The Political Conundrum!

This last weekend I started getting emails on Saturday morning telling me about a major battle going on in eastern Afghanistan that dealt with several outposts and multiple US casualties. However it was asked of me to stay quiet and not blog about it at that point.

Of course I did stay quiet because I was asked and because the first reports from the battlefield are always wrong. And in this instance they were. The initial reports I got were a little off, to include the exact province, unit involved and some other details.

As we know now thanks to the MSM releasing the story, the battle has happened. It was a terrible battle with 8 US and 6 Afghan Forces killed, over 24 wounded and over 300 enemy fighters attacking two combat outposts.

The story below is from a ABC News reporter that was embedded with the unit.

When the chopper lifted off moments later with three wounded soldiers, it left behind others who were wounded but refused to be MEDEVACED out of the combat zone so they could return to fight with their buddies.

Fighting raged at two remote U.S. outposts near the Pakistan border this weekend, that left eight U.S. soldiers dead and 24 wounded. The battle was fought from Friday night through Sunday as hundreds of Taliban insurgents and their allies tried to overrun the Americans.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wounded-us-soldiers-refused-leave-taliban-fight/story?id=8754347

As the New York Times recently pointed out, the proposition of serious enforcing sanctions against Iran, particularly in the financial field, are not bright.

The reasons are multiple, but the basic one is that there are too many people and countries that simply want to make money and are happy to help evade sanctions. The second is that there is very little the international community can actually do to penalize sanctions busters. I lived through the global sanctions on Haiti in 1994, and if a desperately poor, isolated country like Haiti, with no real allies, could figure out how to break the sanctions, see the odds of meaningful actions against Iran.

Another reason is that, no matter what Western Europe and the United States -- heck, throw in China and Russia just for fun -- want to do, there are many countries that simply will not comply and in fact will go out of their way to aid Iran.

If one is searching for an answer as to what Iran wants with its expensive and sustained push into Latin America, at least part can be found in the desire to build an alternative structure to avoid sanctions through use of its Bolivarian allies. Venezuela has already agreed to sell Iran 20,000 barrels of gasoline a day, something Iran will desperately need if sanctions were to really kick in.

It is not likely to be a coincidence that Iranian banks operate in Venezuela as Venezuelan banks, or that Ecuador is allowing Iran's central bank in to operate. Nicaragua is hosting Iranian financial structures as well. Imagine Hugo Chávez or Daniel Ortega deciding not help Ahmadinejad out of a sense of international pressure. Can't do it? Neither can they.

But one does not have to look to Latin America to see how the sanctions will be circumvented. Ras al Khaimah, a small and poor emirate in the United Arab Emirates, has opened itself as an offshore haven and is busily registering hundreds of Iranian companies. Its airport is little encumbered by such things as strict cargo inspections or rigorous passenger manifestos, one of the reasons Viktor Bout operated there. My full blog is here.

Military advance teams from the Pacific prepared for broad humanitarian operations in earthquake-stricken Indonesia, while ships full of sailors and Marines landed Monday in the flood-ravaged Philippines.

In a largely supportive and generous speech, Defense Secretary Robert Gates told the annual gathering of the Association of the US Army in Washington that he continued to support the Army’s modernization plans but reminded the service that it must find uses for the MRAPs bought for Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Marine Corps has issued the first worldwide policy banning pit bulls, Rottweilers and any dogs with "dominant traits of aggression" from bases and housing facilities. The policy allows Marines and families to keep their pets if they apply for a waiver by Oct. 10.

As President Barack Obama grapples with the way ahead in Afghanistan, a decision to launch a new investigation into a deadly firefight is a painful reminder of the challenges the U.S. faces in a country known as the graveyard of empires.

A man who turned in an old artillery shell to Philadelphia police has learned a lesson: Call ahead. A police district headquarters was evacuated Saturday after the man brought in a live projectile for a howitzer tank.

A suicide bomber disguised as a security officer struck the lobby of the U.N. food agency's Pakistan headquarters Monday, killing five people a day after the new leader of the Pakistani Taliban vowed fresh assaults, authorities and witnesses said.

I have an op-ed in today's Boston Globe comparing homegrown terrorism in Europe and the United States:

....Of course, there are differences between the United States and Europe. The first is related to the significantly better economic conditions of American Muslims. While European Muslims generally languish at the bottom of most rankings that measure economic integration, American Muslims fare significantly better. Although economic integration is not always an antidote to radicalization, it is undeniable that radical ideas find a fertile environment among unemployed and disenfranchised youth.

Geographic dispersion, immigration patterns, and tougher immigration policies have also prevented the formation of extensive recruiting and propaganda networks as those that have sprung up in Europe.

Finally, there is the fact that large segments of the American Muslim population belong to ethnicities that have traditionally espoused moderate interpretations of Islam.

While all these characteristics still hold true, they no longer represent a guarantee. A 2007 report by the New York Police Department stated that “despite the economic opportunities in the United States, the powerful gravitational pull of individuals’ religious roots and identity sometimes supersede the assimilating nature of American society.’’

Factors such as perception of discrimination and frustration at US foreign policies could lead to radicalization, irrespective of favorable economic conditions. Recent cases have also shown that radicalization can touch communities where extremism is rare, such as the Albanian and the Iranian American.

Moreover, the fact that no organized group has an extensive network in the country is no longer a guarantee that radicalization cannot reach America’s shores, as the Internet has replaced the need to have operatives physically spreading the propaganda on the ground. A search of jihadist chat rooms and even of subgroups in “benign’’ social network sites reveal the presence of many American-born youngsters who glorify Al Qaeda’s ideology....

Read more.

Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Jane Holl Lute joined her Mexican and Canadian counterparts in Mexico City to discuss continued collaboration to confront the spread of global H1N1 flu and further develop cooperative efforts to inform and educate the public in preparation for the fall H1N1 season.