The Miami Herald writes that the Colmbian government has discovered a stash of “impoverished” (to quote the MH’s article) uranium;
Colombian authorities said they seized up to 66 pounds of low-grade uranium hidden off the side of a road in southern Bogotá on Wednesday, which the Colombian Defense Ministry said belonged to FARC guerrillas.
The Defense Ministry said the discovery adds weight to the evidence found in a laptop belonging to slain guerrilla leader Raúl Reyes, which showed the rebels were interested in buying and selling the uranium on the international underground market.
But the 30 kilograms of uranium found in plastic bags dug about three feet from a road in southern Bogotá was ”impoverished,” the ministry said, and in that state could not have been used to make a radioactive bomb. Authorities were waiting for further analysis to determine how dangerous the material found really is, Armed Forces commander Freddy Padilla told a news conference late Wednesday.
Well, this at least lends credence to the quality of the intelligence that Colombia has gleaned from Raul Reyes’ laptops.
The editorial board at the Wall Street Journal writes a bit about Massachusetts Congressman James McGovern and his relationship to Colombian terrorist group FARC;
A military strike three weeks ago killed Raúl Reyes, No. 2 in command of the FARC, Colombia’s most notorious terrorist group. The Reyes hard drive reveals an ardent effort to do business directly with the FARC by Congressman James McGovern (D., Mass.), a leading opponent of the free-trade deal. Mr. McGovern has been working with an American go-between, who has been offering the rebels help in undermining Colombia’s elected and popular government.
Mr. McGovern’s press office says the Congressman is merely working at the behest of families whose relatives are held as FARC kidnap hostages. However, his go-between’s letters reveal more than routine intervention.
Of course, the article continues, Representative McGovern attempts to undermine the policy of this government to avoid dealing with illegitimate actors like FARC. He treats the blood-soaked narco-terrorists as if they are a rational entity and condemns the elected Colombian government then tries to jam up the Uribe administration into a negotiation plan they might otherwise avoid. he also suggests safe havens for the terrorist leadership. What part of “war against terror” doesn’t McGovern understand?
Where in the Constitution are the Congress members authorized to conduct our foreign policy? This type of behavior borders on treason – McGovern is acting in the interests of himself and his own agenda, not in the interests of the entire nation. He should be censured and removed from his seat – then tried for treason.
Just do a news search on any search engine this morning using the terms “grim+milestone” and see how may results you get. On Yahoo, I get 430 results at 7:30 Eastern Time. Of course, all of these “grim milestones” refer to the US casualties reaching the 4000 mark. It was the first thing I heard on radio this morning when my alarm went off at 5am, it was at the top of Drudge.
Yesterday, the Associated Press pushed it’s “US casualties near 4,000 mark” headline across it’s web presence – it’s almost as if AP set the IED that took out the magic 4 troops this morning so they could have their story and headline.
Yes, it’s a cryin’-ass shame that 4,000 US troops have died in Iraq – I really mean it. I take offense at the “pro-war” label that’s applied to me. I’m certainly not for war. I take offense that the Veterans for Peace imply that I’m a “veteran for war” because I won’t join their broke-dick organization.
But the whole truth is this; if the news organizations AND the Veterans for Peace – and all of the rest of these pinhead anti-war-at-any-cost hadn’t been turning this country into a bunch of pansies over the last forty years, the war would have ended after the first three weeks. If the anti-war crowd, the anti-US media and the anti-Republican politicians in Congress had let us go to Baghdad in March 1991, before Mogadishu, before the Clinton aspirin factory bombings, the bombing of the USS Cole, the US embassy bombings in Africa, before the taliban, we wouldn’t have had to go to Afghanistan or Iraq in this century.
The only reason we’ve lost 4,000 troops in Iraq is because the American Left is a pack of cowards who can’t summon the intestinal fortitude to deal with foreign policy problems as soon as they occur. They’re bound and determined to make the US a third world country.
The most laughable comment I’ve heard today was on the ABC News broadcast on my radio this morning at 5 am when some pinhead newsreader tried to imply that US troops in Iraq are thinking seriously about voting for Obama because he’s consistently been against the war – and that we need change that Clinton and McCain don’t represent. I’d like ABC to show me those troops, currently engaged in Iraq, who think it’s a good idea to throw up their hands and leave Iraq.
Show me or stfu.
Jammie Wearing Fool noticed the same proliferation of the “grim milestone” nomenclature.
Gateway Pundit reminds us of a milestone that the media could be reporting if they had an ounce of integrity left.
Back in Novemeber 2006, I predicted right before the election that the Republicans would lose in the midterm elections because of their greatest success – preventing further attacks against Americans on our own soil. Nearly two years later, nothing has changed – there have been no further successful attacks. The Left continues to use the Republicans success against them by intimating that there is no threat because there’ve been no attacks. Democrats have successfully diverted the discussion away from security and on to the subject that gets them the most votes – the economy.
Today, in the Wall Street Journal, the Left’s favorite boogeyman, Karl Rove writes that the left avoids talking about national security because, as we used to say in the infantry, they’re LIW – Lost In the Woods;
For a party whose presidential candidates pledge they’ll remove U.S. troops from Iraq immediately upon taking office — without regard to conditions on the ground or the consequences to America’s security — a late February Gallup Poll was bad news. The Obama/Clinton vow to pull out of Iraq immediately appears to be the position of less than one-fifth of the voters.
Only 18% of those surveyed by Gallup agreed U.S. troops should be withdrawn “on a timetable as soon as possible.” And only 20% felt the surge was making things worse in Iraq. Twice as many respondents felt the surge was making conditions better.
It gets worse for Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Nearly two out of every three Americans surveyed (65%) believe “the United States has an obligation to establish a reasonable level of stability and security in Iraq before withdrawing all of its troops.” The reason is self-interest. Almost the same number of Americans (63%) believe al Qaeda “would be more likely to use Iraq as a base for its terrorist operations” if the U.S. withdraws.
Rove goes on to quotes Democrat Party leaders deep in denial;
In September, Mrs. Clinton told Gen. David Petraeus “the reports that you provide to us really require the willing suspension of disbelief.” This week, she said “we’ll be right back at square one” in Iraq by this summer.
In December, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid refused to admit progress, arguing, “The surge hasn’t accomplished its goals.” He said a month earlier there was “no progress being made in Iraq” and “it is not getting better, it is getting worse.”
Asked by CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on Feb. 9 if she was worried that the gains of the last year might be lost, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi shot back: “There haven’t been gains . . . This is a failure.” Carl Levin, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee told the Associated Press the same month that the surge “has failed.”
This passionate, persistent unwillingness to admit what more and more Americans are coming to believe is true about Iraq’s changing situation puts Democrats in dangerous political territory. For one thing, they increasingly appear out of touch with reality, a charge they made with some success at the administration’s expense before the surge began changing conditions in Iraq.
Their one hope is that John McCain keeps repeating his absurd comment that we’ll keep troops in Iraq for 100 years (Examiner link);
…McCain’s response at a New Hampshire town hall meeting in January when he was asked about a comment President Bush had made about U.S. troops remaining in Iraq for 50 years.
“Maybe 100,” McCain answered. “As long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed, it’s fine with me, and I hope it would be fine with you, if we maintain a presence in a very volatile part of the world where al-Qaida is training, recruiting, equipping and motivating people every single day.”
I know what he meant, my readers know what he meant, but the knee-jerk media (with whom McCain has lost his luster) distorted it to mean that McCain would stay there and fight a war for a hundred years. McCain should have known better.
But the fact remains that anyone concerned about our security can’t seriously consider the Democrats. Their strategy is to pay off our enemies with perks – and generally ignore the more dangerous. Similar to Jimmy Carter’s strategy that led to the rise of the Islamic Republic (which led to the Iran-Iraq War, the arming of Saddam beyond his security needs and eventually the current war in Iraq), the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan (which led to the rise of the Taliban eventually).
The Democrats’ vocal base won’t let them talk about real national security; Code Pink is holding common sense hostage while Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid prevent discussion and passage of essential national security legislation. Our national security is dependent on a tiny group of shrieking drag queens.
Just wait till they run both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue.
There’s a general theme running through a lot of the criticism I’ve encountered the last few days, that theme being that some military service has more “moral authority” in the discussion about this war against terror. That the voices of some veterans are more valuable than others.
I admire people like Lt. Nixon at LT Nixon Rants – even though politically we’re miles apart, he’s able to successfully make a credible argument on the subject of the war without demeaning any veterans. Others, however, are unable to do that. One veteran who had not even served in any war, placed more value on his own opinion than mine because he’d served since I retired (in 1994, if anyone is interested and unable to click the “About” link above).
I had a run-in with IVAW members yesterday and when I mentioned that I had trouble hearing them because I’d lost most of my hearing in a war, their response both times was “What war were you ever in?” as if only their experience has value.
How come nearly every single one of you people that I’ve seen or read about are Lieutenants and Sergeants? When I look at your little war pictures and read your poorly written bio’s my vision is overflowed with images of lazy, incompetent, cowardly Officers with a handful of brain-dead NCO’s to do their dirty work, as usual. I wonder where you boys all served?
The implication is; if you aren’t Clifton Hicks, your service doesn’t count. (Ed. Note:Hey, Cliff, m’boy, we were two feet from each other at Winter Soldier, I didn’t say a word to you no matter what I thought of you or your service – that’s the kind of stand up guy I am)
I had trouble dealing with a lot of the things I had to do in war when I first came back. I found solace in the strangest of places – in Civil War diaries. I discovered that all veterans of all wars have a common experience that others can’t understand. Not psychologists and certainly not some chic with hairy legs.
Some wars were tougher than others, but the effect that wars have on people is always the same – whether your war was four years of slugging your way across the Pacific or 100 hours of slugging your way across Kuwait.
Since my awakening, I have surrounded myself with war veterans – from across the spectrum of World War II veterans to veterans of our current war. From paratroopers who jumped into Normandy to meatcutters who went across Germany in the back of a deuce-and-half. From Huey crew chiefs in Vietnam to tunnel rats. Many times I discovered that I have more in common with warriors from previous wars than I do with people whom I’ve known my whole life but never left our hometown.
Well, what I’m saying, I suppose, is that if these IVAW guys want to attract us to their point-of-view, the last thing they should be doing is demeaning our own experiences and that commonality in the experience of war that we share. Yeah, us older guys are out-of-shape at the moment, but in our day we kicked ass, on and off the battlefield. To judge our accomplishments on something as superficial as our current appearance borders on childishness. And it adds nothing to the discussion.
I’ve been ruminating how I would close out this weekend after focusing on Winter Soldier for the last few days. I thought a point-by-point refutation of the testimony, but I figured that’d be disingenuous of me, since the testimony lacked context – there were no dates or times or places (other than general references) or even participants in some cases. So, just like the participants, I can only give general impressions – only I’ll do it without playing to the applause.
First, my personal experience with the IVAW/Veterans for Peace and the other and sundry people was professional. I wasn’t especially pleased that I was escorted everywhere I went, or that we spent the day surrounded by security people, or that our blogs were being monitored – however, it does lend what I wrote a measure of credibility. But there were news outlets like the Guardian and al Jazeera wandering around without security and writing what they want. I’ll grant that my readership is somewhat less than theirs, but the product I created was under much more scrutiny while it was being released to the public.
I commend Army Sergeant for her hard work in getting access to the event for us. I’m sure she burned off more than a few calories running in circles making sure we weren’t overly-harassed or confined. Without her support, we’d have been stuck watching the streaming video from our homes like everyone else. We were instructed to only photograph the panels and that we couldn’t photograph the audience. When one member of the audience took a snap shot of TSO and me, I brought it to the attention of one security member and she deleted the picture from his camera.
However, I do condemn them for tackling from behind Gerry Kiley whom I reported stood up and yelled “Kerry lied and good men died”. I don’t agree with what Mr. Kiley did – it certainly didn’t remove any scrutiny from what we were doing – but tackling a frail 61-year-old from behind was just as cruel as any testimony from the panel. I’m sure they could have easily pulled him from the room without the drama. But then the whole day was about over-reaction, wasn’t it?
But to the testimony; War sucks. It’s sucked since the beginning of the invention of the rock as a weapon. Innocent people die in war, and that sucks, too. But not since the beginning of warfare has any Army taken such care to minimize innocent deaths as the United States armed forces. Never. That’s indisputable.
But, the people who testified Friday glossed over that fact. Take Kelly Dougherty’s testimony that Kellog, Brown and Root prevented scavengers from taking the diesel fuel from their disabled vehicles by firing beanbag rounds at them. What other military entity in the world uses beanbag rounds in a combat zone?
Jason Hurd testified that the ROE ALMOST forced him to shoot a woman carrying home groceries – he broke into tears and slung snot all over the panel because he ALMOST shot a woman. I guess the fact that escaped him was that the ROE worked – he didn’t have to shoot her.
Hurd also tearfully testified that his unit, when fired upon from a building turned a 50-cal on the building and unleashed 200 rounds on the masonry structure. The firing stopped and the unit continued their mission. Hurd went into great detail explaining the size of the rounds and the brass (by the way, Jason, a fifty-cal is a half-inch in diameter, you missed that) and how much ammo is in the metal container – but I fail to see how that reflects on the Bush administration or that Pentagon entity he was trying to blame. Hurd admitted that he doesn’t know how many people were in the building, that he knows of no casualties resulting from that action – so one is left to wonder what was his point?
The point of the whole testimony, for the entire day I spent there was that the war is illegal from the get-go. They offered no evidence that the war is illegal – but when there’s room full of aged bobbleheads nodding on cue – who needs evidence? All of these terrible things that happened could have been avoided if George W, Bush and the evil neo-cons hadn’t invaded Iraq in the first place. No one had stories of torture or atrocities – they only described the horror of being in war. You could only accept these things as atrocities if you accepted at the beginning that war is illegal. Without that admission, you were left to wonder what everyone was talking about.
That was one of the problems – I was probably one of the youngest people in the room and I’m nearly 53 years old. The audience were a bunch of old hippies who’d never served in the military and had never seen a war outside of the context of the politics of war. They tch-tched their way through the hearings without understanding the pains the military had to suffer to avoid real atrocities. Their only solution to the war was ending it – today with no real thought of the consequences. The only victory they sought was a victory of Democrats over Republicans regardless of what the nation would be forced to deal with when their solution was enacted.
Almost everyone testified that they were confused as to the ROE – but then they all testified to a measure of restraint they all knew was present. Um, the ROE. The confusion came when they actually had to apply their own common sense in relation to the ROE and their circumstances.
Jon Michael Turner started telling us how he shot people, he showed us pictures of his kills (dare I say trophies?) – but he neglected to fill in the part about why he shot those people in the first place. I’m pretty sure he didn’t just indiscriminately shoot “the fat man” or the guy in the bicycle. Why didn’t he tell us about the events leading up to his pulling the trigger instead of beginning his stories with the death of his targets? He referred to his “choking hand” and his bracelet on his choking hand – but he failed to tell us if he ever used his “choking hand” to choke anyone that didn’t deserved to be choked. Just that he had a “choking hand”. And then he went on to tell us that he’s not the monster he once was. Well, fellow Vermonter, what made you a monster – the fact that you designated one of your hands a “choking hand”?
His testimony has changed somewhat since January when this video was posted on YouTube and Turner announced that atrocities against innocent civilians was the policy of the military in Iraq.
From his testimony Friday, it seems the only policy of committing atrocities against Iraqi civilians was his own.
James Gilligan’s claims were funny. Some troops stole a few gold coins they found (wasn’t that in the movie “Three Kings?) – what about the troops who found billions of US currency and didn’t take even a George Washington? His first sergeant threatened a boy with a pistol – he didn’t kill the boy, he didn’t harm the boy, he just threatened him. hardly an atrocity. Oh, and he outright lied about witnessing someone being waterboarded – but then he was playing to the crowd. More detractors of the practice have been waterboarded to demonstrate it to the masses than have been actually waterboarded to extract information. But as soon as he said “…and of course they were waterboarded”, all of the bobbleheads in the audience went to nodding.
While we’re on the subject of lying, Adam Kokesh began his testimony with a lie – that’s why I switched on the video – so I didn’t have to listen to him and then get dragged out like Gerry Kiley. He claimed that he’d opposed the war before it began but joined because he thought it was his duty – his website used to claim he joined because he was a real hoo-ah guy and supported the war against terrorists and he’d been influenced by recruiters but the horrors of war turned him against it. So now that he’s established that he’s a liar. when was he lying – on Friday or on his blog? Kokesh depends on people to forget what he’s said in the past.
The real atrocity stories were being told out by the ashtray, though. I don’t know how many of the IVAW kids I heard relating their tales to the belly-shirt, hip-hugger wearing college aged chickies while I took my smokebreaks. But I don’t want to c***block on any of those guys who might still be laid up with their airhead honeys today – that’d be a neocon atrocity.
No matter how hard the panels tried, they tried to make it about the Bush Administration, but their testimony all boiled down to the actions of the soldiers. They claimed to support the troops, but their supposed atrocities were all the result of small unit leaders’ actions (yes, guys, your captains and lieutenants are “troops”, too). No matter how hard they tried to deflect their criticism away from the troops, it hit all of our service members square in the forehead. Registering your gun with willie pete isn’t a decision made by some faceless neo-con in the Pentagon, calling for fire on a village is a company commander’s decision, not Dick Cheney’s. Bragging about firing up a civilian car isn’t coming from the Defense Department. George Bush wasn’t pushing down on the 50-cal’s butterflies or reloading the gun.
I may have some more thoughts as the day goes on, but I’m going to spend the day with my grandson. Keep an eye on The Sniper, TSO is supposed to be live-blogging the media portion of the testimony.
Since when does the armed force that’s getting it’s ass handed to it get to set terms of a ceasefire? Here’s some terms for you, Hamas; stop killing Israelis and they’ll stop killing you. But that’s not possible is it?
Gaza’s Hamas prime minister publicly set his conditions Wednesday for a cease-fire with Israel to end the fighting that has killed dozens in recent weeks.
Ismail Haniyeh demanded an end to Israeli military activity in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip, a lifting of Israeli economic sanctions and the opening of Gaza’s borders, which have been sealed since the Islamic militant group seized control of the territory last June.
“We are talking about a mutual, comprehensive calm, which means that the enemy must fulfill its obligations,” Haniyeh said in a speech at Gaza’s Islamic University. “The Israelis must stop the aggression … including assassinations and invasions, end the sanctions and open the borders.”
Yeah, open the borders so those guys with the heavy coats in the 90-degree heat can cross over and start blowing up more Jews on buses. And what are you giving return? Another empty promise? Oh, that’s right, Hamas sets the rules while it’s getting it’s ass kicked – the whole rest of the world has to bow down to the thugs.
Haniyeh used the word “tahdia” to describe the informal cease-fire he sought. He did not use another Arabic term, “hudna,” because it would imply recognition of Israel’s right to retaliate for attacks, Hamas officials said. Both terms denote a temporary cease-fire rather than a permanent peace.
Hamas does not recognize Israel’s right to exist and is sworn to its destruction.
Every time Hamas attacks Israel, the Israelis retaliate and kill more Palestinians. You’d think after awhile Hamas would learn. Well, when I say “you’d think”, I’m assuming that the reader is a rational person living in a 21st Century culture that respects peace, life and liberty.
The Miami Herald reports this morning that there’s a mystery man in a Venezuelan hospital near the Colombian frontier with a bullet wound in his head who could be another FARC big wig;
The Venezuelan military is investigating the identity of a man who showed up Sunday at a medical clinic near the Colombian border with fake names, a phony ID and a bullet wound to the jaw. National Guard troops surrounded the clinic because they believed the man was a leftist Colombian rebel or right-wing paramilitary fighter, the Venezuelan military said.
But when the media got wind of the heavy military presence at the La Colonia clinic in the city of Rubio, rumors spread that the injured man was top FARC leader Joaquín Gómez.
Gómez, who has a $2.5 million U.S. bounty on his head, replaced Raúl Reyes last week on the seven-member FARC secretariat after Reyes died in a Colombian attack on a FARC camp in Ecuador.
However, Venezuelan television footage showed that the patient is much darker-skinned than Gómez.
I guess, if this is Gomez, it’s getting more dangerous to be a terrorist than before.
UPDATED: Geez, I barely pushed the “Save” button and the Miami Herald changed the story;
Venezuelan state TV confirmed Tuesday afternoon that the ailing man is not Gómez. They just don’t know who he is.
The man has given two names — Luis Antonio Garai Calderón and José Antonio Ortiz Barrera — according to the media reports.
News footage showed the La Colonia clinic in the town of Rubio, in the Venezuelan state of Táchira, surrounded by military officers — and reporters. The latest footage by the state channel showed an ailing man — much darker skinned than Gómez — in his hospital bed.
Not that I’d trust the Chavez government to admit they had a FARC big wig under their protection. The Miami Herald says that they’ve sent his fingerprints to Colombia, but the Colombians deny that. They give a little bio of Gomez;
Gómez, who turns 61 next week, is considered one of the FARC’s most devout ideologues. He ran the FARC’s Southern bloc, its historic stronghold — on the opposite end of the country from the border where this hospital is located.
He studied for a dozen years in the Soviet Union and has a doctorate in agronomy. His thesis was on artificial insemination methods for the Ceibu cattle that roam Colombia’s pastures, he once told The Washington Post.
According to a profile published by Semana magazine last week, Gómez first moved to the Soviet Union fleeing violence. He came back in 1981 to join the insurgency.
So Gomez is a cattle-FARCer (sorry couldn’t resist – I’ve been spending too much time at Ace of Spades, I guess).
As usual, the Gateway Pundit has more links and photos and beat me to it.
