http://www.liveleak.com/browse?q=diversion Wed, 22 May 2013 11:36:09 -0400 Liveleak http://edge.liveleak.com/80281E/u/u/ll2/logo.gif http://www.liveleak.com/browse?q=diversion Sun, 12 May 2013 05:45:02 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=b95_1368351158 AntiPropagaanda Saudi Arabia, Wahhabism and the Spread of Sunni Theofascism Amb. Curtin Winsor, Ph.D. The United States has largely eliminated the infrastructure and operational leadership of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda terrorist network over the past five years. However, its ideological offspring continue to proliferate across the globe. American efforts to combat this contagion are hamstrung by the fact that its ideological and financial epicenter is Saudi Arabia, where an ostensibly pro-Western royal family governs through a centuries-old alliance with the fanatical Wahhabi Islamic sect. In addition to indoctrinating its own citizens with this extremist creed, the Saudi government has lavishly financed the propagation of Wahhabism throughout the world, sweeping away moderate interpretations of Islam even within the borders of the United States itself. The Bush administration has done little to halt this ideological onslaught beyond quietly (and unsuccessfully) urging the Saudi royal family to desist. This lack of resolve is rooted in American dependence on Saudi oil production, fears of instability in the kingdom, wishful thinking about democracy promotion as an antidote to religious extremism, and preoccupation with confronting Iran. Background Wahhabism is derived from the teachings of Muhammad ibn abd al-Wahhab, an eighteenth century religious zealot from the Arabian interior. Like most Sunni Islamic fundamentalist movements, the Wahhabis advocated the fusion of state power and religion through the reestablishment of the Caliphate, the form of government adopted by the Prophet Muhammad's successors during the age of Muslim expansion. What sets Wahhabism apart from other Sunni Islamist movements is its historical obsession with purging Sufis, Shiites, and other Muslims who do not conform to its twisted interpretation of Islamic scripture. In 1744, Ibn Abd al-Wahhab forged an historic alliance with the Al-Saud clan and sanctified its drive to vanquish its rivals. In return, the Al-Saud supported campaigns by Wahhabi zealots to cleanse the land of "unbelievers." In 1801, Saudi-Wahhabi warriors crossed into present day Iraq and sacked the Shiite holy city of Karbala, killing over 4,000 people. After the Saudis conquered Mecca and Medina in the 1920s, they destroyed such "idolatrous" shrines as the Jannat al-Baqi cemetary, where four of the twelve Shiite imams were buried (on the grounds that grave markers are bida'a, or objectionable innovations). In return for endorsing the royal family's authority in political, security, and economic spheres after the establishment of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 1932, Wahhabi clerics were granted control over state religious and educational institutions and allowed to enforce their rigid interpretation of sharia (Islamic law). Wahhabism was largely confined to the Arabian peninsula until the 1960s, when the Saudi monarchy gave refuge to radical members of the Muslim Brotherhood fleeing persecution in Nasser's Egypt. A cross-fertilization of sorts occurred between the atavistic but isolated Wahhabi creed of the Saudi religious establishment and the Salafi jihadist teachings of Sayyid Qutb, who denounced secular Arab rulers as unbelievers and legitimate targets of holy war ( jihad ). "It was the synthesis of the twain-Wahhabi social and cultural conservatism, and Qutbist political radicalism- that produced the militant variety of Wahhabist political Islam that eventually (produced) al-Qaeda." The terms Islamofascism and theofascism have been frequently misused by Westerners to refer to virtually all forms of radical Islamism, but they are fitting appellations for Wahhabism today. The sect's rejection of individual liberties, disparagement and reduction of women's rights and status, disregard for the intrinsic value of human life, and encouragement of violence against unbelievers, are unparalleled among Islamic fundamentalist movements. Former CIA Director R. James Woolsey has used the term "Sunni theocratic totalitarianism," a term that highlights both the movement's "will to power" over the most minute aspects of Muslim daily life and its global ambitions. He also notes that its adherents do not raise the banner of Islam in pursuit of specific national, political, or territorial gains. Al-Qaeda's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri has sharply rebuked the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas and Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood for participating in national elections. During the 1970s, Wahhabi clerics encouraged the spread of this revolutionary and atavistic ideological synthesis into Saudi universities and mosques, because it was seen as a barrier to the threat of cultural Westernization and spread of corruption that accompanied the 1970s oil boom. Consequently, the royal family and their religious establishment looked for a cause with which to deflect the growing zealotry from Wahhabist theofascism, a danger highlighted by the seizure of the Grand Mosque at Mecca by heavily armed Islamic Studies students in 1979. The diversion that the royal family seized upon was the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The Saudis financed a large-scale program of assistance to the Afghan mujahideen , in coordination with the Pakistan's Inter Service Intelligence agency (ISI) and the CIA, while funding radicalized madrassas to disseminate neo-Wahhabi ideology and literature in the sprawling Afghan refugee camps of Pakistan. They also dispatched thousands of volunteer jihadis from Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries to fight alongside the mujahideen. These so-called "Arab Afghans" dispersed to far-flung areas of the world after the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1988. They pursued further victories against "unbelievers" in the name of Islam, and they were accompanied by militant Wahhabi preachers. These elements would form the backbone of al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda was initially headquartered in Sudan, but returned to Afghanistan in 1996, following the seizure of Kabul by the Taliban. This was a new Afghan force, recruited in Wahhabi madrassas and, trained by the Pakistanis. Its goal was the establishment of a model Wahhabi state in Afghanistan. The Saudi royal family revoked bin Laden's Saudi citizenship (in response to heavy American pressure), but did little to interfere with Wahhabi "charities" in the Kingdom and abroad. These entities raised money for al-Qaeda, while the religious onslaught of Wahhabism continued to receive government sponsorship and funding. Osama bin Laden is widely believed to have reached an agreement with Prince Turki al-Faisal, then-chief of Saudi National Security and Intelligence in the mid 1990s, whereby al-Qaeda would not target the Kingdom, and the Kingdom would not interfere with al-Qaeda's fundraising or seek bin Laden's extradition. In fact, Al-Qaeda abstained completely from attacks on Saudi targets within the Kingdom prior to 9/11. Terrorist attacks and clashes between Saudi police and Islamist militants have erupted erupting periodically since May 2003, after the Saudi Government began cracking down on underground cells in the Kingdom (under pressure from Washington). However, it appears that most Al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorist groups still respect this quid pro quo Hundreds of members of the Saudi royal family jet around the world without fear of assassination. The country's vulnerable petroleum industry has only once been targeted by terrorists, and then in a less that serious manner. In return, and notwithstanding its limited cooperation with Washington in restricting terrorist financing, the Saudi monarchy has maintained its commitment to propagating Wahhabism at home and abroad, providing the terrorist underground with a growing flood of eager recruits. Wahhabi Indoctrination "Man . . . requires proper instruction and a fortunate nature, and then of all animals he becomes the most divine and most civilized; but if he be insufficiently or ill educated, he is the most savage of earthly creatures." Plato It is estimated that well over one-third of Saudi Arabia's public school curriculum is devoted to Wahhabi teachings. Passages from Saudi textbooks quoted in the American media after 9/11 generated much controversy. One textbook, for example, informed ninth grade students that Judgment Day will not come "until the Muslims fight the Jews and kill them," while another stated that it is "compulsory" for Muslims "to consider the infidels their enemy." Embarrassed by the revelations, the Saudi government purported to launch a comprehensive review of its educational curricula and pledged that all such references would be removed. Last year, however, Freedom House published an exhaustive report on the new curriculum, concluding that it "continues to propagate an ideology of hate toward the 'unbeliever,' which include Christians, Jews, Shiites, Sufis, Sunni Muslims who do not follow Wahhabi doctrine, Hindus, atheists and others." Some analysts dismiss the relevance of this indoctrination on the grounds that "conforming to an ultra-conservative, anti-pluralistic faith does not necessarily make you a violent individual," but this reasoning is fallacious. If only one percent of the 5 million Saudi students exposed to these teachings resort to violence, this would produce 50,000 jihadis. Not surprisingly, bin Laden himself denounced foreign interference in Saudi school curricula in an April 2006 audiotape. Moreover, these teachings are reinforced by Wahhabi clerics in Saudi Arabia, who advocate jihad against enemies of "true" Islam - outside the kingdom." Incitement to violence against Shiites is particularly common. In December 2006, a high-ranking cleric close to the Saudi royal family, Abdul Rahman al-Barak, denounced Shiites as an "evil sect . . . more dangerous than Jews and Christians." In November of 2004, twenty-six clerics, most of whom held positions as lecturers of Islamic studies at various Saudi state-funded universities, issued a call for jihad against American forces in Iraq. Two Saudi officials denounced the fatwa in interviews with the Western media, but no retraction was made in Arabic to local media outlets. Months later, a Saudi dissident group released a videotape showing the Chief Justice of Saudi Arabia's Supreme Judicial Council, Saleh bin Muhammad al-Luhaidan, advising young Saudis at a government mosque on how to infiltrate Iraq and fight US troops, as well as assuring them that Saudi security forces would not punish them after their return. While Luhaidan publicly retracted his statements, videotapes of prominent Saudi clerics exhorting the public to wage jihad in Iraq and elsewhere continue to surface. Exporting Hatred While Saudi citizens remain the vanguard of Islamic theofascism around the world, the growth potential for this ideology lies outside the Kingdom. The Saudis have spent at least $87 billion propagating Wahhabism abroad during the past two decades, and the scale of financing is believed to have increased in the past two years as oil prices have skyrocketed. The bulk of this funding goes to the construction and operating expenses of mosques, madrassas, and other religious institutions that preach Wahhabism. It also supports the training of imams; domination of mass media and publishing outlets; distribution of Wahhabi textbooks and other literature; and endowments to universities (in exchange for influence over the appointment of Islamic scholars). By comparison, the Communist Party of the USSR and its Comintern spent just over $7 billion propagating its ideology worldwide between 1921 and 1991. Wahhabism has made less headway in the former Soviet Republics of Central Asia, despite the fact that decades of Communist rule had weakened their traditional Islamic institutions. Several successor governments, especially the Uzbekis, have cracked down harshly on militant Islamist groups, while encouraging educational systems in the Hanafi tradition that promote tolerant and peaceful Islam. Africa is also a critical area of Wahhabi expansion, as it offers a multitude of "failed states" and communal cleavages ripe for exploitation, most notably in the Sudan and Nigeria. In all of these areas, the central dynamic is the same - it is the overwhelming wealth of Saudi Arabia that enables the Wahhabi sect to proselytize on a global scale, not the intrinsic appeal of its teachings. Throughout the world, moderates echo the assessment of Somali journalist Bashir Gothar, who writes that his country's tolerant Sufi-infused Islamic culture has been: "swept aside by a new brand of Islam that is being pushed down the throat of our people - Wahhabism. Anywhere one looks, one finds that alien, perverted version of Islam." Wahhabism in the West Wahhabi proselytizing is not limited to the Islamic world. The Saudis have financed the growth of thousands of Wahhabi mosques, madrassas, and other religious institutions in Western countries that have fast-growing Muslim minorities during the past three decades. Wahhabi penetration is deepest in the social welfare states of Western Europe, where chronically high unemployment has created large pools of able-bodied young Muslim men who have "become permanent wards of the state at the cost of their basic human dignity." This is a perfect storm of alienation and idleness, ripe for terrorist recruitment. The perpetrators of the 2005 London subway attacks were native-born Britons of Pakistani descent, recruited locally and trained in the use of explosives during visits to Pakistan. The Dutch Moroccan who murdered Dutch filmmaker Theodor Van Gogh in 2004 (for producing a film critical of Islam) was also a product of Wahhabi indoctrination. The Wahhabis have had less traction in the United States, which lacks the masses of unassimilated young people that exist in Europe. US welfare laws no longer allow able-bodied young men to have indefinite periods of government subsidized unemployment and immigrants (both Muslim and non-Muslim) tend to find a more stable niche in American society. Nevertheless, Wahhabi penetration of US mainstream Islamic institutions is substantial. A 2005 Freedom House Report examined over 200 books and other publications distributed in 15 prominent Saudi-funded American mosques. One such publication, bearing the imprint of the Saudi embassy and distributed by the King Fahd Mosque in Los Angeles, contained the following injunctions for Muslims living in America: Be dissociated from the infidels, hate them for their religion, leave them, never rely on them for support, do not admire them, and always oppose them in every way according to Islamic law. hoever helps unbelievers against Muslims, regardless of what type of support he lends to them, he is an unbeliever himself. Never greet the Christian or Jew first. Never congratulate the infidel on his holiday. Never befriend an infidel unless it is to convert him. Never imitate the infidel. Never work for an infidel. Do not wear a graduation gown because this imitates the infidel. Although Saudi-funded religious institutions have been careful not to incite or explicitly endorse violence since 9/11, they unapologetically promote distrust toward non-Muslims and self-segregation. In effect, they are trying to reproduce in America the kind of social conditions that have fueled radicalization and terrorist recruitment in Europe. While the Saudi ambassador in Washington said last year that his government was undertaking a "very intense review" of all missionary activities in the United States, it is clear that the Saudis are concerned primarily with avoiding bad publicity, not abandoning their drive to dominate Islamic institutions in America. Causes of American Inaction The Bush administration has been reluctant to put serious pressure on the Saudis to stop propagating Wahhabism, despite the enormous threat to American security posed by Sunni theofascism. There are several reasons for this. The first is American dependence on the kingdom's abundant oil reserves, which enable to the Saudis to maintain roughly 3 million b/d in spare production capacity. This spare capacity has been called the "energy equivalent of nuclear weapons," because it puts the Saudis in a unique position to compensate for disruptions in supplies from other producers and discourage price gouging - a service provided to the United States (and other industrialized nations) in exchange for protection. However, the argument that a firm public stance against Saudi propagation of religious hatred might lead the kingdom to retaliate economically is spurious. Saudi Arabia's use of the oil weapon would alienate the entire industrialized world, while threatening the relative economic prosperity that preserves stability in the kingdom. Some politicians and writers have voiced concern that pushing the Saudi royal family to curtail the Wahhabis could lead to terrorist attacks on the country's vulnerable petroleum infrastructure or lead to the collapse of the monarchy, which would produce an even worse outcome - a Saudi state controlled exclusively by religious fanatics. While these are serious risks, it must be borne in mind that most Wahhabi radicals view the monarchy (and its oil fields) as a golden goose. It is only by disguising Saudi Arabia as a 'friendly nation' that they have been able to go as far as they have in spreading their atavistic perversion of Islam. Such concerns reveal a tendency to imagine or spin the Saudi royal family as fundamentally pro-Western. Prince Bandar bin Sultan, who served as ambassador to the United States from 1983 to 2005, has played an important role in masking Saudi - Wahhabi realities. His personal charm, Washington Post journalist David Ignatius writes, "many American leaders and even presidents to forget that he represented a secretive, repressive Muslim kingdom that survived because it had made a pact with 'puritanical' Wahhabi clerics who despised America." Bandar was also instrumental in the growth of what Daniel Pipes has called a "culture of corruption" that renders the executive branch of the American government "incapable of dealing with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in the farsighted and disinterested manner that US foreign policy requires." Pipes points to a "revolving door syndrome" afflicting senior diplomats and policymakers who deal with the Saudis in their official capacities. Very often, they have enjoyed lucrative post-government careers working as consultants for Saudi businessmen and companies, or running Saudi-financed nongovernmental organizations. "If the reputation then builds that the Saudis take care of friends when they leave office," Bandar once reportedly told a close associate: "you'd be surprised how much better friends you have who are just coming into office." Unable or unwilling to combat the spread of Sunni theofascism at its main source (Saudi Arabia), the Bush administration launched a democracy promotion campaign intended to eradicate political conditions receptive to its global spread. However, rather than building stable and less oppressive systems resistant to religious extremism in Afghanistan and Iraq, the accumulating shortfalls of American intervention in both countries have made them magnets for jihadist recruitment. The Question of Iran The Bush Administration's reluctance to challenge the Saudis after 9/11 initially encountered impassioned objections from conservative and liberal commentators alike, but the outrage has tapered off as attention has became increasingly focused on Shiite Iran and its nuclear program which is hipped by Israel. In the view of the administration, the Iranian threat to American national security not only supercedes the threat of Sunni theofascism, but supercedes it to such a degree that a more accommodating policy toward Saudi Arabia is warranted. However, while the prospect of militant Shiite clerics in possession of nuclear weapons is understandably disconcerting to many Americans, the Iranian threat is mitigated by several important factors. For all of the shrill and unsettling words of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, his government's foreign policy is driven more by Iranian nationalism than Shiite Islamism (this is evident, for example, in Tehran's support for the predominantly Christian nation of Armenia in its dispute with Shiite Azerbaijan). This is not surprising, as Iran (known as Persia prior to the twentieth century) has existed in one form or another since biblical times, while it embraced Shiite Islam just 500 years ago. While Ahmadinejad exploits Iranian nationalism to win public support in his confrontation with the West, it can easily turn against him if he were to embark on a global adventure. Wahhabi clerics may support the Saudi royal family as a necessary evil in order to protect their global proselytizing mission, but they recognize no Saudi Arabian "nation" whose interests take precedence over their agenda. Such is not the case in Iran. Furthermore, Shiite Islamism does not exhibit theofascist tendencies. Radical clerics in Iran have been responsible for horrendous abuses of power, but they do not regard non-Shiite Muslims as "unbelievers" who must be systematically purged. Basically in Islam Christians and Jews are considered as belivers and in Quran are referred to as "the people of book". Even within the Shiite world, there is no prospect of a Wahhabi-style Iranian takeover of religious discourse because unlike the Sunnis, Shiite Islam is rigidly hierarchical. Iraqi and Lebanese Shiites gladly accept Iranian financial and military support, but they are fiercely loyal to their own clerical establishments. An even greater fallacy is the widespread belief in Washington that a strong relationship with Saudi Arabia is an asset in confronting Iran. On the contrary, coddling the Saudis makes it more difficult for the United States to deal with Iran. The Bush administration's refusal to hold Saudi leaders accountable for their incitement of Wahhabi jihadists (who have murdered far more Shiites than Americans, mostly in Iraq and Pakistan) is a source of deep resentment in the Shiite world. It is no surprise that the only two major public demonstrations against Al-Qaeda in the Islamic world after the 9/11 attacks were both organized by Shiites (in Tehran and Karachi, Pakistan). It is interesting to note that the recent escalation of US - Iranian tensions has made the Saudis less accommodating about Iraq than ever before. Reports that the Saudi Government is threatening to openly fund and arm Sunni insurgent groups if American forces withdraw from Iraq are a case in point. In effect, the Saudis are signaling to the Bush administration that they will thwart any American plan to cede control of Iraq to its Shiite-dominated, democratically-elected government, while signaling to the Sunni insurgents in Iraq that they can reject American efforts to broker a political settlement and not be left to face the consequences alone. Iran has no history of direct aggression against its neighbors, and unlike Saddam's Sunni-dominated Iraq, they have never used weapons of mass destruction during invasions of neighbors or against their own people. The strongest argument for this approach lies with the extent that Iran craves recognition of its actual status as the historically authentic nation state in the Middle East. Iran has long aspired to be and probably will be the region's predominant Islamic regional power. On the other hand Iranians are the most pro American and pro west people in the middle-east, although the recent Israeli pushed American forced sanctions are damaging this view. The Road Ahead Washington will eventually have to face the reality that derailing Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons (and, more broadly, its emergence as the predominant Islamic regional power) may be impossible over the long-term, and possible in the short term only at the expense of fatally undermining efforts to contain the spread of Sunni theofascism. The United States would do better to find a mutually acceptable means of working with this reality, rather sustaining a deadlocked confrontation by conditioning its willingness to normalize relations with Tehran on the abandonment of its nuclear aspirations. US - Iranian engagement will greatly enhance American leverage over the Saudis, as well as check the threat of Sunni theofascist terrorism in Iraq and, to a lesser extent, Afghanistan. Saudi officials have urged the Bush administration not to talk with Iran because they know that a reduction in US - Iranian tensions will draw more attention to their unbridled export of Wahhabism. Reducing American dependence on Saudi oil must also be part of any comprehensive strategy for addressing the threat of Sunni theofascism. Although President Bush has expressed commitment to developing alternative energy sources, the surplus production capacity of the Saudis enables them to lower prices as necessary to ensure that this will not be cost effective for a long time. Barring radical breakthroughs in fuel technologies, an optimistic forecast would have bio fuels (ethanol, synthetic diesel and bio oil) making up to 30% of US petroleum equivalent needs by 2030. For the short to medium term future, only conservation can significantly alter American petroleum dependency. Without the billions of dollars in Saudi funds, the ideological, political, and psychological edifice of Wahhabi theofascism will begin to crumble, particularly if a concerted effort is made by the Bush administration to promote moderate Islamic institutions (a recent study by the RAND Corporation offers some insightful recommendations). Ultimately, the devil is not in the details - it is the administration's broad lack of resolve in confronting the threat of theofascism, not the lack of viable methods of combating it, that imperils American security. REFERENCES See Mohammed Ayoob, "Political Islam: Image and Reality," World Policy Journal, Vol. 11, No. 3, Fall 2004. Fascism is "a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victim-hood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion." See Robert Paxton, The Anatomy of Fascism (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004), p. 218. Saudi police 'stopped' fire rescue, BBC, 15 March 2002. Wahhabi religious police (mutaween) prevented Saudi schoolgirls from fleeing a burning school because they were not properly veiled, leaving fifteen of them to die inside in 2002, an outrage equaled only by the Taliban's rein of terror against women in Afghanistan. R. James Woolsey, "The Elephant in The Middle East Living Room: Watching Wahhabis," The National Review, 14 December 2005. Zawahiri declared in a December 2006 videotape, "How could they not demand an Islamic constitution before entering these elections? Are they not an Islamic movement?" See: "Al Qaeda Warns U.S. on Fighting in Muslim Lands," The New York Times, 21 December 2006. Zawahiri accused it of being "duped, provoked and used" by the United States after it participated in the 2005 legislative elections. See "Al-Qaida's No. 2 leader praises U.S. hints of troop reduction in Iraq," The Associated Press, 6 January 2006. In his 2003 book, Why America Slept, Gerald Posner cites two unidentified senior Bush administration officials as saying that captured Al-Qaeda leader Abu Zubaydah revealed details of a Saudi-Pakistani-Bin Laden triangle. See Gerald Posner, Why America Slept: The Failure to Prevent 9/11, (New York: Random House, 2003). "Inside the Kingdom," Time, 7 September 2003. Nina Shea, Saudi Arabia's Curriculum of Intolerance, Freedom House, 2006. John Esposito, quoted in Gary Leupp, On Terrorism, Methodism, Saudi 'Wahhabism' and the Censored 9-11 Report, Counterpunch, 8 August 2003. Ali al-Ahmed of the Washington Institute for Gulf Affairs makes this point. See Saudi Arabia's Curriculum of Intolerance, CBN.org, 14 June 2006. "Top Saudi cleric issues religious edict declaring Shiites to be infidels," Associated Press, 29 December 2006. More Evidence of Saudi Double Talk?, MSNBC, 26 April 2005. In an April 2006 lecture, Saudi cleric Nasser bin Suleiman al-Omar cautioned his audience not to "get involved in things that are not jihad . . . divert the strife and calamity into the lands of the Muslims, instead of aiming them directly at the enemies." He continued, saying that: "there are places where jihad is proper - in Afghanistan, Palestine, Iraq, Chechnya, Kashmir, and the Philippines." See Saudi Cleric Nasser bin Suleiman Al-'Omar: 'America is Now Disappearing From the Hearts Within America Itself . . . MEMRI Special Dispatch #1154, 4 May 2006. Alex Alexiev, "Terrorism: Growing Wahhabi Influence in the United States", Testimony before the US Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security, 26 June 2003. Author interview with Evgueni Novokov, Ph.D., former colonel, senior staff officer for the Soviet Politburo and deputy director for Middle East Operations, in charge of Arabic Department, and relationships with CPSU Central Committee front organizations and friendly parties; advised Central Committee members on Islamic affairs, 1986 -1988. 22 October 2006. Author interview with Abdel Guzman, Grand Imam of Jolo, Jolo City, Sulu Province, The Philippines, 5 March 2004. Author's interview with Abdel Guzman, The Grand Imam of Jolo, Op. Cit. See Freedom House, The Talibanization of Nigeria: Radical Islam, Extremist Sharia Law, and Religious Freedom, March 2002. "Against the Saudization of Somaliland," Addis Tribune (Ethiopia), 21 November 2003. http://www.addistribune.com/Archives/2003/11/21-11-03/Against.htm In March 2002, the official Saudi magazine Ain al-Yaqeen estimated that the Saudi royal family in countries where Muslims were a minority has funded 210 Islamic centers, 1,500 mosques, 202 colleges, and 2,000 madrassas. The number of all Saudi Government and charitably funded institutions beyond Saudi Arabia is much higher. Cited in "Inside the Kingdom," Time, 7 September 2003. Alex Alexiev, "France at the Brink", The San Diego Union Tribune, 20 November 2005. See also: Alex Alexiev, Europe's Islamist Future is Now, The Center for Security Policy, 13 June 2005. Other publications examined include textbooks from the Saudi Ministry of Education and collections of religious edicts by state-sanctioned clerics in the kingdom. See Freedom House, Saudi Publications on Hate Ideology Fill American Mosques, January 2005. Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, "Wahhabism in the Big House: The Teaching of Jihad in American Penitentiaries," The Weekly Standard, 26 September 2005. "Terrorist Recruitment in Prisons and The Recent Arrests Related to Guantanamo Bay Detainees," Testimony of John S. Pistole, Assistant Director, Counterterrorism Division, FBI, before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology, and Homeland Security, 14 October 2003. Testimony of Dr. J. Michael Waller before the US Senate Judiciary Committee's Terrorism Subcommittee, 14 October 2003. Frank Gaffney, A Troubling Influence, Front Page Magazine.com, 9 December 2003. Glenn Simpson, "Suspect Lessons: A Muslim School Used by Military Has Troubling Ties," The Wall Street Journal, 3 December 2003. "For Conservative Muslims, Goal of Isolation a Challenge; 9/11 Put Strict Adherents on the Defensive," The Washington Post, 5 September 2006. Edward L. Morse and James Richard, "The Battle for Energy Dominance," Foreign Affairs, March/April 2002. David Ignatius, "The Operator," The Washington Post, 5 November 2006, p.7. Daniel Pipes, "The Scandal of U.S.-Saudi Relations," The National Interest, Winter 2002/2003. "Oil for Security Fueled Close Ties; But Major Differences Led to Tensions," The Washington Post, 11 February 2002. In November 2006, Nawaf Obaid, a close advisor to Prince Turki, warned in a Washington Post op-ed that a phased American withdrawal from Iraq will result in "massive Saudi intervention," with options including "funding, arms and logistical support" to Sunni insurgents. "As the economic powerhouse of the Middle East, the birthplace of Islam and the de facto leader of the world's Sunni community (which comprises 85 percent of all Muslims), Saudi Arabia has both the means and the religious responsibility to intervene." See Nawaf Obaid, "Stepping Into Iraq: Saudi Arabia Will Protect Sunnis if the U.S. Leaves," The Washington Post, 29 November 2006. Outlook on Renewable Energy in America, Volume II: Joint Summary Report, American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE), March 2007. The Rand Corporation, Building Moderate Muslim Networks, 2007. Curtin Winsor, Jr. is a former United States Ambassador to Costa Rica. He graduated from Brown University in 1961 with a degree in English literature, and then received a Masters in Latin American studies in 1964 and a Ph.D. in international studies in 1971 from the School of International Service at American University in Washington, D.C. He worked as an adviser to President Ronald Reagan and Sen. Robert Dole, as well as for the U.S. Foreign Service. * This article had previously been published in the Mideast Monitor. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=b95_1368351158 AntiPropagaanda Saudi Arabia, Wahhabism "A Must Read" al-Qaeda, Saudi Arabia, Wahhabism, Terrorism, America, Israel, Thu, 09 May 2013 07:48:06 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=469_1368099461 omniradar Grant F. Smith, Research Director for the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy at IRmep.org, joins Stephen Corbett to discuss the secret Israeli espionage program that smuggled nuclear materials out of the United States to help start the Israeli nuclear program in the 1960s. We go over the declassified documents tying Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu to the smuggling ring, and explore Smith's book, Divert!: NUMEC, Zalman Shapiro and the diversion of US weapons grade uranium into the Israeli nuclear weapons program. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=469_1368099461 omniradar Criminal Netanyahu Involement In Smuggling Nuclear Materials Out Of USA Israel, USA Wed, 08 May 2013 11:18:18 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=582_1368026220 swade55 The Science of Guns Proves Arming Untrained Citizens Is a Bad Idea According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 31,672 people died by guns in 2010 (the most recent year for which U.S. figures are available), a staggering number that is orders of magnitude higher than that of comparable Western democracies. What can we do about it? National Rifle Association executive vice president Wayne LaPierre believes he knows: "The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun." If LaPierre means professionally trained police and military who routinely practice shooting at ranges, this observation would at least be partially true. If he means armed private citizens with little to no training, he could not be more wrong. Consider a 1998 study in the Journal of Trauma and Acute Care Surgery that found that "every time a gun in the home was used in a self-defense or legally justifiable shooting, there were four unintentional shootings, seven criminal assaults or homicides, and 11 attempted or completed suicides." Pistol owners' fantasy of blowing away home-invading bad guys or street toughs holding up liquor stores is a myth debunked by the data showing that a gun is 22 times more likely to be used in a criminal assault, an accidental death or injury, a suicide attempt or a homicide than it is for self-defense. I harbored this belief for the 20 years I owned a Ruger .357 Magnum with hollow-point bullets designed to shred the body of anyone who dared to break into my home, but when I learned about these statistics, I got rid of the gun. More insights can be found in a 2013 book from Johns Hopkins University Press entitled Reducing Gun Violence in America: Informing Policy with Evidence and Analysis, edited by Daniel W. Webster and Jon S. Vernick, both professors in health policy and management at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. In addition to the 31,672 people killed by guns in 2010, another 73,505 were treated in hospital emergency rooms for nonfatal bullet wounds, and 337,960 nonfatal violent crimes were committed with guns. Of those 31,672 dead, 61 percent were suicides, and the vast majority of the rest were homicides by people who knew one another. For example, of the 1,082 women and 267 men killed in 2010 by their intimate partners, 54 percent were shot by guns. Over the past quarter of a century, guns were involved in greater number of intimate partner homicides than all other causes combined. When a woman is murdered, it is most likely by her intimate partner with a gun. Regardless of what really caused Olympic track star Oscar Pistorius to shoot his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp (whether he mistook her for an intruder or he snapped in a lover's quarrel), her death is only the latest such headline. Recall, too, the fate of Nancy Lanza, killed by her own gun in her own home in Connecticut by her son, Adam Lanza, before he went to Sandy Hook Elementary School to murder some two dozen children and adults. As an alternative to arming women against violent men, legislation can help: data show that in states that prohibit gun ownership by men who have received a domestic violence restraining order, gun-caused homicides of intimate female partners have been reduced by 25 percent. Another myth to fall to the facts is that gun-control laws disarm good people and leave the crooks with weapons. Not so, say the Johns Hopkins authors: "Strong regulation and oversight of licensed gun dealers-defined as having a state law that required state or local licensing of retail firearm sellers, mandatory record keeping by those sellers, law enforcement access to records for inspection, regular inspections of gun dealers, and mandated reporting of theft of loss of firearms-was associated with 64 percent less diversion of guns to criminals by in-state gun dealers." Finally, before we concede civilization and arm everyone to the teeth pace the NRA, consider the primary cause of the centuries-long decline of violence as documented by Steven Pinker in his 2011 book The Better Angels of Our Nature: the rule of law by states that turned over settlement of disputes to judicial courts and curtailed private self-help justice through legitimate use of force by police and military trained in the proper use of weapons. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=582_1368026220 swade55 The Science of Guns Proves Arming Untrained Citizens Is a Bad Idea gun control Sat, 27 Apr 2013 12:26:50 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=4f8_1367079759 Traci Sutherland-Gibbs PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - A police officer fired for driving drunk in an unmarked police car while off-duty has filed a $6 million lawsuit against the city of Gresham, the police chief and others, alleging his rights were violated under the Americans with Disabilities Act. The lawsuit filed in Portland alleged the officer, Jason Servo, was suffering from alcoholism, a recognized disability under the act, and shouldn't have been dismissed. The suit also alleged Servo was denied due process, and the police union failed to represent him adequately. "Just as with any type of disability or disease, they should have made some kind of effort to accommodate that, or some kind of effort to work with him, and not simply sever all ties," said Shawn Kollie, one of Servo's attorneys. Police Chief Craig Junginger was out of the office Friday. City spokeswoman Laura Shepard said officials would not discuss the case because their policy is to not talk about pending litigation. Servo, 43, was arrested in January 2011 after he crashed into a ditch while off-duty. The lawsuit said that Servo, a detective who was the department's lead firearms instructor, had taken the police vehicle to a firearms training session in the nearby city of Troutdale. He later joined fellow officers for dinner and drinks. "This was a common practice among (Gresham) officers and had become an inherent part of the culture," according to the lawsuit filed late Thursday. Servo was alone when his vehicle veered into a ditch and he was not hurt. Though Servo refused to take breath or field sobriety tests, the Clackamas County sheriff's deputy who arrested him later testified before the state Department of Public Safety Standards and Training that Servo was probably one of the top 10 most intoxicated people he had arrested in almost 15 years of drunken-driving investigations. Two months after the accident, Servo pleaded guilty to drunken driving and entered a diversion program. He fulfilled the program's requirements and the DUI was dismissed. Servo also voluntarily entered an in-patient program at a Serenity Lane drug-and-alcohol treatment center, where he was diagnosed as an alcoholic. "There were times where I went home and I couldn't get crime scenes out of my head; I went to drinking for that and there are other officers that do the same thing," Servo said Friday, adding that he has now been sober for 818 days. The lawsuit alleged the chief fired Servo to save money, ignoring the known disability of alcoholism. "I know it sounds kind of like a conspiracy theorist's claim," Kollie said, "but we do believe there was a funding issue in the Gresham police department at the time." It could not immediately be determined how common it is for alcoholics to claim their rights have been violated under the Americans with Disabilities Act. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, in a fact sheet, provides an example of how an alcoholic can justly be fired, and it's similar to the Servo case. In its example, a federal police officer is involved in an accident for which he is charged with drunken driving. About a month later, he gets a termination notice stating that his conduct makes it inappropriate for him to continue. The officer says the arrest made him realize he is an alcoholic and that he is obtaining treatment. According to the EEOC, the employer may proceed with the firing. The example, of course, is not precise because Servo's crash happened while he was off-duty. "The ADA has provisions in it, across the board, to not require employers to subject other people to unreasonable risk to accommodate a disability," said Bob Joondeph, executive director with Disability Rights Oregon. Joondeph said he couldn't comment on any specifics in the Servo case, but generally accommodations for an alcoholic might include letting the worker attend Alcoholics Anonymous meetings - not allowing them to drink on the job or drive drunk. Separate from the lawsuit, Servo is appealing the standards-and-training agency's decision to strip him of his police certification. Servo is currently working as a private investigator. Follow Steven DuBois at http://www.twitter.com/pdxdub Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=4f8_1367079759 Traci Sutherland-Gibbs Our tax dollars at work? oregon,cop, fired, dui, claiming disability, fool Tue, 23 Apr 2013 11:23:20 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=57c_1366730171 Lake8737 Police finally find the head 3 km away. Uncensored body can be see at the end of the vid. Google translate In the early morning of April 21, Zhongyuan Road, a car speeding in the night, the back of the 6-year-old child, suddenly found next to the adult head gone ... The day 0:10 Xu, reporters rushed to the Central Plains Xi Luxi Fourth Ring Road intersection 100 meters south of the West side. A black sedan, head East End West parked on the roadside, 120 emergency vehicles parked on one side, four emergency personnel standing on the side of the car, and did not seem too fast. "Injured?" Reporter asked emergency personnel. In the car. "Female nurses speak a little trembling. "How, why not rescue?" Reporters ask a male nurse pulled to the side of the reporters. The person inside the car, there is no head. " Air conditioning along the reporters back to go from top to bottom. Light shines, I saw the rear of the car left the door half open, the body of a person sitting on the seat, but not the first. Seat and door with blood. Female nurse standing afar off, would like to leave at any time on an ambulance. First aid Dr. Li said, he often participated in first aid, rescue scene found that the time of the dead, but rushed to the scene, lights shine on the people inside the vehicle, I was playing a Cold War, too scary. " Seeking: 3 km to find a poll Side of the traffic police asked the owner of the car, while walking west to find, but always walk to the west side of the south-to-north water diversion bridgehead, but could not find. Here from the West Fourth Ring Road car parking is almost three kilometers, when we think of the head is not to be taken away. "To find the police a little disappointed. But the police did not give up, and then walk west to the intersection of Hangzhou, the police finally found the lost head by passing vehicles rolling, this time at 2 am. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=57c_1366730171 Lake8737 Drunk guy gets decapitated when sticking head out of car window to vomit china,chinese,car,head,accident Sat, 20 Apr 2013 12:46:42 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=bcf_1366475362 Vegas Street Prophet ALL ABOUT THE MINOT AFB NUCLEAR WEAPONS MISHANDLING INDICENT https://anonfiles.com/file/22d01053fbc513f4c25ed6055b320630 THE MISSING B-52 2007 A US Air Force B-52 bomber. The US military said on Wednesday it was investigating an alarming security lapse when a B-52 bomber flew the length of the country last week loaded with six nuclear-armed cruise missiles The missiles were mounted on the wings of a B-52 bomber compiled by Dee Finney http://www.military.cz/usa/air/in_service/aircraft/b52/b52.jpg The Boeing B-52 Stratofortress is a long-range, subsonic jet strategic bomber flown by the United States Air Force (USAF) since 1955. The B-52 replaced the Convair B-36 and the Boeing B-47 . Built to carry nuclear weapons for Cold War era deterrence missions, it has dropped only conventional munitions in actual combat. The aircraft has the longest unrefuelled range of any bomber and carries up to 70,000 pounds of weapons. The USAF has had B-52s in active service since 1955 with the Strategic Air Command which was absorbed into the Air Combat Command in 1991. Its superior performance at high subsonic speeds and relatively low operating costs have kept the B-52 in service despite proposals to replace it with the Mach 3 XB-70 Valkyrie , supersonic B-1B Lancer , and stealth B-2 Spirit . In January 2005, it became the second aircraft, after the English Electric Canberra , to mark 50 years of continuous service with its original primary operator. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-52_Stratofortress for more B-52 carried nuclear missiles over US by mistake: military Sep 5, 2007 WASHINGTON (AFP) - The US military said on Wednesday it was investigating an alarming security lapse when a B-52 bomber flew the length of the country last week loaded with six nuclear-armed cruise missiles. The blunder was reported to President George W. Bush after the nuclear warheads were discovered when the aircraft landed at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana, a military official said on condition of anonymity. An air force official, who also asked to remain unnamed, said the B-52, which originated at Minot Air Base in North Dakota, had six cruise missiles with nuclear warheads loaded on pylons under its wings. The US Air Force has relieved the munition squadron commander at Minot Air Base in North Dakota of his duties, and launched an investigation into the August 30 incident, a Pentagon spokesman said. "At no time was there a threat to public safety," said Lieutenant Colonel Ed Thomas. "It is important to note that munitions were safe, secure and under military control at all times." The Pentagon would not provide details, citing secrecy rules, but an expert said the incident was unprecedented, and pointed to a disturbing lapse in the air force's command and control system. "It seems so fantastic that so many points, checks can dysfunction," he said Hans Kristensen, an expert on US nuclear forces. " We have so many points and checks specifically so we don't have these kinds of incidents," he said. US lawmakers expressed outrage at the incident. "It is absolutely inexcusable that the Air Force lost track of these five nuclear warheads, even for a short period of time," Representative Edward Markey, a Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee, said in a statement. "Nothing like this has ever been reported before and we have been assured for decades that it was impossible," said Markey. Two Republican lawmakers on committees overseeing military affairs, Jim Saxton and Terry Everett, said in a joint statement they were "deeply concerned" by the incident and said the United States must "ensure our nuclear assets are protected by the highest safeguards." The breach originally was reported by the Military Times newspaper Wednesday and was confirmed by the Pentagon later in the day. US Defense Secretary Robert Gates was notified early Friday of the incident by Air Force chief of staff General Michael "Buzz" Moseley, Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell said. "I can also tell you that it was important enough that President Bush was notified of it," Morrell said. Gates has received daily briefings from Moseley on the incident, and expects a report by the end of next week, he said. "The munitions squadron commander has been relieved of his duties, and final action is pending the outcome of the investigation," he said. " In addition, other airmen were decertified from their duties involving munitions." Kristensen said he knew of no other publicly acknowledged case of live nuclear weapons being flown on bombers since the late 1960s. The nuclear weapons expert said the air force keeps a computerized command and control system that traces any movement of a nuclear weapon so that they have a complete picture of where they are at any given time. He said there would be checks and detailed procedures at various points from the time they are moved out of bunkers until they are loaded onto planes, and flown away. "That's perhaps what is most worrisome about this particular incident -- that apparently an individual who had command authority about moving these weapons around decided to do so," he said. "It's a command and control issue and it's one that calls into question the system, because if one individual can do that who knows what can happen," he said. Nuclear weapons are normally transferred on cargo planes, never on the wings of bombers, Kristensen said. Bomber flights with live nuclear weapons ended in the late 1960s after accidents in Spain in 1966 and in Greenland in 1968. The weapons were among 400 advanced cruise missiles that the Defense Department quietly decided to retire in March over the course of this year. The advanced cruise missile is a stealthy, longer range version of the air launched cruise missile first deployed in the early 1980s. It carries W-80 warheads of up to 150 kilotons, ten times the destructive force of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima at the end of World War Two. Oops! Were those nuclear warheads on my B-52 bomber? By Staff September 5, 2007 (AXcess News) Houston - A U.S. Air Force B-52 bomber took off from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota on a flight to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana on August 30, which was not out of the ordinary. But what was extraordinary was that it was carrying five nuclear warheads, which the military says was a mistake, or was it? The B-52 was carrying Advanced Cruise Missiles (ACM) which normally carries a W80-1 nuclear warhead with a yield of 5 to 150 kilotons. The ACMs were supposed to have had the nuclear warheads removed before they were transported to Louisiana. B-52 bombers normally deliver the ACMs when they are equipped with nuclear warheads, but these were a part of 400 missiles which were being decommissioned and the nuclear warheads were not supposed to be attached. Oops! An Air Force investigation is said to have been launched to find out how nuclear warheads could have been attached to the B-52 bombers wings for transport and no one notice them missing for nearly four hours. A former Defense Department specialist who worked on nuclear weapons said no one was ever in danger had the bomber crashed as safeguards are installed that make the nuclear detonation impossible unless specifically triggered to do so. Questions arise over whether B-52 bomber flights are being prepared for long-range flights that might include carrying nuclear warheads after Russia began its own long-range bomber flights after the U.S. said it would not back off the installation of missile sites near the border of Russia, insisting that they were for protection against Iran and other renegade countries in the Middle East. The tit-for-tat military developments have been escalating between Russia and the United States that critics say look more like the start of another Cold War. To the North, Russia has claimed sovereignty over a vast area of the Artic seabed, claiming its part of the continental shelf extending out fro Russia's shoreline and Canada and the U.S. have both increased military presence in the Artic to protect the passage way. Washington, Sept. 5 , 2007 - (Xinhua) -- U.S. Defense Department official confirmed Wednesday that a B-52 bomber had been mistakenly loaded with nuclear weapons and flown over American sky. Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell tried to appease the country by saying "at no time was the public in danger." President George W. Bush and Defense Secretary Robert Gates have been already informed of the incident and ordered a probe into it. Earlier Wednesday, media reports, citing an unidentified Pentagon source, said that a B-52 bomber was mistakenly armed with six nuclear warheads and flown over three hours across several states. The plane, loaded with Advanced Cruise Missiles, took off on Aug. 30 from North Dakota and headed to Louisiana. The incident resulted in a comprehensive procedure review by Air Force and the dismissal of a commander, the reports said. House Armed Services Committee Chairman Rep. Ike Skelton described the weapon mishandling "deeply disturbing" and called for more details to ensure that Defense Department would address it appropriately. "There is no more serious issue than the security and proper handling of nuclear weapons," the Democratic said in a Wednesday's statement. September 7, 2007 Questions Remain Over Nuclear-Armed B-52 Over Midwest by Wayne Madsen http://www.opednews.com The reported "loss" of six nuclear-armed stealthy advance cruise missiles (ACMs) flown on the wing pylons of a B-52 from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana on August 30 would represent a complete and unprecedented breakdown in the command and control of nuclear weapons in the United States. For that reason, there is a belief among many seasoned military experts that there is much more to this reported story than meets the eye. The Defense Department is merely describing the nuclear missile flight as an "incident," because it is standard Pentagon policy to not comment on its nuclear weapons. However, the "incident" was serious enough that President Bush and Defense Secretary Robert Gates were both immediately informed of the so-called "mistake" in flying the weapons across several Midwestern states. Missouri Representative Ike Skelton, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, called the incident "deeply disturbing." The incident was first reported by three military officers, who remained anonymous, to Military Times , a newspaper that maintains good contacts within the military services. The ACMs were armed with six W80-Mod 1 nuclear weapons, which pack a punch of between 5 and 150 kilotons each. There is informed speculation that the movement of the nuclear weapons to Barksdale was leaked because the air force base is a staging area for deployment to the Middle East. The Pentagon recently drew up plans to hit 1200 targets inside Iran in a massive bombardment campaign aimed at destroying its military and overthrowing its government. The movement of the nuclear weapons may have been an alert to the public by disgruntled members of the military that such plans would include the pre-emptive use of nuclear weapons. The report that the weapons were transferred to Barksdale for "decommissioning" appears to be a cover story concocted by Pentagon spinmeisters, since any movement of nuclear weapons is treated as highly-classified information. The B-52 sat on a runway at Barksdale for a full 10 hours with the Air Force trying to have the public believe that no one noticed the nuclear missiles on board. The flight from Minot was three and a half hours. The only casualty: the munitions officer at Minot was relieved of his duties pending the outcome of an investigation. There is also speculation that the war hawks in the administration may have flown the nuclear cruise missiles to Louisiana to send a message to Iran. The Defense Department remains a beehive of neocon activity even with Gates in charge. Three other recent incidents indicate the neocons are still employing their perception management campaigns. Cells of so-called "Al Qaeda" terrorists have been arrested in Denmark and Germany. Both countries have neocons embedded in their governments. Those arrested include Danish and German nationals. In addition, the recent weapons of mass destruction "scare" at a United Nations office building in New York, where "phosgene" gas seized in Iraq after Desert Storm was reportedly found in a vial, turns out to have been a hoax. The substance was a non-toxic cleaning solvent. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has named a number of neocons to senior staff positions within the UN Secretariat. http://www.waynemadsenreport.com For more, visit Wayne Madsen Report , which its publisher, Wayne Madsen, keeps refreshed with more news than any one reporter has a right to. Wayne Madsen is an investigative journalist, nationally distributed columnist, and author who has covered Washington, DC, politics, national security, and intelligence issues since 1994. He has written for The Village Voice, The Progressive, CAQ, Counterpunch, and the Intelligence Newsletter (based in Paris). Look for his new book, Overthrow a Fascist Regime on $15 a Day: The Internet Irregulars vs. The Powers That Be!, in the fall. US B-52 in nuclear cargo blunder investigation after a B 52 bomber flew across the US last week mistakenly loaded with nuclear-armed missiles. It follows reports in the Army Times that five missiles were unaccounted for during the three-hour flight from North Dakota to Louisiana. The air force said the cruise missiles were safe at all times. Army Times said the missiles were to be decommissioned but were mistakenly mounted on the bomber's wings. The W80-1 warhead has a yield of five to 150 kilotons, the paper said. 'Decertified' The flight took place on 30 August, from the Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota to the Barksdale Air Force Base, near Bossier City, in Louisiana. Air force spokesman Lt Col Ed Thomas said although this was an "isolated incident", Air Combat Command had directed a "command- wide stand down to review process at all of our bases". Col Thomas said a general had been appointed to investigate the incident and would report by 14 September. "At no time was there a threat to public safety. It is important to note that munitions were safe, secure and under military control at all times," Col Thomas said. "The air force takes its mission to safeguard weapons seriously. No effort will be spared to ensure that the matter is thoroughly and completely investigated." Army Times quoted the colonel as saying the loading crew involved had been temporarily "decertified" pending retraining and the investigation. A military official told AFP news agency that President George W Bush had been informed of the mix-up. "There are procedures in place and they kicked in and worked," the official said. The BBC's Adam Brookes in Washington says experts have made it clear that if the plane had crashed there would not have been a nuclear explosion but there could have been a threat from plutonium leakage. Commander disciplined for nuclear mistake By Michael Hoffman, Military Times The Air Force continued handing out disciplinary actions in response to the six nuclear warheads mistakenly flown on a B-52 bomber from Minot Air Force Base, N.D., to Barksdale Air Force Base, La., on Aug. 30. The squadron commander in charge of Minot's munitions crews was relieved of all duties pending the investigation. It was originally reported that five nuclear warheads were transported, but officers who tipped Military Times to the incident who have asked to remain anonymous since they are not authorized to discuss the incident, have since updated that number to six. Air Force and defense officials would not confirm the missiles were armed with nuclear warheads Wednesday, citing longstanding policy, but they did confirm the Air Force was "investigating an error made last Thursday during the transfer of munitions" from Minot to Barksdale. The original plan was to transport non-nuclear Advanced Cruise Missiles, mounted on the wings of a B-52, to Barksdale as part of a Defense Department effort to decommission 400 of the ACMs. It was not discovered that the six missiles had nuclear warheads until the plane landed at Barksdale, leaving the warheads unaccounted for during the approximately 3 and one-half hour flight between the two bases, the officers said. President Bush was immediately alerted to the mistake and the Air Force launched a service-wide investigation headed by Maj. Gen. Douglas Raaberg, director of Air and Space Operations at Air Combat Command Headquarters, said Air Force spokesman Lt. Col. Ed Thomas. FIND MORE STORIES IN: Air Force AIR FORCE BASE Department of Defense Minot B- 52 Ed Thomas Michael Hoffman Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has requested daily briefings from Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Michael Moseley on the progress of the investigation. Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., a member of the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee, requested a full-classified briefing, not just the preliminary information being provided to lawmakers, to explain how a mistake of this magnitude could have happened. Thomas said the transfer was conducted safely and the American public was never in any danger since the weapons were in Air Force custody and control at all times. But few critics were placated Wednesday by the Air Force's reassurances. "Nothing like this has ever been reported before and we have been assured for decades that it was impossible," said Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., co-chair of the House Bi-partisan Task Force. Non-proliferation treaty experts said the Air Force didn't violate any international nuclear treaties by transporting the nuclear warheads on the B-52, but it was the first time since 1968 that it's been known publicly that nuclear warheads were transported on a U.S. bomber. The Defense Department does transport nuclear warheads by air, but instead of bombers it uses C-17 or C-130 cargo aircraft. "These reports are deeply disturbing," said Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. " The American people, our friends, and our potential adversaries must be confident that the highest standards are in place when it comes to our nuclear arsenal." The Defense Department uses a computerized tracking program to keep tabs on each one of its nuclear warheads, said Hans Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project at the Federation of American Scientists. For the six warheads to make it onto the B-52, each one would have had to be signed out of its storage bunker and transported to the bomber. Diligent safety protocols would have to have been ignored to load the warheads onto the plane, he said. "I just can't imagine how all of this happened," said Philip Coyle, a senior adviser on nuclear weapons at the Center for Defense Information. "The procedures are so rigid; this is the last thing that's supposed to happen." At no time was there a risk for a nuclear detonation, even if the B-52 crashed on its way to Barksdale, said Steve Fetter, a former Defense Department official who worked on nuclear weapons policy in 1993-94. A crash would ignite the high explosives associated with the warhead, and possibly cause a leak of plutonium, but the warhead's elaborate safeguards would prevent a nuclear detonation from occurring, he said. "The Air Force takes its mission to safeguard weapons seriously," Thomas said. "No effort will be spared to ensure that the matter is thoroughly and completely investigated." Along with the 5th Munitions Squadron commander, the munitions crews involved in mistakenly loading the nuclear warheads at Minot have been temporarily decertified from performing their duties involving munitions, pending corrective actions or additional training, Thomas said. The error comes after the Air Force announced last March the 5th Bomb Wing won two servicewide safety awards during fiscal year 2006. "This is really shocking," Coyle said. "The Air Force can't tolerate it, and the Pentagon can't tolerate it, either." http://www.usatoday.com/news/military/2007-09-05-b-52_N.htm In Error, B-52 Flew Over U.S. With Nuclear-Armed Missiles By Josh White Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, September 6, 2007; An Air Force B-52 bomber flew across the central United States last week with six cruise missiles armed with nuclear warheads that were mistakenly attached to the airplane's wing, defense officials said yesterday. The Stratofortress bomber, based at Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota , was transporting a dozen Advanced Cruise Missiles to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana on Aug. 30. But crews inadvertently loaded half of them with nuclear warheads attached. Air Force officials said the warheads were not activated and at no time posed a threat to the public. But a timeline of the episode supplied by the Air Force yesterday to House and Senate lawmakers indicated that the missiles in question sat on a runway in Louisiana for nearly 10 hours before workers noticed that the nuclear warheads were inside. Military officials also said they were concerned that the warheads were unaccounted for several hours while the missiles were in transit. The missiles never left Air Force control, they said. The cruise missiles -- part of an Air Force fleet of more than 400 of their kind -- are being retired and usually would not carry nuclear warheads while being transported. Defense officials said the B-52's mission last week did not include training runs, so the missiles were never meant to be launched. The cruise missiles have a range of about 2,000 miles and are designed to hit precision targets well behind a potential enemy's lines. Two defense officials said it is unclear how stringent safeguards for the handling of nuclear weapons were skirted, allowing the missiles with the warheads to be loaded onto a pylon that was then attached to the underside of the B-52's wing. Air Force officials said the mistake was a serious breach of rules and that an investigation began immediately. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) and Sen. John McCain ( Ariz. ), the panel's ranking Republican, yesterday jointly called the episode "a matter of grave concern" and, in a letter to Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates , requested an investigation of the incident by the Pentagon 's inspector general. The aircraft's pilots and other crew members were unaware that they were carrying nuclear warheads, officials said. "Essentially, this is an issue of a departure from our very exacting standards," said Lt. Col. Edward Thomas, an Air Force spokesman at the Pentagon, who declined to confirm that nuclear warheads were involved. "The Air Force maintains the highest standards of safety and precision, so any deviation from these well-established munitions procedures is very serious, and we are responding swiftly." The incident, first reported by the Military Times, prompted senior leaders to relieve a munitions squadron commander of his duties. Other airmen have been temporarily suspended from duties. "Nothing like this has ever been reported before, and we have been assured for decades that it was impossible," said Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), co-chairman of the House Bipartisan Task Force on Nonproliferation. "The complete breakdown of the Air Force command and control over enough nuclear weapons to destroy several cities has frightening implications not only for the Air Force, but for the security of our entire nuclear weapons stockpile." The Air Force's Air Combat Command has ordered a stand-down for its bases next week to review procedures and prevent a repeat of the mistake. "All evidence seems to point to this being an isolated mistake," Thomas said. Geoff Morrell, a Pentagon spokesman, told reporters at a news conference yesterday that Gates was informed of the incident early last Friday and has been receiving daily progress reports. Morrell said President Bush was also notified. In a statement yesterday, Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said he found the reports "deeply disturbing." Was That Nuclear-Armed B-52 Flight Destined for Iran? Written by Dave Lindorff Monday, 10 September 2007 There's something definitely screwy about the August 30 incident in which a B-52 bomber flew from Minot AFB in North Dakota to Barksdale AFB in Louisiana carrying five fully armed Advanced Cruise Missiles, each equipped with nuclear bombs capable of exploding at anything from 5 kilotons to 150 kilotons. The government has been quick to say that the flight, which violated a number of long-standing orders regarding shipment of nuclear weapons in US airspace, was a "mistake." But was it a mistake? The biggest question is why a B-52 armed with nuclear-tipped cruise missiles would fly to Barksdale AFB. If, as reported, the weapons were being transported to be decommissioned, which supposedly is the destination for 400 of these doomsday weapons, then they should have been destined for Kirtland AFB in New Mexico, near the Pantex plant outside Amarillo, TX, where they would be dismantled. As Michael Salla writes in a disturbing piece in Saturday's edition of OpEdNews , the weapons should also not have been flown at all on a B-52, as there have been standing orders for 40 years against such flights over US soil, following several accidents in which bombs or nuclear-armed rockets were lost because "broken arrow" incidents including inadvertent bomb drops or crashes. A second order, issued in 1991 at the end of the Cold War by George Bush's father, barred the loading of nuclear weapons on any bomber. Any pilot would have known this, as would any ground support people loading the missiles on the B-52. According to Salla, if these five cruise missiles were really being transported by air to Texas for decommissioning, they should have been disarmed and flown in specially designed transport planes that are built to resist nuclear leakage in the event of a crash. They would never be transported under the wings of a B-52. What makes the incident even more suspicious is that Barksdale AFB is a staging area for B-52s being sent to the Middle East for combat duty. As the website GlobalSecurity.org reports: "Barksdale Air Force Base is headquarters for the 2d Bomb Wing, Eighth Air Force and 917th Wing. The 2d Bomb Wing provides global combat capability and trains all B-52 combat crews." The official Barksdale AFB website says: "Barksdale warriors and B-52s have a proud tradition serving both at home and abroad in support of the Global War on Terrorism; they have played vital roles in combat operations supporting Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan and Operation Iraqi Freedom." The original expose of the B-52 flight appeared in the newspaper . Staff writer Michael Hoffman writes that his initial source for the story was three officers "who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to discuss the incident." So this is a case where some military officers who knew something wrong was happening did the honorable, patriotic thing and went public with a publication they trusted, both to do the right thing, and to protect them. So what is actually going on here? Salla suggests the worst: that this was likely a deliberate action, ordered through a chain of command outside the Pentagon. Salla notes that it has been widely reported that the top brass in the US military (note: with the exception of some wackos in the Air Force), have staunchly opposed any use of nuclear weapons in the event of an air attack on Iran. So an order to send nuclear-armed cruise missiles to the Persian Gulf region, if that's what this flight was, would not likely have come through the normal chain of command from the Secretary of Defense through the Air Combat Command (ACC, successor to SAC). It would, Salla hints darkly, have come through the back channel set up since even before 9-11 by Vice President Dick Cheney, who is known to be pushing for an attack on Iran, and who would like nothing better than to use nuclear weapons to disable Iran's nuclear processing facilities. We're talking about high treason, if Salla is right. And the seriousness of what happened - five nuclear-tipped cruise missiles, in firing position, flown across the width of the continental US in violation of all standing orders to a base that is a staging area for B-52 flights to the Persian Gulf war zone - demands a full public investigation. The Democrats in charge of Congress, and the Republican minority, may not have the stomach to stand up to the Bush administration's obsession to keep the bloodletting going in Iraq, and they may not have the courage even to put a stop to plans to attack Iran, but even the most reprehensible weasels and cowards among them should have the basic decency to know that this bizarre and suspicious flight needs to be investigated to the fullest to get to the bottom of what was going on. Salla suggests that behind the scenes, Gates and the generals, who clearly distrust and dislike the vice president and who don't want an Iran attack, will use this incident to go after the vice president and force him into a "medical" resignation. He says that the exposure of the flight will also put any attack on Iran on hold, because military leaders will be worried that there are other nuclear weapons that have been introduced into the equation secretly, either for use in Iraq or for a "black flag" operation against US forces. Let us hope so they are right, and that this will be Cheney's undoing. I'm not as confident as Salla, however. If it turns out that Cheney was behind this incident, that its goal was as sinister as Salla suspects, and that it was only the brave action of several officers who went public and leaked information about it that led to the undoing of the plan, it may take more than behind-the-scenes pressure from the Defense Department to take down the vice president. Moreover, if Cheney simply resigned, without the incident being exposed publicly, Americans would not ever know how close we came to global disaster, martial law, and the end of America as we know it. It is essential that Congress get to the bottom of this one. Every person remotely connected to this mission needs to be called before Congress and put under oath to explain what happened. An independent prosecutor should also be named to start a criminal investigation. Note: Back in the early 1970s, my wife and I knew an Air Force reservist who told us he was flying secret missions for the government, to Central America and to the Middle East. He never explained what these were, but it was clear that they were connected with secret operations of a military nature. This individual, who had turned belatedly against the Vietnam War, and had begun to question what he was doing in secret, died under mysterious circumstances in his apartment. His mother went to the morgue to pick up the body only to discovered to her horror that it was not her son. Someone had removed his corpse, making any investigation as to cause of death impossible. There are sinister operations carried on by this government, and this looks like one that is as sinister as it can get. The crew of that B-52 and the ground crew that loaded it, should be watching their backs. B-52 Bomber Incident and Insider Trading? Was Someone Trying to Profit from a Nuclear Attack Against Iran Before September 21? by Michael E. Salla, M.A., Ph.D. September 11, 2007 A B-52 bomber loaded with five (increased to six in later reports) nuclear weapons fitted on the pylons under its wings was discovered after sitting for ten hours on a tarmac at Barksdale AFB on 30 August 2007. Three anonymous Air Force officers leaked the news of the incident to the Army Times newspaper which announced the discovery on 5 September 2007. The discovery immediately gained world wide coverage: LINK . The "mainstream" Big Business-owned news media has so far concentrated on the U.S. Air Force version of events that the incident was an "error" and is now subject to an official investigation. Barksdal e AFB is a staging post for Middle East operations and routinely has B-52 flying missions. The B-52 incident has subsequently led to speculation that the nuclear weapons were intended for a covert mission to Iran, and the Office of the Vice President was probably involved in bypassing the normal chain of military command, LINK . The discovery of the B-52 came on top of rapidly increasing speculation that the U.S. Bush administration is about to authorize a massive pre-emptive aerial assault against Iran. According to the Sunday Times, the Pentagon has prepared for air strikes against 1,200 targets in Iran that would in three days destroy Iran's military infrastructure, LINK . What gives reports of a planned attack against Iran involving nuclear weapons greater credibility is a number of mysterious August 2007 purchases of a particular type of stock called 'put options' and 'call options' which are based on a dramatic shift in the U.S. stock market, 1 research.wtc7.net/sept11/stockputs.html"> LINK . The investments were so suspicious that they became subject to an insider trading investigation by U.S. Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) but the no one was ever identified or charged. This was despite a determined effort by the SEC to find who was behind the investments. The parallels with "put" and "call option" purchases just before 9/11 has led to speculation that the August billion dollar inves Iran's military infrastructure, or used in a False Flag operation that would have justified a U.S. assault on Iran. Admiral William Fallon, Commander of U.S. Central Command, was to direct conventional bombing operations against Iran's military infrastructure. The covert mission, however, would have had a different chain of command, where the Office of the Vice President was to take a prominent role. The nuclear weapons on the B-52 had adjustable yields between five and 150 kilotons which would have made them suitable in taking out Iran's deep underground nuclear facilities. The effect of tactical nuclear weapons to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities would have been devastating. Radioactive contamination would have dispersed widely affecting the health of millions in the region. At the same time, Iran's military and much of its civilian infrastructure would be destroyed by conventional munitions. This would have restricted Iran's abilities to cope with the health and humanitarian impact of the use of nuclear weapons, and destruction of itss. One question to be asked is who are the hidden investors with insider knowledge that stood to gain billions in short term profits from a possible attack against Iran?? This answer will give an important clue to the long term agenda being played out, and the principal actors involved. In the case of 9/11, similar investors were able to evade detection from an official investigation by the U.S. Securities Exchange Commission (SEC). The SEC launched an unprecedented investigation that deputized "hundreds, if not thousands, of key players in the private sector", LINK . According to former Los Angeles Police Officer, Michael Ruppert, what happens when individuals are deputized is that they are sworn to secrecy on national security grounds. This was a very effective way of keeping secret what was discovered in the SEC investigation. What is the most plausible explanation for the kind of investor that would have the power to subvert an SEC investigation in this manner? The most likely answer is the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). It has been alleged that CIA front companies annually supply funds for a black budget used to fund covert national security projects . The black budget has been estimated to range between 1.1 to 1.7 trillion dollars annually which is funnelled through the CIA to various military-corporate entities fulfilling such projects, LINK . Reportedly, a massive size black budget is needed to fund an alleged "second" Manhattan Project. Such alleged projects would be so deeply compartmentalized and classified, that most members of U.S. Congress would not be informed of their existence. The CIA is uniquely suited to perform this function of secretly raising revenue through the 1949 CIA Act which authorizes the CIA to expend funds "without regard to any provisions of law" (50USC 15:1.403f.a.1.). The CIA therefore does not have to follow any legal requirements for the funds it procures from various sources, and funnels to military-corporate entities directly responsible for the second Manhattan project. The discovery of the nuclear armed B-52 is likely to lead to an indefinite delay in plans for a pre-emptive military attack against Iran. There is nevertheless a need to expose the principle actors and the underlying agendas of those behind the covert plans to use nuclear weapons. It is also important to expose anonymous investors that intended to commercially profit from such an attack before September 21, and had insider knowledge of this. Former U.S. President Eisenhower had warned that an informed public is the best safeguard against unwarranted abuses of executive power. Arguably, a pre-emptive attack against Iran that does not have the support of the American people or U.S. Congress, would qualify for such an abuse. It appears that the period leading up to September 21, 2007 was to witness a pre-emptive attack against Iran, involving nuclear weapons loaded on at least one B-52 bomber. The humanitarian cost in terms of radioactive fallout, and casualties from the destruction of Iran's military and much of its civilian infrastructure would have been catastrophic for the Persian Gulf region (nuclear fallout would also subsequently circle the globe, which would be followed by the proliferation of related diseases and environmental problems adversely effecting all of humanity and other living species on Earth). Furthermore, the U.S. and global economy would have gone into a deep free fall in the event of dramatic increases in oil prices and further instability in the Middle East. Out of this planned tragedy, anonymous investors with possible CIA connections and insider knowledge, had the opportunity to plan for commercial profit. It is further alleged that financial proceeds would have been used to secretly fund an alleged second Manhattan Project that would-piggy back on the military execution of an aggressive neo-conservative agenda against Iran, in the Middle East geo-political milieu. Hopefully, the discovery of the nuclear armed B-52 has averted such a tragedy for the moment. Now is the time to consider the wisdom to consider allegations associated with an apparently aborted pre-emptive strike against Iran, and to make accountable all those who are responsible. About the author: Michael E. Salla, M.A. Ph.D., is a former Assistant Professor in the School of International Service, American University, Washington D.C. He is the author of five books and founder of the Exopolitics Institute, a 501(c)3 non-profit organization based in Kona, Hawaii. (This Institute is about how to make contact with Extraterrestrials) http://www.rense.com/general78/missn.htm Is USAF Stand Down To Find A Missing Nuke? Someone, operating under a special chain of command within the United States Air Force, just stole a nuclear weapon. By Chuck Simpson AboveTopSecret.com 9-12-7 Some History Barksdale Missile Number Six deserves far more public attention than it's received to date. Missile Number Six is potentially the major story of at least this year. Until 1968 under the Airborne Alert Program, informally called Operation Chrome Dome, the Air Force routinely kept about a dozen strategic bombers with nuclear weapons flying at all times. One predictable result was crashes and incidents. In 1968 the Department of Defense published a list of 13 serious nuclear weapons accidents that occurred between 1950 and 1968. In 1980 the list was revised to include 32 incidents through that year. Notably, the Pentagon has not acknowledged any accidents since 1980. This alone highlights the importance the Pentagon is placing on the recent transportation of nuclear weapons from North Dakota to Louisiana. Through 1968, several reported incidents involved plane crashes or malfunctions, beginning with the crash of a B-29 near Fairfield, California in August 1950. The resulting blast was felt 30 miles away. In July 1950 a B-50 crashed near Lebanon, Ohio. The high-explosive trigger for the nuclear weapon detonated on impact. The blast was felt over 25 miles away. In May 1957 a nuclear weapon fell from the bomb bay of a B-36 near Albuquerque, New Mexico. Parachutes malfunctioned and the weapon was destroyed on impact. In October 1957 near Homestead, Florida a B-47 crashed. The nuclear weapon was burned. In March 1958 a B-47 accidentally dropped a nuclear weapon near Florence, South Carolina. The high-explosive trigger detonated on impact. In November 1958 a B-47 crashed near Abilene, Texas. The trigger of the nuclear weapon exploded upon impact. In July 1959 a C-124 crashed near Bossier City, Louisiana. Both plane and nuclear weapon were destroyed. In October 1959 a B-52 with two nuclear weapons was involved in a mid-air collision near Hardinsburg, Kentucky. One weapon partially burned. In January 1961 a B-52 broke apart in mid-air near Goldsboro, North Carolina. Two nuclear weapons were released. The parachute on one weapon malfunctioned, and contamination was spread over a wide area. The uranium core was never recovered. Daniel Ellsberg reported that detonation was a very real risk because five of six safety devices failed. In that month near Monticello, Idaho a B-52 carrying nuclear weapons exploded in mid-air. No information was made available as to the weapons. In March 1961 a B-52 with two nuclear weapons crashed near Yuba City, California. In January 1964 a B-52 carrying two nuclear weapons crashed near Cumberland, Maryland. In January 1966 a B-52 carrying four hydrogen bombs crashed after a mid-air collision near Palomares, Spain. Two weapons exploded on impact, with resulting plutonium contamination. A months-long program was undertaken to locate and extract the other two weapons from the ocean. Major policy changes were taken under consideration. In January 1968 a B-52 carrying four hydrogen weapons crashed and burned near Thule AFB in Greenland. Explosives in one bomb detonated, spreading plutonium contamination. Apparently, the other three weapons have never been accounted for. Following large public protests Denmark, which owns Greenland and prohibits nuclear weapons on or over its territory, filed a strong protest. A few days later the Secretary of Defense ordered the removal of nuclear weapons from planes. After that order was issued, all aircraft armed with nuclear weapons were grounded but kept in a constant state of alert. In 1991 by Presidential order, nuclear weapons were removed from all aircraft. Bomber nuclear ground alerts, during which nuclear weapons are loaded onto bombers during test and training exercises, were halted. After that time, all nuclear weapons to be delivered by plane were permanently maintained in secure storage facilities. August 30, 2007 All of which makes the transport of nuclear weapons in combat position on a combat plane so newsworthy. On August 30, for the first time since 1968, nuclear warheads in combat position were carried by an American bomber. Numerous international treaty provisions were violated in the process. A total of 460 units were manufactured by Raytheon. A total of 394 units are currently maintained by the Air Force. Apparently, 38 are to be modernized and upgraded in Fiscal Year 2008 and the other 356 are to be decommissioned pursuant to the 2002 Moscow treaty. Raytheon has publicly announced the AGM-129 missiles are to be modified to accomplish a "classified cruise missile mission". This has widely been interpreted to mean conversion to bunker-busters, most likely for use in Iran. This widely accepted explanation is being used to explain why armed cruise missiles are being flown in American airspace. Nuclear Warheads The AGM-129 was specifically designed to deliver a W-80 nuclear warhead. The W-80 weapon has a variable yield capability, of 5 to 150 kilotons. For comparison purposes, the bomb used on Hiroshima was 13 to 15 kilotons, or equivalent to 13,000 to 15,000 tons of TNT explosive. News Stories and Flawed Explanations The story of the B-52 flight was first reported by Army Times, owned by Gannett, on Wednesday September 5. Gannett relied on information provided by "anonymous officers". The story was picked up by Yahoo Wednesday morning, published by USA Today and The Washington PosT, and then quickly spread. In response, the Pentagon quickly spread an official explanation. The Air Force admitted to an inadvertent error: The intent was to transport ACMs without weapons. According to military officers, the nuclear warheads should have been removed before the missiles were mounted on the pylons under the wings of the bomber. In the words of the Pentagon: "There was an error which occurred during a regularly scheduled transfer of weapons between two bases. The weapons were safe and remained in Air Force control and custody at all times." For almost the first time in the history of the nation, the military has publicly and promptly admitted it "made a mistake". This in itself is truly astounding. To reinforce the military's claim that a mistake was made, a system-wide stand-down was ordered for September 14. That official explanation was quickly explained away. The mistake was made intentionally, so a "deliberate leak" of a secret operation could occur. The CIA and the Office of Counter-Terrorism in the State Department explained that Barksdale AFB is a "jumping off point" for re-supply of the Middle East. The "deliberate leak" was intended to serve as a veiled warning to Iran. This deliberately misleading explanation is evidently intended to lead the public or Iran or both to logically conclude the missiles are bound for Iran. Bluntly, State and the CIA converted a whistleblower leak by true American patriots into a deliberate leak by official Washington, to scare Iran. By this means Washington has led the public to forget or overlook the real issue. To begin, the multiple official explanations reek to high heaven. They collectively read suspiciously like flimsy cover stories concocted in hasty desperation. And no amount of pretty lipstick will be able to make the official explanations pretty. Transportation Violations More conflicting explanations followed. These missiles are part of a group scheduled to be decommissioned. This would explain why they were shipped out of North Dakota. But the missiles were not transported on their way to decommissioning. Missiles are normally decommissioned at Davis-Monthan AFB at Tucson. Nuclear weapons are decommissioned at the Department of Energy's Pantex facility near Amarillo, Texas, accessed through Kirkland AFB in New Mexico. And military policy requires minimization of the number of flights made with nuclear weapons aboard. So the weapons should not have been mounted on the missiles, flown to Louisiana, un-mounted and flown to New Mexico. The mode of transportation is also a major issue not defused by official explanations. Per standard operating procedures, or SOPs, both missiles and nuclear warheads are transported primarily by air, in specially modified C-130s or C-17s. Under no peacetime circumstances do military SOPs allow transport of nuclear weapons mounted in cruise missiles mounted in combat positions on combat planes. Department of Defense Directive Number 4540.5, issued on February 4, 1998, regulates logistic transportation of nuclear weapons. By delegation of Commanders of Combatant Commands, movement of nuclear weapons must be approved by commanders of major service commands. Commanders of Combat Commands or service component commanders must evaluate, authorize and approve transport modes and movement routes for nuclear weapons in their custody. The Air Force is required to maintain a Prime Nuclear Airlift Force capability to conduct the logistic transport of nuclear weapons. Under SOPs, combat planes with combat-ready nuclear weapons can only be flown on the authority of the Commander in Chief, the Joint Chiefs of Staff or the National Military Command Authority. All of these transportation regulations were flagrantly violated on August 30. Handling Violations Violations of regulations concerning handling of the nuclear weapons in North Dakota are worse. A sophisticated computerized tracking system is used for nuclear weapons. Multiple sign-offs are required to remove the weapons from their storage bunkers. The AGM-129 Advanced Cruise Missile was designed to carry nuclear weapons. No non-nuclear warhead is available for this missile. So the only possible error could have been loading nuclear warheads on the missiles instead of practice dummies. The practice warheads have standard blue and yellow signs declaring "Inert, non-nuclear". The nuclear warheads have at least three distinctive red warning signs. This error is therefore highly improbable, absent tampering with signage. Nuclear weapons are transported from the storage bunker to the aircraft in a caravan that routinely includes vehicles with machine guns front and rear and guards with M-16s. All steps in the process are done under the watchful eyes of armed military police. Rules require that at least two people jointly control every step of the process. If one person loses sight of the other, both are forced to the ground face-down and temporarily "placed under arrest" by observant security forces. All progress stops until inspections are made to assure the weapons weren't tampered with. All nuclear weapons are connected to sophisticated alarm systems to prevent removal or tampering. They could only be removed from the storage bunker by turning the alarm off. And the squad commander clearly would not have authority to turn off the alarm. The Impossible Mistake Bluntly, the mistake of loading nuclear weapons on a combat aircraft in combat-ready position is simply not possible to make. Safeguards are far too stringent and far too many people would be involved. Particularly given that the mounting was in violation of policy that's been in place without exception for almost 40 years. No discipline is expected to be meted out. The New York Times tried to imply the commanding general had been fired. Actually, the squad commander in charge of munitions crews at Minot was "relieved of duty pending an investigation". He has not been removed from his position or disciplined. The crews involved have been "temporarily decertified pending corrective actions or additional training" but have not been disciplined. No mention has been made of the wing commander. Note carefully: These actions amount to nothing at all. The wing and squad commanders are still in place and the crews can easily be re-certified. Successful Confusion Washington's efforts to confuse the public have been successful. Attention has shifted from the crucial issue. This news has already become non-news. The August 14 stand-down will momentarily become news, followed by announcements of more stringent restrictions, improved safeguards and additional training. The public always has been and always will be safe. One of the major issues will be avoided: Someone in an irregular chain of Air Force command authorized loading and transport of nuclear weapons. And that would never have been done without a reason. Given the magnitude of regulatory violations involved, the reason must be extremely important. The paramount issue will be avoided, if necessary with repetition of the reassurance that the Air Force was in control at all times. The weapons were only missing during the 3.5-hour flight. At Barksdale, the missiles were considered to be unarmed items headed for modernization or the scrap heap, and of no particular importance. They were left unguarded for almost ten hours. According to one report, almost ten hours were required for airmen at Minot AFB to convince superiors that the nuclear weapons had disappeared. According to information provided to Congress, this time lapsed before airmen at Barksdale "noticed" the weapons were present. News reports will continue to overlook this fact also. Even here the focus is on time. The number of missiles and warheads issue was overlooked. Early news reports spoke of five nuclear warheads loaded onto the bomber. Apparently, this information was provided from Barksdale. That number was later updated to six weapons missing from Minot, apparently based on anonymous tips provided to Military Times by people at Minot. This information has also been forgotten. Conclusion Six nuclear weapons disappeared from Minot AFB in North Dakota. Five nuclear weapons were discovered at Barksdale AFB in Louisiana. Which leads to my chilling conclusion: Someone, operating under a special chain of command within the United States Air Force, just stole a nuclear weapon. What next? The answer has been provided several times, most recently by CIA Director and General Michael Hayden. On September 7, dressed in full military uniform, Hayden told assembled members of the Council of Foreign Relations: "Our analysts assess with high confidence that al-Qaida's central leadership is planning high-impact plots against the U. S. homeland." "We assess with high confidence that al-Qaida is focusing on targets that would produce mass casualties, dramatic destruction and significant aftershocks." An eye for an eye. Use of nukes will justify use of nukes. A perfect excuse to wage nuclear war against Iran. I suspect Hayden is absolutely correct, except for his mistaken identification of the "central leadership" that is planning detonation of a nuclear weapon on American soil. Air Force secretary being briefed on why B-52 flew nukes over U.S. Created: September 14, 2007 The week after a B-52 mistakenly loaded with nuclear weapons was flown to Barksdale Air Force Base, the secretary of the Air Force was to meet with officials at Minot Air Force Base, N.D., today to review procedures for handling nuclear weapons. Michael Wynne's visit comes amid an ongoing investigation into why the B-52 bomber from Minot was mistakenly armed with six nuclear warheads last month and flown across several states to Bossier City. The B-52 sat on a runway at Barksdale for 10 hours before it was discovered that six of the cruise missiles under its wings had nuclear warheads attached, Pentagon officials told members of Congress. "Secretary Wynne takes the recent breakdown in the munitions system very seriously and is committed to ensuring munitions processes are safe, secure and absolutely reliable," a statement from Minot said. All indications are that it was an "isolated mistake," Pentagon officials said. Air Force officials said the warheads were not activated and never posed a public threat. They also said they were concerned that the warheads were unaccounted for several hours while the bomber flew across the country. The B-52 was transporting a dozen cruise missiles to Barksdale. It happened on Aug. 30. (The Associated Press contributed to this report) Did Military Leak Foil Attempt To Bomb Iran? By Michael E. Salla, MA, PhD 9-16-7 Critically exploring whether or not there was a covert attempt to instigate a catastrophic nuclear war against Iran is illuminated through an introduction using the recent B-52 Incident. On August 30, a B-52 bomber armed with five nuclear-tipped Advanced Cruise missiles travelled from Minot Air Force base, North Dakota, to Barksdale Air Force base, Louisiana, in the United States. Each missile had an adjustable yield between five and 150 kilotons of TNT which is at the lower end of the destructive capacities of U.S. nuclear weapons. For example, the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima had a yield of 13 kilotons, while the Bravo Hydrogen bomb test of 1954 had a yield of 15,000 kilotons. The B-52 story was first covered in the Army Times on 5 September after the nuclear armed aircraft was discovered by Airmen. http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/09/marine_nuclear_B52_070904w/ What made this a very significant event was that it was a violation of U.S. Air Force regulations concerning the transportation of nuclear weapons by air. Nuclear weapons are normally transported by air in specially constructed planes designed to prevent radioactive pollution in case of a crash. Such transport planes are not equipped to launch the nuclear weapons they routinely carry around the U.S. and the world for servicing or positioning. The discovery of the nuclear armed B-52 was, according to Hans Kristensen, a nuclear weapons expert at the Federation of American Scientists, the first time in 40 years that a nuclear armed plane had been allowed to fly in the U.S. http://www.nti.org/d_newswire/issues/2007_9_5.html#149D6ECF Since 1968, after a SAC bomber crashed in Greenland, all nuclear armed aircraft have been grounded but were kept on a constant state of alert. After the end of the Cold War, President George H. Bush ordered in 1991 that nuclear weapons were to be removed from all aircraft and stored in nearby facilities. Recently, the Air Force began decommissioning its stockpile of Advanced Cruise missiles. The five nuclear weapons on the B-52 were to be decommissioned, and were to be taken to another Air Force base. An Air Force press statement issued on 6 September 2007, claimed that there "was an error which occurred during a regularly scheduled transfer of weapons between two bases." Furthermore, the statement declared: "The Air Force maintains the highest standards of safety and precision so any deviation from these well established munitions procedures is considered very serious." The issue concerning how a nuclear armed B-52 bomber was allowed to take off and fly in U.S. air space after an 'error' in a routine transfer process, is now subject to an official Air Force inquiry which is due to be completed by September 14. Three key questions emerge over the B-52 incident. First, did Air Force personnel at Minot AFB not spot the 'error' earlier given the elaborate security procedures in place to prevent such mistakes from occurring? Many military analysts have commented on the stringent security procedures in place to prevent this sort of mistake from occurring. Multiple officers are routinely involved in the transportation and loading of nuclear weapons to prevent the kind of 'error' that allegedly occurred in the B-52 incident. According to the U.S. Air Force statement, the commanding officer in charge of military munitions personnel and additional munitions airmen were relieved of duties pending the completion of the investigation. According to Kristensen, the error could not have come from confusing the Advanced Cruise Missile with a conventional weapons since no conventional form exists. So the munitions Airmen should have been easily able to spot the mistake. Other routine procedures were violated which suggests a rather obvious explanation for the error. The military munitions personnel were acting under direct orders, though not through the regular chain of military command. This takes me to the second question. Who was in Charge of the B-52 Incident? Who ordered the loading of Advanced Cruise missiles on to a B-52 in violation of Air Force regulations? The quick reaction of the Air Force and the issuing of a public statement describing the seriousness of the issue and the launch of an immediate investigation, suggests that whatever occurred, was outside the regular chain of military command. If the regular chain of command was violated, then we have to inquire as to whether the B-52 incident was part of a covert project whose classification level exceeded that held by officers in charge of nuclear weapons at Minot AFB. http://www.rense.com/general78/milleak.htm How Chinese Military Hackers Took Control of a Nuclear Loaded B-52 !!!! This is the case of the "Mistakenly Loaded" 6/5 ? Nuclear Cruise Missiles that caused a complete shutdown of the U.S. Air force on Sept.14 to do a survey of what happened. The answer The U.S. had China make custom made electronic chips for military computers (to save money ?) and the Chinese built in back doors where they could take control of the computers. Now the U.S. military will not know if an order to Nuke a target came from them or China. In case you missed this the first time around - Long But you Must read it. We are Toast ! Command Override How Chinese Military Hackers Took Control of a Nuclear Loaded B-52 !!!! Address: http://www.willthomasonline.net/willthomasonline/Command_Override.html It is the absolute responsibility of everybody in uniform to disobey an order that is either illegal or immoral." -General Peter Pace, Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff addressing the National Press Club, Feb 17/06 COMMAND OVERRIDE How Chinese Military Hackers Took Over A Nuclear-Armed B52 By William Thoma The story sounded like a sequel to "Dr. Strangelove". Leaked by the Pentagon's news service, Military Affairs to quell scuttlebutt racing through the ranks-and perhaps warn the world-a U.S. Air Force B-52 strategic bomber "mistakenly" loaded with six nuclear cruise missiles took off from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota on August 30, 2007 and flew for more than three hours over at least five states, before landing at Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. The mistake was so egregious, the National Command Authority comprising President George BU.S.h and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates were quickly informed. The SecDef has since been assured that nuclear weapons "were part of a routine transfer between the two bases... at no time was the public in danger." Both statements are false. In fact, nuclear weapons like these are carefully crated for shipment between bases, and placed inside the bomb bays or cargo compartments of transporting aircraft. In stunning contrast, this reporter has learned from two independent and highly placed sources that the six Advanced Cruise Missiles dangling from the B-52's fatigued and flexible wings were fully armed and ready to fire-except for a single fail/safe switch under the Command Pilot's control. The quickly blacked out episode has prompted an Air Force investigation. Gates, whose official defense computer was hacked last June, necessitating the shutdown of the entire SecDef network, has ordered daily briefings on the Air Force inquiry. The Minot base commander, who might turn out to be the hero in this frightening affair, was relieved of his command. DR. STRANGELOVE VISITS BOURBON STREET As far as anyone knows, no U.S. aircraft has ever been armed with a full wartime loadout of six nuclear weapons. "Nothing like this has ever been reported before and we have been assured for decades that it was impossible," declared Representative Markey, co-chair of the House Task Force on Nonproliferation. Hans Kristensen, an expert on U.S. nuclear forces, says he knows of no other publicly acknowledged case of live nuclear weapons being flown on bombers since the late 1960s. Director Stanley Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb" was released in 1964 Each of the six ACMs carried a "dialable" 150-kiloton W80-1 warhead--for a combined total of 60-times the destructive power of the bomb that melted the city and inhabitants of Hiroshima--over the unsuspecting residents of five states. Depending on the route flown, a half-dozen armed nuclear weapons wafted for three-and-a-half hours over North Dakota and either South Dakota or Minnesota, Nebraska or Missouri, Oklahoma or Arkansas, and Louisiana. It's no secret that Dick Cheney and his presidential surrogate intend to bomb Iran into the Kingdom to Come. But New Orleans? "What does the government have against Louisiana?" asked a blogger named Lobster Martini. TOUGH LOVE The "mistake" was supposedly discovered when the B-52 landed at Barskdale, where the plane should have been secured by an armed security detail. Instead, it simply parked on the flight line, where ground crew noticed the words "nuclear armed" stenciled on the sides of the missiles. Three officers confirmed the warheads were, in Bush's argot, "nucular." But the mission could have ended in a "broken arrow" nuclear calamity if the bomber had crashed, or inadvertently dropped its ordnance. Munitions, and even entire engines-such as the No. 1 turbine that fell off an American Airlines DC 10 after taking off from Chicago's O'Hare airport in May, 1979, killing two people on the ground and all 271 people onboard-occasionally drop from underwing pylons in flight. A few other examples: -- A B-36 ferrying a nuclear weapon from Biggs Air Force Base, Texas to Kirtland accidentally drops a bomb in the New Mexico desert. -- A fighter pilot accidentally dropped a BDU-33 dummy bomb into a house, narrowly missing a family of three. -- A 500-pound bomb fell from an FA-18 plane during a routine training exercise and exploded on the edge of a U.S. base 100 miles north of Sarajevo. -- A National Guard F-16 fighter jet on a nighttime training mission strafed an elementary school in New Jersey with 25 rounds of depleted uranium ammunition. -- Another U.S. Air Force practice bomb accidentally on the Yorkshire countryside in England. -- Electromagnetic interference from military transmitters may have caused an F-16 jet to accidentally drop a 500 pound bomb on rural West Georgia. A crash, mid-air explosion or structural breakup-not uncommon occurrences with heavily-laden B-52s-could have ignited the high explosives used to implode the warheads. The ultimate dirty bomber's fantasy could have seen plutonium--the deadliest substance ever conjured by humans-raining down over what would become a statewide "national sacrifice zone", off-limits to all life-forms for more than 4 billion years. Barksdale AFB is no stranger to nuclear accidents. On July 6, 1959, a C-124 "Flying Boxcar" crashed on takeoff, completely destroying the aircraft and the nuclear weapon it was carrying. ] PROTOCOLS The Air Combat Command has ordered a command-wide stand down for September 14, 2007 to "review procedures." Though they actually responded flawlessly to apparently authentic orders, the highly trained specialists who carried out the nuclear loadout have been temporarily "decertified" from handling nukes. Representative Ike Skelton, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, called the mishandling of arms capable of destroying cities "deeply disturbing. There is no more serious issue than the security and proper handling of nuclear weapons." The crewdogs who flew their assigned mission without mishap have been ordered not to mention that all pilots are required to perform a "walk around" inspection of their airplanes and calculate elaborate "weight-and-balance" graphs before attempting to aviate. Failure to notice or be informed of the much heavier nuclear casings on the missiles they were carrying would have jeopardized flight safety. According to a well-informed and extremely thorough U.S. military source I call "Hank" (with whom I have broken major stories over the past 15 years), someone "must have adjusted the bomber's balance. It had to have been done." In addition to knowing what is externally attached to their airplane, the amount of paperwork, signatures, and discrete passwords involved in releasing a nuclear weapon from its storage bunker and loading it onto an airframe are more formidable than flak. And there were six of them. PICKUP AND DELIVERY The coded message to upload and launch the B-52 from Minot with six live nuclear weapons carried the signature of the "football" containing the day's nuclear launch codes that is carried close to the president at all times by a specially detailed aide. After checking and counter-checking their coded orders, as few as a dozen people in uniform were actually involved in the subsequent secret nuclear mission. According to Hank, at least three high-ranking officers were escorted into Minot AFB's nuclear arms bunker after passing through multiple doors secured by pass codes, whose complete sequences were supplied each officer, who only knew part of each code. One hiccup, a fumbled code sequence, or "the wrong wrench" would have cancelled the loadout instantly. SAFETY FIRST Because the base had stood down for Labor Day, the timing was ideal for security. In his standing orders for August 30, 2007, 5th Bomb Wing commander Colonel Bruce Emig encouraged his troops to "Enjoy a safe Labor Day weekend. "Warbirds, It's hard to believe that Labor Day weekend is already here!" the colonel wrote. "Though cooler temperatures are right around the corner, the weather forecasters tell me that we should have a warm, summer-like weekend. Since Air Combat Command and Air Force Space Command have declared Friday a Family Day, many of you should be able to enjoy a nice, 4-day break as we transition from summer to fall. I wish all of you a relaxing and enjoyable time off, and urge you all once again to please keep safety in mind in all you do!" Under a bomber's nuclear umbrella in a discrete corner of the sprawling airbase, air, ground and ordnance crews did not converse with each other. Or anyone else. Everyone involved knew better than to ask questions that could abruptly end their careers by inadvertently tipping people who did not need to know. LOADOUT Within hours, an airplane with a wingspan longer than the Wright Brothers' first flight was safely loaded with avgas, sandwiches, and six nuclear weapons. Uploaded to the bomber using an accordion cradle on each missile trolley, each Advanced Cruise Missile was fueled once it was secured to a hard point under the aircraft's wings. Because the ACMs were not inside a bomb bay, where they could be armed in flight, each underslung missile had to be fully armed before takeoff. "Wing walker" is not a B-52 job description. The plates connecting the firing circuits of each warhead to the cockpit were then activated, and the safeties were pulled from each clearly marked "nuclear weapon"-rendering it "live". For the Explosive Ordnance Disposal detail who performed the loadout, there could be no doubt they were activating six nuclear weapons. Alarms on the flight line should have sounded as soon as they sniffed hot ions leaking from the pulled pile rods in six slowly fissioning warheads. But the alarms remain silenced. That order, Hank insisted, could only have come under the properly coded signature of the National Command Authority-Commander-in-Chief G.W. Bush or Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates. The ensuing takeoff was an event branded on the central nervous system of every creature in auditory range as eight jet engines at maximum takeoff thrust levitated six missiles, up to 46,000 gallons of fuel, and an airplane the length of a 150-foot ship into a blue yonder that had just become much wilder. Everyone within miles knew that a B-52 had come into Minot and taken off again. But only God and the devil knew where it was going. And they weren't saying. WHO DUNNIT? In the silence left by this momentous departure, if there were questions, nobody voiced them. Perhaps there were a few quietly delivered high-fives instead. Despite the high stress that runs counter to every human instinct, everyone involved had carried out their assigned duties with complete attention to the details required to launch a half-dozen live nuclear weapons "safely". The professionally conducted operation was carried off in complete secrecy, without a hitch, only after the loadout and launch order had been digitally confirmed as coming from the NCA. There was only one problem regarding the originators of those orders, Hank emailed me: "IT WAS NOT US." FAULTY (COMPUTER) TOWERS Let us quickly review. My earlier exclusive on my former website, willthomas.net, disclosed how in October 2006, North Korea's leaders asked China to take out Japan's shiny new recon satellite before it could be tasked by American officers to monitor Pyongyang's first atomic test. Blowing up someone's satellite is an act of war. But overriding its "Made In China" microchips with a remote command from the ground could never be proven. Even if no solar flares were recorded at the time. This first Chinese demo got the Pentagon's attention. After all, their stated goal of "Full Spectrum Dominance" over Earth's land, seas, airspace and electromagnetic spectrum depends on America's successful weaponization of space. But as the Joint Chiefs are only now discovering, many of the supposedly secure chips in America's civilian infrastructure-as well as all military communications, surveillance and weapons systems-have been "Wal-Marted" by U.S. corporations to low-bid Chinese suppliers-who rigged them for failure or takeover by "command override" in the event of war. "Faulty Microchips Threaten U.S. Attack On Iran" ] SEE DICK RUN The second demonstration of China's newfound capabilities to manipulate microchips came in late February 2007, when Dick Cheney's 757, flying home from Australia where the Vice President had not been well received by the locals, was forced to divert to Singapore. In a story intriguingly tagged, "U.S. Denies Cheney Forced To Land," Agence France-Presse reported that the White House admitted the Vice-President's "specially secured" Boeing 757 had "suffered electrical problems" before landing in Singapore. But Cheney spinner Lea Anne McBride insisted, "This was the preplanned, scheduled refueling stop. We were not diverted. The vice president did not get off the plane during his refueling stop." Wrong again. According to U.S. military personnel present on the tarmac at Paya Lebar Air Base-who according to Hank said were "trying to yak with the locals: 'Can you get us this part? Do you have a Radio Shack?'"-a small Chinese delegation met with Cheney outside his electronically-challenged aircraft. Wandering in and out of the brief conversation, Hank's sources described the brief encounter, which occurred shortly after 1400 hours Singapore time. Disembarking Air Force One, Cheney said something like, "Gosh, we got this kind of interesting problem..." "No, you don't understand sir," a Chinese official interrupted. "This is how we brought you here. And this is why." Cheney's visitors itemized the separately wired galley stoves, reading lights, in-flight video, and power outlets onboard the Vice President's aircraft that had all conked out in flight. They knew this, they said, because the electronic signals that had disabled the microchips controlling these various devices had been directed by their government. In an impressive feat, the Chinese military had located and selectively targeted a stealthy aircraft painted with radar-absorbent materials flying at nearly 500 knots at 35,000 feet without a public itinerary. According to Hank's boots-on-the-tarmac sources, the mostly one-way conversation in Singapore concerned "Gulf of Tonkin possibilities." "They reached out and touched someone," Hank related. "They had a message they wanted to get across: 'You've got ships out there in the Gulf. If this thing cooks off, all bets are off because some of the things that are put out there, we are really now wanting people to talk about.'" The Chinese were referring to their control of most of the microchips on this planet. A very thoughtful Dick Cheney departed two hours later. OPENING THE GATES The next Chinese digital demo came last June. In what came to be called "the most successful cyber attack ever mounted on the U.S. defence department," Chinese military hacked into a Pentagon computer network serving the defense secretary's personal office. Like their American counterparts, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) regularly probes U.S. military networks. But American officials said these latest cyber attack caused grave concern when China demonstrated it "could disrupt U.S. defenses systems at critical times." "The PLA has demonstrated the ability to conduct attacks that disable our system... and the ability in a conflict situation to re-enter and disrupt on a very large scale," revealed a former official, adding that the PLA has also penetrated the networks of U.S. arms corporations and war-launching think-tanks. A Chinese official named Jiang repeated his government's denial that it had penetrated other government and military computer networks. But British and German newspapers cited intelligence and other officials saying that government and military networks in Germany, the United States and Britain had been broken into by Chinese army hackers this summer. According to the Associated Press: "China's military has openly discussed using cyber attacks as a means of harrying or defeating a more powerful conventional military. In a 1999 paper on unconventional strategies titled 'Unlimited Warfare' two top Chinese military figures wrote that a hacker could have more power than a nuclear bomb." In a report this year, security software maker Symantec Corp. listed China as having the second most malicious computer activity in the world-after the United States. Speaking as a soldier, Hank commented, "The June hack showed an enormous hole in our ability to protect and communicate our information. LOST IN SPACE The next hack came almost immediately, when Russian computers controlling the International Space Station's orientation and supplies of oxygen and water inexplicably failed while the station's three crewmembers were hosting seven visiting shuttle astronauts. Among the station's network of six Russian computers, only two remained functioning. A system-wide re-boot usually resolved smaller hitches, But this time, the system was unable to re-boot. "A failure of this type has not occurred before," the BBC reported. "This is serious," stated James Oberg, a retired rocket scientist turned author and consultant. "These computers run their life support, so if they can't be restored, the space station could become uninhabitable." Oberg added, "Statistically, this is not random. There is some new environmental factor that must identified and isolated, and neither step is trivial." Russian flight controllers and onboard engineers traced the problem to "odd readings" in electrical power cables feeding the Russian computers through a corroded junction box labeled BOK 3. The gremlins returned to the Russian machines on February 5, when another ISS computer system crashed in the Zvezda Service Module that routes data between orientation sensors and four positioning gyroscopes. The space station's solar power stopped supplying power, and communications were cut with Earth. Though power and comms were restored three hours later, New Scientist reports, "The cause of the computer crash remains a mystery. NASA has so far not identified the cause of the crash." But Hank was on it. "They had limited oxygen, a limited time frame," he observed. The astronauts onboard the space station didn't know if the next computer malfunction "would open an airlock." But like an airliner in flight, the station should have smoothly shifted over to backup systems. It didn't. "The word 'redundancy' never got into the story," Hank pointed out. Instead, all three backup circuit boards wired into three isolated circuits, "had to blow out in the same way at the exact same time. The fault that occurred in the first board, the second board, and the third board all had to be the same damn thing at the same damn time." "Impossible," he declared. Especially, since each of the simultaneously faulty microchips had been "stress tested to hell and back. Except for internal stressors." Except for "Made In China" microchip mischief. While it is not yet confirmed that the February 5 microchip malfunction was related to the June 14 space station hack, according to Hank's sources, on that earlier date the Chinese pulled the equivalent of Cheney's Singapore diversion--in space. "Nobody got busted for it," he adds. "You always hear about the company at fault." Not this time. AC WE SEE While White House fundamentalists remained mesmerized by the firepower ostensibly under their command, Beijing kept trying to send a very different message. Their next installment came in early September 2007, when U.S. Air Force officers passed through multiple levels of security and entered the inner computer sanctum of America's Air and Space Command deep under Cheyenne Mountain. This digital repository stores regularly updates archives needed to execute "clean reinstalls" in case air force computer systems crash or are otherwise compromised. Entering the quietly humming room, the air force officers were shocked to see monitors aglow with light. The displays were supposed to be off. As they watched in shock and awe, randomly typed letters scrolled across a screen. The words were gibberish. But the message was heart-stoppingly clear: "We Can Play With Your Toys!" The sender "left breadcrumbs," Hank related. The deliberately attached ISP (Internet Service Provider) pointed to China. This was bad enough. But what really freaked out the officers was the realization that none of these "stand alone" machines was online. None of them contained a modem! The only way to access these machines, Hank revealed, is to "use the sneaker net to walk up to it and tap on the keyboard. And yet they were interacting, and they were doing it in real time. They fussed with our stuff. These guys were able to go into what was a stand alone system and take control of it." How did the PLA hack supposedly secure air force computers lacking network modems? Just like as select power companies can now pipe the Internet to home computers through electrical power lines, the Chinese were able to play on SAC's supposedly secure computers through the AC power cables connecting them to the national power... "grid". But how did they break supposedly "unbreakable" military encryption? And how were they able to transmit signals to override specific chips buried under a mountain of granite halfway around the globe? According to Hank, the International Space Station was not in line-of-sight with China when it's onboard computers and back-up systems simultaneously went down. HIT MAN When it comes to dialing up a bomber to drop nuclear weapons on another country, "It's kind of like hiring a hit man," Hank explained. You meet him in the parking lot with the assignment, a weapon, and cash. Later, you confirm that you haven't changed your mind. Then the mission proceeds, and either the target or the hit man is taken out. In the case of the mission out of Minot, the First Phase began with an initiation order authorizing weapons release to arm a B-52 specially flown in for this operation. Proper codes and paperwork provided the Pilot in Command with an initial heading to fly, and initial waypoints or nav points to punch into the plane's GPS. No destination was provided. The pilots were just supposed to get in and drive. They did. Once the B-52 was airborne, it flew into an electronic black hole. No electromagnetic emissions came from the bomber. There were no radio calls to home base asking, "Are you guys sure you really want to do this?" Even more startling, no coded IFF squawks identified the BUFF (Big Ugly Fat F---r) as friendly to prowling post-9/11 fighters. And no transponder beeps identified the airplane and its mission. This is not the normal procedure for transporting weapons, or flying a B-52 through heavily-trafficked air corridors over the Continental United States. Every aircraft flying at high altitudes over CONUS, (or through Controlled Airspace around airports at lower attitudes) must transmit their identity on an assigned transponder frequency. Commercial planes squawk in their own dialect. "When you're talking a government vehicle, like a C-130 , that's another level up," Hank noted. "It's a different kind of squawk. ATC knows how to treat that kind of traffic differently. A B-52 is another level up. Controllers don't see that every day. A C-5 -they really don't see that every day." The transponder code of the B-52 out of Minot would have prioritized it to civilian Air Traffic Control, and they would have cleared a corridor for its exclusive track-much like a presidential motorcade. If this Bad Boy had been transferring six advanced nuclear cruise missiles to Barksdale, as official spin insisted, its transponder would have squawked: "Hey, guess what? We've got nukes onboard! Make sure no one runs into us. And if this signal stops scramble recovery people wearing proper attire." Or code to that effect. But this did not happen. "The Situation Room in the White House was not stood up, but they still have people there,? Hank continued. ?One of their jobs is to track nuclear weapons. Somebody in that head shed should have seen a transponder code matched up with nuclear weapons loaded onto that aircraft. That should have been something that went up on the board. They would have known that a B-52 was getting a full loadout, and that all procedures had been followed. And someone else would have said, ' Mmm , six nukes. We'll keep an eye on it." And given an order for radar operators to push a button to highlight that particular blip. Instead, the blacked-out BUFF flew on. TARGET IRAN High in the stratosphere, where the nitrous oxide exhaust from eight fuel-hungry turbines attacked this planet's shredding ozone layer, boosting global warming another notch toward a catastrophic methane meltdown, wings never designed to carry heavy ordnance flexed up and down like a bird in flight. The crew must have considered the long roster of crashed Stratofortress with ?broken arrows? onboard. Not for a second could they forget that the six live nuclear weapons strapped to their wings were as close to detonation as a gremlin's wet dream. Or the fail-safe switch under the Plane Commander's gloves. An hour or two out of Minot, a bell chimed in the cockpit and a secure printer spat out a coded paper message. Even if they betrayed no emotion, the pilots must have felt a chill. Because the mission's next critical Fail-Safe had been passed. "We've thought about it, and the mission is still a go," the message essentially read. If these new orders had not been received, or had been issued incorrectly, the plane would have immediately turned back to the nearest base capable of handling its special needs. But their orders were in order. Positively authenticated by both pilots as coming from the NCA, the new message received onboard the bomber issued the radio frequencies, call signs and rendezvous coordinates for "hitting" one of three aerial refueling planes constantly orbiting over the Gulf of Mexico. Their new "Go Code" also identified their target region. After topping off their tanks, they were to take up a heading for another Gulf, half a world away. BLIND MAN'S BUFF Wouldn't the base commander, or the other officers involved in sending live nuclear weapons toward Iran have second thoughts about a strike that could trigger an even bigger political-military chain reaction? Not necessarily, Hank explained. Military leaders usually favor intimidation in place of bloodshed. If the Iranians could be dissuaded from acquiring a nuclear deterrent of their own, or decide to stop supplying their Shiite brothers next door with sophisticated shaped-charge rockets capable of penetrating the depleted uranium hides of M-1 Abrams tanks-terrific! Everyone involved in the mission must have hoped that in this high-stakes brinksmanship, when Iranian sensors picked up the radioactive signature of an inbound American nuclear bomber strike, the mullahs in Teheran would burn their Korans and turn to Jesus. On the other hand, how do you say "pissed off" in Persian? The mullahs might panic and start pushing buttons of their own. Especially when the Israeli Air Force was notified of the strike, and launched "supporting" fighter-bombers of their own. In any case, it was out of the hands of the base commander and his immediate superiors. Since any one of these key staff officers could conceivably be kidnapped or impersonated during a nuclear strike, none had the authority to issue a recall order. Even if someone in the chain of command issued an RTB (Return To Base), SAC bomber crews en route to the final IP coordinates to commence their attack are trained to ignore all such entreaties. In fact, a frantic "Come home for lunch," or "Call your wife" command would confirm for the crew that something really was amiss, and they were at war. In this way, a series of rote military assumptions can make an ash out of you and me. WHAT, ME WORRY? Meanwhile, the man under whose digitally coded authority this strike was being carried out, remained completely unaware that six nuclear cruise missiles with his name on them were headed toward Iran. Phase Three would have issued coded authorization to take out their assigned targets. One target confirmed by two highly placed, independent sources was a nuclear power plant hard against the mountains of Iran. "But the bomber would still have five missiles left. And it would not leave the area empty," Hank insisted. "If they go loaded for bear, they're not going to leave with a rabbit." After all, he added, a pre-BDA would have been done before launching the bomber "to determine how many it would take. And they needed six ?" Despite all the Hollywood hype, cruise missiles are notoriously inaccurate. Just ask the folks ducking strays in Kuwait or Iran. Still, a cruise missile striking within 30 miles would have taken out that Iranian power plant. But if the nuclear-tipped ACM had detonated over its pile? "Bad. Bad. Very bad," as Hank would say. Because the resulting electromagnetic pulses from such a synergistic chain reaction would have-- among other things--fried every unhardened Chinese microchip aboard every American ship, plane and vehicle in the Persian Gulf. "You don't have to sink the CAG, just turn it off," Hank said, referring to the formidable--yet completely microchip dependent--Carrier Air Group steaming off the coast of Iran. "Once they realized that these ships were just bobbing around out there," the bad guys would have "launched 10,000 rowboats" from surrounding shorelines to go play pirates. Was this why several Chinese Aegis destroyers were steaming in from the east about 250 nautical miles from the Straits of Hormuz? Was this why two or three Chinese submarines had been deployed to the area of the transiting destroyers the week before? Or were the two Chinese anti-aircraft destroyers part of an elaborate fail-safe in case the demonstration glitched and the bomber could not be recalled? Even if their anti-aircraft missiles could not reach the distant plane (easily tracked through its rigged Chinese chips), specific signals sent from the ship could have turned the plane around. Or its fuel off. What were the Chinese thinking? CHINESE CHECKERS Ever since Katrina, and the subsequent standing wave put up off the south coast of Africa by HAARP to deflect hurricanes from the U.S. Atlantic and Gulf Coasts, Beijing has felt under siege as earthquakes and wild, shipping-interrupting storms continue to be conducted "all the way to China" by the powerful Gakona, Alaskan transmitter. Three times, the Chinese have attempted to override HAARP. And failed. Elaborate demonstrations of their electronic warfare capabilities-- including fizzing circuits in space, and a face-to-face with the U.S. Vice-President in Singapore--had not persuaded American leaders to A: Refrain from hoisting a false flag over a Persian Gulf of Tonkin, and B: Turn HAARP off. Surely, Beijing must have reasoned, ordering a United State Air Force strategic bomber loaded out with six armed nuclear weapons to fly over the United States and then on towards Iran would conclusively demonstrate who was now in charge. "This op would not have 'Made In China' stamped all over it," Hank pointed out. "Instead, American bombs, American bombers and American systems were used." No matter how the mission had proceeded, if Washington had been forced to tell the world, "It wasn't us. We lost control of our bomber carrying six atomic warheads"--how would that have looked to a global audience already angry over America's misuse of its military might? Whatever Beijing's intentions, Hank was not the only person in the U.S. military to have his head rearranged by this latest Chinese demonstration. "They might have wanted to go all the way. Of they might have wanted to put pieces in play and see how far they could go," he surmised. "Maybe the Chinese started, and stopped it." Either way, the unauthorized Minot mission has bluntly shown the White House and the Pentagon: "If you start something, we can stop it. You no longer know how much control you have over your own weapons systems because we can play with them at will. No matter where you are, no matter what you're doing, if you're using our chips you are vulnerable. And you can't know if our Trojan chips are in your systems unless you tear apart every circuits in every surveillance, communications, weapons system, pipelines, telecom and power grid in your entire military and civilian inventory and look. And then dismantle every network they are connected to." "And one more thing," Beijing inferred, "If you take offense and pop off a missile, remember, we might make it do a loop-de-loop and come right back down on its originating silo." Hank and others in America's command hierarchy remain alarmed and puzzled-which makes them even more uneasy. Would China's leadership have precipitated a cloud of radioactive fallout downwind over their own population? Emphatically, yes . The country's generals have long counted an expendable population and land mass as key factors in "winning" a nuclear war. Best case scenario, this recent flight of fancy was a warning for Washington to chill the bomb Iran rhetoric, and dial down HAARP. "Maybe the Chinese got it right and they were just messin' with us," Hank mused. "Or they got it wrong, and something very bad almost happened. But why only one plane? Why stop there? It's a limited use of a system that is now exposed." But what can we do about it? And what a message it sent! "Cyber War"] RECALL Phase Three of the mission would have sent coded target grid coordinates and time(s) of weapon(s) release, as well as updates on weather over the area, enemy defense status and friendly escorts. Those orders never came. Instead, Phase Four was initiated. When the cockpit teleprinter spat out paper tape again, it read, in so many words: "Forget the whole thing. Abort the mission. Turn back." The only people capable of issuing a nuclear strike recall order would be the President, the Secretary of Defense, a specific designate of the SecDef authorized by special code. Or a Chinese military hacker. As Hank notes, "The plane had to be diverted to a base that could handle nuclear weapons." That would be Barksdale. But... "Live hot nukes would have tripped alarms on the tarmac when it touched down. Either they were nonfunctional on both ends , which is scary beyond belief considering what we're talking about." Or the Joint Chiefs or the NCA could have ordered the radiation sensors silenced to keep the mission-and the hijacked mission-under wraps. Or the Chinese could have turned them off. If the system is digital, Beijing probably controls it. Bottom line: if the incoming bomber had crashed approach, no one responding would have known they were dealing with a quiver-full of "broken arrows". BARKSDALE Thought the missiles were never launched, they still remain in play. As Hank worried, "Six nukes are now forward deployed to the air force base that handles Middle East ops." A former counter-terrorism expert with the CIA and the State Department shares his concern. Larry Johnson does not buy the official story that six nuclear weapons were "mistakenly" flown over the USA-not after a retired B-52 pilot reminded him. "The only time you put such weapons on a plane is when they are on alert, or if the crew has been tasked to move the weapons to a specific site." Besides running nuclear war exercises like the Global Guardian drill it ran on the morning of 9/11, Barksdale AFB deploys "heavies" to the Middle East. Like Hank, Johnson wants to know, "Why would we want to preposition nuclear weapons at a base conducting Middle East operations?" His pilot pal believes that an insider leaker tried to send up a bright red flag. Johnson asks, "Did someone at Barksdale try to indirectly warn the American people that the Bush Administration is staging nukes for Iran?" But Hank points out another problem. Cruise missiles-which are essentially autonomous, unpiloted drones-have special needs. Since six cruise missiles showing up at Barksdale were an oddity, can they be adequately stored and maintained there? The Gulf Coast is "a very different environment" than Nebraska, Hank emphasizes. How long is Barksdale going to hold onto them? In the hurricane season? "Are we going to see some of them floating out on the tide?" Hank wants to know. Americans need a big confirm that these weapons have been sent back north to a better home. Verify this story here 2007Audio: http://www.willthomasonline.net/willthomasonline/_RefFiles/B-52_takeoff.mp3 The Story That Never Was: The "Silencing" of the B-52 "Whistleblowers" by Timothy V. Gatto http://www.opednews.com It seems like somebody is throwing misinformation out to the Progressive community either to discredit us or to have us chase phony stories around that in effect, waste our time. I recently received information, and I see that many of us did, about the supposedly "dead" soldiers that helped to "out" the story on that B-52 that carried nuclear weapons from Minot AFB to Barksdale AFB. I heard about it from an e-mail that was sent by a good friend. Since I had just been burned by the "Amero" coin story in which I received information that the Denver mint had begun making "Amero's", I was suspicious and asked my friend to check his sources. Sure enough, my friend wrote that he had been duped again. The worst part of this saga is that he traced the story back to the same source that had released misinformation on the Amero! My source that I believe would rather be left nameless traced the original story that he got to another source. He actually called that source to find out where he got that information and it traced back to Hal Turner. The original article that wrote about the so-called "deaths" was on the Military Times website. Since Michael Hoffman wrote the article I called him today. Mr. Hoffman was very forthcoming and told me that he had two sources that told him about the story, and when he investigated it, he found that the two servicemen that perished, but that they had no connection whatsoever with the bomb-laden B-52. Mr. Hoffman also told me that he had received e-mail from Hal Turner about the article and he had advised Mr. Turner to remove the article from his website on the premise that he was disseminating fraudulent information. Apparently Hal Turner cares nothing for the truth as you can see here: http://www.halturnershow.com/index.html and that the story is still on his website. I have read a few articles, one here at Opednews.com that still maintain that the soldiers that turned the information over to the Military Times have been silenced...permanently. This is pure misinformation and Hal Turner along with all that jumped on this story should have checked their sources more thoroughly. This could have been a counter intelligence program designed to make anyone repeating this story look ridiculous. This isn't an isolated case. People that write articles should be very careful to check their sources, if at least two impeccable sources can't verify a story, that story should remain out of print until a second source has been verified. That's the way I see it. http://liberalpro.blogspot.com Former Chairman of the Liberal Party of America, Tim is a retired Army Sergeant. He currently lives in South Carolina. A regular contributor to OpEdNews, he is the author of Kimchee Kronicles and is currently at work on a new novel. Contact Author B-52 Nuke-Involved Airman Murdered? No Cause Of Death Listed Our Thanks To Ted Twietmeyer For Locating Airman Todd Blue's Obituary 9-17-7 Todd Alexander Blue Todd Alexander Blue, of Wytheville, Va. was born August 13, 1987 in Washington, D.C. to John Briggs and Patricia Blue. He departed this life on September 10, 2007. Todd graduated from George Wythe High School in 2005. After high school, he enlisted into the U.S. Air Force. While serving in the Air Force, Todd received many honors. He was stationed at Minot Air Force Base in Minot, N.D. Todd leaves behind lots of great memories of him. He was a star athlete in track and field and football. He was very outgoing, ambitious, and great with helping others deal with hard situations. He was preceded in death by his grandfather, Mr. Clarence Blue, Sr. He leaves to cherish his memory his mother, Patricia Blue; his father, John Briggs and stepmother, Faith Briggs; one sister, Alvina Blue; two brothers, Bryan Blue and Patrick Bryant; three wonderful grandmothers, Ms. Sarah C. Blue, Mrs. Mildred Patterson, and Mrs. Remonia Haskins; two grandfathers, Mr. Willie Patterson and Mr. Cecil Haskins; ten aunts; four uncles; one niece; two nephews; and many other friends and family. A memorial service will be held at 3 p.m. on Sunday, September 16, 2007 at Bethel A.M.E. Church, 635 E. Main Street, Wytheville, Va. with the Reverend Daryl E. Beamer, Sr. officiating. Interment will take place at Arlington National Cemetery in Washington D.C. Arrangements entrusted to Penn's Funeral Home, Pulaski. Published in the Roanoke Times on 9/14/2007. http://www.legacy.com/roanoke/obituaries.asp?Page=SearchResults http://www.rense.com/general78/death.htm WASHINGTON D.C. - Retired General To Investigate B-52 Nuclear Mistake Sep 21, 2007 08:08 AM PST Defense Secretary Robert Gates has asked a retired general who once commanded the nation's fleet of B-52s to lead an outside inquiry into how one of the bombers was mistakenly armed with nuclear weapons. Gates' press secretary, Geoff Morrell, says the defense chief has asked former Air Force Chief of Staff Larry Welch to lead the investigation. That's in addition to the Air Force's own investigation, which began three weeks ago. The B-52 in question was mistakenly armed with six nuclear-tipped cruise missiles when it flew from Minot Air Force Base, in North Dakota to Barksdale Air Force Base on August 30th. The missiles were mounted onto pylons under the bomber's wings, but the Air Force says there was never any danger to the public. Morrell says Welch will lead a Defense Science Board task force to determine whether the B-52 incident has wider implications for the military. (Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.) Gates Seeks 2nd Inquiry of Bomber Mishap By ROBERT BURNS - 1 day ago WASHINGTON (AP) - Three weeks after the Air Force began investigating the mistaken arming of a B-52 bomber with nuclear weapons, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has asked for an outside inquiry led by a retired general who once commanded the strategic bomber fleet, an official said Thursday. In the embarrassing incident, a B-52 mistakenly armed with six nuclear-tipped cruise missiles flew from Minot Air Force Base, N.D., to Barksdale Air Force Base, La., on Aug. 30. The missiles were mounted onto pylons under the bomber's wings, but the Air Force said there was never any danger to the public. The mistake, revealed publicly by the Military Times newspapers, was so serious that President Bush and Gates were quickly informed and Gates has received regular updates from the Air Force on progress in its investigation. Gates's press secretary, Geoff Morrell, told reporters that the defense chief asked Larry Welch, a former Air Force chief of staff, to lead an inquiry into the implications of the incident. That is in addition to the existing Air Force probe headed by Maj. Gen. Douglas Raaberg, director of air and space operations at Air Combat Command, which is responsible for all Air Force bombers and fighters. Morrell said Welch will lead a Defense Science Board task force to determine whether the B-52 incident has wider implications for the military. "Does this incident reflect a larger problem with regard to the security and transfer of munitions?" is the question that Welch's group will attempt to answer, Morrell said. The Defense Science Board is a standing committee of outside experts, including retired military officers and former government officials, that advises the secretary of defense on a wide range of national security issues. Asked why Gates felt it necessary to launch another inquiry into the matter, Morrell said it did not reflect any dissatisfaction with the way the Air Force is conducting its investigation. "But I think he believes that in an incident of this nature, it's important to get to the bottom of it," Morrell said. "And he believes an outside set of eyes may be additionally helpful to, sort of, get a better sense of what went wrong and how to avoid similar mistakes in the future." An Air Force spokesman, Lt. Col. Edward Thomas, said his service's probe should be done within several weeks. "Our response has been swift and focused," Thomas said. The weapon involved in the Aug. 30 incident was the Advanced Cruise Missile, a "stealth" weapon developed in the 1980s with the ability to evade detection by Soviet radars. The Air Force said in March that it had decided to retire the Advanced Cruise Missile fleet in the near future. Welch is president and chief executive officer of the Institute for Defense Analysis, which administers three federally funded research centers that do analytical work for the Defense Department. Welch retired from the Air Force in 1990 after serving as its chief of staff. He previously was commander of Strategic Air Command, which operated the bomber fleet and was dissolved when an Air Force reorganization created Air Combat Command to operate all of its combat aircraft. On the Net: Defense Science Board at: http://www.acq.osd.mil/dsb/ B-52 bomber at: http://www.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id83 MSNBC.com -Outside inquiry for nuke mishap Former Air Force official to head investigation into B-52 bomber incident The Associated Press Updated: 6:52 p.m. CT Sept 20, 2007 WASHINGTON - Three weeks after the Air Force began investigating the mistaken arming of a B-52 bomber with nuclear weapons, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has asked for an outside inquiry led by a retired general who once commanded the strategic bomber fleet, an official said Thursday. In the embarrassing incident, a B-52 mistakenly armed with six nuclear-tipped cruise missiles flew from Minot Air Force Base, N.D., to Barksdale Air Force Base, La., on Aug. 30. The missiles were mounted onto pylons under the bomber's wings, but the Air Force said there was never any danger to the public. The mistake, revealed publicly by the Military Times newspapers, was so serious that President Bush and Gates were quickly informed and Gates has received regular updates from the Air Force on progress in its investigation. Gates's press secretary, Geoff Morrell, told reporters that the defense chief asked Larry Welch, a former Air Force chief of staff, to undertake a review of the incident. That is in addition to the existing Air Force probe headed by Maj. Gen. Douglas Raaberg, director of air and space operations at Air Combat Command, which is responsible for all Air Force bombers and fighters. Asked why Gates felt it necessary to launch an independent review of the incident, Morrell said it did not reflect any dissatisfaction with the way the Air Force is conducting its investigation. "But I think he believes that in an incident of this nature, it's important to get to the bottom of it," Morrell said. "And he believes an outside set of eyes may be additionally helpful to, sort of, get a better sense of what went wrong and how to avoid similar mistakes in the future." An Air Force spokesman, Lt. Col. Edward Thomas, said his service's probe should be done within several weeks. "Our response has been swift and focused," Thomas said. The weapon involved in the Aug. 30 incident was the Advanced Cruise Missile, a "stealth" weapon developed in the 1980s with the ability to evade detection by Soviet radars. The Air Force said in March that it had decided to retire the Advanced Cruise Missile fleet in the near future. Ex-Air Force official's background Welch is president and chief executive officer of the Institute for Defense Analysis, which administers three federally funded research centers that do analytical work for the Defense Department. He also is a member of the Defense Science Board, which advises the secretary of defense on technical matters. A spokeswoman for Welch, Amy Cohen at the Institute for Defense Analysis, said Welch told her that his review of the B-52 incident was under the auspices of the Defense Science Board, but he did not elaborate on precisely what the board had been asked to do. Welch retired from the Air Force in 1990 after serving as its chief of staff. He previously was commander of Strategic Air Command, which operated the bomber fleet and was dissolved when an Air Force reorganization created Air Combat Command to operate all of its combat aircraft. (c) 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20894747/ Mystery surrounds deaths of Minot airmen Sat, 22 Sep 2007 23:10:30 Six members of the US Air Force who were involved in the Minot AFB incident, have died mysteriously, an anti-Bush activist group says. The incident happened when a B-52 bomber was "mistakenly" loaded with six nuclear warheads and flown for more than three hours across several states, prompting an Air Force investigation and the firing of one commander. The plane was carrying Advanced Cruise Missiles from Minot Air Force Base, N.D, to Barksdale Air Force Base on August 30. The Air Combat Command has ordered a command-wide stand down on September 14 to review procedures, officials said. The missiles, which are being decommissioned, were mounted onto pylons on the bomber's wings and it is unclear why the warheads had not been removed beforehand. In addition to the munitions squadron commander who was relieved of his duties, crews involved in the incident, including ground crew workers had been temporarily decertified for handling munitions. The activist group Citizens for Legitimate Government said the six members of the US Air Force who were directly involved as loaders or as pilots, were killed within 7 days in 'accidents'. The victims include Airman First Class Todd Blue, 20, who died while on leave in Virginia. A statement by the military confirmed his death but did not say how he died. In another accident, a married couple from Barksdale Air Force Base were killed in the 5100 block of Shreveport-Blanchard Highway. The two were riding a 2007 Harley-Davidson motorcycle, with the husband driving and the wife the passenger, police said. "They were traveling behind a northbound Pontiac Aztec driven by Erica Jerry, 35, of Shreveport," the county sheriff said. "Jerry initiated a left turn into a business parking lot at the same time the man driving the motorcycle attempted to pass her van on the left in a no passing zone. They collided." Adam Barrs, a 20-year-old airman from Minot Air Force Base was killed in a crash on the outskirts of the city. First Lt. Weston Kissel, 28, a Minot Air Force Base bomber pilot, was killed in a motorcycle crash in Tennessee, the military officials say. Police found the body of a missing Air Force captain John Frueh near Badger Peak in northeast Skamania County, Washington. The Activist group says the mysterious deaths of the air force members could indicate to a conspiracy to cover up the truth about the Minot Air Base incident. The saga of a 'Bent Spear' 6 nukes fly across U.S.; no one notices for 36 hours - how could it happen? Sept 22, 2007 Just after 9 a.m. on Aug. 29, a group of U.S. airmen entered a sod-covered bunker on North Dakota 's Minot Air Force Base with orders to collect a set of unarmed cruise missiles bound for a weapons graveyard. They quickly pulled out a dozen cylinders, all of which appeared identical from a cursory glance, and hauled them along Bomber Boulevard to a waiting B-52 bomber. The airmen attached the gray missiles to the plane's wings, six on each side. After eyeballing the missiles on the right side, a flight officer signed a manifest that listed a dozen unarmed AGM-129 missiles. The officer did not notice that the six on the left contained nuclear warheads, each with the destructive power of up to 10 Hiroshima bombs. That detail would escape notice for an astounding 36 hours, during which the missiles were flown across the country to a Louisiana air base that had no idea nuclear warheads were coming. It was the first known flight by a nuclear-armed bomber over U.S. airspace, without special high-level authorization, in nearly 40 years. The episode, serious enough to trigger a rare "Bent Spear" nuclear incident report that raced through the chain of command to Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and President Bush , provoked new questions inside and outside the Pentagon about the adequacy of U.S. nuclear weapons safeguards while the military's attention and resources are devoted to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan . Three weeks after word of the incident leaked to the public, new details obtained by The Washington Post point to security failures at multiple levels in North Dakota and Louisiana, according to interviews with current and former U.S. officials briefed on the initial results of an Air Force investigation of the incident. The warheads were attached to the plane in Minot without special guard for more than 15 hours, and they remained on the plane in Louisiana for nearly nine hours more before being discovered. In total, the warheads slipped from the Air Force's nuclear safety net for more than a day without anyone's knowledge. "I have been in the nuclear business since 1966 and am not aware of any incident more disturbing," retired Air Force Gen. Eugene Habiger, who served as U.S. Strategic Command chief from 1996 to 1998, said in an interview. A simple error in a missile storage room led to missteps at every turn, as ground crews failed to notice the warheads, and as security teams and flight crew members failed to provide adequate oversight and check the cargo thoroughly. An elaborate nuclear safeguard system, nurtured during the Cold War and infused with rigorous accounting and command procedures, was utterly debased, the investigation's early results show. The incident came on the heels of multiple warnings - some of which went to the highest levels of the Bush administration , including the National Security Council - of security problems at Air Force installations where nuclear weapons are kept. The risks are not that warheads might be accidentally detonated, but that sloppy procedures could leave room for theft or damage to a warhead, disseminating its toxic nuclear materials. A former National Security Council staff member with detailed knowledge described the event as something that people in the White House "have been assured never could happen." What occurred on Aug. 29-30, the former official said, was "a breakdown at a number of levels involving flight crew, munitions, storage and tracking procedures - faults that never were to line up on a single day." Missteps in the bunker The air base where the incident took place is one of the most remote and, for much of the year, coldest military posts in the continental United States . Veterans of Minot typically describe their assignments by counting the winters passed in the flat, treeless region where January wind chills sometimes exceed 100 degrees below zero. In airman-speak, a three-year assignment becomes "three winters" at Minot. The daily routine for many of Minot's crews is a cycle of scheduled maintenance for the base's 35 aging B-52H Stratofortress bombers - mammoth, eight-engine workhorses, the newest of which left the assembly line more than 45 years ago. Workers also tend to 150 intercontinental ballistic missiles kept at the ready in silos scattered across neighboring cornfields, as well as hundreds of smaller nuclear bombs, warheads and vehicles stored in sod-covered bunkers called igloos. "We had a continuous workload in maintaining" warheads, said Scott Vest, a former Air Force captain who spent time in Minot's bunkers in the 1990s. "We had a stockpile of more than 400 . . . and some of them were always coming due" for service. Among the many weapons and airframes, the AGM-129 cruise missile was well known at the base as a nuclear warhead delivery system carried by B-52s. With its unique shape and design, it is easily distinguished from the older AGM-86, which can be fitted with either a nuclear or a conventional warhead. Last fall, after 17 years in the U.S. arsenal, the Air Force's more than 400 AGM-129s were ordered into retirement by then- Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld . Minot was told to begin shipping out the unarmed missiles in small groups to Barksdale Air Force Base near Shreveport , La., for storage. By Aug. 29, its crews had already sent more than 200 missiles to Barksdale and knew the drill by heart. The Air Force's account of what happened that day and the next was provided by multiple sources who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the government's investigation is continuing and classified. At 9:12 a.m. local time on Aug. 29, according to the account, ground crews in two trucks entered a gated compound at Minot known as the Weapons Storage Area and drove to an igloo where the cruise missiles were stored. The 21-foot missiles were already mounted on pylons, six apiece in clusters of three, for quick mounting to the wings of a B-52. The AGM-129 is designed to carry silver W-80-1 nuclear warheads, which have a variable yield of between 5 and 150 kilotons. (A kiloton is equal to the explosive force of 1,000 tons of TNT.) The warheads were meant to have been removed from the missiles before shipment. In their place, crews were supposed to insert metal dummies of the same size and weight, but a different color, so the missiles could still be properly attached under the bomber's wings. A munitions custodian officer is supposed to keep track of the nuclear warheads. In the case of cruise missiles, a stamp-size window on the missile's frame allows workers to peer inside to check whether the warheads within are silver. In many cases, a red ribbon or marker attached to the missile serves as an additional warning. Finally, before the missiles are moved, two-man teams are supposed to look at check sheets, bar codes and serial numbers denoting whether the missiles are armed. Why the warheads were not noticed in this case is not publicly known. But once the missiles were certified as unarmed, a requirement for unique security precautions when nuclear warheads are moved - such as the presence of specially armed security police, the approval of a senior base commander and a special tracking system - evaporated. The trucks hauled the missile pylons from the bunker into the bustle of normal air base traffic, onto Bomber Boulevard and M Street, before turning onto a tarmac apron where the missiles were loaded onto the B-52. The loading took eight hours because of unusual trouble attaching the pylon on the right side of the plane - the one with the dummy warheads. By 5:12 p.m., the B-52 was fully loaded. The plane then sat on the tarmac overnight without special guards, protected for 15 hours by only the base's exterior chain-link fence and roving security patrols. Air Force rules required members of the jet's flight crew to examine all of the missiles and warheads before the plane took off. But in this instance, just one person examined only the six unarmed missiles and inexplicably skipped the armed missiles on the left, according to officials familiar with the probe. "If they're not expecting a live warhead it may be a very casual thing - there's no need to set up the security system and play the whole nuclear game," said Vest, the former Minot airman. "As for the air crew, they're bus drivers at this point, as far as they know." The plane, which had flown to Minot for the mission and was not certified to carry nuclear weapons, departed the next morning for Louisiana. When the bomber landed at Barksdale at 11:23 a.m., the air crew signed out and left for lunch, according to the probe. It would be another nine hours - until 8:30 p.m. - before a Barksdale ground crew turned up at the parked aircraft to begin removing the missiles. At 8:45, 15 minutes into the task, a separate missile transport crew arrived in trucks. One of these airmen noticed something unusual about the missiles. Within an hour, a skeptical supervisor had examined them and ordered them secured. By then it was 10 p.m., more than 36 hours after the warheads left their secure bunker in Minot. Once the errant warheads were discovered, Air Force officers in Louisiana were alarmed enough to immediately notify the National Military Command Center, a highly secure area of the Pentagon that serves as the nerve center for U.S. nuclear war planning. Such "Bent Spear" events are ranked second in seriousness only to "Broken Arrow" incidents, which involve the loss, destruction or accidental detonation of a nuclear weapon. The Air Force decided at first to keep the mishap under wraps, in part because of policies that prohibit the confirmation of any details about the storage or movement of nuclear weapons. No public acknowledgement was made until service members leaked the story to the Military Times, which published a brief account Sept. 5. Officials familiar with the Bent Spear report say Air Force officials apparently did not anticipate that the episode would cause public concern. One passage in the report contains these four words: "No press interest anticipated." How could so much break down at once? The news, when it did leak, provoked a reaction within the defense and national security communities that bordered on disbelief: How could so many safeguards, drilled into generations of nuclear weapons officers and crews, break down at once? Military officers, nuclear weapons analysts and lawmakers have expressed concern that it was not just a fluke, but a symptom of deeper problems in the handling of nuclear weapons now that Cold War anxieties have abated. "It is more significant than people first realized, and the more you look at it, the stranger it is," said Joseph Cirincione, director for nuclear policy at the Center for American Progress think tank and the author of a history of nuclear weapons. "These weapons - the equivalent of 60 Hiroshimas - were out of authorized command and control for more than a day." The Air Force has sought to offer assurances that its security system is working. Within days, the service relieved one Minot officer of his command and disciplined several airmen, while assigning a major general to head an investigation that has already been extended for extra weeks. At the same time, Defense Department officials have announced that a Pentagon-appointed scientific advisory board will study the mishap as part of a larger review of procedures for handling nuclear weapons. "Clearly this incident was unacceptable on many levels," said an Air Force spokesman, Lt. Col. Edward Thomas. "Our response has been swift and focused - and it has really just begun. We will spend many months at the air staff and at our commands and bases ensuring that the root causes are addressed." While Air Force officials see the Minot event as serious, they also note that it was harmless, since the six nuclear warheads never left the military's control. Even if the bomber had crashed, or if someone had stolen the warheads, fail-safe devices would have prevented a nuclear detonation. But independent experts warn that whenever nuclear weapons are not properly safeguarded, their fissile materials are at risk of theft and diversion. Moreover, if the plane had crashed and the warheads' casings cracked, these highly toxic materials could have been widely dispersed. "When what were multiple layers of tight nuclear weapon control internal procedures break down, some bad guy may eventually come along and take advantage of them," said a former senior administration official who had responsibility for nuclear security. Some Air Force veterans say the base's officers made an egregious mistake in allowing nuclear-warhead-equipped missiles and unarmed missiles to be stored in the same bunker, a practice that a spokesman last week confirmed is routine. Charles Curtis, a former deputy energy secretary in the Clinton administration , said, "We always relied on segregation of nuclear weapons from conventional ones." Former nuclear weapons officials have noted that the weapons transfer at the heart of the incident coincides with deep cuts in deployed nuclear forces that will bring the total number of warheads to as few as 1,700 by the year 2012 - a reduction of more than 50 percent from 2001 levels. But the downsizing has created new accounting and logistical challenges, since U.S. policy is to keep thousands more warheads in storage, some as a strategic reserve and others awaiting dismantling. A secret 1998 history of the Air Combat Command warned of "diminished attention for even 'the minimum standards' of nuclear weapons' maintenance, support and security" once such arms became less vital, according to a declassified copy obtained by Hans Kristensen, director of the Federation of American Scientists' nuclear information project. The Air Force's inspector general in 2003 found that half of the "nuclear surety" inspections conducted that year resulted in failing grades - the worst performance since inspections of weapons-handling began. Minot's 5th Bomb Wing was among the units that failed, and the Louisiana-based 2nd Bomb Wing at Barksdale garnered an unsatisfactory rating in 2005. Both units passed subsequent nuclear inspections, and Minot was given high marks in a 2006 inspection. The 2003 report on the 5th Bomb Wing attributed its poor performance to the demands of supporting combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Wartime stresses had "resulted in a lack of time to focus and practice nuclear operations," the report stated. Last year, the Air Force eliminated a separate nuclear-operations directorate known informally as the N Staff, which closely tracked the maintenance and security of nuclear weapons in the United States and other NATO countries. Currently, nuclear and space operations are combined in a single directorate. Air Force officials say the change was part of a service-wide reorganization and did not reflect diminished importance of nuclear operations. 'What the hell happened here?' "Where nuclear weapons have receded into the background is at the senior policy level, where there are other things people have to worry about," said Linton F. Brooks, who resigned in January as director of the National Nuclear Security Administration. Brooks, who oversaw billions of dollars in U.S. spending to help Russia secure its nuclear stockpile, said the mishandling of U.S. warheads indicates that "something went seriously wrong." A similar refrain has been voiced hundreds of times in blogs and chat rooms popular with former and current military members. On a Web site run by the Military Times, a former B-52 crew chief who did not give his name wrote: "What the hell happened here?" A former Air Force senior master sergeant wrote separately that "mistakes were made at the lowest level of supervision and this snowballed into the one of the biggest mistakes in USAF history. I am still scratching my head wondering how this could happened." (c) 2007 The Washington Post Company Subject: B-52 Nukes Were Headed for Iran: Airforce Refused -- SPECIAL REPORT -- Air Force refused to fly weapons to Middle East theater By Wayne Madsen Sept. 24, 2007 Author's website WMR has learned from U.S. and foreign intelligence sources that the B-52 transporting six stealth AGM-129 Advanced Cruise Missiles, each armed with a W-80-1 nuclear warhead, on August 30, were destined for the Middle East via Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana. However, elements of the Air Force, supported by U.S. intelligence agency personnel, successfully revealed the ultimate destination of the nuclear weapons and the mission was aborted due to internal opposition within the Air Force and U.S. Intelligence Community. Yesterday, the /Washington Post/ attempted to explain away the fact that America's nuclear command and control system broke down in an unprecedented manner by reporting that it was the result of "security failures at multiple levels." It is now apparent that the command and control breakdown, reported as a BENT SPEAR incident to the Secretary of Defense and White House, was not the result of a command and control chain-of-command "failures" but the result of a revolt and push back by various echelons within the Air Force and intelligence agencies against a planned U.S. attack on Iran using nuclear and conventional weapons. The /Washington Post/ story on BENT SPEAR may have actually been an effort in damage control by the Bush administration. WMR has been informed by a knowledgeable source that one of the six nuclear-armed cruise missiles was, and may still be, unaccounted for. In that case, the nuclear reporting incident would have gone far beyond BENT SPEAR to a National Command Authority alert known as EMPTY QUIVER, with the special classification of PINNACLE. Just as this report was being prepared, /Newsweek/ reported that Vice President Dick Cheney's recently-departed Middle East adviser, David Wurmser, told a small group of advisers some months ago that Cheney had considered asking Israel to launch a missile attack on the Iranian nuclear site at Natanz. Cheney reasoned that after an Iranian retaliatory strike, the United States would have ample reasons to launch its own massive attack on Iran. However, plans for Israel to attack Iran directly were altered to an Israeli attack on a supposed Syrian-Iranian-North Korean nuclear installation in northern Syria. WMR has learned that a U.S. attack on Iran using nuclear and conventional weapons was scheduled to coincide with Israel's September 6 air attack on a reputed Syrian nuclear facility in Dayr az-Zwar, near the village of Tal Abyad, in northern Syria, near the Turkish border. Israel's attack, code named OPERATION ORCHARD, was to provide a reason for the U.S. to strike Iran. The neo-conservative propaganda onslaught was to cite the cooperation of the George Bush's three remaining "Axis of Evil" states -- Syria, Iran, and North Korea -- to justify a sustained Israeli attack on Syria and a massive U.S. military attack on Iran. WMR has learned from military sources on both sides of the Atlantic that there was a definite connection between Israel's OPERATION ORCHARD and BENT SPEAR involving the B-52 that flew the six nuclear-armed cruise missiles from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota to Barksdale. There is also a connection between these two events as the Pentagon's highly-classified PROJECT CHECKMATE, a compartmented U.S. Air Force program that has been working on an attack plan for Iran since June 2007, around the same time that Cheney was working on the joint Israeli-U.S. attack scenario on Iran. PROJECT CHECKMATE was leaked in an article by military analyst Eric Margolis in the Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper, the /Times of London/, is a program that involves over two dozen Air Force officers and is headed by Brig. Gen. Lawrence Stutzriem and his chief civilian adviser, Dr. Lani Kass, a former Israeli military intelligence officer who, astoundingly, is now involved in planning a joint U.S.-Israeli massive military attack on Iran that involves a "decapitating" blow on Iran by hitting between three to four thousand targets in the country. Stutzriem and Kass report directly to the Air Force Chief of Staff, General Michael Moseley, who has also been charged with preparing a report on the B-52/nuclear weapons incident. Kass' area of speciality is cyber-warfare, which includes ensuring "information blockades," such as that imposed by the Israeli government on the Israeli media regarding the Syrian air attack on the alleged Syrian "nuclear installation." British intelligence sources have reported that the Israeli attack on Syria was a "true flag" attack originally designed to foreshadow a U.S. attack on Iran. After the U.S. Air Force push back against transporting the six cruise nuclear-armed AGM-129s to the Middle East, Israel went ahead with its attack on Syria in order to help ratchet up tensions between Washington on one side and Damascus, Tehran, and Pyongyang on the other. The other part of CHECKMATE's brief is to ensure that a media "perception management" is waged against Syria, Iran, and North Korea. This involves articles such as that which appeared with Joby Warrick's and Walter Pincus' bylines in yesterdays /Washington Post/. The article, titled "The Saga of a Bent Spear," quotes a number of seasoned Air Force nuclear weapons experts as saying that such an incident is unprecedented in the history of the Air Force. For example, Retired Air Force General Eugene Habiger, the former chief of the U.S. Strategic Command, said he has been in the "nuclear business" since 1966 and has never been aware of an incident "more disturbing." Command and control breakdowns involving U.S. nuclear weapons are unprecedented, except for that fact that the U.S. military is now waging an internal war against neo-cons who are embedded in the U.S. government and military chain of command who are intent on using nuclear weapons in a pre-emptive war with Iran. CHECKMATE and OPERATION ORCHARD would have provided the cover for a pre-emptive U.S. and Israeli attack on Iran had it not been for BENT SPEAR involving the B-52. In on the plan to launch a pre-emptive attack on Iran involving nuclear weapons were, according to our sources, Cheney, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley; members of the CHECKMATE team at the Pentagon, who have close connections to Israeli intelligence and pro-Israeli think tanks in Washington, including the Hudson Institute; British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, a political adviser to Tony Blair prior to becoming a Member of Parliament; Israeli political leaders like Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Likud leader Binyamin Netanyahu; and French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, who did his part last week to ratchet up tensions with Iran by suggesting that war with Iran was a probability. Kouchner retracted his statement after the U.S. plans for Iran were delayed. Although the Air Force tried to keep the B-52 nuclear incident from the media, anonymous Air Force personnel leaked the story to /Military Times/ on September 5, the day before the Israelis attacked the alleged nuclear installation in Syria and the day planned for the simultaneous U.S. attack on Iran. The leaking of classified information on U.S. nuclear weapons disposition or movement to the media, is, itself, unprecedented. Air Force regulations require the sending of classified BEELINE reports to higher Air Force authorities on the disclosure of classified Air Force information to the media. In another highly unusual move, Defense Secretary Robert Gates has asked an outside inquiry board to look into BENT SPEAR, even before the Air Force has completed its own investigation, a virtual vote of no confidence in the official investigation being conducted by Major General Douglas Raaberg, chief of air and space operations at the Air Combat Command. Gates asked former Air Force Chief of Staff, retired General Larry Welch, to lead a Defense Science Board task force that will also look into the BENT SPEAR incident. The official Air Force investigation has reportedly been delayed for unknown reasons. Welch is President and CEO of the Institute for Defense Analysis (IDA), a federally-funded research contractor that operates three research centers, including one for Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Executive Office of the President and another for the National Security Agency. One of the board members of IDA is Dr. Suzanne H. Woolsey of the Paladin Capital Group and wife of former CIA director and arch-neocon James Woolsey. WMR has learned that neither the upper echelons of the State Department nor the British Foreign Office were privy to OPERATION ORCHARD, although Hadley briefed President Bush on Israeli spy satellite intelligence that showed the Syrian installation was a joint nuclear facility built with North Korean and Iranian assistance. However, it is puzzling why Hadley would rely on Israeli imagery intelligence (IMINT) from its OFEK (Horizon) 7 satellite when considering that U.S. IMINT satellites have greater capabilities. The Air Force's "information warfare" campaign against media reports on CHECKMATE and OPERATION ORCHARD also affected international reporting of the recent International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) resolution asking Israel to place its nuclear weapons program under IAEA controls, similar to those that the United States wants imposed on Iran and North Korea. The resolution also called for a nuclear-free zone throughout the Middle East. The IAEA's resolution, titled "Application of IAEA Safeguards in the Middle East," was passed by the 144-member IAEA General Meeting on September 20 by a vote of 53 to 2, with 47 abstentions. The only two countries to vote against were Israel and the United States. However, the story carried from the IAEA meeting in Vienna by Reuters, the Associated Press, and Agence France Press, was that it was Arab and Islamic nations that voted for the resolution. This was yet more perception management carried out by CHECKMATE, the White House, and their allies in Europe and Israel with the connivance of the media. In fact, among the 53 nations that voted for the resolution were China, Russia, India, Ireland, and Japan. The 47 abstentions were described as votes "against" the resolution even though an abstention is neither a vote for nor against a measure. America's close allies, including Britain, France, Australia, Canada, and Georgia, all abstained. Suspiciously, the IAEA carried only a brief item on the resolution concerning Israel's nuclear program and a roll call vote was not available either at the IAEA's web site -- http://www.iaea.org -- or in the media. The perception management campaign by the neocon operational cells in the Bush administration, Israel and Europe was designed to keep a focus on Iran's nuclear program, not on Israel's. Any international examination of Israel's nuclear weapons program would likely bring up Israeli nuclear scientist Mordechai Vanunu, a covert from Judaism to Christianity, who was kidnapped in Rome by a Mossad "honey trap" named Cheryl Bentov (aka, Cindy) and a Mossad team in 1986 and held against his will in Israel ever since. Vanunu's knowledge of the Israeli nuclear weapons program would focus on the country's own role in nuclear proliferation, including its program to share nuclear weapons technology with apartheid South Africa and Taiwan in the late 1970s and 1980s. The role of Ronald Reagan's Director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency Ken Adelman in Israeli's nuclear proliferation during the time frame 1983-1987 would also come under scrutiny. Adelman, a member of the Reagan-Bush transition State Department team from November 1980 to January 1981, voiced his understanding for the nuclear weapons programs of Israel, South Africa, and Taiwan in a June 28, 1981 /New York Times/ article titled, "3 Nations Widening Nuclear Contacts." The journalist who wrote the article was Judith Miller. Adelman felt that the three countries wanted nuclear weapons because of their ostracism from the West, the third world, and the hostility from the Communist countries. Of course, today, the same argument can be used by Iran, North Korea, and other "Axis of Evil" nations so designated by the neocons in the Bush administration and other governments. There are also news reports that suggest an intelligence relationship between Israel and North Korea. On July 21, 2004, New Zealand's /Dominion Post/ reported that three Mossad agents were involved in espionage in New Zealand. Two of the Mossad agents, Uriel Kelman and Elisha Cara (aka Kra), were arrested and imprisoned by New Zealand police (an Israeli diplomat in Canberra, Amir Lati, was expelled by Australia and New Zealand intelligence identified a fourth Mossad agent involved in the New Zealand espionage operation in Singapore). The third Mossad agent in New Zealand, Zev William Barkan (aka Lev Bruckenstein), fled New Zealand -- for North Korea. New Zealand Foreign Minister Phil Goff revealed that Barkan, a former Israeli Navy diver, had previously worked at the Israeli embassy in Vienna, which is also the headquarters of the IAEA. He was cited by the /Sydney Morning Herald/ as trafficking in passports stolen from foreign tourists in Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, and Cambodia. New Zealand's One News reported that Barkan was in North Korea to help the nation build a wall to keep its citizens from leaving. The nuclear brinkmanship involving the United States and Israel and the breakdown in America's command and control systems have every major capital around the world wondering about the Bush administration's true intentions. NOTE: WMR understands the risks to informed individuals in reporting the events of August 29/30, to the present time, that concern the discord within the U.S. Air Force, U.S. intelligence agencies, and other military services. Any source with relevant information and who wishes to contact us anonymously may drop off sealed correspondence at or send mail via the Postal Service to: Wayne Madsen, c/o The Front Desk, National Press Club, 13th Floor, 529 14th St., NW, Washington, DC, 20045. story to be continued MILITARY AND WAR PAGES ON THIS SITE IRAN AND WAR PAGES ON THIS SITE DREAMS OF THE GREAT EARTHCHANGES - MAIN INDEX http://www.greatdreams.com/planes/B-52.htm http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=bcf_1366475362 Vegas Street Prophet ALL ABOUT THE MINOT AFB NUCLEAR WEAPONS MISHANDLING INDICENT Minot AFB, Barksdale AFB, Iran Nuclear Strike, NUCLEAR WEAPONS MISHANDLING INDICENT Fri, 12 Apr 2013 11:13:36 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=4a0_1365779383 absu69 In October 2005, at the height of the speculative financial bubble that eventually cost taxpayers trillions of dollars and devastated millions of lives, Citigroup Equity Strategy analysts Ajay Kapur, Niall Macleod and Narendra Singh published their provocative, though accurate portrayal of bourgeois amorality, Plutonomy: Buying Luxury, Explaining Global Imbalances . According to these worthies, the egregious economic disparities between the filthy ruling rich and the rest of us revolve around the salient fact that the "world is dividing into two blocs--the plutonomies where economic growth is powered by and largely consumed by the wealthy few," and the great mass of proletarians who need to sit down, shut up and worship at the feet of their masters. To whit, their evocation of "disruptive technology-driven productivity gains, creative financial innovation, capitalist-friendly cooperative governments . . . overseas conquests invigorating wealth creation" as the engines driving capitalism's criminogenic "wealth waves . . . exploited best by the rich and educated," recalled Orwell's dystopian vision of a future which imagined "a boot stamping on a human face--forever." In a follow-up piece published in March 2006, Citi claimed that "so long as the rich continue to get richer, the likelihood of these conundrums resolving themselves through traditionally disruptive means (currency collapses, consumer recessions etc) looks low." Indeed, "While we have concerns about the spending power of the middle-income consumer in the US in the event of a housing slowdown, the richest 10% are less exposed to a housing slowdown, as their wealth is more diversified." In other words, while Citi's "plutonomic" clients were gobbling up an ever greater share of the world's wealth, hyperinflating the real estate bubble and peddling fraudulent "investment instruments" that still threaten to drive the global economy into the abyss, "we believe that the rich are going to keep getting richer in coming years, as capitalists (the rich) get an even bigger share of GDP as a result, principally, of globalization." "We expect the global pool of labor in developing economies to keep wage inflation in check," they opined, "and profit margins rising--good for the wealth of capitalists, relatively bad for developed market unskilled/outsource-able labor." If you're an average worker, even one with an advanced degree and mountains of student debt, well, too bad suckers! What could go wrong with this rosy picture? "Beyond war, inflation, the end of the technology/productivity wave, and financial collapse, we think the most potent and short-term threat would be societies demanding a more 'equitable' share of wealth ." (emphasis added) Worry not dear plutonomes, there's an app for that too in the form of militarized police deploying the latest in "less than lethal" technologies--pepper spray, tear gas, tasers and the like to keep those uppity proles at bay! Lost amidst their prattle about the merits of investing in firms which cater to the rich ("do I buy Bulgari, Burberry and Coach or do I limit my options to Hermes and Toll Brothers?" The consensus opinion: "Buy them all!"), was any discussion of the social costs of these massive frauds, bloody imperialist wars of conquest or the hyperinflation of bank balance sheets with veritable "wealth waves" generated by the global drug trade and organized crime, some "3.6 percent of GDP (2.3-5.5 percent) or around US$2.1 trillion in 2009," according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime ( UNODC ). There you have it, "market wisdom" in all its glory from an insolvent, bailed out bank! Handed some $45 billion (lb29.78bn) in TARP funds, the Treasury Department and Federal Reserve secretly backstopped more than $300 billion (lb197.31bn) in toxic assets on their books in addition to the "$2.5 trillion of support from the American taxpayer through capital infusions, asset guarantees and low-cost loans," as financial analyst Pam Martens pointed out in Wall Street on Parade . 'Dark Alliance' 2.0 Although journalists and researchers have spent decades documenting the links between secret state intelligence agencies like the CIA and organized crime conglomerates who butter their bread through global narcotics rackets, the role of major financial institutions in the grisly trade continues to be relegated by corporate media to the realm of "conspiracy theory." But in the wake of rising public anger over the Obama administration's collusion with Wall Street drug banks, we were informed by The New York Times that the "Federal Reserve hit Citigroup with an enforcement action on Tuesday over breakdowns in money laundering controls that threatened to allow tainted money to move through the United States." According to the Times , the Federal Reserve "took aim at Citigroup and its subsidiary Banamex USA over failure to monitor cash transactions for potentially suspicious activity." The Fed's Consent Order charged that Citigroup and Banamex USA "lacked effective systems of governance and internal controls to adequately oversee the activities of the Banks with respect to legal, compliance, and reputational risk related to the Banks' respective BSA/AML compliance programs." An unnamed bank spokeswoman told the Times , "Citi has made substantial progress in a comprehensive manner across products, business lines and geographies," and will continue "to take the appropriate steps to address remaining requirements and build a strong and sustainable program." Nothing to see here, right? Tellingly however, neither Citigroup nor Banamex USA admitted wrongdoing. In what is standard boilerplate in such agreements, the Fed meekly submitted that their "enforcement action" was issued "without this Order constituting an admission or denial by Citigroup of any allegation made or implied by the Board of Governors." Nor did the Fed "give specific examples of problems" at either bank, Reuters reported. During Senate Banking Committee hearings last month, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) grilled federal banking regulators over their non-prosecution of Wall Street drug banks. Referencing penalties levied against HSBC after the British banking giant was caught red-handed laundering billions of dollars for Colombian and Mexican drug cartels, Warren demanded: "What does it take? How many billions of dollars do you have to launder for drug lords" before a criminal prosecution? Judging by the actions of Obama's Justice Department, apparently the sky's the limit. But if history is any guide to current Citigroup "lapses," you can bet that the bank's balance sheet is awash with dirty money. As a prelude to the Federal Reserve's Consent Order, last April the Office of the Currency (OCC) issued a cease-and-desist order charging Citigroup with "deficiencies in its BSA/AML compliance program." OCC regulators stated that the bank had "failed to adopt and implement a compliance program that adequately covers the required BSA/AML program elements due to an inadequate system of internal controls and ineffective independent testing." According to OCC, Citigroup "did not develop adequate due diligence on foreign correspondent bank customers and failed to file Suspicious Activity Reports ('SARs') related to its remote deposit capture/international cash letter instrument activity in a timely manner." In their infinite wisdom, the Federal Reserve did not include fines against the bank, but the Board of Governors hastened to assure Citigroup's masters (their future employers?) that the Consent Order was issued "solely for the purpose of settling this matter without a formal proceeding being filed and without the necessity for protracted or extended hearings or testimony." You bet it was! Citigroup and Banamex: The Salinas Affair If all this sounds familiar, it should. One of the more infamous cases involving taxpayer bailed-out Citigroup's ties to money laundering drug cartels emerged in the late 1990s when Ra'ul Salinas de Gortari, the brother of former Mexican President Carlos Salinas, was arrested after his wife, Paulina Casta~n'on, attempted to withdraw $84 million from a Swiss account controlled by Ra'ul under an alias. Salinas, who spent ten years in prison over the murder of his brother-in-law, political rival Jos'e Francisco Ruiz, was released in 2005 when a Mexican appeals court overturned that conviction. After nearly 13 years of legal proceedings into the origins of the Salinas fortune, SwissInfo reported that "Switzerland will hand over $74 million (SFr77.3 million) to Mexico from bank accounts linked to the brother of a former Mexican president." "The funds--more than $110 million in bank accounts linked to Ra'ul Salinas--were originally frozen after the Swiss authorities initiated criminal proceedings against Salinas in 1995 for money laundering." But as Narco News investigative journalist Al Giordano reported back in 2000, "The Chief Operating Officers of drug trafficking are not Mexicans, nor Colombians: they are US and European bankers, those who launder the illicit proceeds of drug trafficking. Institutions like Citibank of New York--as this report documents--are the true beneficiaries of the prohibition on drugs and its illegal profits." Indeed, "some of these men," Giordano asserted, "like Banamex CEO Roberto Hern'andez Ram'irez--are rags-to-riches stories. Hern'andez, according to Forbes magazine, could not afford to finance an American Express credit card in 1980. Today he earns the largest annual salary in Mexico--reported as $29 million dollars--and is a billionaire presiding over Mexico's top banking institution." According to Narco News , when former President Carlos Salinas initiated bank privatization during the 1990s at the urging of the Bush and Clinton administrations, "the single biggest winner" was none other than his old pal Roberto Hern'andez. And Hern'andez, according to investigative journalist Mario R. Men'endez Rodr'iguez, the editor of Por Esto! , was "the financial engineer of the Gulf Cartel, launched in the 1980s by Juan N. Guerra and based in the Texas border city of Matamoros, Tamaulipas." Reprising their earlier investigations, Giordano reported that "Hern'andez had been accused--publicly and via a criminal complaint--by the daily newspaper Por Esto! of trafficking tons of Colombian cocaine through his Caribbean costa properties on that peninsula since 1997." "The newspaper," Narco News averred, "published photos of the drugs, the smuggling boats, the Colombian garbage strewn upon the shores, the airfield and small airplanes that, witnesses testified, brought the cocaine north to the United States, with confirmation from sources as diverse as local fishermen and high officials of the Mexican Armed Forces." For their investigative efforts both Giordano and Men'endez were sued for libel by Banamex and Hern'andez in 2000, a case summarily dismissed by the New York Supreme Court, which "established, for the first time, First Amendment protections for Internet journalists in the United States." Banamex was bought by Citigroup in 2001 for the then princely sum of $12.5 billion (lb8.21bn). As El Universal Gr'afico journalist Jos'e Mart'inez reported at the time of the Citibank-Banamex buy out, "One of the mechanisms utilized by Mexican investors is the opening of secret accounts in foreign banks that have business in this country. There, the exclusive Citibank, for decades, has been the preferred bank of the elite of wealthy and powerful people involved in the middle of scandal. In recent years this financial institution has been involved in innumerable cases connected to the management of dirty money." According to Mart'inez, "Citibank has been linked to the political scandals derived from the diversion of funds by part of the Mexican elite, among them some narco-traffickers." And as Mexico City's Milenio newspaper columnist Jorge Fern'andez Men'endez detailed in his 1999 book Narcotr'afico y Poder in reference to Ra'ul Salinas: The relation of of Ra'ul Salinas with the Gulf Cartel presumably surged at the end of the 1980s and began with Juan N. Guerra, who since the middle of the decade had led this organization dedicated to drug trafficking (above all, marijuana) and contraband. In 1989, Guerra made various investments in construction projects, mainly in Villahermosa, with Ra'ul Salinas. But, already an old man with grave health problems, with a limited vision of his activity, Juan N. Guerra was not the ideal individual to head the project that would be settled by the strong growth of the Cali Cartel: the change from marijuana to cocaine. Fern'andez noted that when the Gulf Cartel was taken over by Juan Garc'ia Abrego, "...as the person responsible for the operation of the cartel, Ra'ul Salinas de Gortari as the presumed chief of political relations and power of the same." Never mind that before his arrest on money laundering charges, Ra'ul only earned an annual salary of $190,000 as a "public servant," Swiss and US investigators uncovered an illicit cash horde to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. Where did Salinas' money come from? In addition to the outright theft of funds from the Treasury as alleged by federal prosecutors in Mexico, according to a 1995 Los Angeles Times report, Salinas "amassed at least $100 million in suspected drug money." Switzerland's top prosecutor at the time, Carla del Ponte, "launched the investigation after the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration supplied information that led Swiss agents to the accounts in Geneva, where they arrested Ra'ul Salinas' wife and her brother on Nov. 15 as the pair attempted to withdraw more than $83 million." Del Ponte told the Los Angeles Times that after observing Salinas' interrogation by Mexican federal prosecutors the sums found in those accounts were "suspected to be from the laundering of money related to narcotics trafficking." In 1998, when Swiss prosecutors completed their Salinas investigation, The New York Times disclosed that "Swiss police investigators have concluded that a brother of former President Carlos Salinas de Gortari played a central role in Mexico's cocaine trade, raking in huge bribes to protect the flow of drugs into the United States." That Swiss report stated, "When Carlos Salinas de Gortari became President of Mexico in 1988, Ra'ul Salinas de Gortari assumed control over practically all drug shipments through Mexico. Through his influence and bribes paid with drug money, officials of the army and the police supported and protected the flourishing drug business." Leveraging "a low-profile position in the administration's food-distribution agency," Swiss investigators revealed that "Ra'ul Salinas commandeered Government trucks and railroad cars to haul cocaine north, skimming payoffs that the Swiss estimate at upwards of $500 million. On what some of his reputed former associates referred to as 'green light days,' he arranged for drug loads to transit Mexico without concern that they might be checked by the army, the coast guard or the federal police." But without the complicity of major banks, amassing and then hiding, that much loot would be impossible. Enter Citibank's "Private Banking" division. A 1998 report by the General Accounting Office ( GAO ) pointed a finger directly at Citibank. Investigators revealed that "Mr. Salinas was able to transfer $90 million to $100 million between 1992 and 1994 by using a private banking relationship formed by Citibank New York in 1992. The funds were transferred through Citibank Mexico and Citibank New York to private banking investment accounts in Citibank London and Citibank Switzerland." With the connivance of bank officials, in 1992 Salinas was able to "effectively disguise" the source of those funds and their destination. Indeed, with hefty fees secured from assisting their well-connected client Salinas, Citibank "set up an offshore private investment company named Trocca, to hold Mr. Salinas's assets, through Cititrust (Cayman) and investment accounts in Citibank London and Citibank Switzerland." Forget due diligence or "know your customer" (KYC) rules firmly in place under the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA), Citibank "waived bank references for Mr. Salinas and did not prepare a financial profile on him or request a waiver for the profile, as required by then Citibank know your customer policy" and "facilitated Mrs. Salinas's use of another name to initiate fund transfers in Mexico." This should have triggered alarm bells over at OCC, but like today's banking scandals involving Wachovia, HSBC and JPMorgan Chase, US "regulators" sat on their hands and did nothing. Eager to extract those fees from a dodgy client, Citibank's Vice President for Legal Affairs was forced to admit to GAO investigators that the bank "only" violated one aspect of their KYC policy, their failure to prepare a financial profile of Salinas. However, a 1999 Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations report on "Private Banking and Money Laundering" revealed that "a culture of secrecy pervades the private banking industry." "For example," Senate investigators disclosed, "in the case of Raul Salinas . . . the private bank hid Mr. Salinas' ownership of Trocca by omitting his name from the Trocca incorporation papers and naming still other shell companies as the shareholders, directors, and officers. Citibank consistently referred to Mr. Salinas in internal bank communications by the code name 'Confidential Client Number 2' or 'CC-2.' The private bank's Swiss office opened a special name account for him under the name of 'Bonaparte'." And despite the fact, as Senate staff averred, "Federal Reserve examiners stated in internal documents that the Citibank private bank lagged behind other private banks they had reviewed," and that Citi's Swiss headquarters had received the "worst possible audit rating" in 1995, and that Citibank's "poor audit score were 'not taken seriously' within the private bank," no regulatory action was taken. Two years later, a Federal Reserve examiner wrote: "The auditors are a key asset of . The problem is that for years audit has been identifying problems and nothing has been done about it. In 1992 66% favorable audits in 1997 the percentage of favorable audits was 62%. ... It appears that there are no consequences for bad audits as long as meets their financial goals." Bingo! As Time Magazine investigative journalist S.C. Gwynne reported at the time, Citibank and the soon-to-be-merged with Travelers behemoth now known as Citigroup (that 1998 merger was illegal under Glass-Steagall, but that's another story, one which directly correlates to the Act's 1999 repeal by the Clinton crime family and their Republican co-conspirators in Congress), private banking for upscale clients with the means to invest at $1 million "is now the crown jewel in the financial giant's strategy for growth." "That strategy," Gwynne wrote, "calls for Citibank and its parent, Citigroup, to reduce their reliance on cyclical corporate and real estate lending, which tends to be high risk and relatively low profit. It will emphasize the lower-risk, higher-margin business of consumer banking--and especially one-stop financial shopping for the world's booming population of the newly rich." Keep in mind, Gwynne was writing in 1998 before the real estate bubble was inflated and Wall Street banksters dove head first into the dubious "residential mortgage" marketing machine that nearly sunk, and still threatens to sink, the capitalist economy under endless waves of fraud and corruption. "At Citigroup and like-minded institutions around the world," Gwynne noted, "folks with six- and seven-figure portfolios can find not only traditional banking services like checking and savings accounts but also strategic financial advice; introduction to high-yield investment vehicles like hedge funds; tax advice and accounting; estate planning and all manner of insurance. They can also get help in protecting their assets from potential claimants like creditors and ex-spouses, which can involve moving money discreetly from country to country." Indeed, private banking funds were "part of a $17 trillion global pool of money belonging to what bankers euphemistically call 'high-net-worth individuals'--a pool that generates more than $150 billion a year in banking revenue." Hidey holes in the Cayman Islands and other destinations used for squirreling-away illicit cash, such as the world's largest financial black holes, the US State of Delaware and the City of London, remain convenient resting places for loot amassed by various global narcotics combines. Limited at the time by an "ongoing Department of Justice investigation," a lawyerly dodge that prevents corporate criminality from ever coming to light, GAO investigators "could not determine whether Citibank's actions violated law or regulation." The Federal Reserve were also less than forthcoming and "did not comment on whether Citibank's actions were violations because information available to it at the time we inquired was insufficient for it to make a determination." According to asleep at the wheel regulators at OCC, Citibank's "actions did not violate civil aspects of the Bank Secrecy Act" since under rules then in place "private banking's know your customer policies are voluntary and not governed by law or regulation." But as the Mexican weekly news magazine Proceso reported in 2001 during the Salinas affair, "Citibank of New York was transferring Ju'arez drug cartel money to Uruguay and Argentina, where Mexican drug lord Amado Carrillo Fuentes and his associates went calmly about their business, with help from local politicians and businessmen. Not long after, investigations would reveal that in 1998-99, more than $300 million belonging to Mexican drug traffickers went through Citibank." As El Universal Gr'afico noted, when the self-described "Lord of the Heavens" sought refuge in South America, he "had account # 36111386 in Citibank of New York. From this place, the financial operators of the narco-trafficker passed large sums in millions of dollars to ghost banks like MA Bank of the fiscal paradise of the Cayman Islands." In late 2000, when the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations again began looking into drug money laundering allegations against Citibank, they received information from Argentine legislators who claimed there was "a gigantic political-financial conspiracy involving even Citibank President John Reed." Years later, those suspicions were corroborated when a US investigation, Operation Casablanca, "revealed that the Ju'arez cartel entered Argentina through two Citibank accounts and others in shell banks in the Cayman Islands and the Bahamas." Juan Miguel Ponce, the head of Mexico's Interpol branch, "took advantage of Operation Casablanca to explore the vein of Ju'arez cartel allies in Argentina. He claims to have discovered documents in Mexico proving that large contributions were made by the cartel to 1999 campaign in Argentina of Peronist presidential and vice presidential candidates Eduardo Duhalde and Ramon 'Palito' Ortega," Proceso disclosed As James Petras reported in 2001, when Salinas was arrested "and his large-scale theft of government funds was exposed, his private bank manager at Citibank, Amy Elliott, said in a phone conversation with colleagues (the transcript of which was made available to Congressional investigators) that 'this goes in the very, very top of the corporation, this was known ... on the very top. We are little pawns in this whole thing'." Fast forward twelve years: More than 120,000 Mexican citizens have paid with their lives as a result of the grisly trade and the American people are still the pawns of "plutonomic" banksters whose "wealth waves" come from the perverse influence bought by oceans of drug money flowing through a thoroughly corrupt capitalist system. http://antifascist-calling.blogspot.com/2013/04/toothless-federal-reserve-enforcement.html http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=4a0_1365779383 absu69 Toothless Federal Reserve 'Enforcement Action' Hands Citigroup/Banamex a Pass Over Drug Money Laundering(Long Read) federal,reserve,money,laundering Wed, 10 Apr 2013 01:19:29 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=50e_1365570704 USMC5816 For my fellow brothers & sisters in HTR field. Enjoy :) Your brassard and your badge won't stop bullets. If it's stupid but works, it isn't stupid. Don't look conspicuous - it antagonizes officers. When in doubt, empty your shotgun. Never share a patrol car with anyone braver than you. Not wearing body armor attracts bullets and knives. If your response goes well, you're at the wrong barracks. Your Patrol Supervisor will show up when you're doing something really stupid. The time it takes to respond to an emergency is inversely proportional to the importance of the call. The warrant you don't read is the one you'll serve at the wrong quarters. No matter how you write it, the Desk Sergeant will want it changed. If you charge in all alone, you'll be shot by your own officers. The diversion you're ignoring is the actual crime. The important things are always simple. The simple things are always hard. The easy ways are always blocked. The short cuts are always under construction by the post engineers. Anything you do can get you in trouble - including doing nothing. When you've secured a crime scene, don't forget to tell the brass. Using the siren and light to clear traffic - attracts traffic. It only becomes a riot right after you show up. If you take out the newest patrol car, you'll have an accident. No street-wise unit ever passed inspection. No inspection-ready unit ever makes it on the streets. The thing you really need, will be left back at the MP Station. Radios will fail as soon as you need back-up desperately. Flashlight batteries always die out, just when you really need light. Military working dogs attack anything that moves - including you. The helicopter will always be low on fuel, as soon as you need it. You'll find the suspect you want, when you're off-duty and unarmed. If you respond to more than your fair share of calls, you'll have more than your fair share of calls to respond to. The suspect will escape, just before you set up a good perimeter. The dependent who screams loudly when you don't show up quickly, also screams loudly when you do. The weight of the dead body you'll have to carry is proportional to the amount of stairs you'll have to climb. Fatalities always occur at the end of shift - or when it rains and snows. Your weapon was made by the lowest bidder. Contrary to popular belief - general officers don't get tickets. You won't get called to a court martial - unless it's your day off. Take off your hat and the MP Duty Officer shows up. Empty guns - aren't. Your two minute "back-up" is always actually ten minutes away. The alley you sprint down, is the wrong alley. Tasting suspected drugs works - but only on TV or in the movies. Suspects always hide in the last place you look. Better to be judged by twelve, than carried by six. Professional criminals are predictable, but the world is full of amateurs. Admit nothing, deny everything, demand proof - then blame a Private. Don't stand, if you can sit - don't sit, if you can lay down - if you can lay down, you might as well take a nap. Contrary to popular belief, O.C. *IS* an area effect weapon. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=50e_1365570704 USMC5816 Murphy's Law: Military Police Military Police, Police, HRT, Murphy, Law Wed, 10 Apr 2013 01:08:26 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=214_1365570241 USMC5816 If I missed any, please let me know. Hope you enjoy. 1. Friendly fire - isn't. 2. Recoilless rifles - aren't. 3. Suppressive fires - won't. 4. You are not Superman; Marines and fighter pilots take note. 5. A sucking chest wound is Nature's way of telling you to slow down. 6. If it's stupid but it works, it isn't stupid. 7. Try to look unimportant; the enemy may be low on ammo and not want to waste a bullet on you. 8. If at first you don't succeed, call in an air strike. 9. If you are forward of your position, your artillery will fall short. 10. Never share a foxhole with anyone braver than yourself. 11. Never go to bed with anyone crazier than yourself. 12. Never forget that your weapon was made by the lowest bidder. 13. If your attack is going really well, it's an ambush. 14. The enemy diversion you're ignoring is their main attack. 15. The enemy invariably attacks on two occasions: a. When they're ready. b. When you're not. 16. No OPLAN ever survives initial contact. 17. There is no such thing as a perfect plan. 18. Five second fuses always burn three seconds. 19. There is no such thing as an atheist in a foxhole. 20. A retreating enemy is probably just falling back and regrouping. 21. The important things are always simple; the simple are always hard. 22. The easy way is always mined. 23. Teamwork is essential; it gives the enemy other people to shoot at. 24. Don't look conspicuous; it draws fire. For this reason, it is not at all uncommon for aircraft carriers to be known as bomb magnets. 25. Never draw fire; it irritates everyone around you. 26. If you are short of everything but the enemy, you are in the combat zone. 27. When you have secured the area, make sure the enemy knows it too. 28. Incoming fire has the right of way. 29. No combat ready unit has ever passed inspection. 30. No inspection ready unit has ever passed combat. 31. If the enemy is within range, so are you. 32. The only thing more accurate than incoming enemy fire is incoming friendly fire. 33. Things which must be shipped together as a set, aren't. 34. Things that must work together, can't be carried to the field that way. 35. Radios will fail as soon as you need fire support. 36. Radar tends to fail at night and in bad weather, and especially during both). 37. Anything you do can get you killed, including nothing. 38. Make it too tough for the enemy to get in, and you won't be able to get out. 39. Tracers work both ways. 40. If you take more than your fair share of objectives, you will get more than your fair share of objectives to take. 41. When both sides are convinced they're about to lose, they're both right. 42. Professional soldiers are predictable; the world is full of dangerous amateurs. 43. Military Intelligence is a contradiction. 44. Fortify your front; you'll get your rear shot up. 45. Weather ain't neutral. 46. If you can't remember, the Claymore is pointed towards you. 47. Air defense motto: shoot 'em down; sort 'em out on the ground. 48. 'Flies high, it dies; low and slow, it'll go'. 49. The Cavalry doesn't always come to the rescue. 50. Napalm is an area support weapon. 51. Mines are equal opportunity weapons. 52. B-52s are the ultimate close support weapon. 53. Sniper's motto: reach out and touch someone. 54. Killing for peace is like screwing for virginity. 55. The one item you need is always in short supply. 56. Interchangeable parts aren't. 57. It's not the one with your name on it; it's the one addressed "to whom it may concern" you've got to think about. 58. When in doubt, empty your magazine. 59. The side with the simplest uniforms wins. 60. Combat will occur on the ground between two adjoining maps. 61. If the Platoon Sergeant can see you, so can the enemy. 62. Never stand when you can sit, never sit when you can lie down, never stay awake when you can sleep. 63. The most dangerous thing in the world is a Second Lieutenant with a map and a compass. 64. Exceptions prove the rule, and destroy the battle plan. 65. Everything always works in your HQ, everything always fails in the Colonel's HQ. 66. The enemy never watches until you make a mistake. 67. One enemy soldier is never enough, but two is entirely too many. 68. A clean (and dry) set of BDU's is a magnet for mud and rain. 69. The worse the weather, the more you are required to be out in it. 70. Whenever you have plenty of ammo, you never miss. Whenever you are low on ammo, you can't hit the broad side of a barn. 71. The more a weapon costs, the farther you will have to send it away to be repaired. 72. The complexity of a weapon is inversely proportional to the IQ of the weapon's operator. 73. Field experience is something you don't get until just after you need it. 74. No matter which way you have to march, its always uphill. 75. If enough data is collected, a board of inquiry can prove anything. 76. For every action, there is an equal and opposite criticism. (in boot camp) 77. Air strikes always overshoot the target, artillery always falls short. 78. When reviewing the radio frequencies that you just wrote down, the most important ones are always illegible. 79. Those who hesitate under fire usually do not end up KIA or WIA. 80. The tough part about being an officer is that the troops don't know what they want, but they know for certain what they don't want. 81. To steal information from a person is called plagiarism. To steal information from the enemy is called gathering intelligence. 82. The weapon that usually jams when you need it the most is the M60. 83. The perfect officer for the job will transfer in the day after that billet is filled by someone else. 84. When you have sufficient supplies & ammo, the enemy takes 2 weeks to attack. When you are low on supplies & ammo the enemy decides to attack that night. 85. The newest and least experienced soldier will usually win the Medal of Honor. 86. A Purple Heart just proves that were you smart enough to think of a plan, stupid enough to try it, and lucky enough to survive. 87. Murphy was a grunt. 88. Beer Math --> 2 beers times 37 men equals 49 cases. 89. Body count Math --> 3 guerrillas plus 1 probable plus 2 pigs equals 37 enemies killed in action. 90. The bursting radius of a hand grenade is always one foot greater than your jumping range. 91. All-weather close air support doesn't work in bad weather. 92. The combat worth of a unit is inversely proportional to the smartness of its outfit and appearance. 93. The crucial round is a dud. 94. Every command which can be misunderstood, will be. 95. There is no such place as a convenient foxhole. 96. Don't ever be the first, don't ever be the last and don't ever volunteer to do anything. 97. If your positions are firmly set and you are prepared to take the enemy assault on, he will bypass you. 98. If your ambush is properly set, the enemy won't walk into it. 99. If your flank march is going well, the enemy expects you to outflank him. 100. Density of fire increases proportionally to the curiousness of the target. 101. Odd objects attract fire - never lurk behind one. 102. The more stupid the leader is, the more important missions he is ordered to carry out. 103. The self-importance of a superior is inversely proportional to his position in the hierarchy (as is his deviousness and mischievousness). 104. There is always a way, and it usually doesn't work. 105. Success occurs when no one is looking, failure occurs when the General is watching. 106. The enemy never monitors your radio frequency until you broadcast on an unsecured channel. 107. Whenever you drop your equipment in a fire-fight, your ammo and grenades always fall the farthest away, and your canteen always lands at your feet. 108. As soon as you are served hot chow in the field, it rains. 109. Never tell the Platoon Sergeant you have nothing to do. 110. The seriousness of a wound (in a fire-fight) is inversely proportional to the distance to any form of cover. 111. Walking point = sniper bait. 112. Your bivouac for the night is the spot where you got tired of marching that day. 113. If only one solution can be found for a field problem, then it is usually a stupid solution. 114. Radios function perfectly until you need fire support. 115. What gets you promoted from one rank gets you killed in the next rank. 116. Odd objects attract fire. You are odd. 117. Your mortar barrage will put exactly one round on the intended target. That round will be a dud. 118. Mine fields are not neutral. 119. The weight of your equipment is proportional to the time you have been carrying it. 120. Things that must be together to work can never be shipped together. 121. If you need an officer in a hurry take a nap. 122. The effective killing radius is greater than the average soldier can throw it. 123. Professionals are predictable, its the amateurs that are dangerous. 124. No matter which way you have to march, its always uphill. 125. The worse the weather, the more you are required to be out in it. 126. The quartermaster has only two sizes, too large and too small. (or "on order") 127. The only time suppressive fire works is when it is used on abandoned positions. 128. When a front line soldier overhears two General Staff officers conferring, he has fallen back too far. 129. Don't ever be the first, don't ever be the last, and don't ever volunteer to do anything. 130. If at first you don't succeed, then bomb disposal probably isn't for you. 131. Any ship can be a minesweeper . . . . once. 132. Whenever you lose contact with the enemy, look behind you. 133. If you find yourself in front of your platoon they know something you don't. 134. The seriousness of a wound (in a firefight) is inversely proportional to the distance to any form of cover. 135. The more stupid the leader is, the more important missions he is ordered to carry out. 136. When the pin is pulled, Mr. Grenade is not your friend. 137 When the enemy is closing, the artillery will always be to long 138 Smart bombs have bad days too. 139 Uncrating and assembly instructions are always inside the crate. 140 If you have a personality conflict with your superior: he has the personality, you have the conflict. 141 If you enter the CO's Presence with an idea, you will leave his Presence with the CO's idea. Semper Fidelis http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=214_1365570241 USMC5816 Murphy's Law: Combat Operations Combat, Law, Murphy Sun, 07 Apr 2013 13:01:16 -0400 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=526_1365353936 loser32 Are Tall Buildings Safer As a Result of the NIST WTC Reports? Posted on September 7, 2012 by Kevin Ryan What changes have been made as a result of the World Trade Center (WTC) investigation conducted by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)? Are tall buildings around the world safe from the risk of global collapse due to fire as described by the official explanations? In 2008, NIST began claiming that its investigation would help ensure the safety of future buildings. NIST said that such buildings "should be increasingly resistant to fire, more easily evacuated in emergencies, and safer overall" as a result of the WTC investigation. Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, the Bush Administration cabinet member in charge of NIST at the time, said - "The lessons learned from the tragic events of 9/11 have yielded stronger building and fire codes for a new generation of safer, more robust buildings across the nation." Is this true? If so, we should be able to see improvements being made to the design and construction processes for tall buildings around the world. We should also expect that existing buildings would be evaluated for design problems and retrofitted in an urgent manner to ensure that fires do not bring buildings crashing down as they did on 9/11, killing thousands of unsuspecting victims. Unfortunately, there are no signs that such design evaluations and retrofit projects have occurred. This is a strong indication that the international building community has not taken the NIST WTC reports seriously. In a few stunning instances, the NIST findings were never considered at all prior to building design and construction. An example is the new WTC building 7, which was fully completed in 2006. That same year, NlST spokesman Shyam Sunder was saying "We've had trouble getting a handle on building No. 7." To clarify, in 2006 NIST had no idea what happened to the original WTC 7, a 47-story skyscraper that was not hit by a plane yet collapsed into its own footprint in a matter of seconds on 9/11. Therefore the new, even taller, WTC 7 could not have incorporated any design or construction changes resulting from the NIST investigation. Apparently people still use the building, however, and do not seem bothered by the risk. How about for other buildings in New York City and elsewhere, including the widely publicized replacement for WTC 1 being completed this year? In order to answer that question, we should review a little history behind the NIST WTC investigation. The NIST WTC Investigation According to NIST, the original Twin Towers were built to meet the 1968 NYC building code requirements. This code required three hours of fire resistance for the steel column components and two hours of fire resistance for the floor assemblies. A startling discrepancy here is that the south tower was said to be completely destroyed less than one hour after the fires began. And what people often don't realize is that fire is the primary explanation for failure of all three WTC buildings. NIST did not explain this discrepancy directly. Instead, the NIST WTC reports, which amount to tens of thousands of pages, reflected the results of computer modeling that proposed three root causes. "Widely dislodged" fireproofing - the Twin Towers Linear thermal expansion - WTC 7 "Progressive global collapse" - all three buildings Progressive global collapse was a term that NIST used frequently throughout its investigation despite the fact that no tall building had ever collapsed completely due to fire. In fact, the only three instances of progressive global collapse for any reason other than demolition occurred all in the same place (at the WTC) at the same time (on 9/11). With respect to the fireproofing (i.e. insulation) loss in the towers, NIST said - "The WTC towers would likely not have collapsed under the combined effects of aircraft impact and the extensive, multi-floor fires if the thermal insulation had not been widely dislodged or had been only minimally dislodged by aircraft impact." At the time of the 9/11 attacks, the WTC towers were undergoing a fireproofing upgrade to better ensure the buildings' fire resistance. In an incredible coincidence, the floors where the full fireproofing upgrades had been completed were the same floors that were struck by the aircraft on 9/11. The true condition of the fireproofing in the WTC towers at the time of impact has been misrepresented by supporters of the official account. These official account supporters produce old photos of the fireproofing condition prior to the upgrades. What they don't tell you is that the upgraded fireproofing, for example on the impact floors of the north tower, was measured before the attacks and found to be 3.25 inches thick. This was twice what was required by the NYC code. What's more, inspectors found that the adhesion, or bond strength, of the newly installed fireproofing was twice as high as what was required. How did this newly installed, superior fireproofing in the towers get "widely dislodged" as proposed by NIST? We don't know because NIST produced a startling lack of scientific evidence for its central claim that the fireproofing was widely dislodged. In fact, the only evidence NIST presented for this was a test in which 15 rounds from a shotgun were aimed at various non-representative samples. A shotgun may have been needed due to the fact that other tests NIST had performed showed the bond strength of the WTC fireproofing to be "considerably greater" than what was expected. For WTC 7, the root cause cited by NIST was the dislocation of a girder caused by the linear thermal expansion of floor beams. The expanding composite beams were said to have caused the breakage of over one hundred high-strength bolts and other structural connections, and thereby the failure of a girder supporting a critical column. However, other scientists submitted public comments to NIST about actual physical tests they had done, which NIST avoided entirely, that indicated such a sequence was not realistic. "Having conducted numerous fire tests on composite beams, we have never observed this," wrote Dr. David Proe of Victoria Universty. As a whole the NIST WTC reports were found to be unscientific and false. And because the computer models upon which these reports were ultimately based have never been made available to the public, the NIST findings cannot be replicated. Ignoring NIST's recommendations Regardless of the lack of scientific validity of the WTC reports, NIST represents a standard making body of the U.S. government and its findings should compel U.S. professionals to make changes to their practices. To see if building professionals and local government regulators have followed NIST's lead, we should examine the relevant building codes for any updates resulting from the NIST WTC investigation. The International Code Council (ICC)'s International Building Code (IBC) provides a general guidance for local code makers in the United States. Following the IBC code is not a requirement for local governments, however. Translation of the code into local code requirements is strictly a discretionary decision. Although the ICC praised NIST and its contractors for the hard work that had gone into the NIST WTC investigation, the fact is that ICC did not incorporate relevant changes into its IBC code as a result. In its 2008 press release on the subject, NIST claimed that the IBC code had changed to "address areas such as increasing structural resistance to building collapse from fire and other incidents; requiring a third exit stairway for tall buildings; increasing the width of all stairways by 50 percent in new high-rises; strengthening criteria for the bonding, proper installation and inspection of sprayed fire-resistive materials." Of course, additional and wider exit stairways cannot prevent the catastrophic collapse of a skyscraper from fire. But NIST was not telling the truth about the ICC having adopted code changes to increase structural resistance to the kinds of building collapse phenomena proposed by the WTC reports. A 2010 press release from NIST added "better communications" to the list of ICC-adopted recommendations from the WTC investigation. It's true that the radios used by firefighters in the WTC were a concern, and were actually known by NYC officials to be faulty as early as 1993. However, no amount of radio-related code differences would have prevented the unprecedented destruction of the buildings. Similarly, NIST's evacuation recommendations had no relevance to the root cause of the WTC destruction. NIST had to admit that ICC did not adopt the recommendations that called for building professionals to "address areas such as designing structures to mitigate disproportionate progressive collapse." In a January, 2011 letter to NIST, the ICC confirmed that this was still the case. The only code changes that ICC adopted were: "1) Luminous egress path marking required; 2) exit stairway enclosures required to be separated by no less than 30 feet; 3) enhanced inspection requirements for Sprayed-on Fire-Resistant Material (SFRM)." And for buildings higher than 420 feet, "1)Increased bond strength for SFRM; 2) a second, additional exit stairway, with a minimum separation between stairwells; 3) a requirement to increase structural integrity of exit enclosures and elevator hoist enclosures; 4) redundant sprinkler system risers with alternate floor requirements." Of these changes, only the two related to SFRM can be seen as linked to the official account of the collapse of the buildings. But even these changes were not planned for addition to the IBC code until release of the 2012 edition. Apparently the concerns about the SFRM and its bond strength were not that great. That might be because it's tough to see how the SFRM code changes were related anyway. That is, the ICC changes to require greater fireproofing bond strength cannot be reconciled with the fact that the fireproofing in the alleged failure areas of the towers was already far greater than what the code required. Yet still the buildings suffered "progressive global collapse," a phenomenon for which the ICC made no changes. As for the inexplicable collapse of WTC 7, the ICC made no changes there either. The alleged root cause of floor beam thermal expansion is not addressed by any ICC code change. How about New York City and government leaders in general? Were federal and state leaders, municipalities and building professionals willing to put money into the relevant recommendations made by NIST, and thereby endorse the official explanations for what happened at the WTC? No, they were not. The current (2008) NYC code includes changes that were said to be modeled after the ICC's changes, which were said to be a result of the NIST WTC investigation. However, the actual changes made were not related to NIST's three root causes of the WTC destruction. Instead, they focused on "widened stairwells in high-rise buildings, expanded sprinkler systems, and enhanced emergency voice communication systems." The NYC building code includes a requirement for SFRM bond strength that clearly does not take the WTC investigation into account. The requirement is that the bond strength "shall not be less than 150 pounds per square foot (psf)." The problem is that the bond strength of the fireproofing in the WTC was known to be much higher than this and yet we're told it was still widely dislodged. The Port Authority of NY and NJ provided 64 bond strength measurement values to NIST, taken from the fireproofing in the impact and failures zones of the WTC. NIST even listed these in its report. None were as low as 150 psf and most were twice that value. The failure to increase the bond strength requirement in the building code, leaving it at a value that was far lower than what the WTC had in place, indicates that NYC officials are not in the least bit worried about bond strength. Related to WTC 7, the 2008 NYC code also refers to the need to ensure that the fire-induced expansion of building components (e.g. steel beams) does "not adversely interfere with the system's capabilities." But the 1968 code included similar requirements and even stated that the coefficient of expansion for all building materials needed to be addressed in test reports. More specifically, the 1968 code that WTC 7 was required to meet stated that the design "shall provide for forces and/or movements resulting from an assumed expansion corresponding to a change in temperature." Therefore not only was there no change as a result of the NIST WTC 7 report, given the NIST account we might wonder if the original WTC 7 was constructed outside of the NYC code requirements. Another reason the NIST WTC reports are false Despite its grandiose claims, NIST knows that the building community has ignored the WTC investigation findings. That's clear from NIST's own tracking sheet on its website. This tracks all 30 recommendations from the NIST WTC investigation and lists the code "outcomes" from each. As of August 2011, the most recent update, not one NIST recommendation related to progressive global collapse, "widely dislodged" fireproofing, or linear thermal expansion has been adopted. The two NIST recommendations that call for (unspecified) measures to prevent progressive global collapse have been completely ignored. Other things like an additional exit stairway, a fire service access elevator, and stairwells with glow-in-the-dark markings are simply not relevant. NIST might argue that there is one ICC change that calls for fireproofing to have increased bond strength and be installed and inspected correctly. But since bond strength was not a root cause of the WTC destruction, and measurements just before 9/11 showed that the fireproofing in the impact zones was far better installed and had far better bond strength than what was required, this is a red herring. That's not to mention that no tests were ever done to indicate what bond strength was needed to resist flying aircraft debris. Are tall buildings safer as a result of the NIST WTC report? No, they are most certainly not. And if people actually understood and believed the official account of what happened at the WTC they would not enter tall buildings because in doing so they would be putting their lives at risk. The truth, however, is that the NIST WTC investigation was a politically motivated diversion that produced reports which are known to be false. This fact is re-emphasized by the knowledge that the international building community, including that of New York City, has not adopted code changes that can be traced to the root causes cited by NIST for the WTC destruction. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=526_1365353936 loser32 Are Tall Buildings Safer As a Result of the NIST WTC Reports? 911, nist, no changes, Sat, 09 Mar 2013 15:27:59 -0500 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=cc3_1362860402 Vegas Street Prophet Anonymous - Important Warning! -Hackers Abducted, Drugged, and Interrogated for Speaking Out Against the Illuminati Recently, multiple members of 'Anonymous' have been 'kidnapped', forced drugged and interrogated after speaking out against the 'Illuminati' in what appears to be an attempt to 're-educate' them. Are these 'kidnappings' the same kind that we have been warned about with 'red lists' and CIA renditions? We've also been warned about 'forced re-education' camps; are they quiety now coming to fruition? Anonymous issues an important warning to everyone. "Greetings citizens of the world, After a great deal of consideration, several Anons have agreed to the creation of this video. For everyone's safety no channels or user names will be listed. Please understand this video would only be made if there was credible evidence to believe people may be in imminent danger. The following is an important warning to all Anons, and to those who seek to end corruption. Multiple Anons have reported being kidnapped by mysterious men in suits after speaking out against the Illuminati. The original Illuminati were a secret organization founded by Adam Weishaupt on May 1st, 1776 in Bavaria Germany. Adam Weishaupt had an idea of using reeducation to unite humanity under a new world order, free of both government and religion. The Illuminati infiltrated both the Governments and other secret organizations of the time. The Illuminati was disbanded in 1785 after the society was banned by the Bavarian Government. At least a few of these Anons are well trusted, their claims and eye witness accounts of their separate encounters match up. This has led us to believe the same organization is responsible for each of the kidnappings. It's unclear who's exactly responsible for the kidnappings... Whoever these people are, they have a lot of connections and a lot of power. It's important to note that all the Anons kidnapped spoke out against the Illuminati directly prior to being kidnapped. The Anons kidnapped reported being drugged and interrogated. They were threatened into taking down their videos & removing their comments directed at the Illuminati. It's possible a government is responsible for the kidnappings and is using the Illuminati as a diversion, however its also possible an organization going by the name "Illuminati" is responsible for the kidnappings. It can't be ignored that these kidnappings did take place. All we know at this point is the kidnappers wear black suits, drive unmarked vehicles, and appear to be targeting Anons who speak out against the Illuminati. Be assured, the crimes committed by these people will not be forgotten... Justice will come for them. We are Anonymous, We are Legion, We do not Forgive, We do not Forget, Expect us!" http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=cc3_1362860402 Vegas Street Prophet Anonymous - Important Warning! -Hackers Abducted, Drugged, and Interrogated for Speaking Out Against the Illuminati Anonymous, computer hackers, Illuminati, world government, abductions Tue, 05 Mar 2013 17:03:39 -0500 http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=08b_1362520923 Awesome Stuff 100% Proof The Military Has Alien TR-3B Craft to Travel Into Space. Sunday, June 19, 2011 4:45% of readers think this story is Fact. Add your two cents. (Before It's News) A witness in Paris observed a triangular object, lit with a white light at each corner and a red one in the center, passing silently overhead. Shortly thereafter a second triangle appeared, this one brightly lit, and remained visible for a few seconds. A National Institute of Discovery Science assessment published in 2004 stated that "the United States is currently experiencing a wave of Flying Triangle sightings that may have intensified in the 1990s, especially towards the latter part of the 1990s. The wave continues. The Flying Triangles are being openly deployed over and near population centers, including in the vicinity of major Interstate Highways." While it went on to say that "neither the agenda nor the origin of the Flying Triangles are currently known," it also pointed out that the eyewitness observations were consistent with the routine and open deployment of an "unacknowledged advanced" aircraft by the Department of Defense--or the open deployment of something not under the control of the US government. It concluded that "in the post 9/11 era...it is certainly conceivable that deployment of low altitude surveillance platforms is routine and open." The triangles have been observed by witnesses worldwide since the 1950s, which mitigates against their being secret US aircraft. In his article for UFOevidence.org, investigator and scholar Richard Dolan describes a typical early black triangle case: "On a clear fall night in Hastings, Minnesota, multiple witnesses saw a triangular craft approach from the east at a high rate of speed. When it was nearly overhead at about 5,000 feet, it "stopped dead in its tracks. The object had a reddish orange light at each of its corners; these lights sometimes turned greenish. It sat motionless and silent for half a minute, then made a slow 180 degree turn, "leaving a vapor trail." It then sat motionless for a few seconds before it took off at an amazing speed. It stopped dead at a point about 15 miles away from them. It then lifted straight up "at incredible speed" and was gone. http://beforeitsnews.com/paranormal/2011/06/100-proof-the-military-has-alien-tr-3b-craft-to-travel-into-space-729253.html This UFO sighting was caught in Paris, France Video This UFO Sighting apparently happened in 2009, but exact date is unknown, although that is when the video surfaced. This UFO sighting was caught in Paris, France and some people believe this is part of the US gov Aurora Project. You decide. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SU0Er8goVLs The tactical reconnaissance TR-3B's (code-named Astra) first operational flight was in the early 90s. The triangular shaped nuclear powered aerospace platform was developed under the Top Secret, Aurora Program with SDI and black budget monies. At least 3 of the billion dollar plus TR-3Bs were flying by 1994. The Aurora is the most classified aerospace development program in existence. The TR-3B is the most exotic vehicle created by the Aurora Program. It is funded and operationally tasked by the National Reconnaissance Office, the NSA, and the CIA. The TR-3B flying triangle is not fiction and was built with technology available in the mid 80s gathered from Apollo 20 covert missions to the moon to salvage alien technology that NASA found.Not every UFO spotted is one of theirs. Scott C. Waring wrote novels "Dragons of Asgard" & "UFO Sightings of 2006-2009" at online bookstores, or visit my UFO Video channel at http://www.youtube.com/user/TaiwanSCW?feature=mhum http://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/2011/01/this-ufo-sighting-was-caught-in-paris.html Black Triangle UFO Tr3b Astra Witness Speaks - C2c Radio Linda Moulton-Howe Saturday, August 11, 2012 6:47 % of readers think this story is Fact. Add your two cents. (Before It's News) THE BLACK TRIANGULAR UFO SEEN EVERYWHERE - THE TR3B ASTRA WITNESS SPEAKS - L. MOULTON-HOWE "The TR3B ASTRA craft is made by LOCKHEED in N. America and was responsible for the Belgian UFO wave of the late 80's, when the craft was seen by many, including police. In this radio show witnesses described a football-field-sized triangular craft they saw while on a hunting trip in Idaho in the year 2000 (see illustration below). They said the vehicle matched an image in the Special Operations Manual, a purported top secret document from 1954, dealing with the recovery of extraterrestrial entities and technology, that Linda showed them. Witness Kris Bales said he was directly under the huge craft which was about 100-200 ft. above him, just silently sitting there. It had a central pulsing red light that was about 90 ft. in diameter. His brother, Marc, who later observed the craft with binoculars, described seeing a small dome-like light on its top." More here on this nuclear powered black triangular craft seen worldwide and responsible for the BELGIAN UFO WAVE OF THE LATE 80'S WHEN THEY WERE SEEN BY THOUSANDS, INCLUDING POLICE IN BELGIUM... MADE BY LOCKHEED IN THE USA = http://www.alienscientist.com/forum/showthread.php?85-TR-3B-Flying-Triangles-MFD-Information ------------------------------------------------------ http://www.alienvideo.net/0805/alien-abduction-mutilation.php The Most Disturbing Case of Alien Abduction Ever ---------------------------------------------------------- THE VIDEOS WITH LINDA-MOULTON-HOWE FROM COASTTOCOASTAM RADIO : PART 1 https://vimeo.com/35731065 PART 2 https://vimeo.com/35732824 PART 3 https://vimeo.com/35737011 ............................................................................................. MORE VIDEOS AT my disclosetv : http://www.disclose.tv/medias?user=Butlincat&page=2&filter=most_viewed_today&limit=all&layout=thumbs http://beforeitsnews.com/strange/2012/08/black-triangle-ufo-tr3b-astra-witness-speaks-c2c-radio-linda-moulton-howe-2442506.html The Secret TR-3B Government Spacecraft Capable of Interstellar Travel Tuesday, November 6, 2012 9:43 % of readers think this story is Fact. Add your two cents. (Before It's News) The Secret TR-3B Government Spacecraft Capable of Interstellar Travel The TR-3B is a secret government spacecraft that has been flying in our skies since 1994. You can do your own research on this craft, however because it is a classified project you may not find much on this. I have done lots of digging, and I think it is a strong possibility that this craft actually exists. It is indeed powered by an onboard nuclear reactor. It is completely silent and can be seen as a triangular shaped craft that has 4 lights. It has one light on each corner of the triangle along with a light that is in the center. All of these lights can be seen on the underside of the craft. This aircraft also has a code name of Astra. This aircraft has advanced stealth technology that is even far more advanced than the B-2 stealth bomber. It has a polymer skin that allows it also to change it's reflectiveness and even change shapes to the human eye. There are many videos on YouTube that show sightings of this craft. The government of course denies its existance entirely, however there are so many sightings, and scientists that have worked on the project that have come forward, that it should be considered as fact that it exists by the American public. The only problem is no one does research about it and very few people know that it actually exists. That is why I am writing this article. It is also known that the stealth polymer skin can even change the shape to look like a flying "cylinder". So many people have also documented and recorded crafts of this description flying in the skies of the United States. Continued below. Solar System Shift ~ Something Is Happening Be Afraid America, Very Afraid Why Obama Won - And What Conservatives Must Do America Commits Suicide The One-Hour Meltdown Catastrophe Hell In New York Media & Politicians Ignore Chaos, Looting & Deaths The Lull Before The Civil Unrest The Katrina Abductions: New Revelations The Greatest Hoax Of The 21st Century: 2012 Armageddon Planet X Clearing Seen By Naked Eye Bigfoot-Like Beast Has Hikers Running Scared In Utah's Provo Canyon America Won't Exist With 4 More Years Of Obama - UN Rule Within Two Years This craft on top of having advanced stealth, can also trick radar equipment into thinking that there are multiple aircraft in other locations to serve as a decoy, and further allow this ship to remain undetected and to setup a very clever diversion. A circular plasma filled accelerator ring called a magnetic field disrupter surrounds the rotatable crew compartment. This technology is far ahead of any technology previously known by any government on the planet. Was this craft reverse engineered from other crash landed alien ships/technology? The TR-3B is a high altitude stealth aircraft. It has an indefinite time it can sustain its altitude. Once you get it high up there and going fast, it doesn't take much propulsion to maintain its altitude and trajectory. At the Groom Lake military base there are rumors that there is a new element that acts as a sort of catalyst to the plasma reaction. This causes the vehicles mass to be reduced by exactly 89%. The craft can go at mach 9 speeds both vertically and/or horizontally. The performance the TR-3B is only limited by the stress the human pilots can indure, which is a lot, considering that along with the 89% reduction in mass, the G force is also reduced by 89%. The start of the creation of this craft can be traced back to the 1940s and 50s. Mostly because of Project Redlight. Project Plato, originally established as part of Project SIGN in 1954 its purpose was to establish diplomatic relations with extra terrestrials. This project was deemed successful when mutually acceptable terms were agreed upon. What those terms exactly were is unclear. However many high ranking individuals in secret government positions have come forward speaking about this. What I am sure of is that these terms involved the exchange of technology from aliens, while we did NOT interfere with alien affairs on this planet. The aliens agreed to provide MAJI with the means and the technology as long as they didn't interfere with the alien's agenda. I am assuming this had to do with the abduction and experimentation on the human population. This project is being continued on a military base in New Mexico. Project Snowbird established in 1954 was created for the purpose of building a flying saucer type craft for the public. This project was successful when a craft was built and flown in front of the press. This project was used to explain most of the UFO sightings that were occuring in that time. This project was also used to divert the public's attention from Project REDLIGHT. The objective of project REDLIGHT was to fly recovered alien craft, however the project was postponed after the death of many United States Airforce pilots that were killed in trying to operate these crafts. All of these test flights occured in Area 51 (Groom Lake). Some of these test flights also occured at a secret military base code named DREAMLAND. Project REDLIGHT resumed in 1972 when the flights of some of these recovered craft were partially successful and accompanied by black helicopters and f-15 fighter jets. I have done lots of research on this subject and I am positive that our government is hiding this from us. Many of the UFOs that are seen in our skies are actually reverse engineered alien crafts built by the United States Airforce. Please leave comments on what you know on the subject. I have scoured the internet looking for clues. Any help would be greatly appreciated. It is time we start investigating this ourselves. Main stream media is not the way to the truth. Many people do not keep tabs on our government. I feel that is our right as citizens of the United States. If they don't want to tell us the truth, we have the right to search for the truth ourselves. Source http://beforeitsnews.com/alternative/2012/11/the-secret-tr-3b-government-spacecraft-capable-of-interstellar-travel-2491468.html http://beforeitsnews.com/alternative/2012/11/the-secret-tr-3b-government-spacecraft-capable-of-interstellar-travel-2491468.html Triangle UFO's Are Actually US Military New Aircraft TR3-B Sunday, June 10, 2012 16:18 % of readers think this story is Fact. Add your two cents. (Before It's News) The triangle UFO's that people have been seeing for several decades now is apparently a high tech secret aircraft that the US military has been developing behind black operations. The aircraft is called the TR3-B and is basically a flat wing triangle shaped plane. http://nutshellurl.com/TriangleUfos http://beforeitsnews.com/alternative/2012/06/triangle-ufos-are-actually-us-military-new-aircraft-tr3-b-2243479.html http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=08b_1362520923 Awesome Stuff 100% Proof The Military Has Alien TR-3B Craft to Travel Into Space. TR-3B, Lockheed, Classified Military Aerospace Craft, antigravity