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 . '/' . substr('9780375727054',-6,3) . '/' . '9780375727054' . '.jpg'; ?>)
By Gore Vidal
$17.95
By Sean Wilentz
$16.92
$35
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The Bush administration has announced plans to oust Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Peter Pace and Vice Chairman Adm. Ed Giambastiani. Pace was involved with the planning and execution of the Iraq war from the beginning, and his reappointment would likely spark a debate and raise uncomfortable questions in the Senate during his reconfirmation.
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Gen. Peter Pace, speaking to CBS’ Harry Smith on Memorial Day, said: “When you take a look at the life of a nation and all that’s required to keep us free, we had more than 3,000 Americans murdered on 11 September, 2001. The number who have died, sacrificed themselves since that time, is approaching that number.” In actuality, 3,455 U.S. military personnel had been killed in Iraq alone at the time of Pace’s blunder.
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The Pentagon, possibly suffering from a superpower complex, has accused China of spending substantially more on its military buildup than publicly stated. In a report to Congress, the U.S. military also warns of advanced nuclear capability and a possible conflict over Taiwan. Still, even if China spends two or three times the $46 billion on defense it claims, it couldn’t hope to keep pace with the hundreds of billions the U.S. throws at the military every year.
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news.bbc.co.uk
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Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute has agreed to be President Bush’s first “war czar.” Lute will answer directly to the president, although it’s still not entirely clear how much authority he’ll have. The White House had offered the job to a number of nominees who turned it down.
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Tom Engelhardt, Tomdispatch.com —
In New York and Jalalabad, human life is valued differently by the U.S. government. A loved one lost in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack was worth about $1.8 million, according to the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund. The life of a 16-year-old Afghan girl is set, by tragic contrast, at $2,000.
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U.S. and Iraqi forces are continuing their search for three missing American soldiers, despite threats from the Sunni insurgent coalition that claims to have taken them as hostages. Some 4,000 troops along with helicopters, jets and unmanned aerial vehicles are involved in the effort. The Pentagon said on Monday that it believed the soldiers had fallen into enemy hands.
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YouTube, MySpace and 11 other popular websites will no longer be accessible via U.S. military computers. A military spokesman says the move is meant to address bandwidth issues, but it’s no secret the military has been less than thrilled with the content sometimes posted by soldiers. Service members with personal computers will be unaffected, free to visit the Pentagon’s own YouTube channel.
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aftonbladet.se
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President Bush has already decided to veto a second war funding bill that the House Democrats haven’t even finished drafting. The measure would require the White House to report on progress in Iraq in order to free up funds past July.
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While the Bush administration has repeatedly referred to the Democrats’ timetable for withdrawal from Iraq as a recipe for failure, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has praised the measure. He’s also urged an assessment of the troop escalation by this summer—sooner than supporters of the “surge” would like—and indicated support for a withdrawal as outlined by the Iraq Study Group, which he was once a part of.
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An Army survey of troops in Iraq has found some disturbing attitudes, and recommends shorter deployments for the mentally exhausted soldiers. Asked whether civilians should be treated with dignity and respect, less than half said yes and more than a third found torture acceptable.
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The House Oversight Committee has sent requests to the White House and Pentagon asking for all documents related to the death of Pat Tillman. The committee is investigating why the Army misrepresented the circumstances of the Ranger’s death. Key to that effort is a letter sent by a top general urging Gen. John Abizaid to warn the White House.
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Testifying before the House Committee on Government Oversight and Reform, Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman’s brother and mother criticized the Pentagon and the government, which they said manipulated the truth for the sake of political gain.
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By Andy Borowitz — The satirist writes that the most improbable aspect of the Wolfowitz scandal is that the World Bank president actually has a girlfriend.
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From documents already released, it has become clear that the Army acted inappropriately following the death of Pat Tillman, destroying evidence, instituting an “information lockdown” and possibly even discussing a PR strategy. Congress will now investigate the matter, with the aid of uncensored documents and testimony from the Tillman family.
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The White House is having trouble finding someone to be the new “war czar,” and it has apparently decided the problem is the name. The position will now be called “execution manager.” Is it just us, or has this administration lost its flair for snazzy Orwellian lingo? Bonus: Jon Stewart catches Bush in a lie obstruction of the truth.
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AP Photo / Charles Dharapak
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By Robert Scheer — Paul Wolfowitz, the former deputy secretary of defense who helped sell a stupid war, now finds himself in a bit of trouble. As head of the World Bank, he secured a cushy pay raise for his girlfriend, lied about it and alienated his staff in the process. Not to worry—President Bush still thinks he’s doing a bang-up job.
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Jim Lehrer reports that the Army may be underestimating the severity of disabilities, denying servicemen and -women lifetime benefits. The Veterans Disability Benefits Commission found that disability ratings made by the Veterans Affairs Department were typically higher than those of the Army.
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AP Photo / Darko Vojinovic
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Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced Wednesday that the Pentagon is likely to extend the tours of duty of some 100,000 soldiers currently deployed in Iraq by three months. The new policy would enable the surge to last for a year.
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The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform will investigate the Pentagon’s handling of the death of Pat Tillman and the rescue of Jessica Lynch to determine “why inaccurate accounts of these two incidents were disseminated, the sources and motivations for the accounts, and whether the appropriate administration officials have been held accountable.”
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In an effort to meet the demands of the administration, Defense Secretary Robert Gates plans to send 12,000 National Guard troops to Iraq, according to a report from NBC News. In other news, the Pentagon said Monday that roughly 4,500 troops would soon redeploy without getting their full year off.
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The handling of Guantanamo Bay detainee David Hicks’ war-crimes trial has triggered widespread criticism and speculation about politically motivated maneuverings that could undermine the entire legal operation at the Cuban prison camp.
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AP Photo / Haraz N. Ghanbari
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By Robert Scheer — The military covered its ass on Monday, with a report on the investigation into the exploitation of Pat Tillman that stank of non-denial denials. After three years of lies and obfuscation, the Tillman family deserves better.
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news.bbc.co.uk
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The findings of an investigation into the cover-up of the circumstances of Pat Tillman’s death won’t be officially released until Monday, but details are leaking out. According to Defense Department officials, the report will recommend holding nine officers, including up to four generals, accountable.
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Linda Bilmes, the Harvard finance expert who helped establish the true cost of the war, including veteran healthcare, turns her attention to the Walter Reed scandal, and the bureaucratic quagmire that keeps our soldiers from getting help. Bilmes offers four lessons to avoid future problems. We can only hope someone takes her advice.
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globalsecurity.org
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The Pentagon released a transcript Monday of a confession by Walid Mohammad bin Attash, a Guantanamo detainee who allegedly said in a private meeting that he had a hand in the deadly 2000 attack on the U.S. Navy destroyer Cole in Yemen. While he was at it, he also ‘fessed up to aiding in the 1998 American embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania.
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The storied journalist speaks to Truthdig about his new book, “Rumsfeld: His Rise, Fall and Catastrophic Legacy,” which offers fresh insight into the real force behind the Iraq debacle.
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The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network put together this collection of testimonials about the impact of “don’t ask, don’t tell” on the military and the prevalence of discrimination against gay and lesbian soldiers.
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Army Surgeon General Kevin C. Kiley has resigned, the third military official to lose his job in the Walter Reed scandal. An anonymous defense official says Kiley was asked to step down by the acting Army secretary, who got his job only two weeks ago after another abrupt dismissal.
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latimes.com
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Military commanders have begun to develop a contingency plan for Iraq that envisions a drawdown of troops. The strategy is based in large part on past American machinations in El Salvador, and will focus on training locals rather than providing the main force.
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Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the Pentagon has agreed to a request from our man in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, to send an additional 2,200 military police. Gates said the number would not count against the 21,500 combat troops or the 2,400 support troops Bush plans to send. Earlier, Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England said the number of support troops could jump to 7,000.
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vanityfair.com
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Vanity Fair has an interesting profile of six retired generals—all of whom voted for George W. Bush—who famously and courageously condemned the administration’s conduct of the Iraq war. Find out why they went against years of military tradition to speak out, and how they feel about the current state of affairs.
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An independent commission established by Congress has found that the Defense Department is not adequately equipping and funding the National Guard. Roughly 90 percent of U.S. National Guard units are designated “not ready.” The commission determined that the Guard is ill-prepared to meet its obligation to defend the homeland and respond rapidly and effectively in a crisis.
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abc.net.au
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Lt. Col. Karen Kwiatkowski (ret.), a veteran of the Pentagon with firsthand experience of the administration’s cherry-picking of intelligence, reveals why Bush thinks he can win a war with Iran, why few politicians are serious about withdrawal and why “when they call Iraq a success, they mean it.”
Update: Full transcript added
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mda.mil
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For months, Tony Blair has been secretly lobbying the U.S. to locate a missile defense site in Britain. Poland and the Czech Republic are also in the running. The $90-billion “son of star wars” program has performed poorly in the past, and is still under development as it’s deployed.
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The Department of Defense plans to build an $18-million facility at Guantanamo Bay in anticipation of mass migration following the eventual death of Fidel Castro. Administration officials say the housing center will be needed for interdicted Cuban migrants now that space normally used in such an event is taken up by the detention and interrogation facility that holds suspected terrorists.
(h/t: Boing Boing)
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Before the invasion of Iraq, Gen. Tommy Franks gathered with his top advisers to review their plans. The recently released slides from that meeting offer an insight into the startling optimism of the men who designed the war. Four years post-invasion, the commanders expected Iraq to have a fully representative government, a functioning army and as few as 5,000 U.S. troops. Whoops!
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AP Photo / Evan Vucci
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By Robert Scheer — The lies of Douglas Feith, exposed by the Pentagon’s inspector general, are the key to understanding the greatest intelligence fiasco in American history.
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Two Defense Department officials and a mysterious analyst held an anonymous briefing for reporters Sunday to offer evidence of Iran’s involvement with hostile forces in Iraq. The three claimed Tehran is supplying militants with sophisticated weapons that they said had been used against U.S. forces for at least two years, but the analyst, whose exact job description was withheld, admitted the evidence was not a “smoking gun.”
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from npr.org
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An internal review by the Pentagon found that the intelligence cherry-picking policy shop run by Douglas Feith (above), a group President Bush relied on to sell the war, acted inappropriately but not illegally. The inspector general’s findings will be made public at a Senate hearing Friday.
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asashop.org
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Defense Secretary Robert Gates told the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday that if the surge goes badly, the military will probably move troops “out of harm’s way.” Why wait? He also said the surge is not the “last chance” to get it right in Iraq. Let’s hope Congress stops quibbling and makes him wrong.
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The Pentagon has had it with picking up the slack from civilian agencies in Iraq, grumbling its concerns to the president and even Congress. The military has been forced to fill jobs that otherwise would be performed by civilians, mainly from the State Department, which, unlike the Army, can’t force people to work under the nightmarish conditions it helped to create.
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targikielce.pl
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By Robert Scheer — President Bush’s outrageous military budget has nothing do with fighting terrorism but everything to do with pumping up the profits of the administration’s generous political donors in the defense industry. So, the question is: Will the Democrats have the guts to stop this betrayal of the public trust?
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globalsecurity.org
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Although the United States and Iran have a testy relationship at best, weaknesses in security protocol currently allow buyers for Tehran to procure valuable aircraft parts from the U.S. military. At least two Democrats in the Senate want to cut off the supply, which would make the Iranian air force effectively irreparable.
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The Pentagon lists the number of soldiers wounded in combat in Iraq at more than 23,000, a tally often quoted by news agencies. But if one considers troops injured in “noncombat action,” a separate category that includes noncombat helicopter crash victims, the critically ill and others, the number doubles to about 50,000, leading critics to charge that the military is attempting to conceal the true human cost of the war.
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from spacewar.com
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The president has authorized U.S. troops to “kill or capture” Iranian soldiers and intelligence operatives found in Iraq, and the administration has even pressured military commanders to take advantage of the policy, according to multiple sources who spoke with The Washington Post.
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latimes.com
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The Pentagon has traditionally played a major role in monitoring U.S. borders and assisting the Coast Guard in intercepting drug shipments, but the burden of Iraq has forced the military to scale back its efforts, opening holes for drug smugglers to exploit.
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The Pentagon estimates that the cost of the Iraq war will reach $8.4 billion a month this year, or $9.7 billion if you include Afghanistan. That’s up from $8 billion a month last year, and $4.4 billion back in 2003. Either America was getting twice as much war for half the price four years ago, or someone is inflating his budget.
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unbsj.ca
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The Defense Department says it has learned of a plot to spy on U.S. contractors with classified security clearances traveling through Canada. Though it released few other details, the U.S. Defense Security Service says it found tiny transmitters hidden in Canadian coins.
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The Pentagon will no longer limit the time a soldier can spend fighting on active duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. The military can now cycle the same troops indefinitely in and out of Iraq and Afghanistan, where soldiers previously could not serve more than 24 cumulative months.
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