraq, the brain trust of the Iraqi oil sector gathered for a symposium at Baghdad’s Alwiyah Club, a fortified concrete complex of meeting rooms and outdoor gardens. They were officially meeting to discuss “Challenges Facing the Development of the Extractive Industry.” The issues they grappled with held the prospect to transform the global energy marketplace and determine the course of Iraqi democracy.

A few top government officials sat on a dais while members of the audience — about 150 parliamentarians, technocrats, and academics — took turns at a podium, giving short speeches and asking questions of the panelists. Speakers often had to yell to be heard over the objections of audience members. A bit of shouting was to be expected: This was the first time in years that Iraqis were gathering without a foreign military occupation to outline their economic future. And in a country where 95 percent of government revenue comes from oil, any debate about oil is also a struggle for power. They addressed the most fundamental questions: How much oil should Iraq produce? What should happen to the revenue? Who should control the country’s oil strategy? You wouldn’t have known it by the volume of the rhetoric, but a lot of the talk was moot.

Much has already been decided. In 2009, the government started awarding contracts for the country’s largest fields, and the biggest names in oil have signed up. Companies like ExxonMobil and BP have invested billions of dollars, bringing the latest in technology and engineering expertise. Production has rebounded from just over 1 million barrels per day after the invasion to nearly 3 million today. Baghdad’s 11 international oil contracts promise to deliver a total of more than 13 million barrels per day within seven years — a figure that would make Iraq the largest oil producer, ever.

There are good reasons to doubt these projections. For one thing, the current political crisis has underscored Iraq’s failure to build the kinds of institutions — a credible judiciary, non-politicized security forces — that support a stable, functioning, democratic state. Even if Iraq weren’t plagued by daily bombings and political dysfunction, it would be hard-pressed to achieve what would be the most rapid oil expansion in world history.

Yet if the investment bonanza can even partially succeed, it promises to reshape not only Iraq but also the regional balance of power. Falah al-Amri, director of the State Oil Marketing Organization, showed the audience at the Alwiyah Club a PowerPoint presentation with figures that he had quoted to his Gulf counterparts at a recent OPEC meeting. By 2014 or 2015, he said, the country would reach the magic number of 4.5 million barrels per day of oil production, at which point OPEC would start trying to enforce quota restrictions.

Amri vowed that Iraq would negotiate hard for a larger national quota. He also provided a clue to the government’s contracting strategy, which appears to recognize that oil is a source of not only revenue but also geopolitical power.

“Our plan is not to flood international markets. This is not our goal. If we have a spare 2 or 3 million barrels per day, then so be it,” Amri said. He later clarified to me that he thinks Iraq will have this “swing capacity” — that is, the ability to drastically increase production on short notice — by 2017.

Saudi Arabia is currently the world’s only so-called “swing producer,” with an already-developed capacity that far exceeds its current production. This status gives the kingdom enormous power. If any other producer falters — if, say, rebels in the Niger Delta blow up a pipeline or Iranian oil is shut in by an embargo — the world economy depends on the Saudis to open the taps and keep prices from rising too high. This Saudi leverage also keeps its OPEC associates in check: Other cartel members can’t stray too far from their production quotas, lest the Saudis flood the market with a punitive deluge of crude, driving down everyone’s prices and profits.

Amri’s presentation contained the seeds for the disruption of this power dynamic. If Iraq develops 2 million or 3 million barrels per day of swing capacity, which is roughly what Saudi Arabia claims to have, OPEC will suddenly have a second enforcer. That could pave the way for a regional rivalry between Saudi Arabia and the Shiite-led Iraqi government. Relations between the two are already in the doldrums, as Saudi leaders have characterized Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki as an Iranian puppet and continue to refuse to send an ambassador to Baghdad. Their worries are not unfounded. Maliki is no puppet, but he has taken dramatic steps to consolidate power by pushing aside all his major Sunni-backed rivals; as a result he is increasingly dependent on a Shiite political base with deep ties to Iran.

But though the geopolitical implications of Iraq’s efforts to become an energy giant are dizzying, they will only become a reality if the country can meet Amri’s ambitious projections. And there’s no guarantee that the country can overcome the daunting challenges facing its oil industry.

Iraq has already come a long way. A Western oilman recently recalled for me the sorry state of Iraq’s oil sector shortly after the 2003 invasion. He had just arrived in the southern port city of Basra to get a key field back up and running, and he found that after decades of sanctions and underinvestment, some critical equipment was literally held together with duct tape. Thankfully, Iraqi engineers were experts at improvising improbable solutions, and after weeks of work, everyone was confident that the field could restart production.

“It’s time to light the flare,” the oilman announced.

In most modern facilities, when you need to burn off certain byproducts of crude oil production, you press a button on a control panel and ignite a flare atop a metal chimney. But in Basra, where no such mechanism existed, it was a slightly riskier proposition — and the responsibility for the task sparked a shouting match among the more junior Iraqi workers.

After a long argument, the Iraqis drew straws. The loser wrapped a wet T-shirt around his head, held a flaming torch in the air, and, crouching low, crept toward the chimney, which was hissing with invisible, flammable gases. When he got close enough, the air burst into a giant fireball and the man ran screaming back to his cohort, who doused him with water and laughed at his singed body hair. Soon after, the Western oilman introduced a slightly more modern ignition device: a flare gun, which could be fired from a safer distance.

Iraq’s oil sector has matured since then, but that kind of crazy improvisation remains a defining characteristic. Bureaucratic hurdles also continue to hobble the oil industry’s development. For several months in 2011, for example, many top Western oil company officials couldn’t enter the country because their visas took months to process. Amazingly, the government was preventing them from doing the work it had contracted them to perform. The problem turned out to be a simple backlog: In a bureaucracy that functions through the authority of only a few strong leaders, the visa applications had to travel all the way to the prime minister’s office for approval. Iraq’s current atmosphere of political crisis offers little hope that Maliki will relax his tendency to micromanage and govern through just a handful of loyal subordinates.

Similar delays have affected almost every aspect of companies’ operations: They have had problems getting paid on time; Oil Ministry officials have been slow to sign off on plans and subcontracts; and customs officials have held up the delivery of key equipment while waiting for authorization. One Western executive told me recently about a particularly troublesome holdup — a shipment had been waiting for weeks at the border, he said, and now they were running low on essential supplies, including ammunition for their flare guns.

It’s not just the facilities that are badly in need of modernization: The legal infrastructure for Iraq’s oil industry is also held together by the political equivalent of duct tape.

Shatha al-Musawi, a former member of parliament and one of the speakers at the Alwiyah Club, knows firsthand the murky legal foundations of Iraq’s oil sector. She had been the plaintiff in a 2009 lawsuit that challenged the legality of BP’s contract for the Rumaila oil field in Basra — the world’s second largest, which now produces about half of Iraq’s crude. Musawi’s complaint centered on the fact that the Oil Ministry had not submitted the Rumaila contract to parliament for approval, as Iraqi law appears to require. Instead, Maliki’s government unilaterally approved the Rumaila deal — and all subsequent contracts — without the legislative branch. Musawi’s case was a quixotic fight against this power grab.

“There is not a strong legal basis for these contracts,” Musawi said. “There is not any intention to build a new state, a democratic state.”

The Iraqi Constitution calls for a modern oil law, but political dysfunction has prevented one from being passed. In a country where petroleum is power, any law that dictates the structure of the oil industry is also bound to define the state itself. And in a political arena dominated by fear and identity politics, nobody wants to share power. In recent debates, the sides have split along largely ethnic and sectarian lines: Maliki’s Shiite-majority allies have backed centralized control of oil, while parties representing the minority Kurds and Sunnis say local governments should have more authority. No bill has yet survived parliament.

The Rumaila deal, Musawi argued, represented a textbook executive end-around. By commissioning billions of dollars’ worth of investment, the Maliki administration was creating irreversible facts on the ground. Parliament could not pass a law that would invalidate major contracts because that would scare away future business — and Iraq needs foreign investment for its reconstruction. Instead, future legislators would have to retrofit any new law to account for the existing contracts.

This is how governance works in Iraq: Strong leaders take action in the name of necessity when democratic bodies fail to function. As a result, the people in power have few incentives to compromise and many reasons to undermine public institutions. The Rumaila case, for example, was not allowed to proceed. Iraq’s highest court, which has made several suspiciously favorable rulings for the prime minister, said Musawi would have to pay a $250,000 court fee just to bring the case to trial. Unable to raise the money, she was forced to drop the suit.

Political power dynamics have determined the course of Iraq’s oil development far more than legislative policymaking. That volatility, however, hasn’t dissuaded oil multinationals — there’s simply too much oil under the country’s soil. So, many companies, from BP to ExxonMobil to Shell to Lukoil, have been willing to invest billions of dollars without the stability of a modern oil law. Companies have mitigated their risks by negotiating contracts that rely on international arbitration to settle major disputes, rather than Iraqi courts. But the overarching reason companies can operate with some confidence is that — in the laissez-faire political economy of Iraqi oil — their power rivals that of the divided Iraqi state.

Iraq’s oil powers are split between two governments. After the U.S. invasion, the semiautonomous Kurdistan region in the north grew fearful that the new government in Baghdad would, like Saddam Hussein, use economic power to oppress them. Kurdistan’s minister of natural resources, Ashti Hawrami, led an aggressive strategy to develop an independent oil sector, signing contracts without the central government’s consent. He divided Kurdish territory into a grid of several dozen exploration blocks and, over the past decade, has signed a whopping 48 oil and gas contracts.

To leaders in Baghdad, this looks like an affront to Iraqi nationalism. The most forceful objections have come from Hussain al-Shahristani, one of Maliki’s most powerful allies, who became oil minister in 2006 and now serves as deputy prime minister for energy. He argued that without a centralized system to manage oil, competing interests would tear the country apart along geographic, ethnic, and sectarian lines. He insisted that Baghdad should have sole authority over contracting and condemned the Kurdish deals as illegal.

Due to Iraq’s vague constitution and incomplete regulatory structure, it’s not clear which side has the legal upper hand. It’s certainly an urgent question. One of the George W. Bush administration’s biggest reconstruction benchmarks for Iraq was to pass an oil law, and U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad spent months brokering negotiations. In 2007, a draft oil law passed the cabinet, and Khalilzad published a triumphant op-ed in the Washington Post proclaiming “the prospects for passage are excellent.” But negotiations soon died in parliament. There were many reasons for the failure, but the single biggest was the rivalry between the Arab majority in Baghdad and the Kurdish government. The final nail in the coffin came on Sept. 8, 2007, when Kurdistan signed a contract with the U.S. firm Hunt Oil, whose chairman, Ray Hunt, sat on Bush’s Intelligence Advisory Board. The definitive American influence, it turned out, was wielded not by the U.S. Embassy but by a private company.

Shahristani had to respond to this show of the Kurdish government’s growing clout. He also had to start generating the kind of revenue that could fuel Iraq’s reconstruction, with or without an oil law. One sure way to do both was to bring in even bigger companies to develop the vastly larger fields in southern Iraq. In October 2009, Shahristani signed a deal — without parliamentary approval — with oil giant BP to rehabilitate the Rumaila oil field. Then came ExxonMobil, with a contract for the 8.7 billion-barrel West Qurna Phase 1 field. Those two fields hold more proven oil reserves than the entire United States has, and if the terms of just those massive contracts are met, Iraq will reach more than half of Saudi Arabia’s current production before the end of this decade.

Shahristani’s contracting spree was driven at least in part by political motives, and his ambitious projections could easily run aground on some harsh practical realities. For one thing, if Iraq’s fields were to increase production any further right now, the oil would have nowhere to go. There aren’t enough pipelines, storage tanks, refineries, and export terminals. Iraq is building many of these facilities, but probably not fast enough for the production rates that the state is now contractually obliged to support.

Nor is it clear whether world markets could stand so much new supply. If Iraq were actually able to increase production to the unprecedented height of 13 million barrels per day within seven years, the price of oil would likely drop just as steeply. Not only would this destroy Iraq’s profit margins, but it would also provoke dangerous levels of anger from nearby producers such as Saudi Arabia and Iran, both of which possess superior military power.

Worst of all, perhaps, Iraq has lost full control of its production strategy. The deals don’t just require the companies to boost production aggressively — they require Iraq to pay for the contracted volumes. If the companies hold up their end of the bargain, but the government has to make cuts for any number of reasons — infrastructure constraints, market pressures, or OPEC politics — Iraq could be forced to pay companies for oil they’re not producing. As the gatekeeper of the world’s third-largest oil reserves, Shahristani is hardly powerless to renegotiate these deals. Still, the contracts do surrender a remarkable degree of economic sovereignty for a government still struggling to formalize its own powers.

One dramatic expression of Iraq’s declining power over the oil giants came on Oct. 18, 2011, when ExxonMobil signed a massive exploration deal with the Kurdistan region. The move directly violated Shahristani’s policy of unitary authority. In past cases, Shahristani punished oil companies for signing with Kurdistan by blacklisting them from his contracting auctions. But now, with ExxonMobil pumping more than one-tenth of Iraq’s crude from the West Qurna Phase 1 field, the government found itself with much less leverage. (ExxonMobil has not acknowledged any contract with Kurdistan and has declined to comment, though multiple officials in the Kurdish and central governments have confirmed the deal.)

Baghdad is now left with two bad options. It could banish ExxonMobil, risk a loss of production, and probably provoke a lawsuit that would stoke the anxiety of other investors. The more likely scenario is that the federal government will seek some sort of compromise that will eventually validate some of the contracting powers Kurdistan has already claimed.

Nevertheless, Kurdistan isn’t likely to win the complete autonomy that it desires anytime soon. Baghdad continues to hold two trump cards. First, it controls the pipeline network to the Mediterranean port in Ceyhan, Turkey, through which any large-scale exports must travel. Second, it controls the sale of oil and the collection of export revenues — and therefore the flow of money from oil sales back to both Kurdistan’s budget and its contractors. Hawrami, the natural resources minister, has suggested that he wants to increase Kurdish oil exports from their current level of about 175,000 barrels per day to 1 million barrels per day within five years. For that to become a reality, he needs a deal with Maliki and Shahristani.

Indeed, a truce between Kurdistan and Baghdad could be in the works. When Maliki visited Washington in December, he met privately with Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson. One of Maliki’s advisors, speaking anonymously, confirmed to me that Maliki asked Tillerson to “freeze” the Kurdish contracts. The advisor said the government is proposing a quid pro quo: If all parties agree to a new oil law, then Baghdad will endorse a mechanism to recognize ExxonMobil’s Kurdish contracts. Maliki is essentially trying to borrow ExxonMobil’s new leverage with the Kurds, asking the company to pause its new deal in order to force the Kurds into a grand oil bargain. This could be a pragmatic solution that uses ExxonMobil’s influence with both governments to reconcile the two sides. But, assuming it would even work, this plan would transform the oil giant into one of three main parties, alongside the federal and Kurdish governments, that shape the country’s oil sector.

ExxonMobil is hardly to blame; Iraq is simply too divided to realize its potential strength.

If the state were functioning well, then politicians and technocrats would fight their battles within policymaking bodies and through private debates. On the international stage, they would speak with a single voice to the oil majors and neighboring countries. Such a unified front would help Iraq enormously. Its negotiating power would rise and likely its production too. This kind of successful policymaking would probably look something like the passionate arguments at the Alwiyah Club — and indeed, many of the speakers there pointed out that, with strong institutions and a dose of compromise, everyone would benefit.

But this isn’t how it works today. In the arena of Iraqi identity politics, leaders don’t trust each other — often for good reasons — and power looks like a zero-sum proposition. Such perceptions can be self-fulfilling. For the oil sector, the dysfunction of the government has already set projects back; ExxonMobil’s willingness to risk its relationship with Baghdad is one sign of well-informed pessimism. As we look ahead, the atmosphere of crisis and improvisation seems unlikely to break, and the outlook for Iraqi production seems uncertain at best. But in a fledgling country where everyone is still jockeying for power, this much is still clear: Oil is king.

Conferenza dibattito con Fabio Ghioni
IL LATO OSCURO DELLA RETE – La sfida di Ulisse oggi: varcare il virtuale

6 Marzo 2012 ore 16.30-19:00
Corso Vittorio Emanuele II, 349. Roma

Tutto quello che avreste voluto sapere su Internet ma … non sapete a chi chiederlo. Nell’incontro a Roma con Fabio Ghioni, promosso dall’Ucsi, Unione stampa cattolica del Lazio, il 6 marzo, si accenderanno i riflettori sulla parte “in ombra” della rete, aprendo orizzonti di riflessione sui meccanismi del mondo web. La rete è sconfinata per contenuti ma soprattutto è inesplorata nei suoi meandri tecnici e nelle modalità di gestione.

​Il punto è che la sua zona oscura ai più potrebbe per certi versi incidere sulla vita di ognuno di noi più della zona “illuminata” della navigazione senza limiti di luogo o di tempo. Per dirla con Leopardi, anche il web ha le sue ‘magnifiche e progressive sorti’ che giustamente incantano appunto per magnificenza e per senso del progresso ma che non possono rimanere inesplorate. Chi gestisce i dati che immettiamo ogni giorno sui social network è solo uno degli interrogativi che generalmente non ci si pone pur vivendo l’amicizia virtuale per ore al giorno. Ma si può scoprire che non è una domanda da poco. Inoltre: che cosa comportano gli aggiornamenti continui dei service provider? Solo miglioramenti tecnici? Che cosa comunicano le macchine quando autorizziamo l’aggiornamento? Ancora: quale margine di sicurezza è possibile nell’utilizzo delle reti Wi-Fi? Per non parlare dei virus che permettono di tramutare qualunque computer in un computer spia, cosiddetto Zombie, che trasmette ogni tipo di dato a un pc terzo. Se ci sono margini di difesa, ne abbiamo una pallida idea?

​E poi c’è l’interrogativo degli interrogativi: Internet è destinata a rimanere terra di nessuno dove la legislazione non potrà mai nulla perchè non ci sono confini fisici e dunque si annullano le giurisdizioni? E’ possibile un controllo di Internet? O meglio: quanto è doveroso pensarne uno, visto che la criminalità organizzata e il terrorismo apprezzano la magnificenza della rete tanto quanto cittadini e istituzioni? Ma si può  studiare un controllo della rete senza cadere nel tabù di uso distorto di alcuni poteri, a partire dalla banale censura? Ma a questo proposito ci si dovrebbe chiedere: ora che ci gloriamo della libertà di Internet, siamo consapevoli dei limiti di questa libertà? Ognuno di questi interrogativi ne può aprire altri e soprattutto può dare vita a un dibattito. Ed è quello che scaturirà dall’incontro di Ghioni con alcuni giornalisti e alcuni esperti ma anche con chi vorrà seguire e intervenire.

​Per tutti c’è la sfida che il mondo virtuale pone. Con la consapevolezza che Ulisse è sempre nell’animo umano. Nell’antichità, l’Ulisse di Omero sfidava e veniva sfidato dai confini fisici tra noto e ignoto. Nel Medio Evo l’Ulisse di Dante “sconfinava” inseguendo la conoscenza tra vizi e virtù dell’animo. Poi nel ’900, l’Ulisse di Joice: spinto dalla stessa brama di conoscenza ma sui “confini” tra conscio e inconscio. Oggi  Ulisse è sfidato sempre sul solito terreno della conoscenza ma nella zona in ombra tra reale e virtuale. Tra il pochissimo che sappiamo della rete e lo sconfinato e intangibile molto che non sappiamo.

Fausta Speranza

Dharamsala (AsiaNews) – To celebrate the Lunar New Year, in Tibet, Beijing has sent about a million Chinese flags and tens of thousands of portraits of the leaders of the party, with the order to display them in Buddhist temples, schools and places of public meeting. In addition, dennounces Phayul, the new deployment of 20 thousand Chinese Han is about to begin in the high planes: they must “teach the Tibetan love for the motherland.”

After the 16 self-immolation of Buddhist monks and the different manifestations bloodily suppressed, the Chinese central government seems to have decided to try the path of Maoist propaganda. Some analysts had pinned hopes on the new Communist secretary of the zone, Chen Quanguo, but this material shows that the policy of “9 obligations” remain in force.

This policy consists of a list of objects that all places of worship and education must display: among them, the flag, portraits of leaders and a copy of the People’s Daily. According to the Tibetans, however, it is a violation of their identity and an insult to their religion: many, some sources say, challenge the government and do not put these objects on display.

Of greater concern however, is the Communist leaders sending 20 thousand Han into Tibetan villages. According to Beijing’s orders, these will remain in the area for at least a year to “teach love for the motherland” and “bring to reason back to the Tibetans minds.”

The comments by the official, James R. Clapper Jr., the director of national intelligence, in prepared testimony to the Senate Intelligence Committee, came as tensions between the United States and its allies with Iran over its nuclear program have escalated, with the United States trying to build support for increased sanctions against Iran.

Other intelligence officials indicated that while there was no evidence of other Iranian plots in the United States, Mr. Clapper’s remarks were intended to put both the Iranians and the American intelligence community on notice that high priority would be given to ferreting out information about possible plans to stage attacks in this country.

Mr. Clapper said that the suspected assassination plot “shows that some Iranian officials — probably including supreme leader Ali Khamenei — have changed their calculus and are now more willing to conduct an attack in the United States in response to real or perceived U.S. actions that threaten the regime.”

He said the United States was also concerned about plotting by Iran against American or allied interests overseas, adding that “Iran’s willingness to sponsor future attacks in the United States or against our interests abroad probably will be shaped by Tehran’s evaluation of the costs it bears for the plot against the ambassador as well as Iranian leaders’ perceptions of U.S. threats against the regime.”

The written statement did not provide any details on what types of attacks Mr. Clapper thought were possible, and senators did not ask him about it during the panel’s annual session to review global threats to the United States.

The session was the first such hearing since the death of Osama bin Laden last May, and Mr. Clapper used the opportunity to say that sustained pressure from the United States and its allies will probably reduce Al Qaeda’s remaining leadership in Pakistan to “largely symbolic importance” over the next two to three years as the terrorist organization fragments into more regionally focused groups and homegrown extremists.

Flanked by senior intelligence officials from throughout the government, Mr. Clapper also noted the rising volatility in the Middle East and North Africa after the popular uprisings of the Arab Spring, increasing threats of cyberattacks against government and private business computer systems, continued tensions with North Korea over its nuclear program and rising drug-fueled violence in Mexico and Central America that threatens to spill over the border.

As American diplomats step up their efforts to broker a peace deal with the Taliban and other militants to end the war in Afghanistan, Mr. Clapper also defended the administration’s discussions of preliminary trust-building measures, including a possible transfer of five Taliban prisoners from Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

Senator Saxby Chambliss, a Georgia Republican who is the committee’s vice chairman, signaled Congressional opposition to the plan, which administration officials have said would not release the prisoners outright but transfer them to authorities in Qatar, where the Taliban are setting up an office to hold political talks. “We should not transfer these detainees from Guantánamo,” Mr. Chambliss said, citing American intelligence assessments warning of the risks the prisoners posed.

Mr. Clapper acknowledged that the Taliban remained “a resilient, determined adversary” and underscored that any deal involving prisoners would hinge on “where these detainees might go and the conditions in which they would be controlled or surveilled.”

As Taliban leaders debate whether to fight or cut a deal, the death of Bin Laden has severely weakened a Qaeda leadership that was already reeling from the death or capture of several other top leaders. The losses have forced the organization to rely more heavily on affiliates in such places as North Africa, Iraq and Yemen, as well as individual “lone wolf” extremists in the United States.

Intelligence officials say that continued pressure by the United States and its allies — including drone strikes, efforts to dry up terrorists’ financing and campaigns to counter extremist recruiting propaganda — are likely to fragment this already decentralized movement.

“As long as we sustain the pressure on it, we judge that core Al Qaeda will be of largely symbolic importance to the global jihadist movement,” Mr. Clapper said in his opening statement.

Of all the affiliates that have sprouted up over the past decade, intelligence analysts say that the Qaeda arm in Yemen, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, poses the greatest immediate threat to the United States. Mr. Clapper said that the death last September of Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born cleric who was a top propagandist and operational planner for the Yemen affiliate, “probably reduces, at least temporarily, A.Q.A.P.’s ability to plan transnational attacks.”

Over all, Al Qaeda has struggled to keep pace with events unfolding as result of the Arab Spring, Mr. Clapper said, warning, however, that “prolonged instability or unmet promises of reform would give Al Qaeda, its affiliates and its allies more time to establish networks, gain support and potentially engage in operations, probably with less scrutiny from local security services.”

The domestic instability in Syria could potentially escalate into regional crises, and American intelligence officials were wary on Tuesday of being pinned down on how long the government of President Bashar al-Assad could survive and what would replace it if it fell.

“It’s a question of time before Assad falls, but that’s the issue; it could be a long time,” Mr. Clapper told senators. “The opposition continues to be fragmented.”

David H. Petraeus, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, said the opposition had shown increasing resilience in the face of stepped-up attacks by Syrian military forces in suburbs of Aleppo and Damascus. “It has shown, indeed, how substantial the opposition to the regime is and how it is, in fact, growing and how increasing areas are becoming beyond the reach of the regime’s security forces,” he said.

Hopscotching around the world in his remarks, Mr. Clapper singled out Iran for special attention in both his opening comments and a more detailed written statement.

He reiterated the American intelligence assessment that “Iran is keeping open the option to develop nuclear weapons, in part by developing various nuclear capabilities that better position it to produce such weapons, should it choose to do so.”

He added, “We do not know, however, if Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons.” The United States also faces evolving cyberthreats from nations like Russia and China, as well as nonstate entities. Robert S. Mueller III, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, said his agency was beginning to reorganize to combat this. “Down the road, the cyberthreat, which cuts across all programs, will be the number one threat to the country,” he said.

Nearly a dozen senior administration officials, including the homeland security secretary, Janet Napolitano, are scheduled to brief senators on Wednesday about the latest cyberthreats and American responses.

By Eric Schmitt

Had the satellite Rosat remained aloft for just seven more minutes, it would have landed into a metropolis of 20 million people.

The consequences of chunks of the 2.5 ton satellite falling into the city would have been catastrophic – huge craters, shattered fuel lines, explosions, wrecked buildings and countless human casualties in the Chinese capital.

The European Space Agency asserted that it was ‘perilously close’ to hitting Beijing at nearly 300 mph.

The satellite would have re-entered the atmosphere at a much higher speed, but the friction of the atmosphere slows satellites as they descend – burning them up and tearing them to pieces, the Daily Mail reported.

“Beijing lay directly in the path of its last orbit,” said Manfred Warhaut of the European Space Operations Centre in Darmstadt, Germany.

But scientists had no means of controlling it once it went out of business miles above the earth.

“Our calculations showed that, if Rosat had crashed to the ground just seven to 10 minutes later, it would have hit Beijing,” said Heiner Klinkrad, head of the ESA’s Space Debris team.

An impact ‘was very much within the realm of possibility,’ added Klinkrad.

Rosat went aloft on June 1, 1990 when launched into orbit from Cape Canaveral on a mission to look for the sources of X-ray radiation. (ANI)

China National News

On Jan. 5, President Obama unveiled a new defense strategy in general terms,
de-emphasizing nation-building land wars such as those in Iraq and
Afghanistan in favor of a strategic shift that focuses on East Asia and the
Western Pacific. This budget-driven strategy has shortcomings and will
result in increased risk for our nation.

The Obama administration and Congress agreed last year on $450 billion in
military budget cuts through 2021. This was on top of $350 billion in
weapons programs already cut. The military services face the potential of
another cut of $500 billion to $600 billion starting next January under
“sequestration.” Needless to say, such cuts would be devastating to our
military. As past administrations have done, Obama officials are trying to
capitalize on an illusory “peace dividend,” which history has shown to be
shortsighted.

The strategy glosses over the fact that while Arab Spring uprisings in the
Middle East are still in a state of flux, Islamists have clearly achieved
control through the democratic process. Furthermore, there is no resolution
to Iran’s drive to achieve a nuclear weapon capability. Iran’s latest
threats to close the strategic Strait of Hormuz cannot be dismissed and must
be factored into any threat equation. Nonetheless, a plan to address China’s
unprecedented, rapid military expansion affecting the strategic balance in
the Western Pacific is a necessity.

Since 2002, China has been using our involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan to
promote its own long-term objectives. Clearly, one of their objectives is to
weaken our alliances with Japan and South Korea as well as our mutual
defense treaty with the Philippines and our mandate to protect Taiwan. China
in the near-term wants to dominate the Pacific out to the first island
chain, which includes Taiwan and Japan and, eventually, the second island
chain, which includes Guam. Such aggressive action by China had led some
analysts to believe nations in the Western Pacific are slowly being
“Finlandized.” They have a point.

China’s rapid military buildup goes well beyond what they claim to be
necessary for defense of the homeland. As part of its naval expansion
program, China conducted the first sea trial of its aircraft carrier, which
it purchased from Ukraine in August and probably will not be operational for
another two years. By 2020, however, China could have a constant presence of
three to four carriers in the Western Pacific.

China’s development of an anti-ship ballistic missile (ASBM) is clearly
designed to target our aircraft carriers and other major ships. Furthermore,
there are alarming indications that China may be equipping a new submarine
class with ASBMs, which raises the potential for major U.S. ships to be
“bracketed” with both land- and sea-launched ASBMs. This capability is part
of their anti-access/anti-denial strategy, which is designed to prevent the
United States from coming to the aid of Taiwan and other allies in a crisis
situation.

Statements by Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Michele Flournoy during
her visit to China in December that we do not consider China an “adversary”
do a disservice to U.S. objectives. Of course, China has become an adversary
by its own conduct and threatening military expansion program, which clearly
targets the U.S. Navy. The Chinese should be told in unambiguous terms they
are on a dangerous course that could lead them into unchartered waters.

As a stopgap measure, the Navy is developing long-range drones to launch
from carriers, but this will not be sufficient for “forcible entry” in any
direct conflict. Unfortunately, the restarted DDG-51 Arleigh Burke
destroyers do not have the capability to counter China’s new ASBMs. The
Advanced Missile Defense Radar is key to providing such a capability, but
its initial operational capability is estimated to be 2021 or 2022. The Navy
plans for it to be incorporated in the preferred surface combatant for the
future, the upgraded DDG-51 Flight III hull. Notwithstanding a recent
Government Accountability Office report, which severely questioned the
limited analysis used by the Navy for selecting the DDG-51 hull for the
future, the fleet needs a ballistic missile defense capability now.

Putting aside the future hull’s design, the ship that currently has the
basic capability to counter an ASBM threat – be it launched from land or a
submarine – is the Zumwalt-class destroyer. Using more than $11 billion in
research and development, it was built from the keel up to be stealthy and
is the only hull designed with the space, weight, cooling and power margins
sufficient to grow efficiently into a ship providing a simultaneous
ballistic and cruise missile defense capability in any environment. Its dual
band radar will need to be restored with modified computer codes to support
ballistic missile defense. Its missile launch system will also need to be
modified to accommodate the SM-3 missile.

Regretfully, a decision has been made to limit the production of this 21st
century surface combatant to only three ships, because of cost
considerations. The Navy has embarked on a questionable shipbuilding
program, the Littoral Combat Ship, which is fitted with mission modules that
have yet to be successfully developed. With current and future budget cuts,
the Navy cannot afford to waste taxpayer dollars on a ship that essentially
has no real war-fighting capability. The Littoral Combat Ship program should
be canceled as soon as contractually feasible. The funds saved should be
invested in modifying the current three Zumwalt-class destroyers to provide
the necessary “gap filler” ballistic missile defense capability. There are
less expensive, proven designs that could meet the Navy’s need for low-end,
multirole ships.

Retired Adm. James A. Lyons was commander in chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet
and senior U.S.military representative to the United Nations.

By Adm. James A. Lyons

Logging into an account associated with a residential internet service provider (such as Comcast or AOL), an activity that could simply indicate that you are on a trip, is also considered a suspicious activity.  Viewing any content related to “military tactics” including manuals or “revolutionary literature” is also considered a potential indicator of terrorist activity.  This would mean that viewing a number of websites, including the one you are on right now, could be construed by a hapless employee as an highly suspicious activity potentially linking you to terrorism.

The “Potential Indicators of Terrorist Activities” contained in the flyer are not to be construed alone as a sign of terrorist activity and the document notes that “just because someone’s speech, actions, beliefs, appearance, or way of life is different; it does not mean that he or she is suspicious.”  However, many of the activities described in the document are basic practices of any individual concerned with security or privacy online.  The use of PGP, VPNs, Tor or any of the many other technologies for anonymity and privacy online are directly targeted by the flyer, which is distributed to businesses in an effort to promote the reporting of these activities.

Gang members are using police scanner smartphone apps to listen in on secure law enforcement radio transmissions. It’s a tactic officers say could give criminals an unfair advantage and a means to avoid capture.

Criminals can choose from around 20 scanner apps, including iScanner, 5-0 Radio Police Scanner and PoliceStreamFree, which allow them to eavesdrop on secure police channels, according to the “Criminal Use of Police Scanner Apps,” a Dec. 9 warning from the Maryland Coordination and Analysis Center (MCAC).

Counter Terrorism Studies www.APUS.eduEarn an Online Counter Terrorism Studies Degree. Flexible Courses.Is He Cheating On You? Spokeo.com/Cheating-Spouse-Search1) Enter His Email Address 2) See Hidden Social Profiles & Pics Now!Get Rid of Your Timeshare GiveBackTimeshare.comGuaranteed exit program. No upfront fees. A+ rating by the BBB.Ads by Google
The snooping technology has already hit the streets: In one incident, the MCAC warning says, “officers pursuing a suspect on foot overheard the suspect listening to the pursuing officers’ radio transmission over a smartphone.”

Criminals are also keeping abreast of official emergency activity by using RadioReference.com, a free website that streams law enforcement channels and is searchable by country, state, metro area, city and ZIP code.

[Cop Car's Computer Hacked by Security Researcher]

These tech tools put cops in serious danger, the MCAC said, and could potentially compromise an officer in the field.

“A criminal who is able to listen to law enforcement radio transmissions in near-real time could use the information to further their criminal activity, hide criminal activity, assist in a get-away, gain investigative information or set up an ambush position,” the memo said.

The founder or RadioReference.com, Lindsay Blanton, spoke to the security firm Kaspersky Lab and refuted the police’s assertion that his site’s streaming audio is being used by gangs to monitor tactical law enforcement operations.

“The reality is that each feed we provide has a delay of 30 to 45 seconds,” Blanton said, adding that a delay of that length is an “eternity in a foot pursuit.”

RadioReference relies on more than 3,000 volunteers worldwide to capture and stream feeds, Blanton said, but prohibits the rebroadcast of public safety transmissions that are hosting tactical police operations.

Blanton admitted to Kaspersky Lab that some operators don’t continuously monitor the content they are rebroadcasting, and that RadioReference “can’t do much if law enforcement sends out tactical information over their normal dispatch channels.”

“We have a very promising technology to guide small projectiles that could
be fully developed inexpensively and rapidly,” researcher Red Jones said.

Jones, Brian Kast and their colleagues have invented a dart-like,
self-guided bullet for small-caliber, smooth-bore firearms that could hit
laser-designated targets at distances of more than a mile, or about 2,000
meters, a statement from the laboratory said.

A tiny light-emitting diode (LED) attached to a self-guided bullet at Sandia
shows a bright path during a nighttime field test that proved the battery
and electronics could survive the bullet’s launch.

Researchers have had initial success testing the design in computer
simulations and in field tests of prototypes, built from commercially
available parts, Jones said.

While engineering issues remain, “we’re confident in our science base and
we’re confident the engineering-technology base is there to solve the
problems,” he said.

Sandia’s design for the four-inch-long bullet includes an optical sensor in
the nose to detect a laser beam on a target. The sensor sends information to
guidance and control electronics that use an algorithm in an eight-bit
central processing unit to command electromagnetic actuators, the lab
statement said. These actuators steer tiny fins that guide the bullet to the
target.

Most bullets are shot from rifles with grooves in the barrel that causes the
bullets to spin so they fly straight. But Jones said to enable a bullet to
turn in flight toward a target and to simplify the design, the spin had to
go. The bullet flies straight due to its aerodynamically stable design,
which consists of a center of gravity that sits forward in the projectile
and tiny fins that enable it to fly without spin, just as a dart does, he
said.

Computer aerodynamic modeling shows the design would result in dramatic
improvements in accuracy, Jones said. Computer simulations showed an
unguided bullet under real-world conditions could miss a target more than a
half mile, or 1,000 meters, away by 9.8 yards–9 meters, but a guided bullet
would get within 8 inches–0.2 meters–according to the patent.

The four-inch-long bullet has actuators that steer tiny fins that guide it
to its target. Plastic sabots provide a gas seal in the cartridge and
protect the delicate fins until they drop off after the bullet emerges from
the firearm’s barrel.

The prototype does not require a device found in guided missiles called an
inertial measuring unit (IMU), which would have added substantially to its
cost. Instead, the researchers found that the bullet’s relatively small size
when compared to guided missiles “is helping us all around. It’s kind of a
fortuitous thing that none of us saw when we started,” Jones said.

As the bullet flies through the air, it pitches and yaws at a set rate based
on its mass and size. In larger guided missiles, the rate of flight-path
corrections is relatively slow, so each correction needs to be very precise
because fewer corrections are possible during flight. But “the natural body
frequency of this bullet is about 30 hertz, so we can make corrections 30
times per second. That means we can overcorrect, so we don’t have to be as
precise each time,” Jones said.

Testing has shown the electromagnetic actuator performs well and the bullet
can reach speeds of 2,400 feet-per-second, or Mach 2.1, using commercially
available gunpowder. The researchers are confident it could reach standard
military speeds using customized gunpowder.

Researchers also filmed the bullet with high-speed video radically pitching
as it exited the barrel. The bullet pitches less as it flies down range, a
phenomenon known to long-range firearms experts as “going to sleep.” Because
the bullet’s motions settle the longer it is in flight, accuracy improves at
longer ranges, Jones said. “Nobody had ever seen that, but we’ve got
high-speed video photography that shows that it’s true.”

Potential customers for the bullet include the military, law enforcement and
recreational shooters.

In addition to Jones and Kast, Sandia researchers who helped develop the
technology are: engineer Brandon Rohrer, aerodynamics expert Marc Kniskern,
mechanical designer Scott Rose, firearms expert James Woods and Ronald
Greene, a guidance, control and simulation engineer.

Sandia National laboratories is operated by Sandia Corp., a Lockheed Martin
[LMT] unit for the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security
Administration.

Ann Roosevelt

By Rohan Gunaratna

THE YEAR 2012 will be a crucial year in the global fight against insurgency, terrorism and ideological extremism. The global economic downturn has led the United States, backbone of the global counter-terrorism effort, and other governments to scale down counter-insurgency and counter-terrorism budgets. With the US-led coalition preparing to withdraw from Afghanistan in 2014, following the withdrawal of US forces from Iraq last year, the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan is likely to deteriorate.

Although the core leadership of the global terrorism movement, Al Qaeda, was decapitated by the killing of its leader Osama bin Laden in May 2011, Al Qaeda’s ideology and its clones in West Asia and the Middle East still present a real threat to societies and governments. The US withdrawal from Iraq, leaving behind an unfinished conflict, and its intention to withdraw forces from Afghanistan, had emboldened the international terrorists and extremists, who view both as defeat for the US.

Four significant developments

The year is likely to see four significant developments in the multi-dimensional threat: i) self-radicalised homegrown terrorists will eclipse the threat posed by traditional terrorist groups operating out of fragile and failed states; ii) continuing and likely escalation of terrorism and insurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan; iii) expansion and escalation of the tribal and sectarian insurgencies in Yemen and Somalia; and iv) displacement of the terrorists from the Maghreb in North Africa to the Sahel in West Africa.

The global threat landscape is influence by the tempo of attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan, the signature battlefields. Despite the ending of the US mission in Iraq, terrorism presents the preeminent challenge to the security and stability of Iraq and beyond. The Al Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State of Iraq (ISI) conducted a wave of bombings against government and Shia targets in Baghdad last December. With Iraqi forces incapable of maintaining security Iraq is likely to face a high level of terrorist attacks with heavy casualties in the coming year. Like Afghan veterans, Iraq veterans will seek targets beyond the Middle East; like the Iraqi-Swede who killed himself in Stockholm in December 2010, other Iraq veterans will conduct attacks in the West.

Insurgent and terrorism groups in and around Afghanistan, empowered and inspired by the US withdrawal from Iraq, will want to attack the seat of power, Kabul. The announced withdrawal of US-led forces from Afghanistan in 2014 has created conditions favourable to the Taliban insurgents and Al Qaeda terrorists. The international community’s effort to negotiate with the Taliban in 2012 is likely to fail. Regional powers like Iran, Pakistan, India and China however, will watch and influence developments in their favour. Operating in an environment of high threat, Iraqi and Afghan forces will need long-term international support to face the challenge of insurgency and terrorism.

Arab Spring

Across the Middle East and North Africa the Arab people’s uprisings against dictatorial regimes have created opportunities for the Islamist organisations. While Western intervention in Libya created an unfavourable condition for terrorist groups in the Sahel the resultant proliferation of weapons and trained fighters present a new scale of threat in the region. The unstable environment created is likely to detriorate, culminating in insurgencies unless international assistance helps to stabilise both regions and the countries where the Arab Spring brought about regime change.

Elsewhere the spread of the terrorism threat is being facilitated by the growing incidences of fragile and failed states and ungoverned spaces, together with the increasing migration of displaced and desperate people. Though the core of the Al Qaeda leadership has been decapitated the ideology and propaganda of the terrorist organisation continue to be disseminated by means of electronic media and the Internet, providing radicalisation and online training to the Muslim diaspora. That in turn seeds the threat of self-radicalisation among vulnerable groups and individuals.

Even though terrorist groups face difficulties in mounting cross-border operations because of increased security measures by governments in the West, attacks by self-radicalised individuals and cells are on the rise. Given the failure or neglect of governments to counter terrorist ideology, the world will see a steady rise of terrorist incidents by self-radicalised individuals. If radicalisation of vulnerable populations is not prevented it will be difficult to manage the global threat of terrorism and extremism.

Intermittent terrorist attacks

International neglect of geopolitical conflicts has resulted in an escalation of global insecurity and the threat of insurgencies and terrorism. The continuing and growing instability in Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan and Pakistan will threaten international security. Terrorism will remain the first order of threat to the US, Europe and their friends. Although the threat is manageable all the major powers, China, Russia and India will continue to suffer from intermittent terrorist attacks in the coming years.

In an age of persistent conflict the threat to aviation, maritime and land transportation remains significant. Suicide attacks and remote-controlled bombings as well as unconventional means of attacks will be mounted by terrorists. While physical security measures can deter the threat counter-terrorism operations and community engagement strategies are also essential to reduce the threat.

Rohan Gunaratna is Professor and Head, International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR), at the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University. An earlier version was published in The National Interest.

Written by: RSIS

di Emma Evangelista, Da Il Punto

All’aeroporto militare di Herat ci attende la nostra scorta per condurci nel cuore nevralgico di quello che è l’Afghanistan italiano: RC-West. Una sigla che racchiude tutti gli sforzi militari, logistici e umanitari per un Paese dilaniato da trentacinque anni di guerra, fame, contrabbando e povertà assoluta. Il territorio è impervio e in questo periodo dell’anno le temperature scendono di parecchio sotto lo zero, è anche per questo che le azioni di rappresaglia contro gli stranieri si limitano di molto: la guerriglia serrata è rinviata alle stagioni più miti, quando dai campi di papavero a Sud, nell’area del Gulistan, partono i convogli dei contrabbandieri diretti verso le raffinerie in Turkmenistan e Pakistan. Un viaggio da Sud verso Nord lungo il territorio Italiano, quello messo in sicurezza dai militari dell’Isaf sotto il comando del Generale Luciano Portolano. Qui siamo nell’anno 1433 dell’Islam in una terra ancora divisa da interessi tribali, di cui nei secoli hanno approfittato tutti. I Russi arrivarono qui fino al confine Nord, dove ora a Bala Murghab c’è l’ultimo avamposto italiano, e lì furono fermati dagli stenti, dal freddo e dalla resistenza di un popolo caparbio che conduce quella che oggi definiremo una guerra asimmetrica: armamenti improvvisati, bombe, esplosivi e attacchi a sorpresa. Queste sono le armi degli insurgent che non sono in grado di affrontare un attacco frontale contro le truppe addestrate e armate della coalizione, ma riescono a metterle in difficoltà con attacchi mordi e fuggi. A Sud, invece, dove oggi ci sono gli avamposti di Lavaredo, Ice e Snow, fino al 14 marzo sotto il comando del Reggimento San Marco agli ordini del comandante Panebianco, ci sono ancora i resti dell’ultimo fortino inglese. Il glorioso reggimento di Sua maestà si barricò nel deserto in tipiche costruzioni locali di fango e argilla che oggi sono usate dalle squadre cinofile italiane per gli addestramenti delle mute. Una situazione, quella afghana, in continua evoluzione con la prospettiva della transizione che nel 2014 dovrebbe vedere il ritiro delle truppe militarizzate e il passaggio totale del controllo del territorio alle autorità locali. Per quel che riguarda le operazioni italiane, al comando di Herat ci spiegano che ‘procedono a passo spedito’ e siamo addirittura in anticipo sugli step da raggiungere per la transizione: le cosiddette aree in sicurezza si allargano ogni giorno e tra qualche mese anche il Prt (project recostruction team) verrà reincorporato nella base per lasciare ai locali la gestione effettiva della ricostruzione. L’aeroporto civile, costruito interamente con 750 mila euro sarà pronto per il 31 gennaio. La popolazione ha accettato la presenza dei militari e collaborano per poter riemergere seppure con mille contraddizioni. Qui la famiglia è il fulcro della società: i figli sono la ricchezza maggiore, anche se la prospettiva di vita è di massimo 47 anni. Le donne invece, sono relegate al ruolo di mogli e madri, chiuse nei loro burqua azzurri, recluse per venti anni a scontare i suicidi dei mariti senza un processo e allo stesso tempo, con l’avvento del nuovo regime, si arruolano come soldatesse, agenti segreti e diventano governatrici delle province. Un Paese dove la corruzione dilaga anche se ufficialmente viene contrastata, dove ufficialmente si favorisce la riconversione delle colture: si estirpa l’oppio per piantare zafferano, in realtà un esperimento che tale rimane solo sulla carta visto che la droga è sempre la prima fonte di introito del Paese ed insieme ai dazi doganali, la sola. Un paese a cui la task force Grifo, gli specialisti della Guardia di Finanza, ha restituito la prima copia di un codice civile e penale scritto in dari, pashtun e inglese con la raccolta di tutto il diritto vigente in Afghanistan. Un uppercut all’orgoglio americano e ai giuristi made in Usa che in questi anni non sono riusciti a ricomporre a loro immagine ‘il modello di legalità afghano’, che peraltro per quel che riguarda il codice militare assomiglia molto a quello americano con una struttura simile al JAG.

DESTINAZIONE BALA
A Herat ci sono i militari della Brigata Sassari che ci accompagnano nel nostro viaggio attraverso la provincia di RC-West; si parte verso Nord: direzione Bala Murghab, ultimo avamposto sulla strettissima gola montuosa della valle del Murghab, il valico più pericoloso e trafficato dove la tensione è ancora molto alta e bonificato, per così dire, solo negli ultimi due mesi.
Lungo la strada che porta alla cop di Mono, uno degli ultimi avamposti italiani sul confine col Turkmenistan, al passaggio del convoglio i ragazzini si affollano ai lati della strada. Sono vestiti con gli abiti tradizionali, tuniche di lana cotta e pantaloni voluminosi sui quali, a volte, appaiono piumini smunti e troppo leggeri per poter far fronte alla rigidità del clima invernale del continente. Hanno visi che raccontano il melting pot di secoli di colonizzazioni e incroci. Gridano, incitano cercano in ogni modo di richiamare l’attenzione. Che vogliono? “acqua”, ci spiega Tamara, la soldatessa sulla ralla, “a volte gli tiriamo qualche bottiglietta”, naturalmente senza mai fermare il convoglio, non si sa mai una piccola distrazione, anche un gesto umanitario potrebbe mettere in discussione la sicurezza dell’intera pattuglia. L’ultimo attentato su questa strada c’è stato solo una settimana fa, era un ordigno improvvisato. Gli italiani da queste parti sono ben accettati dalla popolazione, anche per i piccoli gesti di umanità, ma la sicurezza non può essere compromessa, gli insurgent sono sempre in agguato e, non avendo forza e mezzi per affrontare un attacco strutturato e frontale sfruttano i momenti di debolezza. Qui l’acqua è preziosa: le malattie come il colera, o una semplice dissenteria sono letali, anche se il medico del campo ci spiega che gli afgani sono ancora puri dagli antibiotici per cui se presi in tempo anche dosi da neonato sono efficaci. Ma le medicine sono merce rara e i medici anche, giornalmente alle porte carraie si presentano tanti bambini e uomini, ma anche donne che chiedono assistenza. Hanno vinto la vergogna, si siedono accucciati, nel tipico modo tribale e aspettano con dignità, che i dottori li aiutino. La causa maggiore dei decessi, qui, sono gli incidenti domestici, oltre alle malattie esantematiche ed endemiche e, naturalmente alla malnutrizione.
La terra è brulla ed impermeabile per coltivare l’orto c’è bisogno di creare pozzi artificiali da cui attingere ed irrigare. Gli afghani si limitano, a volte, a scavare intorno al piccolo appezzamento domestico delle grandi buche per la raccolta, mentre sempre più spesso gli Helder, i signori i capi tribù, dei villaggi trattano con l’esercito per chiedere la costruzione di pozzi artificiali. Questa è un’operazione che i militari italiani definiscono quick operation, possono realizzarla con un budget autonomo dalle progettazioni globali e strutturate dei PRT e che costano grossomodo  2000 euro, per una struttura che pesca acqua a 40 metri di profondità. Un pozzo significa acqua, acqua significa sopravvivenza per uomini e animali domestici. L’unico caso registrato di azioni contrarie è stato l’attentato delle donne di un villaggio la cui unica occasione per uscire di casa era quella della raccolta dell’acqua. Private di questa opportunità fecero saltare il pozzo appena costruito. Caso raro, solitamente gli helder, ossia i capitribù, chiedono, e tanto, ad ogni incontro con le autorità offrendo in cambio ‘collaborazione’. La tendenza della popolazione, infatti, è quella di denunciare i tentativi di sabotaggio nei confronti dei militari. Arrivati dopo un viaggio di un’ora e quaranta, per percorrere tredici chilometri, dalla Fob di Bala Murghab all’avamposto di Mono, incontriamo anche il proprietario del terreno affittato ai militari per costruire il fortino italiano. Siamo a 1200 metri d’altitudine da qui si controlla l’area del confine, c’è un piccolo manipolo di uomini, la dotazione è quella pesante e tecnologica: oltre alle armi e ai blindati ci sono i piccoli droni che garantiscono la visuale di un ampio tratto di terreno intorno al campo. Mentre nelle basi grandi la sicurezza del perimetro è affidata a quello che i militari chiamano ‘il grande fratello’ ovvero i PGGS, dirigibili che permettono un rilevamento ottico di un raggio di 30 km, e che ufficialmente si occupano del servizio meteorologico; qui c’è solo un aereoplanino telecomandato che all’occorrenza viene lanciato per la ricognizione aerea. Un giocattolino da svariate migliaia di euro utilissimo per il controllo delle aree a rischio, che ha dei piloti specializzati ai radiocomandi.

PROFESSIONE INTERPRETE
Il comandante Luigi Viel, colonnello del 151 esimo reggimento della Brigata Sassari,  ci spiega che la popolazione cerca di collaborare e ci permette di avvicinarci all’interprete: è un ragazzo poco più che ventenne che ha frequentato il college inglese di Herat. È per così dire un cittadino, uno dei pochi, parla un inglese corrente e pulito e traduce in dari e pastuhn per la Task force north da circa due anni. L’etnia è fondamentale, l’appartenenza alla tribù determina la qualità del rapporto tra le parti, gli altri interpreti che sono a Bala non sono così istruiti, e sono tutti di tribù diverse. Kaled  rispetta gli italiani che aiutano il suo Paese, ma pensa che prima o poi dovranno ricominciare a ‘camminare da soli’ e lui finita la ‘guerra’ vorrebbe tornare a fare il musicista suonando gli strumenti classici indiani. Gli interpreti sono le figure chiave della ‘collaborazione’, parola che non si può usare, bandita dai locali che preferiscono parlare di cooperazione.
“La situazione – racconta Shammammoud – è molto migliorata da otto mesi a questa parte, più o meno da quando l’area è stata messa in sicurezza dalle interforze dell’Isaf. “Adesso c’è una speranza ,  crediamo che i militari di Isaf siano qui per aiutare il popolo afghano, non per occuparci”, confessa alle telecamere il piccolo proprietario terriero dopo essersi assicurato che il filmato non sarebbe stato diffuso in patria. E gli italiani? “Aiutano la popolazione, non la uccidono” ci viene risposto “abbiamo un feeling con loro”.

CAMPI D’OPPIO
Tornati a Herat ci si reca nel piccolo mercato domenicale che i locali allestiscono nella base. Vendono tappeti, prevalentemente fatti oltreconfine con manodopera locale. Coi militari fanno affari, specie con gli americani. Con gli italiani il rapporto è diverso: onorano l’antica arte berbera della contrattazione. Il viaggio continua verso Sud. Nella Fob Lavaredo, il deserto circonda gli uomini del battaglione San Marco, il black hawk americano che ci trasporta, atterra su grandi teli stesi sulla sabbia sottile, alzando un gran polverone. Marinai in mezzo al deserto, sotto il comando del capitano di vascello Panebianco, un gruppo i militari scelti, molti dei quali veri e propri veterani con alle spalle almeno una dozzina di missioni. Anche qui i rifornimenti da Herat arrivano dopo molti giorni di viaggio. L’area è particolarmente calda, soprattutto a qualche centinaio di chilometri, nella cop Ice, che si trova al ridosso delle coltivazioni d’oppio, nell’area ancora sotto il controllo USA. Tra qualche mese il San Marco tornerà a casa e si avvicenderà con i Bersaglieri, sarà il mese di marzo e l’oppio sarà già in fiore, partiranno i convogli dei contrabbandieri e faranno a ritroso il nostro stesso viaggio, diretti verso nord. La Lithium e la Bronze, le arterie che percorrono la RC-West, saranno il teatro di tanti fermi, perché. È ovvio, che quello che viene bloccato qui non arriva in Europa: droga, armi, tecnologie e uomini disposti a tutto. Anche per questo la transizione potrà essere completa solo quando il governo Afghano, le loro forze di polizia e il loro esercito sapranno davvero cavarsela da soli e mettere un freno alla violenza e al contrabbando, per ora stanno imparando, anche e soprattutto dagli italiani.

BOX 1
L’INTERVISTA / AL GENERALE MOHAIUDDIN GHORJ
“LAVORIAMO SPALLA A SPALLA CON VOI E VI RISPETTIAMO PERCHÉ CI AIUTATE”

HERAT – Saliamo sui blindati: giubbotto antiproiettile ed elmetto, usciti dalla base velocemente e con molta attenzione percorriamo la high way one, verso la base militare dell’ANA (Afghanistan national army), l’esercito regolare. Nella base le differenze tra i nostri militari e quelli afghani si notano subito, dall’armamento al portamento ogni particolare sottolinea lo scarto. Il generale ci attende e come ogni militare ama la puntualità, anche perché è giovedì, per il mondo islamico giorno prefestivo, ci riceve prima di pranzo, poi sarà di riposo per santificare la festa. Lui è Mohaiuddin Ghorj, capo di Stato Maggiore dell’ANA (Afghanistan National Army). Con noi, guida d’eccezione e passpartou per poter raccogliere l’intervista, ci sono il colonnello Paolo Fabbri, a capo dell’OMLT (Operational Mentoring and Liaison Team), il progetto Isaf di favorire lo sviluppo dell’esercito nazionale afghano, e il colonnello Vincenzo Lauro, portavoce del Regional Command West e, naturalmente l’immancabile interprete dari. La transizione è una data vicina: 2014, ma è una speranza più che una certezza. La situazione deve ancora essere normalizzata e stabilizzata, a questo contribuiscono le forze dell’Isaf.
Generale come sono percepita dalla popolazione l’esercito afghano e le truppe della coalizione e come sono i rapporti tra voi militari?
La popolazione è contenta  che ci siano ANA e che lavori con ISAF. C’è un aumento della credibilità nell’esercito nazionale da parte degli afghani. Collaboriamo con le truppe della coalizione che contribuiscono all’addestramento dei nostri militari e per quel che riguarda la lotta agli insurgent ora è e la popolazione stessa che avvisa le forze armate di trappole esplosivi e ordigni artigianali piazzati per uccidere, poi insieme alle forze della coalizione le disattiviamo. Lavoriamo shona ba shona (spalla a spalla nella lingua dari). Abbiamo il massimo rispetto di coloro che lavorano con noi, non ci interessa di che nazionalità siano, siamo coscienti che lo fanno per aiutare il nostro Paese e che come noi sono militari e per questo restano lontani da casa anche durante le vostre feste di Natale e Capodanno. Il collega italiano con cui condivido quotidianamente la vita militare, con cui esco in pattuglia, con cui faccio briefing costanti è Marco Crimi (comandante della 2brigata con sede a Farah) lui per me è la Tigre italiana.
La leva in Afghanistan è su base volontaria? Perché i giovani si arruolano?
Gli arruolamenti sono esclusivamente su base volontaria e il fermo è di tre anni. I ragazzi vengono reclutati  attraverso un’agenzia specifica e la prima cosa viene controllata la veridicità dell’età che dichiarano: devono aver compiuto 18 anni. Il fenomeno a cui stiamo assistendo è il notevole aumento delle domande per la riconferma dell’arruolamento dopo il primo triennio. Lo fanno principalmente per una motivazione economica, infatti lo stipendio medio di un militare è di 250 euro, un introito sicuro (quasi il doppio di un manovale) che permette di mantenere le famiglie. Inoltre si assiste negli ultimi tempi a un fenomeno di contro-immigrazione: molti emigrati stanno tornando indietro. Non sono riusciti ad integrarsi in altri Paesi e tornano in Afghanistan. Alla fine, però, possiamo dire che fare il soldato può anche piacere. Ci piace pensare di  poter cacciare a calci il nemico dalla nostra terra.
Già, i nemici, ma chi sono i vostri nemici?
Bella domanda, diciamo che noi combattiamo tutti coloro che armati attaccano noi, il nostro governo e il processo di pace. Comunque trattiamo con umanità i nemici, li trattiamo come soldati, abbiamo un codice penale e affidiamo alla giustizia i detenuti. Per farle un esempio durante una della festa di eid al adha  (festa del sacrificio ndr) abbiamo distribuito dei pacchi dono e uno di questi è stato consegnato anche ad un detenuto per dimostrargli che anche lui ha dei diritti civili.
Nell’esercito afghano ci sono anche delle donne, come vengono considerate?
Sì abbiamo delle soldatesse, medici e parametrici e un’ufficiale della sezione intelligence: una delle più valenti risorse del gruppo, per ora l’unica che ricopre questo ruolo, ma speriamo possano essercene altre. Nell’esercito come in politica (Maria Bashir, Procuratrice Capo per la Provincia di Herat ndr) le donne ricoprono ruoli chiave per merito.
L’oppio è la maggiore fonte di reddito per la popolazione, qual è la vostra politica in merito?
Purtroppo siamo consapevoli che la droga sia una piaga per la nostra società, soprattutto per i giovani. È una disgrazia vedere tanta gioventù afghana che si perde: a Kabul (lungo il Kabul River) c’è un ponte molto famoso dove i ragazzi vanno per comprare le dosi e drogarsi. Vedere questi ragazzi sconvolti dall’abuso di oppio è uno spettacolo doloroso. Se i nostri militari trovano i campi d’oppio si limitano a segnalarli ma non è nostro compito distruggerli o occuparcene.

BOX 2 l’Intervista / Edoardo Luzzi
UN ITALIANO TRA I Marines
“È STATA DURISSIMA MA CE L’HO FATTA”

Bakwa – Gira di ronda per la Fob (Forward Operation Base) di Lavaredo con il nome di ‘centurione’ che si è scelto in omaggio alle origini romane, è il ‘capoplotone’ di turno: occhiali e radio per comunicare con il cuore operativo della base, un ragazzo come tanti, un soldato che svolge le mansioni quotidiane ma è anche il vanto del reparto. Edoardo Luzzi è infatti l’unico militare italiano del Battaglione San Marco che negli ultimi anni sia riuscito in un’impresa storica: affermarsi primo tra i Marines americani al corso per il brevetto anfibi di Camp Pendelton in California.  Il sottotenente di Vascello però è un ragazzo semplice, non se la tira come dicono i suoi coetanei rimasti a casa, o come farebbero in tanti e i suoi commilitoni lo rispettano anche per questo, non solo per la sua impresa. È schivo e riservato, si sente un militare qualunque, ma per molti ha già il segno del comando, alcuni vedono per  lui un futuro roseo al ciomando di un battaglione, ma lui vorrebbe per ora solo continuare a comandare il suo plotone: “è sicuramente più divertente” confessa.

Sottotenente ci racconti la sua impresa.
C’è poco da dire, ho affrontato le selezioni e sono volato tra i Marines in California. Ci hanno selezionati e in base alle nostre caratteristiche più o meno simili ci hanno divisi in coppia. Sono riuscito ad arrivare alla fine del corso e sono arrivato primo. Le prove erano dure: 2 miglia di pinneggiata in oceano con 40 kg di zaino e vestiti con mimetica e muta, naturalmente da percorrere entro un tempo limite insieme al mio compagno. Oppure le prove con i lacrimogeni, sono state dure, così come i test dopo ore di privazione del sonno. Una prova veramente ardua è stata quella della corsa legata con l’elicottero: eravamo legati da una fune appesa ad un elicottero che improvvisamente durante la corsa ci sollevava, i problemi arrivavano quando ci rimettevano giù…se quelli davanti a te non cominciavano a correre si creava una frana umana….diciamo che è stato faticoso, ma ce l’abbiamo fatta.
Com’era il suo compagno?
Un ragazzo simpatico, molto bravo, tanto che si è classificato secondo (naturalmente) meritando l’appellativo di ‘Iron Man’.
Qual è la differenza tra un Marines e un Marò?
Nessuna, siamo ragazzi che credono in quel che fanno e s’impegnano al meglio ogni giorno. La differenza sta in come gli americani, la gente di strada vive questa nostra appartenenza ad un corpo militare. Le spiego: quando giravamo per strada in divisa in America le persone ci fermavano e ci ringraziavano per quello che stavamo facendo per loro. Sentono molto la vicinanza con i militari, ne sono orgogliosi. In Italia questo non sempre accade.
La Marina militare italiana è orgogliosa di Lei, e il Suo reparto?
Devo essere sincero, ho ricevuto un encomio semplice che mi ha fatto molto piacere, non me l’aspettavo, in fondo ho fatto quello che sentivo e in cui ho sempre creduto.
E la sua famiglia che ne pensa?
Sono orgogliosi, il momento più bello è stato quando mi hanno raggiunto per la consegna del diploma e della Pagaia. Ci tenevo molto che loro fossero con me ed è stato un bel momento.
Da piccolo voleva fare il militare?
Sì, finiti gli studi liceali mi sono arruolato in accademia. È stata dura per i primi tempi ma ho sempre voluto fare questo e la passione mi ha aiutato nei momenti più duri. Nella mia famiglia non ci son altri militari, è stata una passione nata e maturata in me coscientemente, gli unici racconti che ho potuto sentire erano quelli di mio nonno che durante la seconda guerra mondiale era fotografo sui caccia bombarideri e nemmeno i miei due fratelli hanno seguito la mia strada, per lo meno per ora.
Ha mai avuto voglia di mollare tutto?
No, magari è c’è stato qualche momento duro, soprattutto durante il corso in America in cui qualche dubbio, lo confesso, è potuto sorgere per la stanchezza, per lo stress fisico e psicologico, per l’allenamento duro, ma sono riuscito a superarli anche grazie allo spirito di corpo e ai miei compagni.
Qualcuno vede per lei un futuro roseo, magari al comando di un intero battaglione, anche presto, ma Lei a cosa aspira?
Per me la cosa più bella è, naturalmente, comandare il mio plotone ed assere fianco a fianco coi miei compagni in azione. Non aspiro a incarichi politici o ruoli che possano tenermi lontano da questo, ma quello che sarà non posso determinarlo, sono un militare e accetterò quel che mi viene chiesto di fare, dove e quando serve, naturalmente sempre per il mio Paese.

Una giornata di pratiche ed esperienza per sviluppare la comprensione come strumento di realizzazione verso La Vita Nuova.

Uno sguardo verso il Sentiero che conduce al centro, dov’è generata la Realtà, in uno spazio d’armonia, equilibrio, chiarezza, lontano dalle proiezioni mentali che nutrono la nostra tendenza a polarizzare la vita e l’esperienza.

Nessun conflitto sotto un unico cielo; solo la perfezione del Mondo.

ENOC – LA VITA NUOVA – una giornata di pratica esperienziale
Sabato 11 Febbraio – ore 14.00 Bassano Romano, Monastero San Vincenzo

Per informazioni e prenotazioni terra5project@gmail.com

oppure compilando il seguente modulo

MODULO DI RICHIESTA PARTECIPAZIONE ALL'EVENTO. (Specificare nome e data dell'evento nel testo del messaggio)

*(indica campo obbligatorio)

Nome: *

Indirizzo email: *

Oggetto: *

Messaggio: *

Codice CAPTCHA: *

Powered by Fast Secure Contact Form

It can be difficult to find death toll numbers if you do not know where to look and because of media and/or political bias.  The numbers below come from government sources/government related sources except for the very last set of numbers which came from a well trusted media sources (New York Times and Borderland Beat) that cited Mexican government numbers.  The takeaway from this chart that is the death toll numbers per year continue to increase as of late December 2011.

Mexican Death Toll Numbers:

December 2006 to December 2008 – 7000

2009 – 14300  (7300 for 2009 alone).

2010 – 27000 (13000 alone for 2010)

2011 – 47,515 (20,515 for 2011 alone)

Sources:  

McCaffrey, Barry.  After Action Report – General Barry R McCaffrey USA (Ret) VISIT MEXICO – 507 DECEMBER 2008. 29Dec08. http://www.mccaffreyassociates.com/pdfs/Mexico_AAR_-_December_2008.pdf; Accessed 25Jan12

Finklea, Kristin, William Krouse and Mark Randol.  Congressional Research Service:  Southwest Border Violence: Issues in Identifying and Measuring Spillover Violence.  25Jan11. http://opencrs.com/document/R41075/. Accessed 25Jan12.

Smith, Phillip.  Mexico 2010 Death Toll Higher Than Afghanistan. 3Jan11. http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/2011/jan/03/mexico_2010_death_toll_higher_af. Accessed 25Jan12.

Cave, Damien.  Mexico Updates Death Toll in Drug War to 47,515, but Critics Dispute the Data.  11Jan12. http://www.borderlandbeat.com/2012/01/mexico-updates-death-toll-in-drug-war.html.  Accessed 25Jan12

But the occupations of some of the judges revealed perhaps the main purpose
of the contest: helping the Chinese military develop weaponry to protect its
expanding maritime interests.

High-ranking officers of China’s air force were among the judges for the
contest for unmanned aircraft in autumn organized by the Chinese Society of
Aeronautics and Astronautics and other organizations.

It was the first such contest and was held at the Chinese Aviation Museum at
the foot of a mountain in the suburbs of Beijing. A total of 107
organizations, such as universities and military research institutions,
competed.

The aircraft, painted in such colors as red, yellow or military camouflage,
took off from a runway that was about a quarter of the size of the deck of
China’s first aircraft carrier, the Varyag.

Beijing, which is seeking reunification with Taiwan, is forging an “access
denial” strategy to prevent the United States from approaching waters around
China and intervening in potential conflicts between China and Taiwan and
other areas.

Two key parts of that strategy are unmanned aircraft and anti-warship
ballistic missiles called “aircraft carrier killers.”

“Unmanned aircraft are one of the arms that we put top importance on,” Wang
Qingzong, a vice director of the general planning division of the Chinese
military’s General Armaments Department, told The Asahi Shimbun. “At
present, our unmanned aircraft have not reached the levels of their U.S.
counterparts. So, we will make more efforts for their development.”

Around the same time of the contest, the International Aviation Exhibition
was held in Beijing, where a video on a computer attracted visitors,
including government officials and military officers from foreign countries.

The video showed a gray unmanned aircraft locating and collecting data on an
aircraft carrier of an enemy country. Anti-warship missiles were then fired
from the coast, splitting the aircraft carrier and sinking it to the bottom
of the sea.

The simulation apparently envisioned a battle with a U.S. aircraft carrier.

The video was created by China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp., an
affiliate of the Chinese military forces. The unmanned aircraft in the video
was the most advanced one produced by the organization.

“Unmanned aircraft will become the main force of jets placed on aircraft
carriers,” a Chinese military officer said.

The most advanced unmanned aircraft can elude radar detection, fly at
altitudes of about 10,000 meters and reach speeds of 600 kph. They can also
be armed with missiles.

When the Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force was keeping watch on the
Chinese Navy’s live-fire exercises in June last year, it found small black
planes flying around the frigates. They were new, unmanned reconnaissance
planes, and they appeared to be keeping watch on the moves of the MSDF.

The key sea area for China’s “access denial” strategy is the western Pacific
Ocean south of Japan.

Chinese military officials regard the line connecting Okinawa, Taiwan and
the Philippines as the “first line of islands.” They also stipulate that an
outer line linking Japan’s Ogasawara islands, Guam and Indonesia is the
“second line of islands.”

If an enemy’s vessel crosses the second line, Chinese military forces are
under instructions to destroy it before it reaches the first line.

Since 2010, the Chinese military has alternately dispatched warships of the
North Sea Fleet, based in Qingdao, and the East Sea Fleet, headquartered in
Ningbo, for exercises in the key sea area.

The area overlaps the activity zone of mobile troops of the U.S. Navy’s
aircraft carriers. Japan, an ally of the United States, also conducts naval
activities there.

On Dec. 1, 2011, four Chinese Navy vessels, including destroyers, were
sailing northwest about 100 kilometers east of Miyakojima island of Okinawa
Prefecture after completing their exercises in the western Pacific Ocean.

Japan’s Aegis-equipped destroyers monitored the Chinese vessels’ movements
while maintaining a distance of several kilometers from them.

According to officials of Japan’s Defense Ministry, the U.S. government knew
through its satellites around Nov. 20 that warships had departed from
Qingdao in Shandong province. It immediately conveyed the information to the
Japanese government.

The MSDF’s P3C surveillance planes and Aegis-equipped destroyers looked for
the Chinese vessels in the East China Sea, and found six Chinese warships,
including destroyers and frigates, from the North Sea Fleet.

They took photos of the Chinese warships in waters about 900 km southwest of
Okinotorishima island, which is under the jurisdiction of the Tokyo
metropolitan government.

The Chinese vessels were engaged in refueling exercises. Helicopters also
practiced take-offs and landings on the vessels.

Beijing strongly opposes Japanese observations of China’s warship
activities, particularly maneuvers involving Chinese submarines.

Japanese P3C surveillance planes scatter sonars to detect sound from Chinese
submarines. Using this method, one P3C can cover an area as wide as Shikoku,
one of the four major islands of Japan.

The Chinese Navy, which has about 70 submarines, has obtained sonars of
almost the same capabilities through “friendly countries,” and has been
studying methods to prevent its submarines from being detected by Japan.

Using ocean research ships, China is looking into the geological formations
of sea bottoms and other characteristics to find navigation routes where
submarines cannot be easily detected.

A Chinese military officer expressed concerns about the MSDF’s surveillance
planes.

“Their capabilities to detect submarines are extremely high. They are a
threat to our forces,” he said.

By Kenji Minemura, Correspondent

ISTANBUL, Turkey–Tehran has stepped up its bellicose warnings of conflict
in the Persian Gulf as potentially crippling new European Union and American
sanctions have been approved on Iran’s oil exports and central bank.

The US defied the warning of a top Iranian general this week and sent the
USS Abraham Lincoln ­ flanked by British and French warships ­ through the
Strait of Hormuz at the mouth of the Gulf. A senior Iranian lawmaker scoffed
that the US “did not dare” to send its ship alone, because of the danger
posed by the Islamic Republic. If Iran were to close the strategic waterway,
as it has threatened to do, the American aircraft carriers “will become the
war booty of Iran,” he declared.

Such bluster is not all talk. The US may outspend the Islamic Republic
nearly 90-to-1 on defense. But Iran, heir to ancient Persia’s naval
innovation, has a well-honed asymmetric strategy designed to reverse that
advantage.

A 2002 US military exercise simulating such a conflict proved devastating to
American warships.

Indeed, Iran can cause immense harm, analysts say, without ever directly
facing off against far superior conventional US forces. Even a few incidents
­ like mines laid in the Gulf, or Iran’s small-boat swarming tactics against
oil tankers or a US Navy ship ­ could raise fears of insecurity to
unacceptably high levels.

It could also have far-reaching economic consequences, including a spike in
oil prices, since roughly a third of all seaborne oil shipments pass through
the Strait of Hormuz ­ making it the single most important choke point for
oil tankers in the world.

“[Iran's] final aim is not to physically close [the strait] for too long,
but to drive up shipping insurance and other costs to astronomical heights ­
which is just as good, in terms of economic damage, as the physical closing
of the strait,” says a former senior European diplomat who recently finished
a six-year tour in Tehran.

“If you are not sure whether you will get hit, or if you get hit not by
conventional force but some wild boat that might float around in the sea ­
or a mine or two ­ that will create far more insecurity than a battle line
where the strait is closed,” he says.

And Iranian harassing tactics are just the start, he adds. Other layers
include artillery and rockets stationed at the Strait of Hormuz, Kilo
submarines, and mini-submarines from which divers can be sent out to damage
ships.

Many options short of full-blown war

Iran’s conventional military forces are often aging and of limited
capability. Iran spent just $7 billion on defense compared to America’s $619
billion defense budget in 2008, the latest year for which Iran’s data was
available, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research
Institute’s database.

Iran’s strategy of asymmetric warfare recognizes that, since the 1979
Islamic Revolution, Iran has little chance of winning any face-to-face
military contest with powerful enemies like the United States.

Instead, Iran aims to “exploit enemy vulnerabilities through the used of
‘swarming’ tactics by well-armed small boats and fast-attack craft, to mount
surprise attacks at unexpected times and places” which will “ultimately
destroy technologically superior enemy forces,” writes Iranian military
expert Fariborz Haghshenass in a 2008 study based on published doctrines of
the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

In any future fight, Iran would likely “avoid escalating the conflict in a
way that would play to US strengths in waging mid- to high-intensity warfare
­ by employing discreet tactics such as covert mine-laying, limited
submarine options, and occasional mobile shore-based attacks,” writes Mr.
Haghshenass, in the study for the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

In fact, Iran has many options short of a direct challenge in the Persian
Gulf.

“Iran could seek to create perpetual, low-grade instability in the strait,
mostly through asymmetric means, with the objective of making it an aquatic
‘no-man’s land,’ ” says Reza Sanati, in an analysis published by the Tehran
Bureau/PBS Frontline website. “For Iran, the choice is not ‘to close’ or
‘not to close,’ but rather to clog. A major global choke point, once
considered safe, would no longer be so.”

The US “would be drawn into providing the manpower and bearing the
exorbitant cost for removing the impediments,” adds Mr. Sanati, while the
risk of inadvertently sparking a war would “vastly multiply.”

Devastating result for US in war game

Iran’s asymmetric focus is no secret. It has sought to enhance deterrence by
claiming repeated triumphs during large military exercises, and by fielding
new hardware, from super-fast torpedoes and to kamikaze drones.

During the “Great Prophet V” exercise in April 2010, for example, the IRGC
Navy trumpeted the launch of a new “ultra-fast” watercraft that it claimed
was less detectable by radar. Across the shimmering Gulf waters, Iran
fielded 300 boats in a swarming attack, with commandos landing on one of the
target warships.

“The Strait of Hormuz belongs to the region and foreigners must not
intervene in it,” military spokesman Ali Reza Tangsiri said at the time.

That warning echoed the words of a ranking Iranian cleric in 2008 that the
“first shot” fired against Iran would turn the Israeli capital Tel Aviv and
the US fleet in the Persian Gulf into “the targets that would be set on fire
in Iran’s crushing response.”

More than a decade earlier, in 1997, then-IRGC commander Mohsen Rezaei said
“Iran will never start any war,” but if the US attacked first “we will turn
the region into a slaughterhouse for them. There is no greater place than
the Persian Gulf to destroy America’s might.”

Could Iran do it?

It would seem so, in light of a $250 million classified US war game called
Millennium Challenge 2002. The gaming scenario hypothetically pitted the
Blue Team (representing US warships) against a Red Team that launched a
coordinated assault using swarming boats and missiles ­ the kind of tactics
Iran might employ.

In the game, 16 American ships, including an aircraft carrier and most of
its strike group, were sunk before the exercise was suspended and the
parameters controversially changed to ensure a US victory.

The Red Team commander, Lt. Gen. Paul K. Van Riper, told the New York Times
in 2008, “The sheer numbers involved overloaded their ability, both mentally
and electronically, to handle the attack.² He said he had been inspired by
Marine Corps studies of the natural world, where everything from ant
colonies to wolf packs took on larger prey.

“It is not a matter of size or of individual capability, but whether you
have the numbers to come from multiple directions in a short period of
time,” said Van Riper.

Since then, American naval strategists have worked to overcome the
vulnerabilities of conventional warships to swarm tactics. One solution has
been a US Navy project to build a ³littoral combat ship² (LCS), designed to
operate at high speeds and close-to-shore, with shallow draft and capable of
launching helicopters, assault boats and submarines. Only two have been
built, the project plagued by delays and cost overruns.

The LCS fits Iran’s coastal waters and its methods, and is designed “to
counter growing potential ‘asymmetric’ threat of coastal mines, quiet diesel
submarines, and the potential to carry explosives and terrorists on small,
fast, armed boats,” according to the website www.naval-technology.com.

Iranian units given great independence

Iran also appears to have learned from the 2002 US exercise, just as it
learned from a 1988 incident during the Tanker War in the Persian Gulf, when
US forces sunk or damaged three Iranian warships in a single day, to
retaliate for an American ship hitting a mine.

Part of Iran’s strategy includes decentralized decisionmaking.

“The entire [IRGC] structure ­ if you look at how air defense is organized,
the land forces, the combination of the Basij [militia] and the [IRGC] ­
this is all geared toward what they call the Mosaic Strategy, where you have
individual military units who have a great deal of independence to decide
what they can do without referring back to the center,” says the former
European diplomat.

Haghshenass explains one way this could play out in the Gulf.

“In the naval arena, speedboats will be taken out of camouflaged coastal or
inland hide sites and bunkers, hauled on trailers to coastal release points,
and given mission-type orders that will not require them to remain in
contact with their chain of command,” he writes.

But Iran’s retaliation would not likely be limited to the strait.

“This is only one aspect of their deterrent strategy. Threats about Iraq and
Afghanistan… there is Hezbollah and Hamas they could activate,” says the
diplomat, referring to the militant groups active on Israel’s borders.
“There is a whole array of deterrent strategies they have put into place,
and the Strait of Hormuz is just one aspect. [T]hey have made it very clear
the last few years that they have this whole portfolio, and will use it all
in case of a military attack.”

Labyrinth of ports and ‘spiritual’ superiority

Historically, the fleets of ancient Persia sailed far afield, and in the
Mediterranean used “spy ships, disguised as foreign merchantmen and small
warships for clandestine operations,” notes Haghshenass’s analysis. Ancient
Persians, during the reign of Xerxes, “invented the concept of naval
infantry.”

The geography of Iran’s southern coastline hasn’t changed, and with 10 large
ports and 60 small ones ­ and an endless labyrinth of fishing villages,
inlets, and coves ­ it is ideal for staging the kind of hit-and-run and
stealth operations envisioned by the Iranian strategy.

With a daily transit rate of 3,000 boats and ships in the strait, US forces
could have trouble differentiating friend from foe, providing Iran with an
upper hand.

And Iranian commanders believe they have another advantage, if the rhetoric
about the Strait of Hormuz ever turns into a real conflict.

“The IRGC places religious belief at the core of the Iranian concept of
asymmetric warfare,” writes Haghshenass. “In Iran’s concept of asymmetric
warfare, the ideological or ‘spiritual’ superiority of the community of
believers is considered as important as any other factor.”

That means, he adds, that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard believes that “its
chain of command extends through Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei to God, thereby
investing military orders with transcendent moral authority…”

By Scott Peterson, Staff writer

KABUL “One week after four French troops were killed by a rogue Afghan
soldier, prompting President Nicolas Sarkozy to suspend military operations
in Afghanistan, France will sign a bilateral agreement outlining its
commitment here over the next two decades.

French troops will continue to train their Afghan counterparts well beyond
2014, when combat operations are due to conclude, according to the agreement
described by Afghan and French officials.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai will sign similar agreements with Britain and
Italy during a trip to Europe this week, securing commitments from key NATO
members as the alliance’s formal military campaign winds down. Karzai has
long expressed concern that a lack of international support after 2014 could
threaten the tenuous progress of the past decade.

Despite about a year of negotiations, the United States has been unable to
secure its own strategic partnership agreement, which would govern the
country’s military and diplomatic presence after the majority of its troops
have withdrawn.

Karzai has said that he won’t sign such an agreement until “NATO-led night
raids,”as he refers to targeted night operations, are halted.

Even though Karzai often refers to the operations publicly as “NATO-led,”he
holds the United States alone responsible for the civilian casualties caused
by the operations, according to Afghan officials. So, while the operations
continue, Karzai felt comfortable signing partnership agreements with the
three European countries, but not the United States, the officials said.

Efforts to bridge the gap between the two countries’ long-term demands have
been steeped in mutual suspicion, with the United States balking at Karzai’s
demands for an end to night operations and a prompt hand-over of U.S.
detention facilities. The ease with which European partnership agreements
were crafted highlights the relative scope and complexity of Afghan-American
relations, and the commensurate tension.

“The U.S. is our largest and most important ally. What’s important for
Afghanistan is the quality of the document, not how fast we can rush the
signature,”said Janan Musazai, a spokesman for the Afghan Foreign Ministry.

France’s bilateral agreement with Afghanistan was crafted before last week’s
attack on the French soldiers in Kapissa pro-vince, northeast of Kabul.
Despite Sarkozy’s initial suspension of military operations “and his threat
to withdraw from Afghanistan earlier than planned “the strategic
partnership was not affected by the incident, according to French officials.

Afghan authorities have launched an investigation into the motives of the
attacker, a 21-year-old man who joined the army less than three months ago,
according to Afghan officials.

Britain’s partnership agreement, which will last through 2022, describes the
role the British troops will play in training Afghan military officers and
offers a commitment to economic development and cultural exchange, according
to Afghan officials. Italy’s agreement, which also focuses on the country’s
economy and security forces, was described as “long-term past 2014″in a
statement from Karzai’s office.

In a Wednesday meeting with Italian President Giorgio Napolitano, Karzai
described Italy’s contribution in Afghanistan as “unforgettable.¡±

All three pacts must be approved by Afghanistan’s parliament before they
become official.

“These agreements reference the continued need for the training of Afghan
security forces and acknowledge the long-term commitment of each of the
three countries,”according to Musazai.

Although the partnership agreements provide few specific details about the
character of bilateral cooperation beyond 2014, they carry symbolic weight
in Kabul, affirming to Karzai that despite public opposition in much of
Europe, major powers will contribute financially and militarily in
Afghanistan for years to come.

None of the agreements details the number of foreign troops that will remain
in Afghanistan after 2014 or NATO’s financial obligation to the country
after its combat operations conclude. The maintenance of Afghanistan’s
military and police forces probably will cost between $4 billion and $6
billion annually, according to Afghan Defense Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak.
Some Western officials have expressed concerns about those costs.

Washington Post
January 27, 2012

By Kevin Sieff

India on Monday became the world’s sixth country after the US, Russia, France, the UK and China to operate nuclear-powered submarines when the Russian Akula-II class submarine `K-152 Nerpa’ was commissioned into Indian Navy as INS Chakra on a 10-year lease under a secretive almost $1-billion contract inked in 2004.

The 8,140-tonne INS Chakra, however, is not armed with long-range nuclear missiles, like the Russian SS-N-21 cruise missiles with an over 2,500-km range due to international non-proliferation treaties like the Missile Technology Control Regime.

The Indian nuclear triad’s elusive underwater leg will only come when the homegrown nuclear submarine, the over 6,000-tonne INS Arihant equipped to carry a dozen K-15 (750-km) or four K-4 (3,500-km) ballistic missiles, becomes fully operational by early-2013. India has the land and air legs in the shape of the Agni series of missiles and fighter jets capable of carrying nuclear weapons.

Defence ministry sources said INS Chakra, commissioned at the Primorye region in far south-eastern Russia in a ceremony attended by top Indian and Russian officials, would soon set sail for India. It will be based at Visakhapatnam, next to where INS Arihant is slated to begin extensive sea trials in February-March after the ongoing harbour-acceptance trials.

Though it may not add to India’s nuclear deterrence posture, INS Chakra will give some much-needed muscle to India’s depleting underwater combat arm, which has only 14 ageing conventional submarines to brandish. India is in talks for the lease of another Akula-II class submarine from Russia, say sources.

Nuclear-powered submarines are stealthy since they can operate underwater at long ranges for months unlike diesel-electric submarines that need to surface every few days to get oxygen to recharge their batteries and have limited endurance due to fuel requirements.

INS Chakra will also be armed with the 300-km range Klub-S land-attack cruise missiles, which India deploys on its Kilo-class conventional submarines as well as other missiles and advanced torpedoes.

“It will be deadly `hunter-killer’ of enemy submarines and warships, as also provide effective protection to a fleet at sea. It can also provide cover to the nuclear-armed INS Arihant if required. With a dived speed of 30-35 knots, INS Chakra will be able to outrun any current Pakistani or Chinese submarine,” said a source.

The Navy will also use INS Chakra to train its sailors in the complex art of operating nuclear submarines. The `Charlie-I’ class nuclear submarine India had leased from Russia from 1988 to 1991 was also named INS Chakra but the expertise gained on it was steadily lost since the Navy did not operate any other nuclear submarine thereafter.

The new 10-year lease flows from the January 2004 agreement, with India funding a major part of Nerpa’s construction at Komsomolsk-on-Amur shipyard after Russia stopped it midway due to a fund crunch. It was slated for induction much earlier but technical glitches delayed the process, which included a toxic gas leak in November 2008 that killed 20 Russian sailors.

WASHINGTON — Iran continues to make steady progress on its nuclear program.
The international community, led by the United States, is imposing increasingly tough sanctions on Tehran, including a European ban on oil imports from Iran. The world should hope that Iran will negotiate away its uranium enrichment program.

But that is highly unlikely. And so, in the coming months, Washington might be forced to choose between simply letting Iran have nuclear weapons or conducting a military strike designed to prevent that from happening. The options are awful, but here are five reasons why, if faced with that
decision, the United States should strike:

1. A nuclear-armed Iran poses a grave threat to international peace and
security. Iran currently restrains its foreign policy because it fears US
and Israeli retaliation. With nuclear weapons, Tehran will be emboldened by
the confidence that it can engage in provocation and use its nuclear weapons
to deter the worst forms of retaliation. A more aggressive Iran will
increase its support to terrorists and engage in tougher coercive diplomacy.

Nuclear weapons in Tehran will cause global nuclear proliferation, as other
states in the Middle East seek their own nuclear weapons in response, and as
Iran provides uranium enrichment technology to US enemies. The global
nonproliferation regime would be weakened.A nuclear Iran could threaten
nuclear war to stop developments contrary to its interests, giving the world
a nuclear scare every few years. And given that the nuclear balance between
Iran and its adversaries would be less stable than the one that held between
the United States and the Soviet Union during the cold war, these future
crises could very well spiral out of control resulting in a nuclear exchange
between Iran and Israel or even Iran and the United States.

2. Deterrence is costly and might not work. In practice, deterring a nuclear
Iran means extending the US nuclear umbrella and pledging to fight nuclear
wars on behalf of America’s regional partners. But, is the US really willing
to trade New York for Riyadh?

To make this inherently incredible threat credible, the US would have to
station troops and forward-deployed nuclear weapons in the region, ensuring
that the United States will be dragged into any future conflict. These and
other costly measures would have to remain in place as long as Iran exists
as a state and has nuclear weapons, which could be decades or longer.

And, while the threat of US retaliation could deter Iran from intentionally
launching a nuclear war, the threat to go to war with a nuclear-armed Iran ­
especially after America was unwilling to fight a nonnuclear Iran ­ would be
irrelevant or incredible as a response to other Iranian challenges. That
means the US would simply have to live with those other challenges.

3. A strike would significantly set back Iran’s nuclear program. A US strike
would cause immense damage to Iran’s nuclear program. It is unlikely that
Iran has significant operational nuclear facilities that America doesn’t
know about. The United States could destroy Iran’s known facilities.

While US government officials have said that an Israeli strike would only
set back Iran’s nuclear program by one to three years, the US, with its
superior capabilities, would impose a greater delay of three to 10 years.
This purchases much time for diplomacy or other events that could result in
permanently keeping Tehran from the bomb.

4. The consequences of a strike are manageable. While serious, the
consequences of a US strike on Iran’s nuclear program would be less grave
than many people fear. The US could also put in place a strategy to mitigate
the worst-case outcomes.

Some have speculated, for example, that a US strike would lead to a
full-scale war. But, while Iran would certainly retaliate, it wouldn’t want
to commit national suicide. It knows that a major conflict with the United
States could lead to the destruction of its regime. It would almost
certainly, therefore, aim for a calibrated response that allows it to save
face, but that stops short of risking the regime’s survival.

America can play on Iran’s fears by clearly communicating the red lines
that, if crossed, would provoke a devastating US response. One such red line
would be Iran closing the strategic oil shipping gateway, the Strait of
Hormuz.

By promising to eliminate the Iranian nuclear threat, Washington should be
able to get agreement from regional allies including Israel to stay out of
the fight even if they become the victims of Iranian retaliation. And while
the White House might feel political pressure to respond to Iranian
provocations, the US should be content to trade Iran’s nuclear program for a
round of retaliation, which would likely include missile and terror attacks
against US and allied interests in the region.

5. A strike is the least bad option. Make no mistake about it, a strike on
Iran’s nuclear program is an unattractive option. But it is better than the
even worse option of allowing a nuclear-armed Iran to threaten international
peace and security for decades to come.

Successive US presidents have declared that a nuclear-armed Iran is
“unacceptable” and that “all options are on the table” to prevent that from
happening. America is rapidly reaching the point where it must accept the
unacceptable or exercise its last remaining option.

Faced with this choice, the United States should destroy Iran’s nuclear
program, step back and absorb an inevitable round of retaliation, and seek
to quickly de-escalate the crisis. Dealing with the problem now will allow
the US ­ and its friends and allies ­ to avoid an even greater threat in the
future.

Matthew Kroenig is a Stanton Nuclear Security fellow at the Council on
Foreign Relations. This article has been adapted from an essay in the
January/February 2012 issue of Foreign Affairs magazine.

By Matthew Kroenig

Edizione 2012 per Il Sabato del Villaggio che aggiunge un altro importante tassello, l’undicesimo, alla sua già lunga e gloriosa storia. In tutti questi anni la rassegna ha rappresentato per la Calabria un laboratorio culturale in cui sperimentare percorsi inediti, visitare slarghi poco noti o mal noti. Le nostre proposte hanno così illuminato terre di confine fra letteratura e filosofia fungendo da paradigma per una serie di iniziative che sono nate nel solco fecondo della rassegna. Anche per questa nuova edizione, Il Sabato del Villaggio ha allestito per il suo pubblico un cartellone di primissimo piano, attingendo a piene mani dal meglio della cultura italiana e internazionale. Con una certezza: che a ogni evento giovani e adulti escano dal teatro coscienti che ognuno di noi ha dato il meglio per farli star bene. Infatti, il successo di una rassegna come Il Sabato del Villaggio, la fedeltà di un pubblico sempre crescente, si gioca su sensazioni, ricordi, impressioni, su qualcosa d’intangibile e non misurabile che noi cerchiamo di alimentare con piccoli e grandi gesti. Un po’ diverso da un abito che, una volta comprato, non suscita più alcun desiderio. Al Sabato del Villaggio nulla è invece scontato, ma ogni dettaglio è frutto di passione, inventiva, ricerca del nuovo. Ciò che puntualmente si verificherà anche quest’anno. Buon divertimento.

Raffaele Gaetano

L’EVENTO

Diventare un mago dell’informatica può essere esaltante, ma anche  fonte  di  prevedibili  guai.  Fabio  Ghioni,  ospite  attesissimo dell’evento  La  Repubblica  degli  Hacker  fa  paura,  unanimamente riconosciuto come uno dei massimi esperti mondiali di com- puter ed ex capo della sicurezza informatica di Telecom, divenuto l’hacker “più famoso d’Italia” nell’ambito dell’inchiesta sulle intercettazioni, ne è testimone. Lui ha inciampato nel suo talento senza rete: accusato di associazione a delinquere finalizzata alle incursioni informatiche, è finito in carcere. Infine, uscito dal processo con il patteggiamento, ha messo a frutto la sua esperienza in un libro che va al di là della fantascienza: Hacker Republic, manuale d’immediato successo dedicato a tutti coloro che navigano nel web ignari delle tante insidie che non sanno vedere. Un contributo prezioso per conoscere il nostro mondo ipertecnologico e per apprendere i trucchi e i segreti idonei a difendersi dai ladri di privacy che popolano l’universo informatico.

L’OSPITE

Editorialista, conferenziere raffinato, consulente strategico, top manager, Fabio Ghioni è riconosciuto come uno dei maggiori esperti a livello mondiale di sicurezza informatica. È divenuto l’Hacker più famoso d’Italia in seguito alle vicende delle intercettazioni Telecom. Accusato di aver violato la banca dati della più importante multinazionale di intelligence privata, è stato arrestato e tenuto forzatamente lontano da qualunque tecnologia per cinque mesi. Autore di Ombre asimmetriche, definito da L’Espresso “un cult” della cultura underground, è coautore della serie a fumetti Hero-Z, un technothriller che ha spopolato negli Usa e in estremo Oriente.