Beijing Shocks US With Unbelievable Progress of Artificial Island and Airstrip in South China Sea.(SP).
New satellite imagery shows the extent of China’s construction of artificial islands in the South China Sea. Fiery Cross Reef could soon serve as a military-grade runway in the middle of the ocean.
And despite its own military presence in the region, US officials are in panic.
Dredging sand from the seafloor, the Chinese government has been steadily building artificial landmasses atop sunken reefs in the Spratly Islands archipelago. In part, the islands will be used to bolster emergency response in the region. But Beijing also says the islands will be used as military defense posts, which worries officials in Washington, already concerned about a growing Chinese influence.
Images obtained by IHS Jane’s Defense Weekly from Airbus Defence and Space show just how rapid the island growth has been. With construction beginning only last year, Fiery Cross Reef is now home to China’s first airstrip in the South China Sea. With 503 metered already paved, the runway could be as long as 3,000 meters once completed. That’s long enough to support heavy military transport planes and fighter jets, according to Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies. Hmmmm.....Rumor has it The Pres. is contacting China to know if there are possibilities of building golf trips in the Ocean. Read the full story here
Center for security policy warns about DEM House Intelligence Committee Member’s Extensive Ties To The Muslim Brotherhood.(CJR).
Center for Security Policy, Feb. 24, 2015: (Washington, D.C.):House Speaker Nancy Pelosi
recently appointed Rep. André Carson (D-IN) to a coveted position on the
House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.
This panel is
charged with oversight of the United States’ most sensitive national
intelligence capabilities and operations. These include any directed at
Islamic supremacists seeking to impose worldwide – through violent and,
where necessary, through stealthy forms of jihad – the totalitarian
program they call shariah.
Preeminent among the practitioners of this jihadist agenda is the
Muslim Brotherhood. In fact, according to evidence introduced by the
U.S. government into the Holy Land Foundation trial in 2008, the
Brotherhood’s self-declared mission in America is: “a kind of grand
jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within
and ‘sabotaging’ its miserable house by their hands [i.e., those of
non-Muslims] and those of the believers so that it is eliminated and
God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.” (From the
1991 Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America, Government Exhibit 003-0085, 3:04-CR-240-G.)
It is, therefore, problematic and potentially detrimental to the
national security that Rep. Carson has extensive and longstanding ties
to organizations and individuals associated with the Muslim
Brotherhood.
As established in a dossier and video
released today by the Center for Security Policy, the Indiana
congressman has an extensive record of involvement with, support of and
support from a virtual Who’s Who of Brotherhood front
organizations in America and leading figures in the jihad movement in
this country.
The dossier makes it clear that, as a group, they have “a
documented history of serving as unregistered foreign agents, engaging
in material support for terrorism and possessing direct ties to the
Brotherhood’s Palestinian franchise, Hamas, a designated terrorist
organization.”
Among those with whom Rep. Carson has been involved as a guest
speaker, panelist, fundraiser, recipient of funds, etc., are: the
Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and a number of its
chapters across the country; the Islamic Society of North America
(ISNA); the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA); the Muslim American
Society (MAS); and the Brotherhood’s new proto-political party, the U.S.
Council of Muslim Organizations (USCMO).
The Carson Dossier warns: The fact that Rep. Carson’s association with these organizations has
persisted even after he has had every opportunity – as well as a
responsibility – to know the threat they pose to U.S. national security
displays, at the very best, a grave lack of judgment that is
incompatible with service on the HPSCI.
In addition, the prospect that the nation’s most highly-classified
information could fall into Muslim Brotherhood hands – whether
purposefully or by accident – by way of a HPSCI member who associates on
a regular, friendly and ongoing basis with its operatives is a grave
one. It merits a rigorous counter-intelligence assessment of the
potential risks associated with Rep. Carson’s vulnerabilities to
recruitment, blackmail or other suborning.
Center President Frank J. Gaffney, Jr. unveiled the Carson Dossier in
the course of a presentation about the Muslim Brotherhood, its
civilization jihad and its success in advancing its stated mission of
“destroying Western civilization from within” before the National
Religious Broadcasters today. Mr. Gaffney observed:
Given the Muslim Brotherhood’s unalterable commitment to Islamic
supremacism, the imposition of shariah worldwide and the establishment
of a caliphate to rule globally in accordance with that totalitarian
program – in place of our constitutional republic and all other forms of
government, what the Obama administration is doing is bad enough.
Its
serial efforts to engage, legitimate, fund, arm and otherwise empower
the Brotherhood overseas and to rely upon the Brothers’ domestic front
organizations as representatives of and outreach vehicles to the Muslim
community in this country are intensifying the dangers we face from the
Global Jihad Movement.
It is wholly unacceptable to have as a member of a key congressional
committee charged with overseeing U.S. intelligence and
counterintelligence an individual with extensive personal and political
associations with the Muslim Brotherhood’s civilization jihadist
infrastructure in America.
At a minimum, Rep. Andre Carson’s presence
on the House Intelligence Committee will necessitate restrictions on his
access to classified information about the presence and operations in
this country of what amounts to a subversive Islamist Fifth Column and
his participation in the panel’s deliberations concerning how it can
best be countered.
Since there are, at the moment, few topics more in need of assiduous
oversight by the Congress – even if there were no actual risk of
compromise of national security secrets or Muslim Brotherhood influence
operations associated with Rep. Carson’s presence on the , the potential
impediment he may constitute to such work demands his removal from this
panel.
The Center for Security Policy recently released a Secure Freedom Strategy
a comprehensive strategy to defeat the Global Jihad Movement.
The
Secure Freedom Strategy is adapted from the one employed by President
Reagan to defeat the last totalitarian ideology that sought our
destruction (Soviet communism). As formalized in the President’s
National Security Decision Directive 75, this plan successfully brought
to bear all instruments of national power, a template for victory that
stands in stark contrast to President Obama’s hapless draft
Authorization for the Use of Military Force against the Islamic State.
Video - Everything you ever wanted to know about Obama's BFF Qatar.
US hostage policy reviewed as Qatari emir visits Obama.(BBC).
US officials do not pay ransoms or negotiate with militant organisations for the release of hostages. Yet deals are made.
That is where the Qatari authorities come in.
"We do not deal with terrorists," says Rick Brennan, a political scientist at the RAND Corporation. Still hostage negotiations are complex, he says, and at times free-wheeling.
"There are things that happen - quid pro quo and under the table," says Brennan. "This is when you get into the murky situation that Qatar is in."
Even in the US, hostage policies are interpreted in different ways. Officials are never supposed to negotiate with terrorists.
Earlier this month I asked Susan Rice, the national security adviser, about the policy regarding hostages. She said they were reviewing ways they could support the family members.
"Frankly this is an area which the president believes we can do better," she said. Hmmm....."Lets give them ISIS Guys a well paying job 'Hostage takers'.Read the full story here.
In Kuwait, Def. Sec. Carter meets with brass over Islamic State war strategy.(stripes).
As Iraqi troops fight to recapture the Iraqi town of al-Baghdadi from the Islamic State, Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter met Monday with U.S. troops and high-ranking officials in neighboring Kuwait to discuss the fight against the terrorist group.
Seated around a large T-shaped table for the hours-long, closed-door session were 25 military and diplomatic officials Carter called his “Team America.”
Carter, who stepped into his new job last week, traveled to Camp Arifijan to confer with senior military and diplomatic experts and develop his own assessment of the U.S. war strategy in the region.
There are about 3,000 American troops in Iraq training and advising Iraqi forces and providing force protection. During a troop talk before the big confab, Carter was asked if the cap on the number of U.S. troops in Iraq, set at 3,100 by President Barack Obama, should be raised.
“I don’t have a good answer for you right now,” Carter acknowledged, saying “that’s one of the things I want to climb on top of” during the meeting with senior experts.
When asked what it would take for him to recommend sending American ground troops into direct combat with the Islamic State, an option that Obama has so far ruled out, Carter sounded a note of caution.
“We need to be convinced that any use of our forces is necessary, is going to be sufficient, [and] that we’ve thought through not just the first step but the second step and the third step,” he said, “so that we if we do ask you to do something, we’re asking you to do something that is going to succeed and it makes sense and ... it is necessary to take the risk that you’re taking. That’s my responsibility.”Read the full story here.
Related:Aug 2014: "What we’re facing in northern Iraq is only partly a crisis about Iraq. It is about the region and potentially the world as we know it."By Ret. Gen. John Allen.
Make no mistake, the abomination of IS is a clear and present danger to the U.S. The only question really is whether the U.S. and its allies and partners will act decisively now while they can still shape events to destroy IS, an act that seems increasingly self-obvious.
'Leading from behind' while exercising 'strategic patience'
ISIL terrorist command preparing to declare Islamic emirate in Lebanon: sources. (DS).
ISIS is preparing military plans to declare an Islamic emirate in Lebanon very soon to serve as a geographical extension of the so-called “Islamic State” as announced by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in Iraq last year, security sources said.
ISIS fighters have demanded support from the militant group in northern Syria to achieve this goal, the sources said.
They added that the ISIS command has begun preparations to set up a military organizational committee tasked with running Lebanese affairs and considering Lebanon as part of its state.
However, ISIS is facing difficulties in choosing a Lebanese commander for this mission. The reported appointment of the fugitive preacher Ahmad al-Assir for this post was merely a trial balloon, the sources said.
They added that arrangements to form an ISIS command for the Lebanon emirate were taking place under the supervision of the group commander Khalaf al-Zeyabi Halous, codenamed “Abu Musaab Halous,” a Syrian who had played a key role in the ISIS offensive to capture the Raqqa province in 2013.
As Lebanon faces growing security threats, military assistance to the Lebanese Army is expected to be stepped up to help the country stand on its feet.
The United States will provide the Lebanese Army with six Super Cobra fighter aircraft as part of the U.S. military aid to the Army, reports said. The aircraft are manufactured by the Bell military helicopter company.
Also, sources close to the military establishment said that America had agreed to sell some F-5 fighter jets to the Lebanese Army in the next five months. Hmmmm.....that 'Leading from behind' while exercising 'strategic patience' really works great.(Sarc). Read the full story here.
UN Security Council demands Houthis cede power in Yemen. (MEM).
The UN Security Council on Sunday demanded Yemen's Houthi rebels relinquish control of the government and withdraw their forces from the capital.
The 15-member council unanimously adopted a Britain and Jordan-drafted resolution at an urgent session to discuss the political and security crisis in the impoverished country.
The resolution, which falls short of invoking Chapter 7 of the UN Charter that allows it to take military action, demanded that the Houthis "immediately and unconditionally" withdraw their forces from Sanaa and relinquish government and security institutions.
It also called for an end to "external interference" that sought to "foment conflict" and urged the Houthis to release President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, Prime Minister Khaled Bahah and members of the cabinet who are "under house arrest or arbitrarily detained."Read the full story here.
China Flies The 'Divine Eagle' it's largest 'Stealth Bombers' hunting drone. (Popsci).
New images of testing materials have emerged of China's largest ever UAV, the secretive Divine Eagle. Compared to other Chinese aviation projects like the J-20 stealth fighter and Y-20 heavy transport aircraft, the lack of publicly available photos of the Divine Eagle suggests that like the American RQ-180, this giant drone is a strategic and sensitive asset.
Given the presence of official diagrams and wind tunnel testing, the Divine Eagle is likely to be a real Chinese project, built by the "black project" division of the venerable Shenyang Aircraft Corporation.
Reliable Internet sources also indicate that the Divine Eagle conducted its first flight in December 2014 or early 2015. Hmmm.......The U.S. has the 'White Elephant' a.k.a. F-35 , perhaps they should rename it to the 'Dodo bird'?Read and see the full story here.
Obama's National Security Strategy: "Leading from behind while exercising strategic patience".(Foreignpolicy).
Critics of President Barack Obama’s foreign policy have for years assailed his administration for responding too slowly to crises ranging from Syria to Russia.
In a far-reaching blueprint laying out the administration’s worldview, the White House on Friday will defend its deliberate approach and make clear that it intends to continue on a path of what it calls “strategic patience.”
The National Security Strategy, required by U.S. law, is intended to set the direction for the administration and communicate American intent to lawmakers, the public, and the world.
The document will be Obama’s second, and likely last, before he leaves office in early 2017. It aims to rebut criticism that he has consistently waited too long to respond to challenges like the rise of the Islamic State and Moscow’s military aggression in Ukraine, allowing the problems to worsen while his administration debated ways to act.
The document argues that such an approach was instead part of a carefully constructed strategy designed to ensure that the United States considered all options before getting ensnared in risky and potentially open-ended conflicts. It will effectively make the case for Obama as a prudent president who was ever mindful of possible future risks rather than an overly cautious one unwilling to act aggressively in the nation’s defense.
Obama will introduce his strategy by arguing that the United States remains the strongest global military and economic power — even if the country lacks enough influence or resources to solve all the world’s problems.
A person who has seen the document, and described it to Foreign Policy on condition of anonymity, said the strategy document is meant to explain and defend Obama’s reluctance to use military might for crises that are unlikely to be solved quickly or easily. Read the full story here.
'Moderate' Iran denies deal on limiting enrichment at Fordow or Arak plants. (PTV).
A senior Iranian nuclear negotiator has dismissed allegations of Iran’s consent to scale down its uranium enrichment program.
“Any agreement about Arak or Fordow [nuclear facilities] is denied. No agreement has so far been reached about the issues under discussion [with six world powers], including these two sites, and the differences still remain,” ISNA quoted Abbas Araqchi, who is also a deputy to the Iranian foreign minister, as saying.
He was reacting to July 29 remarks by the US lead nuclear negotiator Wendy Sherman to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about “tangible progress in key areas, including Fordow, Arak and IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) access.”
“It [Iran] promised not to fuel or install remaining components at the research reactor in Arak…. It allowed inspectors to have daily access at the Natanz enrichment facility and the underground plant at Fordow,” said Sherman who is the deputy US secretary of state.
Araqchi said, “The only criterion for the Islamic Republic of Iran has been the country’s needs and throughout negotiations [with the world powers], decisions will be made only based on the country’s needs.”
Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council – the United States, France, Britain, Russia and China – plus Germany are to resume their negotiations to discuss ways to reach a final agreement over Tehran’s nuclear energy program in September.Hmmm.....The never ending talks......till breakout.
Head of US naval intelligence in the Pacific claims China plans quick attack against Japan.(Alalam).
Head of US naval intelligence in the Pacific claims China is stepping up its
training for a “short, sharp war” designed to seize the disputed Senkaku islands
from Japan.
Addressing a conference sponsored by the US Naval Institute in
San Diego, California, Captain James Fannell said the recent Missing Action 2013
exercises were training for the invasion of the uninhabited archipelago, which
China considers as its sovereign territory and refers to as the Diaoyutai
Islands.
“We concluded that the [People's Liberation Army] has been given the
new task to be able to conduct a short, sharp war to destroy Japanese forces in
the East China Sea, following with what can only be expected as the seizure of
the Senkakus or even a southern Ryukyu island,” said Capt. Fannell, director of
intelligence for the US Pacific Fleet.
The Ryukyu islands are Japan’s Okinawa
Prefecture, which China has also recently laid claim to.
“As a senior US
government official recently stated, there is growing concern that China’s
pattern of behaviour in the South China Sea reflects an incremental effort by
China to assert control of the area contained in the so-called ‘nine-dash line,’
despite the objections of its neighbors and despite the lack of any explanation
or apparent basis under international law,” Capt. Fannell said.
“By the way,
‘protection of maritime rights’ is a Chinese euphemism for coerced seizure of
coastal rights of China’s neighbours,” he added.
Beijing has laid claim to
vast swathes of the area based on its sovereignty over the Spratley and Paracel
island groups.
China is undeterred by Washington declaring that is does not
recognize the “nine-dash line” drawn up by Beijing to encompass its territorial
claims – which go as close as 125 miles from the mainland of the
Philippines.
Reports suggest that as many as 40,000 service personnel took
part in the exercise, which was based on a scenario of invading an island “where
China has encountered strong resistance to its claims of territorial or maritime
assets”.
An analyst with Japan’s National Institute of Defense Studies said
Tokyo has “good reason” to be concerned given that Beijing has deployed an
aircraft carrier on operation patrols in the South China Sea and has purchased
two large hovercraft, designed to land invasion forces on a beachhead, from the
Ukraine.
Beijing has announced that it will develop indigenous versions of
the hovercraft as well as a new class of large landing ships, designed to put
large numbers of troops and equipment ashore.Hmmm.....The World realy has become a 'much safer place' since Pres Obama is a the helm........'leading from behind the golf course'.
Al Qaeda-linked militants attack Somali presidential compound. (Taz).
Al Qaeda-linked militants al Shabaab attacked the Somali presidential palace compound on Friday, blasting through a gate with a car bomb and engaging in a fierce gun battle with African peacekeepers, police said.
Somali Islamist militant group al Shabaab claimed responsibility for the attack on the heavily fortified compound in Mogadishu, known as Villa Somalia, but the Somali president Hassan Sheikh Mohamud was unharmed, Reuters reported.
"President just called me to say he's unharmed. Attack on Villa Somalia had failed. Sadly some lives lost," U.N. Special Representative Nick Kay wrote on his official Twitter feed.It was not immediately clear how many people were killed.
In the past few weeks, Mogadishu has been hit by a series of suicide bomb attacks claimed by al Shabaab, who were pushed out of the city in mid-2011 but have continued to wage a sustained guerrilla campaign.
Friday's battle took place at the house of Somalia's top military commander, General Dahir Aden Indha Qarshe, located in the same compound and near the presidential palace building, Abdikadir Ahmed, a senior police officer, told Reuters.
"The al Shabaab fighters who attacked the palace were about ten men in military uniform and the red hats [worn by the palace guards]," Hussein Farah, a senior police officer at the scene, told Reuters.
"They had three cars. One was a car bomb and the other cars were carrying well-armed fighters," he said. "All the Shabaab fighters perished, some blew up themselves while others were shot dead. Several government guards also died. Now the fighting is over, and scattered on the scene is human flesh and blood."
At least seven Somalis were killed when a remote-controlled bomb aimed at a U.N. convoy tore through cars and tea shops just outside the capital's international airport last week.Hmmmm......"The war on terror is over"....yeah sure.
WASHINGTON — Senior US intelligence officials on Tuesday offered a more
alarming assessment of al-Qaida than President Barack Obama’s declaration
that the organization is on the run and headed toward defeat.
For several years, Obama and his top national security aides have talked
publicly of an al-Qaida greatly diminished by US armed drone strikes in
Afghanistan and Pakistan, and the emergence of affiliate groups mostly
focused on attacks in Southwest Asia, the Middle East and North Africa.
In a landmark speech on his targeted-killing program last May, Obama
described al-Qaida’s core cell and leaders in Afghanistan and Pakistan as
“on the path to defeat.” The commander in chief said al-Qaida’s “remaining
operatives spend more time thinking about their own safety than plotting
against us.”
“They did not direct the attacks in Benghazi or Boston,” Obama said. “They’ve
not carried out a successful attack on our homeland since 9/11.”
Obama also made clear that he and his top advisers see an al-Qaida focused
less on attacks in the United States.
“While we are vigilant for signs that these groups may pose a transnational
threat, most are focused on operating in the countries and regions where
they are based,” Obama said at the time. “And that means we’ll face more
localized threats like what we saw in Benghazi, or the BP oil facility in
Algeria, in which local operatives — perhaps in loose affiliation with
regional networks — launch periodic attacks against Western diplomats,
companies and other soft targets, or resort to kidnapping and other criminal
enterprises to fund their operations.”
In his State of the Union address a few weeks ago, Obama again described a
weakened al-Qaida, although he did acknowledge “the threat has evolved, as
al-Qaida affiliates and other extremists take root in different parts of the
world” like “Yemen, Somalia, Iraq, and Mali.”
When describing the role of any American and NATO forces that will remain in
Afghanistan after this year, Obama said one of the primary missions would be
“counterterrorism operations to pursue any remnants of al-Qaida.”
In that address, Obama again said “we have put al-Qaida’s core leadership on
a path to defeat.”
Obama also vowed to take America “off a permanent war footing.”
But during testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday,
Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and Defense Intelligence
Agency Director Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn offered a different assessment.
Under questioning on that topic from panel Ranking Member Sen. James Inhofe,
R-Okla., Clapper described al-Qaida as “morphing,” with new groups popping
up in North Africa.
Flynn replied, “they are not,” when asked by Inhofe if al-Qaida is, as Obama
has said, on a path to defeat and on the run.
Clapper seemed to downplay his own warnings about the threat to the United
States posed by so-called al-Qaida affiliates when he said such
organizations are not currently plotting attacks on “the homeland.” But he
keeps them on his lengthy threat list simply because one day, “they could.”
Obama sees al-Qaida groups outside Afghanistan and Pakistan as focused on
the countries in which they operate and not on attacking America. When asked
by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., whether the emergence of new Islamic extremist
groups in Syria increases the threat of attacks on the US homeland, Clapper
said yes.
No panel members pressed Clapper on this seeming disconnect with his boss.
In his written testimony, Clapper stated that regarding “core al-Qa’ida” in
Afghanistan and Pakistan, a number of factors have put it “on a downward
trajectory since 2008.” The group now possesses “a degraded … ability to
carry out a catastrophic attack against the US homeland and eroded its
position as leader of the global violent extremist movement.”
Where Obama describes a mostly defeated core al-Qaida, Clapper warns it is
poised for a comeback.
“It probably hopes for a resurgence following the drawdown of US troops in
Afghanistan in 2014,” the DNI told the Senate panel.
Meantime, panel Chairman Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., pressed the duo on
whether the situation in Afghanistan would be improved if Washington and its
allies simply announced it would wait for a new Afghan president before
again pushing for finalization of a long-term security pact between the two
countries that would keep US forces there into 2015 and beyond.
“The United States and the Coalition of which we are a part would be better
off waiting for [Hamid] Karzai’s successor to sign the agreement the Afghan
people favor, as reflected by the consensus of the 3,000-member Loya Jirga,”
Levin said.
Clapper revealed he believes Karzai will not sign the security pact before
he leaves office later this year.
The DNI said that waiting this long to finalize the agreement already has
yielded “negative trends,” such as an exodus of foreign investment in
Afghanistan.Read the full story here.
Iranians mocking U.S.- "We Are Eager for US Military Option" Read Placards Carried by Iranians.(Fars).
The Iranian people participating in the annual rallies to commemorate the 35th anniversary of the victory of the Islamic Revolution carried banners which mocked the US military threats against the country.
Millions of Iranians have taken to the streets on the 35th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution in demonstrations across the country.
Over 1,500 domestic and 194 foreign reporters are covering the Bahman 22 (February 11) rallies.
In Tehran, demonstrators congregated at the Azadi Square, Tehran's main square and the site of major national rallies over the past three decades.
People in different cities carried a number of banners and placards saying they are ready for confrontation against the US. Some of the banners read “We are eager for 'the options on the table'”, a clear reference to the US officials worn-out phrase when dealing with Iran. Others say “We are ready for the great battle”, again a reference to Washington officials' repeated threats of military action against Iran.
Yet, the signs are more seen as a direct response to the provocative statements and war rhetoric of the US Secretary of State, John Kerry, and his Under-Secretary Wendy Sherman, who have both repeatedly stated that Washington’s options for dealing with Iran have been kept on the table despite the recent deal between Tehran and the six world powers. The Washington rhetoric has also received wide condemnation from the Iranian officials as well.
The Iranian military and government officials have warned that in case of any military aggression against the country, Tehran’s response will be inconceivable.
A large number of Iranian officials have warned of the dire repercussions of such remarks by Washington officials. Lieutenant Commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Brigadier General Hossein Salami warned that the slightest military move by the US will be reciprocated by Iran's harshest response, underlining that Iran's reaction would "recognize no boundary".
John Bolton: Clapper’s Right, 'Leading from Behind' Obama’s Wrong on Terror Threat.(Newsmax).
National Intelligence Director James Clapper is right about the current terror threat to the United States - and probably is even understating it, says former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton.
In congressional testimony Wednesday, Clapper said he can’t say the threat is any less today than it was in 2001, the year of the 9/11 attacks.
“Now we are facing a much more dispersed threat,” Clapper told the Senate Intelligence Committee.
“This is a stunning statement by James Clapper. You can’t underline it enough,” Bolton said Thursday on Fox News Channel’s “The Kelly File.”
President Barack Obama said during his 2012 re-election campaign that al-Qaida is on the run and noted that its head, Osama bin Laden, is dead.
“Clapper’s right. The president’s wrong,”Bolton said.
“This is a repudiation of the entire Obama administration political narrative these last several years by his own director of national intelligence.”Read the full story here.
Netanyahu says There will be 'no chance' of striking a final nuclear deal with Iran.(Jpost). Iran's nuclear march, not negotiations with the Palestinians, dominated Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's talks with world leaders in Davos, he told the cabinet Sunday, just hours after returning from the World Economic Forum in that Swiss city.
Netanyahu said that the most important thing Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said during his speech to the conference was that Iran has not dismantled, and will not dismantle, a single centrifuge.
"If Iran will stand by that statement, that means that a permanent agreement – which is the goal of the entire diplomatic process with Iran – cannot succeed," Netanyahu said. "Iran is basically insisting on preserving its ability to get fissile material for a bomb without in any way extending the time-line to a nuclear break-out."
Netanyahu said that this meant that much of what Israel has warned against was indeed already taking place. The prime minister said that Rouhani also tried in Davos to break the sanctions regime against his country. While praising US Secretary of State John Kerry for his statement that the US would act to preserve the existing sanctions, Netanyahu said the test will be in the results.
Netanyahu said Rouhani's speech, coupled by an interview given by his Foreign Minster Mohammad Javad Zarif, in which he declared that Iran has an ideological agenda that puts it in constant tension with the west and the US, caused the people he spoke with to understand that that situation with Iran is "not rosy."
"There is a problem here," Netanyahu said "We know the truth, that there is a regime which under the cover of a charm offensive is trying to arm itself with nuclear weapons, to become a [nuclear] threshold sate that can achieve nuclear weapons very fast, and a state that has not change at all its true ideology."Hmmm......The real 'problem' is a US President obsessed with going down in History as the man who gave Iran the Bomb.
Iranian Oil Tanker Sanctions Suspended After Nuclear Deal.(IP)
Iran’s National Oil and Tanker companies director has said the US Treasury has
removed Iran’s National Oil and Tanker Company from the sanction list. In an
interview to Mehr News about the impacts of easing some sanctions on Iran’s oil
sector after Geneva deal, Ali-Akbar Safaei told that all barriers on the way of
providing insurance coverage, banking services, and other international shipping
services especially for oil transport has been removed.
He also detailed about the exports of Iran’s black gold to six traditional
destinations of China, India, Turkey, Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea. “Currently
there is no international barrier in the way of sea transport of Iranian oil to
these countries.
According to arrangements made in Geneva join Plan of Action
printed by the US government, beginning in January 20, all sanctions on Iran’s
oil sector have been removed,” Safaei added.
He also said that the removal of sanctions covered also insurance,
transportation, and financial swift transactions. “The suspension however
excludes legal entities and natural persons sanctioned before, but Iran’s
National Oil and Tanker Companies are exceptions to this rule,” said Safaei.
The National Oil Tanker Company official also detailed on the possible
maneuver by the company after sanctions had been removed. “However this is a
green light for going forward to the Company, but we speculate rapid return to
the international oil market, and oil transportation would be highly profitable
not only for importing countries, but also for great multinational oil giant
companies,” he added.
“As long as the National Tanker Company has not returned international
markets, it will receive supports as bonus to carry Iran’s exported oil,” he
said.National Iranian Tanker Co. got permission to ship oil to some Asian countries as sanctions were eased, the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported, citing the company’s Managing Director Ali Akbar Safaei.
Tankers belonging to the company may export crude to China, India, Turkey, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan after sanctions against insuring the country’s vessels were suspended Jan. 20, IRNA said, citing Safaei. Hmmmm...."Israel's staunchest Ally", he might imposes sanctions on Israel next.
Senior Euro MP: Iraqi executions "like sheep being slaughtered in an abattoir" (NCRI).
A senior Euro MP has called the current spate of mass executions in Iraq as “like sheep being slaughtered in an abattoir”.
Struan Stevenson, a Conservative MEP from Scotland who chairs the European Parliament’s important Delegation for Relations with Iraq says the executions are being carried out on “an industrial scale.” Speaking from the European Parliament in Brussels, Struan Stevenson said:
“Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is waging war on his own people. His Shia-led government, with the backing and encouragement of his puppet-masters in neighbouring Iran, is engaged in a genocidal military campaign against the Sunni population whom Maliki has branded as terrorists.
Men, women and children are being massacred in cities like Fallujah and Ramadi in relentless bombing raids, rocket attacks and tank battles, under the pretext that these people are all members or supporters of Al Qaeda. The Americans have fallen for this ruse hook, line and sinker and are rushing in supplies of automatic weapons, tanks, aircraft and rockets to help Maliki’s killing machine.
“Captured prisoners are being herded to the gallows in batches of 10 or 12, like sheep being slaughtered in an abattoir.
There seems to be no formal judicial process. Branded as terrorists, these people are neither defended nor tried in proper courts. What were their crimes? Where are the witnesses? This is capital punishment on an industrial scale. Maliki has set in motion a conveyor belt of death to terrorise the Sunni population into submission.
“The UN, US and EU cannot simply stand aside and watch this horror unfold. We have helped enforce an Iranian puppet state on the Iraqi people. It’s time we put a stop to this murderous brutality and restored freedom, democracy and human rights to the beleaguered people of Iraq.”
Struan Stevenson MEP President of the European Parliament's Delegation for Relations with Iraq.Hmmm......Obama: If We Work Hard, Afghanistan Could Be a Success...Like Iraq!
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