The Political Conundrum!

As the crisis between India and Pakistan is drawing the attention of the international community and the diplomatic efforts of the United States, public opinion has shown an increased interest in the Jihadi agenda in India. In this regard the Counter Terrorism community is focusing on analyzing the long term strategic agenda of the Terror forces involved in the attack. Today's panel discussion in Congress at the invitation of the Counter Terrorism Foundation opened several perspectives in projecting the next stage of the conflict. The minutes of this briefing will be useful to the growing debate about Post Mumbai. Following is a short piece published initially by Fox News.com today, raising some of the issues I discussed at the panel in Congress this morning.

Videos from Back in the Day (BITD). While I was in A-stan I made a lot of different video from my time there. In addition to me, some on my team also made videos. Since this blog has been going on so long and some of them are buried, I have re-posted links to them. I have many of these uploaded on You Tube, however because some of these videos have great songs playing in the video, the copyright Nazis on You Tube disabled them. Since I think the music is an important part of each video that has music, I have made a widget on the side of this blog and I have the blogs listed there for you to download and watch.

Scroll down the right side and you will see the Bouhammer’s Video section right near the bottom of all the widgets.

Many of the thousands of troops who suffered traumatic brain injuries in Iraq and Afghanistan are at risk of long-term health problems including depression and Alzheimer's-like dementia, but it's impossible to predict how high those risks are, researchers say.

The brazen attacks in areas where the U.S. military has struggled for years to maintain order raised questions about Iraq's ability to ensure its own security as the U.S. scales down its own combat role under the newly ratified U.S.-Iraqi security pact.

"Click." It's the sound that no operator ever wants to hear under fire. And if he carries a gas-impingement automatic rifle, it's a sound that could mean a malfunction. Enter Adams Arms which offers a simple conversion kit that helps address this issue by keeping receivers cleaner, offers more consistent operation and saves money.

NBC News: Pakistani militants deny role in Mumbai terror attacks

The sole surviving terrorist of the Mumbai attacks allegedly spent 18 months training at camps run by Lashkar-e-Taiba (LET), a banned Pakistani militant organization with a long history of high-profile attacks in India and Indian-controlled Kashmir. And, as NBC News has reported, Indian authorities also have found the names of several high-ranking LET members in the satellite phone used by one of the Mumbai perpetrators.

So what is Lashkar-e-Taiba, and was the group truly behind the horrific attacks in Mumbai’s hotels, train station and restaurants? Lashkar’s political wing offered reporters in Pakistan a rare tour of their sprawling, 200-acre headquarters today, and allowed me to interview one of their top officials yesterday. In a phone interview, the LET’s Abdullah Muntazir repeatedly denied any involvement in the attacks. “No, not at all,” said Muntazir, a chief spokesman of LET’s accused political wing, Jamat-ud-Dawa.

“The violence against the general public carried out by any individual, group, or any government--whether it is committed in Mumbai, or in Kashmir, Afghanistan, or in Iraq--that cannot be justified at any cost. And Islam does not allow its followers to kill innocent people, to target public places,” Muntazir said. “Blowing up [bombs] in public places… from my point of view, that we cannot endorse and we have no relation to such kind of things.”

During the press tour today at the group’s headquarters outside Lahore, Muntazir continued with his denials. “We are a charity organization and these premises are just an educational and medical complex,” he said. “We condemn India for putting [our leader’s] name on the list of terrorists… India is blaming us because its their habit and the moment the attacks happened in Mumbai, they started blaming us without any proof or evidence,” Muntazir told reporters today.

Controversial history
The denials aside, the LET has a long history of supporting violence and terrorist acts. At their annual “Mujahideen Conference,” held in Pakistan in November 1999, for example, former LET chief Hafiz Mohammed Saeed issued a threat to the Prime Minister of India. He said that if “he didn’t withdraw from Kashmir the Mujahideen would invade his office in New Delhi,” Saeed said. “The Jihad is not about Kashmir only. It encompasses all of India… We will not rest until the whole India is dissolved into Pakistan.”

And in October 2000, when asked about the hijacking of a Saudi commercial airliner and the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole in Yemen, Saeed responded, “Mujahideen Lashkar-e-Taiba does not favor to undertake these operations, as [such] activities are mostly advantageous to America. The real jihad, in fact, is to target the Jews… and to kill them in their own homes.”

[Click for more on the MSNBC.com website]

Almost unnoticed in the chaos created by recent terrorist events is the nuclear agreement signed between Russia and Venezuela signed when Russian president Medvedev visited Caracas last week. His visit coincided with the arrival of Russian naval ships for joint operations with the Venezuelan navy.

The ships, in their first post-Cold War venture into Latin America, included the Peter the Great, the flagship missile cruiser of the Russian navy, and several other vessels.

Under the accord, Russia would help Venezuela build a nuclear energy plant. Joint gas projects were also approved. Military co-operation is also high on the agenda of Mr Medvedev's talks with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

None of this would be alarming if Chavez were not a known sponsor of violent and radical movements across the hemisphere, from the FARC in Colombia to the worst elements (and a small minority of the overall parties) of the Sandinistas in Nicaragua and the FMLN in El Salvador.

His closest allies, such as Iran and North Korea, are rogue nations who have repeatedly lied and failed to abide by international nuclear agreements.

Having already spent $4.4 billion on Russian weapons in the past three years, and despite a sharp downturn in oil revenues, Chavez wants to go nuclear.

The reason he gives is electrical production as the prime peacetime use of the energy. But this raises several important questions. My full blog is here.

Tonight is a packed show once again, and in fact becuase so many of the shows have went over the 90 minute mark, CJ and I have decided to extend all the shows going forward to a full 2 hours. If for some reason we run out of stuff to talk about (which I really doubt), then it can end early.You can get to the show’s website and listen live starting at 7:00 PM EST by clicking here http://www.blogtalkradio.com/youserved or clicking on the icon to the right of this post.

This week our special guest is Paul ‘Bud’ Bucha. Mr Bucha was a two time All-American swimmer. After graduating from West Point, he was commissioned as an officer in the U.S. Army. In Phuoc Vinh, Vietnam, Captain Bucha of the 3rd battalion, 187th Infantry, 3rd Brigade 101st Airborne Division led a recon patrol that encountered strong resistance. He was awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions between March 16-19, 1968.He later taught at West Point and became president of the Congressional Medal of Honor Society. Most recently he served as a foreign policy adviser to Barack Obama’s 2008 successful presidential campaign.

We will also have three other very special guests. One is another blogger from the VAMC You Served blog, Claire who writes about life of a military spouse - the hardships, the joys, and everything in between.  We will have another visit by Kat from Operation Love from Home will be giving us an update on the Christmas Card Drive that she held in Oct and Nov. Last but not least, we will have on Kim Cameron who is a singer/songwriter who recently released a song dedicated to America’s Military. It is titled “My Hero” and you can watch Kim sing it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FB5DhRI-YbY. You can learn more about Kim at http://www.sidefxband.net/./

So as you can see this is not a show to miss. We have the full gammut tonight from Heroes, to those that support heroes, to those that stay home while the heroes are gone and one that has dedicated her gifts and talents to honor our heroes. Be sure to join Marcus and I tonight at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/youserved and listen live.

The Mumbai massacre may not be a “new” terror tactic. The mass firearms attack riveted the world in 1972 when the Japanese Red Army gunned down 27 people at Ben Gurion Airport. Since then the annals of terrorism have included innumerable other examples, most notably al-Gamaa Islamiya’s 1997 Luxor Massacre in which 59 tourists were murdered.

Still, the Mumbai attack stands out in its scale and has led many analysts to wonder if the mass firearms and bomb attack will be tactics of choice for the next 9/11. A useful way to examine this proposition is to invert the question, and ask, “Why hasn’t this already happened in the United States?”

Read the full post here.

The amphibious assault ship Kearsarge arrived home Dec. 2 after four months of visiting South and Central American countries to bring medical care, engineering expertise and humanitarian assistance.