“You are a priest for ever, in the line of Melchizedek.”
–Psalm 110:4
(Mass Readings: Hebrews 7:1-3, 15-17 / Mark 3:3:1-6)
Apparently, Your Host Has Found Some That Need This Translated--In America
Jesus, I want to hear Your word, even when it upsets me.
Fellow Patriot’s,
I have need of maintainence, but since I lack the currency, my only recourse is to go here. Then, as some intimately know, I will seek my grievances regarding ‘Honor’ addressed via among this portion of the [American] legal system.
So I must keep my analysis–brief (I know, like I could do that without being in considerable pain).
So I will only present what I deem worth the understanding and note of all that read this tome. And let any ‘that forget’ the sacrifices of those that “step forward, and step up” in the protection of a line between ‘the free and those that would enslave them’, be set upon the Lord. Yes I [said] that.
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Ea Nos Vallo (Latin: This We'll Defend)
- Rangers Lead The Way
Arkansas family loses second son in Afghanistan
(Part 1: Universal Soldier)
The war in Afghanistan has claimed the lives of two sons of an Arkansas couple who also have a third son in the military.
Sgt. 1st Class Benjamin Wise, 34, of Little Rock, was on his fourth deployment overseas when he was injured during an insurgent attack on his unit last week. He died from his wounds Sunday at hospital in Germany, the Department of Defense said in a statement Tuesday.
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(Part 2: Universal Soldier)
Think 'Freedom', Does Not Have Its Price?
Need There Be Any Commentary Regarding The Importance Of 'This' Agency?
His brother, 35-year-old Jeremy Wise, was killed in a terrorist attack on a CIA outpost in Afghanistan in December 2009. He was a former Navy Seal working as a security contractor.
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(Part 3: Universal Soldier)
Of These 'Few', What Do You Really Know?
Their brother, Marine Corps Cpl. Matthew Wise, is based Hawaii but was in Germany to be with his brother, his wife Amber said. She said she was at Benjamin’s home in Washington state watching his children, but she declined further comment.
The Army Ranger is survived by his wife, two sons and a daughter.
The men’s parents, Dr. Jean and Mary Wise of Hope, Ark., and their sister did not return telephone messages seeking comment from The Associated Press. But the family released a statement thanking friends and Benjamin’s fellow soldiers “for their sincere expressions of sympathy during this very difficult time.”
His family described him as a loving husband, devoted father, caring son and selfless soldier.
“The Wise family is sincerely touched by the concern and interest all have taken in Ben’s life, his career and his sacrifice for our country,” they said in the statement. “Ben was proud of the career he built in the Army.”
He was assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 1st Special Forces Group, Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington.
Benjamin Wise, who entered military service in 2000, discussed his work as a soldier in a September 2004 interview with the Hope Star newspaper.
“It’s something I’ve wanted to do for a while now,” he told the newspaper. “I was in college and I took a break from college and thought I’d do it now while I was relatively young. I wanted to serve my country, and do something that I found exciting.”
Wise compared his work as a soldier to a job, noting that “there are a lot of frustrating things about being over there, about being with people from another culture and the special circumstances.
“But, at the end of the day, it’s a job and we’re specialists in the field. The troops are sent there to accomplish a mission,” he said.
Members of Arkansas’ congressional delegation released statements of condolence and described Benjamin Wise as a hero.
“His bravery, dedication and patriotism exemplified what it means to be an American soldier and I am eternally grateful for his selfless sacrifice,” said Democratic Rep. Mike Ross. Republican Rep. Tim Griffin added: “He dedicated his life to serving in defense of our country and has earned the deepest respect of a grateful nation.”
Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., said Wise served in Iraq as well as Afghanistan.
“While Arkansas has lost a great patriot, the Wise family has paid an extraordinary price in service to our country,” Pryor said.
We Shall Never Forget The Wages Paid For Freedoms Sake
For God. For Humanity.
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Your hosts' "Standard": "Love It, or I would strongly suggest, to seriously learn to"
A Flag to one’s family is not much consolation, even from “…a grateful nation”, however at least each that gives their life, the penultimate sacrifice a Warrior can give in adherence to the creed of “Duty, Honor, Country”, the families Honor remains–their legacy confirmed. And hence my own actions that are soon to come. It is not about financial compensation at all as some that are unfamiliar with the ‘ethos’ of the Warrior.
A visual reminder:
The Warrior Ethos: Not Taken And Adhered To Lightly
So my deeds today are based on these tenets, an Oath that every Warrior partakes. But these are not taken to ‘harden ones Heart’. In fact, the complete opposite is indeed the truth.
I thought the best explanation of the difference was the following.
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From theological author Mr. Jim Manney:
Hardness of Heart
The Gospel of Mark has begun (today’s reading is the beginning of chapter three) and already the powers that be are implacably hostile to Jesus. At the end of today’s reading, the Pharisees get together with the Herodians to plot His death. Why? All Jesus has done is heal some sick people and speak against burdensome Sabbath rules. Clearly He’s a threat in other ways. The crowds love Him. He speaks well, with authority.” He doesn’t defer to the elders. He talks about something new arriving, a Kingdom of God. This is disturbing enough, but Jesus points to something else: “their hardness of heart” (3:5). There will be no discussion, no compromise, no thought that Jesus might have something valuable to say. This closemindedness makes Jesus angry. Let’s pray that our hearts be open.
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What? Were you surprised or something?
Finally, in a matter that should concern every single person in the free world, the following comes from ‘friendlies’, though all they sent came before the announcement that the best hope for energy security, and inherently reduced costs for gasoline (it was $3.39/Gallon/Regular Unleaded), and for any product that absolutely needs petroleum to be created, countless direct employment, countless in-direct employment and potentially created enterprises along the proposed XL Keystone Pipeline that would have begun in our friends country to the North of America, down the entire ‘middle’ region of the United States, to the coast where the Gulf of Mexico begins.
Why? I can not speculate, nor do I, as a habit or unintentionally.
I just live here…
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The following comes from our friend’s and allies here, but they present an analysis that–all should at least–consider:
“The Case for Regime Change in Iran” and Additional Resources
From FPI Executive Director Jamie M. Fly and Gary Schmitt
Foreign Affairs
January 17, 2012
It has been the policy of U.S. presidents over the last three decades to state that a nuclear-armed Iran is unacceptable. Yet as Iran moves closer to achieving that goal, political leaders, including key Obama administration officials such as Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, have begun to waver. They now speak more frequently about the potentially disastrous consequences of an Israeli or U.S. military strike on Iran’s nuclear program than about the dangers of a nuclear Iran.
Matthew Kroenig thus deserves credit for advancing the argument that the repercussions of a military attack on Iran’s nuclear program are a worthwhile risk, given the far more dangerous consequences of Iran getting the bomb (“Time to Attack Iran,” January/February 2012). There are, however, problems with some elements of Kroenig’s strategy for avoiding the nightmare scenario. Namely, a limited military strike would only be a temporary fix, and it could actually do the opposite of what it intends — drive the program further underground and allow Iran to retain the ability to threaten the United States and its allies.
If the United States seriously considers military action, it would be better to plan an operation that not only strikes the nuclear program but aims to destabilize the regime, potentially resolving the Iranian nuclear crisis once and for all.
Kroenig bases his argument on Israel’s successful limited strikes against Iraq’s Osirak reactor in 1981 and against Syria’s Al Kibar reactor in 2007. Yet the Iranian nuclear program of 2012 is not comparable to either of those cases, which were embryonic and focused on building reactors with limited auxiliary facilities. Once those reactors were destroyed, it was difficult for either country to reconstitute their efforts immediately. Even so, Saddam Hussein did eventually return to the nuclear weapons business. After the Osirak strike, he drove the Iraqi program further underground and diversified it, exploring multiple pathways to the bomb. By 1991, Iraq was close to developing a nuclear weapons capability, a fact only discovered after the Gulf War.
In contrast, Iran has had years to expand its program and already boasts several large reactors and enrichment facilities, which the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspects, and a host of associated research programs and facilities at which equipment to enrich uranium is studied, manufactured, and assembled. Although these declared facilities tend to be isolated in secure compounds or on military installations, many of the subsidiary facilities are in residential urban neighborhoods. Thus, Kroenig is wrong when he writes that an attack on Iran’s nuclear program “could reduce the collateral damage . . . by striking at night or simply leaving those less important plants off its target list.” If associated sites are not targeted for humanitarian reasons, Iran could still have a nuclear future.
More troubling are, in the words of former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, the “known unknowns.” There is no question that covert elements of Iran’s nuclear program exist. After devoting so many resources to its nuclear program and suffering years of increasingly tough sanctions, it is entirely reasonable to believe that Tehran maintains at least a small pilot enrichment facility far away from the scrutiny of the international community. After all, hiding one from the world’s eyes would not be difficult; the IAEA has very limited access to the workshops where Iran produces the components for and assembles its centrifuges and thus cannot precisely track the size and scope of Iran’s enrichment activities.
Further, Iran’s capability to enrich uranium is a technical skill that cannot be bombed out of existence. Nor can the progress it has made on weaponization. Those aspects of the program would likely survive a limited bombing campaign along the lines advocated by Kroenig.
To be sure, a limited strike is not pointless. Kroenig’s support seems in part an effort to avoid the consequences skeptics of military action often highlight, such as Iran responding militarily or with operations via its terrorist proxies. He argues that the United States “could first make clear that it is interested only in destroying Iran’s nuclear program, not in overthrowing the government” to moderate the Iranian response. But there, too, he is wrong. Iran has been in confrontation with the international community over its nuclear program for years. Whether a limited military strike or regime destabilization operation, Iran’s leaders would almost certainly believe they would have to respond to such a challenge to maintain their credibility in the region, employing missiles, proxies, and/or their own terrorist operatives. After all, Iran has been killing Americans for years — most recently, U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. And, as the Iranian plot last year to assassinate the Saudi ambassador on American soil revealed, Tehran seems to be in no mood to modulate its behavior. It is dubious that the Iran’s supreme leader and the Revolutionary Guard Corps would, or even could, accept a limited strike without retaliating.
Given the likely fallout from even a limited military strike, the question the United States should ask itself is, Why not take the next step? After all, Iran’s nuclear program is a symptom of a larger illness — the revolutionary fundamentalist regime in Tehran.
Thanks to internal political developments and sanctions, the regime is at its weakest point in decades. But the international community is slowly exhausting the universe of palatable sanctions, and even the pressure brought to bear on Iran thus far has not caused it to halt its program. A limited strike against nuclear facilities would not lead to regime change. But a broader operation might. It would not even need to be a ground invasion aimed specifically at toppling the government. But the United States would need to expand its list of targets beyond the nuclear program to key command and control elements of the Republican Guard and the intelligence ministry, and facilities associated with other key government officials. The goal would be to compromise severely the government’s ability to control the Iranian population. This would require an extended campaign, but since even a limited strike would take days and Iran would strike back, it would be far better to design a military operation that has a greater chance of producing a satisfactory outcome.
Of course, there is no assurance that the Iranian regime would immediately crumble under such an onslaught. But once the cost to the country and the weakness of the current regime became clear, the door would open for renewed opposition to Iran’s current rulers. It is sometimes said that a strike would lead the population to rally around the regime. But given the current unpopularity of the government, it seems more likely that the population would see the regime’s inability to forestall the attacks as evidence that the emperor has no clothes and is leading the country into needlessly desperate straits. If anything, Iranian nationalism and pride would stoke even more anger at the current regime.
At a minimum, it would be far better for Iran’s rulers to be distracted by domestic unrest after a massive strike than totally free to strike out at enemies after a limited one.
Some would argue that if the regime does fall, any subsequent leader would value the nuclear program just as much, especially considering Iranian nationalism and citizens’ supposed pride in the nuclear program. But as the economic costs of the program have grown, so, too, has disillusionment with Iran’s isolation. As the Iranian activist Shirin Ebadi told The Wall Street Journal in April 2011, “Ahmadinejad talks about nuclear energy as national pride . . . but that’s not true. People don’t care.” The United States, in concert with its allies, would thus be in a strong position to make clear to Iran’s new leaders that the path to prosperity is predicated upon giving up the nuclear program.The Obama administration has avoided the choice between a military operation and a nuclear Iran by relying on conclusions by the U.S. intelligence community that Iran has not made the final decision to develop a weapon. But its faith in receiving that intelligence in a timely and unambiguous way is, if history is any guide, misplaced. Kroenig is correct then to argue that a military strike should be in the cards. But he is wrong to suggest that a limited strike is the one option that should be on the table. If strikes are chosen, it would be far better to put the regime at risk than to leave it wounded but still nuclear capable and ready to fight another day.
Jamie M. Fly is the Executive Director of the Foreign Policy Initiative. Gary Schmitt is the Director of Advanced Strategic Studies at the American Enterprise Institute
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In addition, the following contribution, including suggested reading material;
- Russia opposes new sanctions against Iran, Israel attack “far off”
- Ottolenghi: European oil embargo against Iran can’t wait
- At least 34 people killed in violence across Syria
- WaPo: Standing by while Syrian violence continues isn’t an option
- Elder Kim brother blasts Eun and the North Korean regime
- Violence in Iraq up sharply after US troop withdrawal
- Senators: Arm SE Asian allies for territorial disputes w/Beijing
- China’s crackdown against dissidents continues
- Yemeni official suggests delay in presidential vote
Middle East/North Africa
Iran
Russia signaled renewed aversion to tighter sanctions on Iran on Wednesday and Israel said a decision on a possible attack was “very far off” as European powers prepared to escalate the conflict with Tehran over its nuclear intentions. – New York Times
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran has ordered extra security for scientists because of the drive-by assassination last week of the deputy director of the country’s primary uranium enrichment facility, which he attributed to “the evil hands of arrogance and Zionist agents,” the state-run news media reported Tuesday. – New York Times
Iran warned Saudi Arabia against delivering additional oil to world markets to compensate for a drop in Iranian oil exports if they are hit by sanctions, as the U.S. continued to have mixed success in convincing Iran’s major oil customers to reduce their purchases of Iranian oil. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
South Korea said it will continue bilateral discussions with the U.S. to find an acceptable compromise on sanctions against Iran’s crude-oil exports, as the resource-poor country attempts to safeguard its energy security without alienating its key ally and trade partner. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
India won’t seek a waiver of U.S. sanctions on Iran and continues to buy crude oil from the country, Indian Foreign Secretary Ranjan Mathai said Tuesday. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Israel’s parliament Monday that the current sanctions against Iran are not going to stop its nuclear program. – DEFCON Hill
Iran’s government is fighting for its survival amid unprecedented political and economic pressure caused by international sanctions and internal opposition. But even as it moves to improve its nuclear capability, it has not yet made the final decision to build a nuclear warhead. That’s the Israeli intelligence assessment that U.S. officials will hear this week during security meetings with U.S. Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, according to Israeli media reports. – LA Times’ World Now
Iran’s Ministry of Education has announced it will soon publish separate school textbooks for boys and girls, creating another area of gender segregation in the Islamic republic. – Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
A new Iranian-built spy plane and satellite are slated to go operational next month, Defense Minister Brig. Gen. Ahmad Vahidi told the official Iranian news agency IRNA – AOL Defense
The European Union would ban the import of Iranian oil from July 1, giving member states nearly six months to wind up existing contracts, under a proposal by rotating EU presidency holder Denmark, EU diplomats said on Tuesday. – Reuters
FPI Executive Director Jamie Fly and Gary Schmitt write: If the United States seriously considers military action, it would be better to plan an operation that not only strikes the nuclear program but aims to destabilize the regime, potentially resolving the Iranian nuclear crisis once and for all. – Foreign Affairs
Mark Helprin writes: Any president of the United States fit for the office should someday, soon, say to the American people that in his judgment Iran—because of its longstanding and implacable push for nuclear weapons, its express hostility to the U.S., Israel and the West, and its record of barbarity and terror—must be deprived of the capacity to wound this country and its allies such as they have never been wounded before. – Wall Street Journal
Emanuele Ottolenghi writes: This month Iran confirmed the sudden acceleration of its nuclear program, with the activation of the underground Fordow Enrichment Plant near Qom. Last November, an IAEA report exposed the military dimensions of the program. All of this is clear evidence that Iran is edging closer to the bomb, while shielding the program from military strike with increasing effectiveness. Waiting until June [for a European oil embargo] could thwart those wishing to prevent an Iranian bomb peacefully, and only makes a military showdown in the Gulf more likely. – Wall Street Journal Europe
Colin Kahl writes: given the high costs and inherent uncertainties of a strike, the United States should not rush to use force until all other options have been exhausted and the Iranian threat is not just growing but imminent. Until then, force is, and should remain, a last resort, not a first choice. – Foreign Affairs’ Snapshots
Kenneth Pollack writes: Doubtless such a war would leave Iran far, far worse off than it would leave us. But it would be painful for us too, and it might last far longer than anyone wants because that is the nature of wars, especially wars involving this Iranian regime. Thus, if we continue down this path, we had best be ready to walk it to its very end. And if we don’t have the stomach to realistically prepare for war, we should seriously reconsider our current embrace of sanctions. – The New Republic
Syria
Violence surged in Syria on Tuesday as activists reported that at least 34 people had been killed in several towns and cities across the country, including six soldiers who had defected and three members of the security forces. – New York Times
Anti-regime protesters in the Damascus suburbs gave an Arab League peace observers’ mission an ecstatic welcome Tuesday, but warned that President Bashar al-Assad’s security forces would attack as soon as they left. – Washington Post
A recent visit by the commander of Iran’s elite Quds Force to Damascus is the strongest sign yet that Iran is supplying weapons to aid Syrian President Bashar Assad’s crackdown on his people, a senior Obama administration official said Tuesday. – Associated Press
Russia signaled on Tuesday it would not make major concessions over its draft Security Council resolution to end bloodshed in Syria, sticking by its key ally in the Middle East. – Reuters
Syria may let Arab monitors stay on after their mission expires on Thursday, but foes of President Bashar al-Assad say the U.N. Security Council should step in to halt 10 months of bloodshed. – Reuters
Israel has serious concerns about what will happen to “huge stockpiles” of chemical and biological weapons in Syria when the Assad regime collapses, a senior military official said on Jan. 17. – AFP
Syria “absolutely rejects” any plans to send foreign Arab troops into the country, the foreign ministry said Tuesday, as the death toll mounted from the 10-month-old uprising against President Bashar Assad. – Associated Press
Syrian troops fighting rebels in the town of Zabadani near Lebanon agreed on Tuesday to a ceasefire under which the army would withdraw and insurgents would leave the streets, a senior opposition leader in contact with residents said. – Reuters
A Syrian tribal leader apologized on Tuesday for backing President Bashar al-Assad on state television, saying a gun was being pointed at his head while he made the broadcast last year. – Reuters
Editorial: The Western allies have stood back from the carnage in Syria, even while calling for the end of the Assad regime. For the past several months, the Arab League’s initiatives have been a cover for inaction. If the organization now reaches a dead end, outside powers will have to consider new measures, in collaboration with the Arabs. Standing by while the bloodshed goes on should not be one of the options. – Washington Post
Yemen
Adding to fears of a worsening political crisis in Yemen, a top government official hinted at a possible delay in presidential elections set for February that would mark the formal end of President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s 33-year rule. – New York Times
[T]here are at least three key reasons to remain concerned about the persistent threat posed by AQAP, according to John McLaughlin, who was deputy CIA director from 2000 to 2004 and, briefly, the agency’s acting director. The reasons, in short: speed, simplicity and strategy. – Checkpoint Washington
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Tuesday that the U.S. regrets that Yemen’s president has not complied with agreements to leave the country and allow elections for a successor. – Associated Press
North Africa
Defense attorneys for Hosni Mubarak on Tuesday slammed the prosecution’s case amid growing disappointment about the trial among many Egyptians who hope to see the ousted president convicted of capital murder charges. – Wall Street Journal
King Mohammed VI has made a flurry of appointments to his royal Cabinet in recent weeks, men who look poised to challenge the new government’s power and, critics say, threaten democratic progress unleashed by the Arab Spring. – Associated Press
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will travel to Algeria in the next few weeks, two diplomatic sources told Reuters, a visit which would boost an Algerian government left exposed by the “Arab Spring” uprisings. – Reuters
Josh Rogin reports: Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, warned the U.N. Security Council that Sudan’s restive South Kordofan region faces the prospects of famine if Khartoum does not allow international aid workers into the region to provide relief to more than 500,000 needy civilians. – The Cable
Gulf States
Israeli hackers claim to have opened a new front in the escalating cyber war with their Arab rivals, by launching an attack on the websites of stock markets in Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi. – Financial Times
That highlights the growing confidence among the Gulf Arabs — all close U.S. allies — to stand up against Iran and use tougher tactics in what they view as the region’s hard-boiled realities: Any gain for Shiite power Iran is perceived as a loss for its Sunni rivals led by Saudi Arabia. – Associated Press
Iraq
Violence appears to have increased sharply since U.S. troops left Iraq a month ago, as insurgents have unleashed a wave of furious bombings targeting Baghdad neighborhoods, Shiite pilgrims and police facilities in Sunni areas. – Washington Post
Tension has flared between Turkey and Iraq, as the two countries exchange recriminations about what Ankara says is the Iraqi government’s shift towards sectarianism and what Baghdad labels Turkish interference in its domestic affairs. – Financial Times
Iraq’s Shiite-dominated Cabinet suspended boycotting Sunni-backed ministers Tuesday, an official said, deepening a sectarian conflict of politics and violence that has raised fears of civil war in Iraq now that U.S. troops are gone. – Associated Press
A Shi’ite militia that fought U.S. troops in Iraq said Tuesday it will not lay down its arms immediately despite the departure of American forces. – Reuters
Israel
Israel’s state prosecutors began a hearing on Tuesday to decide whether to indict Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman on charges of fraud, breach of trust and money laundering, a move that could shake up Israeli politics and lead to early elections. – New York Times
A nuclear Iran could make it tougher for Israel to act against enemies closer to home, a senior Israeli military official said Tuesday, suggesting that regional fallout would be broad should Tehran achieve bomb making capabilities. – Associated Press
Turkey
A Turkish court convicted one man on Tuesday of instigating the 2007 murder of a prominent editor, but acquitted all 19 suspects on charges of being members of a terrorist organization, rejecting claims that the murder was an act of conspiracy by an illegal network within the Turkish state. – New York Times
Asia
Afghanistan
After years of steady decline, only 25 polio cases were reported in the country in 2010, prompting one international health care official to declare that “the Afghans are heroes.” Then last year, the number tripled to 76, the Afghan Ministry of Public Health said. – New York Times
On Tuesday, after an intensive eight-month investigation, the U.S. Air Force concluded that the shooter, Col. Ahmed Gul, 46, had acted alone in killing eight members of the U.S. Air Force and one American contractor before killing himself. The probe found no evidence that the attack was part of a Taliban conspiracy. – Washington Post
Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.) continued his quest for an Afghanistan-Pakistan study group Tuesday, writing to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to establish the group with $1 million that was included in the 2012 appropriations bill. – DEFCON Hill
Assailants gunned down a prominent anti-Taliban tribal leader as he was praying in a mosque Tuesday in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, authorities said, the latest in a steady campaign of assassinations of pro-government officials. – Associated Press
Con Coughlin writes: Mr. Obama will have no one but himself to blame for failing to achieve a peace settlement in Afghanistan. If he were really serious about winning the war, then he would keep the troops deployed until their mission had been achieved. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
Pakistan
Pakistan has rejected U.S. special envoy Marc Grossman’s request to visit the country, a senior official said on Wednesday, highlighting the increased tensions between the uneasy allies. – Reuters
North Korea
The eldest half brother of North Korea’s new leader says Kim Jong-un is unprepared for command, the totalitarian regime will collapse and the military has become too strong for the impoverished nation to support. – Washington Times
A senior North Korean party official dismissed concerns about Kim Jong-un’s readiness to lead, saying he spent years working closely with his late father and helped him make key policy decisions on economic and military affairs. – Associated Press
The United States, Japan and South Korea agree that “a path is open” for North Korea to return to stalled six-party talks on Pyongyang’s nuclear program, the State Department said on Tuesday. – Reuters
China
The Chinese authorities have charged another veteran human rights activist with attempting to subvert the state, the latest in a series of indictments or trials of well-known dissidents that have brought unusually stiff prison sentences and widespread condemnation abroad. – New York Times
China sharply criticized comments by the U.S. ambassador to Beijing that China’s human-rights record is deteriorating, adding to tensions between the two nations ahead of a sensitive visit by China’s likely next president. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)
China will expand nationwide a trial program that requires users of the country’s wildly popular microblog services to disclose their identities to the government in order to post comments online, the government’s top Internet regulator said on Wednesday. – New York Times
China has announced that people living in its towns and cities now outnumber those in the countryside, making it a predominantly urban nation for the first time in Chinese civilization. – Wall Street Journal
Curious about the television interview with U.S. China envoy Gary Locke that prompted a mini-tirade from China’s Foreign Ministry earlier this week? Here it is. – WSJ’s China Real Time Report
Around 1,000 villagers denouncing a suspected land grab protested outside a government building in southern China while a new local leader called for protection of farmers’ rights, newspapers reported on Wednesday. – Reuters
Joseph Nye writes: The development of soft power need not be a zero sum game. All countries can gain from finding attraction in one anothers’ cultures. But for China to succeed, it will need to unleash the talents of its civil society. Unfortunately, that does not seem about to happen soon. – New York Times
India
[F]or weeks, the Indian Army has been embroiled in an achingly public dispute not about national security but about the birth date of its chief…The answer to the dispute could determine whether General Singh retires in May or 10 months later, as military regulations stipulate that the army chief must step down after three years on the job or upon his 62nd birthday, whichever comes first. – New York Times
India and China’s agreement Tuesday to set up a mechanism to settle border disputes is unlikely to help lead to a broader pact over the disputed frontier. – WSJ’s India Real Time
As two Asian giants jostle for regional power and influence, India, traditionally the silent one, is now working to diffuse tensions with its largest trading partner, China. – Aviation Week
India hopes to unveil within two weeks the winner of a $12-billion fighter jet deal for which France’s Dassault and the Eurofighter consortium are on a final short list, the air force said Jan. 17. – AFP
India’s Priyanka Gandhi joined the election campaign in the country’s most politically important state on Tuesday, injecting sparkle into a tightly fought race and overshadowing her brother Rahul, heir-apparent of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty. – Reuters
Southeast Asia
A U.S.-China confrontation in Asia is unlikely but Washington is committed to help bolster the military firepower of its allies like the Philippines amid territorial disputes with Beijing, two U.S. senators said Tuesday. – Associated Press
Ecstatic cheers of “Long Live Aung San Suu Kyi!” echoed through the streets of this impoverished Yangon suburb Wednesday as she registered for elections, a sign of how vastly Myanmar has changed since the junta gave up power after decades of iron-fisted rule. – Associated Press
Editorial: The U.S. was right to restore diplomatic relations, but also right not to jump the gun like Denmark, which pledged to double aid, or Norway, which lifted restrictions on private investment in the country. The Burmese regime is clearly responding to international pressure, but because of its opaque nature nobody knows what its longer-term intentions are. This suggests that an incremental approach to lifting sanctions is warranted. Lowering standards for that reward will only encourage backsliding on the promise of reform. – Wall Street Journal Asia (subscription required)
Taiwan
U.S. officials have praised the re-election of Taiwan’s president, even though it sets the island nation and longtime U.S. ally on course for closer ties with mainland China. – Washington Times
Philip Bowring writes: President Ma Ying-jeou’s re-election victory in a Taiwan poll widely seen as a referendum on cross-Strait relations with mainland China signals lukewarm approval for further economic engagement. The result also suggests both sides of the political divide here would do well to stop obsessing about ties with the mainland and focus more attention on the rest of the world. Taiwan is missing big opportunities with the U.S. and the European Union. – Wall Street Journal Asia (subscription required)
Daniel Blumenthal writes: In many respects it is U.S. blood and treasure, spent over decades, that set the conditions for the Taiwan miracle. There is no sense letting the sacrifices of Americans who fought and died for freedom in Asia be in vain. Washington must hold out until politics in China changes, which would pave the way for a peaceful democratic solution. – Shadow Government
Japan
In a move that could reignite territorial tensions, a quartet of remote, anonymous islets surrounding the disputed group of East China Sea islands known as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China will be getting a name by the end of March. A Japanese name, that is. – WSJ’s Japan Real Time
Security
Defense
The U.S. congressional defense committees hope to move their legislation faster this year, with the goal of completing the defense appropriations and authorization bills before the November elections, according to professional staff members. – Defense News
At the latest of a series of conferences on the future of the Army, junior officers openly debated with top generals over how to sell the service to the Congress, the country, and its own war-weary soldiers wondering whether to get out. – AOL Defense
A special Marine Corps task force created specifically to drag the service’s amphibious operations into the 21st century will be sticking around for awhile longer, according to a top service general. – AOL Defense
To retain and maintain its strength in the Pacific as China grows as a naval force, the U.S. needs to augment its naval fleet size, a noted think tank asserts. – Aviation Week
The Pentagon may conduct more prototyping of high-tech capabilities to help preserve the industrial base at a time when weapon and equipment purchases are projected to decline. – Defense News
Russia/Europe
Russia
Russian space officials are speculating that American radar may have zapped the failed Mars moon probe that fell into the ocean Sunday, a prominent Russian newspaper said Tuesday. – Washington Post
Mikhail Prokhorov, a super-rich tycoon challenging Vladimir Putin for Russia’s presidency in March, said his country faced the danger of violent revolution if it did not break conservative resistance and move quickly to democracy. – Reuters
Capital flight from Russia, which last year was second only in post-Soviet times to outflows in the crisis year of 2008, should reverse once political stability returns after the March presidential election, the World Bank says. – Reuters
Josh Rogin reports: Apparently, this is Moscow’s idea of rolling out the “red carpet”: Russian state television [yesterday] launched an all-out assault on new U.S. Ambassador Mike McFaul. – The Cable
United Kingdom
The European Court of Human Rights ruled Tuesday that Abu Qatada, a radical Islamic preacher regarded as one of Al Qaeda’s main inspirational leaders in Europe, cannot be deported from Britain to his native Jordan because his trial there would be tainted by evidence obtained by torture. – New York Times
Eastern Europe
A jailed former Belarusian presidential candidate has been placed in solitary confinement and an opposition activist transferred to a “closed regime” prison for violating rules, RFE/RL’s Belarus Service reports. – Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Ukraine continues to languish in a leading global index of economic freedom, despite promises of reform from President Viktor Yanukovych. – Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty
Hungary
Reawakening a debate on what the European Union should do when one of its members threatens its democratic principles, the bloc’s executive arm opened legal proceedings on Tuesday against Hungary, which critics contend is sliding toward authoritarianism. – New York Times
United States of America
The State Department said Tuesday it “absolutely and fundamentally” disagrees with Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry’s remark during Monday’s debate in South Carolina that Turkey is “ruled by what many would perceive to be Islamic terrorists.” – Washington Times
Josh Rogin reports: After Turkey’s Foreign Ministry lashed out at GOP presidential hopeful Rick Perry for saying that Turkey is led by “Islamic terrorists,” the Perry campaign doubled down on those remarks and told The Cable the incident shows why Perry is bolder than President Barack Obama and GOP rival Mitt Romney on foreign policy. – The Cable
Rogin also reports: John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign prepared an extensive opposition research file on Mitt Romney that spelled out several of Romney’s flip flops on foreign policy and painted him as naïve and inexperienced on international affairs and national security. – The Cable
Peru
Peruvian Vice President Omar Chehade has resigned over corruption allegations but managed to hang onto his seat in Congress on Tuesday after surviving an expulsion vote. – Reuters
Nicaragua
[Ortega’s] choice of friends abroad makes many Nicaraguans worry that the former guerrilla and Cold War icon is dragging down the country’s reputation and unnecessarily antagonizing the United States and other Western countries. – Reuters
Haiti
For a once-notorious dictator facing charges of crimes against humanity, Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier is living a nice life here after his sudden return from exile a year ago. – Washington Post
West Africa
The main suspect in a Christmas Day bomb attack on a church just outside Nigeria’s capital escaped within 24 hours of his arrest and the police commissioner in charge has been suspended, police said on Wednesday. – Reuters
At least one Malian soldier and several assailants were killed on Tuesday when Tuareg rebels and former soldiers from Libya attacked a town in northern Mali and were pushed back by the army, the government said. – Reuters
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urged Ivory Coast to press ahead with democratic reforms on Tuesday, saying the country could once again be “the engine of growth” for West Africa. – Reuters
Josh Rogin reports: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is on a trip to West Africa this week to promote and encourage new African democracies, while two of her top aides fan out to two countries where democracy is teetering — Russia and Afghanistan. – The Cable
Ethiopia
Gunmen have killed five foreign tourists in Ethiopia’s remote northern Afar region, after crossing into the Horn of Africa country from neighboring Eritrea which trained and armed the attackers, an Ethiopian official said on Tuesday. – Reuters
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This is the part where, ‘you’ stay inside the fort, and hold it down, while your host goes on a “…one man mission…”, and it’s a “Black Op” (Sterile operation; no easily recognizable uniform; blending in with local population–unless not being seen is part of the completion of the task, with includes the possibility of elimination of any that do see you); “highly classified”, so much so that a government could disavow knowledge of the task, and consider you were doing it all on your own), though not with the ‘typical protocol’s.
Those that know me best,
know that is how “I” roll–most of the time…
For those that pray, I hope you’ll spare a prayer for your host. Those that do not, can simply state, or just think the following in your mind”
“Watch your six, Universal Soldier”
But all should know;
Your Host Will be "Getting Medieval"
In Deo Speramus
Non Timebo Mala
“Strength And Honor”
In the meantime,
watch your six.
Universal Soldier
†
This blog is brought to you by The Patriot’s Network for all the Patriotic morale boosting that you can handle; And Armad.net, ”Hamming it up for our Troop’s” in the field. And by Yankeemom.com, perspective from a stanch supporter of the military, “One pissed off Army Mom”, and a premier resource for up to date current event’s without the ‘political correctness’, since ‘the stakes’ are far too high. And, “supporting the line against the dark”, “Warchick” not allowing the darkness any quarter, as well as “American Jihad Watch”.
A Reminder Of Why We Fight
"We will know them by their deeds": I Shall Never Forget. I Shall Never Surrender. I Shall Never Submit.
This Is My Stop...
Creator-God, help me use and enjoy the earth and its resources without misusing or abusing them.
Mercy is not over-rated…