| Who is appending and pushing for which of their own agendas by turning the tragedy to
their own advantage and benefit? Introduction and Selection of Documents
by Andre Gunder Frank PREFACE by Catherine Fitts CUI BONO? Building a Map to Solve the CrimeTo understand events such as wars or any of the events on the nightly news, always ask the question "Cui bono?" which translates as "Who benefits?" Cui Bono? Who Benefits? Catherine Austin Fitts [former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban Development and former managing director of Dillon Read. Today she is Director of the Solaris Group] INTRODUCTION by Andre Gunder Frank To begin with we need also to ask whether there were alternatives to this war that could have achieved its objectives without the war or even a small scale rapid military intervention. The conservative Daily Telegraph (London) 4 October 2001 reports in a story filed by Patrick Bishop Pakistan halts secret plan for bin Laden trialA secret plan to put Osama bin Laden on trial in Pakistan has been blocked after President Musharraf said he could not guarantee his safety, it was disclosed yesterday. Suggested by the Taliban’s closest allies in Pakistan, it was a last-minute attempt to satisfy Western demands for bin Laden's surrender while averting a war and ensuring the fanatical regime's survival. The possible credibility of this claim is supported by ample precedent. To note only some· To assure waging the Falklands/Malvinas War against Argentina, British Prime Minister Thatcher deliberately torpedoed negotiations in Lima that were on the point averting it by provocatively attacking the Argentine sjip Belgrano · Prior to the Iraq/Gulf War and in order to prevent it, Saddam Hussein made 7 separate offers to withdraw from Kuwait. Allwere deliberately rejected by the then President Bush [father] who was intent on starting the war no matter what. · Prior to the NATO WAR against Yugoslavia, the Western powers made demands o Yugoslaviaat Ramboulliet that weredeliberatelydesigned to be NOT acceptable, because they included provisions for NATO military occupation not only of Kosovo but of all of Yugoslavia itself. NATO ultimately settled for less than Yugoslavia had been prepared to accept before the war began. The claim that similar possibilitiesbut refusal to defuse the War against Afghanistan arethereforepotentially credible already on the basis of similar precedent. Everybody who has an agenda B and has had it for a long time -is using Tuesday September 11, 2001to push their own agenda for all they canopportunistically and shamelessly take advantage of this the monstrous tragedy. [Nobody seems to see any connection with also Tuesday September11, 1973, when the Presidential Palace in Chile was bombed as the first act ina bloody military coupwith the collaboration of the CIA and at the instance of President Richard Nixon and his Secretary of State Henry Kissingerthat cost 30,000 lives, countless vitims of torture and over 100,000 exiles[vide the hearings of the Church Committee in the US Senate and the recent proposal by Chistopher Hitchins in Harpers Magazine to indict Kissinger for war crimes and crimes against humanity, that is the same Hitchins who a few months later now supports the War against Afgnhanistan!]. SO CUI BONO? The unread news today is that the “war against terrorism” is being exploited in order to achieve objectives that consolidate American power. These include: the bribing and subjugation of corrupt and vulnerable governments in former Soviet central Asia, crucial for American expansion in the region and exploitation of the last untapped reserves of oil and gas in the world; Nato’s occupation of Macedonia, marking a final stage in its colonial odyssey in the Balkans; the expansion of the American arms industry; and the speeding up of trade liberalisation. JohnPilger in The Independent - The extension of US and NATO power, especially to Caspian Sea and CentralAsian oil. - appeal to "those who are not with us are against us" [A phrase introduced into the lexicon of international relations by US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles to promote the cold war phrase!] to blackmail Europeans, Arabs, and as many as possible others into making all kinds of economic, diplomatic, political, military and other concession to the USA. - putting all "rogue" and other unruly states on notice that if they don't play ball they will be unilaterally bombed and maybe nuked. -- except that this showwas already begun with the bombing of Iraq in 1991 by President Bush, Sr., who in so doing established what he calledthe “NEW WORLD ORDER” [apparently with historical amnesia of the prior one so named by Adolf Hitler], and which I termed THIRD WORLD WAR [with 3rd meaning both 1,2,3rd WAR and war in and against the THIRD WORLD] and which was continued by the NATO war against Yugoslavia that showed how it can work even in Europe [Milosevic was the only one who refused to knuckle under the US Treasury/IMF policy!] B and NATO's occupation of now also of Macedonia and while nobody is looking, marking a final stage in its colonial odyssey in the Balkans; - pushing the US/WTO trade and NAFTA agenda, and getting "fast track" authority out of congress. - opening up alaska oil—for “security reasons” Early in the Cold War, U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles threw down the gauntlet : A "those who are not with us, are against us." B The same phrase has been invoked again by President Bush after September 11, 2001. In both instances, the self-evident purpose and effect was to throw the weight of the United States around to intimidate as manystates and others to make all possible military, diplomatic, political, economic and other concessionsto the United States that it demanded of them. Then, it was in the name of fightingthe common cold war enemy, and today it is in the name of fighting the commonterrorist enemy. However worthy the causes, in both cases the cause then was and now again is used to promote agendas as well that have no visible connection with the cause B until the United States "links" them, also to invoke the old cold war terminology. Through this simple mechanism, any number of other agendas of theU.S., other states, and a myriad of private interests are conveniently linked to an offer to good- or too dangerous -to refuse. By way of example, particular interest groups saw and took the opportunity immediately to attach riders that promote their own agendas to disaster and defense spending bills that were sure fire bets to be immediately passed by the U.S. Congress. That however, is but a tip of the iceberg example of how countless other state and private interests around the world opportunistically saw and cynically and shamelessly sought - and often already succeeded - to turn a monstrous human tragedy to their own particular advantage. Literally first was Israel, waiting no more than a day to launch an expanded militarycampaign against what it likes to call Palestinian >=terrorism,=> which with U.S. help it has persuaded much of the non-Arab world to accept as such. NOW CUI BONO? The agendas are without limit, both in number and in the distance and breadth of the "link" to the cause as well as in the cynical ingenuity or ingenious cynicism of establishing making these links. Below are assembled only a tip-of-the-iceberg SHORT list of other agendas that have already been solinked B mostly as per the horse=s mouth testimony of the actors themselves and/or institutional and other observers of the same. Only one major agenda is not represented by their own voices in the items below, although with a bit more diligence in searching them out, it should not be altogether too difficult to document that as well. That agenda of more than a decade' s standing and that has now received an enormous new boost: is the further promotion by President George W. Bush [son] of what President George Bush [father] called "THE NEW WORLD ORDER" that he was constructing with hisWar against Iraq in 1991. That THIRD WORLD WAR as I then termed it [in which THIRD meant both the 3rd following the 1st and 2nd AND a war fought in and against the THIRD WORLD] put one and all on notice that "the bully on the block", alas now in the world as a whole, was prepared to bomb and maybe even to nuke any country in the Third World, that not being "with" us, is "against" us. President Clinton made the Bush Doctrine his own and extended it onwards to Europe in the first "out of area" war by NATO against Yugoslavia , which not coincidentally was the only country in Europe that refused to knuckle under the US Treasury/IMF line - excepting only Belarus, which for that simple reason is the other bete noire. All of this done always with the loyal support of the world's # 1 cynical hypocrite opportunist Tony Blair, who goes on and on abou this latter day mission to "save civilization" with radio-active depleted uranium for refugees in Kosovo and cluster bombs for starving ones in Afghanistan. It may appear as though that represented another innovation as well, namely the invocation of "human rights" to crush human rights. Alas Clinton and Blair cannot legitimately claim originality, for a half century earlier the invasion of Czechoslovakia and then of Yugoslavia as well was also "legitimated" in the name of "the defense of the human rights" of the victims by Adolph Hitler. This now third war in the series of THIRD WORLD WAR/S promises to advance the NEW WORLD ORDER agenda still further. Today of course that agenda includes first and foremost the oil rich regions of the Caspian Sea and Central Asia, which also "happen" to be the soft under-belly of Russia, which already fought "A The Great Game" in Central Asia against its British rival in the nineteenth century. Today, of course Britain has been dis- and re-placed by the United States, although formerly "Great" Britain is now satisfied opportunistically still to play at least second fiddle to the American tune. There as in the U.S. and in any number of other countries, not only foreign policy agendas, but also any number of domestic agendas that are being opportunistically used in the wake of human tragedy. The first and foremost of course is the administration's understandable desire to rally popular political support for and to legitimate itself by catering to public demand for revenge, which the administration and its servants in the media have themselves have been irresponsibly whipping as much as possible with all manner of jingoism. and to do so by military action even without any other visible purpose or definable enemy and target. Both are highly irresponsible and do the American public an enormous disservice in failing to educate it about the causes behind the tragic action by others, and in addingto and accentuating these causes. Instead of seeking to protect the public, the administration and the media are instead knowingly exposing the people of the United States and others in the West to ever more terror and pain. Indeed, the administration, its own cabinet members and other high ranking politicians have even made numerouspublic statements signifying their lack of concern over how their own actions are certain to incite others to escalate attacks of reprisal. To that effect a recent Strategic Command document recommend a recent revision of U.S. strategy anywhere in the globe: "We must understand in advance, to the degree possible, what an adversary values,” the paper says, adding that “what a nation’s leadership values is complex, since, to a considerable extent, it is rooted in a nation’s culture.” In addition, it also says that the United States “must communicate, specifically, what we want to deter without saying what is permitted.” It also adds, “We must communicate in the strongest ways possible the unbreakable link between our vital interests and the potential harm that will be directly attributable to any who damages, or even credibly threatens to damage, that which we hold of value.” To that end, the Strategic Command paper says the United States should not say “whether the reaction would either be responsive or preemptive” and as a result the country should never adopt declaratory policies such as “no first use” of nuclear weapons. The personal characteristics of the U.S. leader, the paper says, play a part. “Fear,” the authors say, “is not the possession of the rational mind alone.” But they go on to say that deterrence “must create fear in the mind of the adversary—fear that he will not achieve his objectives, fear that his losses and pain will far outweigh any potential gains, fear that he will be punished.” Also high on the list of answers to the question of cui bono isthe American domestic right's agenda to roll back civil liberties. Not by accident did the VERY REVERENDS Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson in the United States rush to assure us only days after the tragedy of September 11, 2001 that it was God's punishment of American transgressions, including abortion, gay/lesbianism, and all manner of "liberal excesses" in civil liberties. Still Confederate flag waving Attorney General Ashcroft immediately sent Congress a long laundry list of with demands vastly to curtail civil liberties, almost all of which were granted by the Congress. Moreover, the President amplified these much further by the executive order creating military tribunals to try civilians without the protection guaranteed under the Constitution. Concomitantly, the dictatorships in Central Asia take advantage of the situation to protect and shore up their ownpower. Experience with Saddam Hussein and Dagoslav Milosevic demonstrate the almost certain recurrence of such consequences with Taliban in Afghanistan and the Central Asian dictators inherited from the Soviet ear. The difference is that, excepting Taliban, this time the U.S. and NATO have an interest in protecting and using these know devils for their own purposes in the region instead of running the risk of having to deal with as yet unknown ones. That is the case even in Afghanistan, where the U.S. is loath and Pakistan is completely opposed to letting the "Northern Alliance" replace Taliban, whose "moderate" elements are therefore designated also to have a role in any post-war settlement and government in Afghanistan. To add a historical footnote, it is revealing that nobody seems to have recalled, much less made any connections with,that other Tuesday September 11 when the Presidential Palace in Chile was bombed and a military dictatorship was installed in 1973, which in the course of a decade and a half assassinated and disappeared some 30,000 victims, tortured unknown thousands of them and among survivors, and exiled well over 100,000 people, with the collaboration of the US CIA and at the direct instance of US President Richard Nixon and his Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. [Their role was documented in the US Senate hearings of the Church Committee , which resulted in reigning in some CIA excesses with some restrictions in the 1970s that are now being again eliminated and then some in the name of fighting international terrorism. The role of Kissinger was recently documented also in the pages of Harper's Magazine by Christopher Hitchins, who a few months ago called for the indictment of Kissinger for war crimes and crimes against humanity, but now rises in defense of the same in the present War against Afghanistan]. .Instead, the new administration in Washington is now intent to unleash the CIA, and undoubtedly also the much less known but much more important Defense Intelligence Agency, to pursue and push American government policies around the world. Before proceeding to the documentation below of some of the many agendas that are being promoted in the wake of and lugubriously "thanks to" the human tragedy of September 11, we should make no mistake in noting as well how and to what extent one other agenda is being promoted probably more than any of the other by present policies and events: that of Osmani bin Laden, who first and foremost seeks to replace the Saudi regime in his native Arabia, secondly, the corrupt American puppet regimes in neighboring Arab states, and thirdly Israeli colonization of Palestine, whose roots he sees in the neo-colonialist partition of the whole area, especially by Britain, in the 1920s to which refers in his statements about "80 years ago." Neither of the Holy Warriors bin Laden and Bush , nor the promotion of their respective agendas, could be better served than by the policies and praxis of the other. SO WHO’’S AGENDAS NOW BENEFIT FROM THE WAR AGAINST AFGHANISTAN AND IN WHAT WAYS? U.S. DOMESTIC AND INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC POLICY AGENDAS ITEM- Corporate Patriotism By Ralph Nader November 10, 2001 http://www.citizenworks.org U. S. corporations aren’t even subtle about it. Waving a flag and carrying a big shovel, corporateinterests are scooping up government benefits and taxpayer money in an unprecedented fashionwhile the public is preoccupied with the September 11 attacks and the war in Afghanistan .Shamelessly, the Bush Administration and Congress have taken advantage of the patriotic outpouring to fulfill the wish lists of their most generous corporate campaign donors. Not only is theTreasury being raided, but regulations protecting everything from personal privacy to environmental safeguards are under attack by well-heeled lobbyists who want to stampede Congress to act while the media and citizens are distracted. Only a handful in the Congress—members like Senator Russell Feingold of Wisconsin andRepresentatives Peter DeFazio of Oregon and Barbara Lee of California—have shown the courage to question the giveaways and the quick wipeout of civil liberties and other citizen protections. In most cases, such as the $15 billion airline bailout and corporate tax breaks, legislation has been pushed to the forefront with little or no hearings and only fleeting consideration on the floor of the Senate and the House of Representatives. One of the boldest grabs for cash has been by corporations seeking to eliminate the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT), which was enacted during the Reagan Administration to prevent profitable corporations from escaping all tax liability through various loopholes. Not only do the corporations want relief from the current year’s AMT taxes, but they are seeking a retroactive refund of all AMT taxes paid since 1986. This giveaway, as passed by the House of Representatives, would make corporations eligible for $25 billion in tax refunds. Just 14 corporations would receive $6.3 billion of the refund. IBM gets $1.4 billion; General Motors, $833 million; General Electric $671 million; Daimler-Chrysler $600 million; Chevron- Texaco $572 million. The 14 biggest beneficiaries of the minimum tax repeal gave $14,769,785 in “soft money” to the national committees of the Democratic and Republican partiesin recent years. Soon to join the bailout parade is the nation’s insurance industry, which is lobbying the Congress to have the federal government pick up the tab for future losses like those stemming from the attack on the World Trade Center. Proposals are on the table for taxpayers to either pick up losses above certain levels or to provide loans or loan guarantees for reinsurance. The insurance companies want federal bailouts, but they continue to insist on regulation only by underfunded, poorly staffed state insurance departments, most of which are dominated by the industry. Any bailout or loan program involving the insurance companies must include provisionswhich ensure that insurance companies cannot refuse to write policies and make investments in low, moderate and minority neighborhoods. Allegations about insurance company“redlining” or discrimination against citizens in these areas have been prevalent formany years. It would be a terrible injustice for citizens to be forced to pay taxes to help bail out insurance companies that discriminate against them. Congress needs to address this issue before it even considers publicassistance for the industry. People-concerns have been missing in all the bailouts. When the airline companies walked off with $15 billion plus in bailout money, the thousands of laid-off employees—airline attendants, maintenance crews, baggage handlers and ticket counter employees—received not a dime.Attempts to include health benefits and other help for these employees were shouted down on the floor of the House of Representatives. Last month, more than 400,000 employees lost their jobs nationwide and the national unemployment rate rose to 5.4 percent, the highest level since 1996. The Bureau of Labor Statistics said roughly a fourth of the lost jobs were the direct result of the terrorist attacks of September 11. Bailouts, benefits or other aid for these victims of the attacks? No, that’s reserved just for the corporations under the policies of the Bush Administration and the present Congress. As Bill Moyers, the author and national journalist, commented: “They (the corporations) are counting on your patriotism to distract you from their plunder. They’re counting on you to stand at attention with your hand over your heart, pledging allegiance to the flag, while they pick your pocket.” --------------------- ITEM -Who will benefit from the $40 billion anti-terrorism and recovery package-to be taken from the “sacrosanct” Social Security surplus-which lawmakers approved, without blinking, three days following the attack? This sum is, of course, in addition to the some $325 billion that the bloated military apparatus already gobbles up each year. Not unlike the Israeli government-which recently passed its 2002 budget, slashing all social spending while dramatically increasing the money allocated to infrastructure and military-the U.S. Congress is now expected to circumscribe spending on health care, education and other social services, so as to confer billions on the military or, more precisely, on corporations like Lockheed Martin and Raytheon. In a week in which the Dow Jones posted a 14.3 percent loss, its largest since the Depression, Lockheed Martin and Raytheon gained 10 percent and 37 percent, respectively. ITEM: “The age of entitlement ended on September 11. We can no longer demand [health care] services as our due. We have to accept responsibility along with our rights. “Even patients and their families have responsibility in using health care services prudently.” Valerie Roddick, Chair BC Select Standing Committee on Health Report of Proceedings, October 10, 2001 ITEM -what most people don’t know is that there is a parallel economic coalition being assembled that mirrors the political loyalties and ambiguities of the war. The World Trade Organization is still, unbelievably, planning to meet in the Middle East nation of Qatar in a month’s time. There, hundreds of high level trade officials and politicians will attempt to resurrect the talks that collapsed in Seattle two years ago. Until the terrible events of Sept. 11 and the war now being fought, itappeared there would be no chance at all of a new round. The differences between the wealthy countries of the North and the poor countries of the South were too great. The U.S., Canada and the EU have proposed an ambitious agenda that includes a number of new items, including investment, services and competition. Dear to the heart of the United Statesand the European Union is the desire to launch a new “round” of tradenegotiations, one that would last for several years and advance the globalfree-trade agenda in a whole host of areas. The United States wants this newagreement, now more than ever. And it iscounting on the strong global support for its war on terrorism to revive its failed trade agenda. Robert Zoellick, U.S. Trade Representative, equatessupport for free trade with the fight against terrorism. Declaring that free trade “promotes the values at the heart of this protracted struggle,” he haslaunched a drive to persuade Congress to grant the President “fast-track” authority. He says that in signing such legislation, the United States would be signaling to the world that it does not plan to retreat from its global responsibilities, including the defense of free trade against terrorist threats and opponents of globalization. Maude Barlow in the Globe & Mail [Toronto] ITEM - Qatar reveals impact of Sept 11 on trade battleBy Judy RebickAfter years of battle, the pro-corporate globalization forces have won a victory in Qatar. MaudeBarlow in an internet radio report from Qatar http://www.canadians.org says NGOs on the ground attheWorld Trade Organization (WTO) talks Aare devastated.@The United States and other rich countries are using the Awar on terrorism@ to bully and bribepoor countries into supporting the WTO agenda, which will expand corporate power and increase the gap between rich and poor.the monumental events of September 11 and its aftermath have had an impact in bothstrengthening the position of the rich countries and weakening the anti-corporate globalizationforces, especially in North America. -------------------- ITEM - On Monday, theSecretary of State for Trade and Industry, Patricia Hewitt, called a meeting of the voluntary aid agencies to tell them that, “since 11 September, the case is now overwhelming” for the poor to be given “more trade liberation”. She might have used the example of those impoverished countries where her cabinet colleague Clare Short’s ironically named Department for International Development backs rapacious privatisation campaigns on behalf of British multinational companies, such as those vying to make a killing in a resource as precious as water. U.S. FOREIGN POLICYAND MILITARY AGENDASITEM -The unread news today is that the “war against terrorism” is being exploited in order to achieve objectives that consolidate American power. These include: the bribing and subjugation of corrupt and vulnerable governments in former Soviet central Asia, crucial for American expansion in the region and exploitation of the last untapped reserves of oil and gas in the world; Nato’s occupation of Macedonia, marking a final stage in its colonial odyssey in the Balkans; the expansion of the American arms industry; and the speeding up of trade liberalisation. John Pilger in THE INDEPENDENT [London] ITEM - The war against terrorism is a fraud. After three weeks’ bombing, not a single terrorist implicated in the attacks on America has been caught or killed in Afghanistan. None of those directly involved in the September 11 atrocity was Afghani.Most were Saudis, who apparently did their planning and training in Germany and the United States.The camps which the Taliban allowed bin Laden to use were emptied weeks ago. By John Pilger, Former Mirror chief foreign correspondent ----------------- ITEM - After nearly a decade of disentanglement from the conflict following the withdrawal of Soviet occupying forces from Afghanistan, major-power interests are once again on the rise in that war-torn country. The United States and Russia, which engaged in a proxy war for the soul of Afghanistan in the 1980s, have finally found common ground in their opposition to what has been created in the intervening period: the Pakistan-backed ultra-orthodox Islamic Taliban militia. In a summit in early June, the two powers agreed on the need to contain the Taliban as a perceived source of support for the spread of “Islamic militancy” and “international terrorism.” This is a development that may also resonate well with Iran, the Central Asian republics, India, China and the European Union, all of which have grown apprehensive of the Taliban for varying reasons. ITEM - The story we hear on the news and read in the newspapers is simply not believable.The most cursory glance at the verifiable facts, before, during, and after September 11th, does not support the official line or conform to the current actions of the United States government. The official story is that this is a “response” to attacks on September 11th. The problem is that this operation is already operating at a level of sophistication that would require far more than three weeks to plan, coordinate, and initiate. That’s categorical.It quite simply can not be done in three weeks on the other side of the globe.People aren’t questioning that here, because the massive military operations on the other side of the world take a very long time [to prepare].That’s a fact.The very permissive operation I last participated in to invade Haiti in 1994 took months of planning. by Stan Goff [I was a tactics instructor at the Jungle Operations Training Center in Panama, and I taught Military Science at West Point. And advice and assistance to foreign forces... andon how to coordinate effective air operations with a sister service. [This commentary is] based on that experience,and operations in eight designated conflict areas from Vietnam to Haiti] ITEM - Credibility, Diplomacy and Military Reality To defeat the Taliban, the United States needs to bolster the global coalition while also building a new local coalition inside Afghanistan. Unfortunately for Washington, these two groups have conflicting military requirements. http://www.stratfor.com/home/0110162220.htm ITEM - U.S. Policy Toward Arab States Gets Aggressive The United States seems to be taking a more hard-line stance toward Syria, Iraq and Lebanon. All sides believe U.S. military action is unlikely, but the risks are too high for these states to take a chance on calling Washington’s bluff. http://www.stratfor.com/home/0110152040.htm ITEM -Ex-CIA boss calls for war on Iraq ‘Absolute destruction’ of Saddam Hussein is next step in war on terrorism: top adviser By Juliet O’Neill Washington—The man reportedly assigned by the U.S. government to give advice on whether Iraq was involved in the Sept. 11 terror attacks appears to have decided that a “ruthless” war against Saddam Hussein is justified as soon as military strikes in Afghanistan are finished. “This time, no Mr. Nice Guy,” said James Woolsey, director of the Central Intelligence Agency from 1993-95.“This time, no stopping short of absolute destruction of the Baath regime. ... This time, no quarter.” These were among the many blunt statements Mr. Woolsey made in an after-dinner speech Monday to members of the influential American Jewish Congress. You could hear a pin drop through most of it, and he received a standing ovation at the end. ITEM- U.S. Official Reveals Colombia as Target State Dept.’s Taylor at OAS: The Andes is in Military’s Sites Washington - The terrorist organizations that operate in Colombia are also targets of the global anti-terrorist campaign launched by the United States after September 11th, said Francis Taylor, anti-terrorism coordinator of the State Department. “All the resources” available to the United States will be used in that campaign, including, “where appropriate, as we have done in Afghanistan, the use of military force,” Taylor told journalists today in the headquarters of the Organization of American States (OAS) in Washington, DC. Agence France Press , October 15, 2001 - ITEM - Colombia is a high priority right now, because (1) there’s oil there, (2) there’s a successful insurgency going on there, and (3) the military needs a testing ground for some new doctrine and technology.As an aside, Al Gore’s family is heavily invested in Occidental Petroleum, the biggest dog under the porch in Colombia. BUSH, U.S & NATO OIL & STRATEGICAGENDAS ITEM - [George W. ] Bush can not be taken on his own terms.Dad is the immanence gris in this outfit.He’s not only the former-pres, he’s the former VP, and the former Director of Central Intelligence.Dad has been also working hard behind the scenes for the Carlyle Group since leaving office, and is on Carlyle’s Board of Directors. Carlyle is a $12 billion private “equity company”.Carlyle’s onnections to Bush go way back.In 1990, Carlyle put Baby Bush on the board of its subsidiary, Caterair, as a favor, we presume, to Senior. Dallas lawyer and Bush-bud Robert Jordan was recently confirmed as ambassador to Saudi Arabia, where a hell of a lot of the world’s known remaining sweet oil is... Jordan works for Baker Botts, a firm with offices in Riyadh, that represents Carlyle Group.By the way, the Baker in Baker Botts is none other than James Baker III, Bush Senior’s blue-blood Secretary of State, former classmate of now-SecDef Rumsfeld, and former roommate of the head of Carlyle, Frank Carlucci.Carlucci served Reagan as his chief of the National Security Council. Baker, don’t forget, was they guy who worked behind the scenes coordinating the Florida coup in the 2000 election. Carlyle also includes former heads of state, Fidel Ramos of the Philippines, Park Tae Jon of South Korea, and John Major of Great Britain.It even has former Chairman of the JCS, John Shalikashvili.Carlyle is now America’s 11th biggest Defense contractor.Over $2 million in Carlyle funding has come from the family of America’s Most Wanted in our current adventure, Osama bin Laden. Stan Goff[A-List] ITEM -Congressional Republicans are exploiting the Sept. 11 terror attacks to push the Bush administration’s plan for an all-out increase in energy production. Lawmakers first proposed making the administration’s controversial plan— which includes drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge—part of a federal anti-terrorism bill. Though that amendment failed late last month, drilling advocates are likely to continue invoking terrorism fears as they argue for more oil development. Bush, of course, has long maintained that his energy plan will increaseAmerica’s “energy security”—meaning the nation’s access to relatively inexpensive electricity and fuel. To that end, he has proposed a package of measures intended to encourage greater production of oil, along with other fossil fuels and nuclear power. In a victory that surprised even Republicans, the House of Representatives in August endorsed much of Bush’s approach, including $33 billion worth of tax incentives for oil companies. MotherJones.com October 15, 2001 ITEM - As Central Asian expert Ahmed Rashid describes in his 2000 book “Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia,” the U.S. and Pakistan decided to install a stable regime in Afghanistan around 1994 -- a regime that would end the country’s civil war and thus ensure the safety of the Unocal pipeline project. Impressed by the ruthlessness and willingness of the then-emerging Taliban to cut a pipeline deal, the U.S. State Department and Pakistan’s ISI intelligence service agreed to funnel arms and funding to the Taliban in their war against the ethnically Tajik Northern Alliance. It has been reported that as recently as 1999, U.S. taxpayers paid the entire annual salary of every single Taliban government official, all in the hopes of returning to the days of dollar-a-gallon gas. Pakistan, naturally, would pick up revenues from a Karachi oil port facility. Harkening to 19th century power politics between Russia and British India, Rashid dubbed the struggle for control of post-Soviet Central Asia “the new Great Game.” ITEM - “Washington is now becoming the arbiter or leader of virtually every interstate and international issue in the area” [254] and indeed also “the main center of international adjudication and influence for local issues” [255]. However in the face of the Russian bear, old style gun-boat diplomacy is too dangerous and is now replaced by its “functional equivalent ... peace operations” [256]. Washington is pursuing these with intense “actual policy making on a daily basis throughout the executive branch” [253] in Washington and by a myriad of “Partnership for Peace” programs of which the Strategic Research Development Report 5-96 of the [U.S] Center for Naval Warfare Studies reports on activities of these forces that provide dominant battlespace knowledge necessary to shape regional security environments. Multinational excersizes, port visits, staff-to-staff coordination - all designed to increase force inter- operability and access to regional military facilities - along with intelligence and surveillance operations.... [So] forward deployed forces are backed up by those which can surge for rapid reenforcement and can be in place in seven to thirty days [256-257]. All this andmore “reflects a major shift in U.S. policy toward Central Asia ... coordinated by the National Security Council,” as the author quotes from the hawkish U.S. JAMESTOWN FOUNDATION MONITOR. The Security Council’s former head and then already super anti-Soviet Russian hawk, Zbigniew Brzezinsky, now promotes a modernized Mackinder heartland vision of a grand U.S. led anti-Russian coalition of Europe,Turkey, Iran, and China as well as Central Asia [253]. Stephen Blank in OIL AND GEOPOLITICS IN THE CASPIAN SEA REGION edited by Michael P. Croissant and Bulent Aras, Westport, Conn. & London: Praeger 1999 ITEM - . Former U.S. Secretaries ofState and of Defense Christopher and Perry stated in 1997 that “thedanger to security ... is not primarily potential aggression to their collective [NATO] territory, but threats to their collective interests beyond their territory....To deal with such threats alliance members need to have a way to rapidly form military coalitions that can accomplish goals beyond NATO territory” [252]. Javier Solana, the Secretary-General of NATO also during its war against Jugoslavia, and now promoted to czar of European Union [EU] foreign policy, pronounced himself at a Washington conference on NATO enlargement to say that Europe cannot be fully secure without bringing the Caucasus into its security zone [250]. U.S. Ambassador Nathan Nimitz agrees: “PAX NATO is the only logical regime to maintain security in the traditional sense... [and] must recognize a need for expansion of its stabilizing influence in adjacent areas, particularly in Southeastern Europe, the Black Sea region (in concert of course with the regional powers...) and in the Arabian/Persian Gulf. The United States must continue to play the major role in this security system” [252]. Stephen Blank , ibid. ITEM- Subject: Testimony of Unocal V.P. before Congressional committee http://commdocs.house.gov/committees/intlrel/hfa48119.000/hfa48119_0f.htm “From the outset, we have made it clear that construction of the pipeline we have proposed across Afghanistan could not begin until a recognized government is in place that has the confidence of governments, lenders, and our company.” Mr. John J. Maresca, vice president of international relations, Unocal Corporation U.S. INTERESTS IN THE CENTRAL ASIAN REPUBLICSHEARING BEFORE THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON ASIA AND THE PACIFIC OF THE COMMITTEE ONINTERNATIONAL RELATIONS HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES- ONE HUNDRED FIFTH CONGRESS SECOND SESSION FEBRUARY 12, 1998 Next we would like to hear from Mr. John J. Maresca, vice president of international relations, Unocal Corporation. You may proceed as you wish. STATEMENT OF JOHN J. MARESCA, VICE PRESIDENT OF INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, UNOCAL CORPORATION Mr. Maresca. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It’s nice to see you again. I am John Maresca, vice president for international relations of the Unocal Corporation. Unocal, as you know, is one of the world’s leading energy resource and project development companies. I appreciate your invitation to speak here today. I believe these hearings are important and timely. I congratulate you for focusing on Central Asia oil and gas reserves and the role they play in shaping U.S. policy. I would like to focus today on three issues. First, the need for multiple pipeline routes for Central Asian oil and gas resources. Second, the need for U.S. support for international and regional efforts to achieve balanced and lasting political settlements to the conflicts in the region, including Afghanistan. Third, the need for structured assistance to encourage economic reforms and the development of appropriate investment climates in the region. In this regard, we specifically support repeal or removal of section 907 of the Freedom Support Act. Mr. Chairman, the Caspian region contains tremendous untapped hydrocarbon reserves. Just to give an idea of the scale, proven natural gas reserves equal more than 236 trillion cubic feet. The region’s total oil reserves may well reach more than 60 billion barrels of oil. Some estimates are as high as 200 billion barrels. In 1995, the region was producing only 870,000 barrels per day. By 2010, western companies could increase production to about 4.5 million barrels a day, an increase of more than 500 percent in only 15 years. If this occurs, the region would represent about 5 percent of the world’s total oil production. One major problem has yet to be resolved: how to get the region’s vast energy resources to the markets where they are needed. The key question then is how the energy resources of Central Asia can bemade available to nearby Asian markets. There are two possible solutions, with several variations. One option is to go east across China. The second option is to build a pipeline south from Central Asia to the Indian Ocean. One obvious route south would cross Iran, but this is foreclosed for American companies because of U.S. sanctions legislation. The only other possible route is across Afghanistan, which has of course its own unique challenges. The country has been involved in bitter warfare for almost two decades, and is still divided by civil war. From the outset, we have made it clear that construction of the pipeline we have proposed across Afghanistan could not begin until a recognized government is in place that has the confidence of governments, lenders, and our company. Mr. Chairman, as you know, we have worked very closely with the University of Nebraska at Omaha in developing a training program for Afghanistan which will be open to both men and women, and which will operate in both parts of the country, the north and south. Unocal foresees a pipeline which would become part of a regional system that will gather oil from existing pipeline infrastructure in Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Russia. The 1,040-mile long oil pipeline would extend south through Afghanistan to an export terminal that would be constructed on the Pakistan coast. As with the proposed Central Asia oil pipeline, CentGas can not begin construction until an internationally recognized Afghanistan Government is in place.The impact of these resources on U.S. commercial interests and U.S. foreign policy is also significant. Without peaceful settlement of the conflicts in the region, cross-border oil and gas pipelines are not likely to be built. U.S. assistance in developing these new economies will be crucial to business success. We thus also encourage strong technical assistance programs throughout the region. Specifically, we urge repeal or removal of section 907 of the Freedom Support Act. This section unfairly restricts U.S. Government assistance to the government of Azerbaijan and limits U.S. influence in the region. Developing cost-effective export routes for Central Asian resources is a formidable task, but not an impossible one. Unocal and other American companies like it are fully prepared to undertake the job and to make Central Asia once again into the crossroads it has been in the past. Thankyou, Mr. Chairman. DRUG TRADE AGENDASAFGHANISTAN, COLOMBIA, VIETNAM: THE DEEP POLITICS OF DRUGS AND OIL http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~pdscott/index.html ITEM - [current drug political economy item misplaced] GREAT POWERS’ AGENDASITEM - Russia has grown increasingly wary of the Taliban. It has castigated the militia for aiding cross-border Islamic militancy into the former Soviet Central Asian republics and for providingassistance to what it has called the “Chechen Islamic rebels.” It has been profoundly perturbed by recurrent bursts of Islamic opposition activity in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, which in August 2000 was also manifested in a (reportedly Taliban-supported) protracted armed attack by an Islamic group, made up of Uzbek, Tajik and Chechen elements, on parts of Kyrgyzstan bordering Tajikistan. The attack resulted in a major military confrontation at the cost of many lives. It alarmed not only the Kyrgyz government and its Central Asian counterparts but also Moscow which has assumed responsibility for the security of the borders of Central Asian states with Afghanistan. Russia has also been incensed at the reception that the Taliban have given to the Chechen Islamic fighters, allowing them to open a mission in Kabul and use Afghanistan as a training and conduit base for their anti-Russian resistance in Chechnya. While beefing up its border guard defenses along Afghanistan’s borders with Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, Moscow has threatened to launch air strikes against Taliban positions in Afghanistan and called for tougher U.N. sanctions against the Taliban. As a corollary, it has become more receptive towards the anti-Taliban forces in northern Afghanistan, led by Commander Ahmed Shah Massoud, representing the ousted government of Burhannudin Rabbani, which still occupies Afghanistan’s seat in the U.N. General Assembly. Although publicly at odds with Russia’s handling of Chechnya, Washington has increasingly come to appreciate Moscow’s concern about the Taliban. Amin Saikal MEPC Volume VII October 2000 Number 4 ITEM - Facing WTO Life Sentence By Boris Kagarlitsky in Moscow The attacks in New York and Washington have provided the impetus for a new round of rapprochement between the United States and Russia. After several years of cool relations and confrontational rhetoric, the Russian government is demonstrating a willingness to be a military and political ally. It’s another matter that the Kremlin, strictly adhering to free market principals, is trying to sell its friendship for the highest price. In a strange way, the Kremlin is trying to get from the West what the West has always dreamed of extracting from Russia. Moscow is talking about joining the WTO and about strengthening ties with NATO, even discussing the possibility of joining the alliance. In other words, Russia is seeking complete integration with Western institutions in which it will not have a great deal of influence. Effectively, Russia is placing itself on a level with Estonia and Poland, whose only strategic foreign policy goal for the past 10 years has been integration with the West. ITEM -Having accepted Sept. 11 as a watershed, there is discussion in Moscow about the concessions that Russia can expect from the United States as the price for the new partnership. The shopping list includes: an end to criticism of the war in Chechnya; cancellation of Soviet-era debts; abandonment of national missile defense; an end to NATO expansion; lifting sanctions on Iraq; U.S. help in the event of future terrorist attacks on Russia; and more. (Fortunately, last weekend the Russian soccer team qualified for the World Cup finals, or one suspects that also might have been on the list.) If Russia really believes that the September bombings will lead the United States to abandon unilateralism, it is headed for a rude awakening. [Some agendas are not very realistic, but there=s no harm in trying to hitch them to September 11 anyway] A Turning Point in U.S.-Russian Relations? By Peter Rutland ITEM - Russia Moves to Balance Books With Moscow earning nods of approval for joining the international coalition against terrorism, President Putin is trying to maximize Russia’s new standing by proposing early repayment of an IMF loan. Stratfor ITEM -Putin’s Quest for the West In the emerging new world order, Russian President Vladimir Putin sees an opportunity to join the West that will not come again—and he is grabbing hold of it with both hands. http://www.stratfor.com/CIS/commentary/0110231940.htm ITEM - China sets terms for backing U.S. war on terror. Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhu Bangzao demanded U.S. support for its own struggle against “terrorism and separatism”—shorthand for groups that include Taiwan independence advocates and the Tibetan Dalai Lama—in return for backing a U.S.-led war on terrorism. “The United States has asked China to provide assistance in the fight against terrorism,” Zhu said. “China, by the same token, has reasons to ask the United States to give its support and understanding in the fight against terrorism and separatists,” “We should not have double standards.” South China Morning Post,September 18th, 2001 China has given strong rhetorical support to the American campaign against terrorism and has shared intelligence with Washington. It appears to have encouraged Pakistan, a close ally, to stand with the United States. In return, it seems to expect America and other countries to accept its mischaracterizations of the Falun Gong spiritual movement and separatists in Tibet and Xinjiang as terrorists.” Http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/18/opinion/18THU3.html?ex=1004068800&en=4ca5d ---------------------------- - The call, made by a government spokesperson in Beijing, follows recent reports that the Chinese authorities had launched a new campaign to suppress “terrorist and separatist” activity in the XUAR. Local officials made it clear that “ethnic separatists” were a major target of the campaign. “The Chinese authorities do not distinguish between ‘terrorism’ and ‘separatism’,” Amnesty International said. “Separatism in fact covers a broad range of activities most of which amount to no more than peaceful opposition or dissent. Preaching or teaching Islam outside government controls is also considered subversive.” http://web.amnesty.org/802568F7005C4453/0/BB01E090E3F1D2D580256AE3005DC8B9O Suppression of social organizations has been so harsh that the number of such organizations in Xinjiang’s capital, Urumqi, declined by 50 percent between 1996 and 1999, according to official government figures. The backgrounder notes that the Chinese government has provided diametrically opposed assessments of the security situation to different audiences. As part of its campaign to encourage foreign investment in western China, including Xinjiang, Chinese authorities insist that the situation is stable and secure, and only a handful of people are engaged in separatism. When the government wants international support for its campaign to eradicate opposition to Chinese rule in Xinjiang, however, it raises the spectre of Islamic terrorism. http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=3623 OTHER POWERS’ AGENDASITEM - Pakistan’s strategy is the extension of its influence, even control, over Afghanistan by ensuring that a compliant force, the Taliban [or another], is in power. In this way Pakistan would have significantly extended its strategic influence within central Asia. This strategic advantage would have been of geopolitical and commercial significance. Under these conditions Pakistan would have significant influence over the fuel and other resources in Afghanistan. Perhaps even the further colonialist expansion of Pakistan beyond Afghanistan into neighbouring Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. This would mean its increased influence over the surrounding countries. Its influence, even colonisation, of Afghanistan would have strengthened its position concerning its relationship with India over the Kashmir question. Karl Carlile [This observation refers to Pakistan=s support of Taliban, but it applies equally to Pakistan's negotiation with the U.S. over a friendly government in Kabul as a condition for its support of the U.S. operation to itsreplacement, for which Pakistani support is necessary. Equally however, the forces in Pakistan including its younger brother of the CIA twin seek to use resulting anti-government forces uprisings for their own agenda in Pakistan] ITEM - India Seeking to Disrupt U.S.-Pakistani Ties India’s recent shelling of Pakistani soldiers in Kashmir was meant to send a message to Washington: India does not like the growing ties between Pakistan and America, and it has the power to throw those ties into disarray. Stratfor CENTRAL ASIAN REPUBLICS’ AGENDASITEM -Central Asian States Advance Multinational Fight Against Terrorism While bombs continue to fall on Afghanistan, Central Asian states are trying to focus international attention on the region’s future security. Regional leaders said during a recent United Nations conference that a well-coordinated international effort will be needed to successfully combat terrorism. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav101001a.shtml ITEM - Nursultan Nazarbayev has a terrible problem. He’s the president and former Communist Party boss of Kazakhstan, the second-largest republic of the former Soviet Union. A few years ago, the giant country struck oil in the eastern portion of the Caspian Sea. Geologists estimate that sitting beneath the wind-blown steppes of Kazakhstan are 50 billion barrels of oil—by far the biggest untapped reserves in the world. (Saudi Arabia, currently the world’s largest oil producer, is believed to have about 30 billion barrels remaining.) Kazakhstan’s Soviet-subsidized economy collapsed immediately after independence in 1991. Autocrats tend to die badly during periods of downward mobility. Nazarbayev, therefore, has spent most of the last decade trying to get his land-locked oil out to sea. Once the oil starts flowing, it won’t take long before Kazakhstan replaces Kuwait as the land of Benzes and ugly gold jewelry. But the longer the pipeline, the more expensive and vulnerable to sabotage it is. The shortest route runs through Iran, but Kazakhstan is too closely aligned with the U.S. to offend it by cutting a deal with Teheran. Russia has helpfully offered to build a line connecting Kazakh oil rigs to the Black Sea, but neighboring Turkmenistan has experienced trouble with the Russians: they tend to divert the oil for their own uses without paying for it. There’s even a plan to run crude out through China, but the proposed 5,300-mile line would be far too long to prove profitable. The logical alternative, then, is Unocal’s plan, which is to extendTurkmenistan’s existing system west to the Kazakh field on the Caspian andsoutheast to the Pakistani port of Karachi on the Arabian Sea. That projectruns through Afghanistan. The New Great Game: Oil Politics in Central Asia Ted Rall, AlterNet, October 11, 2001 ITEM- [Afghanistan]: world’s largest illicit opium producer, surpassing Burma (potential production in 1999 - 1,670 metric tons; cultivation in 1999 - 51,500 hectares, a 23% increase over 1998); a major source of hashish; increasing number of heroin-processing laboratories being set upin the country; major political factions in the country profit from drugtrade CIA Factbook ( Afghanistan). ITEM - [Other interests] have all aligned the US on the same side as powerful local drug traffickers. Partly this has been from realpolitik—in recognition of the local power realities represented by the drug traffic. Partly it has been from the need to escape domestic political restraints: the traffickers have supplied additional financial resources needed because of US budgetary limitations, and they have also provided assets not bound (as the US is) by the rules of war. And partly (I believe) it has been from a concern to manage the drug traffic itself, and ensure that it will never fall under the control of another hostile power. These facts, however coincidental in origin, have led to enduring intelligence networks involving both oil and drugs, or more specifically both petrodollars and narcodollars. These networks, particularly in the Middle East, have become so important that they affect, not just the conduct of US foreign policy, but the health and behavior of the US government, US banks and corporations, and indeed the whole of US society. It has become customary for US intelligence agencies (or what I call cryptocracies) to draw on the assets of the illicit drug economy (or what I call the cryptonomy) in pursuit of various goals, from negotiation to corruption. This has been a major factor in the failure of our government to address the problem of drugs and the cryptonomy reasonably, and the concomitant growth of the cryptonomy to a point where the US economy has become dependent on it. (For another example of this, click here.) We see proof of this in the appalling US government handling of BCCI, the Bank of Credit and Commerce International, a bank controlled by the petrodollars of Sheikh Zayed al-Nahayan the Enir of Abu Dhabi, and a bank which became a major global channel for the laundering of narcodollars and other illicit funds. More specifically the deep politics of the Al-Qaeda network, and of bin Laden’s personal family, involves the same pattern of Afghan-Pakistan-United Arab Emirates drug-trafficking, money-laundering, and intelligence activity Peter Dale Scott ITEM - Abkhazia Primed to Explode Again, Russia Poised to Intervene Justin Burke The fallout from the September 11 terrorist attacks is spreading to the Caucasus. After years of uneasy peace, Georgia and Abkhazian separatists are mobilizing to resume their bitter conflict. Georgian officials are accusing Russia of fomenting unrest, and President Eduard Shevardnadze is considering pulling Georgia out of the Commonwealth of Independent States. Russian leaders, meanwhile, say the Georgian government has lost control of the country, an ominous indicator that Russian forces may intervene in the brewing conflict. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav101101.shtml ITEM -Uzbekistan Seeking Regional Dominance About three weeks ago, the United States began shipping men and materiel to the Khanabad air base near Karshi in southern Uzbekistan. American forces look set to be engaged on Uzbek soil for several years. http://www.stratfor.com/home/0110171700.htm ITEM - Karimov Stakes Out Firm Boundaries for US-Uzbek Cooperation Josh Machleder Uzbek President Islam Karimov is striving to keep a tight rein on events that threaten to stampede out of control. After years of repressing freedom of expression, Karimov is now taking tentative steps to open up Uzbekistan’s tightly controlled media. But gaining popular trust is proving a difficult challenge for the government. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav101001.shtml ITEM -Kazakhstan Tries to Balance Disparate Interests Alima Bisenova Along with other states in the region, Kazakhstan is struggling to find a way to appear supportive of the US campaign against terrorism, while avoiding direct involvement in hostilities. The opening of the US bombing raids on Afghanistan serve to deepen the dilemmas faced by Kazakhstani leaders. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav100901a.shtml ITEM -Kyrgyzstan Opens Airspace To US Warplanes Chris Schuepp Kyrgyzstan, a country that has battled Islamic radical insurgents for the past three years, is backing the United States in its anti-terrorism offensive. On September 25, President Askar Akayev announced he had authorized the opening of Kyrgyz airspace to US military aircraft for possible raids on targets in Afghanistan. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav092501.shtml ITEM - Georgia Faces New Regional Realities Richard Giragosian and Khatchik Derghoukassian In the meetings and speeches of his recent visit to the United States, President Shevardnadze was anxious to demonstrate his nation’s strategic value in the face of an evolving U.S. foreign policy. A EurasiaNet Partner Post http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/pp100901.shtml ITEM - Caucasian Crisis: Georgian Opportunity, Russian Quandary. In an attempt to diffuse Russia’s forces, Chechen and Georgian militants are attacking the renegade Georgian province of Abkhazia. Unlike previous fighting, this round could actually end with an international deployment in Georgia. http://www.stratfor.com/CIS/commentary/0110172110.htm FARTHER OUT JUMP ON THE BANDWAGEN AGENDAS ITEM -Malaysia: Hedging Support for U.S. War Unlike Indonesia and the Philippines, Malaysia has largely kept Islamic insurgency under control. The new fear for Kuala Lumpur is that the global anti-terror campaign may incite domestic Muslim extremism and terrorism. http://www.stratfor.com/asia/commentary/0110152200.htm ITEM -Xinjiang - China http://www.hrw.org/press/2001/10/xinjiang.htm The call, made by a government spokesperson in Beijing, follows recent reports that the Chinese authorities had launched a new campaign to suppress “terrorist and separatist” activity in the XUAR. Local officials made it clear that “ethnic separatists” were a major target of the campaign. “The Chinese authorities do not distinguish between ‘terrorism’ and ‘separatism’,” Amnesty International said. “Separatism in fact covers a broad range of activities most of which amount to no more than peaceful opposition or dissent. Preaching or teaching Islam outside government controls is also considered subversive.” http://web.amnesty.org/802568F7005C4453/0/BB01E090E3F1D2D580256AE3005DC8B9O ITEM - Pakistan’s strategy is the extension of its influence, even control, over Afghanistan by ensuring that a compliant force, the Taliban [or another], is in power. In this way Pakistan would have significantly extended its strategic influence within central Asia. This strategic advantage would have been of geopolitical and commercial significance. Under these conditions Pakistan would have significant influence over the fuel and other resources in Afghanistan. Perhaps even the further colonialist expansion of Pakistan beyondAfghanistan into neighbouring Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. This would mean its increased influence over the surrounding countries. Its influence, even colonisation, of Afghanistan would have strengthened its position concerning its relationship with India over the Kashmir question. Karl Carlile [This observation refers to Pakistan=s support of Taliban, but it applies equally to Pakistan=s negotiation with the U.S. over a friendly government in Kabul as a condition for its support of the U.S. operation to itsreplacement, for which Pakistani support is necessary. Equally however, the forces in Pakistan including its ISI younger brother of the CIA twin seek to use resulting anti-government forces uprisings for their own agenda in Pakistan] ITEM - [India] Seeking to Disrupt U.S.-Pakistani Ties India’s recent shelling of Pakistani soldiers in Kashmir was meant to send a message to Washington: India does not like the growing ties between Pakistan and America, and it has the power to throw those ties into disarray. Stratfor CENTRAL ASIAN STATES’AGENDAS ITEM -Central Asian States Advance Multinational Fight Against Terrorism Todd Diamond While bombs continue to fall on Afghanistan, Central Asian states are trying to focus international attention on the region’s future security. Regional leaders said during a recent United Nations conference that a well-coordinated international effort will be needed to successfully combat terrorism. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav101001a.shtml ITEM - Abkhazia Primed to Explode Again, Russia Poised to Intervene Justin Burke The fallout from the September 11 terrorist attacks is spreading to the Caucasus. After years of uneasy peace, Georgia and Abkhazian separatists are mobilizing to resume their bitter conflict. Georgian officials are accusing Russia of fomenting unrest, and President Eduard Shevardnadze is considering pulling Georgia out of the Commonwealth of Independent States. Russian leaders, meanwhile, say the Georgian government has lost control of the country, an ominous indicator that Russian forces may intervene in the brewing conflict. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav101101.shtml ITEM -Uzbekistan Seeking Regional Dominance About three weeks ago, the United States began shipping men and materiel to the Khanabad air base near Karshi in southern Uzbekistan. American forces look set to be engaged on Uzbek soil for several years. http://www.stratfor.com/home/0110171700.htm ITEM - Karimov Stakes Out Firm Boundaries for US-Uzbek Cooperation Josh Machleder Uzbek President Islam Karimov is striving to keep a tight rein on events that threaten to stampede out of control. After years of repressing freedom of expression, Karimov is now taking tentative steps to open up Uzbekistan’s tightly controlled media. But gaining popular trust is proving a difficult challenge for the government. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav101001.shtml ITEM -Kazakhstan Tries to Balance Disparate Interests Alima Bisenova Along with other states in the region, Kazakhstan is struggling to find a way to appear supportive of the US campaign against terrorism, while avoiding direct involvement in hostilities. The opening of the US bombing raids on Afghanistan serve to deepen the dilemmas faced by Kazakhstani leaders. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav100901a.shtml ITEM -Kyrgyzstan Opens Airspace To US Warplanes Chris Schuepp Kyrgyzstan, a country that has battled Islamic radical insurgents for the past three years, is backing the United States in its anti-terrorism offensive. On September 25, President Askar Akayev announced he had authorized the opening of Kyrgyz airspace to US military aircraft for possible raids on targets in Afghanistan. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav092501.shtml ITEM - Georgia Faces New Regional Realities Richard Giragosian and Khatchik Derghoukassian In the meetings and speeches of his recent visit to the United States, President Shevardnadze was anxious to demonstrate his nation’s strategic value in the face of an evolving U.S. foreign policy. A EurasiaNet Partner Post http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/pp100901.shtml ITEM - Caucasian Crisis: Georgian Opportunity, Russian Quandary. In an attempt to diffuse Russia’s forces, Chechen and Georgian militants are attacking the renegade Georgian province of Abkhazia. Unlike previous fighting, this round could actually end with an international deployment in Georgia. http://www.stratfor.com/CIS/commentary/0110172110.htm OTHERS’ AGENDAS ITEM -Malaysia: Hedging Support for U.S. War Unlike Indonesia and the Philippines, Malaysia has largely kept Islamic insurgency under control. The new fear for Kuala Lumpur is that the global anti-terror campaign may incite domestic Muslim extremism and terrorism. http://www.stratfor.com/asia/commentary/0110152200.htm ITEM -By Wayne S. Smith and Anya K. Landau [Wayne Smith is the head of the U.S.Interests Section in Cuba]http://www.ciponline.org.nxlkhost.com/cuba/main/perspectiveonterrorism.htm ITEM - Xinjiang, China Suppression of social organizations has been so harsh that the number of such organizations in Xinjiang’s capital, Urumqi, declined by 50 percent between 1996 and 1999, according to official government figures. The backgrounder notes that the Chinese government has provided diametrically opposed assessments of the security situation to different audiences. As part of its campaign to encourage foreign investment in western China, including Xinjiang, Chinese authorities insist that the situation is stable and secure, and only a handful of people are engaged in separatism. When the government wants international support for its campaign to eradicate opposition to Chinese rule in Xinjiang, however, it raises the spectre of Islamic terrorism. http://www.hrw.org/press/2001/10/xinjiang.htm ITEM - Pakistan’s strategy is the extension of its influence, even control, over Afghanistan by ensuring that a compliant force, the Taliban [or another], is in power. In this way Pakistan would have significantly extended its strategic influence within central Asia. This strategic advantage would have been of geopolitical and commercial significance. Under these conditions Pakistan would have significant influence over the fuel and other resources in Afghanistan. Perhaps even the further colonialist expansion of Pakistan beyondAfghanistan into neighbouring Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. This would mean its increased influence over the surrounding countries. Its influence, even colonisation, of Afghanistan would have strengthened its position concerning its relationship with India over the Kashmir question. Karl Carlile [This observation refers to Pakistan's support of Taliban, but it applies equally to Pakistan's negotiation with the U.S. over a friendly government in Kabul as a condition for its support of the U.S. operation to itsreplacement, for which Pakistani support is necessary. Equally however, the forces in Pakistan including its ISI younger brother of the CIA twin seek to use resulting anti-government forces uprisings for their own agenda in Pakistan] ITEM - [India] Seeking to Disrupt U.S.-Pakistani Ties India’s recent shelling of Pakistani soldiers in Kashmir was meant to send a message to Washington: India does not like the growing ties between Pakistan and America, and it has the power to throw those ties into disarray. Stratfor ITEM -Central Asian States Advance Multinational Fight Against Terrorism Todd Diamond While bombs continue to fall on Afghanistan, Central Asian states are trying to focus international attention on the region’s future security. Regional leaders said during a recent United Nations conference that a well-coordinated international effort will be needed to successfully combat terrorism. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav101001a.shtml
ITEM - Abkhazia Primed to Explode Again, Russia Poised to Intervene Justin Burke The fallout from the September 11 terrorist attacks is spreading to the Caucasus. After years of uneasy peace, Georgia and Abkhazian separatists are mobilizing to resume their bitter conflict. Georgian officials are accusing Russia of fomenting unrest, and President Eduard Shevardnadze is considering pulling Georgia out of the Commonwealth of Independent States. Russian leaders, meanwhile, say the Georgian government has lost control of the country, an ominous indicator that Russian forces may intervene in the brewing conflict. ITEM -Uzbekistan Seeking Regional Dominance About three weeks ago, the United States began shipping men and materiel to the Khanabad air base near Karshi in southern Uzbekistan. American forces look set to be engaged on Uzbek soil for several years. http://www.stratfor.com/home/0110171700.htm ITEM - Karimov Stakes Out Firm Boundaries for US-Uzbek Cooperation Josh Machleder Uzbek President Islam Karimov is striving to keep a tight rein on events that threaten to stampede out of control. After years of repressing freedom of expression, Karimov is now taking tentative steps to open up Uzbekistan’s tightly controlled media. But gaining popular trust is proving a difficult challenge for the government. ITEM -Kazakhstan Tries to Balance Disparate Interests Alima Bisenova Along with other states in the region, Kazakhstan is struggling to find a way to appear supportive of the US campaign against terrorism, while avoiding direct involvement in hostilities. The opening of the US bombing raids on Afghanistan serve to deepen the dilemmas faced by Kazakhstani leaders. ITEM -Kyrgyzstan Opens Airspace To US Warplanes Chris Schuepp Kyrgyzstan, a country that has battled Islamic radical insurgents for the past three years, is backing the United States in its anti-terrorism offensive. On September 25, President Askar Akayev announced he had authorized the opening of Kyrgyz airspace to US military aircraft for possible raids on targets in Afghanistan. ITEM - Georgia Faces New Regional Realities Richard Giragosian and Khatchik Derghoukassian In the meetings and speeches of his recent visit to the United States, President Shevardnadze was anxious to demonstrate his nation’s strategic value in the face of an evolving U.S. foreign policy. A EurasiaNet Partner Post http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/pp100901.shtml ITEM - Caucasian Crisis: Georgian Opportunity, Russian Quandary. In an attempt to diffuse Russia’s forces, Chechen and Georgianmilitants are attacking the renegade Georgian province of Abkhazia. Unlike previous fighting, this round could actually end with an international deployment in Georgia. http://www.stratfor.com/CIS/commentary/0110172110.htm ITEM -Malaysia: Hedging Support for U.S. War Unlike Indonesia and the Philippines, Malaysia has largely kept Islamic insurgency under control. The new fear for Kuala Lumpur is that the global anti-terror campaign may incite domestic Muslim extremism and terrorism. http://www.hrw.org/press/2001/10/xinjiang.htm The call, made by a government spokesperson in Beijing, follows recent reports that the Chinese authorities had launched a new campaign to suppress “terrorist and separatist” activity in the XUAR. Local officials made it clear that “ethnic separatists” were a major target of the campaign. “The Chinese authorities do not distinguish between ‘terrorism’ and ‘separatism’,” Amnesty International said. “Separatism in fact covers a broad range of activities most of which amount to no more than peaceful opposition or dissent. Preaching or teaching Islam outside government controls is also considered subversive.” http://web.amnesty.org/802568F7005C4453/0/BB01E090E3F1D2D580256AE3005DC8B9O
ITEM - Pakistan’s strategy is the extension of its influence, even control, over Afghanistan by ensuring that a compliant force, the Taliban [or another], is in power. In this way Pakistan would have significantly extended its strategic influence within central Asia. This strategic advantage would have been of geopolitical and commercial significance. Under these conditions Pakistan would have significant influence over the fuel and other resources in Afghanistan. Perhaps even the further colonialist expansion of Pakistan beyondAfghanistan into neighbouring Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. This would mean its increased influence over the surrounding countries. Its influence, even colonisation, of Afghanistan would have strengthened its position Concerning its relationship with India over the Kashmir question. Karl Carlile [This observation refers to Pakistan's support of Taliban, but it applies equally to Pakistan's negotiation with the U.S. over a friendly government in Kabul as a condition for its support of the U.S. operation to itsreplacement, for which Pakistani support is necessary. Equally however, the forces in Pakistan including its ISI younger brother of the CIA twin seek to use resulting anti-government forces uprisings for their own agenda in Pakistan] ITEM - [India] Seeking to Disrupt U.S.-Pakistani Ties India’s recent shelling of Pakistani soldiers in Kashmir was meant to send a message to Washington: India does not like the growing ties between Pakistan and America, and it has the power to throw those ties into disarray. Stratfor ITEM -Central Asian States Advance Multinational Fight Against Terrorism Todd Diamond While bombs continue to fall on Afghanistan, Central Asian states are trying to focus international attention on the region’s future security. Regional leaders said during a recent United Nations conference that a well-coordinated international effort will be needed to successfully combat terrorism. http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav101001a.shtml ITEM - Abkhazia Primed to Explode Again, Russia Poised to Intervene Justin Burke The fallout from the September 11 terrorist attacks is spreading to the Caucasus. After years of uneasy peace, Georgia and Abkhazian separatists are mobilizing to resume their bitter conflict. Georgian officials are accusing Russia of fomenting unrest, and President Eduard Shevardnadze is considering pulling Georgia out of the Commonwealth of Independent States. Russian leaders, meanwhile, say the Georgiangovernment has lost control of the country, an ominous indicator that Russian forces may intervene in the brewing conflict. ITEM -Uzbekistan Seeking Regional Dominance About three weeks ago, the United States began shipping men and materiel to the Khanabad air base near Karshi in southern Uzbekistan. American forces look set to be engaged on Uzbek soil for several years. http://www.stratfor.com/home/0110171700.htm ITEM - Karimov Stakes Out Firm Boundaries for US-Uzbek Cooperation Josh Machleder Uzbek President Islam Karimov is striving to keep a tight rein on events that threaten to stampede out of control. After years of repressing freedom of expression, Karimov is now taking tentative steps to open up Uzbekistan’s tightly controlled media. But gaining popular trust is proving a difficult challenge for the government. ITEM -Kazakhstan Tries to Balance Disparate Interests Alima Bisenova Along with other states in the region, Kazakhstan is struggling to find a way to appear supportive of the US campaign against terrorism, while avoiding direct involvement in hostilities. The opening of the US bombing raids on Afghanistan serve to deepen the dilemmas faced by Kazakhstani leaders. ITEM -Kyrgyzstan Opens Airspace To US Warplanes Chris Schuepp Kyrgyzstan, a country that has battled Islamic radical insurgents for the past three years, is backing the United States in its anti-terrorism offensive. On September 25, President Askar Akayev announced he had authorized the opening of Kyrgyz airspace to US military aircraft for possible raids on targets in Afghanistan. ITEM - Georgia Faces New Regional Realities Richard Giragosian and Khatchik Derghoukassian In the meetings and speeches of his recent visit to the United States, President Shevardnadze was anxious to demonstrate his nation’s strategic value in the face of an evolving U.S. foreign policy. A EurasiaNet Partner Post ITEM - Caucasian Crisis: Georgian Opportunity, Russian Quandary. In an attempt to diffuse Russia’s forces, Chechen and Georgian militants are attacking the renegade Georgian province of Abkhazia. Unlike previous fighting, this round could actually end with an international deployment in Georgia. http://www.stratfor.com/CIS/commentary/0110172110.htm ITEM - Xinhua General News Service November 7, 2001 U.S. to offer military support to Turkey for anti-terror cooperation Ankara - Washington is planning to offer a package of support to Turkey as quids pro quo for its cooperation in U.S. anti-terror operations in Afghanistan, the Anatolia News Agency reported on Wednesday. The military aspects of the support package is being carried out by the U.S. Defense Department, the news agency said. The U.S. has planned to transfer weapons and military equipments including helicopters to Turkey by donations or by selling at reasonable prices. |
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