The Political Conundrum!

The senior military judge overseeing trials at Guantanamo Bay is expected to drop charges against a suspect in the 2000 USS Cole bombing. Administration officials said that the charges against Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri will be dismissed without prejudice. That means new charges can be brought again later.

The launching of an Iranian satellite into orbit, said to be about "communications technology" and "earthquake monitoring," would have been a normal news item not exceeding the greater news report about India landing a space craft on the moon last month. But according to news agencies around the world, Western chanceries and national security agencies have taken the development "seriously." Associated Press and the BBC described reactions as "nervous." Although the debate about the value of Iranian space technology and commercial rocket capacity usually concludes that the Mullah regime is far away from reaching a respectable level, many defense analysts dismiss the issue as about the sole industrialization of the Islamic Republic: In fact it is about the "weaponization" of the satellite. Obviously this one launch may not be the crossing for the line, but the first step was accomplished and statements were made about the immediate following steps. The quasi consensus today is about the strategic intention of Tehran's war room, solidly in the hands of the Pasdaran. As I argued in discussions I had on France 24 TV and the BBC this week, the space program is one component of a regional strategic deployment. Hence it deserves to be analyzed from this perspective. Following is a short article published in Human Events

Kyrgyzstan's parliament will delay until next week a vote on a plan to close a key U.S. air base that supports American and NATO operations in Afghanistan, a senior official said Thursday.

Somali pirates said Thursday that they were freeing a Ukrainian ship carrying tanks and other heavy weapons after receiving a $3.2 million ransom. The U.S. Navy said it was watching the pirates leaving the ship.

Five family members who lost loved ones in the bombing of the destroyer Cole have been selected to attend the arraignment next week of the alleged mastermind of the attack. Five family members were chosen by lottery to go to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for the proceeding.

Five family members who lost loved ones in the bombing of the destroyer Cole have been selected to attend the arraignment next week of the alleged mastermind of the attack. Five family members were chosen by lottery to go to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for the proceeding.

The Navy has concluded efforts to search for a sailor who was missing in the waters of the Gulf of Aden on Wednesday missing after an accident aboard the Norfolk-based amphibious transport dock San Antonio.

As Ethiopian forces have withdrawn from Somalia, Shabaab militants have taken their place. Shabaab's area of effective control now stretches from Baidoa in south-central Somalia and Kismayo in the far south all the way to the capital of Mogadishu. Today I have an article in the Middle East Times examining the situation that Somalia confronts. An excerpt:

The circumstances of Ethiopia's withdrawal can only be described as a defeat. Anti-Ethiopian insurgent forces split into two primary groups during the course of the fighting. The Alliance for Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS) is frequently described as a "moderate Islamist" faction by the international press, and much pressure was brought to bear on the TFG [transitional federal government] to constructively engage with ARS, including by the U.S. State Department. (Some observers believe that labeling the ARS "moderate" is inaccurate.) The insurgent faction that now lays claim to a large part of Somalia, Shabaab, is regarded as extremist by virtually all outside observers.

A large number of Somali members of parliament fled their country as the Ethiopians left. The exiled lawmakers settled in Djibouti, where they promptly set about undertaking "reconciliation talks." The representatives agreed to double the size of the parliament to include Islamist MPs affiliated with the ARS, and they selected ARS leader Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed as their new president following Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed's December resignation.

President Ahmed has said, "I think we can improve the situation in Somalia and establish genuine peace and reconciliation in my country." But it's difficult to see how this can be accomplished.

"Where will this parliament go?" asks Abdiweli Ali, an associate professor of economics at Niagara University and a former adviser to the TFG. "The seat of government has already been captured by Shabaab."

You can read the whole article here.

Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) did a good story on Scott Kesterson and his making of the documentary, At War. You can watch the entire interview and read a little about the story they did and some positive and hateful comments over at http://www.cbc.ca/national/blog/video/militaryafghanistan/kesterson_at_war.html.

If you have ever watched the trailers and raw footage that I have posted on here or on other sites and you liked it, then you need to watch the interview above. There is some of the same footage in there, but lots of never before seen footage that I am sure is in the actual movie. You also get to watch and hear Scott talk about his experiences, feelings, etc. while in Afghanistan and while watching his own work afterward.

In fact you could ask any one of several tens of thousand of soldiers. I am sure they would all have told you the same thing.

http://www.military.com/news/article/gis-new-armor-too-heavy-army-says.html