Welcome to  America Goes To War. We focus on news about the war on terror and other important strategic matters.

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Staff Editor & Publisher Ravi Rikhye We did not bring out CWA 2007 for lack of orders. Concise World Armies 2008 Under preparation. $75 E-copy; $135 hard copy 800+ pages, airmail. E-mail Ravi Rikhye to order. List of Countries Now Available [180 countries/territories; approx. 45 more to be added.] 1.07 American Samoa; 1.20 Jordan

RETURN TO MAIN Condensed World Armies Condensed World Paramilitary Forces 2006 Analysis WE BRING YOU THE WORLD © Published on an ad hoc basis Declassified Gulf II Planning Documents Report on US Army readiness March 2007 [Thanks Joseph Stefula] Welcome to  America Goes To War. We focus on news about the war on terror and other important strategic matters. 0230 GMT May 11, 2008 Al-Sadr, Government Call Truce In Baghdad We suppose that was inevitable once the Sadr faction returned to Parliament, but we are disgusted, with the Iraq Army and with Sadr's militia. As long as US troops are not involved, we are willing to respect anyone who puts up a good fight, regardless of what we think of their ideology. When US troops are involved, then we are absolutely partial to the Americans. My country right or wrong, that sort of thing. But both Iraq Army and Mahadi Army saw the whites of each other's eyes and promptly turned yellow. So we are being harsh, because Mahadi army cannot fight the Americans, and had they started beating the Iraqi Army the Americans would have had to step in. And the Iraq Army was going precisely nowhere, so a truce was a logical step. If, however, you want to be called a warrior, then fight you must. Neither side did any real fighting. Hezbollah Withdraws From More Of West Beirut to show it regards the Lebanon Government as an enemy because the Government is interfering in Hezb's efforts to fight Israel, but that it has no issue with the Lebanese people. We're amused many western observers - including American - are attempting to paint Hezb's victory as a defeat. The grounds are that the people of Lebanon now see Hezb is ready to attack Lebanese as much as the Israelis, and so Hezb has lost face. Hello, with whom has it lost face? First, it not only did not turn its guns on the Lebanese government or Army, it has withdrawn and is content to let the Army act as the firebreak between itself and the government. Second, now that the Army has said Hezb can keep its communication network and its man will remain head of airport security, Hezb is going to push the angle "See? We're peaceful; we were provoked, we had to fight; now the army says it will leave us alone, we're back to our old positions." It is utterly immaterial whether the Lebanese people as a whole refuse to now love Hezb because the country never said it loved Hezb. Those that were its allies remain its allies; those who are its enemies have gotten a sound thrashing. None of this affects Hezb's political ambitions. It never expected all Lebanon to vote for its political party. It wants solely as Step 1 to attain a blocking minority in Parliament, which it probably already has, as step 2 it will split Lebanon. We dont know where people get the idea Hezb wants to take Lebanon over. Lebanon has now become ungovernable - too many factions who cant stand each other. Hezb wants south Lebanon for its own; right now it seems set to attain that in 3-5 years. So may be suggest to those American officials who seek comfort in 1984 Speak by labeling Hezb's victory as a defeat there is a source of better comfort. They should sit around in a circle and suck their thumbs. By the way, wasn't it just the other day Israelis were trying to convince the world they'd defeated Hezbollah? Yesterday, Hezb survived everything the Israeli military could throw at it. No use saying the Israelis could have wiped out Hezb had they wanted. They wanted, but they could afford the cost. That is why they lost and Hezb won. Today, after an amazingly short crisis, Hezb has clearly established it can run the Lebanese government out of Beirut anytime it wants and that it is unconcerned about the Lebanese Army - which according to what we hear is majority Shia anyway. If these two events are "defeats" then we suggest it's time for a lot of people to go back to grade school and learn English. The British Special Air Service's motto is: "Who Dares, Wins" and whether we like it or not, Iranian Shias and their Shia allies are daring, and they are winning. Its going to take real men to take Iran down, not the gasbags who are in free flight all over Washington. In case you didn't know, that's the reason the entire US Air Traffic Control system in the eastern half of the US is messed up. So what's the explanation for the ATC mess in the west? No clue. Its too distant for us to bother. Russia's VE Day Parade Okay, now that the Russians have been knocked out of the ring and truly squashed, we can afford to cut them slack. We completely understand why the proud people of this proud country are thrilled and delighted at the return of their Victory Europe Day parade. We'd nonetheless like an explanation of why Russia has bought exactly three - count'em, three - fighters in the last 8 years. It doesn't matter how darned broke you are, a major industrial power like Russia can afford more than three fighters in 8 years. The Russians had better think things through before showing America attitude. 0230 GMT May 9, 2008 Beirut Fighting Kills 7 including civilians, report AFP. Hezbollah said it will not dismantle its private communications network because Israel taps into the Lebanese network and Hezb needs secure communications. any attempt to touch the network will be tantamount to war, says Hezb. Meanwhile, it says the officer in charge of airport security who was removed by the government for allowing Hezb to set up surveillance equipment will not leave its post. Hezb says it needs the surveillance to counter US, Israeli, and other surveillance of the airport. Hezbollah gunmen and pro-government supporters clashed throughout yesterday. At least 3 civilians were killed in the crossfire. Lebanese Army has warned that if fighting continues, its unity will be affected. A significant fraction of the army is Shia. US national security spokesperson made a valuable and extremely helpful statement: "Hezbollah needs to make a choice: Be a terrorist organisation or be a political party, but quit trying to be both," said US national security council spokesman Gordon Johndroe. They need to stop their disruptive activities now." This is the way American elementary school teachers talk to their students when attempting to discipline them. We say "attempting" because all discipline authority has been taken away from them. Why exactly should Hezbollah let the US tell it what it needs to do or not do? If Hezb does not listen, the US is going to do what? Bomb South Lebanon? Hezb, i.e. Iran, will like nothing better because Death By A Hundred Diversions is Teheran's strategy for dealing with the US. Tell Israel to bomb Hezbollah? Exactly what Iran is waiting for, a causus belli that pits Israel against Muslims, even if they are the hated Shias, and which gives Mideast Shias the opportunity to create all sorts of trouble in their home countries. So what's left? Block broadcasts of American Idol? Tell Pepsi to pull its vending machines in Hezb territory? Refuse visas to Hezb officials and freeze their accounts? Like any Hezb official wants a US visa and like Hezb keeps it money in foreign bank accounts. US National Security would do well to recall Teddy Roosevelt's words a century ago: Talk softly and carry a big stick. NSC has recast that wise aphorism into "Carry a limp noodle and talk 'em to death." Oil at $124 Part of the reason is US Energy Information Administration had forecast an 800,000/bbl rise in US stocks of domestic distillates; instead stocks fell by 100,000/bbl. [Price for West Texas Intermediate Crude, the benchmark for high quality oil, in after hours trading.] Zimbabwe Agencies say 11 opposition supporters were beaten to death by government goons in several incidents. BBC says 40,000 farmers and their families have fled their land because of violence/threat of violence inflicted by government supporters. A South African observer says run off polling may have to be postponed for up to a year because of security concerns. Obama's Pastor and Mrs. Clinton [The views expressed here are solely those of the Editor.] This is a dead issue because it had minimal impact if any on the primaries in North Carolina and Indiana. And we hold zero brief for Senator Obama: if we were forced at gunpoint to vote for a Democrat, we'd go for Mrs. Clinton. Nonetheless, we feel compelled to ask Mrs. Clinton a question. Mr. Obama is being beat up because he didn't leave his church after his pastor started fulminating about 9/11 and such. We wonder if Mrs. Clinton is a regular churchgoer in the neighborhood she grew up in and continues to live. If she is, she might perhaps know that many people have a loyalty to their church first and their pastor second. We also wonder if Mrs. Clinton is ready to bash anyone who associates with the Reverend Jerry Fallwell, who regularly says the same nonsense things that Mr. Obama's pastor says. Next, is Mrs. Clinton going to attack those of us who failed to resign our jobs in Catholic Schools when the priest abuse scandal became known? Is she going to go after my former principal, a nun of great devotion, for failing to renounce her vows on learning of the scandal? At my last Catholic school - where I hope to return if I should make enough money somehow that I dont need to teach in public school - a deacon was recently arrested for having abused his step-daughter four decades ago. The abuse did not occur when he was a member of the church. I am told he realized what he did was wrong and as atonement took vows as a deacon and as far as I know, led an exemplary life subsequently. So should the entire congregation at the church which runs my old school now resign or incur Mrs. Clinton's wrath? Should I now never attend the school's Christmas and Easter Pageants? Will I be excoriated if I take my granddaughter, who attends another Catholic school, to the pageants? Is Mrs. Clinton going to divorce her husband because he was receiving oral sex in his office, which also happens to be part of a complex where the President and First Lady lived? So someone can say, but that was the Clinton's private business. Well, isn't it Mr. Obama's private business where he attends church? And actually it turns out there was nothing private about Mr. Clinton's assignations. We don't want to contaminate ourselves by repeating the details which have lately become known about exactly how, when, what the President was doing and in exactly whose knowledge and in whose sight he was doing. Personally, we admire Mrs. Clinton for forgiving her husband. The Prez, like any driven alpha person, has been engaging in extra-martial sex for a long time. It says something positive about her character that she has ignored these affairs even when they have become public knowledge. It's easy to say she sticks with Mr. Clinton because of her political ambitions. But you know what? She'd have politically done better if she had ditched him before launching her bid for President. From what we hear, however, she actually takes the sacrament of marriage very seriously and has done her best to keep her family intact through very humiliating times. Let him who is without sin cast the first stone. Mrs. Clinton should remember that. Your editor talks to perhaps 100 African-Americans regularly, mostly at his school. He can personally testify that Mrs. Clinton's attacks on Mr. Obama have hurt her badly with her "natural" constituency. None of the people the editor talks to have any interest in Mr. Obama's preaching. If they suspect that maybe the preacher is right, that maybe America was responsible for bringing 9/11 on itself, well, the Editor is sorry to say he also knows a large number of people of other races - white, Indian, Hispanic - who think exactly the same thing. There is scarcely a Muslim who does not privately think on the same lines. So is Mrs. Clinton going to refuse the Muslims who vote for her? After all, if Mr. Obama is guilty for being in the same room as his preacher, and given that almost all anti-American terrorism is conducted by Muslims, shouldn't Mrs. Clinton refuse to take any money from a Muslim or be in the same room as them? Mrs. Clinton, like almost every elite American, thinks that the average American Jane and Joe are idiots and that this kind of smear will work. Actually Americans are fed up with smears, which is the reason so many people are opting for Mr. Obama. He could bring to light all kinds of smears against Mrs. Clinton and her husband. They seem to have sailed rather close to the wind time and again, horrifyingly for the most petty of financial gains. But Mr. Obama has not spread dirt. Mrs. Clinton is making a big mistake if she thing the average American hasn't noticed. 0230 GMT May 8, 2008 Lebanon Pro-Hezbollah elements clashed with pro-government supporters in Beirut. The immediate provocation is a one day labor march backed by Hezbollah for raising the minimum wage. The march itself had to be cancelled because of the violence; Hezbollah blocked streets and the airport, using barricades of earth, burning tires and so on. Lebanese army did not, as far as we can tell, intervene in the disturbances. Adding to the tension is the removal by the Government of an Hezbollah-aligned brigadier general who, says the Government, helped Hezb with planting cameras around the airport to monitor VIP traffic with an intent of assassinating Government leaders. There was already a row on because Government of Lebanon discovered Hezb has installed a separate, parallel communication systems in south Lebanon, supposedly at Iran's behest. Government says the system will be taken down. Nonetheless, our feeling still remains people on all sides are trying their darnest to avoid a new war. No one wants war. The danger remains that the posturing and friction will get out of control regardless, and that a new Lebanese war will escalate across the board, drawing in Israel, Palestine, Syria, and Iran. Then the US will come in, and we'll have a nice, cozy Mideast war and oil at $200. No Sooner Did we Say Oil Dropped to $112, then it started going up again and hit $122. The analyst who predicted $100 oil says it will go up to $200 in the next 6-24 months. Others disagree, saying that is an equal probability oil will fall to $60. We Have To Modify Our Position that the world governments, particularly the US, will not tolerate oil at anything like $200, and will shut down the futures market. That alone could knock $25-$35 off oil at $130, more at higher price ranges. We now are inclined to think that Those Who Run The World are vested in higher prices, including the US. By the way, we pat ourselves on the back for our estimate that oil at oil at $100 meant a tolerable $3.30-gallon at the pump. We forget to put a date on the estimate, but you can read it at Gasoline with oil at $100 bbl US gasoline is now at about $3.65 average with oil hovering around $120. If oil hits $200, then using a 03.12.08 US EPA estimate that every $1 increase translates into 2.4 cents a gallon for gasoline, we'd be looking at $6 gasoline in the US. At which point every patriotic American will be screaming for a forcible takeover of OPECs oil fields. Naturally, such an action will temporarily push up the cost of oil very high. But so what: the price is going up regardless of peace or war. So we're all for oil at $200 - Go OPEC Go. The poor countries, of course, will be going back to bullock carts if/when oil hits $200. But see, no one has been particularly bothered about the world's poor with oil at $120 and basic commodities going through the roof to boot. The general attitude toward the poor has been: "Can you kindly have the decency to die out of our sight, our pet dogs get upset because of the stench your dying creates." US Rejecting Pakistan Coalition Support Funds says Jang of Pakistan. Since 2002, US has given $5.5-billion in CFS, about $1-billion a year, to support GWOT operations in Pakistan. We were told years ago by People In The Know that Pakistan was siphoning off 40-80% of the funds. Siphoning off as in reallocating money to non-GWOT defense programs plus actual skimming, as in Swiss Bank Account. We didn't think anything of it because frankly we didn't see it as any of our business. Readers know we are extra careful about Pakistan as we don't want people attacking Orbat.com's credibility simply because the editor is of Indian origin. We were told that basically the Pakistanis scribbled "You Owe Us $xxxxxxxx" on the back of a piece of dirty scrap paper, wandered over to the US Embassy in Islamabad, and the Embassy paid up without asking questions. Here's the interesting part: before you get mad at the US Embassy in Islamabad, recently we were told that of course the Americans in the program have ceaselessly agitated about the way your tax money is being spent. But they were told to shut up or find other jobs. We are not going to draw conclusions from this because we have no clue why all this has taken place. Nonetheless, Mandeep Singh Bajwa has the details such as gathered by Indian intelligence. May be he'll share them with us or may be not. He did sent over a bunch of details but we deleted the emails. Mandeep will testify that if he mentions Pakistan has raised a new armored brigade, your editor will hound him day and night for details till Mandeep goes on "business" to escape. As for this money stuff or just about anything non-military re. Pakistan, really, your editor is not interested. 0230 GMT May 7, 2008 How Iraq Government Fails To Do Its Job Washington Post [May 5, 2006 A10] reports on the Baghdad Sunni enclave of Adhamiyah where thanks to the Surge, the US has brought peace at least to the extent that shops are reopening. But the Iraq Government refuses to provide services as basic as garbage collection. So the Americans pay for them. The Iraq Government refuses to pay for the Sunni militia that has helped the US stabilize Adhamiyah. So the US pays. Iraq Government clearly has no interest in helping Sunnis, nor in creating Sunni militias that will compete for power with the Shia government once the US leaves. The government position is logical, and replicated in other Sunni majority areas suggests that a partition of Iraq is the sensible way to create a lasting peace. Yet America believes its interestd lie with a united Iraq. So who do we blame: the Shia government for refusing to see things America's way, or America, for refusing to see things Iraq Government's way? And how do we explain that in Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union, America assiduously worked, and continues to work, to enable people who do not want to live together to have their own countries, whereas in Iraq the US spends billions each month to force people who do not want to live together to cohabit? Third Surge Brigade Leaves US troop strength falls to 17 brigades. What happens when the Surge forces entirely withdraw is irrelevant, because the US cannot sustain its present troop levels in Iraq. Indeed, it cannot sustain 15 brigades either, given that the best the US has been able to come up with is six extra brigades by 2011 - a decade after entering Afghanistan and 8 years after Gulf II began. Matching your objectives to your means seems sort of a basic principle in every walk of life, not just in warfare. We suppose the new Best and Brightest feel America is so powerful that it can write its own basic principles. We wonder who will succeed: the B & B lot or basic principles. Hint: we are not betting on the B & B. Hilary-Obama Smackdown Continues with Ms. Clinton winning Indiana as expected and Mr. Obama winning North Caroline as expected. Among the Democrats there is much moaning and groaning about the nomination fight dividing and weakening the Democratic party. But others say: "This is democracy in action, and the Clinton-Obama match has drawn perhaps millions of people to vote whereas they might not have done so earlier. So democracy has been strengthened, and the Democrats will be the stronger no matter who wins the nomination." We are again warned by our sources that a surprisingly large number of Democrats - white, Hispanic, and non-black minorities will not vote for Obama against McCain when push comes to shove regardless of what they tell pollsters. We have no clue how accurate this information is, as American politics interests us less than Indian politics, for which we have zero interest. We were interested in the race only insofar as a Democratic president might have been expected to reverse course on Iraq. It is now clear that no president of any stripe or species is going to reverse course on Iraq, or bring this profligate nation to spend within its means, or aim for energy independence. As such who wins interests us as much as who wins American Idol, which we have never watched. Reader Jim Freemon On John Paul Jones In the US Marines, this piece of history always concludes with a little humor poked at the Navy: The Continental Marines had been furiously firing their muskets from the rigging and cannon from deck of the badly damaged Ranger. Many were wounded or dead and the few still able to stand and fight were preparing for hand-to-hand combat with the British Marines as the two ships closed.  When John Paul Jones shouted his famous line, "I have not yet begun to fight!",  a much bloodied  Marine sergeant on the Ranger's deck looked around and retorted, "That figures. There will always be that 10% that don't get the WORD." 0230 GMT May 6, 2008 While Your Kids Are Dying In Iraq and while we're mortgaging their future with deficits to pay for the war, here's a couple of facts about Iraq that will truly warm your heart. "Iraq's Parliament in recent months has been at a standstill. Nearly every session since November has been adjourned because as few as 65 members made it to work, even as they and the absentees earned salaries and benefits worth about $120,000." That's from the International Herald Tribune and if you want to celebrate, you should read the rest of the article. You'll get so mad you'll want to pick up your gun and head straight for Iraq, not to kill AQI or this militia or that militia, but to do some gentle persuasion to the parliamentarians. Please note: Iraq's GDP per capital with the inflated oil prices is something short of $4000. So the 275 Iraqi MPs each get 30 times the country's per capita GDP. US's per capita GDP is ~$40,000. SO our national representatives would have to get $1.2-million each to match salaries. Apparently the MPs feel insecure in Baghdad, and in many cases anywhere in Iraq. And American soldiers and civilians in Iraq don't feel insecure? They're doing their duty, why aren't the Iraqi parliamentarians? Apparently also they don't attend because they feel parliament is ineffective. So why are they taking their salaries? Why aren't they resigning? The reason this story really got our goat is: why does the US Government hide information like this? Aren't we entitled to know? After all, the USG is in Iraq in our name. We keep getting pathetic propaganda from USG about how we're making progress in Iraq? Does USG call the above progress, that the Iraqi parliament cannot even muster quorums to vote? This Administration has from Day One of Gulf II ridden on the military's back. Almost all that has been achieved in Iraq has been achieved by the military and the success claimed by the Administration.  All the rest is a sham. And as the military will be the first one to tell you, all its sacrifice, hard work, determination, mean nothing at all unless the political process moves forward. IHT makes clear that at its most basic level the political process is NOT moving forward. Here's another heartwarming fact about "progress" in Iraq. Government of Iraq has signed a $5-billion deal for 40 Boeing passenger aircraft and 10 Canadian Bombardier jets that are ideal for very thin routes. Yes, Iraq has to revive its civilian infrastructure. But when the government cannot provide water, health, sanitation, local security, power, gasoline, food why is it building up its civilian aviation sector? Next question: US is spending $5-billion every two weeks to provide the Iraqis security. Why is Iraq not handing over the $5-billion earmarked for civil aircraft to the US Treasury? Next we'll be told the Iraqis have earmarked $5-billion for shopping malls. How is it logical for the Iraq government to make $70-billion last year on oil revenue and not at least pay for ALL its development and some of the US security cost? Why does the Iraqi government have $30-billion stashed in foreign banks? Don't they know there is a war on? Let them keep 10% of that $70-billion. all the rest should go to the US Treasury. This is no way to fight a war, and if the USG does not very soon start straightening out Iraq, we're going to start smelling a very large, very stinky rat. Bu the way, why has the USG not released its estimate of public monies bled off by the Iraqi government to private bank-accounts in the last three years? Since our money is being used to fight the war, aren't we entitled to know how much money has been stolen by the Iraqis themselves? And please no one from USG say "we don't have an estimate" because post 9/11 USG has developed highly sophisticated money tracking systems. We know for a fact it has an estimate which is regularly updated. We do not know the amount but from what we've heard its between $5 and $10-billion, and the looting of the Iraqi people by their government is just starting. Think for a minute: In 2008 Iraq will likely earn a quarter-billion dollars a day from oil exports if not more. It is likely at least 20% of that money, more probably 40% will be stolen. Isn't it time this nonsense stops? Irony Time The IHT reports that on Monday parliament actually achieved a quorum. How come? Because Al-Sadr's 30 MPs ended their boycott and sat down in parliament. At this point you will rightly say: "What? We thought the Iraq Government is engaged in an all-out offensive against the Mehadi Army?" We thought so too. But apparently it is not. So what gives, people? Or are Americans to be left in the dark as usual about the truths of this war. More Irony Time Iran has refused to continue security meetings with the US unless the US stops the offensive against the Mehadi Army. But wait a minute, you say, we've been told that Teheran is no longer backing the Mehadi Army? Well, that might be what people want to believe. We've said at all times that all Shia factions are puppets of Iran. And BTW - not this will be any news to anyone - Teheran believes it is winning its war against the US and is making progress on its goal of being the dominant Mideast/West Asian power. Are they taking happy pills over in Teheran? If they are, Washington is taking twice as many. 0230 GMT May 5, 2008 US Oil Demand Up Only ~2% in 2006 and 2007 says the Washington Post Sunday Business Section. So high oil prices are having an effect. Prices have dropped to $112/barrel due to a combination of factors. These include global slowdown in demand due to economic woes, strengthening of the US dollar, and the restoration of some lost output from Nigeria. But we all need to understand that from OPEC's viewpoint, its 2-3 year gamble on restricting output has worked big time. We have heard every variety of opinion on why prices have doubled in two years: speculation, fear premium, greater investment by previously risk averse investors like big mutual and pension funds, the fall of the US dollars, demand growth in China/India, supply disruptions, ad nauseum. No oil experts us, but we find it impossible to escape the conclusion that production restriction by OPEC are the cause. We've said the run-up in prices is great for the US because - if you count its investments in foreign oil - it is probably the largest producer; for OPEC; for bankers; and yes, crucially great for alternate energy which now has a much reduced incentive to produce power at economical cost. Obviously to compete with $60 oil you need to work a lot harder than with $120 oil. As for the poor countries which are now being driven to despair by the continued rise in oil and food, who the heck gives a darn about them? The truth is the United States blew its great chance between 1973 and 2006 to develop energy alternatives, though it did double GDP output for the same amount of energy input. In the Editor's former day job an enormous intuition was required to anticipate future events. His intuition tells him the US is on the verge of blowing this new opportunity. We don't accept that getting 20% of our power from alternate sources by 2030 or whenever or increasing fuel efficiency of the gasoline engine are the breakthroughs that are required. We need to be going Apollo Project on fusion power, for example, and in the interim we need to go all out on conventional N-power. Try as we might over the immediate next decades, we will not get away from the requirement for big, heavy, expensive base-load electricity installations. But it is still taking 10-12 years to build an N-station in the US - the initial approvals for an initial batch of - is it 6? - plants has recently been given after a 30-year period in which no new N-plant has come up. This pace is not a serious response to a serious problem. By the way, did we mention that coal produces hundreds of times the radiation that N-plants do? We suspect that most people, even the so-called greens, understand this. What "freaks" people out is when you tell them the waste is going to remain radioactive for a gazzilion years. The industry needs to do a much better job of educating the public about current technologies for waste disposal. These are quite adequate for the next 100 years, at which point you'll have the Fusion Torch. This will strip every kind of waste and reassemble atoms into useful stuff. This is as true of radioactive waste as it is of toxic waste as it is of politicians. The latter class of waste badly needs recycling into more productive forms. Port-O-Potties for example. Then we'll get to do to the politicians what they have been doing the rest of us. The "Mission Accomplished" Banner The kindest thing Mr. Bush can do to his advisors is to throw them off an aircraft carrier's deck and let them drown peacefully before they sink him. Though with his 21% approval rating Mr. Bush is quite in the position of John Paul Jones, who with his ship Ranger on fire and sinking due to cannonades from HMS Serapis told the British when they demanded his surrender "I have not yet begun to fight". The difference is that John Paul Jones was then, Mr. Bush is now. Jones closed with the Serapis and fought his way on to her, winning a ship even as his was lost. Today's leaders couldn't fight their way out of a cream puff factory. As usual, we digress. Right after the fall of Baghdad in 2003 Mr. Bush told the world, on board the USS Abraham Lincoln, "Mission Accomplished". This has become shorthand to make fun of the president. For example, you will see signs in the Editor's town that say: "4000 dead. Mission accomplished". Last week, the President's press secretary came up with what has to be the lamest and most delayed comeback we have heard in modern times: "The President probably should have clarified he meant the carrier had accomplished its mission". It takes five years for the President's staff to lay this gem? They must suffer from serious constipation. And does it make any sense? What was the mission the carrier was supposed to accomplish? Help set the stage for a hundred year war? Why don't the Prez's people just shut up before they shoot him in the foot? By the way, something needs to be done about this press secretary. She talks exactly like a college undergrad speaking at 300 words per minute. You didn't think anyone can speak that fast? Little do you know. Her accent, speech mannerisms and general impression is that of a highly educated ditz. No sexism, there are boy ditzes as well, just that we don't have to suffer listening to them. The President is not a ditz. He has a speech impediment and he would have done better to frankly explain this to everyone. Then we'd admire him for overcoming a physical handicap instead of making fun of him for being a doofus, which incidentally he also is not. 0230 GMT May 4, 2008 US Planning 2 More Brigades For Afghanistan says International Herald Tribune. This is after giving up on repeated pleas for more troop contributions from NATO allies. ISAF/US currently have 62,000 troops in Afghanistan, compared to 25,000 in 2005 when it was thought the Taliban was defeated. We are of mixed opinion on the news. Any extra troops are good, but in our opinion two brigades is far short of the requirement, which has to include sealing the border with Pakistan. Also, extras for Afghanistan can come only at the expense of troops who should be resting in the US after the strain of the Iraq Surge. Quite aside from the matter of rest, troops have to be given time to train for general combat, not just CI. Bolivian State Set For Autonomy Vote Santa Cruz state, one of Bolivia's nine, is to proceed with an unofficial autonomy vote today despite threats from the president Evo Morales and the army. Mr. Morales came to power on promises to the indigenous population that he would redistribute land and government revenues in its favor. Santa Cruz and five other states are having none of this. These mainly plains states have most of the country's hydrocarbon and agricultural wealth and do not see why beyond a certain point they should subsidize the mountain states. Mr. Morales accuses the autonomy lot of being more concerned with money than with the country as a whole. We're a bit surprised. He is, after all, a leftist, and though he is not a Marxist he should understand that people bind together as a nation out of common interest, and the common interest usually consists of security and money. If a majority of the states - six of nine - feel their interests are not being met, obviously they will seek to change this. And particularly when the states concerned have most of the country's wealth there is nothing to stop them from seceding if autonomy is not given. There is nothing moral or immoral about this.  Santa Cruz alone has 25% of the nation's population. Nonetheless, so far Mr. Morales is to be congratulated for his restraint. He has ruled out sending the Army into Santa Cruz to stop the vote. While We Slept: Israeli PM Likely To Fall we have no clue as to what's going on because the current - and fifth - criminal investigation against Mr. Olmert has been hit with a gag order. Presumably this is the bribery and corruption thing that has been chasing Mr. Olmert from his time before becoming prime minister. Both Jerusalem Post and Haaretz report that members of Mr. Olmert's partty, Kadima, feel that when details of the investigation are revealed it will be the end of the road for him. One scenario sees Foreign Minister Tipzi Livni serving as interim prime minister till a new leader is chosen, perhaps after an election. We would not advise relying on Debka.com's take on the situation, but no harm in reading it.  http://debka.com/article.php?aid=1348 It too is working under the gag order, but its sees a conspiracy with American involvement to get rid of Mr. Olmert. Somehow this is tied in with the US NIE that Iran is not developing N-weapons and a potential strike by the US against Iran. The Editor too sees a conspiracy: one chocolate bar from his precision horde is missing from the 'fridge. He suspects the CIA wants to weaken his staunch resolve by holding the chocolate hostage. He expects a ransom demand at any moment. It would, of course, help if the CIA tells him which staunch resolve of his needs to be weakened or eliminated. If the demand is going to be - the Editor suspects - that he stop publishing this ridiculous blog, or at least make some sense - the CIA should already know the answer is "no." Unless the CIA is, of course willing to discuss a permanent supply of chocolate. We will not be pressured or intimidated, but we didn't say anything about refusing to be bought. All reasonable offers entertained. Decaying US Infrastructure: From Reader Kyle M Re. your recent discussion of our decaying American infrastructure. I recently returned from my honeymoon and my wife and I visited Tokyo for the first week of our honeymoon. I'd never been to Japan. Tokyo and the Japanese culture, neither of which I was more than fleetingly acquainted with, were endlessly fascinating. Just when my wife and I expected one thing, we got something else, and more of it than we expected. Thanks to the largely bilingual Japanese rail system my wife and I went shooting all over Tokyo from one end to the other. We visited about a dozen neighborhoods in the course of one week and got a pretty good, if superficial, look at the city. San Francisco, where my wife and I live, is a city of about 750,000. Tokyo, in contrast, has a population of 13,000,000. So it was with considerable puzzlement that I often wondered how public transportation in a city fifteen times larger than San Francisco can be run, it seemed, fifteen times better. Although extremely busy, the subway was clean, efficient, and on time (we often showed up early to places because we were used to accommodating the constant delays of the San Francisco public transportation system). It was also quite fast. In San Francisco, it takes at least an hour to cross the city by public transportation. Say, five miles. Traveling five miles across town in the Tokyo subway probably took a third as long. The Japanese infrastructure is extremely good. Much of it is brand new, and even the old stuff is well maintained. Often things were so well maintained it was difficult to figure out how old things were. We stumbled into a series of shrines in nearby Kamakura and I have no idea when they were built. In America, you can often peg, within a decade, when something was constructed. For all I know, the shrines we visited in Kamakura were two hundred years old. I really have no idea. It was not just a matter of not knowing the local architecture-- everything was so well maintained it looked new. North of San Francisco in the small town of Tiburon is a place called Blackie's Pasture. Blackie's Pasture is a large community field where people go to run their dogs, play sports, and hang out on the shore of San Francisco Bay. Blackie was a horse owned by the people who donated the land to the city, and a life-sized bronze statue stands in the middle of the pasture in his honor. I was told the story of Blackie by a former employer who lived in Tiburon. He added to the story that some vandals had smashed a hole in the statue and that it had just been repaired. Tiburon, it should be noted, is one of the most affluent neighborhoods in California. Japan has a great deal of stuff--displays, art installations, statues, etc--that is just wide open for vandalism. I was surprised at how vulnerable much of it was, until I realized that the Japanese are sensible people and they simply knew that all this stuff that wouldn't last a week in American city just wasn't going to be vandalized. Even in areas of affluence such as Tiburon, America has a problem with vandalism that Japan just does not have. I have my doubts as to whether or not an injection of money into the national infrastructure would make anything more than a short-term difference. Beyond wear and tear, the worst threat to our national infrastructure is the American people themselves and our national attitude. You can do whatever you want--someone else will make (and pay for) more. Everything is disposable, and nothing is taken care of. Also, in Japan there is also no sense that vandalism is just another means of self-expression. Back in San Francisco, I took the subway across town to do a little shopping. Descending into the underground rail station, I was struck by how decrepit and quaint it all looked--something that had not occurred to me before Tokyo. As I waited for the bus, I looked up at the real-time display that showed where in the tunnel the trains were. The train was, of course, late. And the display was a big-screen TV that showed a pathetically low tech-looking .gif image of where each train was in the system. San Francisco is one of the richest cities in America, and the difference between our subway and Japan's was startling. And embarrassing. Now, I like aircraft carriers, nuclear submarines, tank divisions, and being at least twenty years ahead of the rest of the world in military technology as much as any armchair general. But having seen what a society can do that doesn't have to spend money on such things, it makes one wonder. 0230 GMT May 3, 2008 UK Ruling Party Walloped In Local Elections It has fallen to third place behind the Conservatives (44% of the vote), and the Liberal Democrats (25%) with just 24% of the vote. Equally humiliating, Labor's London mayor "Red" Ken Livingstone, an ardent leftie, has lost to a conservative. If this had been a general election rather than one for local bodies, going on the basis of voting patterns, the Conservatives would have emerged as the leading party with a big majority of 138 votes. This whole thing is a huge disaster from Prime Minister Gordon Brown who on becoming PM a few months ago following phaseout of Tony Blair had very high approval rating and fawning review - including from us. Interestingly in the US the conservatives have been taking a beating since 2006. We suppose the old truism that people vote their pocketbook takes precedence over all else regardless of ideology. Though the Iraq War also plays its part in the downfall of both ruling parties. Prime Minister Brown, like Mr. Blair has staunchly supported Mr. Bush on the GWOT. We are no experts on UK politics, but we do know that opposition to the GWOT has run very high in UK from the start. That the British government has been able to stand by America is due in great part to the British sense of loyalty (how quaint!). Many Britishers argue that regardless of what they think of the GWOT, America has always stood by Britain since 1914, if that 1982 little misunderstanding in the South Atlantic is not counted, and its payback time. So what effect will Labor's local defeat have on UK's support for GWOT? On the one hand, we could argue that at the very least, the residual British contingent in Iraq looks like gone. On the other hand, so much of the Brit opposition is because they hate Mr. Bush with a deep and abiding passion. So we could argue that when in 2009 Anyone-But-Bush takes office, the Brits may cool off and acknowledge the GWOT is less about Americans stupidity than a battle for the shared values of liberal democracies.   Zimbabwe Presidential Results Finally Released  The opposition leader won 47% of the vote versus Mr. Mugabe's 43%. Most of the rest went to another opposition candidate, whose decision to split the party can be seen as potentially fatal for the opposition. The opposition refuses to recognize the results, and it has good reason to so do, considering the Zimbabwe government has had a month to fiddle the results. Conversely, however, the government was unable to get the EC to redo the parliamentary vote, so perhaps 47-43 is a fair count. The 43 is, nonetheless, after government rigging. If the opposition refuses to accept a run-off, Mr. Mugabe will be declared  victor. If it accepts a runoff the danger is this time the government will do a proper job of fixing the vote. It certainly has been engaging in big-time violence against the opposition prior to a runoff. But equally possible is that since the other opposition candidate will back the opposition leader, if effective foreign monitoring can be forced on Mr. Mugabe, it's likely the opposition will win with a comfortable margin. The problem is that while South Africans of all persuasions are getting fed up with their government's position supporting Mr. Mugabe, the current leader, Mr. Mbeki has nothing to lose by continuing his complete backing of the dictator. Mr. Mbeki is already on his way out. The government representative at the UN Security Council will have to do as his boss tells him, and right now that boss is Mr. Mbeki. With Russia and China kissing up to Zimbabwe, there is no prospect of UNSC action. Will EU/NATO action have the same impact on Mr. Mugabe? We suspect not because that will allow him to continue his favorite rant about the white colonists wanting to return. The UN is majority non-white and as thus has greater moral authority. Congratulations, Team USA on knocking off the commander of the Somalia Islamic Courts Islamist militia, in a "Sudden Death" attack from the air against his residence in Central Somalia. Eight others were killed, of whom seven may have been have civilians - this was the man's house, after all. In such cases, however, the balance lies clearly in favor of the strike regardless of civilian deaths. It is not as if he was some local thug of no import. Oh, The Arabs Feel So Much Palestinian Pain that they have actually delivered 20% of the aid they promised in December. While Gaza citizens are reduced to destitution and a near complete breakdown of health and water services thanks to Israel, the Arabs are still holding on the 80% of the aid. The Arab argument that the west created this problem and the west is responsible runs both old and cold. The truth is that when it comes to the Palestinians, the Arabs are callous hypocrites, cowards, liars, traitors and betrayers. As has been true since 1947, the Arabs want to prevent any solution to the Palestinian issue because it gives them the biggest excuse to maintain a permanent state of hostility against Israel and thus to keep their own people in chains on grounds that a state of emergency exists. You may not agree with the Israelis on the matter of Palestine. The Editor for one does not. But what has that got to with humanitarian relief for fellow Arabs? What kind of stupid argument is "we didn't create this problem, so we're going to let our brothers starve and suffer?" Often the sole recourse the weak have is to curse their oppressors and say: "God will see you are punished." There is nothing we at Orbat.com can do for the Palestinian people. But we can join with those who curse the Arabs. You, the Arabs will be punished. 0230 GMT May 2, 2008 We did not update May 1. Gas, Security, and the American Way of Life  We've been arguing what exactly is the big deal about US gas at $4/gallon when any developed country pays a lot more - $8/gallon is common in Europe. CNN Money May 1, 2008 has a valid counter-point to our argument. Whereas other developed countries have traditionally heavily taxed gas, the US has kept the price low. So the relative price increase hurts Americans more than Europeans. For example, when Americans were paying $1 for gas, Europeans were paying $5 or more. So now the Euros pay 60% more at $8, but the Americans are paying 300% more at $4. Now, we realize - and several readers have pointed this out - Americans feel more pinched than other countries because they have to drive long distances for work, shopping, recreation, whatever. Fine. But we do not consider this an acceptable argument because Americans have deliberately kept gas prices low and used that as an excuse to buy bigger cars and bigger houses further and further out. To us this is living beyond our means, and as good Christians, Hindus, Muslims, Jews and so on, we also object to the long-held belief in America that more consumption brings us closer to God. The whole thing has reached ridiculous heights when half the country considers a $3 coffee a necessity of life and anything less than a 3000-square-foot house to be poverty level. If everyone in America lived like that, then we'd say, okay, that's that American standard of life. But a heck of lot of people don't live that. To make our point, we will tell just one little story. In the Catholic school your editor worked before transferring to public schools, we had a white substitute who had retired from full-time teaching. We are specifying race least people think, oh, that must have been an inner-city African-American or an immigrant person. No, Madam and Sir. This lady was of a solid middle class family in a solidly white middle-class part of our area. One day she came in with a nice coat, and the other teachers complimented her. This lady said: "Last month we paid off the final installment on our 30-year mortgage. My husband and I have six children, all grown, of course. This is the first new coat I have ever been able to afford since I got married more than 30-years ago." And by the way, the coat was from a solidly middle-class sort of department store chain. Nothing fancy. This lady belonged to the real America. The 2006 median household income is $48,000, and that means half of households had incomes less than that. We suspect there is not too much drinking of $3 coffees in the bottom half. At this point, we will not blame exasperated readers who say: "For gosh's sake, Editor. We know you were brought up in New England before the Revolution. But why should a person's virtue judged by how frugal she is? And is any case, what earthly business is it of yours and your fellow bluenoses if we want to live well? We work hard to earn our money and we can spend it as we want." To quote the Teen Age Ninja Turtles, you Editor would say: "No problemo, dude. You are free to spend as you want, and if that means a truck each for you and your wife and nice sedans for each of your three kids, and if that means you live 150-kilometers from your place of work because that's where you can buy an affordable 4000-sft house, carry on. But you know what? We'd like you to pay the true cost of gasoline and then it really is your business." Let us ignore the cost of extra vehicular miles and multiple-care households and the damage this does the environment. Social scientists have worked out those costs but we dont want to complicate the argument. Let's talk of the true cost of that barrel of oil America has built its life around. It's $120, right? Wrong. The defense budget for 2009 is ~5% of GNP, say $650-billion. Add to that the cost of the Afghan/Iraq wars. That's $850-billion. Add intelligence, nuclear weapons, homeland security, foreign aid and so on. Will you agree we are up around $1-trillion? Some part of that budget is being spent because we need to defend overseas oil producers and the sea lanes for oil delivery. What percentage of the defense budget will you allow us to claim for protecting of oil? We think 20% is fair and we're prepared to defend our position, but will you at least agree to 10%? That's $100-billion. According to official figures http://www.eia.doe.gov/basics/quickoil.html , US is consuming ~21-million barrels a day and net petroleum imports are ~12.5-million barrels a day. ~3.8 million barrels come from Canada and Mexico. of the rest, some we do not need to invest security dollars to ensure supply. For simplicity we'll put it at 3 million barrels a day from countries like Venezuela, Russia, Nigeria, Angola. So - roughly - 6 million bbl/day is coming from risk areas. Very roughly that's 2-billion bbl/year, and that costs us $50/bbl extra if we allow 10% of the defense security budget for protection of oil; $75 if we allow 15%; and $100 if we allow 20%. We need to tack on a $50/bbl tax before we can say that we are paying the true cost of oil. And actually we need to tack on more because the major users of oil, imported or otherwise - ~10 million bbl/day for transportation - don't pay enough to maintain the road infrastructure, on which we are falling behind by up to $200-billion annually. And that adds up to another ~$50 barrel. Every dollar increase in crude means 2.4-cents/gallon more at the pump. And  additional $100 bbl means gas should be - voila - $6/gallon assuming a $3.5 average across the US. And that's still less than $8/gallon common in Europe. Okay, this is a very approximate calculation and there can be serious differences on how to cost all this stuff. There must be 1000 questions needing answers about how we go about paying closer to the true cost without disrupting the country. But we hope that some readers see what we're getting at. And that is, the American way of life is just peachy keen, but thermodynamics says you don't get something for nothing. The American way of life costs a great deal more today than we are actually paying. Via budget deficits, we are putting the true cost of our way of life onto the shoulders of our children and grandchildren. Surely that should not be is not part of the American way life, don't you think? And surely we should be spending more time discussing this issue than the pornographer-using-art-as-an-excuse Annie Liebowitz and her pathetic pictures of Cyrus Miley aka Hannah Montana, whose business promoters are excusing child pornography as art to make themselves rich, don't you also think? ----------------- Continue to archived news APR 2008 MAR 2008 FEB 2008 JAN 2008 DEC 2007 NOV 2007 OCT 2007 SEP 2007 AUG 2007 JUL 2007 JUN 2007 MAY 2007 APR 2007 MAR 2007 FEB 2007 JAN 2007 2006 DEC 2005 NOV 2005 2004 2003

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