February 3, 2007
Analysis Is Bleak on Iraq’s Future

By MARK MAZZETTI
WASHINGTON, Feb. 2 — The release on Friday of portions of a bleak new National Intelligence Estimate about Iraq’s future left the White House and its opponents vying over whether its findings buttressed their vastly different views about how to arrest the worsening sectarian chaos there.

The assessment, by American intelligence agencies, expressed deep doubts about the abilities of Iraqi politicians to hold together an increasingly balkanized country, and about whether Iraqi troops might be able to confront powerful militias over the next 18 months and assume more responsibility for security.

The analysis, the first such estimate on Iraq in more than two years, described in sober language a rapidly unraveling country in which security has worsened despite four years of efforts by the administration.

President Bush acknowledged last month that his strategy had failed so far.

The estimate suggested that the United States now faced an unpalatable decision in which a rapid withdrawal of American troops would only accelerate momentum toward Iraq’s collapse, and in which Iraq faced long odds of quelling the violence and overcoming hardening sectarian divisions, regardless of how many American troops police Iraq’s streets.

The report was released a week after Vice President Dick Cheney dismissed suggestions that Iraq is in a parlous state, saying, “The reality on the ground is, we’ve made major progress.”

The administration has also intensified its criticism of Iran, accusing it of fueling the sectarian violence in Iraq and providing Shiite militias with material for bombs that the administration says have been used in attacks on American forces. The White House has thus far made little evidence public to support its case.

The intelligence report did conclude that Iran is providing “lethal support” for Shiite groups that is intensifying the violence. But it portrayed the violence as essentially “self-sustaining,” and suggested that the involvement of outsiders, including Iran, was “not likely to be a major driver of violence or the prospects for stability.”

National Intelligence Estimates provide a consensus of the 16 agencies that make up the intelligence community.

In choosing to take the rare step of making public three and a half pages of “key judgments” from the classified report, administration officials seized on one conclusion — that American forces remain “an essential stabilizing element in Iraq” — to reinforce their view that more troops are needed to secure Baghdad and give Iraqi leaders breathing room to develop a political settlement, particularly between the warring Sunnis and Shiites.

But top Democratic lawmakers said the estimate’s conclusions supported their view that the best way to combat violence in Baghdad would be through new political and diplomatic programs.

The declassified portions included an assessment that an Iraqi military hampered by sectarian divisions would be “hard pressed” over the next 12 to 18 months to “execute significantly increased security responsibilities, and particularly to operate independently against Shia militias with any success.”

The report also concluded that security in Iraq would continue to deteriorate at current rates unless “measurable progress” can be made in efforts to reverse the conditions that fuel violence.

The full classified report was said by officials to be about 90 pages in length, and was provided to the White House and members of Congress. Top Democrats said the release of the intelligence estimate would strengthen their hand as the Senate prepares for a possible vote next week on a nonbinding resolution opposing President Bush’s new Iraq strategy.

“The estimate reaffirms my belief that the best hope for progress toward stabilizing Iraq lies only with the Iraqi people and their political leaders,” Senator John D. Rockefeller IV, the West Virginia Democrat and chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said in a statement. “The steps identified by the intelligence community as having the best chance of reversing the chaos and bloodshed in Iraq are all political developments, not military.”

But Stephen J. Hadley, the national security adviser, said at the White House that the estimate “gives us some evidence” of why Mr. Bush had concluded that “an American withdrawal or stepping back now would be a prescription for fast failure and a chaos that would envelop not only Iraq, but the region.”

Mr. Hadley said the estimate also bolstered the White House strategy of sending more than 20,000 new troops into Iraq.

The previous National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq, in the summer of 2004, detailed three possible outlooks for Iraq over the following 18 months, with the most pessimistic possibility that Iraq would descend into civil war.

By contrast the new report, struggling to describe the nature of the ongoing violence, said that calling it a “civil war” was hardly sufficient.

“The intelligence community judges that the term ‘civil war’ does not adequately capture the complexity of the conflict in Iraq, which includes extensive Shia-on-Shia violence, Al Qaeda and Sunni insurgent attacks on coalition forces, and widespread criminally motivated violence,” the assessment read.

John E. McLaughlin, who oversaw the previous intelligence estimate when he was acting director of central intelligence, said that he believed that intelligence officials in 2004 had presciently assessed what was to come in Iraq, but that the escalation of sectarian violence over the past year had made the situation even more complex.

“Civil war is checkers,” he said. “This is chess.”

The report also warned that a further sectarian splintering of Iraq could incite other countries in the Middle East to arm and finance various sects in the country: Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt supporting the Sunnis, and Iran coming to the aid of Shiite forces.

A National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq that was produced in 2002 in the prelude to the American invasion has become infamous as an example of an intelligence failure, because most of its central assertions about Iraq’s weapons capabilities and ties to terrorism have since been proven to have been mistaken.

Since then, American intelligence officials have made efforts to overhaul the process to produce the reports, in part by giving new emphasis to dissenting views that were once buried in obscure footnotes.

The latest analysis is understood to contain multiple dissents, one of which concerns the role of Syria in supporting Sunni insurgents in Iraq.

Intelligence analysts have been divided over whether it is the policy of the government in Damascus to aid the flow of foreign fighters who enter Iraq from Syria, or whether that assistance is the work of lower-level Syrian officials acting on their own.

American intelligence analysts have also disagreed about the extent to which Iranian government officials are aware of the flow of Qaeda operatives between Iran and Iraq.

Beyond the current grim picture, the report described several “triggering events” that could cause the situation to worsen significantly. Among them, it listed the assassination of major religious or political leaders, a complete Sunni defection from the government, and sustained mass sectarian killings that could “shift Iraq’s trajectory from gradual decline to rapid deterioration with grave humanitarian, political and security consequences.”

Were the already fragile government to collapse, the report outlined three possible outcomes: the emergence of a Shiite strongman to assert authority over minority sects, an “anarchic” fragmentation that puts power in the hands of hundreds of local potentates, or a period of sustained, bloody fighting leading to partition of Iraq along ethnic lines.

“Collapse of this magnitude would generate fierce violence for at least several years,” the report concluded, “ranging well beyond the time frame of this estimate, before settling into a partially stable end-state.”

February 2, 2007
Serbia Rejects U.N. Plan for Independent Kosovo

By CRAIG S. SMITH
PRISTINA, Kosovo, Feb. 2 — Serbia rejected a United Nations proposal today that paves the way for an independent Kosovo, setting up a possible showdown between its supporter, Russia, and the West over the disputed territory’s final status.

Serbia’s response came almost immediately after a United Nations envoy, Martti Ahtisaari, presented the complex plan to politicians here and in Belgrade.

“I told Mr. Ahtisaari that Serbia and I, as its president, will never accept Kosovo’s independence,” President Boris Tadic said in a statement from Belgrade. He noted that while the plan does not mention statehood for Kosovo, it “opens the possibility for Kosovo’s independence.”

The proposal, which is still subject to weeks of negotiation between the two sides, will require Russian acquiescence in order to win Security Council approval. Russia, a permanent member of the Security Council with veto power over the plan, has until now backed Serbia’s position that Kosovo must remain an integral, albeit autonomous, part of Serbia.

A NATO bombing campaign stopped fighting between Serb and Kosovo Albanian forces in 1999 and put the disputed territory under United Nations administration. It has been in limbo since then. Mr. Ahtisaari’s proposal is intended to finally fix the province’s future, closing the last chapter of the 1990’s Balkan wars.

While the plan does not mention independence, its provisions describe de facto statehood for Kosovo — providing for an army, constitution and flag — though it would still be protected by NATO and overseen by the international community for the indefinite future. The plan would also allow Kosovo to declare independence if the package is approved by the Security Council.

Mr. Ahtisaari avoided addressing the subject of independence today at news conferences in Belgrade and Pristina, saying only that “there will be a clear definition of Kosovo’s status when I submit my proposals to the Security Council.”

He did not expect the provisions regarding Kosovo’s status to change much before then, he said.

“Let’s face it,” he said, “the positions of the parties are extremely firm on both sides, so on the question of status, I’m not very hopeful” that there will be any more progress toward a compromise.

That shifts the onus to Russia and, to a lesser extent, China, both of which have supported Serbia’s territorial claims — in part, over concerns about ethnically motivated secessionist movements in their own countries.

In Russia, officials have long said they would not back any solution that was not supported by Serbia, effectively ruling out a forced separation, even one that stopped short of outright independence.

By tonight, the Russian government had not responded officially, but Leonid E. Slutsky, deputy chairman of the international affairs committee of the lower house of Parliament, said that Mr. Ahtisaari’s proposal was far from the last word.

“It raises many questions,” he said, according to Interfax, “and it appears to me that any haste in trying to implement this plan may bring negative consequences.”

The question now is what Russia will demand in exchange for dropping its objections to the plan, if it is willing to drop them at all.

Mr. Ahtisaari did not give a timetable for taking the plan to the Security Council, but said he would set aside the rest of February for further negotiations with the two sides.

The proposal provides for the province’s United Nations administration to be replaced by an International Civilian Representative who would have veto power over all government decisions for an indefinite period. It also foresees a multiethnic Kosovo security force of 2,500 troops and 800 reserves as well as a domestic intelligence agency to monitor threats to internal security.

The plan calls for the disbanding of the Kosovo Protection Force, which consists primarily of former fighters from the Kosovo Liberation Army, which fought Serbia and has been charged with human rights violations against Serbs.

Kosovo Serbs in six municipalities would be granted wide autonomy powers, including the right to receive financial donations and technical assistance from Serbia. The proposal would also establish more than 40 “protected zones” limiting building and commercial activity around Serbian churches and monasteries.

A constitution, to be written by a 21-member Constitutional Commission, will need a two-thirds majority for approval by Kosovo’s Parliament. Kosovo Serbs and other minorities will be consulted on the document but the proposal does not require them to be included in the commission.

Serbs and other minorities would be guaranteed seats in the Parliament and have the power to block legislation of “special interest” to them. But Mr. Ahtisaari said Friday that the provision could not be used to block more important measures, such as the constitution or a declaration of Kosovo’s independence.

In Belgrade the mood was glum. Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica, who refused to meet with Mr. Ahtisaari, called the proposal “illegitimate,” saying that it violated the United Nations Charter because it would “divide Serbia’s territory and redraw its internationally recognized borders.”

The proposal was met with only muted optimism in Pristina. “Kosovo will be sovereign like all other countries,” said Kosovo’s president, Fatmir Sejdiu, after his meeting with Mr. Ahtisaari. The territory’s prime minister, Agim Ceku, said the document “is very clear for Kosovo’s future.”

Not everyone is so sure. Albin Hurti, a Kosovo Albanian whose Movement for Self-Determination has called for protests against the proposal on Feb. 10, argues that Mr. Ahtisaari’s soft and slow approach to Kosovo’s independence will give Serbia time to strengthen its hold on Kosovo’s Serb areas. “This plan will lead to more conflicts,” he said.

Xhimajl Kilminda, 53, a graphic designer, watching the news on television at his apartment in Pristina, said he was hoping for immediate independence but was nonetheless encouraged by the news.

“Now we have to wait,” he said. “I hope we will have independence soon.”

Steven Lee Myers contributed from Moscow

 

The U.S Veteran Dispatch ^ What Thomas Jefferson learned from the Muslim book of jihad

By Ted Sampley

U.S. Veteran Dispatch

January 2007

Democrat Keith Ellison is now officially the first Muslim United States congressman. True to his pledge, he placed his hand on the Quran, the Muslim book of jihad and pledged his allegiance to the United States during his ceremonial swearing-in.

Capitol Hill staff said Ellison's swearing-in photo opportunity drew more media than they had ever seen in the history of the U.S. House. Ellison represents the 5th Congressional District of Minnesota.

The Quran Ellison used was no ordinary book. It once belonged to Thomas Jefferson, third president of the United States and one of America 's founding fathers. Ellison borrowed it from the Rare Book Section of the Library of Congress. It was one of the 6,500 Jefferson books archived in the library.

Ellison, who was born in Detroit and converted to Islam while in college, said he chose to use Jefferson's Quran because it showed that "a visionary like Jefferson" believed that wisdom could be gleaned from many sources.

There is no doubt Ellison was right about Jefferson believing wisdom could be "gleaned" from the Muslim Quran. At the time Jefferson owned the book, he needed to know everything possible about Muslims because he was about to advocate war against the Islamic "Barbary" states of Morocco, Algeria , Tunisia and Tripoli.

Ellison's use of Jefferson's Quran as a prop illuminates a subject once well-known in the history of the United States, but, which today, is mostly forgotten - the Muslim pirate slavers who over many centuries enslaved millions of Africans and tens of thousands of Christian Europeans and Americans in the Islamic "Barbary" states.

Over the course of 10 centuries, Muslim pirates cruised the African and Mediterranean coastline, pillaging villages and seizing slaves.

The taking of slaves in pre-dawn raids on unsuspecting coastal villages had a high casualty rate. It was typical of Muslim raiders to kill off as many of the "non-Muslim" older men and women as possible so the preferred "booty" of only young women and children could be collected.

Young non-Muslim women were targeted because of their value as concubines in Islamic markets. Islamic law provides for the sexual interests of Muslim men by allowing them to take as many as four wives at one time and to have as many concubines as their fortunes allow.

Boys, as young as 9 or 10 years old, were often mutilated to create eunuchs who would bring higher prices in the slave markets of the Middle East. Muslim slave traders created "eunuch stations" along major African slave routes so the necessary surgery could be performed. It was estimated that only a small number of the boys subjected to the mutilation survived after the surgery.

When American colonists rebelled against British rule in 1776, American merchant ships lost Royal Navy protection. With no American Navy for protection, American ships were attacked and their Christian crews enslaved by Muslim pirates operating under the control of the "Dey of Algiers"--an Islamist warlord ruling Algeria.

Because American commerce in the Mediterranean was being destroyed by the pirates, the Continental Congress agreed in 1784 to negotiate treaties with the four Barbary States. Congress appointed a special commission consisting of John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Benjamin Franklin, to oversee the negotiations.

Lacking the ability to protect its merchant ships in the Mediterranean, the new America government tried to appease the Muslim slavers by agreeing to pay tribute and ransoms in order to retrieve seized American ships and buy the freedom of enslaved sailors.

Adams (ala Kerry; Pelosi; Murtha; Kennedy and MANY others as an example [materal added not by the original author]) argued in favor of paying tribute as the cheapest way to get American commerce in the Mediterranean moving again. Jefferson  (ala GWB??? maybe???) was opposed. He believed there would be no end to the demands for tribute and wanted matters settled "through the medium of war." He proposed a league of trading nations to force an end to Muslim piracy.

In 1786, Jefferson, then the American ambassador to France, and Adams, then the American ambassador to Britain, met in London with Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja, the "Dey of Algiers" ambassador to Britain.

The Americans wanted to negotiate a peace treaty based on Congress' vote to appease.

During the meeting Jefferson and Adams asked the Dey's ambassador why Muslims held so much hostility towards America, a nation with which they had no previous contacts.

In a later meeting with the American Congress, the two future presidents reported that Ambassador Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja had answered that Islam "was founded on the Laws of their Prophet, that it was written in their Quran, that all nations who should not have acknowledged their authority were sinners, that it was their right and duty to make war upon them wherever they could be found, and to make slaves of all they could take as Prisoners, and that every Musselman (Muslim) who should be slain in Battle was sure to go to Paradise."

For the following 15 years, the American government paid the Muslims millions of dollars for the safe passage of American ships or the return of American hostages. The payments in ransom and tribute amounted to 20 percent of United States government annual revenues in 1800.

Not long after Jefferson's inauguration as president in 1801, he dispatched a group of frigates to defend American interests in the Mediterranean, and informed Congress.

Declaring that America was going to spend "millions for defense but not one cent for tribute," Jefferson pressed the issue by deploying American Marines and many of America's best warships to the Muslim Barbary Coast.

The USS Constitution, USS Constellation, USS Philadelphia, USS Chesapeake, USS Argus, USS Syren and USS Intrepid all saw action.

In 1805, American Marines marched across the dessert from Egypt into Tripolitania, forcing the surrender of Tripoli and the freeing of all American slaves.

During the Jefferson administration, the Muslim Barbary States, crumbling as a result of intense American naval bombardment and on shore raids by Marines, finally officially agreed to abandon slavery and piracy.

Jefferson's victory over the Muslims lives on today in the Marine Hymn, with the line, "From the halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli, we will fight our country's battles on the land as on the sea."

It wasn't until 1815 that the problem was fully settled by the total defeat of all the Muslim slave trading pirates.

Jefferson had been right. The "medium of war" was the only way to put and end to the Muslim problem.

Mr. Ellison was right about Jefferson. He was a "visionary;" wise enough to read and learn about the enemy from their own Muslim book of jihad

U.S. AUDIT CONCLUDES MILLIONS WASTED IN IRAQ. A quarterly audit by
U.S. Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction Stuart Bowen,
released on January 31, found that corruption and mismanagement
continue to hamper the reconstruction effort in Iraq, international
media reported the same day. The 579-page report established that
tens of millions of dollars in reconstruction aid have been wasted.
It reported scores of unaccounted-for weapons and a never-used camp
for housing police trainers. In addition, the report indicated that
the ongoing violence is a huge impediment to the reconstruction
process. "The security situation in Iraq continues to deteriorate,
hindering progress in all reconstruction sectors and threatening the
overall reconstruction effort," the report said. SS